The Myth of Secularization

(Click on link for episode) The Myth of the Secular, Part 4

The Fundamentals was a series of books, published by the Bible Institute of Los Angeles between 1910 and 1915, which tried to set the basics of Christianity in stone. Fundamentalism now refers to any back-to-basics movement. Malise Ruthven’s Fundamentalism asks what all these movements have in common, in this feature interview with David Cayley.

Malise Ruthven has been talking and writing about religion for 40 years – ever since he joined the Arabic section of the BBC World Service in the early 70’s.  During that time he’s seen a remarkable surge in fundamentalist forms of religion all around the world. One reason for it, he’s concluded, is religions unequalled ability to express identity: to say who I am and where I belong.  In 2004 he published Fundamentalism: The Search for Meaning, in which he tries to show what various religious back to basics movements around the world have in common.