On the issue of wanting to reform or eliminate religion from society I think a clarification is in order. Realistically speaking, doing away with religion is a completely unrealistic idealism at least for the time being. Weaning the masses off the opiate (Marx), deconstructing the mass delusion (Freud) and eliminating weakness (Nietzsche).is something that Jordanian society is not ready for.
*referring to the 3 great German thinkers and their musings on religion

PAX ISLAMICUS: An objective examination of the emergence and perpetuation of transnational fundamentalist Islamic movements.

Introduction

The origins of fundamentalism as a quasi-religious ideology are almost impossible to trace. One can however, begin to examine the origins of the term “religious fundamentalism” in an effort to actualize the concept itself. The phrase in question can be traced back to an early 20th Century protestant movement in the United States (University of Virginia faculty of Religion). The rise of this form of Protestantism was attributed as the culmination of a reaction lasting two centuries, a reaction against the definite secularism of the European enlightenment. The fundamentalist movement found its theological inspiration from the intellectual spirit of Tertullian’s writing. It is interesting to note that this movement did not in fact find its spiritual orientation within the actual writings but rather within the notion of eliminating impure Christian dogma and a return to the scripture.

In this introductory space I would also like to add that before attempting to identify the nature of fundamentalism we must first establish an agreed upon historical framework. This paper represents a rejection of the “Orientalist” (Edward Said) and Eurocentricism (Blaut, 1996, “The Colonizer’s Model of the World”) historical perspective. The point I’m trying to make is that I approached the subject from the standpoint of global interconnection in terms of historical modeling instead of the more widely adopted Eurocentric Historical model that is also adopted in the Middle East which stipulates that civilizations and cultures have evolved (in the pre20th century globalized world) with little or no cultural interaction. That is to say that the development of civilizations is an insular process involving a single cultural grouping. Blaut, Wolf, and Abu Lughod are experts on the subject but their analysis is primarily attuned to Economic development and to some extent cultural development. With this discussion I would like to take it a step further and argue that the development of belief systems such as fundamentalist thought is not simply an Islamic concept and neither did it diffuse from the West to the Middle East. But rather that it is a product of a global Historical process involving cross cultural interaction.

The emergence of Islamic Fundamentalism
We can define fundamentalism according to a number of selected sources. The most agreed upon definition of religious fundamentalism is that fundamentalism is the acceptance and adoption of a literal understanding of scripture (Ruthven 2005 “Fundamentalism; the search for meaning” Oxford University). A study of various fundamentalist movements crossing the faith divide (Islamic, Christian and Judaic) has found that fundamentalists of various different religions share a distinct historicism of dividing history into seemingly clearly defined historical epochs. These historical time periods can be seen as being a) a time of perfection or ultimate moral and spiritual well being in the past (in Islamic terms think of it as the early Islamic state in the 8 and 9th centuries AD 2)followed by the fall in the present. The fall is characterized by decadence and moral bankruptcy (note the manner in which the perpetrators of the bombings referred to the hotels as centres of prostitution and vice as well as being the centres for western powers to attack the Islamic nation. This historical period is also defined by fundamentalists as being a time of weakness. 3) Salvation, the state of redemption to which the glories and moral fortitude of the original (first) historical period will be realized again. This is state of being to which fundamentalists of different faiths are working towards the re-establishing. (Bercek 2002)
It is interesting to note that that the tripartite model of utopia-fall-redemption/salvation occurs within all three major monotheistic religions. This perhaps is to be expected. There is however, an even more interesting revelation that this model predates even the oldest of these faiths (Judaism). The Aristotelian notion of forms and idealism is perhaps the earliest example of this model in which the individual exists in a sort of elated plain of ideas and then the individual is born and suffers the “trauma of birth” and as such forgets his or her higher existence in the form of plains and finally, that it is the role of philosopher to find the way back to idealism. Thus we have utopia-fall-salvation. There also examples of this in polytheistic religions. This tripartite model reproduces itself throughout different civilizations and historical time periods as if it were simply re-manifesting itself within different belief and cultural systems (Morton, Duke University 2005). In his book “Aristotle and the Arabs: The Aristotelian tradition within Islam” F.E. peters examines the impact of Aristotelian thought on Islamic dogma. The book is primarily concerned with the commentaries of the early Islamic thinkers such as Ibn Khaldoun, Avicenna and Averroes to mention few. What is also interesting about the book is attempting to outline how Mohammed himself might’ve been influenced by Aristotle. Of course I realize this might offend some people but I am approaching this from a secular perspective. As such if we believe that Islamic scripture was actually written by Mohammed the similarities between the Quran and Aristotelian philosophy is astounding. Secularist perspectives of Islam have traditionally likened Islam to a mixture of Judaism and Christianity. I do not wish to challenge this notion in its entirety but rather to augment it whereby the visible influence of Aristotle is to be acknowledged. Without going into this too much I would cite one example. A parallel exists between Aristotelian thought and Islam when it comes to Abortion and the time at which the spirit enters the fetus. Both schools of thought agree that the spirit enters the fetus after a month or so of conception (depending on which school of Islamioc sect or Aristotellian school of thought one adheres to). There exist also, a lot of parallels in terms of the notion of conception and how the fetus is formed “min nutfatin 3alaqa” and so on.

