Germanized Islam?

Over the weekend.....German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble....made a comment which will drive a lot of Germans (and others) to discuss his idea....that you can assimilate a million Muslims who've arrived in Germany and develop a Germanized Islam, which is based on tolerance and liberalism.

Some would suggest that Schaeuble was pulling your leg when he made this comment.  Some might say that he's being awful naive.  Some might suggest that it's a fairly crazy idea.

How would you accomplish this?

You'd have to go and do some type of 'rewrite' of the Quran and the two associated documents.  It's basically said that it's forbidden to alter these three books, so I think it'd end up being an underground-type project where suddenly the three books appear in digital form, with a major editing process which edits out the "death-to-non-believers" theme.

Then you'd have to have some 'insiders' who are liberalized to some degree and the German door open as a way to modernize their religion and reinvent it for the modern era.....rather than have handcuffed to the 7th Century.

Then the Mullah issue comes up.  Oddly, Germany has started a university project to get Germanized individuals headed in the direction of being degreed Islam Mullahs and fairly educated (in order to get any degree in Germany....it requires a fair amount of class-work and projects).  The intention is within ten years....there won't be any more deals where you import Saudi Mullahs to run Mosques in Germany.

Why should one think this radical idea would work?  Well....history has this odd theme.

When the Romans got to the point of entering Middle East.....they found one particular group almost impossible to conquer....the Jews.

In most cases, when the Romans entered a land.....just having 300 to 1,000 Roman soldiers was enough to scare a city into surrendering or accepting Roman rule.  If things did escalate to a larger degree, then troops would enter into a campaign and quickly establish authority, with the locals generally scared.

The Jews were a different group entirely.  They had established their religion on a great deal of faith.  The leaders of the religion had the mass of Jewish society in Judea strongly attached.  The Romans weren't easily accepted, even with force.

So, eventually after countless battles and analyzing the Jews to a great extent, the Romans came to some belief that you needed to "water-down" the Jewish faith.  Up until this point, the Bible that did exist at the time....was strictly the Old Testament.  After the Roman's perception of the situation....you then start to have an effort for the kinder and gentler version of the Jewish religion....the Christian religion.

If you go through the New Testament, there are dozens of highlights where it's suggested that acceptance of the Roman authority is a positive thing.  Jews and their old method of viewing things were cast in a negative light.  People were drawn to the Christian religion because of it's positive virtues. People were drawn away from the Jewish religion because of its harsh nature.

My guess is that the Germans are thinking along the lines of the Romans, and thinking long-term....you can liberalize and change a religion....in a sly sort of way.

I'm not going to suggest this is a wise idea or one that will be successful in the end.  But the Romans weren't naive or stupid, and I think the Germans may have come to realize the trick could easily work again.