Here we go again: another dhimmi professor explains it all for us. Did you know that jihad is actually a spiritual struggle? And that Al-Qaeda represents a tiny minority of extremists, much like ... Timothy McVeigh? And that the Qur'an's violent passages are just like the Old Testament's?
From the Wausau Daily Herald, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:
STEVENS POINT - While coalition forces laid siege to insurgents holed up in the Iraqi city of Fallujah on Monday, a University of Wisconsin Stevens Point professor clarified some misconceptions about jihad, a term often associated with terrorism.Speaking to a lecture hall filled with students and local residents, UWSP professor of history Howard Eissenstat dispelled the notion that jihad explicitly refers to a holy war against infidels. Rather, he said, the Islamic term refers broadly to "a struggle" - be it spiritual, moral or political.
Though jihad has taken on myriad meanings in the modern era, it has become associated with nationalist struggles during the 20th century, Eissenstat said. He cited Hezbollah as one example of a nationalist organization that uses the concept of jihad to justify violence against its enemies, namely Israel.
Al-Qaida, he said, is not as widely accepted in the Islamic world.
"You might compare (al-Qaida) quite fairly to the Michigan Militia and Timothy McVeigh," Eissenstat said. "They claim to represent Christianity, but they don't do so accurately."
Eissenstat likened the Quran's usage of militaristic imagery to passages from the Old Testament, which sometimes include calls to violence. Neither text, he said, accurately reflects the nature of its religion.
"If you look at the Old Testament, there are all sorts of things we think of as contextual ... You'll often see people reading (religious) texts for positive things and negative things to support their thinking," Eissenstat said.
Professor Eissenstat? Yes, me in the back. A few questions, please?
1. I understand that "jihad" means "struggle," and that it is validly understood as a "spiritual struggle" within Islamic tradition. But do you really mean to say that that means that it isn't also a holy war? Are you aware that it has also been understood as a holy war against infidels throughout Islamic history, and that radical Muslims today interpret it as such around the world, based on copious evidence from the Qur'an and Islamic tradition? Are you aware that some leading radical Muslim theorists, including Hassan Al-Banna and Abdullah Azzam, actually rejected the idea of jihad as a spiritual struggle as based on a weak hadith (that is, a false tradition of Muhammad), and that indeed, the saying attributed to Muhammad establishing this idea does not appear in the hadith sources that Muslims consider most reliable?
2. If Al-Qaeda is comparable to McVeigh, can you please point out the McVeighite churches in Christianity? Can you please show me where the global movement of Christian McVeighites can be found? Can you explain why there are no such churches or terrorist groups, while Islamic jihadists can be found in Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, India, Kashmir, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Chechnya, Bosnia, Nigeria, Liberia, the Netherlands, and elsewhere?
3. If the Qur'an and the Old Testament are equally violent, can you please show me where in the Old Testament is an open-ended command for believers to wage war against unbelievers, comparable to Qur'an 9:5 and 9:29? If this is just a matter of some radicals taking some verses out of context, why is warfare against unbelievers a constant of Islamic history, with explicit justification in these verses and Islam's teachings about jihad, while it is not a constant of Jewish or Christian tradition?
I look forward to hearing from you.
OK Mr. Spencer, are you going to contact this guy with your questions
One thing I don't get about all these "comparison" arguments, for example
"You might compare (al-Qaida) quite fairly to the Michigan Militia and Timothy McVeigh," Eissenstat said. "They claim to represent Christianity, but they don't do so accurately."
How does the Michigan Militia "claim" to represent Christianity? Which verses of the Bible do they claim to draw their inspiration from for attacks like the Oklahoma bombing???
Eissenstat is just another stupid moral equivalencer, likely to end up on the scrap-heap of academe just like Michael (Oh, no -- I helped elect Geo Bush with my idiot rantings) Moore.
good idea, cgw. i found his email address in the uwsp faculty directory. (it is heissens@uwsp.edu). i am taking the liberty of forwarding this thread to him
in order to see what such misinformation is doing to shape the minds of the kids he lectures, check out some of their responses to the reporter of the above-mentioned article:
"The comparison between Islamic and Judeo-Christian texts resonated among many of the students in attendance at the lecture. UWSP freshman Kathryn Stankivitz said she was surprised to learn that the two religions, which have clashed over the centuries, share some doctrinal similarities.
