{"id":63373,"date":"2018-07-28T00:50:16","date_gmt":"2018-07-28T06:50:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=63373"},"modified":"2018-09-05T09:52:57","modified_gmt":"2018-09-05T15:52:57","slug":"muslim-identity-part-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2018\/07\/muslim-identity-part-6.html","title":{"rendered":"“Muslim Identity” (Part 6)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
Cairo at twilight (Wikimedia Commons public domain)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

This is the sixth installment of an article that I wrote for\u00a0Richard C. Martin, et al., eds., \u00a0Encyclopedia of Islam and the Muslim World<\/em>, 2 vols. (New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2004), on the subject of \u201cMuslim Identity\u201d:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Among the Arabs<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

The Young Ottoman thinker Namik Kemal argued that separatist movements would not arise among the empire\u2019s diverse ethnic groups because they were too intermingled to be able to form viable states.\u00a0 The only possible exception to this, he felt, was the Arabs.\u00a0 However, he reasoned, Arabs were bound to the Ottoman state not only by their loyalty to the sultan but by their sense of Islamic brotherhood with the empire.\u00a0 And, in fact, al-Afghani\u2019s great Egyptian disciple Muhammad \u2018Abduh (d. 1905) opposed local patriotism or nationalism as a threat to Islamic unity.\u00a0 Race and nation, in his view, were unimportant accidents, irrelevant to one\u2019s fundamental identity as a member of the Islamic umma<\/i>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Still, Kemal was wrong.\u00a0 Arab nationalism\u2014the idea that Arabic speakers form a single nation with legitimate aspirations to separate statehood\u2014seems to have been born among the Christian Arab elite of Lebanon, perhaps under the influence of their European fellow believers.\u00a0 They, of course, felt no religious loyalty to the sultan, but deeply prized the language and culture they shared with their Muslim fellow-Arabs.\u00a0 In 1860, the Christian journalist Butrus al-Bustani founded \u201cThe Patriotic School\u201d (al-madrasa al-wataniyya<\/i>); by 1870, the motto \u201clove of country is part of the faith\u201d appeared on the masthead of the magazine he edited.\u00a0 The watan<\/i> of which he spoke, however, was not the Ottoman empire.\u00a0 His \u201ccountry\u201d was Syria, an Arabic-speaking land.<\/span><\/p>\n

Graduates of newly founded schools in Syria and Iraq were likewise infected with nationalism and political consciousness, but their pride too was in Arabic language and Arabic history.\u00a0 They called first for decentralization, then independence.\u00a0 The Arab revolt of 1916 resulted in the eventual creation of at least nominally independent states in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and Jordan after the interwar British and French mandates ended.\u00a0 These were constructed essentially on the European model that had been invoked previously by the Young Turks.<\/span><\/p>\n

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***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The survey results mentioned here are scarcely surprising. \u00a0They are, in fact, exactly what I would have expected. \u00a0And the same general pattern holds true with respect to Latter-days Saints, as well. \u00a0People who actually know Mormons<\/a> as individuals \u2014 excepting me, of course \u2014 think more highly of Mormons and Mormonism than people who don\u2019t:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIn Western Europe, familiarity with Muslims is linked to positive views of Muslims and Islam\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

As a general rule, it\u2019s far easier to fear, to hate, and\/or to demonize groups of people whom we don\u2019t know. \u00a0Granted, there are groups that really are fearsome, and some that are very nearly demonic. \u00a0But they\u2019re few and far between. \u00a0And, on the whole, Muslims are certainly not among them.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Posted from Ucluelet, British Columbia<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 This is the sixth installment of an article that I wrote for\u00a0Richard C. Martin, et al., eds., \u00a0Encyclopedia of Islam and the Muslim World, 2 vols. (New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2004), on the subject of \u201cMuslim Identity\u201d: \u00a0 Among the Arabs The Young Ottoman thinker Namik Kemal argued that separatist movements would […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-63373","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n"Muslim Identity" (Part 6)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"    This is the sixth installment of an article that I wrote for\u00a0Richard C. 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