9/12/10
Temple Cleansing and Book Burning
I have now heard multiple Christians defend the Koran burning plan as being an acceptable thing for Christians to do, and thought I'd address their argument formally.
Two arguments that I've heard multiple times are as follows:
1. Since Jesus cleansed the Temple, it follow that Christians should burn the religious books of other faiths.
This line of reasoning is easily countered. Jesus was speaking truth to power against those in his own religion. Doing something drastic to send a message to those in your faith community who are misrepresenting God might be needed at times. But toward the lost sheep whom God is seeking to save, we ought to have an attitude of patience, love, servitude, and we should have the singular focus of showing them the gospel. I would consider supporting a Christian pastor who was making a dramatic statement about radical elements within Christianity.
2. Since "A number who had practiced sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly" (Acts 19:19), this justifies the plan to burn Korans.
There is an obvious and fundamental difference between the Acts incident and the present one. In Acts, people burned their own old religious documents as a token of their conversion. If this pastor was leading converted Muslims in a service where the newly converted Christians burned their old religious books, that would be comparable to the Acts situation, but this passage doesn't support what the pastor had called for in the least.
[I should add an addendum to this brief post. While I find the plan to burn Korans to be abhorrent, I want to make it clear that any human being has the natural right to destroy through fire or whatever method his/her property. A Christian or any person has the political right to purchase religious books and burn them. Though it is hateful, there is no such thing as a "hate" crime. Hating is not a crime. It is a crime in heaven, but please don't let the outrage over the Koran burning controversy lead to support of hate speech legislation.]
Two arguments that I've heard multiple times are as follows:
1. Since Jesus cleansed the Temple, it follow that Christians should burn the religious books of other faiths.
This line of reasoning is easily countered. Jesus was speaking truth to power against those in his own religion. Doing something drastic to send a message to those in your faith community who are misrepresenting God might be needed at times. But toward the lost sheep whom God is seeking to save, we ought to have an attitude of patience, love, servitude, and we should have the singular focus of showing them the gospel. I would consider supporting a Christian pastor who was making a dramatic statement about radical elements within Christianity.
2. Since "A number who had practiced sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly" (Acts 19:19), this justifies the plan to burn Korans.
There is an obvious and fundamental difference between the Acts incident and the present one. In Acts, people burned their own old religious documents as a token of their conversion. If this pastor was leading converted Muslims in a service where the newly converted Christians burned their old religious books, that would be comparable to the Acts situation, but this passage doesn't support what the pastor had called for in the least.
[I should add an addendum to this brief post. While I find the plan to burn Korans to be abhorrent, I want to make it clear that any human being has the natural right to destroy through fire or whatever method his/her property. A Christian or any person has the political right to purchase religious books and burn them. Though it is hateful, there is no such thing as a "hate" crime. Hating is not a crime. It is a crime in heaven, but please don't let the outrage over the Koran burning controversy lead to support of hate speech legislation.]
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