"Linnea Weeden, also a freshman at UWSP, said the lecture contributed to her understanding of Islam.
"'Since 9/11 our eyes have been opened to a new culture,' Weeden said. 'I'm learning what (Islam) is all about, not just the violence of it.'
"UWSP vice chancellor Bob Tomlinson said Eissenstat's lecture is a continuation of an ongoing dialogue that began in the weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks."
as someone who on 9/11 lost a personal friend, whose office mates lost friends and family, whose local firehouse lost half our bravest, who could smell and see the smoking ruins for a month afterward, who lived in a panicked city where such panic did not begin to abate until the bombs began to fall in afghanistan, i find this la-de-da postmodern anti-objective approach to understanding islam reprehensible. i also find the misinterpretation of old testament theology laughable. i find the comparison between the two misguided and an indication of the shallow nature of the modern leftwing academy. i really could care less about the adults (i.e. tomlinson & eissenstat). they are academics and believe false concepts at their own peril. it is the kids i worry about
What does it take for someone to be removed, or at least sued, for educational malpractice? Such a suit, if brought by an intelligent and determined student or group of students, could do much to get a university administration's attention, even if the professor is beyond hope.
University administrators -- and university presidents, alas, tend to be chosen not from among the reluctant Jacques Barzuns, but from the Sammy Glicks of Academe (not always, but often). After all, Jacques Barzun and those akin to him have a real and deep interest in the malaise of the modern university, and would wish to imrpove matters, but have no interest whatsoever in the gladhanding and fundraising and receptions in that extremely luxurious house the university provides its leader, or should one say, the president taking his damn "leadership role," and close attention to what is actually taught, especially in those courses that make up what was once optimistically called "liberal education," is beyond most of them.
And this tenure business has gotten way out of hand. Look at John Mack, the recently-deceasted bonkers professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. He wrote a terrible book on the mythomane T. E. Lawrence, "A Prince of Our Disorder," which simply ignored everything that Richard Aldington in his 1959 biography had revealed about this man, and of course he carefully ignored the studies of Elie Kedourie. Mack had a big interest in UFOs and the reality of sexual encounters of a distinctly intergalactic nature, and he was ready for the Laughing Academy, but Harvard would not touch his precious tenure, or remove him. It seems once you get tenure, that's it.
Well, ditto for this absurd Eisenstatt -- who repeats, comically, the most obvious of CAIR-inspired cliches. What does he think? No one has been reading or paying attention to Islam lo these past few years? He's a little late -- he might have peddled this stuff a few years ago and gotten away with it. But not now.
And what is the Department Chairman (who may be a collaborator of the MESA-member variety), what is the university president, what are the trustees -- and what are the governor and the members of the Wisconsin legislature who are paying the salary of this full-time propagandist and apologist for Islam, going to do about preventing taxpayers' money from being so ill-spent, especialy when, if memory serves, the Wisconsin National Guard is right now trying to avoid being killed by people who apparently do not share Professor Eisenstatt's interpretation of what Jihad is all about.
Students, faculty members who retain your senses, administrators, Wisconsin state legislators, voters, editorial writers -- investigate this, investigate the whole scandal of Middle Eastern studies.
And do something about it.
Living proof that just about anyone, as long as they're blindly gullible, can become a college professor.....
While we're on the topic of CAIR, you all may be interested in this letter that CAIR has placed under their Incitement Watch:
http://www.canada.com/calgary/calgaryherald/news/letters/story.html?id=1bc2f5f3-e294-4a53-9787-6b8e04ef28c4
The big question is who is inciting what here?
Mike, I read that column in the Calgary Newspaper. The Muslims want it their way and their way only, which is not going to happen. The United States Voters spoke out last Tuesday, and the Muslims couldn't be more unhappy.
I'm only hoping that the next four years will bring to us mass deportation of Muslims and the closing of these alleged "Muslim Civil Rights and Advocacy" groups.
