If the Jews of 1898 — who were fleeing persecution in Europe — could push Islam back (which they did), it signified an intolerable theological disaster of Islamic weakness.
If your theory of the Islamist mindset is correct, then they're looking at theology thru the wrong end of the telescope. Instead of trying to destroy Israel to regain Allah's favor, they should realize they failed to destroy Israel because Allah loves Israel.
The noted historian Daniel Boorstin asks a fundamental question: Why did the flowering of civilization that we enjoy today [ information age, medical breakthroughs, industrial age, space travel, agricultural breakthroughs etc.] not start until 16th century Western Europe? Why did the Chinese not get there first – 2,000 years ago they were at the same starting technological stage? Or: Why did the Arabs not get there first? They also had the technologies 1200 years ago – so why didn't the Arabs get here first?
Then he provides the answer: Because Arabic society as a whole is a very fatalistic society. Insh’Allah – if something is to be done then Allah will see to it; if a problem is unsolved then Allah didnt see fit to resolve it. Everything is Fate; it is useless to struggle against fate. Travel throughout the Arab, nay Moslem world and the predominant sentiment is “Insh’Allah”. This is not racism, this is fact.
But Jews [and Western Europe once the Reformation had thrown off the yoke of the Roman Church] struggle against fate. When there is a problem we do not sit and accept but rather we all apply our creativity, our capital, our energy, our ambitions and we derive solutions to resolve problems and make life better. The way of the West is to constantly create and invent new solutions.
So, the problem that Islam has is not with Israel per se but with all of the West. Israel is just a handy scapegoat because so much of the West can be counted upon to be anti-Israel/anti-Jewish.
The real issue is this: How does one deal with life when one’s world-view has been proven incorrect by “facts on the ground”? Clearly, the West has shown that fate does not drive history and that passive fatalism does not deliver a modern society?
Thus the world of Islam is faced with two choices:
a) They can adapt a world-view that more closely matches to reality
b) They can destroy the reality that disproves their world-view.
Obviously a strong contingent of the world of Islam has opted for violence to destroy the facts they cannot abide. We can all provide an extensive list of destructive behaviors from the world of Islam that have no other goal other than to destroy the world-view that mocks theirs.
The deep rooted honor / shame mentality plays an essential part in the daily lives of Arab muslim communities all over the world.
This aspect of difference in mentality between Arab and western cultures is too often being downplayed and ignored.
"The honor-shame dynamic explains much of the Arab and Muslim hostility to Israel. A state of free Jews (i.e., non-dhimmi infidels), living inside the historic Arab Dar al-Islam (Jerusalem), constitutes blasphemy. Israel’s ability to survive repeated Arab efforts to destroy it constitutes a permanent state of Arab shame before the entire global community."
"Whether one views the impact of Edward Said (1935-2003) on academia as a brilliant triumph or a catastrophic tragedy, few can question the astonishing scope and penetration of his magnum opus, Orientalism.
"In one generation, a radical transformation overcame Middle Eastern studies : A new breed of “post-colonial” academics, boasting a liberating, anti-imperialist perspective, replaced a generation of scholars disparaged by Said as “Orientalists.”
Source : Richard Lander's article "Celebrating Orientalism", winter 2017 :
This is a crucial point in explaining why Palestinians continue on their murderous rampage and reject all compromise. It also underlines why Israeli victory is crucial to preserving what is left of western civilization. Your article helps to understand why Netanyahu claims Israel is fighting to defend both itself and the West.
I was born and have lived most of my life in southeast Michigan. Detroit [and area] have had an annual murder rate of around 225-250 murders per million population for at least 75 years; in contrast, Toronto with a larger population has a murder rate of about 15 per million. It is neither racist nor phobic to reach a conclusion that Detroit has a much higher level of violence than Toronto.
