Thank-you Alan Caruba for speaking the truth.

"Islam’s Lethal Certitude" is going to be its lethal ending.

Posted by: bigcatgirl13106 at June 28, 2006 8:23 AM

"...the enemies of Islam are to be beheaded..."

In order to match the psychological condition of the followers of Islam.

No doubt.

Posted by: profitsbeard at June 28, 2006 8:42 AM

These muslims don't want peace anywhere. Not even amongst themselves. They fight each other. Of course, they involve themselves with each other, such as beating another's wife or daughter if not properly covered. They put fatwa's against other muslims for the most idiotic reasons. They blow each other up. They enslave others. They rape each others children. Plus, they worship a murdering pedophile that says it's ok to do all this and then lie about it.

And we're supposed to be ok with this and let them live among us?

Posted by: freewoman at June 28, 2006 8:46 AM

The appeal of Islam to the psychically marginal in the West is based partly on that assurance of certitude. Just imagine: you trade debilitating individualism, your status as a poor wandering and lonely Leibnizian monad, for a role as a recruit in the army of Islam, with those "brothers" to whom you owe your sole loyalty (and they, in turn, owe their sole loyalty to you) for you are all part of one big rally, or prayer-group, prostrating yourselves together, ideally always together, turned, all of you, Qiblawards at the same time (in your time zone, of course), and reading the same Guide to the Universe, the One Book That Explains It All To You. Certitude, certitude, certitude. Don't engage in your own free inquiry. No skepticism needed, and not accepted. Ask Mr. Fatwa and he will tell you. Someone else will tell you what Allah wants, needs, forbids, commands. And Allah knows best. One handy package gives you the Total Regulation of Life and the Complete Explanation of the Universe or, if you prefer, the Complete Regulation of Life, and the Total Explanation of the Universe.

What could be better?

Posted by: Hugh at June 28, 2006 9:33 AM

Re: Islam’s Lethal Certitude

I've noticed this. Many Muslims treat beliefs as if they are facts. A true faith is well aware that a religious belief is not a fact, that fanatical certainty is not faith. Faith must have some doubt, some skeptacism, to be rational-to be human. Once the skeptical mind is abandoned a person may comiite the most horrible crimes and delude themselves that they are God's agents on earth.

I believe that God does not give us certainty in this life so that we will seek out other human hearts and that He will reveal Himself through men and women of good will. He wants us to remain human in this life. Certainty is God's realm (only He can handle the whole truth). We are falible, sinful, with minds that are prone to bully (and not reason).

To be aware of how human and mistake prone we are is to heed God. To accept uncertainty-to be human and to have faith in God is as good as it gets on earth. Fanatical certainty kills our humanity-it does violence to our nature, to God's work.

We must have faith.

Posted by: Frank at June 28, 2006 9:37 AM

Dear Robert,

Thank you for this excellent article. Islam's certitude is yet another example of it's basic and fundamental intolerance. And why we non-muslims have such a hard time comprehending how this belief system works.

And it isn't just us Westeners who have a hard time understanding. I've read several articles by Hindus who confront this and they too find it hard to comprehend. Any civilized people will have a problem with Islam's arrogance and certitude. Which is why we in the West must stand with India, Thailand and any civilized nation facing the Islamic peril.

Freewoman, you make an excellent observation. Even among themselves Muslims are looking for reasons to fight, kill, maim and make the lives of others miserable. Conversion to Islam is no guarantee of peace and tolerance from Muslims.

Posted by: Proud Infidel at June 28, 2006 9:49 AM

Someone who read my above comment liked the thought but told me to use spell-check. Being a mistake-prone human-I'll do that in the future-and even spell "skepticism" right. I should not act with such certitude and use spell-check.

Posted by: Frank at June 28, 2006 10:20 AM

Part of this self-defeating Western mindset is that it does not understand that to our fanatical enemies, there is a big difference between an original grievance and a goal.

