"On Islam: A Reply to Rick Brookhiser," by Andrew Bostom at The Corner, November 11 -- a most illuminating exchange.
Responding to an e-mail query I posed to him about a Corner post on October 26, Rick Brookhiser (on November 3) claimed: "My correspondent [Bostom] and the Islamists say that Islam is unchanging, because the Koran says so."First, let me point out that Mr. Brookhiser has equated me with the wrong "Islamists." Through at least the mid-1950s, dedicated students of Islamic doctrine and history — such as myself — were still referred to as “Islamists.” This “Islamism” helped me to understand, in detail, the other “Islamists” somewhat better than Mr. Brookhiser does.
In 19th-century parlance, “Islamism” and “Islam” were synonymous, and meant to be equivalent to “Catholicism,” “Protestantism,” and “Judaism” — not to “radical” or “fundamentalist” sects of any of these religions. Sir Henry Layard, the British archeologist, writer, and diplomat, described an abhorrent spectacle of such “Islamism” (i.e., Islam) that he witnessed in the heart of Istanbul, during the autumn of 1843:An Armenian who had embraced Islamism [i.e., Islam] had returned to his former faith. For his apostasy he was condemned to death according to the Mohammedan law. His execution took place, accompanied by details of studied insult and indignity directed against Christianity and Europeans in general. The corpse was exposed in one of the most public and frequented places in Stamboul, and the head, which had been severed from the body, was placed upon it, covered by a European hat. [Early Adventures in Persia, Susiana, and Babylonia, London, 1887, pp. 454-55.]
Mr. Brookhiser’s glib November 3 post replying to my e-mail omitted mention of a published essay I had included that covers the historic nature of punishment for blasphemy under Islamic Law. This detailed piece debunks his assumption that the desire to impose Islamic blasphemy law is somehow limited to a present-era “radical” version of Islam. According to Brookhiser, “the practice of Islam changed during the twentieth century, and even in her [i.e., Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s] lifetime, thanks to the evangelizing of the Muslim Brotherhood, and the agendas of Saudi Arabia and post-Shah Iran.” Here, from my February 2008 essay, is an explanation of how much, sadly, has not changed:
Even in that purely mythical paragon of Islamic ecumenism, Andalusia, Charles Emmanuel Dufourcq, a pre-eminent scholar of Muslim Spain, observed that the myriad religious and legal discriminations suffered by non-Muslim dhimmis (i.e., the non-Muslim Iberian populations vanquished by jihad, and governed by Islamic law, Shari’a), included lethal punishments for “blaspheming” the Muslim prophet, or the Koran: “[For] having insulted the Prophet or blasphemed against the Word of God (i.e., The Koran)-dhimmis were executed.”
"My correspondent [Bostom] and the Islamists say that Islam is unchanging, because the Koran says so."
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Repellant. And Bostom is hardly the only Cassandra who has been—bizarrely—made morally equivalent to Islamists merely because he has pointed out irrefutable facts. Robert Spencer has been a frequent victim of this ludicrous comparison, as well.
Let's rephrase the above:
"My correspondent [Winston Churchill] and the Nazis say that National Socialism is anti-Semetic and violently expansionist, because Mein Kampf says so."
I imagine most Westerners would balk at such a characterization, and at such an implied moral equivalency. At least, let's hope they would.
A solid refutation by Bostom. I wonder if Brookhiser will respond at NR. Perhaps he might even admit he was wrong but I don't want to get too hopeful. After all, the refusal to see the elephant in the room has affected even ordinarily sensible folks like Brookhiser. The great illusion (sadly and lethally) continues.