Good article. This raises a question for me. Is any kind of traditionalist Islamic society fundamentally sick and inevitably hostile to the West? Also to me at least, this article confirms my view that traditionalism itself needs to be constrained by democracy and constitutional rights, just as democracy and rights need to be constrained by traditional values.

Nonie Darwish has a web site, devoted to “Honest and in-depth analysis of current issues involving Mideast culture and politics from the perspective of a woman of Mideast descent.” A former Moslem who came to the U.S. 25 years ago, she is horrified by the Moslem support for the 9/11 attack, and by much else in the Moslem world as well.

http://www.noniedarwish.com/pages/745434/index.htm

Here’s another interesting article by Nonie Darwish, about the “Berlin Wall” of family/tribal loyalty in the Arab world that trumps truth and morality. I’m struck by the thought that the totalitarian tribalism of Islam (which we have discussed before at VFR) could simply be an extension of Arab familism and tribalism onto a cosmic level by means of religion.

http://www.noniedarwish.com/pages/745435/index.htm

Here are some excerpts from the article:

“Truth, logic, fairness, appreciation of humanity as a whole and striving to find one’s own identity is not of value and practically non-existant. Loyalty to the clan is number one and it does not matter how good or bad your clan is. If Saddam Hussein is head of your clan, you have no choice but to abide. If you dissagree with and abandon the clan no other one would take you in. Membership is strictly given through blood relations and the fact that both clans are Moslem does’nt help much. Dissension guarantees being ostracized.”

“When Arabs/Moslems face the World arena, they find their internal views in conflict with international law and values, and have to put on a different face. Changing one’s religion from Islam to, say, Christianity, is punishable by death. In 1981, Moslem countries pressured the United Nations to water down a declaration on the elimination of religious discrimination, in order that the language used not embarrass them as violators of human rights laws. The original language declaring the right “to adopt” or “change” ones religion was removed and only the right “to have” a religion was kept. The United Nations can be corrupted just like any government; food for thought for those who think one world government is the solution.”

“The father of communism was Karl Marx, a human being who could be found wrong, however long it might take. In the Middle East, on the other hand, they claim that Allah gave them their beliefs and right to Jihad and nothing can be negotiable —ever.”

“Supporting one’s culture is a normal and healthy reaction that citizens of all nations have. However, that is not what I am describing. This support is taken to an extreme among many Moslems who have an us against them mentality. Communists shot at people who tried to escape the Berlin wall. In the Arab World, critics on the inside are coerced into complying without questions. If coercion does not work they are put in jail or even killed. The wall has to hide a woman being shot in a soccer field, female cicumcision, and the killing of girls who have premarital sex, even in the case of rape.”

“I am an American of Middle Eastern descent recovering after jumping the fence of the psychological Arab ‘Berlin Wall’. I am looking at the Middle East from the outside in. This wall is truly ugly from the outside. The few of us who leave the confines of that wall will sometimes feel alienated from our cultural background. However, what a wonderful feeling it is to enjoy our God given freedom to think for ourselves.

“Arabs, tear down this wall!”

Shawn writes:
“Also to me at least, this article confirms my view that traditionalism itself needs to be constrained by democracy and constitutional rights, just as democracy and rights need to be constrained by traditional values.”

It isn’t clear that that follows. Tradition isn’t an abstraction, so the fact that some (or even most) traditions are bad eggs can’t have the implication Shawn claims. One might as well claim that since Osama bin Laden is a human being we’d better keep Mother Theresa under lock and key; clearly a nonsequitir.

I think that what Shawn was trying to get at was that any belief system or tradition needs some reference point outside that belief system in order to avoid going to extremes. This even applies to Christianity. “Render under Caesar.”

Mr. Auster wrote:
‘I think that what Shawn was trying to get at was that any belief system or tradition needs some reference point outside that belief system in order to avoid going to extremes. This even applies to Christianity. “Render under Caesar.”’

That could be, but what he actually said was that governance, even in a traditionalist society, should always be under liberal democracy. I disagree with that prescriptively and I disagree with the premises as already stated.

Darwish’s account of her early life in Arab society should not be assumed to definitively define Arab/Islamic society. Her account is one of someone who has left her faith and society, and hence is a reaction to that tradition.
I could post accounts of American converts to Islam who would decry the corruption, selfishnes, materialism, and basic rot of American society, the confusion, idealism, and dogma of Christianity, while praising the balanced justice, clarity, and good will embodied in Islam.