*Peters also notes the struggle between the Islamic philosophers and the “fundamentalists” of that age. A FICTIONALIZED account of this struggle can be seen Yusuf Shaheen’s “Le Destin”. This is not necessarily a contradiction to my earlier statements in the sense that fundamentalism could have arisen earlier than the 20th century but it had not been fully conceptualized till then.

We can establish the linkages between the monotheistic religions from a secular perspective by adopting that the similarities arise not from the fact that they are all “Abraham’s religion” but rather that they are simply a newly manifested version of older beliefs one of which being Aristotelian thought. We can also say that Islam is in itself is the end result of global historical interaction between Christianity, Judaism, Aristotelian thought, Persian Zoroastrianism as well as a various other pagan African beliefs. I won’t go into proving this because it would take an obscene amount of time. I will however submit this as an argument.

A Wave of Religiosity Envelopes the Middle East
I had previously made the claim that “religiosity” had increased dramatically in the Middle East since the middle of the previous century. Of course, there is no index of religiosity that I can point to prove this claim. I can however supersede that and establish the claim by looking at Historical sociological and political trends. We need look no further than the prevailing popular political trends of the modern day and the past. It is without contention that beginning with anti-colonialist sentiments in the early part of the 20th Century there had been an extremely popular leftist/ socialist movement in the Middle East. The ascendance of nationalist and socialist movements such as the Ba’ath party and the various other socialistically inclined movements across the Middle East shows the manner in which radical change could be afforded through the adoption of radical political belief systems
Here I wills tart with a Marxist perspective. The underlying motivation for populations to adopt radical political movements is class struggle. Whether it be Socialism or political/radical Islam in the face of a stratified society class system that is the hallmark of the capitalist mode of production. Society will move to adopt radical solutions if capitalism is in crisis. The most notable example of this would be post World War 1 Germany and the demise of the Weimar republic. Nothing is clearer than that at this time German civil society (civil society in the Hagelian sense) tuned towards Nazism on one hand and Communism on the other. The ensuing struggle between the forces of the extreme right (Nazism) and extreme left Marxism would result in the victory of Nazism and the rest is history.
The inability of the capitalist mode of production to unfold without crisis in the Arab world has in effect led to the intensification of class consciousness. Without economic success in the capitalist mode of production Arab populations turned to radical political movements similar to the way German civil society turned to extremist politics.
In the Arab world, we see that Nationalist Socialism (Nasserism as it is often called) would take form as a philosophic/political reaction to colonialism and Zionism. It is clear however that Nationalist socialism in the Middle East has failed to deliver in terms of economic prosperity and achieving Arab Unity. This leads us to the fundamentalist movement.
As much of a Marxist as I am I find analyzing fundamentalism from a class struggle perspective issue As such I would like to incorporate Bassam Tibi’s (University of Gottingen) argument that radical Islam is also a product of Islam’s “traumatic” interaction with western modernity. Unlike Tibi however, I will not disassociate class struggle from the equation. I see that identity issues is as much a force that brought on fundamentalism as class struggle one simply re-enforces the other.
There is no clear agreement on when Socialism in the Arab world and fundamentalism took over. Some scholars seem to point to the Iranian revolution as the beginning others cite the widespread practice by despotic Arab rulers of countering socialist/communist tendencies by propping rightist movements such as the Moslem brotherhood and other similar movements. These movements in turn formed the basis of reactionary conservative fundamentalist Islamic ideology.

I will now address my central premise, why is fundamentalism inherent within Islam? The reason should be fairly obvious given our definition of fundamentalism. The reasoning is that one of the basic tenets of Islam requires that every Moslem accept the Quran as being inerrant and can not be changed. This has stifled Islamic theological discussion and debate across the centuries.
Who are the fanatics?
Robert Fisk once commented on fanatics by saying “A Fanatic is someone who redoubles his efforts every time his goals become less clear”. The ultimate goal of the fanatics/fundamentalists is the re-creation of an Islamic state of being; a political entity one might even call it a government. The reason that this is not an achievable goal is the fact that political Islam is simply unattainable and it is my belief that the Islamists themselves on one level or another know that as well. In their quest to achieving pax islamicus they would inevitably cause much terror and dismay without being able to achieve any goals (Tibi 2000 The Challenge of Fundamentalist and the rise of the new world disorder).

