4

Islam and the West:
An Equivocal Encounter

The history of the relationship between the world’s two largest monotheistic religions is a long and multilayered one.  Although Muhammad taught that Judaism and Christianity were precursors to Islam and Medieval Christians borrowed heavily from the more advanced Muslims, conflict has been as frequent as collaboration.  Other than trade, war has perhaps been the most common language between the followers of two religions, and they have invaded the territories of each other on many occasions.  Uncovering the complex layers of religious and cultural interdependence and conflict between the two religions is like peeling the many fine layers of an onion with all the implications that entails.  Today, there are dissident voices in the Middle East, and many are disturbed by the materialism represented by Western capitalism.  In reaction to these foreign forces and the globalization of the economy, fundamentalist religious groups have emerged in many countries challenging this view of the world.  Along with these have appeared militant jihadi groups.  Many voices are calling for a return to the fundamental principles of family, female seclusion, and Quranic law.  Although many Muslims live in terms of pluralism and acceptance of non-Muslim ways, others see the threat to their way of life in global capitalism and listen to the call of fundamentalists to re-affirm traditional values.
In the twentieth century, the Muslim world emerged from centuries of political and economic isolation and colonialism to establish a series of nation-states.  By the last half of that century the newly independent Muslim states took their place as important powers on the world stage.  Now, in the twenty-first century the Muslim world includes more than one billion people. They are the dominant population in thirty-five countries extending from Morocco in North Africa to Kazakhstan in Central Asia and Indonesia on the east.  Islam has re-emerged as a cosmopolitan, cultural and religious presence, reclaiming its rich heritage.  Although there is anger in the Muslim world toward international influences that seem to be threatening the traditional way of life, there are also moderates advocating cultural adaptations between the West and traditional Islamic values.
The Christian West has been in close and continuous contact with the Muslim world for the 1300 years, and the two have a history of repeated invasions and attempts to dominate the other.  Christendom has had a higher level of conflict with the Muslim world than any other part of the world over the centuries.  Many factors contribute to this history of conflict, starting with geographic proximity.  Second, is the fact that both are monotheistic traditions that claim an exclusive truth, rejecting any competing claims.  Since their claims are mutually exclusive, the potential for conflict is ever present.  Global capitalism and the cultural expansionism of the West are additional factors that threaten Muslim traditionalists.  The revolutionary cocktail of a history of former greatness mixed with a lack of contemporary power and influence can lead to explosive results.
This history of conflict between Christendom and Islam began when the Muslims invaded Spain in 711 and shortly afterwards France.  Although their occupation of France was short-lived, they were in Spain for almost eight hundred years.  Then, in 1099 Christian crusaders invaded the Middle East and took much of modern day Lebanon and Israel along with Jerusalem. The Christian invasion of the Middle East marked the beginning of militant Christianity.  Although the 9/11 attack on the United States and subsequent invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq by the United States are the most visible contemporary confrontations between Christendom and Islam,  these are the most recent incidents in a long multi-layered history. In addition to warfare, Christians and Muslims have a rich history of cultural exchange and commerce, beginning in Spain.
Contributions of Muslim Civilization to Western Civilization
      The most visible influence of Muslim culture in Western Europe can be seen in Spain which has a rich heritage of Muslim influences in various areas of life.  Muslim architecture can be seen in the world famous Alhambra palace in Granada, the Alcazar of Seville, and the Mosque of Córdoba among others.  The influence of Muslim architecture can be seen especially in southern Spain the interior courtyards, arched-colonnades, white-washed walls, and red-tiled roofs, all borrowed from Muslim North Africa.  Other influences can be seen in the Spanish language where the vocabularies for city government (alcalde), horse back riding (jinete), construction (albañil), ceramic technology (alfarero), mathematics (algebra), and many others are adopted from Arabic.  Muslims also introduced new irrigation techniques for farming.  One of the important Muslim influences in Spain that spread to Europe and beyond were in the tanning and decoration of leather.  More refined, almost cloth-like, leather could be produced, and it was elaborately decorated in relief with organic designs, a tradition that was to be further developed later in Mexico and the Southwest of the United States.  Beyond these direct influences of Muslim culture in Spain, Europeans borrowed extensively from Muslim learning and engineering which was more advanced at the time. 