So Darwish’s account should be taken with a grain of salt. Still, she is no doubt saying more than just her reaction to something, I think that Arab society is at an all time low, and is surely full of tribalism, extremism and general idiocy. However, this does not then mean that Islamic or Arab society has eternally been thus, and in essence is such.

Such an assumption shows that one has already judged Islam and Arabs in all their manifestations in space-time, and is merely using the article to support an otherwise foregone conclusion.

Does RD object to my view of Islam for proceduralist reasons, i.e., that I have judged Islam prematurely, or for substantive reasons, i.e., that my judgment of Islam is objectively wrong?

Either way, I think we know enough about Islam at this point in the discussion to make some general, essentialist judgments about it. Yes, there have occasionally existed more humane and civilized forms of Islam, but that was only to the extent that they were not true Islam. The great Sufi poets, for example, represent a high level of spirituality, but they stand at a distance from Orthodox Islam. I believe the essence of Islam is as it has been described in our previous discussions: a tribal, totalitarian faith that is required to destroy and subjugate everything that is not itself.

“That could be, but what he actually said was that governance, even in a traditionalist society, should always be under liberal democracy.” — Matt

Actually no, thats not what I said at all. If you wish to interpret what I say thats fine, but please don’t claim that your interpretaions are my actual words or intended meanings. I object to that strongly. What I did in fact say was that traditionalism needs to be constrained by democracy and constitutional rights. Nowhere did I use the word “liberal”, and nowhere did I use the word “under”. I said clearly that they both need to be in balance, each constraining the other, while allowing the other sufficient freedom to exist and function. Lawrences’ interpretaion of what I said is spot on. It may be your view that all forms of republican democracy are liberal, but that is not mine. I certainly would not consider republican Rome as a “liberal” society, and in fact pre-Imperial Roman society, both politcally and culturally, is pretty close to my ideal model for any society.

Talk about coincidences, I started to mention the idea of republicanism in my last comment, but left it out, and now Shawn mentions the Roman republic. That’s exactly what was in my head. The key idea of a republic (and Rome of course was the first republic) is that power or sovereignty is not concentrated in one person or in one body, but is distributed and balanced among several offices or bodies within the state. One could make an analogy from this to the idea of the relationship between the spiritual and the temporal. As human beings we live, so to speak, in a republic, negotiating in the creative tension between different forces that pull on us, and striving to find the right balance between them. It is this idea of man as the citizen of a divinely ordered republic, as a being who is both free AND under God, that distinguishes the West from all other cultures.

Now I hope no one jumps on me and says that I’m making the secular equal to the religious. I am not. I am speaking of the idea of giving to each thing its proper weight and function in the whole.

If Shawn is saying that “democracy and constitutional rights” does not refer to liberal democracy as in the U.S. specifically but to any sort of republicanism (presumably back to Plato) in general that is fine, but it doesn’t take a big leap of interpretation to get from the specific phrase he used to liberal democracy as in the U.S. A democracy that is not badly contaminated by liberalism may be possible in theory (for example one in which only the landed aristocracy has a vote), but democracy as practiced for the last few hundred years and specifically in the U.S. has always been liberal to a significant degree.

Shawn’s other objection to my interpretation of his words was my use of “under”. What Shawn actually said was “traditionalism itself needs to be constrained by democracy and constitutional rights” and “democracy and rights need to be constrained by traditional values”; that certainly implies that “democracy and rights” would be the structure and tradition would have to live within it as “values”. It isn’t clear why saying that traditional values have to live under democracy would be a misinterpretation.

What Shawn specifically (seems to) exclude is any sort of political structure other than democracy, and it is this exclusiveness, if in fact that is what he intends, with which I disagree. Simply put I just disagree with his original statement completely. Democracy has certainly not shown itself to be an effective constraint on evil, and indeed as the liturgy of liberal modernism has contributed tremendously to it. The original American experiment self-destructed after a paltry 80 years, and modern democracy doesn’t have a stellar record in preventing, for example, the election of Hitler or the wholesale murder of hundreds of millions (including 40 million innocent unborn in the U.S.) since then. The notion of democracy as an effective constraint on evil is self-delusion.

