John R. Houk
© April 26, 2014
Numerous people in the blog world and even my own family have labeled me a bigoted homophobe and Islamophobe propagator of hate-speech because of my agreement with the Biblical moral standards and the New Testament message that Jesus Christ is the only way to God. I am definitely not the perfect Christian by Biblical standards. I mess up way more than I should. BUT, I am quick to repent to turn myself around with conviction. As a Christian the most prominent reason I can offer ‘messing up’ is that I do not meditate on the Word of God enough and neither do I commune with God in prayer as often as I should. I find when I am lacking in those two qualities I tend to gravitate off the narrow road into a ditch. God have mercy on me in Jesus’ Name.
Yeah … That is about as much holy groveling that a human will hear or read from me so let’s move on.
There is absolutely no doubt that homosexuality is clearly morally reprehensible to God Almighty. It is only in the moral dilution of secular-minded Leftists that the Bible is pronounced an archaic book with some good ideas and some outdated modes of thinking not of the modern age of humanity. And “Progressive” Christians seem to align themselves with secular Leftists in which the Scriptures of the Bible are cherry-picked as applicable to modernity and none of the Bible is God-inspired but rather the sole work of human hands and minds. There might be degrees of agreement or absolute agreement with me when I say the secularist stand is a denial of God and of Christ Jesus the Risen Savior. AND that the “Progressive” Christian mentality is similar in which some of those Church theologians doubt that Christ arose in bodily form from the grave. Ergo the accusation of bigoted homophobia is the same as calling the Creator of all that exists as bigoted. Nope! I will never go there.
Then I absolutely believe that Jesus Christ is the only path to God by the Redemptive act of offering the Lord’s own Blood as a Redemptive price enabling each individual human of choosing life in Christ or choosing death (i.e. the second death) to eventually join Satan in the lake of fire eternally separated from God. Since Jesus as Crucified, Buried and Arisen Bodily in Resurrection is the only way to God by Faith through Grace I reject all other religions that teach something different. I don’t care if it is Buddhism, Hinduism, and Taoism and so on. I also reject sects that are a spinoff from Christianity but in some way or another reject Christ’s Death, Burial and Resurrection and that as the Son of God is co-equal as God along with the Father and the Holy Spirit. Three Persons in ONE God is Biblical. Thus that leaves out Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses and other cult deviations from the basics of orthodox Christianity. On a personal level I’m on board with the Protestants that still respect the Bible, Roman Catholicism, and various Eastern Orthodox Church variations that do not deny the Godhood of Jesus Christ. In my book if a Believer has faith in the Christian basics I can live with differences in dogma. Even if my faith beyond the Christian basics is unacceptable to some of the Protestants, Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox variations.
Historians have classified three religions as being derived from the Abrahamic Covenant because the Patriarch Abraham holds a prominent starting place for those three religions. If you are unaware of those three religions in historical order are Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Historically there has been an element of disdain between all three religions. I am going to briefly talk about these three religions from my Christian perspective.
The Old Testament is basically the Tanakh of Judaism. The Tanakh is divided into the Torah or the Law (Christians call it the Pentateuch or Books of Moses), the Nevi'im (Christians call the Prophets, but includes Joshua, Judges, 1 & 2 Samuel and 1 & 2 Kings) and Ketuvim (which roughly corresponds to Old Testament Wisdom books e.g. Psalms, but also include Daniel, 1 & 2 Chronicles, Ruth, Ezra-Nehemiah, Lamentations, Song of Songs and Esther). For the Jews the Torah is the preeminent Word of God.
I’m not going to pretend that I know the theology of Judaism in any kind of detail. From the Christian perspective, the Old Testament is the scarlet thread (royal bloodline) that points to Jesus Christ as the promised Savior from Adam’s sin of rejecting God at the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. The New Testament portrays the Jewish leadership during Jesus’ birth as a human that are also the prime movers of Jesus’ death. And then the Jewish leadership is shown as trying to stamp out the influence of the Apostles in the spread of Christianity in which Saul of Tarsus is mentioned as persecutor-in-chief. Jesus appeared in a vision of stunning light to Saul and transformed him into a Believer and thus became Paul the Apostle to the Gentiles and the God-inspired writer of most of the New Testament.
As Christianity became the State Religion of the Roman Empire then the hostility was reversed. Christians became more numerous than Jews with the infusion of non-Jews into the Christian faith. The Gentile dominated Christian clergy began to vilify Jews as Christ-killers. THIS COUNTER-PERSECUTION IS ONE OF THE MOST HEINOUS SINS OF EARLY CHRISTIAN LEADERSHIP!
