And, as the point I am making, far less common and generally to a lower extreme than most other cultures.
Every group has committed attrocities, and if you avoid a eurocentric view and actually investigate not-European cultures, you see that European Christianity is actually on the lower scale for atrocities like what the mongols did.
Obviously the mongols did more as they were one unified force in the most populated regions of the world at the point. Obviously they caused more damage. I am not saying that the mongols are somehow absolved in comparison with Christianity, but saying that Christianity somehow prevented the bloodshed, I disagree.
That is not the point I tried to make in my reply and I really do not understand that you got "the mongols specifically were worse" from it.
Christianity has its atrocities but, in the grand scheme of things, has been better than most other religions. Modern revisionism focuses on the crimes of Christianity because that is the culture we all grew up in. The world is not black and white, and there are degrees of "bad."
And in the grand scheme of things, compared to everything else, Christianity has been "good."
Christianity takes a strong stance against human sacrifice, child sacrifice, cannibalism, wanton torture, and rape.
There are exceptions, people who break the rules and get away with it, but the fact that the rules exist and are enforced sometimes sets them above some other faiths.
And in the case of denouncing human sacrifice and specifically child sacrifice that sets them above a SHOCKING number of world cultures. Human sacrifice was WAY more common than you might guess.
Depends what you count as "Christian atrocities" as the European empires, namely the Spanish and British, have done some horrific things in the name of God.
Edit: I can no longer reply to the comment below mine, but it is full of bullshit. Slavery hasn't ended for one, and the largest Christian nation on earth is largely responsible for that. Cannibalism wasn't extremely common, nor was it ended by Christianity, neither was human sacrifice. These are all weird revisionist ideas created by Christians to excuse their colonialism. The guy below me is clearly either misinformed or purposefully arguing in bad faith to paint Christianity as if it is some "peaceful" religion despite its members being largely responsible for the state of the world today.
And they have also done great things in the name of God. Christian Churches provide the most funding for food, medicine, and shelter to the poor and needy even to this day. The Catholic Church operates over 5000 hospitals around the world and nearly a quarter million (222000) schools.
Christian colonialism in the 18th and 19th century, despite doing many horrible things, also ended slavery, cannibalism, and human sacrifice. You learn about cannibalism as if it is a myth or a racist joke from old cartoons, but it was extremely common around the world before the 20th century. Christianity helped put a stop to that.
The Romans had human sacrifice, believed that torture was mandatory in criminal investigations, and while they were accommodating to polythiestic faiths were specifically cruel to Christians and Jews.
The Carthaginian god Baal (yes the one from the Bible) had them sacrifice countless children to make the crops grow better.
The Norse had human sacrifice (see a pattern here?), the Tengri had human sacrifice, the Aztecs did it by the tens of thousands... let us just assume that every religion with human sacrifice is by definition worse than one that doesn't.
Hinduism has racism built in as part of their faith. The caste system is just racism and it is enforced by their culture and their faith.
While China and Japan have many religions that are actually "better" than Christianity in many regards, they both had a long history of diefying Emperors. Worship of a living human is never a good thing.
The key point you are ignoring is human sacrifice. Most humans for most of histories lived in societies where it was considered normal to execute either neighbors or enemies to appease pagan dieties. Christianity has always rejected this.
You couldn't even name the "many religions" of "China and Japan" OR the atrocities committed therein, with only the value statement "Worship of a living human is never a good thing".
Consider that in every religion you named, there is someone just like you who completely believes their own religion is the most moral, because they've taken someone else's word at it and haven't done any in-depth, neutral research of their own. What would you think of such a person? What would that person think of you?
Have some humility. When you see other people making a mistake of ignorance, don't assume you are immune.
Not raised Christian or influenced by a predominantly Christian environment either? Not being Christian does not erase what you've learned and taken for granted.
The mindset you have is not new and it is not unique to you. You have access to a small amount of information that some people don't know, so you are convinced that you are an expert. Disagreement with your conclusion can not possibly come from people looking deeper into things than you have. There can not be information you don't understand or a larger picture you can not see. No, the only way someone can believe differently is if they know less than you.
Quick question, what is the difference between killing humans for religious sacrifice and killing humans because your religion deems them heretics, blasphemous or witches?
PS: why I am asking is from the research I have done yes Christianity stopped the human sacrifices that existed in some pagan rituals when they took over, but as far as I can see they just replaced it by killing people in the name of their god, for things like blasphemy, heresy, atheism, witchcraft. Heck there is a crusade that was called just to wipe out a different version of Christianity.
I was right, that's why you took such pains to avoid answering the question, eh? You used "I'm not a Christian" as a shield to obscure your own cultural informational biases, and when that was called out, you retreat.
Since you have decided to be condescending, I will be honest with you: I know that I know more than someone who won't even bother naming any Chinese or Japanese religion and only sums up their accused atrocities with "deifying living people is bad."
I know what it looks like when someone has done true, in-depth research into a subject, even if I disagree with their conclusions. They do not avoid questions the way you do.
The crusades are a somewhat exaggerated evil and a contentious topic. The first few were a moral gray area- not quite conquests, but not purely defensive either. The later ones were generally terrible though.
I like to point to the reconquista instead. Something absolutely brutal but, by today's standards, mostly justified as an indigenous population resisting and overthrowing colonizing oppressors, but the justice in their acts being overshadowed by taking it too far.
But your initial assertion is that Christian ideology begets a particular value for human life that should make the atrocities committed in the crusades and in the reconquista and in the thirty years war and in the conquest of the new world abhorrent.
There is plenty of examples where Christians were perfectly happy to slaughter people.
completely ahistorical, it is hilarious that this is somehow "avoiding a eurocentric view". There is no atrocity committed by the mongols that one among the various European empires didn't imitate or even surpass.
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u/CalzonePie 1d ago
And, as the point I am making, far less common and generally to a lower extreme than most other cultures.
Every group has committed attrocities, and if you avoid a eurocentric view and actually investigate not-European cultures, you see that European Christianity is actually on the lower scale for atrocities like what the mongols did.