Mr. Auster says:
“…The key idea of a republic (and Rome of course was the first republic) is that power or sovereignty is not concentrated in one person or in one body, but is distributed and balanced among several offices or bodies within the state.”

But again, Shawn is saying more than that, because he specifically invokes democracy as a necessary component. Feudal distribution of power, localism, etc are all clearly desirable in opposition to concentrated tyranny. Often though democracy produces just the opposite.

” but it doesn’t take a big leap of interpretation to get from the specific phrase he used to liberal democracy as in the U.S.”

Big or small, a leap is a leap.

“but democracy as practiced for the last few hundred years and specifically in the U.S. has always been liberal to a significant degree.”

I disagree. This very much depends on your interpretaion of liberalism. American democracy was not liberal in any way until the 1930’s and especially the 1960’s.

“What Shawn specifically (seems to) exclude is any sort of political structure other than democracy,”

What I exclude is any other political structure other than constitutional republican democracy, or constitutional monarchist democracy as in Britain. No other system has been as succesful in preventing the evils of tyranny, dictatorship and theocracy. See http://www.pattern.com/bennettj-anglosphereprimer.html

Within those basic structures there is plenty of room for debate about exactly what form democracy should take. I persoanally believe that universal suffrage is wrong and that democracy and democratic franchise need to be more severely limited in a number of ways. But the basic structure is right.

“Democracy has certainly not shown itself to be an effective constraint on evil,”

On the contrary, Anglo-democracy, with it’s emphasis on constitutional constraints, distributed power and common law, has shown itself to be a very effective constraint on evil, at least as much as any system can in a fallen world. The advent of cultural Marxism in the 30’s and 60’s was not the result of democracy, and no system would have prevented it’s attack.

” The original American experiment self-destructed after a paltry 80 years,”

The American “experiment” has not self destructed, it remains, even if under attack from Marxism. And it certainly did not happen after 80 years. The argument that Lincoln and the Civil War destroyed the original American system of constitutional government does not wash with me. American democratic republicanism, and the traditional Protestant cultural order, did not come under attack until the 1930’s and the New Deal, and more importantly the 1960’s and the advent of New Left Marxism and the Adversary culture.

“and modern democracy doesn’t have a stellar record in preventing, for example, the election of Hitler”

Invoking the example of the Weimar republic is easy but essentially a false argument. Germany had no tradition of democracy, constitutioanl republicanism, common law, or respect for individual rights. The fact that the Weimar Republic failed is therefore hardly surprising, but says nothing about the system of government that I advocate and that has existed in Britain and America succesfully.

“or the wholesale murder of hundreds of millions (including 40 million innocent unborn in the U.S.) since then.”

The Catholic medieval system was pretty good at the wholesale slaughter of millions, just ask the Jews who were constant victims of Papist feudalism, or ask the Albigensians in France. The world is fallen and man is a sinful creature prone to evil. All we can hope for in this world is to hopefully constrain evil as much as possible. Abortion has always existed, including in medieval times, when it was fairly common. The current problems are the fault of Marxism and the easily availabilty of the procedure made possible by technology. It cannot be blamed on constitutional democracy.

“The notion of democracy as an effective constraint on evil is self-delusion”

In fact as I said above and as the article I posted shows, the Anglo-American tradition of constitutional democratic government has been generally far more effective at constraining evil than any other system in history.

I get the impression that you wish to take away people’s right to choose their own government in order to impose some kind of Catholic theocracy. That to my mind would be an evil in itself, and a form of government little different or better that that which the Taliban imposed. Sorry to be such a thorn in the plans of Roman Papist Imperialism, but we British and Americans like our freedom.

Shawn writes:
“I get the impression that you wish to take away people’s right to choose their own government in order to impose some kind of Catholic theocracy.”

Not at all (if Shawn wanted to know what I think all he had to do is ask). I think that ideally the Church should have its own secular power over the Papal states (securing it military and economic autonomy), and that secular rulers elsewhere should recognize it as authoritative on faith and morals but otherwise govern autonomously in traditional ethnically and culturally cohesive countries. I don’t have a structural scheme that I would impose from without comprehensively on everyone and I would be against any such attempts, but I advise strongly against secular democracy and am in general for moving away from it. I think that in general devolved and distributed political authority is better than centralized, and that Shawn’s (apparent) notion that democracy is the only good form of government — with due acknowledgement that he isn’t for the more ideological egalitarian sort — is complicit with the Marxism that Shawn rightly despises. Locke and Jefferson were liberals, and Marxism is just a manifestation of liberalism that attempts to be more consistent.