Originally, Hitler came to power in Germany by feeding on resentment over the Versailles Treaty, and the social dislocations caused by hyperinflation and then the Great Depression. But even after he tore up the Versailles Treaty and got the German economy going again, Hitler was not content to stop there. He went way beyond that, with a radical program that would remake all of Europe, and maybe all of the world too.

Today, we hear the same thing from Leftists about the "legitimate grievances" of the Islamists: the alleged "oppression" of the Palestinians or U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia or whatnot. But, as the 9-11 Commission noted, the newly empowered Islamist fanatics are no longer just interested in addressing grievances. They too have a radical program for this world that they are starting to put into effect.

I would remind the Leftists that some in their number are the same way: The neo-Communists of the International Action Center, for example, rail against Bush and the Iraq War as their immediate grievances. But even a cursory look at their website and writings shows that they have a long-term goal that goes way beyond today's events: socialism.

Posted by: Steven L. at June 28, 2006 10:41 AM

"Everything that preceded the Koran was the 'accumulated debris; beliefs, concepts, philosophies, myths, thoughts, doubts, superstitions, customs and traditions'.”

Doesn't this statement undermine some basic foundations of islam - didn't mohamod "absorb" (steal...) existing Judeo-Christian prophets and use them in his fabrication?

Another case of "trying to have it both ways - oh, and if you disagree with me having it both ways, then I'll call you a racist, a bigot, slander you, libel you and eventually cut off your head because you 'insulted' the one true religion."

How's your next book coming, Robert?!

Thank you all for your work!

Posted by: oregonjack at June 28, 2006 10:41 AM

Yup, these Moslems are certainly unfamiliar with the sweat lodge, the spirit quest, the lion's roar, the armed knight riding alone into the forest there where the trees are thickest, amor, following one's own star and not anothers.

Posted by: bobalharb at June 28, 2006 10:59 AM

Islam greatest contribution is savagery. I was a dhimmi in the land of Islam, and have seen enough. Muslims win debat by cutting the infidels' tongue.

Posted by: ssa at June 28, 2006 11:37 AM

"Fe que no duda es fe muerta."

[translation:] "Faith which does not doubt is a dead faith."

Miguel de Unamuno, Spanish Catholic philosopher (1864-1936)

"This people doesn't go beyond primary colors, especially white and black: it ever sees the world following a straight line. A people filled with certitude, despising doubt -- that modern crown of thorns of the Western man. An Arab [i.e., Muslim] isn't capable of comprehending our metaphysical difficulties, the questions that we pose for ourselves. The Arab knows not but that which is true, and that which is not, that which one believes, and that which one doesn't: all our hesitations, our reservations, are foreign to them. It is not only the Arabs' view that abides in the black-and-white; it is also their interior equipment. Their thoughts pass with the greatest facility from one extreme to the other. They move spontaneously among superlatives. Sometimes, the greatest inconsistencies seem, by them, to be seized en bloc. They exclude all compromise and follow the logic of their ideas to the absurd conclusion, without seeing anything incompatible among their opposed conclusions. Their serene judgment oscillates with sangfroid from asymptote to asymptote so imperturbably that they seem hardly conscious of their vertiginous leap from the one to the other."

-- T(homas) E(dward) Lawrence ("Lawrence of Arabia") (1888-1935)

"The strength of the West lies in its rich, complex, disturbing, problematic, yet ultimately progressive openness to doubt, skepticism and free inquiry -- and in facing all the difficulties and problems and anxieties this unavoidably opens up with more maturity and grace than any other culture in history."

-- Television, 1956-2056

Posted by: Television at June 28, 2006 11:53 AM

I think that Qutb was a closet homosexual. He was celebate and never married. I've seen other people shroud themselves in Christianity for years, beating themselves up over their hidden sin, only to come out years later as gay. Perhaps this guy went so extreme the other way trying to hide his secret delight in the young smooth American male buttocks of the 1950's, that he had to remind himself daily that he hated the thing that was making him want to commit this "deadly sin". The homoerotica is self evident here today with islam: the misogyny, the "hiding" of women under burqas, the muslim "brotherhood". Do we ever see Osama or Zawahiri with some women tucked under their arms? These guys just need a nice good cry under the strong arms of someone like Ian McKellan, or Rupert Everett. That! Is the way to fix Islam.

