The Crisis of Islam by Bernard Lewis

Preface: Lewis is a professor emeritus of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University. His works on the Middle East, Islam, and the West's interaction with Islam have spanned the latter part of the 20th century. He coined the phrase "clash of civilizations" that Samuel Huntington made infamous. Lewis is a proponent of Turkey - as the democratic hub in Islam - and largely focuses on the clash of the two monolithic religions - Islam and Christianity.

Review: The Crisis of Islam is a quick read at just under 170 pages. This Middle East primer was written in 2004 as a collection of expanded essays on the basic idea of: "What went wrong in Islam?" What Went Wrong? is actually the title of an essay written for The Atlantic in 2002. Crisis covers a breadth of topics in a cursory fashion to give the reader a better understanding of why the Middle Eastern culture/Islam harbors such hostility and antipathy towards the West.

Lewis makes some good points and "The Failure of Modernity" offers sobering statistics on the economic, educational, and social status of Islamic - or largely Muslim - countries. His brief discussion on jihad is enlightening to those that may be ignorant on the subject. Lewis points out that jihad has been adulterated by radical Islamists/terrorists; he even provides evidence of how suicide attacks and killing noncombatants indiscriminately is not only an innovation in Islamic doctrine, it's an illict doctrine.

While Lewis provides some answers to the "humiliation" felt by Islamic culture, - an element frequently cited by bin Laden, Zawahiri, and other radicial Islamists as justification for offensive and defensive jihad - the reader must remember that Lewis has spent the majority of his academic career speaking of the decline of Islamic culture at the hands of the superior West. Certainly, some of his argument rings true given the difference in GDP and economic development -aside from oil money. However, Lewis places more stock in his belief that Islam's Western envy has more to do with decline than the impact of imperialist rule and poor management after imperialism left the region.

The book has a lot of good nuggets one can take from it and I would recommend it to anyone interested on the subject. It's not a definitive work on the subject of Islam or Islamic relations with the West, but it's a decent jumping off point.

The War for Muslim Minds by Gilles Kepel

Preface: This book was written in 2004 - prior to the London bombings; just a minor fact to keep in mind when reading the book and Kepel's analysis of "Londonstan." Also of note, Kepel is a French political science professor; alors - thus - his analysis of American policy is hardly apologetic.

Review: I liked this book. Despite his critical analysis and tone of American policy post 9/11, I didn't feel the critique was unwarranted or overtly anti-American. Kepel does an excellent job of wading through the different Islamist doctrines and groups to provide the reader with a better understanding of the internal strife within the umma and young Muslim minds. The book starts with the Second Intifada in Palestine/Israel and the failure of the Oslo Peace Accord. He quickly jumps to the influence of the Neocons on Washington policy before addressing the events leading up to and immediately after 9/11. His discussion and explanation of the jihad doctrine is clear, as is his differentiation of Islamist groups like the salafis, the Wahhabis, the Muslim Brotherhood, and al-Qaeda to name a few. He also discusses the power struggle of the within Saudi Arabia between the Islamic scholars and the house of Saud. His ability to cover one topic and tie it back into a later chapter makes the connections of the groups, ideologies, and political jockeying even more clear.

Kepel has been criticiseized for his castigation of the Bush Administration and neocon officals, and for portraying the threat of Islamization as a weak adversary to the Western society. Kepel's critiques of the Bush Administration - and his chapter on the failure in Iraq - are no more harsh than current public sentiment. While he does argue that Islamists are no longer a real threat to Western society, he bolsters his argument with cogent arguments and empirical evidence. Kepel doesn't argue that terrorism from jihadi elements is no longer a threat to our safety, rather he argues that 9/11 failed to galvanize the Muslim world as al-Qaeda had hoped. The umma has turned its back on al-Qaeda, Kepel argues; mainstream Muslims are not interested in martyrdom operations and joining bin Laden's "war on America."

Kepel ends the book with a look at Muslim immigrant communities within Europe - a subject that receives little press in the US unless their are riots. Kepel has an uncanny ability to summarize detailed histories and ideologies in a few paragraphs. The reader can understand the plight of the Muslim immigres in France and Britain, and why the radical views of the Muslim Brotherhood or the salafi imam is more appealing than the status quo. Kepel argues in the end that this Euro-Muslim (my term) youth decides the future of Islam. A generation exposed to and benefiting from Western Democracy will either chose to embrace Western ideals and combine them with their Islamic faith, or they will reject them and embrace the hatred and separatism espoused by radical imams.