Similarly, if one looks at Israel and ignores violence due to terrorism [both Arab and Jewish] that the Jewish sector in Israel has a murder level like Toronto while the Arab sector has, in 2024, a murder rate of about 175 per million -- easily ten times that of the Jewish sector. No one wants to talk about the innate level of violence in the Arab sector and in Arab culture. But blood feuds are a way of life in parts of Arab society; When two high schoolers in the US engage in sex its accepted as part of growing up; in Europe also accepted. But in, again, parts of Arab society the offending male may be murdered by relatives of the girl and the girl herself may be harmed. My point is that the outpouring of violence witnessed on Oct 7th [and in 1938, 1935, 1929 et al] are not aberrations but a typical expression of a society that the West now finds itself in conflict with. To ignore it would be stupid.
Many Christians feel the same way, although some may be more cautious to admit it. For centuries Christians preached that the God of the Hebrews had rejected the Jews and had chosen Christian Europe as their successors; this is the so called replacement theology. IIf the Jews are sovereign in the Land of Israel, than what does that say about European replacement theology. It's worth pointing out as well that Jewish Christianity was ultimately tolerant of the Europeans. The New Testament Book of Acts 15 describes how the council of Jerusalem exempted the European Christians from Jewish law. When the Church authority was transferred from Jewish to Gentile, the Jewish Christians were banned with much furious Anti-Semitism against Judaizers etc, I might add.
Less a distinction when you realize that Trump and his ultra nationalist racist followers wish to abolish all except Christian white men from American society.
Do you mean that the man whose previously and presently closest advisors both use the Nazi salute or that he wants to send African American to shit hole countries, or that he uses antisemitic tropes against the leader of Ukraine, or that he sucks up to anyone who has the power to allow him to build a hotel to the detriment of The free world, or that he allowed Iran to purify nuclear material?
Or am I missing something like he hires an antivaxxer and wants to stick lightbulbs up your a…. Or releases over a thousand treasonists?
I would suggest you make statements instead of just denigrating thoughts.
Wouldn’t the formulation be that the Jews had rejected their own God and his will? Ironically the most fervent Christians these days are Israel’s most fervent supporters. Just need to rebuild the temple and sacrifice the red heifer and the Second Coming is nigh.
I think all the Diaspora Jews are supposed to return to Israel, too, for the Second Coming, right? And that might have to happen if the trajectory of world-wide antisemitism continues as it has been. But anyway, like I joke to my wonderful Israel-supporting Christian friends: "We're not that far apart, you know. Your Second Coming will be our First Coming."
The formulation you describe is how the Europeans described the Jewish estrangement from Christianity. In reality the European church banned Jews, and like most ethnic groups, many Jews gravitated to their own ethno-religious-linguistic traditions. Hence the Talmud, Hebrew etc. Even if the talmud was less polished and coherent.
“Banned Jews” is an odd way to put it. It’s true that the radical anti-legalism that developed in Christianity was mostly a Pauline creation but Jesus was no strict follower of Mosaic Law or respecter of existing Jewish authorities. Arguably it was inevitable that the two movements would diverge. There was never any prohibition on language or secular cultural practices. Greeks and Romans managed to become Christians without ceasing to be Greeks and Romans. Had there been the desire, a Hebrew Christian movement could have survived but evidently there was no such will.
Jesus followed the Jewish laws. He had disputes with other Jewish leaders about the interpretation of those laws, but He followed them, was circumcised etc.
Those disputes were inter-communal and the understanding of them loses the nuance when interpreted by foreign nations.
The Council of Laodicea, if I'm not mistaken, banned Saturday worship.
Well, Jewish Christians would have worshiped on Saturday. The Jewish Christians wanted to do things in their own ethno-cultural way, as everyone does.
You'll notice that Jewish Christian communities tend to disappear from the historical record around the 4th and 5th centuries, when the Europeans really consolidated Christian power in the Mediterranean area.
You mention the Greeks and Romans. They practiced Christianity in their way.
The Jewish Christians were persecuted for being Christian in their way.
In time they had to either become Greco Roman, which most probably did, or gravitate to the Talmudic version of Judaism.
