I should note that although the OP specifically focuses upon Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity & Islam), violence and/or intolerance in the name of religion is far more pervasive generally across human belief systems - whether religious or secular - than many are willing to admit outside scholarship.
I mentioned this on a different thread already, but take Buddhism - in its scriptures one of the most non-violent and compassionate creeds imaginable. But not all Buddhists have been so, unfortunately. I think we'd all agree that there isn't something inherently wrong with Buddhism. Its a religion, moreover, that is effectively atheist - it has no conception of a supreme creator deity (and the
devas are just beings subject to samsara like the rest of us).
But consider the Mahāvaṃsa, the "
Great Chronicle" of 5th century Buddhist Sri Lanka written in the Pali language, composed by a Buddhist monk at the Mahavihara temple in Anuradhapura.
One of the Buddhist kings it describes, Dutugamanu destroyed his opponents in battle. After the bloodshed, he laments for causing the deaths of millions of innocents in the campaign. Eight enlightened monks (
arhant) comfort him with this explanation:
"From this deed arises no hindrance in thy way to heaven. Only one and half human beings have been slain here by thee, O lord of men. The one had come unto the (three) refuges, the other had taken on himself the five precepts. Unbelievers and men of evil life were the rest, not more to be esteemed than beasts. But as for thee, thou wilt bring glory to the doctrine of the Buddha in manifold ways; therefore cast away from thy heart, O ruler of men!"
(Geiger 1993 translation; 178)
This is no different to what you'd expect to hear from the most intolerant Abrahamist, for example in the Catholic Spanish Inquisition or Islamic Mihna. Buddhists are distinguished from non-Buddhists, the murders in the narrative of the "unbelievers" of "evil life" are dismissed, because the king has pure intent with the desire to defend Buddhism.
This kind of rhetoric has been used today in majority Buddhist Burma, against the Muslim minority in that country:
Persecution of Muslims in Myanmar - Wikipedia
A BBC article on it by Professor Alan Strathern, an anthropologist from Oxford University, makes an excellent point about the corruption of religious ideals arising from the almost inevitable bargain with "
state power":
Why are Buddhist monks attacking Muslims?
Of all the moral precepts instilled in Buddhist monks the promise not to kill comes first, and the principle of non-violence is arguably more central to Buddhism than any other major religion. So why have monks been using hate speech against Muslims and joining mobs that have left dozens dead?
This is happening in two countries separated by well over 1,000 miles of Indian Ocean - Burma and Sri Lanka. It is puzzling because neither country is facing an Islamist militant threat. Muslims in both places are a generally peaceable and small minority...
On Tuesday, Buddhist mobs attacked mosques and burned more than 70 homes in Oakkan, north of Rangoon, after a Muslim girl on a bicycle collided with a monk. One person died and nine were injured...
Aggressive thoughts are inimical to all Buddhist teachings...while your compassion for all living things grows.
Of course, there is a strong strain of pacifism in Christian teachings too: "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you," were the words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount...
But however any religion starts out, sooner or later it enters into a Faustian pact with state power. Buddhist monks looked to kings, the ultimate wielders of violence, for the support, patronage and order that only they could provide. Kings looked to monks to provide the popular legitimacy that only such a high moral vision can confer.
The result can seem ironic. If you have a strong sense of the overriding moral superiority of your worldview, then the need to protect and advance it can seem the most important duty of all.
Christian crusaders, Islamist militants, or the leaders of "freedom-loving nations", all justify what they see as necessary violence in the name of a higher good. Buddhist rulers and monks have been no exception.
So, historically, Buddhism has been no more a religion of peace than Christianity.
Burmese rulers, known as "kings of righteousness", justified wars in the name of what they called true Buddhist doctrine.
In Japan, many samurai were devotees of Zen Buddhism and various arguments sustained them - killing a man about to commit a dreadful crime was an act of compassion, for example. Such reasoning surfaced again when Japan mobilised for World War II.