      When Western Europe was emerging from the Dark Ages in the early Medieval period, Europe turned to the Middle East for science, mathematics, and knowledge from the classical civilizations of Greek and Rome.  Muslim culture valued learning and knowledge, and at that time the Muslim world was the center of learning.  Since Islam is a religion centered on law, jurisprudence is of central importance.  Madrassas, or religious schools, were established to study Muslim law and other religious knowledge.  The madrassa was centered around a teacher, or sheik, and students chose a school based on the reputation of its teacher.  Elementary education started with the memorization of the Quran, and more advanced study included religious law and other subjects.  These schools were only for men which meant that few women had the opportunity to educate themselves.  During the empire periods, the Muslim world was cosmopolitan and scholarship spread quickly from all ends of the empire, Central Asia to North Africa. 
      Muslim scholarship was at the forefront of medical science, mathematics, and philosophy at this time.  In Baghdad, doctors began working with proto-germ theory and opened the first hospitals.  Muslim medical science reached an apex with Avicenna, also known as Ibn Sina, who worked during the early eleventh century.  His book, al-Qanun, became the authoritative medical text, bringing together the best of classical Greek and Arabic medical knowledge.  He described the nature of contagious diseases such as tuberculosis, and he compiled a list of 760 medicines that could be used to treat various diseases.  There were other important scientists, such as al-Zahrawi, who described the medical procedures for such things as cauterizing wounds and pulverizing stones in the bladder.  Al-Razi wrote a medical treatises and manuals on a wide range of topics which were translated into Latin and widely read in the West.  His teachings on gynecology and child-care were commonly followed in the West by both physicians and midwives.  During the Medieval period in Europe, the best medical science was borrowed from the Middle East.  But, the advances were not only in medical science but also in mathematics. 
Europe also borrowed the more sophisticated mathematical system from Muslim scholars.  The basis of the system was originally developed by Hindu scholars and then borrowed by the Muslims.  These Hindu numerals included the zero (which did not exist in Latin numerals), and it was easier to multiply and divide which led to an important growth in the mathematical sciences from algebra to trigonometry and geometry.  The old cumbersome Latin numerical system was replaced in Europe with the much more efficient Arabic numerals which have now become the world standard.  A ninth century Persian scholar, al-Khwarizmi, wrote the first algebra textbook and essentially created that field.  He also compiled the best astronomical tables of the day that were to become the basis for later research in that area for scholars from Europe to Asia.  The practical benefits of this new numerical system ranged from engineering to bookkeeping, making calculations and records more flexible and accurate.
      Philosophy was another area of important scholarship in the Muslim world of that period, and it was seen as a branch of theology.  In the ninth century the House of Wisdom was established in Baghdad as a center to accumulate the existing knowledge of the world (primarily Persian, Hindu, and Greek) and translate it into Arabic.  Humayn ibn-Ishaq, a Nestorian Christian, directed this center of learning in its early years, a reflection of the religious tolerance in the early Muslim world.  Ibn-Ishaq systematically collected the classical works of Greek philosophy and science.  They translated Aristotle’s collected works as well as the complete medical writings of Hippocrates which contributed to the work of Avicenna.  Muslim philosophers used the classical Greek writings to develop their own ideas of society, ethics, and politics.  Al-Kindi, working in the early years of the House of Wisdom, theorized about ethical conduct by humans as affected by their relationship to God and the cosmos.  In another case, al-Farabi borrowed from Plato’s Republic and Aristotle’s Politics to develop his own ideas about the moral and intellectual qualities of rulers and how they should rule for the well-being of their citizens. 
In the Medieval period, the Muslim and Christian worlds came together in libraries and bookstores of Córdoba and Toledo in Spain where important centers of translation emerged.  Two of the greatest Medieval rationalist scholars came from Córdoba, Averröes, Islam’s great authority on Aristotle, and Moses Maimonides, the Jewish Biblical scholar, philosopher, and medical scientist.  In the twelfth century European scholars developed a strong interest in Arabic and classical Greek writings on medical science, mathematics, and philosophy, and these works were translated from Arabic into Latin.  It was Muslim scholarship that saved the writings of the classical Greek world and built on those to create new levels of knowledge which the Europeans borrowed.  Western science and philosophy were built on the foundations prepared by Muslim scholars.
In contrast to the Muslim influence on the West, very little was borrowed by the Muslims from Europe.  They looked on the Medieval Europeans as “ignorant infidels”, and the crudeness of life in European cities contrasted with the cosmopolitan cultures of Baghdad and Córdoba.  Although Muslims were considered to have the best armies in the world at the time, they did borrow some ideas about fortifications and advances in weaponry from the Europeans. 
