-Caveat Lector-
>From a Christian web site, cross-posted from a Jewish list. Go figure.
Tenorlove
> The Myth of Islamic Tolerance
>
>
>
> Muslim "protection" of Christians and Jews has actually been
> oppression,
> says scholar Bat Ye'or.
>
> Interview By Michael Cromartie
>
> It is standard fare in many college and university courses
> today to contrast
> the history of Christian treatment of religious minorities,
> particularly
> Jews and Muslims, with the history of Jews and Christians
> under Islam.
> According to this politically correct scenario, Christians
> have been
> brutally intolerant while Muslims have generally been quite
> benign (except
> in response to Christian provocations, from the Crusades to
> colonialism).
>
> Alas, the charge of Christian intolerance has a good deal of
> substance,
> though the historical record is not as uniformly bad as it
> is often said to
> be. But what about Islamic tolerance of Jews and Christians?
>
> Bat Ye'or (a pseudonym meaning "daughter of the Nile") is an
> Egyptian-born
> Jewish scholar. In articles and books such as The Decline of
> Eastern
> Christianity Under Islam: From Jihad to Dhimmitude
> (Fairleigh Dickinson
> Univ. Press), she has argued that Islamic tolerance is a
> myth of modern
> origin, born of the converging interests of the Islamic
> states and the
> Western colonial powers. The actual condition of the
> dhimmi-that is, the
> indigenous Jews, Christians, and other non-Muslims under
> Islamic law as a
> result of conquest-was one of fundamental subjection that
> permitted only the
> private exercise of religion. To describe the historical
> reality of Jews and
> Christians under Islam from the seventh century to the
> present, she has
> coined the term "dhimmitude."
>
> This revisionist history is important for its own sake, to
> set the record
> straight. But it is particularly significant, Bat Ye'or
> argues, at a time
> when many Muslim intellectuals are neither discarding their
> faith in favor
> of Western models nor accepting uncritically the dictates of
> Islamic
> traditionalists but rather are seeking a reform of Islam
> from within.
>
> Michael Cromartie interviewed Bat Ye'or this spring in
> Washington, D.C.,
> where she was speaking at the Ethics and Public Policy
> Center.
>
> You have challenged the alleged tolerance of Islamic regimes
> toward
> Christians and Jews. You say Christians and Jews were
> considered to be
> protected and given a special designation as ahl al-dhimma
> ("protected
> people"), but contrary to this theory of a protected status,
> the conduct of
> many Muslims has been brutally oppressive toward
> non-Muslims. Could you
> elaborate?
> In Islamic law there is both a history of protection of Jews
> and Christians
> and a history of persecution of Jews and Christians. Because
> of the whole
> history of Judaism and Christianity, Islam has been a
> subject deliberately
> obfuscated by Western policy. When there is no real history,
> there is a
> void, and myths flourish. We now have a myth which has taken
> the place of
> history, a big myth which has covered three continents:
> Africa, Asia, and
> Europe. This myth spans not only three continents but also
> 13 centuries, the
> period of Islamic rule over the Christian world.
>
> A myth of tolerance?
> Although tolerance existed, it was counterbalanced by a
> system of oppression
> that led to the open extermination of Christian populations
> and the
> disappearance of the Eastern Christian culture. Tolerance
> was given to Jews
> and Christians only on the condition that they would accept
> and submit to a
> system of persecution and total inferiority. The governing
> context for such
> tolerance was the jihad. The two are linked and cannot be
> separated.
>
> How do you define jihad?
> Jihad is a religious conception that divides the world into
> two parts: the
> Muslim lands and the non-Muslims. Between the two exists a
> situation of
> perpetual conflict. This situation of war can be replaced by
> a temporary
> situation of semipeace whereby non-Muslim countries pay a
> tribute to the
> Islamic countries. But if they stop paying the tribute, the
> jihad resumes
> because jihad is the normal state of relationship between
> the non-Muslim and
> the Muslim. Jihad is often compared to the Crusades, but it
> actually
> preceded the Crusades by five centuries. It was within the
> context of jihad
> that the Christian populations and Jewish communities became
> subject to the
> Islamic law.
>
> Historically among the non-Muslims there were Jews and
> Christians who
> benefited from a privileged situation. If they submitted
> without resistance
> to the Arab armies, they were given protection by the
> Islamic ruler, but
> this was protection from the laws of jihad, not protection
> because they were
> loved. Protection from the laws of jihad protected the
> non-Muslim's life,
> property, and family. But non-Muslims were not allowed
> genuinely to practice
> their religion. In general, they could not repair their
> synagogues or
> churches, which then fell into ruins, nor were they
> permitted to build new
> synagogues or churches; they could not observe their
> religion in public.
>
> So it all had to be private?
> Under Islamic law there are several rules, which I describe
> in my book at
> length, that limit non-Muslims' exercise of their religion,
> but allow them
> to enjoy a measure of security and self-administration
> according to their
> own religious rules. Such tolerance was extended to the
> Christian majorities
> in the early centuries of Muslim conquest when, in many
> regions, Muslims
> were a ruling minority, a minority army of conquest.