I look forward to picking up Kepel's other book: Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam in the near future.

The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers

Preface: This book was given to me by my friend Josh shortly after my return from Egypt in the summer of 2005 (I believe it was a birthday gift). Time travel, Egyptian gods, and anachronistic hijinx, what isn't to like?

Review: The first time I tried to read the book I was a bit put off by the paragraph-long first sentence. However, this time I paid no attention to the Dickens-like intro and was soon sucked into the adventures of Prof. Brendan Doyle.

As a matter of forewarning, the book was written in 1983, so the "present time" is a time jump in itself for the modern day reader. Doyle is the unknowing pawn of a dying wealthy old man at the beginning of the book. He travels back in time with the help of a super high dose of radiation and the adventures of Prof. Doyle ensue.

Not to spoil the book, but everyone's favorite fuzzy Egyptian god Anubis appears only on the cover; he never actually appears within the story. For your Anubis fix you'll need to watch The Mummy Returns or Stargate.

Powers' book is an enjoyable read and does a fairly good job of keeping the story moving along. At just under 400 pages, it's not your normal summertime or airplane flight read, however it's a story you can keep your imagination wrapped around.

If you have a hankering for historical fiction, time travel, and the cosmic battle between good and evil The Anubis Gates should fill that void in your soul.

The Warrior Prophet by Richard Gabriel

The Quarterly Journal of Military History (MHQ)
Summer 2007 ed.



Preface:

While I was home in the Des Moines area I stopped by Borders after catching a movie with some family. As I was perusing the magazine aisle I noticed a magazine with a front cover that read: "Muhammad the ingenious military mind of the first insurgent." My first reaction was a mixture of shock, curiosity, and offense.

Review:

As stated above, I did not begin reading this article with an open mind. I expected it to be offensive article. The cover of the magazine - as well as a picture of the relief in our Supreme Court of the Prophet- portrays Muhammad with a sword in one hand and the Qur'an in the other. Most - a product of our right-handed society, mostly - place his scimitar in his right hand, with the last message of Allah in his left. Minor problem: in Arabic culture placing the Qur'an in Muhammad's left hand is offensive because that is the hand traditionally used to clean oneself after defecation.

The article was not as offensive as I feared it would be. The majority of the article is spent discussing the ingenuity of Muhammad's military stratagem. Gabriel makes the fairly obvious argument that if not for Muhammad's military success, the faith of Islam would have either died a quiet death or remained a regional sect.

Gabriel's article is different from the apologist writings that fill the bookshelves these days. Modern day Islamic scholars deplore the categorization of the spread of Islam via "the sword and the book," as the West is keen to describe Islam's impressive conversion rates over the last thirteen centuries - hence the aforementioned depictions of Muhammad. Far from the apologetic and modern day writers on Islam, Gabriel's article embraces the militaristic elements of Islam's roots and the proliferation of the faith.

Despite the interesting military strategy discussion, I had three problems with the article:

1) The label "insurgent"
- While Gabriel's description of an "insurgency" was educational for me, as I do not have an military training, I do not feel the term is correctly applied to Muhammad. Webster's defines "insurgent" as "person who revolts against civil authority or an established government; especially : a rebel not recognized as a belligerent" and defines "insurgency" as "the quality or state of being insurgent; specifically : a condition of revolt against a government that is less than an organized revolution and that is not recognized as belligerency."

I would submit that the so-called "insurgents" in Iraq and Muhammad rise to the level of belligerent. The Qur'aysh (the dominant tribe in control of Mecca during Muhammad's life) viewed Muhammad's military battles to be a matter of war. The Muslims certainly did as jihad doctrine is based largely on the battles with the Qur'aysh (both in the Qur'an and the Sunna). While al-Qaeda or local terrorist cells, as well as Muhammad, may not be combatants under the command of a state they certainly qualify as "inclined to or exhibiting assertiveness, hostility, or combativeness." Regardless of the modern day parallels, the Qur'aysh weren't a nation state either, merely the strongest and most wealth tribe in Arabia. The term "insurgent" is erroneously applied to Muhammad with respect to actions against other tribes. Moreover, the umma was the a faith based community with its own government and military elements. One could - and many have - argue that the umma was a nation.

