Shadows of the West
"Fundamentalism Begins at Home" by Josie Appleton is part book review, part interview-with-author. I haven't read the book in question, just this walk-around piece. That doesn't meet the minimum requirement for pontification, but the topic is an urgent one and the author's argument seems worth considering.
Good points. The Quran, read selectively, can be used to justify all sorts of behaviors, some of them violently contradicting one another. In that, it's not unlike the Christian Gospels or the Old Testament. The question is, why do some people choose to read it in the most violent and destructive way possible?
Roy's attempt to answer this took him not deep into the mosques of the Middle East and the Wahhabist madrasas, but into the immigrant enclaves of Europe and America. "New-style Islam," Appleton writes, "... is strongest among Muslim immigrants living in Western cities. In fact, far from fundamentalist Islam being a Middle Eastern import into the West, it is increasingly the other way around."
She explains elsewhere in the article:
So far, this makes sense. The reflexive apologists for terrorism say it is a tragic but inevitable outgrowth of rage and despair. If the Americans and the Israelis didn't persist in picking on Muslims/Arabs, so this thinking goes, the Muslims/Arabs wouldn't lash back so violently.
But that runs into two problems: other peoples have been, and continue to be, degraded and dominated yet they do not form suicide bomber cults. And the 9/11 attackers almost to a man (and in many cases the Palestinian suicide bombers) came from relatively successful middle class families and were themselves educated and had the promise of successful career paths.
Instead, the suggestion being made in Roy's book seems to be that there is a serious "dislocation" that comes about when men and women plunge deeply into a religion while disconnected from its social context. V.S. Naipaul, too, has noted this characteristic of Islam, though mostly in examining non-Arab Muslim peoples. The source of the disconnection is different, but the result seems to be the same:
Karen Armstrong, too, in her own way has linked the rise of modernism and the triumph of secularized Western culture with the rise of fundamentalism in the three great monotheistic faiths.
God-stuff is potent. Religion is the insanity that keeps us sane; it is humanity's way of confronting darkness, death, and chaos -- in the world and in human hearts -- without falling into them. That part of religion is only safely practiced inside the firm walls of a community. And the great religions have grown up within communities -- whether Greek polytheism, Judaism, or Arab Islam. To step outside the humanizing web of community, but to practice intensely the religion, is to risk a Dionysian possession that makes what is most horrible into a holy virtue. E.R. Dodds described this 50 years ago in "The Greeks and the Irrational." In our lifetimes, David Koresh lived it out and died in it. So, it seems, did the 9/11 killers.
Near her conclusion, Appleton writes:
And this is where I am wary. It is possible that the violent reaction among some modern Muslims is in part a reaction to conditions in the West, and to the world-dominance of Western culture. That seems to me worth exploring.
But it is easy to take one step too many in that direction and say, "this is all the fault of the West." And now you're into Chomsky-land, and you've lost all decency and perspective. I'll have to go find Roy's book to see if he can walk that tightrope.
After 9/11 the Koran became a bestseller in the West, as readers scoured the text for phrases that might explain the hijackers' actions. Some argued that violence is inherent in Islam; others said that Islam means peace. The 'understanding Islam' industry boomed, with debates, books and pamphlets professing to unearth the mysterious depths of Islamic culture, politics and history.
In Globalised Islam: The Search for a New Ummah, the French sociologist Olivier Roy criticises this 'confused' and 'sterile' debate. 'It is based on an essentialist view', he tells me, 'the idea that Islam is this or that. But you can find anything in Islam. The problem is not what is in the Koran, but what people think is in the Koran.' His concern is to look at the lived reality of Islam, rather than its canonical or historical background. For example, in the book he argues that the idea that Islamic suicide attacks are an attempt to win virgins in paradise is 'not very helpful. Why should Muslims have discovered only in 1983 that suicide attacks are a good way to enter paradise?'