They're an undermining group of bigots, pushing an agenda that we'll all make sure never comes to pass. The Muslims wanted Kerry in office because they knew he'd be more tolerant of their bullshit...
Last Tuesday, we took our country back. I'm tired of Muslim immigrants moving here then referring to America as their country, or their Government...
They're visitors here, hopefully not for long. It's quite arrogant of them to be so lacking in class as to refer to this as their country when they've done nothing to help build it and are here only to benefit from the hard work of true Americans.
There's a word for people like them, Sponges......The nation will be a better place as long as the deportations of these slithering rodents continues, and the immigration from Islamic lands is halted.
By the way, everyone please sign the petition at LGF, and have everyone you know who appreciates free speech to sign it too. This is important, as this book must be available to everyone.
Here's the link:
http://www.petitiononline.com/islam999/petition.html
Malpractice, lying, or simple stupidity are rampant.
Here is a quote from a brand new textbook, hot off the press, from McGraw Hill, Ethics Across Cultures, by Michael C. Brannigan (soon to be read by college students on a campus near you):
p.356 (title of the section...you know, those little descriptions that help students 'read': Islam's Image Problem):
"Many Americans have come to think of Islam as a religion as a religion of violent fanatics. It is therefore all the more imperative to point to a critical difference between Islamic extremists and those devout Muslims who follow the creed of nonviolence that is espoused in the Qur'an"
And, it gets worse, and then better, and then worse, from here.
Of course, Esposito gets cited on the next page for an argument that 'perceiving a global Islamic threat' will actually cause 'extremism'.
And so it goes, a book that says a lot, about a lot, very badly: unethical ethics across culture...And I am sure there will be folks who will use this book because of its 'breadth'.
Oh my, yes, we truly should learn about different cultures. Don't you think?
The fires of New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania light the road to Damascus: maybe we have to turn aside from our life's dream of being a gentleman scholar among men and women with good and moral minds, and turn to the dirty path of politics; maybe the voice of reason is saying that though one is cheated of one's hopes and expectations, the other road can lead to a different, perhaps equal, fulfillment.
Robert provides us daily with a powerhouse, and we are the energy he creates. Where do we go? What do we do? Much fizzle, and not much focus. Again, allow me to urge that we organize concretely in our neighborhoods and communities, and that as we gain sympathetic ears and as our numbers grow, there might come a time when it turns out that there is even a congressional district with numerous people who think Robert and Hugh are just the kinds of men who, with the help of dialogue coaches, hair dressers, and a roomful of spinsters, could win seats in government.
There are numerous options for all of us, and not all of us have to pursue the same; but to co-ordinate our actions, even at a distance--Robert and Hugh would do poorly with my public support--we can do some great thing.
"The creed of nonviolence that is espoused in the Qur'an" writes Michael C. Branigan, author of a textbook on "Ethics Across Cultures." Would he care to point to the particular suras, and the particular verses, that espouse the "creed of nonviolence," for they seem to have slipped my mind, and try as I find to locate them, on-line, at www.usc.edu, I cannot. And certainly any student taking a course where this textbook by Michael C. Branigan is assigned, any professor now wondering whether to adopt this book for course use or to sell it back to the bookstore along with that accumulating pile of examination copies that can be so profitably turned in (or handed out like party favors, perhaps to that povera ma bella studentessa he has had his eyes on), or any administrator, or college alumnus, or potential donor, who wishes to investigate whether this book by Michael C. Branigan may onstitute educational malpractice, will also have no difficulty, not only in reading the Qur'an on line and looking busily for those passages that preach the "creed of nonviolence" -- yes, Muhammad was there before Gandhi, before Martin Luther King, and no doubt he was also the inspiration for Albert Schweitzer's "Reverence for LIfe" while we're at it -- and they can also consult the hadith or sira.
What's that, Michael C. Branigan asks? The "hadith"? The "sira"? I thought it was just the Qur'an that mattered.
