I swear, it seems like certain newspaper and magazine columnists read my blog. Not really, but how awesome would that be? Let's take that idea and run with it, though, for a second. Newsweek's Gersh Kuntzman follows up my Zell Miller post with a much more eloquent way of saying what I did.
In an unscientific poll, he found that almost every one of the folks on the street supported displaying the Ten Commandments in public areas. "They're just the basic rules that everyone can agree on." (Where have we heard that?) But when quizzed, none could name all 10. And when they were reminded about what I call the 4 Religious Commandments, they all said, well, maybe we should rethink posting these in government places.
He also makes a few more points, including the fact that there not just 10 commandments. (In the Jewish understanding, these are the "Ten Statements", with 14 or 15 commandments. There are a total of 613 mitzvot, or commandments in the Torah.) Should we post all of these?
And don't forget the fact that Jews, Catholics, Protestants, Jehovah's Witnesses, and Muslims can't agree on the wording of the Ten Commandments, and that other religions don't even have the Ten Cmmandments - they have their own rules.
My thought for the day: how freaked out would right-wing idealogues get if a Muslim justice put a monument to Allah and the Koran in his or her courthouse? And why don't they ever think of these things when they're fighting for more religion in government?
1 comment:
Let's remember that not all right-wingers are religious. I'm not, and I don't think that the Ten Commandments should be publicly displayed using taxpayer money.
As far as why religious activists (Christians) in the US don't see the connection between what they are pushing and the horror they would feel about a statue of Allah being put up in their courthouse, it's simple. To a Christian fanatic, their way is right, all others are wrong, and the concept of a courthouse in America wanting to put up a display for the "evil" religion of Islam just doesn't cross their minds.
Islam has a long way to go before they've killed nearly as many people in the name of Allah as have been killed in the name of Jesus over the last couple of millenia.
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