The notion that modern liberalism sprang suddenly into existence inexplicably with Marx is of course ludicrously ahistorical, but you know what they say about horses and water. I suppose I could have a little fun by quoting Hitler, Marx, and Jefferson and seeing who can tell who said what; I’ve considered putting a little web application in place that does just that and I may yet get around to it. It is a matter of historical fact that secular powers have done more wholesale murdering in the last century or two than all murdering done by all religious regimes in recorded history combined, even including the Protestant wars of religion that followed the reformation’s destruction of feudalism.

“I suppose I could have a little fun by quoting Hitler, Marx, and Jefferson and seeing who can tell who said what; I’ve considered putting a little web application in place that does just that and I may yet get around to it.”

You could add in a few Popes while you were at it, including the present one. Many of the Roman Churches previous Popes made comments about the Jews that where also indistinguishable from Hitler’s. And those since Vatican 2 have made comments that could easily be atrributed to Locke Marx and Jefferson. Much of Vatican 2’s language (yes I have rad the documents), sounds very much like Locke and Marx in places. I think such an above excercise would in fact be little more than misleading and self-serving nonsense.

“It is a matter of historical fact that secular powers have done more wholesale murdering in the last century or two than all murdering done by all religious regimes in recorded history combined, even including the Protestant wars of religion that followed the reformation’s destruction of feudalism.”

I think your view of both Medieval and Catholic history is largely a whitewash. You downplay the murder of hundreds of millions by the Roman Church as though it were a drop in a bucket, which it manifestly was, and is, not. The concept that Locke, Jefferson and Marx can all be thrown into the same box labeled as “liberals” and that therefore America’s founding, and all forms of constitutional democracy, are tainted as such, is both historically shallow, and in my opinion deeply anti-American. Your aguments sound very much like the “back to the Middle Ages” arguments used by Islamic fundamentalists. It’s an easy, but shallow and a-historical argument to simply condemn all the Protestant inspired polictical developments from the Reformation on as “liberal” and thefore just Marxism in another form, but this is throwing out the wheat with the chaff. It conveniantly ignores that CONSTITUTIONAL democratic rights are neither liberal nor conservative, but are simply a way of structuring government that has existed from time to time in European history long before Locke and Jefferson, or Marx for that matter. Unless your going to argue that these men got in a time machine and started the Roman Republic as a liberal/Marxist plot to undermine the glory of medieval Catholicism in the future. As to the Vatican having it’s authority on faith and morals recognised by states, when the Roman Church figures out that moving priests around to bugger, abuse and rape tens of thousands of innocent children is morally wrong, then I might take it’s “moral authority” seriously. Until then in my view the Church today is a venal, corrupt and largely immoral institution that should come with the warning label “may be harmful to minors”.

I agree with Shawn about the significantly liberal character of postconciliar Catholic writings, but obviously about little else (in fact if I do create the quote machine I’ll be sure to include some postconciliar Papal material as well; thanks to Shawn for the idea).

Shawn’s odd notion that democracy is an illiberal institution is clearly not something that Jefferson would agree to, for example (although one of the grounding aspects of liberalism is this attempt to define itself as objective and above the fray), and his odd claim that Popes have massacred hundreds of millions (as have modern secular regimes, including America’s contribution of 40 million or so) must be coming from some radical protestant pamphlets I haven’t seen. If Shawn were to say that the fact that the Church always handed heretics over to secular authorities for sentencing and punishment doesn’t absolve the Church of responsibility I would agree; but clearly some of Shawn’s basic facts are simply wrong.

Finally, before the state of affairs I described could come about a repentence from liberalism of vast proportions would have to occur; and I agree that that repentence would have to encompass the child molesting homosexual culture in particular and the liberalism in general that has infected the Church. Where Shawn and I clearly part company is in that I think the repentence from liberalism would also have to include repentence from the cult-of-democracy. Whether that is properly anti-American or not I don’t know, but it isn’t clear why advocating the only thing America can do to survive in the long run — repent of her liberalism — should be considered intrinsically anti-American any more than rehab should be considered anti-alcoholic.