Spare us. Do not adopt the book. If you are a member of the tenured "protected peoples" tell McGraw-Hill that you do not approve of this choice, and that it may effect your faith in the quality of their other textbooks as well, which you had previously been considering for adoption but...
See if that ever-helpful publisher's representative, the one who comes by the college every so often, and distributes the free books, and wants to accoommodate your every need, will take back to base camp the news that this book, or these passages in that book, are causing just a little restlessness among the natives. Remember, no appeal to the truth matters -- all that matters is that you do them sufficient economic damage to get their attention, and their cooperation. That is it.
Oh, as for the professor wondering whether to adopt that book or give it to that studentessa I mentioned above -- don't adopt it, but give it to her. She'll be so pleased. And yes, we've heard the rules of the game have changed, and yes, the Mrs. Grundys on the Faculty Oversight Committee have cramped your freewheeling style, but you'll find a way. And what are "Ethics" textbooks for, if not to provide a textbook case for the professor, of an example of situational ethics.
"The creed of nonviolence that is espoused in the Qur'an" writes Michael C. Branigan, author of a textbook on "Ethics Across Cultures." Would he care to point to the particular suras, and the particular verses, that espouse the "creed of nonviolence," for they seem to have slipped my mind, and try as I find to locate them, on-line, at www.usc.edu, I cannot. And certainly any student taking a course where this textbook by Michael C. Branigan is assigned, any professor now wondering whether to adopt this book for course use or to sell it back to the bookstore along with that accumulating pile of examination copies that can be so profitably turned in (or handed out like party favors, perhaps to that povera ma bella studentessa he has had his eyes on), or any administrator, or college alumnus, or potential donor, who wishes to investigate whether this book by Michael C. Branigan may onstitute educational malpractice, will also have no difficulty, not only in reading the Qur'an on line and looking busily for those passages that preach the "creed of nonviolence" -- yes, Muhammad was there before Gandhi, before Martin Luther King, and no doubt he was also the inspiration for Albert Schweitzer's "Reverence for LIfe" while we're at it -- and they can also consult the hadith or sira.
What's that, Michael C. Branigan asks? The "hadith"? The "sira"? I thought it was just the Qur'an that mattered.
Spare us. Do not adopt the book. If you are a member of the tenured "protected peoples" tell McGraw-Hill that you do not approve of this choice, and that it may effect your faith in the quality of their other textbooks as well, which you had previously been considering for adoption but...
See if that ever-helpful publisher's representative, the one who comes by the college every so often, and distributes the free books, and wants to accoommodate your every need, will take back to base camp the news that this book, or these passages in that book, are causing just a little restlessness among the natives. Remember, no appeal to the truth matters -- all that matters is that you do them sufficient economic damage to get their attention, and their cooperation. That is it.
Oh, as for the professor wondering whether to adopt that book or give it to that studentessa I mentioned above -- don't adopt it, but give it to her. She'll be so pleased. And yes, we've heard the rules of the game have changed, and yes, the Mrs. Grundys on the Faculty Oversight Committee have cramped your freewheeling style, but you'll find a way. And what are "Ethics" textbooks for, if not to provide a textbook case for the professor, an example of situational ethics.
hugh, thank you for your posts. I always enjoy them.
sonofwalker, a call to action is what I want to hear, but how? I'm trying to educate myself, and join the front of the U.S. cultural battle (which in my opinion is another front of our battle against Islam). I've encouraged my family to JW as well. But what else can I do? If I knew of an organization near me, I'd join. But in my neighborhood there are only peace, love, and anything-goes groups.
I know the answer. Start the group myself. But I'm too chicken, and besides, wouldn't know how to focus the group if i started one. Just slit this infidel's throat now and get it over with.
One fundamental non-equivalence between Islam and the Bible:
One thing that all should note about the Torah's commands to exterminate the Amalekites and Canaanites is that the Israelites were also warned that should they practice the same abominations, they, too, would be thrown out of the land of Canaan. The historical narrative of the OT from Genesis through II Kings is an extended commentary on this--albeit of historical anecdoate rather than exposition. This warning concerning covenant-breaking is the key to the prophets who spoke before the exile.
I see no such sacred soul-searching in Islam.