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"Scholar: Religion not driving violence," from the Richmond Times-Dispatch, with thanks to all who sent this in:
Islam is neither more violent nor more peaceful than other religions, a Middle East scholar said here Monday.
This is an extremely common view, but repetition doesn't make it so. It would be interestng to see Berkey address passages of the Qur'an such as 9:5 and 9:29, which -- contrary to popular belief -- have no equivalent in any other religious tradition, as well as the material from the Hadith and the legal superstructure that has grown up around the notion of jihad warfare in Islam.
The wave of violence in the Muslim world is being driven by political, social and economic problems, not by religion, Jonathan P. Berkey, a professor of history at Davidson College, told the audience at a program co-sponsored by the Council for America's First Freedom and the World Affairs Council of Greater Richmond."Religious ideology is really a kind of ex post facto justification for the violence," Berkey said.
"The problem is not that Muslims are hopelessly committed to wage jihad as holy war against the rest of us," he said. "The fundamental problem has to do with the failure of the secular ideology of government which has dominated the Muslim world since the first world war."
Then why did Muslims wage war before they suffered under secular ideologies? Why did the old Islamic empires wage jihad, before anyone had ever heard of a secular ideology? Why are the chief promoters of jihad today Saudi Arabia and Iran -- hardly states where Muslims are suffering under failed secular ideologies?
Berkey said American policy in the Middle East is partly responsible for the frustrations that have led to the violence."As a historian, I cannot think of a single instance in the last 50 years in which the American government has consistently . . . supported democratic forces in the Arab world," he said....
As a historian, you should be ready to explain why the history of jihad is much older than 50 years, and tell us what that fact does to your idea that America is responsible for this.
While Berkey said he does not see the current violence as a clash of civilizations, he said he is concerned that the current "us against them" rhetoric will develop a life of its own."We are going to make this a clash of civilizations, this unrelenting jihad, this brutal crusade, whether we think of it in religious or secular terms," he said, "something that we, our children and our grandchildren are going to have to live with for generations to come."
We are going to make this into a clash of civilizations? As Tonto once said, "What mean 'we?'" I suppose we are responsible for rhetoric like this?
The Mideast and most of the Islamic world have been ruled since the last century by secular regimes, regimes that in many ways were Western in form and in cultural orientation, Berkey said. He noted that Saddam's Ba'ath Party was founded by a Syrian Christian.
10 to 1 Berkey did not note that that Syrian Christian, Michel Aflaq, ultimately became a Muslim, saying that Arab nationalism is Islam.
Posted by Robert at May 17, 2005 6:56 AM
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'this brutal crusade'
What brutal crusade?
Does anyone wonder why I keep at this aspect of Dhimmitude in the Academia?
The distinction between education and indoctrination:
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=17621
Further info on Indoctrination in the schools:
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=17965
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at May 17, 2005 7:43 AM
Giaour, kj, need your input here. See, this is sort of what I've been at: When a secular government takes over (as in, say, 1792 France), things seem to go down the tubes in a rush (The Terror).
I'm not being tongue-in-cheek or argumentive here. I would like to hear your arguments why this Berkey is Wrong.
Posted by: Gary at May 17, 2005 7:49 AM
Re Gary:
Secular governments go 'in the tubes'?
For starters America was intended to be a secular government (no mention of God in your Consitution) and it still stands despite recnt efforts. Japan is the most secular country in the world today and the most stable by many estimations.
Compare also India with Pakistan. One secular, one religious. One a stable democracy for sixty years, the other an on-and-off military-dictatorship.
Berkey was referring to Arab nationalism when he mentions the 'the secular ideology of government' at play. The problem is that none of these Arab governments are really secular. They all have blasphemy laws, morality codes, etc. which derive from a particular religous doctrine. Egypt for example has "Islamic" in its official name.
Many snide conservatives seem to think that Communism, the French revolution and their crimes make for an indictment of 'secularism'. What they fail to see is that the people involved in these cases made their ostensibly secular views into a new atheistic religion complete with saints (Lenin), apostates (Trotsky) and venerabale books (Marx).
The real issue is not whether one believes in god or not but whether blind faith (of any kind) goes above reason in human affairs. Exclusivity in faith is always servicable by evil intentions.
Would you Gary rather live in secular Europe or Europe at the height of Papal theocratic influence in the Middle Ages or even Cromwell's Engalnd?