Lauren Auster…
“Yes, there have occasionally existed more humane and civilized forms of Islam, but that was only to the extent that they were not true Islam.”

This is, to be perfectly frank, BS. The modern fundamentalist currents of extremism, ranging from the rather moderate pan-arabism of Nasser over the radical revolution of Khomenei, to the seizing of power by the taliban in Afghanistan are ALL reactions to western (in this case including Soviet) colonialism/cultural imperialism. The problems are numerous, artficial “nations” constructed by the French and Brittish, reactions to western “culture” such as pornography (this phenomena is thought to have played a major part in provoking the revolution in Iran), the intervention of the United States and/or the Soviet Union in numerous conflicts, and of course the ever present problem of Israel are just a few of the many reasons why a particulary violent and extreme form of Islam have arisen. These are NOT expressions of som sort of Islamic essence (even though they MIGHT be viewed as a sort of misplaced self defence, similar to the radical reactions of american right wing christians turning survivalist or violently separatist in response to the course of the federal government).

Virtually all previous Islamic societies had an amount of respect for dissident religious groups with which the christian west could never compete, in fact only the pre-christian Roman Empire even came close (and then only at times; as most probably know the mandatory worship of the Emperor made many religions incapable of partaking in this “freedom of religion”). So if it’s “democratic rights” that is the criterion for the quality if a civilization Islam only began to plunge in the later years of the Ottoman empire (and definitely with colonialism/imperialism). The fact that it was Islam that kept the works of Plato, Aristoteles and so on when the catholic church attempted to extinguish their writings from the European mind also seems to be entirely forgotten by some on this forum.

To claim any sort of superiority of the terrible excuse for a civilization, based solely on the satisfaction of artificially produced material needs, that the west has become, over the deeds of classical Islam is absurd. That the arab world, as someone pointed out, is at “an all time low” is of course a whole other issue, and probably entirely correct (if one exempts the pre-islamic arab world, from which many of the more brutal currents advertised in the west as “Islamic Tradition” actually comes). The fact that to many people (given the rising tide of converts to Islam in the west) Islam seems to be the only viable option to our mindless “world of quantity” should be viewed as a spiritual challange to the west, and one that cannot be met with bombs and pretentious romanticism based on the peculiar ideas of the Enlightenment, but with work for restoration of a TRUE European Tradition.

As for this article, I’ve read hundreds of the same type describing the Israeli treatment of Arabs, the American treatment of civilian Vietnamese, the Soviet treatment of everyone, the attitude of prison guards to prisoners, the views of the Right, the views of the Left and so on and so forth ad infinitum. In particular children of christians who have abandonded their faith tend to write resentful pieces just like this one.

The hatred between arabs and Israeli jews are very much mutual; I have enough friends who have travelled the area and spent time with Israeli youth (especially military trained youth) viewing the arabs as “animals” and “dogs”, which is far more frightening, given the military (even nuclear) capacity of Israel, to know this.

The fact that the concept of martyrhood is entirely forgotten in the West (and apparently not appreciated by certain arab girls) is of course a consequense of rising atheism, and nothing else.

“Shawn’s odd notion that democracy is an illiberal institution is clearly not something that Jefferson would agree to,”

Actually my claim was that CONSTITUTIONAL democracy is neither conservative nor liberal. I have never simply used the term “democracy” and for good reason. You continue to misrepresent my views. And Jefferson may well not have agreed, but so what? Jefferson is hardly the only voice advocating constitutional limited democratic government.

“and his odd claim that Popes have massacred hundreds of millions (as have modern secular regimes, including America’s contribution of 40 million or so) must be coming from some radical protestant pamphlets I haven’t seen.”

Actaully my claims come fron history. I dont read “radical Protestant pamphlets”, whatever that absurd statement is supposed to mean. Are you saying that a Pope did not order the Albigensian crusade? In July of 1209 A.D. an army of Catholics attacked Beziers and murdered 60,000 unarmed civilians, killing men, women, and children. The whole city was sacked, and when someone complained that Catholics were being killed as well as “heretics”, the papal legates told them to go on killing and not to worry about it for “the Lord knows His own.”

