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The Case for Islamo-Christian Civilization
Richard W. Bulliet
Not Necessarily Enemies...
Columbia University Press
July 2004
192 pages ISBN: 0231127960 Hardcover
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Non-Fiction Political | Non-Fiction
Conventional wisdom maintains that the differences between
Islam and Christianity are irreconcilable. Pre-eminent
Middle East scholar Richard W. Bulliet disagrees, and in
this fresh, provocative book he looks beneath the rhetoric
of hatred and misunderstanding to challenge prevailing --
and misleading -- views of Islamic history and a "clash of
civilizations." These sibling societies begin at the same
time, go through the same developmental stages, and confront
the same internal challenges. Yet as Christianity grows rich
and powerful and less central to everyday life, Islam finds
success around the globe but falls behind in wealth and power. Modernization in the nineteenth century brings in secular
forces that marginalize religion in political and public
life. In the Christian world, this simply furthers a process
that had already begun. In the Middle East this gives rise
to the tyrannical governments that continue to dominate.
Bulliet argues that beginning in the 1950s American
policymakers misread the Muslim world and, instead of
focusing on the growing discontent against the unpopular
governments, saw only a forum for liberal, democratic
reforms within those governments. By fostering slogans like
"clash of civilizations" and "what went wrong," Americans to
this day continue to misread the Muslim world and to miss
the opportunity to focus on common ground for building
lasting peace. This book offers a fresh perspective on
U.S.-Muslim relations and provides the intellectual
groundwork upon which to help build a peaceful and
democratic future in the Muslim world. On "clash of civilizations" "Civilizations that are destined to clash cannot seek
together a common future. Like Mathews' Islam, Huntington's
Islam is beyond redemption. The strain of Protestant
American thought that both men are heir to, pronounces
against Islam the same self-righteous and unequivocal
sentence of 'otherness'that American Protestants once
visited upon Catholics and Jews."
On "what went wrong" "The idea that people in the Middle East once embraced the
goal of becoming like Europe and hoped that by adopting
European ideas and institutions they would someday
experience all of the liberal values we recognize in the
Europe of today is nonsense. It assumes a historical outcome
for Europe itself that no one even in Europe could have
predicted." On "why do they hate us" "Those who advanced the Japanese occupation as a model for
postwar Iraq seem to have baseball, Hello Kitty, and Elvis
impersonators in the back of their minds rather than
headscarves and turbaned mullahs.... Like latter day
missionaries, we want the Muslims to love us, not just for
what we can offer in the way of a technological society but
for who we are -- for our values. But we refuse to
countenance the thought of loving them for their values." On Islam's ideological shortcomings "Jim Jones, David Koresh, and Meir Kahane do not typify
Christianity and Judaism in the eyes of the civilized West
but those same eyes are prone to see Osama bin Laden and
Mullah Muhammad Omar as typifying Islam." On Middle East studies "The founders of Middle East studies ignored recommendations
that they focus on contemporary Islam and focused instead on
Middle Easterners trying to act like westerners. There
weren't a lot of these, just as there hadn't been a lot of
converts, but the conviction was strong that those few would
be pioneers in bringing western modernity to the region...
The people we supported as agents of modernity became tyrants."
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