Religion was one area in which neither culture influenced the other in any significant way, especially in formal theology.  The one area where there might have been contact was mysticism because Muslim Sufism was not unknown to Christian mystics of the time.  Christian Medieval mysticism developed from the experiences and writings of Hildegard of Bingen who lived at the time of greatest Muslim influence on the West.  Her knowledge of Muslim scholarship is reflected in her writings on medicine and the classification of the natural world, including plants, animals, and astronomy.  She helped develop a tradition of Christian mysticism and is known for her mystical writings and the rich theology that she developed from her visions. Although direct evidence is lacking, her connection with God through mysticism is certainly reminiscent of what had been occurring in Muslim mysticism and given that she was aware of Muslim writings, it suggests that she may have been influenced by that tradition of mysticism.

Mutual Fear and Intimidation: Christendom and Islam

      Although Christianity and Islam are related monotheistic religions that worship the same God and trace their religious heritage to the same common ancestor, their relationship has alternated between cultural collaboration and distrust, leading to warfare. The history of repeatedly invading the other to establish their political system, religion, and way of life has left a trail of death, destroyed towns and cities, and religious intolerance in which each group has demonized the other.
      Muslim Invasions of Europe.  The Muslim invasion of Christian Syria and Egypt shortly after the death of Muhammad started this long history of confrontation between two religions and ways of life.  In 711 Muslim forces invaded Spain and pushed their way deep into France.  They burned and sacked towns and sold people into slavery which started the history of European fear of the Muslims.  The culture of fear of the Muslims can be seen in literature, such as Dante’s Divine Comedy which describes Muslims as enemies, who are guilty of heinous acts against humanity.  Even European children’s games (i.e. Moros en la costa) project Muslims as the bogeyman who will catch innocent children, reflecting the fear of Muslim invasion. 
      With the rise of the Ottoman Empire in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, Muslims once again invaded Europe, but this time from the East.  Again, Muslim armies marched through Christian countries burning towns and creating the mayhem of war.  The struggles left over from that period of Muslim occupation of Europe can still be seen in the Balkan countries today.  However, Christians have been equally active invading Muslim lands, creating a counterpart fear in the Middle East. 
      In Spain Muslims, Christians, and Jews lived side by side and shared knowledge of each other’s cultures, languages, and religions, but that was not the case in the rest of Europe.  There were no Muslim communities in Europe and, of course, no mosques.  As a result, Muslims did not travel there.  If they needed business or diplomacy to be done, they would send Christian or Jewish emissaries.  Although Muslim scholarship was rich about other parts of the world, it included very little information on European languages, culture, and religion.  The Muslim world was rich and the center of civilization, Europe was not, so there was little cultural interest in this backward part of the world.  Europe had little to contribute in scholarship to the Muslim world, so it was ignored.  In contrast, European scholars actively studied Arabic and Muslim culture, and Arabic studies programs were established in European universities.  Muslims were viewed by Europeans with a mixture of awe of their wealth and sophistication and fear of their military power and religion.
Christendom Viewed from the Middle East.  The Crusades and the later invasions of the Muslim world by European imperial powers created a history of fear of the West in the Arab world.   When the Crusader knights of the West arrived to the Holy Land in 1099 to re-establish Christian control over the holy sites, they brought a war of destruction that was shocking to the Arabs who were more accustomed to negotiating the surrender of civilian populations rather than annihilating them.  Tens of thousands of civilians were slaughtered in Jerusalem, and thousands were even killed on the holy mount at the al-Aksa Mosque, the third holiest site in Islam.  Actually, many of those killed were Christians and Jews living in Jerusalem, but since they looked Middle Eastern, and the Crusaders did not distinguish between them and the Muslims.  So, they killed them all.  In contrast, when Saladin re-conquered Jerusalem eighty-eight years later in 1187, he protected the civilian population and established a rule of religious tolerance for Christians, Jews, and Muslims.  Muslims are proud of the fact that Saladin did not massacre Christians, and they are quick to point that out to people today.  Saladin is an icon, and he is honored in many parts of the Middle East, in story and in statues such as one that stands in Damascus before the main gate entering the central marketplace. 
Later attempts at creating Christian crusades failed, and for the next four centuries the people of the Middle East had to contend more with internal struggles and fighting off the invading Mongols that worry about the Christian West.  In fact the tables turned against the Christians in 1453, when the Ottoman Turks conquered Constantinople, renaming it Istanbul.  By the early 1500's, they had occupied most of Eastern Europe, almost taking Vienna in 1529.  The strength of the Ottoman armies held the Europeans back until the nineteenth century when their rule began to weaken. 
