Savvy on religion

In the wake of a Pew Research Center poll which found that many religious people were remarkably uninformed about religion, Nicholas D. Kristof presents a multiple chice quiz in the New York times testing people's savvy on religion.
Question number 2 is as follows:
2. Which holy text declares: “Let there be no compulsion in religion”?
a. Koran
b. Gospel of Matthew
c. Letter of Paul to the Romans

Scrolling further down the article, one is presented with the answer.
2. a. Koran, 2:256. But other sections of the Koran do describe coercion.

Mr. Kristof's conclusion is that, "And yes, the point of this little quiz is that religion is more complicated than it sometimes seems, and that we should be wary of rushing to inflammatory conclusions about any faith, especially based on cherry-picking texts."
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/10/opinion/10kristof.html?src=me&ref=homepage

Daniel Greenfield's latest post is about the case of the Times Square bomber.
He quotes Faisal Shahzad's words.
“This is but one life,” he said. “If I am given a thousand lives, I will sacrifice them all for the sake of Allah, fighting this cause, defending our lands, making the word of Allah supreme over any religion or system.”
The Judge did her usual liberal shtick, foolishly lecturing Shahzad on how moderate Islam is. She suggested that Shahzad should "spend some of the time in prison thinking carefully about whether the Koran wants you to kill lots of people".
But who knows better what Islam really represents, Faisal Shahzad or Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum?
Read full article: http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/2010/10/its-about-jihad-stupid.html

I would say to Mr. Kristof that just as you can't reach inflammatory conclusions about faith based upon cherry-picking texts, you can't reach benign conclusions about religious faiths based upon hand picking sentences that suit one's cause. I have come across Reform rabbis who hand pick a verse out of the Torah to justify their causes while ignoring just as salient verses which contradict their mindsets.
What scares me are those whose opinions are accepted as "moderate" simply because they know the right verse to quote when speaking to a particular audience. And the audience is too ignorant to be aware that there are other verses and opinions which are in direct opposition to what was said.
In Hebrew, the word "shalom" has three different meanings. It means "hello", "good bye" and "peace". I can tell someone I dislike, "shalom" and he can get insulted because I greeted him with "good bye." But, I can fool him and say that I didn't mean "good bye." I really meant to say "hello." Only I am the one who knows what went on in my mind when I used the word.
We have to become more savvy on religion to realize when a threat is impending or, conversely, when the consequences will be benign.