Posted by: Tomilio at June 28, 2006 11:55 AM

TV-

Pretty good comment. I am competitive by nature so when I give complement it's not easy and it is meant.

Posted by: Frank at June 28, 2006 1:01 PM

Have been reading speculation lately--that is all it is--that St. Paul may have been a closet homosexual. His thorn in the flesh, etc. If so, he found acceptance and love in Jesus, and did not go Qutb's way.

Posted by: bobalharb at June 28, 2006 1:06 PM

Muslim peace. Remember that for Muslims, peace isn't the absence of war, controversy, or struggle, or even "peace of mind". Peace is the "absence of enemies".

Enemies are absent when made into friends -- the Koran mandates Muslims to make friends of non-Muslims. Thus friends must be Muslims. Muslims fuss among themselves as to what makes a "real Muslim'. Conversion or reversion to true or pure Islam will make on a possible friend.

Neutralizing those that refuse to convert or revert will eliminate enemies. Neutralizing through the process of dhimmification, or creating "useful idiots", making powerless, or the final solution, death, will at least keep enemies in check or make them ineffective.

Islam will always be at war because the above conditions will never be met as human nature rebels against tyranny.

Posted by: Eleanor at June 28, 2006 4:14 PM

Qutb's epiphany about the decadence of american life was described in that informative, if wrongheaded, series of documantaries,

"One summer night, he went to a dance at a local church hall. He later wrote that what he saw that night crystallized his vision. He talks about how the pastor played on the gramophone one of the big-band hits of the day, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” He dimmed the lights so as to create a dreamy, romantic effect. And then, Qutb says that “chests met chests, arms circled waists, and the hall was full of lust and love.”
To most people watching this dance, it would have been an innocent picture of youthful happiness. But Qutb saw something else: the dancers in front of him were tragic lost souls. They believed that they were free. But in reality, they were trapped by their own selfish and greedy desires. American society was not going forwards; it was taking people backwards. They were becoming isolated beings, driven by primitive animal forces. Such creatures, Qutb believed, could corrode the very bonds that held society together. And he became determined that night to prevent this culture of selfish individualism taking over his own country.

Posted by: wallyUK at June 28, 2006 6:50 PM

The documentary whose name I forgot to enter, was 'The power of nightmares'

Posted by: wallyUK at June 28, 2006 6:52 PM

wallyUK-

That's the sub-title of the oldest Koran.

Posted by: profitsbeard at June 28, 2006 8:07 PM

wally,

You didn't supply the most important part of that incident about Qutb: he was witnessing a dance in the late 1940s!!! Most Muslims still have Qutb's mentality now in 2006. Imagine what they must think and feel seeing hip-hop dancing with girls gyrating their pelvises mimicking copulation etc. or -- since we are already 30 years past Woodstock by now -- "world music" fairs where shirtless men and women in halter tops or bikini tops are writhing together under the sun to pulsating pagan African-Caribbean-Hindu rhythms. The perennial Qutb mentality of most Muslims must, in the 21st century, be on the verge of imploding at such sights.

Posted by: Television at June 28, 2006 8:27 PM

A poster above mentions Qutb's revulsion at the sight of American square dancers at church socials. Here's a bit replayed from December 24, 2005:

"You know that Qutb, the spiritual father of so many now running around in Iraq and Afghanistan today (not to mention London, Paris, and Rome), wrote his Signposts Along the Way (Ma-alim fi al-tariq) partly prompted by his disgust with the West. And that disgust was the result of two years he spent in the United States in the late 1940s. How decadent it all was, how thoroughly un-Islamic. And do you remember what it was that offended him the most? It was the horrifying spectacle of a church social, and a square dance sponsored by a church -- where American girls and boys could swing their partners and do-si-do, and try not to step on your neighbor's toe, and now promenade. The horror, the sheer horror of it!

