Not a single war in the history of mankind has EVER been fought because of religion.
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It was a mixture of religion, politics, money, and land/people control.
For example King Henry had problems with the Catholic church because of their policies on divorce and not so much his personal religious beliefs.
Well technically, that's mostly right. Wars are usually fought for land, trade route control, money, and resources. Religion is rarely the motivation by those who initiate and declare war. But religion is the motivation provided to the masses of peasantry and low-level land-owners to justify why they must go thousands of miles away from home and risk death (least of all), injury and infection, capture and torture, etc. "Aristocrats want money" just doesn't cut it, but "God says so" apparently does.
Only in a handful of cases is religion more a primary motivation than other factors, but even then, it's not the sole motivator.
To my above post: In our multi-cultural, multi-religious and "church/state separated" country, we now replace "God and Church" with "Spread freedom and democracy." But it's the same crap. We don't really give a crap who runs a country that has oil, so long as they are amenable to cutting us in on that oil more than other nations.
"Not a single war in the history of mankind has EVER been fought because of religion."
This doesn't seem that fundie to me, to be honest. It seems to be more like something from the Politically-Correct brigade, trying to pretend that all religion is wonderful and lovely so to not offend lunatic Christians and barmy Muslims.
"Not a single war in the history of mankind has EVER been fought because of religion."
This comment doesn't seem that fundie to me, to be honest. It seems to be more like something from the Politically-Correct brigade, trying to pretend that all religion is wonderful and lovely so to not offend lunatic Christians and barmy Muslims.
Still, its naivety and sheer ignorance of reality ARE almost dogmatic enough to be equal to that of a fundamentalist's, so I suppose it could count in a way.
Someone should remind Magic Hymen of the Crusades, the Troubles, Operation Iraqi Freedom, and I believe several European wars like the Thirty Years' War,...
Cathar Wars, Charlemagne's Saxon war, the Crusades, the wars of the Conquistadores, the wars of the reformation... Even the war in Afghanistan!
You are an idiot.
...Except the Crusades, the Inquisition, the French Wars of Religion, the Reconquista, the Thirty Years War, the conflicts between Jews and Canaanites mentioned in the Old Testament, the Muslim conquest of Spain and northern Africa, the Second Sino-Japanese War...
Man, sounds like someone was enjoying the magic mushrooms during history class to not know about ANY of those conflicts.
"...Except the Crusades, the Inquisition, the French Wars of Religion, the Reconquista, the Thirty Years War, the conflicts between Jews and Canaanites mentioned in the Old Testament, the Muslim conquest of Spain and northern Africa, the Second Sino-Japanese War..."
Well, pretty much in each of these cases it's not religion that's the primary reason for war. The Crusades, for example, had almost nothing to do with liberating Jerusalem for "religious" reasons - it was about ensuring that Palestine remained open for trade and travel for the purposes of the European powers and the Catholic church. It was an unacceptable situation for this strip of land to be controlled by an empire that wasn't at the beck and call of the RCC, so off to war went the nobles and serfs of Europe. It's important to remember that a great many Jews and Christians were slaughtered at the hands of the Europeans as well.
Most of those European Wars cited, yes, appear to be religious conflicts but they're not. They're really about lands being in the hands of powers/kings that were not Catholic, and thus not answerable to the Pope (and therefore, not controllable by such threats as excommunication). They really have nothing to do with theology or who believes in what. They're about power and control of land.
Wrong, several wars are mentioned in the bible. There is also the crusades, the inquistition, and many would count the holocaust.
"To a lesser extent, very few wars have ever resulted from a difference in cultural beliefs. ALL wars are fought either for profit or territory.
Individuals may squabble and fight about things like religion and other cultural beliefs, but countries do not. Money knows not race nor creed, it is atheist in nature. Land knows not race nor creed, it is also atheist in nature. Atheism is the sole root of war in such a sense, although any differences between nations are used as trumpets to the cause and then later blamed by the very ignorant.
"
That's the continuation. Why wasn't it included originally?
Now, please introduce all Biblical quotes including money as an at least neutral concept - there'll be many that take it as positive and natural.
I'll mention that the LAND of Israel is entirely revolved around land and the bloody acquisition of it - any Biblical war which dealt with taking the future lands of Israel were bloody to the point of God demanding ALL are slain, and NOTHING is looted. That's pure land for ya'.
And there I was thinking almost the absolute opposite...silly me.
Of course, he could be correct. Most wars were fought over ideals and money, not nessicarily(I can't spell it right today) religion...of course, since ideals are a key part of religion.....yeah, wars were fought because of religion.
If you leave out the Crusades, the reformation, the Hussian Wars (11 million tortured to death), the Hugonaut Wars, the Inquisition, the Northern Ireland "troubles", the partition of India, the South-Central European wars (against the Turkish invasion), plus at least 85 other conflict I can't be bothered to type, you would probably be right.
As it is of "The definition of Faith is not wanting to know the truth."
CHECK YOUR HISTORY - I teach it at 11 accreditted universities around this planet, and have done so for over 50 years.
"Welcome to Belfast. For your own protection, tell anyone who asks your religion that your Jewish."
In Belfast, a person comes home from the pub when suddenly, someone points a pistol at him and with a low and threatening voice asks: "Catholic or Protestant?" The person is scared and manages to stutter: "Neither, I am Jewish!" *BANG!* he is shot. The murderer laughs and says to himself: "I must be the luckiest Palestinian in entire Belfast!"
DISCLAIMER: yes, I know, not all Muslims/Palestinians are terrorists.
Wow, talk about the misquote of the century...
The missing context was the fact that war is fought almost exclusively for monetary gain or personal vendetta. The Crusades were fights for the so-called Holy LAND. Both sides had a perceived claim to the same land, which sparked the conflict. As for your soldiers, war was one of the few opportunities for medieval man to better himself and increase his station. Of course, your kiddy textbooks tend to gloss over these facts to simplify history so that below-par students can understand it.
Because within your life-time you've only known unprofitable wars like Iraq, Vietnam, etc, you're completely aware that at one time war was a very profitable enterprise for the winners. In fact, WWII was partially sparked by the poor economic conditions in the losing countries following the first World War which enabled a man like Hitler, who promised a return to better days, to rise to power.
Also missing is my clarification that war is occasionally fought in the name of religion, but that's hardly causation. I could rob a bank and claim a talking dog commanded it; would that make it the dog's fault?
Confused?
So were we! You can find all of this, and more, on Fundies Say the Darndest Things!
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