Personal Reflections.
I see that this newly formed fundamentalist movement is less of an individual groups of dissidents and more of an ideology. As I had mentioned earlier up until November 9th, 60 percent of Jordanians gave tacit approval to the actions of Zarqawi and Bin Laden. Years of oppression and capitalist exploitation coupled with a lacking economy that hasn’t until very recently been able to deliver (note that us of late the King has been able to institute a number of free market reforms that have greatly benefited the economy) has caused civil society to either accept fundamentalist or for moderates apologize for it. It is absolutely imperative that Moslems begin addressing central aspects of their faith without leaving anything sacrosanct. Moslems cannot simply believe that the Quran is inerrant. Some of the Quran might very well be wrong, some of it might not, the point is debate over every single issue, nothing should be left untouched. This is what I meant when I referred to the Christian or protestant reformation. The reformation was a reform movement beginning in the late 14th and early 15th century that aimed at reforming the Catholic Church and ended up with the Christian schism between the Catholic and protestant church. The importance of the reformation is that it provided a proto forum of theological debate. As you can see
Christians retained their faith but reformed it (in the form of the protestant church). This is a gross oversimplification of the process but to go into it in detail I’d have to write another 50 pages but I’m sure all of you can look it up.
The main danger of religion is that it DOESN’T cause people to commit to evil but rather provides the moral justification for it. This is true in the monotheistic religions more so than in the polytheistic religions

Anyway I think this is long enough, I can’t exactly keep going so lets continue the discussion in the comments section,
I am going to revise this and concentrate on specific subject and then publish it on http://www.globalcomment.com, so if anyone iss still interested look up that website in a few weeks
Khaled Talhouni

===================================It is me again the first Anonymous with the seven year old to say what happened in Amman is not consistent with Islam.
Toly ,my regret to miss lead you with my remark :
“Note Islam like other respected religions, is becoming a commercialized commodity used by people like you and I but with a worldly motives that many innocents fall for.”
What I meant by this, you and I, are with good motivated intentions towards Islam, and others who take a stand to tarnish Islam by appearing like us(you and I in the collective semintics) and pretending to take same stand but with different motives .Hope to have explained my self ?

Khaled Talhouni, I will grant your wish of posting your upcoming comment in a seperate entry on Tololy’s Box. I will not, however, turn the Box into a live debate about Islam.

As much as I would love to do that, this is not the purpose for which I have the Box set up. Anyone wishing to elaborate further will have to do so through comments on this, and the future entry, or via emails to tutunai@gmail.com

That is not say there is no possibility of my discussing religion here in Tololy’s Box, in the future. Only I do not want to give the feel that the Box is established for this sole reason and no other.

Have no worries that your awaited comment will take longer in time. I did not expect to receive it tonight, since the matter requires a good deal of research. Good luck with your paper as well.

Sara, benvenuta in Tololy’s Box! Ti rigrazio per quel commento gentile che mi hai fatto. Spero che i miei idee e le idee espresse qui ti danno un nuovo scopo delle cose, e spero sinceramente che ritorni nel Box.

Noor, stay tuned for more,hopefully.

Abu Sinan, I thank you for your support.

Black Cats, I thank you for the nice experience you shared with us. I had hoped it was posted in English, for in that manner it would reach a larger number of people. Nevertheless, many thanks.

Anonymous, I enjoyed reading your comment. Yet I must disagree with some of what you say. I also failed to understand what you meant by saying: “Note Islam like other respected religions, is becoming a commercialized commodity used by people like you and I but with a worldly motives that many innocents fall for.”

I do beg your pardon for my incomplete knowledge, but how do you see me using Islam with worldly motives that many innocents fall for? I do not understand the content of your message.

I should post a reply to your comment, being nice and long as it was, it would take me some time to understand it fully and reflect upon what codes it contains. I hope I will be able to do that soon. Oh, and welcome to Tololy’s Box.

Lulu, I found your comment very pleasant and unemotional. Emotions often get in the way of common sense and they hinder people’s abilities to deliver a good argument. I salute you.

My system of belief is very close to Khaled’s although not as extreme, so I mostly agree with what he said.

Yet, kudos to you Tololy for handling his question so tolerantly and openmindedly.