I’m curious what “practicing Christianity in their way” means? Were the Romans and Greeks doing particularly different things from each other? Worshipping on a Saturday is a Jewish practice true, not a Christian practice. It has nothing to do with whether one speaks Hebrew or is an Israelite. One can worship any God in any way, it doesn’t change one’s genealogy and ethnicity. How would the idea of Christians as one church have worked when one group wants to do many things differently for no real reason except habit? It would make about as much sense as a Roman Christian wanting to sacrifice to Jupiter on Friday and go to church on Sunday.
Maybe according to certain universal Christian ideals everyone should be Christian the same way.
In reality, if you go to Armenia, Kerala, Egypt, Manila, Mexico, Greece, Rome, Berlin, London, Ireland, Poland etc, you'll find different nation groups, communities, practicing Christianity in their own way.
The first Christians were Jews and they most certainly worshipped on Saturday, and you know Seventh day adventists do, and Orthodox Christians celebrate Christmas in January.
In reality, every nation has their own personality. The universal idea is not as authentic as the nation-state idea.
So much of ethnic strife is based on the fact that peoples, nations, are essentially different from one another and we fill in that hostility with ideas to give the hostility some form. Sort of like when a person doesn't like someone they will often not like things about them that would be just fine if the very same characteristics were displayed by someone that they did like.
The first Christians were Jews. Read the Book of Acts 15. It describes how the Jewish Church exempted non Jewish Christians from the obligations of Jewish law. When Church power fell into European hands the Jews were banned essentially, at least those Christians who wished to remain Jewish. Early Christianity was fully part of Judaism.
Its a curious observation that Arab nationalism is a peon to the old golden age... it may be a nostalgia for something that never was.
By that I mean that I've always suspected that the Muslim golden age had less do do with Arabs but was predominantly Byzantine in origin - the Ottomans having used Arab armies as the muscle of expansionism after having borrowed the mechanisms of state and settled civilised behaviour from the Byzantines.
That would explain why it was a flash of light which died while the European renaissance took off and snowballed into modernity. It would also explain the persistent failures at state building and supranationalism Arab nationalists have attempted through the 20thC.
Surely a truly pious and devout person, regardless of religion, must realize that a tattered, scattered, destroyed, and weak peoples such as the Jews to be able to establish and renew its national homeland and defeat must larger and more powerful enemies could not possibly happen without divine assistance. Whether you refer to G-d, the most powerful, as Hashem, Adonai, Allah, Jesus, the Father, Buddha, or Shiva, matters less than the realization divine intervention was involved in the establishment and continued strength of Israel despite the schemes otherwise, past and present, by the devil. Genesis 12:3
This very insightful essay also explains the other major problem in Islam, the sectarian violence. The number one victims are other Muslims who belong to different versions/sects. Then it’s the Jews and then the rest of the western world that was under Islamic rule. My opinion is that from the beginning it was formed as a death cult, and we can see that tradition today. Death cults don’t succeed over the long term since they end up in the sectarian violent spiral.
Thank you great discussion! Looking for institutional evidence of Islam being liberalized. Is there any such thing. I see individuals calling themselves liberal Moslems, and their views seem liberal, but I cannot find out what that really means.
Good point. In practice we see Saudi Arabia and the UEA making some effort to progress in a more moderate way of Islamic beliefs. But on an individual it remains vague. They may be reluctant to develop their views by fear of being excluded. Because Islam teaching is not subject to change.
I am posting a series of reflections on Melanie Phillips’ new book, The Builder’s Stone. In it she makes the point that the future of Western civilization is bound up with the story of the Jews. More precisely, it is bound up with the story of God’s revelation, beginning with Abraham and reaching its climax in Jesus. Both modern Judaism and Islam are (different types of) unnatural offshoots from this original stock.
So what you are saying is that it is all about power that they achieve by being closer to God. I don't doubt that this is correct, but don't the Islamists want to rid the planet of all infidels, starting with the Jews, in order to create their caliphate?
They're following their prophet's book which states that by doing jihad - becoming a martyr - you become close to their God. So killing infidels is a highway to paradise.
If your theory of the Islamist mindset is correct, then they're looking at theology thru the wrong end of the telescope. Instead of trying to destroy Israel to regain Allah's favor, they should realize they failed to destroy Israel because Allah loves Israel.
