Foundations
The problem of thinking of religion as hazardous to civilization is that the reverse is true. Religion is the order upon which a country, culture, or civilization is built.
What is termed as western civilization is founded upon Christianity. America was founded upon a better implementation of British law which was itself founded on Christian principles.
The simple reason democracy is resisted by the Arab civilization is that the concept of democracy is foreign to Quranic thinking. Rather it is recognized correctly by them as a concept of Christianity.
The proper danger lies in a culture becoming a civilization. The Jewish people have bypassed the hazards of a civilization by remaining a culture. That does not imply they alone can do it. Rather they have done it and outlived several civilizations in the process. Derived from Max I Dimott's book "Jews, God, and History".
Civilization
The difference between a civilization and a culture is simply this. A culture retains the ability to maintain itself apart from yet interacting with the civilizations in its midst.
A civilization is a codified culture. Since it is codified it has lost its adaptability and will eventually die. History is littered with the corpses of civilizations.
A culture like a person keeps its core identity while adapting to and learning from other entities as they come into contact with each other.
Every person, culture, or civilization has a core character that must be understood at some level to properly interact with them.
To violate that core will certainly result in relational death between the two parties.