Good points. The Quran, read selectively, can be used to justify all sorts of behaviors, some of them violently contradicting one another. In that, it's not unlike the Christian Gospels or the Old Testament. The question is, why do some people choose to read it in the most violent and destructive way possible?
Roy's attempt to answer this took him not deep into the mosques of the Middle East and the Wahhabist madrasas, but into the immigrant enclaves of Europe and America. "New-style Islam," Appleton writes, "... is strongest among Muslim immigrants living in Western cities. In fact, far from fundamentalist Islam being a Middle Eastern import into the West, it is increasingly the other way around."
She explains elsewhere in the article:
Most of the 9/11 ringleaders were 'born again' Muslims, who went to secular schools, had spent time in the West, and had cut themselves off from their families and communities. Judging by the documents they left behind, they had invented a bizarre set of religious prescriptions for themselves - instructions for the attacks included to 'wear tight socks' and 'blow your breath on yourself and on your belongings.' Such nihilistic violence cannot be understood in conventional religious or political terms - instead, it seems to be an individual's demonstration of the strength of their faith.
So far, this makes sense. The reflexive apologists for terrorism say it is a tragic but inevitable outgrowth of rage and despair. If the Americans and the Israelis didn't persist in picking on Muslims/Arabs, so this thinking goes, the Muslims/Arabs wouldn't lash back so violently.
But that runs into two problems: other peoples have been, and continue to be, degraded and dominated yet they do not form suicide bomber cults. And the 9/11 attackers almost to a man (and in many cases the Palestinian suicide bombers) came from relatively successful middle class families and were themselves educated and had the promise of successful career paths.
Instead, the suggestion being made in Roy's book seems to be that there is a serious "dislocation" that comes about when men and women plunge deeply into a religion while disconnected from its social context. V.S. Naipaul, too, has noted this characteristic of Islam, though mostly in examining non-Arab Muslim peoples. The source of the disconnection is different, but the result seems to be the same:
The disturbance for societies is immense, and even after a thousand years can remain unresolved; the turning away has to be done again and again. People develop fantasies about who and what they are; and in the Islam of converted countries there is an element of neurosis and nihilism. These countries can be easily set on the boil.
Karen Armstrong, too, in her own way has linked the rise of modernism and the triumph of secularized Western culture with the rise of fundamentalism in the three great monotheistic faiths.
God-stuff is potent. Religion is the insanity that keeps us sane; it is humanity's way of confronting darkness, death, and chaos -- in the world and in human hearts -- without falling into them. That part of religion is only safely practiced inside the firm walls of a community. And the great religions have grown up within communities -- whether Greek polytheism, Judaism, or Arab Islam. To step outside the humanizing web of community, but to practice intensely the religion, is to risk a Dionysian possession that makes what is most horrible into a holy virtue. E.R. Dodds described this 50 years ago in "The Greeks and the Irrational." In our lifetimes, David Koresh lived it out and died in it. So, it seems, did the 9/11 killers.
Near her conclusion, Appleton writes:
The new breeds of Islam are really just the shadows cast by the changing shapes of the West. Today, with the old political frameworks gone, the West is unable to furnish the ideologies to go along with the process of Westernisation. Islam is reached for as an age-old gel, to hold things together in a dislocated world. Iran is modernising in reality - the age of marriage is on the rise, as are female literacy rates - but in ideology it is going backwards, with the lowering of the legal marriage age to nine. Educated, well-off young men, with degrees and laptops, imagine that their box-cutters are the equivalent of seventh-century swords.
And this is where I am wary. It is possible that the violent reaction among some modern Muslims is in part a reaction to conditions in the West, and to the world-dominance of Western culture. That seems to me worth exploring.
But it is easy to take one step too many in that direction and say, "this is all the fault of the West." And now you're into Chomsky-land, and you've lost all decency and perspective. I'll have to go find Roy's book to see if he can walk that tightrope.
Labels: Olivier Roy