This explains why only Westerners advocate the two state solution.
The noted historian Daniel Boorstin asks a fundamental question: Why did the flowering of civilization that we enjoy today [ information age, medical breakthroughs, industrial age, space travel, agricultural breakthroughs etc.] not start until 16th century Western Europe? Why did the Chinese not get there first – 2,000 years ago they were at the same starting technological stage? Or: Why did the Arabs not get there first? They also had the technologies 1200 years ago – so why didn't the Arabs get here first?
Then he provides the answer: Because Arabic society as a whole is a very fatalistic society. Insh’Allah – if something is to be done then Allah will see to it; if a problem is unsolved then Allah didnt see fit to resolve it. Everything is Fate; it is useless to struggle against fate. Travel throughout the Arab, nay Moslem world and the predominant sentiment is “Insh’Allah”. This is not racism, this is fact.
But Jews [and Western Europe once the Reformation had thrown off the yoke of the Roman Church] struggle against fate. When there is a problem we do not sit and accept but rather we all apply our creativity, our capital, our energy, our ambitions and we derive solutions to resolve problems and make life better. The way of the West is to constantly create and invent new solutions.
So, the problem that Islam has is not with Israel per se but with all of the West. Israel is just a handy scapegoat because so much of the West can be counted upon to be anti-Israel/anti-Jewish.
The real issue is this: How does one deal with life when one’s world-view has been proven incorrect by “facts on the ground”? Clearly, the West has shown that fate does not drive history and that passive fatalism does not deliver a modern society?
Thus the world of Islam is faced with two choices:
a) They can adapt a world-view that more closely matches to reality
b) They can destroy the reality that disproves their world-view.
Obviously a strong contingent of the world of Islam has opted for violence to destroy the facts they cannot abide. We can all provide an extensive list of destructive behaviors from the world of Islam that have no other goal other than to destroy the world-view that mocks theirs.
Good point.
The deep rooted honor / shame mentality plays an essential part in the daily lives of Arab muslim communities all over the world.
This aspect of difference in mentality between Arab and western cultures is too often being downplayed and ignored.
"The honor-shame dynamic explains much of the Arab and Muslim hostility to Israel. A state of free Jews (i.e., non-dhimmi infidels), living inside the historic Arab Dar al-Islam (Jerusalem), constitutes blasphemy. Israel’s ability to survive repeated Arab efforts to destroy it constitutes a permanent state of Arab shame before the entire global community."
"Whether one views the impact of Edward Said (1935-2003) on academia as a brilliant triumph or a catastrophic tragedy, few can question the astonishing scope and penetration of his magnum opus, Orientalism.
"In one generation, a radical transformation overcame Middle Eastern studies : A new breed of “post-colonial” academics, boasting a liberating, anti-imperialist perspective, replaced a generation of scholars disparaged by Said as “Orientalists.”
Source : Richard Lander's article "Celebrating Orientalism", winter 2017 :
https://www.meforum.org/middle-east-quarterly/celebrating-orientalism
This is a crucial point in explaining why Palestinians continue on their murderous rampage and reject all compromise. It also underlines why Israeli victory is crucial to preserving what is left of western civilization. Your article helps to understand why Netanyahu claims Israel is fighting to defend both itself and the West.
There is another aspect that no one addresses.
I was born and have lived most of my life in southeast Michigan. Detroit [and area] have had an annual murder rate of around 225-250 murders per million population for at least 75 years; in contrast, Toronto with a larger population has a murder rate of about 15 per million. It is neither racist nor phobic to reach a conclusion that Detroit has a much higher level of violence than Toronto.
Similarly, if one looks at Israel and ignores violence due to terrorism [both Arab and Jewish] that the Jewish sector in Israel has a murder level like Toronto while the Arab sector has, in 2024, a murder rate of about 175 per million -- easily ten times that of the Jewish sector. No one wants to talk about the innate level of violence in the Arab sector and in Arab culture. But blood feuds are a way of life in parts of Arab society; When two high schoolers in the US engage in sex its accepted as part of growing up; in Europe also accepted. But in, again, parts of Arab society the offending male may be murdered by relatives of the girl and the girl herself may be harmed. My point is that the outpouring of violence witnessed on Oct 7th [and in 1938, 1935, 1929 et al] are not aberrations but a typical expression of a society that the West now finds itself in conflict with. To ignore it would be stupid.