Parsing definitions aside, the term "insurgent" to the general public is one that carries a negative connotation. I cannot imagine that to state officials or trained military officials the term is positive either. In the end, it is the implied negative representation that was offensive to me.

2) The label "terrorism"
- Much like the negative term "insurgent," the argument that Muhammad used "terrorism" to spread his faith and as the predominant military strategy of his army is again offensive.

"Terrorism seems to be an indispensable element of a successful insurgency, and it was no less so in Muhammad's case. He used terrorism in two basic ways: First, he ensured discipline among his followers by making public examples of traitors and backsliders...Second, Muhammad used terrorism to strike fear in the hearts of his enemies to a large scale."

Acts of treason and military defection punished by death are not limited to Muslim armies. Gabriel references the execution of Jewish tribes - Arabs of Jewish faith - as an example of terrorism against his enemies. However, what Gabriel fails to mention is that the tribes sold out Muhammad to the Qur'aysh - in fact leaving the Muslim army to die - before and during battles. According to Arabic tribal law his reprisal - death of their men for his - is not without precedence. It was less an act of terrorism ("the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion") as it was a matter of retribution. Gabriel also mentions Muhammad's execution of Meccans after he finally conquers the city, however this was limited to "pagans." Converts to Islam or dhimmi - people of the book; Christians and Jews - would not have been killed. Muhammad and his men probably did kill many Meccans after they overtook the city; I am sure that many died at his command. Does that make him any different than any other military conqueror after years of war? (Fallujah anyone?) If the answer is "no" then either every military leader is a terrorist or Gabriel is singling out Muhammad for his own personal reasons.

Despite Gabriel's claim that the faith Muhammad founded and spread should not be measured by the brutality of its Prophet, the tone of the article and the terminology used does little to bolster Gabriel's claim. The last two sentences of the article are:

"Conservative Sunnis, such as the Wahhabis of Arabia, and modern militant jihadis in Iraq and Pakistan still adhere to the traditional doctrine [of jihad]. It is among these militant conservative Muslims that the military legacy of Muhammad is most alive today."

It's not much different than telling the populace of the Middle East that the raping and pillaging campaigns of the Vikings and Genghis Khan are most alive today in the United States armed forces. Or compairing our forces to that of the Crusaders as Islamist rhetoric is quick to do.

3) The last section
- Gabriel ends the piece by trying to summarize complex theological and juristic differences with Islam in seven paragraphs. This section does little to clear up the readers questions regarding Shi'ism v. Sunnism, the legitimacy of the doctrine of jihad, classical v. modern interpretations of the jihad doctrine, and what constitutes jus ad bellum and jus in bello under Shari'a. The last seven paragraphs did nothing more than paint Islam as a religion of blood thirsty torturing heathens. By the end of the article you may believe that Muslim warriors are likely to come out of the closet and kill your children at night for not eating the their vegetables as they complete a nightly raid of your neighborhood.


While Gabriel does acknowledge Muhammad's - and his advisers' - military prowess, he also takes the opportunity to paint Islam as a backwards blood thirsty religion by using terms such as "terrorism," and "insurgent," and by adding convoluted and highly debated theological and legal doctrines into the article. The article is not devoid of merit, but it is also not devoid of polemics.

Irony for the day: Gabriel is the angel that acted as the medium between Muhammad and Allah. The Revelation passed on to Muhammad and contained in the Qur'an are the words of Gabriel.

Midaq Alley by Naguib Mahfouz

Naguib Mahfouz was a Nobel Peace Prize winner and is heralded as one of the Arab world's best writers. He was born, died, and buried - last August at the age of 94 - in Cairo, Egypt. I found this book while I was studying at AUC. It is supposed to be one of his best; the story did not disappoint.


