The Bible however, does actually forbid it: Exodus 20:4
I seem to remember that Jehovas Witnesses actually practice this as they take the words of the Bible literally.
I’m by no way an expert on theology, mainly interested on a hobby level, so take what I say with a grain of salt.
As evidence, consider the vast number of practicing Jews and Christians who were or are artists.
In Exodus 25:18-20, on the other hand, God commands Moses to carve statues for a religious purpose: two cherubim which would sit atop the Ark of the Covenant.
Notice that these angelic images were to serve such an exalted purpose (not because the statues themselves were in any way intrinsically exalted but because of the use to which they would be put) that God was very exacting in the instructions he gave Moses as to the materials to be used and the posture in which they were to be carved.
Similar divine commands to carve statues and embroider images of various religious objects are found in Exodus 21:6-9, Numbers 21:6-9, 1 Kings 6:23-28, and 1 Kings 7:23- 39. In each case, the statue or embroidered image was intended by God for a religious use.
Although the worship of anything, not just statues, in place of the True God is idolatry, there are times when statues are not just tolerable but recommended.
Just as those Old Testament statues were ordered fashioned by God to reminded the Israelites of heavenly realities, Catholic statues of Jesus and the angels and the saints serve the same purpose.”
If it were to be implemented in full in any of our Western societies today, it would result in a misogynistic, brutal, intolerant regime that infringes severely on what we understand as universal human rights. Just look at Afghanistan for an example. We should definitely be "phobic" of this.
Similar to fundamental Christianity then?
Right or wrong, that's the context.
One fact of religious tolerance is that one person will inevitably view as sacred something that another person views as stupid. Drawing lines around certain practices is a challenging task for society as a whole. I personally don't believe that reducing everything to "fascism" is productive.
Your suggestion that people be deported to Iran or Afghanistan is among the most common racist retorts against Muslim people and indicates a lack of tolerance for what is in reality a fairly complicated issue that can only be solved by mutual respect.
That's the point. This student obviously doesn't have any respect for the country and the culture he's currently living in. He has a point to make and a war to wage.
And that's not xenophobic to say that; I've hosted an Afghan refugees for months. I didn't try to feed him pork, and he didn't try to stab me for eating ham or not praying for Allah. There are decent people everywhere. You can be an oppressed refugee, and still be a fascistic, intolerant moron; you can be a white cis male billionaire and still be a good person (this one's tough though). Being a victim buys you no moral superiority at all. Being a decent person only does.
Regarding your experience with a refugee...doing good isn't a cache of poker chips. You can't justify judging a person today based on using something good that you said/did yesterday.
I don't think it's right to say something along the lines of "we might as well send this Sudanese person to Afghanistan for objecting to an image depicting something they consider sacrilegious."
I think you are wrong to frame the situation as a renegade student who is out to wage war. This (along with "if they don't like it, deport em") is a pretty common racist trope that is used to put Muslims down. Not saying that's your intent.
Religious freedom in the US is usually viewed in a way that differs from Europe (esp. France). Rather than forcing people to act or think secularly, Americans try to respect other people's boundaries as they are. It's a fundamentally different concept. No idea where you're from, but based on your attitude toward the meaning of "mutual respect" I'm guessing France.
It is likely that a Sudanese Muslim will view a depiction of the Muslim prophet as impermissible, and that a Persian Muslim will not. Why conflate the two?
There's more context in the school newspaper. [0] "'I am showing you this image for a reason. And that is that there is this common thinking that Islam completely forbids, outright, any figurative depictions or any depictions of holy personages. While many Islamic cultures do strongly frown on this practice, I would like to remind you there is no one, monothetic Islamic culture,' the professor said before changing to the slide that included these depictions."
The lecturer was aware that the images would be considered by many Muslims as forbidden, and the head of the university's Muslim Students' Association was in the class. The lecture was on video and undoubtedly reviewed by the administration before they chose to let the adjunct professor go.
To me, it seems like this was a self-own by the lecturer rather than some kind of "war" waged (as you put it) by a student.
I think intolerant religion must not be tolerated in an open society. I think that a society has absolutely no obligation to try to be amenable and welcoming to any ideology. When I travel in a Muslim country, I don't go around at noon during Ramadan eating ham sandwiches and drinking beer. That student is doing exactly that. She's literally spitting in the face of the country that hosts and educates her.
Yes, the professor may have tried to teach her students about the complexity of the world. That's the very definition of her job, after all!
The next step for a person like this student ends in a Samuel Paty or Charlie Hebdo. My advice is to deport her back to her miserable, war-torn, fascistic backward country she shouldn't have left.
Tolerance is great, but must be with at least a modicum of reciprocation. As Paul Claudel said "Tolerance? There are houses for that."
The standard response is that there can be no such thing as Westernphobia because the West is powerful and Islam is weak, just as there can be no such thing as anti-white racism because whites are powerful and nonwhites are weak.
I am not at all racist, my best friend has dark skin, but I also can't help but notice that on social networks there's always that black* group/tag/community never do you see white,red, yellow, only ever black. I do find that quite racist and exclusive. If we're all the same, why does such distinction exist?
If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.
It's not all about race and sexuality.
Non property owners are discriminated against?
Look for the etymology of the term "slave". You will be surprised.
That is not remotely true, if I log into Reddit I can find subreddits with white, black, Spanish, German, Japanese, Indian, French, Jamaican, etc. topics as well several subcategories such as Valencian etc. I am not sure what or where you are looking.
I don’t think Native Americans go by red or East Asian people yellow as well honestly. What social networks are banning you?
There is a heterosexual flag here if you need one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straight_flag
You're wrong about that; the Chinese do refer to themselves as yellow. (It's not a native tradition there - it's taken from the old Western taxonomy. But it's still current.)
If you want me to treat you equally, you need to hold us both as equals, anything less is hypocrisy.
Does that mean that virtually all Western art is islamaphobic?
At what point does the demand that Western art doesn't do something that offend Islam itself become westernphobic.