Many Christians feel the same way, although some may be more cautious to admit it. For centuries Christians preached that the God of the Hebrews had rejected the Jews and had chosen Christian Europe as their successors; this is the so called replacement theology. IIf the Jews are sovereign in the Land of Israel, than what does that say about European replacement theology. It's worth pointing out as well that Jewish Christianity was ultimately tolerant of the Europeans. The New Testament Book of Acts 15 describes how the council of Jerusalem exempted the European Christians from Jewish law. When the Church authority was transferred from Jewish to Gentile, the Jewish Christians were banned with much furious Anti-Semitism against Judaizers etc, I might add.
Today Christians are not attempting to gain God's favor through constant endless mass murder so thats a pretty big distinction.
Less a distinction when you realize that Trump and his ultra nationalist racist followers wish to abolish all except Christian white men from American society.
Do you mean that the man whose previously and presently closest advisors both use the Nazi salute or that he wants to send African American to shit hole countries, or that he uses antisemitic tropes against the leader of Ukraine, or that he sucks up to anyone who has the power to allow him to build a hotel to the detriment of The free world, or that he allowed Iran to purify nuclear material?
Or am I missing something like he hires an antivaxxer and wants to stick lightbulbs up your a…. Or releases over a thousand treasonists?
I would suggest you make statements instead of just denigrating thoughts.
I asked AI “what is Trump Derangement Syndrome “.
It replied by showing your post as a prime example.
Wouldn’t the formulation be that the Jews had rejected their own God and his will? Ironically the most fervent Christians these days are Israel’s most fervent supporters. Just need to rebuild the temple and sacrifice the red heifer and the Second Coming is nigh.
I think all the Diaspora Jews are supposed to return to Israel, too, for the Second Coming, right? And that might have to happen if the trajectory of world-wide antisemitism continues as it has been. But anyway, like I joke to my wonderful Israel-supporting Christian friends: "We're not that far apart, you know. Your Second Coming will be our First Coming."
The formulation you describe is how the Europeans described the Jewish estrangement from Christianity. In reality the European church banned Jews, and like most ethnic groups, many Jews gravitated to their own ethno-religious-linguistic traditions. Hence the Talmud, Hebrew etc. Even if the talmud was less polished and coherent.
“Banned Jews” is an odd way to put it. It’s true that the radical anti-legalism that developed in Christianity was mostly a Pauline creation but Jesus was no strict follower of Mosaic Law or respecter of existing Jewish authorities. Arguably it was inevitable that the two movements would diverge. There was never any prohibition on language or secular cultural practices. Greeks and Romans managed to become Christians without ceasing to be Greeks and Romans. Had there been the desire, a Hebrew Christian movement could have survived but evidently there was no such will.
Jesus followed the Jewish laws. He had disputes with other Jewish leaders about the interpretation of those laws, but He followed them, was circumcised etc.
Those disputes were inter-communal and the understanding of them loses the nuance when interpreted by foreign nations.
The Council of Laodicea, if I'm not mistaken, banned Saturday worship.
Well, Jewish Christians would have worshiped on Saturday. The Jewish Christians wanted to do things in their own ethno-cultural way, as everyone does.
You'll notice that Jewish Christian communities tend to disappear from the historical record around the 4th and 5th centuries, when the Europeans really consolidated Christian power in the Mediterranean area.
You mention the Greeks and Romans. They practiced Christianity in their way.
The Jewish Christians were persecuted for being Christian in their way.
In time they had to either become Greco Roman, which most probably did, or gravitate to the Talmudic version of Judaism.
I’m curious what “practicing Christianity in their way” means? Were the Romans and Greeks doing particularly different things from each other? Worshipping on a Saturday is a Jewish practice true, not a Christian practice. It has nothing to do with whether one speaks Hebrew or is an Israelite. One can worship any God in any way, it doesn’t change one’s genealogy and ethnicity. How would the idea of Christians as one church have worked when one group wants to do many things differently for no real reason except habit? It would make about as much sense as a Roman Christian wanting to sacrifice to Jupiter on Friday and go to church on Sunday.