Midaq Alley was written in 1947 and takes place during the later portion of World War II in an alley of Cairo. The basic idea behind the story is modernization - specifically the breaking of Arab tradition for Western tradition. The story follows the everyday lives of the people that live in the alley. Everything from the mundane to the taboo and unrequited love to war is experienced by the small group of Egyptians in the alley. The characters are extreme representations: the match-maker, the professional crippler/beggar, the rich land-lady, the hashish store owner, the coming of age male, and the young beautiful female that longs for a new life of her own as she has to fight off suitors.

The story is a touching blend of the character's lives, feelings, and desires. I often found myself trying to imagine the characters walking in the alleys, smoking hookah at the shops, and going about their daily lives in Cairo. It helped to have a firsthand experience as a reference point, but it's not required to become engaged by Mahfouz's writing.

My only regret is that I didn't pick up more of his works while I was at AUC. The AUC Press is holds the rights to his works and I can't buy the same artwork for the covers outside the Middle East. If you want to pick up a copy, don't fret, Amazon has copies too.

Quick Reviews

Here are some books I have read recently:

Holy Superheroes! by Greg Garrett

This nonfiction books examines the impact of faith and spirituality in comic books. The book is less than 200 pages so the examination is cursory but informative. I enjoyed the book mainly because I enjoy both the intersection of the two different elements, as well as each element individually. Some of the sections were thought provoking, while the post-9/11 chapter is very touching. The book is rife with quotes from founding fathers and great social reformers which make the book worthwhile in itself. If you have a little time to kill and enjoy thinking about spirituality or what role comic books have in our society as side from providing scantly clad women illustrations for the teenager male population, pick up Garrett's book.



July, July by Tim O'Brien

Tim O'Brien is a wonderful storyteller. He's also a graduate of Macalester College in St. Paul. A fun fact for me when I was talking to Prof. Dick Lesicko about the book in March. O'Brien was a member of Lesicko's debate team. Anyways, I have been impressed with O'Brien ever since I read The Things They Carried (the collection of narratives not just the short story of the same title). This book is about a class reunion (at Mac but in the book it's Darton Hall) of former hippies and Vietnam Vets. It's an interesting examination of what happens in life after college, when you have to put form to your dreams and theories. It's a quick read and a good summertime book.



Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

As I wrote in my review of Fragile Things I like Gaiman's writing style and fantasy worlds. He always has an excellent amalgam of wit, history, religion, philosophy, and the spectacular. The premise of this novel is that there is a world beneath London, literally an Underground London, were people go when they fall through the cracks or are forgotten. This alternative London is full of knights, lords, monsters, and bounty hunters. The novel is about a man that stumbles into this world after trying to help a young woman and desparately tries to get his old life back. Another great summertime or travel book.



How Soccer Explains the World by Franklin Foer

Foer aims to explain globalization and the geopolitics of certain regions through their passion and treatment of football (soccer). It's an interesting book, and surprisingly on point with some regions international politics. I learned a lot about the history of certain European clubs like Milan, Barcelona, and the nasty sectarian history and fighting between Reading and Celtic. Rarely in the United States do we hear any news about the football clubs around the world. Every four years soccer is a blip on our radars for the World Cup and then back to exile, making it hard to understand the world's passion for the sport. While Foer doesn't actually believe that soccer/football explains the positives and negatives of globalization he does provide a clear argument for the extension of certain world ailments (i.e. sectarian strife, crime syndicates, ethnics divides, and the Jewish Question) onto and into football clubs around the world.


In the end, I would reccommend all of these books for summer reading. None of them are too heavy for a nice summer day.

Divided by God by Noah Feldman

Noah Feldman is a constitutional law scholar and professor. He's on his way to Harvard Law this fall after previously teaching at NYU.

Divided by God seeks to provide the reader with a historical account of and propose an answer to the separation of church and state problem. Feldman does a good job of walking the reader through the history of the First Amendment Freedom of Religion jurisprudence and history.

Most of the book is spent covering the history of the religious freedom jurisprudence. Your basics are covered -like the difference between the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause - as well as a brief philosophical discourse on freedom of conscience in the 18th century. Feldman also spends a lot of time on the history of two groups, the legal secularists and the value evangelicals.

The propose of this book is three-fold:

1) To provide the reader with a history of the issues surrounding the separation of church and state;
2) Show why both the legal secularists and the value evangelicals have incorrect interpretations of the First Amendment and its history;
3) To propose a solution to the current cultural, political, and social problems surrounding the separation of church and state dilemma.

