"Love your neighbor as yourself, and your country more than yourself," wrote Thomas Jefferson the year before his death. Who did he include among his neighbors in the blueprint for the nation he loved so much?

Jefferson implicitly included Muslims in his patriotic rendering of the Golden Rule. Many may find this idea startling today, but explicit proof for it exists.

In 1776, Jefferson inscribed these pivotal words among his private notes: "(N)either Pagan nor Mahometan (Muslim) nor Jew ought to be excluded from the civil rights of the commonwealth because of his religion." They were written a few months after he composed the Declaration of Independence, when he returned to Virginia to draft new laws for his state.

Jefferson borrowed the precedent of "civil rights" for Muslims from the English philosopher John Locke's 1689 tract, "A Letter Concerning Toleration." Locke's ideas about the toleration of Muslims and Jews provoked attacks: One critic condemned him for having "the faith of a Turk." His enemies also charged, rightly, that he owned a copy of the Quran, which they termed "the Mahometan bible."

For centuries, it had been common in Europe for one Christian to defame another with references to Islam, a practice that crossed the Atlantic. Jefferson, for his expansive views of religious liberty and political equality, would be attacked repeatedly as an "infidel," a word that in his time meant not just an "unbeliever," but a Muslim.

And like Locke, Jefferson owned a Quran.
[...]

Yes, Yes Brian we all know you are the biggest biggot you hate all religions bar islam.

How utterly the opposite of what Islam stands for.

Bwian, the members of ISIL would pass you around like currency.  Hilarious!

Rocketanski wrote on Dec 28^th, 2014 at 7:34pm:


go away and talk to isis members brian.

tell them how you dislike us Christians.

you make me sick

Brian Ross wrote on Dec 28^th, 2014 at 7:17pm:



There is nothing in Islam about religious freedom, freedom of expression, freedom of enquiry, a plurality of religious practice separate from social engagement - in short, Islam could never produce something like the Federalist Papers, the Declaration of Independence or the American Constitution because its every instinct is opposed to every instinct expressed in those documents.

Submission stands for submission, not enquiry, not freedom, not tolerance. It is called Submission because that is its central idea, its root and branch. Submit to what a semi-literate Arab tells you about god. Don't question it. Submit.

Works for you, Brain, obviously.