Maybe according to certain universal Christian ideals everyone should be Christian the same way.
In reality, if you go to Armenia, Kerala, Egypt, Manila, Mexico, Greece, Rome, Berlin, London, Ireland, Poland etc, you'll find different nation groups, communities, practicing Christianity in their own way.
The first Christians were Jews and they most certainly worshipped on Saturday, and you know Seventh day adventists do, and Orthodox Christians celebrate Christmas in January.
In reality, every nation has their own personality. The universal idea is not as authentic as the nation-state idea.
So much of ethnic strife is based on the fact that peoples, nations, are essentially different from one another and we fill in that hostility with ideas to give the hostility some form. Sort of like when a person doesn't like someone they will often not like things about them that would be just fine if the very same characteristics were displayed by someone that they did like.
What is a a Jewish Christian? Is it a phenomenon of a certain time period only?
The first Christians were Jews. Read the Book of Acts 15. It describes how the Jewish Church exempted non Jewish Christians from the obligations of Jewish law. When Church power fell into European hands the Jews were banned essentially, at least those Christians who wished to remain Jewish. Early Christianity was fully part of Judaism.
Its a curious observation that Arab nationalism is a peon to the old golden age... it may be a nostalgia for something that never was.
By that I mean that I've always suspected that the Muslim golden age had less do do with Arabs but was predominantly Byzantine in origin - the Ottomans having used Arab armies as the muscle of expansionism after having borrowed the mechanisms of state and settled civilised behaviour from the Byzantines.
That would explain why it was a flash of light which died while the European renaissance took off and snowballed into modernity. It would also explain the persistent failures at state building and supranationalism Arab nationalists have attempted through the 20thC.
Surely a truly pious and devout person, regardless of religion, must realize that a tattered, scattered, destroyed, and weak peoples such as the Jews to be able to establish and renew its national homeland and defeat must larger and more powerful enemies could not possibly happen without divine assistance. Whether you refer to G-d, the most powerful, as Hashem, Adonai, Allah, Jesus, the Father, Buddha, or Shiva, matters less than the realization divine intervention was involved in the establishment and continued strength of Israel despite the schemes otherwise, past and present, by the devil. Genesis 12:3
This very insightful essay also explains the other major problem in Islam, the sectarian violence. The number one victims are other Muslims who belong to different versions/sects. Then it’s the Jews and then the rest of the western world that was under Islamic rule. My opinion is that from the beginning it was formed as a death cult, and we can see that tradition today. Death cults don’t succeed over the long term since they end up in the sectarian violent spiral.
Very important historical context. Thank you!
Fascinating, thank you
Well said.
Thank you great discussion! Looking for institutional evidence of Islam being liberalized. Is there any such thing. I see individuals calling themselves liberal Moslems, and their views seem liberal, but I cannot find out what that really means.
Good point. In practice we see Saudi Arabia and the UEA making some effort to progress in a more moderate way of Islamic beliefs. But on an individual it remains vague. They may be reluctant to develop their views by fear of being excluded. Because Islam teaching is not subject to change.
I am posting a series of reflections on Melanie Phillips’ new book, The Builder’s Stone. In it she makes the point that the future of Western civilization is bound up with the story of the Jews. More precisely, it is bound up with the story of God’s revelation, beginning with Abraham and reaching its climax in Jesus. Both modern Judaism and Islam are (different types of) unnatural offshoots from this original stock.
Islam is the Detroit of religions
Huh? Detroit is the "Arsenal of Democracy" ... what are you trying to say ?
So what you are saying is that it is all about power that they achieve by being closer to God. I don't doubt that this is correct, but don't the Islamists want to rid the planet of all infidels, starting with the Jews, in order to create their caliphate?
They're following their prophet's book which states that by doing jihad - becoming a martyr - you become close to their God. So killing infidels is a highway to paradise.