The last few weeks I have purposely refrained from preaching and philosophizing, but I must comment on these Muslim fanatics in Afghanistan worshipping the Koran and killing over it.
This kind of fanaticism is a perversion of
True Religion Outlet , a spiritual sickness that afflicts the bigoted fundamentalists of all religions. I haven’t had any experience with Muslim fundamentalists, but I have suffered many years under their Christian counterparts.
What these religious fanatics don’t understand is, their holy books, the Bible, the Koran, etc., are not to be worshipped in the place of God. That is idolatry pure and simple, i.e., bibliolatry.
I don’t know what Muhammad thought about it, but the Bible writers were aware of this perversion of true religion, and tried to guard against it.
“We have this treasure in earthen vessels.” (2 Corinthians 4:7)
“The letter killeth, but the Spirit queth life.” (2 Corinthians 3:6)
So it is not the holy book that is sacred, but its message, and it has to be studied and interpreted correctly to get this message, because along with the spiritual message is a lot of extra baggage that has to be waded through. The Bible tells us that this is the correct way to study the Bible. It has to be rightly divided, that is correctly interpreted. See 2 Timothy 2:15.
So, it is not the Bible, the Koran, etc., that is sacred, but the moral and spiritual message. How foolish it is to think that the burning of the book could injure its message. In fact, it might have just the opposite effect. It could motivate more genuine interest in the book. If I were a public figure right now, I would publicly burn a copy of the Bible to call attention to its beautiful message.
