Restoring the Sacred

Thursday, January 8, 2015

Words of Relevance: Turkish President Erdogan Defines Islam


That's Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, president of Turkey, with his friend Barack Hussein Obama. It's a sure bet that Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of The Republic of Turkey in October 1923, is spinning in his grave as Erdogan dismantles his creation.  

Erdogan's policies leave no doubt that he has abandoned the idea of the secular republic of Ataturk, and would like very much to return to something more like the absolute monarchy of the Ottaman Empire.  

That, fortunately, not being a possibility, he has done all he can to return Islam to its proper place (in his mind) throughout Turkey.  At least he has no qualms about providing the rest of us with a clear understanding of the "religion of peace" as it has been described by our last two presidents.  Who better to define Islam than Erdogan himself, and he does so in today's quote.

Here's the quote: 
"...descriptions (of moderate vs immoderate Islam) are very ugly, it is offensive and an insult to our religion. There is no moderate or immoderate Islam. Islam is Islam and that’s it.”
Finally, here's an earlier post, from September 2010, with an interesting video about the "religion of peace."

http://wwwpopblogger.blogspot.com/2010/09/religion-of-peace.html