Goin' to Town

Feb 7, 2006

Jeff

5 Comments

Killing Cartoons

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Michelle Malkin has an excellent commentary about the recent Danish cartoons that have provoked an Islamic firestorm. She has even posted the cartoons so that you can see them and judge just how offensive they are for yourself.

You know… a person earns your respect. You can’t force someone to respect you. Islam seeks to enforce what it cannot earn. It does so through fear, terror, and false teaching. Read the Koran and make your own judgements.

While you cannot force someone to respect you, the Christian faith teaches love for your enemies. That one counter-cultural, inhuman teaching by Jesus Christ reveals the reality of His divinity.

I respect the right of the Muslim to be mad. I respect the right of the cartoonist. But I cannot respect the person who, through violence, tries to solve a matter of opinion with the sword.

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5 Comments

• 
  Jeff Noble February 9, 2006 at 8:11 pm

  I still agree with you! ;)

  Semantics are a powerful force for misunderstanding.

  But I do think you can love someone without respecting them. As soon as both of my children were born (really even before), I LOVED them deeply. But I did not respect them in the sense of the word that I am meaning.

  Respect, in how I refer to it, points toward quality and characteristics that draw forth a reaction of admiration and praise.

  Thanks for clarifying our thoughts for all to understand!

  Reply
• 
  DB February 9, 2006 at 6:39 pm

  In the noun form, I’m thinking more of the second definition. In the verb form, I’m thinking mainly of the second definition, but with some of the third mixed in.

  I think it’s impossible to love someone without first respecting them. It’s true that we don’t have to respect everything they do (because people do some stupid and harmful things. Believe me, I know–), but I think that’s a different thing from respecting a person as a fellow thinking, feeling creature.

  I think you and I may be saying basically the same things. I think where we differ is that you’d rather call due regard what I prefer to think of as respect.

  Reply
• 
  Jeff Noble February 8, 2006 at 6:33 pm

  Methinks you have a great point. I recall that Paul instructed wives to “respect” their husbands. That’s pretty much an imperative. However, husbands were also to live in such a way that made it delightful for wives to respect them. I really believe the Ephesians passage I’m referring to teaches mutual submission.

  Jesust taught that we are to love our enemies. I wholeheartedly agree with that faith-mentally. It’s so difficult in life-practically. Yet, when I use the term respect, I think it’s important to define it so that we are not thinking of different nuances.

  Noun:
  a. A feeling of deep admiration for someone or something elicited by their abilities, qualities, or achievements.
  b. Due regard for the feelings, traditions, wishes, rights of others

  Verb:
  a. Admire deeply as a result of someone’s abilities, qualities, or achievements
  b. Have due regard for the feelings, traditions, wishes, rights of others
  c. Avoid harming or interfering with
  d. Agree to recognize and abide by

  In all the meanings, I still think that the overall meaning is that respect is gained by the actions of another. “Due regard,” I believe, intimates that you give people reasonable treatment, but that if what they ask you to respect is not respectable, that’s where the “due regard” comes in.

  Loving someone as a person and respecting a flawed point of view or world system are, in my mind, two different things.

  What say you?

  I sure appreciate the comment and making me think harder. Blogs are way too simple a venue from which to shout from a soap box, which we should be “chatting over tea.”

  Reply
• 
  DB February 8, 2006 at 6:07 pm

  Jeff,

  I agree with your conclusion, but I don’t know if I agree with your thesis. I’ve been thinking about this recently, and I think that respect isn’t earned…it’s owed. Too many people use the “you have to earn my respect” ruse to justify treating others abominably. I think, as God’s creatures, we owe each other respect, whether we like each other’s actions or not.
  What think you, friend?

  Reply
• 
  jill February 7, 2006 at 8:15 pm

  amen! isn’t funny, how when Christians are discriminated against (all the time by the way), we write letters, call managements, etc. They torch embassys and kill innocent people. yet NBC continues to attempt to make fun of US

  Reply

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