>
> What happened when Jews or Christians made public appeals to
> their religious
> faith?
> It was considered a breach of the contract, which had
> several penalties. As
> long as they would pay the avanias, which was a ransom money
> or tax, their
> life was safe. But if they refused to pay that, then they
> would give back to
> the Muslim communities the rights of jihad: they could be
> killed, forced to
> convert to Islam, or put into slavery. Also, when
> non-Muslims were out in
> public they had to wear special clothing so that they would
> not be confused
> with Muslims.
>
> Their own religious clothing?
> No, there were Muslim rules obliging Jews and Christians to
> wear special
> clothing with enormous collars that made them objects of
> ridicule.
>
> And if they refused?
> If they refused, for instance, to wear those enormous
> collars, the Jewish or
> Christian religious leaders would be called upon by the
> Muslim rulers and
> would be forced to impose upon their own religious brethren
> very severe
> sanctions.
>
> So, while Jews and Christians enjoyed a form of religious
> liberty, it was
> very constricting.
> The demands for ransom money were particularly harsh. And
> because they could
> not pay, the Jewish and Christian peasantry often simply
> abandoned their
> villages. In order not to be converted to Islam or to be
> reduced to slavery,
> they fled to the mountains or to the cities, where they
> wouldn't be found
> among the crowds. In fact, the economic persecution led to
> the disappearance
> of the Jewish and Christian peasantry from the lands in
> which they had their
> roots, including the abandonment of the synagogues and
> churches.
>
> How active is that today? Is that still taking place?
> Those rules were integrated into shari'a, the Islamic sacred
> law. They were
> justified by a certain interpretation of Qur'anic verses. I
> must say that
> the jihad ideology and the dhimmi rules are not in the
> Qur'an. These were
> devised by Muslim theologians after the death of Muhammad.
> They were the
> result of the interpretation of some verses in the Qur'an
> and some of the
> hadith. The hadith are the deeds and words attributed to the
> prophet
> Muhammad after his death. They form a companion to the
> Qur'an and are
> considered normative because the prophet is regarded as
> expressing the will
> of God in his actions. Those hadith were composed during the
> period of the
> Islamic conquest in the eighth or ninth century, at a time
> of strong
> military confrontation between Christianity and Islam,
> giving them a
> militant orientation. On the basis of this interpretation of
> the Qur'an and
> those hadith, the laws pertaining to Jews and Christians
> were established
> and integrated into shari'a.
>
> Is there a possibility that this intolerance, which has
> grown out of the
> concept of jihad, could be turned around by calling Muslim
> theologians back
> to the Qur'an?
> The Qur'an, like all sacred texts, is subject to competing
> interpretations.
> A number of contemporary Muslim theologians and
> intellectuals want to break
> away from the prison of jihad. They have argued for a new
> interpretation of
> the Qur'an, recognizing that the conflicting passages
> dealing with Jews and
> Christians-some very positive, others very negative-reflect
> contingent
> historical situations.
>
> So within Muslim theology, there is a war of ideas going on.
>
> Absolutely! In Nigeria, in Egypt, in France, everywhere!
> There is profound
> intellectual and spiritual ferment in the Islamic world
> today.
>
> So this gives you some level of encouragement.
> Of course.
>
> That's good, because in reading your book, one can become
> quite discouraged.
> How can the West support this process of change and reform?
> Is that
> something we can do?
> The situation is very complex. First, not only Jews and
> Christians but also
> Buddhists, Hindus, and other non-Muslims in many Islamic
> lands are caught in
> the middle of this internal Islamic debate. Muslims today
> are debating not
> only the condition of the woman, for instance, but also what
> their
> relationship should be to us, Jews and Christians and the
> non-Muslim peoples
> generally. Will Muslims continue to treat us as dhimmi, as
> is the case with
> the Christian Copts in Egypt or in other Islamic regions
> such as the Sudan,
> where there is jihad against the Christian Sudanese and the
> animists? Or
> will the more tolerant "modernizing" movement within Islam
> triumph? The
> Muslim intelligentsia are fighting to protect Christians
> because they are
> also fighting for the secularization of Islamic law.
>
> At the same time, we Jews and Christians bear some of the
> responsibility for
> the fate of our persecuted fellow believers. We have swept
> the real history
> of dhimmitude under the carpet. If instead we had
> forthrightly proclaimed
> this history of Islamic intolerance, that witness would have
> helped the
> Muslim intelligentsia to resist the demonization of Jews and
> Christians. It
> would have helped the Muslim intelligentsia to fight against
> the intolerance
> in their own heritage.
>
> Why has the West failed to tell this story?
> Before the twentieth century, the myth of Islamic tolerance
> had no currency.
> It is largely a modern creation. The West's obfuscation was
> a result of the
> political and cultural difficulties of colonialism. France
> had North Africa,
> Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Syria, and Lebanon after World
> War I. England had
> a huge Islamic population in India and also in Egypt and
> Sudan, Iraq and
> Palestine. They didn't want to confront this population.
