Churchill on Islam

[snopes]

Comment: I am sending the attached short speech from Winston Churchill,
delivered by him in 1899 when he was a young soldier and
journalist. It probably sets out the current views of many
but expressed in the wonderful Churchillian turn of phrase and
use of the English language, of which he was a past master. Sir
Winston Churchill was, without doubt, one of the greatest men of
the late 19th and 20th centuries.

He was a brave young soldier, a brilliant journalist, an
extraordinary politician and statesman, a great war leader and
Prime Minister, to whom the Western world must be forever in his
debt. He was a prophet in his own time; He died on 24 January
1965, at the grand old age of 90 and, after a lifetime of
service to his country, was accorded a State funeral.

----------------------------------------------

HERE IS THE SPEECH:

"How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its
votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in
a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic
apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries, improvident
habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of
commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the
followers of the Prophet rule or live.

A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and
refinement, the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that
in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his
absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine,
must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of
Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.

Individual Muslims may show splendid qualities, but the
influence of the religion paralyses the social development of
those who follow it.

No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from
being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing
faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa,
raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that
Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the
science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilization
of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient
Rome."

Sir Winston Churchill; (Source: The River War, first edition,
Vol. II, pages 248-50 London)

Churchill saw it coming.

[Mr. Billion]

Apparently there's two different versions of the book out there. The one-volume 1902 version is easily available: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?...ldid=420401732 Wikipedia has 3 different links to it.

But the quotes in question supposedly appear in the 1899 two-volume version, which I can't find online. The words "votary" and "dreadful" don't appear in the one-volume version.

The one-volume version has this nice quote:

For more than a thousand years the influence of Mohammedanism, which appears to possess a strange fascination for negroid races, has been permeating the Soudan, and, although ignorance and natural obstacles impede the progress of new ideas, the whole of the black race is gradually adopting the new religion and developing Arab characteristics. In the districts of the north, where the original invaders settled, the evolution is complete, and the Arabs of the Soudan are a race formed by the interbreeding of negro and Arab, and yet distinct from both... The qualities of mongrels are rarely admirable, and the mixture of the Arab and negro types has produced a debased and cruel breed, more shocking because they are more intelligent than the primitive savages.

The whole book is pretty racist, what with it being an account of the white man's appointment with his destiny to conquer black and "Mohammedan" men. The New York Times review of the 1899 version says as much: "The River War was... a logical and an important incident in the progressive story of our race." It opens by listing British conquests in Africa, then says they're "part of one great movement. This movement is centuries old. It has its vicissitudes, but it is the most persistent political phenomenon now visible to mankind. It is the forward movement of the men born to speak the English tongue." http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive...in&oref=slogin There we go, toss in some sexism and ethnocentrism while we're at it.

[Skeptic]

were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science

LOL, the same Christianity that still today denies evolution.
But the real stupidity of this verse is its claim that the Muslim world was backward. They actually had a very advanced civilisation hundreds of years before the western world caught up from about the 1600s.

Islam had universities, a diplomatic corp, cryptography, astronomy, chemistry, soap, and medicine: at a time when most of Europe was illiterate and living in poverty or serfdom.

[Auburn Red]

Very good point, Skeptic, something that I was trying to make not that long ago with someone who said that Islam "has nothing that we need to learn or understand."

While my gut says that Churchill would never have said that, it does sound like the whole "White Man's Burden" thing that was going through Britain at the time, the whole jiingoistic let's go in there conquer them and ask questions later attitude, so I wouldn't have been surprised if he did say that.

[bufungla]

Originally Posted by Skeptic

LOL, the same Christianity that still today denies evolution.

That very quote says as much, in the next phrase:

were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled

[Mr. Billion]

Originally Posted by bufungla

That very quote says as much, in the next phrase:

I think by "the science against which it had vainly struggled," Churchill was referring to "the science against which Islam had vainly struggled".

[Lainie]

Originally Posted by Skeptic

LOL, the same Christianity that still today denies evolution.

More accurately, some Christians still deny evolution.

[Dasla]

Originally Posted by Lainie

More accurately, some Christians still deny evolution.

This is true, I work at a christian school (and also attended a christian school for grades 11/12) and the practising christian teachers definately teach evolution in science (and believe it as far as I can see). They have no time for intelligent design or creationism.

To clarify I am a teacher aid not a teacher.