Catholic apologists attempt to downplay the significance of the Inquisition, saying that relatively few people were ever directly affected. While controversy rages around the number of victims that can be claimed by the Inquisition, conservative estimates easily place the count in the millions. This does not include the equally vast numbers of human beings slaughtered in the various wars and other conflicts instigated over the centuries by Vatican political intrigues. Nor does it take it account the Holocaust wrought upon the Jews by the Nazis, led by Roman Catholics who used their own religious history to justify their modern excesses.

Shawn writes:
“Nor does it take it account the Holocaust wrought upon the Jews by the Nazis, led by Roman Catholics who used their own religious history to justify their modern excesses.”

With this statement Shawn disqualifies himself from being taken seriously.

“Nor does it take it account the Holocaust wrought upon the Jews by the Nazis, led by Roman Catholics who used their own religious history to justify their modern excesses.” — Shawn

Shawn, I always like your posts — even the ones that, shall we say, seek to put Catholics in their place — but this one really does go over the top … don’t you think? Do you refer to the fact that Hitler’s and some other Nazis’ families were Catholic? What you say is a meaningless syllogism, then. One might as well say, “Hitler breathed air; therefore the Holocaust was wrought upon the Jews by the Nazis, led by air-breathers.”

Shawn is a valuable participant in our discussions, and I don’t want to make it seem as if he is being piled on here, but I do hope he will re-evaluate his apparent endorsement of the liberal propaganda line that the Nazi war against the Jews was a Catholic or Catholic-led or Catholic-inspired phenomenon.

Martin writes:
“Virtually all previous Islamic societies had an amount of respect for dissident religious groups with which the christian west could never compete, in fact only the pre-christian Roman Empire even came close (and then only at times; as most probably know the mandatory worship of the Emperor made many religions incapable of partaking in this ‘freedom of religion’). So if it’s ‘democratic rights’ that is the criterion for the quality if a civilization Islam only began to plunge in the later years of the Ottoman empire (and definitely with colonialism/imperialism). The fact that it was Islam that kept the works of Plato, Aristoteles and so on when the catholic church attempted to extinguish their writings from the European mind also seems to be entirely forgotten by some on this forum.”

It seems to me that Martin is telling an important part of the truth here. What is missing from Martin’s analysis is Islam’s violent imperialism, which has always been a part of it; the modern notion of the Crusades as wars of aggression against Islam is false propaganda, for example. But there is a real sense in which the modern neocon/liberal is more the legitimate heir of classical Islam than the Wahhabi. Like classical Islam the modern neocon/liberal allows for “freedom of religion” of a sort — as long as there is utter submission to itself as overruling abstraction. Both classical Islam and liberalism lie, pretending to provide freedom while asserting comprehensive control. I’ve argued elsewhere that liberalism is ultimately a product of Islam, since Islam provided the philosophical basis for the protestant reformation to Wyclif, Hus, Luther, and others; and liberalism itself was a reaction to the violence that resulted from protestant subjugation of Church to State.

None of this implies that we should go around blowing up whole civilizations and ways of life. What is needed is not massive imperialist aggression, nor civilizational finger-pointing, nor naive pacifism and a failure to defend what is good. What is needed is what is always needed when Christendom goes astray: to understand what happened and repent.

Matt:

Perhaps I was a little unclear; I am not really arguing for or against any particular form of Islam, and I am as aware as the next person that the Islamic doctrine actually divides the world in the World of Peace (the Islamic Umma), and the World of War (The rest of the world), the latter being more or less “ment” to be be conquered. My point wasn’t really to show that Islam is really “nice” in the liberal sense of the word (quite obviously, as liberalism after all is in essence a western product, and one that I am not at all fond of myself). My point was simply to say that the extremely radical forms of Islam demanding absolute political and religous submission and conformity from it’s subjects is about as much an heir to classical Islam as Hitler’s Germany was a heir of the actual early/pre christian Europe. This analogy may seem a bit far fetched, but my point is simply that, for instance, the conquest’s of early Islam (in a time when war was a legitimate political tool in almost all human societies) can’t really be directly connected to the current sentiments of present day Islamist “fundamentalists” any more than the conquests of the Vikings can be connected to Hitler’s attack on Poland. The present situation in the Islamic world produces new and different forms of ideas and actions, some of which CAN be connected to Islam (whether “good” or “bad” ideas or actions), but many of which is simply connected to the present state of inferiority and decline vis-a-vis the western world.

