From archives: Global Jihad vs Islamic Enlightenment

Posted by DrEdwardHudgins 8 years, 4 months ago to News
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Today's massacres in Paris harken back to the January Jihadist attacks and remind us that the war of the savage versus civilized is ongoing:
SOURCE URL: http://atlassociety.org/commentary/commentary-blog/5650-global-jihad-vs-islamic-enlightenment


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  • Posted by CircuitGuy 8 years, 4 months ago
    I found this interesting. I don't understand the link between religion and Enlightenment values. I understand how Europe went through the Dark Ages, including the crazy stuff with people murdering each other horrifically over disputes over whether to view God as a trinity or one entity. Now we find this incomprehensible. But Islamists behave like this in modern times.

    Your claim, as I understand it, is that Christianity and Judaism got Enlightenment but much of Islam did not. I always (perhaps wrongly) viewed religion and modernity as unrelated variables. There are definitely more Muslims who are medieval than there are people of other religions, but I always imagined that distribution was just chance, the result of a random distribution of independent variables. I always thought suggesting religion caused medievalism was just thinly veiled bigotry.

    I live in a bubble of pluralism. People have religious traditions but never take religious stories literally. It's more like the learned some religious practices in childhood and are only vaguely aware of the ghastly parts of the religious texts. They live in the modern scientific world, and don't take religion literally.

    I am intrigued but not convinced by your view of religion being tied to modernity. In your view, Islam needs to get modernity. In my view, the world needs to get modernity without regard to religion.
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  • Posted by j_IR1776wg 8 years, 4 months ago
    "He argued that “We need a revolution of the self, a revolution of consciousness and ethics to rebuild the Egyptian person.”"

    I wonder if Sisi had read the US Constitution and had in mind the Bill of Rights when he made this statement? Or am I being too optimistic?
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  • Posted by Lucky 8 years, 4 months ago
    I recall it the first time, it is still apt.
    Abdel Fattah el-Sisi is still Egyptian President . What he said is so sensible that is shows how individuals should be judged as individuals, judging on group affiliation has dangers.
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