A History of Violence In Religions

Throughout their histories, religions have shared a common process, enduring long periods of persecution, seeing the coming of heroic religious martyrs and missionary leaders, fighting long wars of expansion and conquest, surviving times of internal factional struggles for doctrinal purity or supremacy, resisting the temptation to blend in with other religions and philosophies of neighbors, and adjusting to times of dramatic growth and increasing popular acceptance. Between the major religions lie wide gulfs of mutual distrust and antagonism, historical disagreements, territorial encroachments, wars, and feuds. These struggles highlight the violent nature of the conflict that continues to the present between radically differing worldviews, clashing cultural values, and rival political ideologies that date back to the beginnings of their common recorded history.

The history of religious violence ...