As for the crusades, I believe that the account of Julius Evola in Revolt against the modern World is really one of the better ones, showing a mutuality not in “responsibility”, but rather in the spiritual implications both of the crusades and the early Jihads. The essential point here is that these phenomena, even though they might be viewed as a form of “kulturkampf” also was mutual spiritual acts in relation to concepts of self-sacrifice and martyrhood/ascetism, which on a deeper level might be said to reveal SIMILAR traditional ideas in the two civilizations. Naturally, with modern warfare, this highly controversial concept can hardly be transfered to modern days, but I choose to mention it simply to show one example of a view that doesn’t use these events as a moralistic bat to swing at Christianity nor Islam.

That my first posts might be seen as a lacking in their analysis was probably because I wrote them in a state of slight irritation; as many others I tend to react to thoughtless attacks on various phenomena with defending them. I hope I’ve clarified my view at least to some extent.

Martin writes:
“My point was simply to say that the extremely radical forms of Islam demanding absolute political and religous submission and conformity from it’s subjects is about as much an heir to classical Islam as Hitler’s Germany was a heir of the actual early/pre christian Europe.”

Is that really true though? This is really the first time that Dar Ul Islam has been faced with extermination by the infiltration of outside values rather than military threat. Osama bin Laden points to the fall of the Ottomon Empire as his watershed event, and it isn’t clear that he is wrong about that. Sure modern Wahhabism predates that by a century or so, but it is usually the case that ideological currents are precursor to political ones. It isn’t obvious to me why bin Laden and the Taliban should be considered radically discontinuous with classical Islam, even with the irony that its enemy is at least to some degree its own creation.

In response to some of the above posts, the Nazi genocide against the Jews did not arise in a vacuum. Anti-semitism arose in Catholic Europe, in particualr in the medieval age, although it had existed to some degree prior to that. But it was medieval Catholicism that really turned the heat up. There is no doubt that Hitlers message resonated with many Catholic Germans, and it is no accident that Bavaria was where the Nazi’s first became a major political force. Even if they had repudiated their religion, many Nazi’s remained strongly influenced by Catholic medieval romanticism and it’s hatred of the Jewish people. The Nazi genocide then is most certainly a continuiation, and an attempted fullfillment, of Catholicisms long held anti-semitism.

The reason why I have brought up this litany of the Roman Churches crimes is not to demonise Catholicism per se. I belong to the high church tradition within Lutheranism, and I believe there is much that Protestants need to re-learn from the Catholic tradition, in particular respect for the sacraments and the importance of an incarnational spirituality.My point is to highlight the inherent dangers in vesting sole and supreme moral and religious authority in any single human institution, such as the Vatican and it’s priestly hierachy. The behaviour of the Churche’s heirachy has not always been to the highest moral standards by any stretch, and vesting such infalted authority in human beings always leads to abuse of that authority, as the recent controversy in the Boston diocese illustrates. Hence my opposition to Matt’s idea that the religious and moral authority of Rome should be recognised by soveriegn states. In my opinion, the attitude of both the individual and the state should be “No King but Christ alone”.

Shawn writes:
“The Nazi genocide then is most certainly a continuiation, and an attempted fullfillment, of Catholicisms long held anti-semitism.”

Again, Shawn simply disqualifies himself from being taken seriously here.

Let’s not forget that the Nazis came after the Catholic Church early on, and many priests were persecuted. This is not meant to deny that some Catholics supported the Nazis; I don’t have any polls to quantify the support.

I don’t see how the many Catholics in Western Europe can be singled out as the decisive Nazi ingredient in the primarily Lutheran soil of Germany, which attacked every Catholic country in Europe.

I am not asserting that Lutheranism had much of a role in Nazi atrocities. I am merely questioning the proposal that Catholicism had a decisive or even a substantial role in Nazi atrocities.

…which attacked every Catholic country in Europe except Italy, Spain, and Portugal—all for stragegic reasons. Hitler would have had at the latter countries eventually.

I posted without knowing about Matt’s always important ideas, which are once again right on the money.