Posted by: kali at May 17, 2005 9:31 AM
'What they fail to see is that the people involved in these cases made their ostensibly secular views into a new atheistic religion complete with saints (Lenin), apostates (Trotsky) and venerabale books (Marx). ' ~ Kali
But that is exactly my point. In an attempt to surplant the religions they blamed (at least on some level) for their circumstances, they tried to create a new religion. What are the assurances it can't happen again? Would it not be better to guarantee a Right to worship as one sees fit, so long as that person's faith doesn't work it's way into government? And vice-versa.
Further question: Wasn't the UN supposed to be a secular body? And hasn't it at least partially been hijacked by one religion, namely that of the jihadists?
at May 17, 2005 10:03 AM
By Berkey's reasoning, the Bashaw of Tripoli declared a jihad on the United States of America in 1801 in anticipation of the political, social and economic oppression that the United States would inflict upon the Arab world a century in the future. I remind my fellow scholar that prior to the Barbary depradations in the 1790s the United States did not even have a standing navy. Congress reluctantly agreed to authorize the construction of the first six American frigates in direct response to the acts of war perpetrated against the United States by the Barbary navies. Lest anyone harbor any fairytale images of pirates of the Mediterranean like they do pirates of the Caribbean, the Barbary navies were composed of warships with officers in uniform operating under the command of admirals who reported up a chain of command that led to the capital of the Ottoman empire. These were no mere undisciplined gangs of seaborne thieves. The Barbary States were engaging in classic unprovoked state-sponsored acts of war upon peaceful nations, the infant United States being a perfect victim. The Barbary governments never declared "war" however, they had a much more refined word for what they were doing: jihad.
It is interesting to note that the USS Constitution ("Old Ironsides"), one of the original six vessels of the new United States Navy, still in commission today, was built as a direct result of jihad-inspired attacks upon the peaceful merchant vessels sailing under the flag of the United States. The authorization to form the United States Marine Corps was simultaneously enacted by Congress when the Navy was created. It is thus apropos that the very first verse of the Marine Corps Hymn contains explicit reference to the "shores of Tripoli".
Posted by: DrMack at May 17, 2005 10:47 AM
I officially nominate Berkey as an honorary DHIMMI.
Posted by: nuh at May 17, 2005 10:55 AM
"Islam is n[ot] more violent....than other religions?"
Is this an pathetica attempt at mere legalistic hair-splitting of the: "it depends on what your definition of 'is' is" type of conceptual bamboozling?
Islam, as a religion, breeds violent lunatics who quote its calls to kill infidels for the faith.
Other religions, at present, do not.
Thus, Berkey is a liar.
And, for that, a squalid, slimy, seditious scumbag.
Posted by: BigSleep at May 17, 2005 12:01 PM
Re Gary: "Would it not be better to guarantee a Right to worship as one sees fit, so long as that person's faith doesn't work it's way into government? And vice-versa."
Yes, of course, but is not that the accepted definition of secular democracy? That is what India and the US both are by their constituitions.
Although I feel it is important that citizens have the right to be free from religion in the public social sphere. Look at the article posted today on the beating of the gay man in Amsterdam, what good was Dutch law to him if the Muslims enforce their 'morals' means outside the law. People will never agree of faith so you must encourage to be kept private.
Posted by: kali at May 17, 2005 12:34 PM
There have been a handful of attempts at semi-secular government in recent Muslim history: Turkey, Indonesia, Morocco, Tunisia, Iraq, Egypt.
All these have tried to secularize, in varying degrees (Turkey succeeding the most, for certain periods of time since the enlightened revolution of the West-inspired Ataturk in the 1920s).
However, every one of these Muslim attempts at secularization has required degrees of dictatorship, often quite brutal and oppressive (Iraq under Saddam being the worst; Ataturk and the Shah of Iran being the best).
The main reason why Muslim attempts at secularization have required oppressive dictatorship? Answer: that's the only way to control grass-roots Islam.
That is one main reason why the USA (and previously, the Western Colonial Empires of Britain, France, Spain, the Netherlands) has often supported Muslim despots & dictators -- because the alternative would be worse: the will of the Muslim people is for totalitarian fascistic theocracy that hates the West and expresses this through an ideology of perpetual jihad.
Posted by: metaxy at May 17, 2005 1:31 PM
'Yes, of course, but is not that the accepted definition of secular democracy? That is what India and the US both are by their constituitions.' ~ Kali
*nods* I understand. And of course the same thing can be said......... sort of!... when it comes to those two thugs who beat that kid and left him to die on the fence.