The book was fairly easy to read. Even those without a legal education should find Feldman's arguments, discussions, and historical regurgitation clear and concise as he uses very little "legalese."

In the end, Feldman decides to propose his own solution to the church/state problem. He believes the Lemon test and O'Connor's endorsement test should be replaced with what he calls a more historically accurate test of "no coercion and no money". While I agree that his "coercion and money" prohibition is a better bright line test for the courts, I don't know that I personally want more religion in the public sphere. Nor do I want more politicians deciding and writing legislation based on their personal faith.

Regardless of my personal views, Divided by God is an insightful book and one that more people should read. The more the general population knows about the law and why certain freedoms are in place the better.

Starman: Sins of the Father (TPB)

At the behest of a friend I read the trade paperback (TPB) Starman: Sins of the Father.

Premise: The Starman mantle is passed down a generation after family tragedy. However, the next in line is not only hesitant about taking up the herioc post, but is antipathetic about it.

I'm not much of a DC Comics guy. I've mostly read Marvel comics - particularly the X-Universe - and thus have less knowledge about the DC Universe. I was able to read the series without much trouble even though I don't know much about the original Starman, Opal City's history, or the Starman villian du jour.

This series is mostly a coming of age/father-son personal struggle story arc. The series was written in the mid-nineties and thus has the artistic flavor of that time period. Personally, I didn't much care for the art work. It's not bad, just not aesthetically pleasing to me, if you will. The writing used a lot of broken sentences and incomplete thoughts to move the storyline; as far as literary style goes, it's some what hard to read in the comic book format. However, the emotional intensity and personal struggle in the arc required a disjointed thought process. I would be interested to see if the writing style changes as the series progresses; that being said, I don't know yet that I will seek out the story of Starman.

I don't know if it's a failing on my part to understand the DC Universe, the Starman history, or the appeal of Starman, but I didn't get extremely attached to any of the characters in the storyline. I'm sure as Starman comes to term with his new life as the champion of good in Opal City and more villians seek to wipe him off the face of the earth the intrigue will build.

There is a character in the storyline called The Mist. Apparently, the Mist and Starman (1940s style) were quintessentional adversaries to the point that the animosity has passed down through the generations. Yet I didn't quite understand the author's last depiction of the Mist. Perhaps I am missing something because I lack the history of the series and characters, but the almost decreped and absent-minded image of the Mist at the end of the series is so contradictory to his persona in the rest of the series that it left me in a state of disbelief.

All in all, the series was entertaining. It was a nice read on a hot day. The storyline seemed in tune with natural human emotions. Yet i just couldn't get myself to care about what happened next in the saga once the arc was finished. Perhaps it will grow on me if I pick up another TPB of Starman. I shall reserve judgment, until that day.

Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman

As I finish books on my "Current Reading List" I intend to review them, for whatever that's worth. I'm not a literary critic by any means, but I'll give it a whirl.


Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman

Preface:

This book was given to me by my friend Brad after I recommended American Gods - also by Gaiman - to him. I haven't read a lot of Gaiman; my first exposure to him was as the writer of Sandman. Now I haven't actually read Sandman but I have read American Gods, Good Omens, Neverwhere, and 1602, a one shot series for Marvel. Needless to say, I like Gaiman's style and fantasy aimed stories.

Fragile Things is a collection of short stories and poems by Gaiman.

Review:

I am not a poetry fan, and thus I tended to read but rarely enjoyed the poetry. There is nothing wrong with poetry per se, I just prefer prose. The poetry wasn't overly artsy - difficult to follow or read - nor was it cliched; poetry fans will probably find nothing wrong with the poems contained in Fragile Things.

I enjoyed most of the stories. The collection served it's purpose of passing the time in a limitless, non-stressful, and imaginary world. The American Gods novella at the end of the collection was a nice addition. A couple of the shorts have been made into graphic novels since Gaiman originally wrote them, like Harlequin Valentine. Overall, I enjoyed the collection and would recommend it to anyone that enjoys stories filled with imagination, dark imagery, and dark humour.

Favorites: The Monarch of the Glen, Sunbird, Other People, and A Study in Emerald