Among both Roman Catholics and the eventual Eastern Orthodox Christians Antisemitism became embedded among Christians in the same way that the Jewish leaders before the Romans compelled Diaspora of Jews persecuted Christians. Christians persecuting Jews became so much more wicked than the Jewish persecution of Christians in pre-Diaspora Judea. The Roman Empire was huge. Christians became so much more numerous than the Jews of Judea had ever become. Forced conversions, forced deportations and/or ethnic cleansing became the plight of the Jews in the Roman Empire and later Christian Europe and what was left of Christianity under Byzantine rule until Islamic conquest. Christ-killer antisemitism was so embedded in Christianity that Protestantism that emerged from the Reformation initiated by Martin Luther was still present. Indeed, as famous as Martin Luther was for standing up to Roman Catholic theological abuses he was also a rabid antisemite.
A closer reading of the Old and New Testament should have brought at the very least a reverence for Jews from among Christians. The Old Testament pointing toward Jesus as the Deliverer first to Jews and even after Jewish leadership rejection, Jesus is pointed to as the restorer of David’s Kingdom among the Jewish faithful. Who knows? Perhaps a better treatment of the Jews may have hastened the return of Jesus Christ to rule and reign as the Messiah-King already. Christ’s return would have flocked Jews to finally believe that He is the Risen Savior. Even the Apostles had a problem believing the Resurrection of Christ until the Lord revealed Himself to them. When Christ returns there still will be some Jewish rejection of Jesus; however the Bible records that there are also nations with a Christian heritage in which people will believe a supernatural acting Antichrist above Christ Jesus as representative of God’s Kingdom on Earth. So even though there is good reason for Jewish distrust of the motives of Christian Evangelism I am a Christian Zionist in full support of Israel. I’ll let King Jesus handle the belief factor among Jews in the same way He did with the Apostles right after the Resurrection.
This is my view that connects Jews and Christians today. It is my belief the Bible shows this in the Bible.
Historians also classify Islam as being one of the great Abrahamic Religions. In a historical sense there is some validity to this classification of Islam. Islam’s prophet Mohammed looks back to Abraham as one of Islam’s great prophets. In a Biblical sense there is no possible way Islam has a valid connection to Judaism or to Christianity.
The so-called valid collected recordings of Mohammed in the Quran totally warps the message of the Old and New Testament. Mohammed molded his Islam by twisting the Bible to be applicable to the trade and raiding nature of Arabs of today’s Arabic Peninsula. Mohammed had to find a way to connect his Allah with what the Arabs already believed and mix reworked Biblical stories to provide an eternal nature of Islam in Earth’s history. In Mohammed’s early trading days he undoubtedly heard dialogue from Jews and Christians that had migrated to the Arabian Peninsula or were part of the Arab trading routes. The Arab tribes of Mohammed’s day actually had tribal families that were Jews of the Diaspora. Mohammed thought an eclectic message that merged Arabic belief systems with Jewish and Christian theology would inspire Jews and Christians to join him as much as Arabs. Unfortunately for Mohammed Jewish Rabbis and Christian clergy were educated enough in their faith to recognize Mohammed’s version of Biblical history was totally revised to fit the thinking of the majority Arab group he lived and grew up among.
Jews and Christians rejected Mohammed’s message as a message of false prophecy.
After Jewish and Christian rejection of Mohammed’s message I find it amazing how the Allah preached in Mecca became hostile to Jews and Christians when preached from Medina. Medina is the city Mohammed fled to after Meccan leaders grew weary of the anti-polytheistic message and pro-monotheistic message that he hoped would persuade Jews in particular who were quite numerous on the Arabian Peninsula. By a good amount of subterfuge and a little military skill that enriched his followers from raiding parties, Mohammed eventually became the supreme leader of Medina. With a military base Mohammed proceeded to conquer the Arabian Peninsula with a convert, submit or die paradigm. Any resistance was viewed as not submitting which led to the ethnic cleansing of Jews in the Arabian Peninsula.
The Christians of the Byzantine Empire (the old eastern half of the Roman Empire) became a target for enrichment raids which turned into wealth building via conquest. Conquered Christians soon learned that Islam denies that Christ died on the Cross or that the Lord was Resurrected. For that matter Islam rejects Jesus’ Divine nature altogether but has the hutzpah to name the Jesus of the Bible as one of a long line of Muslim prophets of which Mohammed was to be the last.