But I recently came across in a dusty bookstore, the kind where you find in the backroom a certain forgotten book that, once you realize its contents, leads you on a frightening journey into the deep dark past, or perhaps causes you to live in fear for your life, as others, afraid of what you have discovered in that manuscript, begin to chase you down (in either case, Soon To Be A Major Motion Picture), a book that prompted me to think of Sayyid Qutb. No, I am not speaking of the Qur'an -- though some will no doubt attribute Qutb's behavior to his fervent belief in the Qur'an and Sunnah.

The book I have in mind, one which I recently bought, is called Honor Your Partner. It is described as "Eighty-one American Square, Circle and Contra Dances, with Complete Instructions for Doing Them," compiled by Ed Durlacher, with musical arrangements by Ken MacDonald and photography by Dr. Ira Zasloff. It was published by Devin-Adair in 1949, while Qutb was in this country, seeing that fiendish and insensate whirl of boy and girl. It was a sight he could never forget.

Check out the book yourself. You will not believe the things you find therein. I would like to draw your attention in particular to "A Word to the Caller" and the "rules to all dancers for a successful evening":

(1) When instructions are being given DO be quiet so that all may hear and understand.
(2) Each person will be dancing with three or more others. One person can spoil the dance for everyone by being a "showoff" or ill-mannered.

(3) Have a GOOD time.

That last -- "Have a GOOD time" -- is particularly disturbing. What would Bin Laden, what would Ayatollah Khomeini, what would al-Qaradawi, what would Hassan al-Banna, what would al-Ghazzali, what would the earliest caliphs, say about that -- "Have a GOOD Time"?

No wonder Qutb went home, intent on preaching Jihad. Don't, as is fashionable, blame American "racism." Blame those square-dance fiends. Blame all those who preach "Have a GOOD time." Blame Ed Durlacher."

Posted by: Hugh at June 28, 2006 8:50 PM

Hugh-

Thank Allah Qutb never saw the Round Dance!

"Round dancing is a fun, social activity, where couples dance synchronously to cued choreographed routines that exercise the body, mind and soul."

Using all styles of music, unlike their more "country" Square Dance roots.

Can't have that!

It would've been a Zoot Suit Jihad!

Posted by: profitsbeard at June 28, 2006 9:57 PM

Qutb became radicalized after spending a few years in an innocent, pristine America, an America that now exists only in photo albums, history books, and the memories of a few people. Imagine the effects of present-day America on pious, holier-than-everyone muslim immigrants.

How many Qutbs have landed in our country, invited by the naive and ignorant diversity freaks who make immigration law? How many ticking timebombs, cleverly disguised as innocuous muslims, cross our paths every day? When they decide that our decadence and corruption are intolerable, that their Islamic sanctuaries do not sufficiently isolate them from our wicked culture, what will they do?

I think we all know what they will do, we just don't know when or where. So obviously the solution to this irremedial dilemma is to let almost twenty thousand Saudis join the umma in America. Twenty thousand this year; thirty thousand next year? What difference will twenty or thirty thousand sullen, arrogant, supremacist Wahabbis make in our huge country of almost 300 million?

Posted by: Susanp at June 28, 2006 11:50 PM

No wonder most of their countries look like the Flintstone's Bedrock or worse

Posted by: Dumbo at June 29, 2006 9:21 AM

Susanp sez

"...invited by the naive and ignorant diversity freaks who make immigration law?"

I'm not sure the immigration officials are diversity freaks. I am much more concerned about Mohammedan infiltration in the immigration offices and the subversive activities these moles are engaged in....

Posted by: sheik yer'mami at June 29, 2006 6:47 PM