Posted by pancho from ? (64.94.93.158) on Friday, August 09, 2002 at 3:22PM :
>Salute and Prayer to our Assyrian Martyr's, May God rest their souls. Today August 7th Yumet Saadeh we pay tribute to our beloved Martyr's who through the sword fell, bled, suffered and perished from this world. For they were the true Assyrians, they were the true saga of years past, and for them always and forever we pray and shed tears as we remember our struggle in this the 7th of August (Yumet Saadeh)
>GOD BLESS YOUR SOULS...R.I.P....
***I know this will shock you...but ever read a dictionary? There are books written on martyrs spelling out just what it takes to qualify. You cheapen the word to use it indiscrimanatly just because you WISH there had been Assyrian martyrs.
***I``ve tried to define the word before, only to be told by the moderator that Assyrians have their own dictionary...and reading here for over a year, I well believe it. If you were interested at all in going out onto the world``s stage...where we must go...you might wish to check to see if you are speaking the same language as the rest of them...so they can understand you and not laugh at you.
***Murdered Assyrians are NOT martyrs...they are "murder victims". That is tragic enough...what you people hope to gain from forcing them all to be martyrs I can``t fathom, unless you seek pity. No Assyrian was forced to choose between Jesus and anyone else. That is your Church working the Franchise. No Muslim really wanted to convert a Christian...true Muslims feel no need to. These people were bent on murder, all they wanted to do was add some humiliation and suffering before the final act...that isn``t Islam, that is "human".
***Assyrians, like my great grandfather and two uncles were killed in cold blood. Being killed outright, for whatever reason, does not make you a martyr. To be a martyr you have to be presented with a choice...if you remain true, you know you will be killed...but if you turn...you HAVE to believe that your life will be spared. This did not happen...Assyrian Christians were just rounded up and shot. Being raped doesn``t make you a martyr either.
***To be a martyr you also have to suffer State sponsored terror...not individual, or mob attacks. It has to be the clearly stated objective of the Government that they will present you with a choice...and if you don``t conform, you will be killed. Not even the Jews call their millions of murdered victims "martyrs" because they know the German Christians did not want to convert any of them, except to soap and lampshades...their stated objective was to murder them all...not convert them or else!
***One also has to believe that ones death will further some cause...in other words you just can``t be a nut job who wants to be killed for some personal whim...or to make something grand of yourself.
***The world recognizes the meaning of the word "martyr" and there is great respect, not for the act of being killed...but for choosing death for a cause in the face of intense Government pressure. There is great sadness, I think, at the thought of innocent people being killed...by a mob or a government or an individual...but the world knows a martyr from a murder victim...if you don``t.
***Actually the fourth definition of the word "martyr" takes into account what you are trying to do...it says people claim to be martyrs, or have martyrs, to arouse pity for themselves. I am afraid this is closer to the truth, given the way we usually operate.
***Can``t you just honor the dead, including the ones being killed by America in Iraq and elsewehere...without falsifying their status in order to win something so worthless as pity? Is that the Assyrian way?
-- pancho
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