I suspect Jewish rejection of Islam has a lot to do with the Quran making Ishmael who was the son of Abraham and Hagar the principle heir of Abraham. The Bible makes it clear that Isaac, the son of Abraham and Sarah, was the child of Promise that would lead to the creation of the nation of Israel (12 sons of Jacob) and for Christians the bloodline on the human side leading to Jesus.
The Islamic denial of Christ as the Messiah-Redeemer, both the Son of God and son of man, the incarnate God born in human flesh that lived as a sinless man for 33 years, died by crucifixion on a cross and returned to life in His human body to be glorified with the return of Divine attributes surrendered at birth to sit at the Right hand of the Father always interceding for the humanity that believes in the Redemptive-Resurrected work of Christ – is the reason I find Islam particularly despicable.
Regardless of the current majority of the so-called Moderate Muslims that believe Islam is peace, the Islamic holy writings and the Sharia Law based on them demand retribution for all insults to Allah and Mohammed. Those insults can be something as simple as apostatizing from Islam to another religion or to atheism, perceived defamation of Mohammed and Allah, refusing to submit to the laws of Sharia if one is in the non-Muslim minority living condition, to being a Muslim that deviates from Sharia. Retribution is up to or including execution or familial honor killing.
No holy writing from any other religions mandate such violence based on rejecting or insulting that particular religion. Now there are many adherents of other religions including my faith historical Christian adherents, who have taken it upon themselves to institute violent retribution as a matter of the rule of law apart from religious holy writings. ONLY Islam mandates violence and/or execution as a course of holy writ against a human being.
Today! In the 21st century, the so-called Muslim minority have terrorized humanity for the perception of insulting Islam, Allah and Mohammed. Even the so-called Muslim majority disown the practice, the fact remains the Muslim terrorists are instituting a reformation to return Islam to the purity of the lifestyle of the so-called perfect man the Prophet Mohammed.
Does exposing this make me a bigoted racist Muslim-hater? That is correct only as far as any Muslim stands by the purist form of Islam espoused by its prophet Mohammed and his immediate shapers of the religion of Islam that conquered in imperial bloodlust, booty and slavery followed by ramrodding the Islamic Sharia system until the remnant non-Muslims eventually became the brainwashed Muslim majority. I deplore purist Islam because I will never submit or honor that false god called Allah or the man placed on the pedestal of prophethood who was either delusionally insane or a demonized individual.
Even though I despise Islam for its antichrist nature, Jesus’ imperative to the early Believers before ascending to the right hand of the Father was to go into the world and make disciples of men. (Yup, I said “men”. I realize that is chauvinistic today but I also realize making disciples of men included women as well.) This includes the poor deluded people that have bought into the load of cow manure that Islam is peace when it is really translated to Islam is submission or else.
I have no clue as to Geert Wilders’ spiritual beliefs. I don’t know if he is a Protestant, a Catholic, a nominal secular-minded Christian or an atheist. But I do know he is looking out for the heritage that has brought the Western World to the freest humanity has achieved ever. Admittedly Europe’s cultural spin downward was given a push by multicultural Socialist-Marxism to allow the Islamic threat the freedom to prosper like cancer cells destroying its host. People like President Obama wants to push the Christian and Western European destructive mode upon America under the fallacy that transformation is good. The European example is proving to be culturally lethal. Geert Wilders is making a stand to withstand European self-destruction. Multicultural laws in Left Wing oriented Europe has made Geert Wilders a target for political elimination by the European Leftists that still believe multicultural diversity is a concept that divergent cultures and immoral lifestyles can be mutually accepted in a humanistic utopia of diverse egalitarian unity.
I am an admirer of Dutch politician Geert Wilders. Why? He is that rare high profile European that speaks his mind of what is threatening Dutch culture in the Netherlands (by the way also a huge chunk of Europe). What is threatening Dutch culture? Could it be a love of America’s free enterprise concepts in business and just taxation? Could it be Socialist/Marxist concepts that undermines the Dutch historical-cultural heritage? Wilders is not as concerned about American Capitalism vs. European Socialism as much as one other huge factor that is altering society in general. That factor is the immigration of Muslims into the Netherlands that not only refuse cultural assimilation but also are encouraged to practice the cultural norms of Islam that run counter to Dutch traditions (well … European socio-historical traditions in general - See Also book review of “While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam Is Destroying the West from Within”).
