How sad

[bararallu]

Originally Posted by andak01

You have very good reasons for your own version of the story (ie. Muhammad as the purely negative stereotype mindless persecutor of the Jews), but they have neither to do with ethics or with history.

And yet that wasn't the point or ultimately the question asked. I asked you whether the story taken out of context, necessitates a recognition of Rape. Your contortions are pretty funny- since I haven't asked you to condemn Mohamed, and gave you a straight assessment of a condition:

If you are captured and forced to have sex, does or does that not mean rape: whether a 100k years ago, 1500 or yesterday.

[bararallu]

Originally Posted by baggi

yea yea mohammed wants you to kill infidels. jesus wants you to forgive them, see the difference?

Sure, Martin Luthor, the Pre-Vatican II Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox to this very day, havent gotten the memo though.

[andak01]

Originally Posted by bararallu

And yet that wasn't the point or ultimately the question asked. I asked you whether the story taken out of context, necessitates a recognition of Rape. Your contortions are pretty funny- since I haven't asked you to condemn Mohamed, and gave you a straight assessment of a condition:

If you are captured and forced to have sex, does or does that not mean rape: whether a 100k years ago, 1500 or yesterday.

I wasn't captured and forced to have sex. And I would not venture to characterized the level of consent within a marriage 1400 years ago. The record does not record that she was forced just as the record doesn't record whether Thomas Jefferson forced Sally Hemming. But one difference is that Safiyah came to Muhammad (SAW) as a slave and became a full wife free of slavery. Sally Hemming was never freed. There is no record of Safiyah being mistreated or abused in any way or of her hating Muhammad (SAW). This is your own opinion and you're entitled to it.

If you can believe that the Midianite women in Numbers were not raped, and I have read that argument, then they in all their multitudes would be similar to the beloved (by the Prophet and among Muslims) Safiyah.

15 "Have you allowed all the women to live?" he [Moses] asked them. 16 "They were the ones who followed Balaam's advice and were the means of turning the Israelites away from the LORD in what happened at Peor, so that a plague struck the LORD's people. 17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, 18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.

Weren't the virgin women raped?

There are two parts to this objection: did God instruct or permit the soldiers to rape the women, and did the soldiers actually rape them?

It's clear that God didn't intend for the soldiers to rape the women, but rather to take them captive. The law God had given to the Israelites condemned rape, in some cases punishing it with death (Dt 22:25-27). Also, immediately following the command to spare the virgin women, the soldiers were instructed to purify themselves and their captives (31:19), and rape (or consensual intercourse) would have violated this command (Lev 15:16-18). In the rest of the chapter, the women are usually referred to as people (using the masculine adam), not women or virgins, underscoring the notion that they were seen as captives rather than sexual objects.1

It's theoretically possible that some of the soldiers raped the women, but given the circumstances it seems very unlikely. The soldiers would have known that rape was a violation of both the law and the instruction to purify themselves, as shown above; they had also seen God punish such violations with death during their travels in the desert. In fact, they had recently experienced a plague and executions resulting from their relations with Midianite women (25:1-9), as Moses reminded them. At that time, all those who had sexual relations with the Midianites were killed. It's highly implausible that the soldiers would have wanted to have anything to do with the Midianite women given this context.

So what did happen to the women (and children)? God gave the Israelites permission to marry women they took captive, but they were to treat their wives with respect: the women were to have time to mourn their families first, and were not to be mistreated (Dt 21:10-14). Those who didn't marry would have become servants, but there were rules against mistreating them as well (Ex 21:26-27, Dt 23:15-16). See the article on slavery laws for more on the treatment of female slaves.

http://www.rationalchristianity.net/numbers31.html

[bararallu]

Who said the "midianites" weren't raped? If they existed, and the story wasn't hyperbole or fantasy or homily as is given with religiously inspired texts, then they most probably were. When did any Jew claim we were the most just and perfect people and our prophets even faultless? We don't, in majority over a long time, idolize our Prophets or Priests or Kings. How many Jews on here have attacked me over my stated position on David? How many Christians? Name them please....

You ever hear of a phrase in the English language called "Strawman" Andak? 'Cause it seems that you have more straw coming out of your keyboard than a typical barn.

[andak01]

Originally Posted by bararallu

Who said the "midianites" weren't raped? If they existed, and the story wasn't hyperbole or fantasy or homily as is given with religiously inspired texts, then they most probably were.

Then what? Judaism is bad? Moses was evil? To quote you "not that I'm asking you to condemn him". What a load of manure! Of course you want me to condemn Muhammad, to characterize him as nothing more than a rapist. And if I ask you to do the same with Moses, you go off about how the Torah is a fantasy. Just what type of homily is it that sends a crowd of virgins into the hands of a bunch of soldiers that have just slaughtered their families down to the last baby as G_d smiles down? Tell me what a superior and just culture that encapsulates.

So if you want to tell me about what contortions I'm going through, it is that I simply refuse to condemn Judaism and the Jews and Israel after years of being taunted. Given how I was taught growing up to revere Moses and Columbus and the Pilgrim fathers, it would be downright perverse to focus on anything Muhammad (SAW) did, even if taken in the worst possible context. It's called respecting tradition, and it can lead us to very ethical conclusions because we focus on the very values that are ethical.

So Jesus isn't condemned because he defended the laws of Moses, which in many ways are similar to the laws of Shariah. And Thomas Jefferson isn't condemned for sleeping with his slaves. And Martin Luther isn't condemned for hating the Jews. And Socrates isn't condemned for loving little boys. And George Washington isn't condemned for owning slaves. And Andrew Jackson isn't condemned for slaughtering Indians. And we still celebrate Columbus Day regardless of what he did to the Indians. And King David's symbol is worn around countless necks regardless of how he lived his life. And Moses graces the fronts of many a courthouse regardless of what he did.

When did any Jew claim we were the most just and perfect people and our prophets even faultless? We don't, in majority over a long time, idolize our Prophets or Priests or Kings.

And idolizing Muhammad (SAW) would send me or any Muslim straight to Hell. Saying that we do any such thing is most insulting.

How many Jews on here have attacked me over my stated position on David? How many Christians? Name them please...

Hey, not that they don't find it offensive, just that they find me more offensive. Same reason as some of them are willing to stick up for Nazis so long as they are after Muslims.

Some of the posters here hate Muslims so much that they would gladly witness a Holocaust of us a hundred times the breadth of the Jewish Holocaust. And to be fair, many or the most rampant haters are neither Jewish nor Israeli.