That is Not, of course, the proper interpretation of the Bible. Not in my book! (again, bad pun, sorry). But I do see your point.
That does however leave freedom of speech. One can talk about the Koran all they want in today's schools, for example- but if one so much as wears a 'What would Jesus do?' T-shirt to school, their freedom of expression goes right to the principal's office. That's part of the problem I have with some of the thinking being used today, which goes right back to what has happened in the past- how does one prevent the Wrong people/thinking, from taking control? There is fair to Everyone, and then there is 'Your turn to suffer, whether you like it or not.'
I'm learning. And leaning towards the view held by my best friend and Best Man at my wedding- It doesn't matter Who is in government, the whole lot, right left and libertarian, are out to lord it over the rest of us.
But! This is just another reason we have to keep bringing teachers like that one to the public's attention. By his blaming secularism, yet another foothold is being given to the jihadists.
Posted by: Gary at May 17, 2005 1:53 PM
Metaxy is right. Support the "not-so-bads" to control the "bads".
Posted by: Ibn Rushd at May 17, 2005 1:54 PM
For a time, the US marginally supported Saddam Hussein, under the logic of supporting the lesser evil against the worse evil (at the time, Iran). At that time, we also had less awareness of both Saddam's egregious brutality (unusual in its degree even in that barbaric region of the world), and his crafty support of anti-American jihadists.
However, it is interesting to note that, even though Saddam found it necessary to be unusually brutal against his own Muslim populations (since they were fundamentally & religiously opposed to his quasi-secularist Socialism, not because they were opposed to brutal rule in principle), he still found himself compelled to make significant concessions to Muslim puritanism: beginning in the late 80s, Saddam made prostitution a capital offense, and many prostitutes were beheaded and their severed heads displayed in public: Saddam did this to placate the Muslims, not because he himself was morally against prostitution.
One point here being that even a dictator as brutal as Saddam, with as much near-total control as he had, found it necessary to give in to some of the Muslim demands -- THAT IS HOW DEEPLY, PROFOUNDLY, AND SOCIALLY WIDESPREAD ISLAMIC INTOLERANCE IS IN ANY GIVEN REGION WHERE MUSLIMS HAVE TAKEN CULTURAL ROOT.
at May 17, 2005 2:29 PM
Supporting the 'not so bads' in Uzbekistan may have been the right decision at the time.
But, I wonder how we'll be perceived if their own 'bads' take over, and it turns out the Uzbek government was 'badder' than suspected.
Posted by: PRCS at May 17, 2005 5:23 PM
I have a few questions:
Does Dr. Berkey speak for Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri and Abu Mousab al-Zarqawi? How about Mohammed Atta, who wrote in his suicide note "Remember this is a battle for the sake of God." How about all the other proud jihadis who have made no secret of their ideological motivations?
When we look at the violence in the Middle East, what are we looking at? We're looking at internal sectarian violence and international terrorism. Who's driving that violence? What motivates a takfir-spewing Wahhabi like Zarqawi to blow up a Shiite funeral procession in Iraq? Why would he attack the nation's oil infrastructure if he was worried about the economic well-being of the Iraqi people? And what of bin Laden? Scholars rangeing from Bat Ye'or to Bernard Lewis outright reject the notion that OBL's motives are anything other than ideological (although we should not leave out egotistical, as well).
The sectarian violence is ideology driven. The international terrorism is ideology driven. It's the economics that are an after-thought, not "religion".
Moving on, weren't the nationalist-socialist thugocracies that Berkey refers to (Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Libya, etc.) Soviet client states? Why is he barking at the US about them? Yeah they failed, like their Red patron. On the other hand Israel, who chose democracy and free enterprise, is the most prosperous and powerful state in the region. What does that tell you??
And didn't the decline of Islamic civilization really begin when Jan Sobieski drove the Ottomans from the gates of Vienna followed by the signing of the Treaty of Carlowitz? Where was the United States in 1699?
How is religion "ex post facto"??
How is the United States responsible for internal cultural deficiencies that have rendered the Islamic world uncompetitive in the modern world??
Oh, and did I mention a certain law professor at the University of Richmond is a big cheese in the group that invited Dr. Berkey to Richmond? Some of us might remember her from a whopper of a speech she gave at the UN Islamophobia Fair recently...
Posted by: Mike at May 17, 2005 8:40 PM
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