Fjordman provides some fantastic insight on the intrusion of Islam that could have or even should have been written in volumes of books:
Any discussion of an Islamic “Reformation” projects a Western European phenomenon, the Protestant Reformation, onto a totally different religion with more violent core teachings and religious texts than all other major religions on the planet combined. If by “reformation” we mean to imply a peaceful, tolerant religion with no Jihad and secular laws, then no, it is very unlikely whether such a form of Islam will ever exist. There are a few types of what we might term “diluted Islam” that are slightly less violently aggressive than the mainstream version of it, but these are all marginal in the greater scheme of things and are frequently persecuted precisely because they deviate from traditional Islamic practices.
If by “reformation” we simply mean a return to the earliest practices of the religion then we have already had a Muslim Martin Luther: the terrorist leader Osama bin Laden. He was a violent Jihadist because the earliest followers of Mohammed were also violent Jihadists. You can base a peaceful Christian religion with secular laws on the peaceful example of Jesus and his disciples as contained in the Christian Gospels. In Islam, however, such an example can only be found in the early Mecca period. As long as the example of Mohammed and his followers in Medina remain in force, along with the chapters of the Koran supposedly introduced there, any form of Islam based on traditional Islamic texts is bound to be potentially repressive, aggressive and violent. You may successfully question whether the story of Mohammed as told in traditional text is historically accurate. It probably isn’t. But if you abandon traditional sources and state that Mohammed as we think of him never existed, Islam may not be reformed, but could collapse instead.
…
We are currently mass importing this very conflict to all of our major cities, a process which is already well underway. It is criminal negligence on the part of our so-called leaders to continue this madness and conduct a dangerous Multicultural experiment with hundreds of millions of people as guinea pigs. This needs to end. Now.
If you believe that this analysis is correct then you are left with only one possible conclusion: We must physically separate ourselves from Islam and Islamic culture as much as is practically possible. The American essayist Lawrence Auster has dubbed this strategy “separationism,” which is not a bad term. (Why Islam Does Not Belong in the Western World; By Fjordman; Gates of Vienna – New Website); 11/20/12)
People like Geert Wilders are trying to reverse the Islamic destruction of Europe’s heritage of Western Civilization. Wilders has already been tried and cleared of Hate-Speech charges in relation to his short documentary entitled “Fitna”. Here is an excerpt of a review of the documentary:
Fitna opens with a view of a closed Qur’an, which when opened reveals a bland version of Kurt Westergaard’s turban bomb Mohammed on one page, and a ticking clock counting down from 15 minutes (the length of the film) on the opposite page. The film proceeds in the form of a casual thumbing through a few select pages of the Qur’an. A page is flipped, a few quotes encouraging terrorism and violence toward non-Muslims are presented, numerous video demonstrations of Muslim’s mirroring if not directly obeying the anti-infidel sentiments are shown, and then the page is flipped again and the process is repeated.
Video footage throughout the film includes the World Trade Center attacks, the Madrid train bombing, images of the maimed and dead of various terrorist attacks, the beheading of American journalist Daniel Pearl, Muslims celebrating the killing of Theo van Gogh and warning non-Islamic Europeans that they should learn from van Gogh’s fate (read: van Gogh acted against Islam and was stabbed to death; anybody else want some?), Mohammed B—one of van Gogh’s killers—saying that he would do it again if he had the opportunity, Islamic leaders inciting extreme violence toward non-Muslims (e.g., Jews) often to the cheers of large and raucous crowds of fervent Muslims, a 3.5 year old Islamic child saying that Jews are apes and pigs because Allah says so in the Qur’an, anti-semitic signs reading “God Bless Hitler” and … (READ ENTIRETY - SUMMARY OF GEERT WILDERS’ ANTI-QUR’AN FILM FITNA (SPOILER ALERT; Posted by RB; The Frame Problem; 3/27/08)
Showing suras in the Quran which is considered the very word of the uncreated Allah and comparing them to Islamic terrorist attacks got Wilders in trouble with the judiciary in Netherlands. In America such a criminal charge would have been thrown out of Court as a violation of the First Amendment.
Leftists in America still went out of their way to label Geert Wilders a racist Muslim-hating Islamophobe. I have to ask, “How are the words of Islamic holy writings labeled as hate-speech when a non-Muslim informs the world that they exist?”
At any rate Dutch Leftists are trying to imprison Geert Wilders again under hate-speech violations encoded in the Dutch and EU legal system.
JRH 4/25/14
***********************************
Who is in More Trouble: Wilders or The Netherlands?