“The Nazi genocide, then, is most certainly a continuation, and an attempted fulfillment, of Catholicism’s long-held anti-Semitism.” — Shawn

I have to agree with Matt: what Shawn writes here is beyond the pale. His statement is such a huge falsehood that one is hard-put to argue against it, because citing a mere finite number of counterproofs wouldn’t seem sufficient to debunk an untruth of such cosmic scale — you have the feeling that the only way to go against it is to cite, as counterproof, every single word ever written or spoken in the Catholic West since the Gospels.

The alternative is simply to solemnly deny it — just once — and leave it at that … which is exactly what I’ll do now. It’s not true; not one word of it.

(Matt, when Shawn identified himself here as a Lutheran, it occurred to me that that might explain the boldness and harshness of his recent posts, since you have said some pretty harsh things about Luther [practically putting him in the Moslem camp, for instance]. You’ve hurt Shawn, and now he’s hurting you back. If you were to lighten up about the Protestants in general and Martin Luther and Lutheranism in particular, Shawn might ease up on the Catholics.)

“The Nazi genocide then is most certainly a continuation, and an attempted fullfillment, of Catholicism’s long held anti-semitism.”

Granting the serious sins of the persecution of Jews in the Catholic Middle Ages, granting the hateful hostility entertained by many Catholics toward Jews in the 20th century, this statement by Shawn is nevertheless totally wrong. For what Shawn is saying is that the long term aim of the Catholic Church was the literal expropriation, dehumanization, and extermination of the Jewish people, and that the Nazis in exterminating the Jews were only putting into action what the Church had desired all along.

It’s an utterly shocking assertion. Even the leading Catholic bashers like Carroll and Goldhagen do not go as far as Shawn does.

“Again, Shawn simply disqualifies himself from being taken seriously here.”

Firstly this is a shallow way to make a rebuttal. If you can’t rationally debate what I said why say anything?

Secondly, while I don’t agree with Unadorned’s interpretation of my stand on this issue, pointing out the blindingly obvious link between medieval Catholic anti-Semitism and the Nazi’s is far less of a leap than claiming that the Protestant reformers introduced “Islamic” heresies into Christendom.

Shawn writes:
“Nor does it take it account the Holocaust wrought upon the Jews by the Nazis, led by Roman Catholics who used their own religious history to justify their modern excesses.”

And again:
“The Nazi genocide then is most certainly a continuiation, and an attempted fullfillment, of Catholicisms long held anti-semitism.”

Again, Shawn simply disqualifies himself from being taken seriously here. His inability to distinguish between the nature of his specific claims here and other claims made elsewhere doesn’t mitigate his self-disqualification: it adds to it. That certain parts of Catholicism have been anti-semetic doesn’t imply that the Nazis were Catholics completing a long term mission of exterminating the Jews any more than Martin Luther’s authorship of _On the Jews and Their Lies_[1] and other similar anti-Semetic vitriol implies that the Nazis were Lutherans.

1. http://www.us-israel.org/jsource/anti-semitism/Luther_on_Jews.html

As a sample, for those who don’t want to go read Luther’s entire article:

“First to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians, and do not condone or knowingly tolerate such public lying, cursing, and blaspheming of his Son and of his Christians.”

“Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed.”

“Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them.”

“Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb.”

“Fifth, I advise that safe­conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews.”

“Sixth, I advise that usury be prohibited to them, and that all cash and treasure of silver and gold be taken from them and put aside for safekeeping.”

“Seventh, I commend putting a flail, an ax, a hoe, a spade, a distaff, or a spindle into the hands of young, strong Jews and Jewesses and letting them earn their bread in the sweat of their brow, as was imposed on the children of Adam.”

All quotes from _On the Jews and their Lies_ by Martin Luther, 1543.

“The Nazi genocide then is most certainly a continuation, and an attempted fullfillment, of Catholicism’s long held anti-semitism.”

A further thought on this statement of Shawn’s. If what the Nazis did was only an ATTEMPTED fulfillment of the long-term Catholic agenda, and since the Nazis were aiming at killing all Jews they could get their hands on (not only in Europe and Russia, but no doubt in Palestine and the rest of the Middle East if Rommel had defeated the British in Egypt), then it follows that the true Catholic agenda was (and is?) the physical extermination of every Jew in the world.

Could Shawn please provide some evidence to back up this claim?