Why is the Koran so violent? Because the world Islam was born into was violent, anarchic and savage. The early Muslims lived outside of the clan system that was the only source of protection and support until Muhamed arrived. The earliest years of Islam were years of violent struggle and assault from outsiders.
By comparison, the earliest years of Christianity were comparatively benign. Jesus may (or may not, depending on whom you read) have been severely persecuted by the orthodox religious authority of his time, but by no means did the earliest Christans live under constant fear of massacre. Mostly, it appears, they were ignored.
So, is it surprising that the original text of this religion should dwell on themes of violence? No, of course not. By comparison, the other pertinent facts are very surprising indeed, and that is that* so much *of the Koran centers on peace, generosity and forgiveness.
For instance, the Koran lays out penalties and penances for murder, more or less codifying the previous clan warfare into a law. It seems to suggest that Allah accepts that people crave vengeance, but insists on rough justice, the penalty must not exceed the crime. But it also holds out the prospect of forgiveness, that if the injured party should forgive the transgressor, no penalty is exacted but the forgiving are dearer to the heart of Allah, the merciful.
No, the violence and martial spirit of the Koran is not a surprise, the surprise is that it speaks so much of peace and mercy when born in a time and place where no good deed went unpunished. Because one illiterate man began spouting moral poetry, untold thousands of people made one giant step from darkness to civilization. Miracle enough for me, close enough for rock and roll.
Everything evolves, every religion, every philosophy, every science, every art. To insist that a religion inherently retains the taint of its violent birth is to deny that principle and to fling oneself into the teeth of the obvious facts.
Lutherans don’t spout Martin Luther’s anti-Semitism because we are not the same people as we were. Catholics no longer insist that Jews murdered Jesus, same reason. Mormons no longer resist non-white members. The list goes on and on.
If you are going to insist that the violent circumstances of Islam’s birth persist against evolution, then you are in need of some supernatural explanation to clarify why Islam remains essentially static while everything else changes, for fourteen hundred years. Or, more reasonably, you can accept that the circumstances of Islam’s origins are of no special importance, and that the violence that plagues the Islamic world is, to a large degree, not of their making, and certainly not an expression of the will of the Prophet or of Allah, the Merciful and Compassionate. That’s what they call Him, you know. Not Allah, the Superbad Ass-kicker. The Merciful and Compassionate.
Not exactly terms of inherent belligerence, are they?