By Timon Dias
April 24, 2014 at 5:00 am
"Freedom of speech is a great thing and we have said nothing that is not allowed." — Geert Wilders, MP and leader of the Party of Freedom.
Now, the police have apparently decided to become part of the prosecution. They have drafted pre-filled "Wilders forms" to press charges and have offered to come to people's homes to help them fill out the paperwork.
Dutch Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders again made international headlines. Nazi comparisons are rampant, self-proclaimed victims are lining up to sue and now more than ever there is a chance that Wilders actually might be convicted of hate speech.
In an interview on the Dutch Public News Service [NOS] on March 12, Wilders said (10:10): "[People] will now be voting for a safer, a more social, and... in any case a city with fewer costs, and, if at all possible, with fewer Moroccans."
Wilders has the numbers to support his concern. Statistics show that 65% of all Moroccan youths have been arrested by police, and that one third of that group have been arrested more than five times.
Wilders emphasizes the inordinate costs associated with the disproportionately high number of Dutch Moroccans registered as social welfare beneficiaries and who are implicated in welfare fraud.
Based on those numbers, Wilders seems to imply that if there were not such a large number of Moroccans, Dutch crime rates and social welfare costs would significantly drop.
Wilder proposes that Dutch Moroccans who are habitual criminal offenders should be deprived of their Dutch passports and sent back to Morocco, an act that is possible as all Moroccans and their descendants are, by Moroccan law, prohibited from relinquishing their Moroccan passports.
Dutch Moroccan criminals are known to be highly indifferent to sentences in Dutch prisons, which are known for their comfort. In a majority, Dutch prisons are populated by Dutch Moroccans.
Moroccans also apparently derive status from prison sentences. Evidently, upon their release, many gloat. Apparently it is only the thought of having to trade the luxury of the Netherlands -- even prison -- for Morocco that strikes terror into the hearts of potential offenders. In Italy, the same threat is already in effect and acts as a successful deterrent. It seems as if it is only the threat of deportation, more than any other measure, that is likely to deter young Moroccans from a life of crime.
Although the proposal is being used by Wilders's opponents as either a laughing stock or beating stick, the merits of the proposal are rarely elaborated on, including even by Wilders. A recent poll showed 76% of Dutch voters to be in favor of the measure.
The NOS, interviewing Wilders again on March 14, asked him if he actually meant what he had said regarding Moroccans in general, possibly expecting him to say that he had only been referring to Dutch Moroccan criminals. But Wilders stood firm. He emphasized that his concern lay with the number of Moroccans currently flooding the crime statistics, and repeatedly stated, "The fewer Moroccans, the better."
"Can you imagine that people are startled by your remarks?" he was asked.
"It is unfortunate if people are startled by the truth," he said.
This latest round of anger against Wilders began after the announcement of voting results on March 19. At the end of his victory speech, Wilders remarked, "And the third question is, and I'm actually not allowed to say this, because I'm being sued, and there might even be Social Democrat DAs that would prosecute me, but freedom of speech is a great thing, and we have said nothing that is not allowed. We have said nothing that is not accurate. So I am asking you now: Do you want, in this city and the Netherlands, more or fewer Moroccans?" The crowd replied: "Fewer, fewer, fewer!"
That time, however, after the event, Wilders did nuance his views. He stated that he was referring to criminals, and only in favor of the voluntary repatriation of law-abiding Moroccans.
Now the police have apparently decided to become part of the prosecution. They have drafted pre-filled "Wilders forms" to press charges and have offered to come to people's homes to fill out the paperwork.
Is Wilders a racist? He recently tweeted: "Support for Moroccan businesswomen Elou Akhiat. It is a shame she receives death threats over opening a wine bar."
_________________________
The West has to DECIDE what Bigotry is and what Cultural Survival is
John R. Houk
© April 26, 2014
____________________________
Who is in More Trouble: Wilders or The Netherlands?
About Gatestone Institute
"Let us tenderly and kindly cherish, therefore, the means of knowledge. Let us dare to read, think, speak, and write."
— John Adams
— John Adams
Gatestone Institute, a non-partisan, not-for-profit international policy council and think tank is dedicated to educating the public about what the mainstream media fails to report in promoting:
o Institutions of Democracy and the Rule of Law;
o Human Rights
o A free and strong economy
o A military capable of ensuring peace at home and in the free world
o Energy independence
o Ensuring the public stay informed of threats to our individual liberty, sovereignty and free speech.
Gatestone Institute conducts national and international conferences, briefings and … READ THE REST
