Is Islam A Death Cult?

[Leonardo17]

Dying for the cause of God is the highest honour a Muslim can get.
The question is: what ranks up as a death in "God's cause"?

Martyrdom = death in battle for God, death while sacrificing for God.


So if God despises your act (like causing the death of innocents -even innocent non-believers-, causing corruption on the land...etcetera)  you can't claim it is death for God. God might throw you in hell instead for the sin you caused.

BTW, all countries claim they have the true "meaning of martyrdom". I know lots of Americans who threw themselves in the crematoria of Iraq and Afghanistan to be "martyrs for the USA".

Well, obviously in the islamic faith, dying for Islam is a high honor. The leaders want strongly devoted followers.
It is the same in christianity.

It isn't just the united statians that didn't like what the taliban and Al-quada was doing.
One of the issues is that they don't allow women to get an education.
But that isn't the primary reason why they went to Afghanistan. The primary reason is that Al-quada payed a visit to the USA and decided to randomly kill people. They also conducted attacks in other countries.
Since they are taking away lives, it makes sense to take away their (Taliban) lives.

The only problem is that all wars come down to resources. The USA and allies do not have the resources to kill all of Taliban or Al-quada.
It costs too much.
Also, they wanted Afghanistan to self govern and to handle the taliban. Looks like that didn't happen.
Looks like the taliban has a large population and lots of weapons.
Probably another factor is the Russia-USA problem that has been going on for 100 y or so. The USA chose to help the taliban when Soviet Russia wanted to invade Afganistan. It makes sense for Russia to help the Taliban. It is a “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” situation.

I think it would have been the best if no one entered Afghanistan in the very beginning. Did you know that there were even US companies investing if Afghanistan in the 50’s and that it was a more or less stable country until the soviet invasion in 1979? As Lao-Tzu puts it “Where there is war the land ceases to be fertile, only thorns will grow in the land and weapons will ultimately return toward those who first used them”. So the US armed the Taliban against the soviet, Than Russian armed the Taliban against the US. Both of them finally left the country. So what happens to all these people now?
 
On the interpretation of religion. There is one example that caught my attention today:
In one verse of the Quran it clearly says “Follow the advices of – those who are knowledgeable – “. To me this goes in line with an interpretation of Quran that states that true faith cannot coexist without a sense of deep respect and adherence to the facts that are stated by technology and positive sciences.
 
So while I was searching for the exact Quranic quote in the internet I came through some websites that used the same quote for a different purpose. Their interpretation / translation was “Follow the advices of – Those who are knowledgeable in Religious issues –“
 
And these misinterpretations have permeated every aspect of religion. I grew up reading the works of a famous theologian and legist in my country who appeared in television shows stating that “the religion they taught to you in school is not real Islam”.
 
Explanation: Like the religion oriented schools in the US Putschist Generals in the 1970’s have introduced mandatory Religious education classes to all schools as a tool of social cohesion. What they do is to explain all the superficial aspects of different religions in the world and conclude the curriculum with something like “the best way is our way”. I think this is more or less the main method of religious indoctrination of the world.
 
As I result: I need to read volumes, and have endless debates with many people to take things like “Women are not supposed to be educated in Islam” and get them / and myself to understand that the original message of the holy book itself had never had anything to do with this sort of distorted / irrational view that goes against all sorts of moral, scientific, sociological and/or rational way of doing things in this world.
 
For this reason: I think that atheism might simply be the best way of doing thing in our time. The problem with all religion and spiritual teaching is that we live in an age when people still like to use things, to do other things. So finding your way through all sorts of distortions and misunderstandings is not always an easy task. So the more simple approach is to not get into these things. And in spiritual terms (as far as I know): Being an atheist or an agnostically person is better (much better) than being fooled into a distorted version of any religion. In the Quran it says: “May those who fool you not fool you with God” (that’s the exact expression).
 
So it may take generations, before we get to a widely practiced and correct interpretation of religion across the world. But I think we will get there at some point. Until then, don’t join Al-Qaida and (try) not to harass women in front of abortion clinics