> They didn't want to
> protect the Christian minorities in these lands because they
> wanted to have
> an economically beneficial pro-Arab, pro-Islamic policy.
>
> They didn't want to upset the status quo by bringing up the
> question of
> dhimmitude?
> They didn't want to protect the Christians. They told them,
> You have to
> integrate into the Islamic environment; we are no longer
> protecting you.
> Therefore, for political, strategic, and economic
> reasons-mostly related to
> oil in the Middle East-the Western colonial powers didn't
> want to antagonize
> the Muslim countries. As a result, they developed a whole
> literature
> praising Islamic tolerance toward Jews and Christians.
>
> There was also a theological reason, which is anti-Judaism.
> At the end of
> the nineteenth century we see the emergence of Zionism,
> which created a lot
> of opposition from the main churches in Europe, especially
> the Vatican and
> also among the Eastern Christians. Some were favorable to
> Zionism, but
> nonetheless they were afraid the general trend was to be
> anti-Zionist. We
> see, therefore, the collusion of an alliance between
> Christian anti-Judaism
> with Islamic forces against the Jews, against Zionism.
>
> This alliance had several consequences. First, in the
> history of dhimmitude,
> Jews and Christians represent a single unit. Whether they
> like it or not,
> they are bound together as the People of the Book. So this
> long history,
> which had created a kind of companionship between Jews and
> Christians in the
> destiny of the dhimmi, had to be totally denied by the
> Christians in order
> to separate themselves from the Jews. The Jews had to be
> depicted as the
> source of all evil in the Middle East, especially as the
> source of the
> persecution of Christians. (We hear even today that it is
> because of the
> creation of Israel that there is a bad relationship between
> Muslims and
> Christians, while, in fact, the source of this persecution
> of Christians is
> in dhimmi rules that were established in the eighth
> century.)
>
> These Christians had hoped by this policy to integrate
> themselves into
> Islamic society by being anti-Zionist. In Europe they were a
> bridge between
> the Islamic world and the Christian world. They hoped to
> bring the Christian
> West on the side of the Muslims against Israel. They were a
> political asset
> to the Muslims because of their fight against Zionism and
> the Jews. One
> still sees this attitude in Europe today, despite the
> intervening
> history-above all, the Holocaust.
>
> In the present day we have a responsibility to help the
> Muslim elite that is
> seeking the modernization of Islam. To do so we must reject
> the myth of
> Islamic toleration.
>
> What are the prospects for liberalization within Islam?
> It depends in part upon us. If we do nothing, we shall
> regress. We are
> already responsible for doing nothing. But if we are active,
> and if we
> understand all of the political and economic interests
> involved in this very
> complex situation, there is hope, even amidst the rivalry of
> some Christian
> groups.
>
> Are there Muslim intellectuals who will read your book and
> say, Yes, this is
> what we are fighting also?
> Muslim scholars are understandably hesitant to speak out on
> this subject
> because they could be assassinated. Some Muslim scholars
> don't know this
> history because it has been obfuscated, ignored, and denied
> within their own
> tradition. It is a surprise for them to encounter it. Others
> have called and
> congratulated me, and have even gone further than I have in
> their criticism.
>
> Is there a common understanding of human rights in Islam and
> the West?
> There are many Muslim countries, and we have to be wary of
> sweeping
> generalizations. For instance, Turkey is trying to be
> secular. On the other
> hand, in Muslim countries that are governed by shari'a, the
> rights of the
> non-Muslims are those that are given by Islam.
>
> So it is not equivalent to the Western notion of universal
> human rights?
> According to the notion of universal human rights, everyone
> is equal in this
> fundamental way. Under shari'a, not everyone is equal. Only
> Muslims are
> equal, and they extend particular rights to the non-Muslim
> according to
> Islamic law. I don't think that could be said for all the
> Muslim countries,
> but as for Egypt, for example, Anwar Sadat said as much in
> 1980, when he was
> in America. At that time, the Copts were expressing
> indignation over their
> oppression. Sadat's response was that the Copts must know
> that Islam is
> their best protection-not human rights, but Islam. Islam
> protects them. This
> is in contrast to the universal declaration of human rights,
> which
> recognizes that everyone has the right to live in freedom
> and liberty.
>
> This leads us back to the anti-Jewish attitude so prevalent
> in Islam today,
> too often condoned in the West. This anti-Jewish attitude is
> anti-Christian
> as well-Christianity, after all, is rooted in Judaism-and
> ultimately
> antihumanity. If we want to bring the Muslims with us out of
> this dynamic of
> war, Jews and Christians must ally themselves. Our fight is
> for the human
> heart and for human dignity, regardless of our religion. We
> must not remain
> indifferent to the oppression of another person simply
> because his religion
> is different from ours. He is a human being, and we all have
> to fight
> together against hatred and prejudice.
>
> Michael Cromartie directs the Evangelical Studies Project at
> the Ethics and
> Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.
>
> http://www.christianitytoday.com/bc/8b5/8b5038.html
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