Muslims see this contrast between Christian and Muslim behavior repeated in subsequent history, especially with the British and French colonial presence in the Middle East in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries when thousands of Muslims were again killed by Christian forces suppressing opposition.  It would repeat with the United States invasion of Iraq in 2003.  The colonial control of the Middle East by these European Christian powers emphasized the powerlessness of the Arab world and its civilization.  That pattern continued with the perceived imposition of the state of Israel on the Middle East by the European powers in the United Nations.
 In the Muslim world, many see Israel, and the United States protection of it, as a new European crusade threatening Arab civilization.  The Israeli defeat of the Arab armies in the 1967 war humiliated them once again, emphasizing their powerlessness, and at that point the Muslim fundamentalist movement began growing again in the Middle East.  The two United States led wars against Iraq and the privations and deaths caused by those wars are evidence to many of the disdain of Americans for their religion and civilization.  The intervention of the United States in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Afghanistan, and other Muslim countries are additional signs to many that the United States has only ill will for Muslims.  In the Middle East some people dream of another Saladin, a just man who could drive back the Christian West and defend the religious and cultural integrity of Islam. 
The Colonial Interlude and the Emergence of Nationalism
After the fall of the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War I, the British and French moved to stake out colonial claims to Middle Eastern territories that had been under Ottoman rule, including present day Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Kuwait, Yemen, and parts of Saudi Arabia.  Although Arabs and Turks were united by Islamic beliefs and culture, they were separated by language and local traditions.  The Arabs were also marginalized within the Ottoman Empire, so that as the Empire weakened Arab nationalism grew.  After the fall of the Turks, the French and British tried to divide up the region under their colonial rule, however, Turkish, Arab, Iranian, and Jewish nationalists reacted violently against them.  During the 1920's and 1930's, the various nationalist groups fought to create their own nation-states, and the British and French were forced to withdraw completely from the Middle East in the late 1940's following World War II.  This was the last gasp at European colonial expansion. 
The most important Arab leader was Hussein ibn-Ali (1856-1931) who claimed direct descent from the prophet Muhammad and the Quraysh clan.  He was the chief magistrate of Mecca and ruled the territory along the Red Sea in the name of the Turks.  In 1916 he declared independence from the Ottoman Empire and declared himself the King of the Arabs, the British supported him.  In events narrated in the movie Lawrence of Arabia, the British sent T.E. Lawrence in 1917 to work with Hussein’s Bedouin troops in a guerrilla war against the Turkish army in the Sinai desert.   By 1918 these groups along with the British regular army had pushed the Turks back to their own borders, and the son of Hussein, Faisal, entered Damascus in an Arab victory.  In 1920, Syria and Iraq declared themselves as independent countries, but the French promptly invaded Syria, making it a colonial “protectorate”, and the British did the same to Iraq.  Faisal was named King in Iraq, and in 1932 he was able to negotiate independence from Britain.  In 1936 Syria gained the promise of independence from France.
During these events in the Middle East, Spain and France also occupied Algeria and Morocco in North Africa until they received their independence in 1962 and 1956, respectively.  The carving up of the Muslim world into small colonial holdings which later became nation-states had the corollary effect of dividing this world into smaller fragments than had ever existed.  The Golden Ages of Islam occurred during the Arab and Ottoman Empire periods when the forces of the Muslim world could be concentrated into a united front.  The divided world of modern day Islam means that there is no central power to pull Muslim forces together, making Muslim countries subject to the intervention of outside forces, both those of the Western powers and Islamist militants and warlords.
Muslim Activist Response to Globalism
The West, and especially the United States, has become the “Great Satan” for Muslim fundamentalists groups because of the high profile and power of its corporate and military presence in the Middle East.  Although the European countries are more closely tied to the Middle East economically, they have more carefully adapted their presence to local cultural demands, something the Americans have not done so well.  When people from this part of the world explain why they are against the United States, they frequently say that it is because of the lack of respect for their values and traditions.  Although this may be the result of ignorance of those traditions, the fact of violating them is insulting.  For a proud people with the longest history of civilization in the world, the indignity of disrespect is an insult that can lead to anger.
Across Africa, the Middle East, India, Indonesia to the Philippines, Islamists are resisting Western influences in their societies, and their resistance can turn to violence.   The violent stage of the struggle against non-Western forces started as the Arab forces opposed European colonialism, and it has spread into some thirty conflict points throughout the Muslim world.  Militant Islamic groups have become the opposition to the existing governments in Muslim countries from North Africa to Central Asia.  Although most of their militant activity is focused against their own governments, Israel and the United States are also targets for these groups.  The exclusive vision of monotheism creates an all or nothing vision of the world for fundamentalists (Muslim, Jewish, or Christian) which can lead them to demonize everyone who does not accept their ideology.  Once the people of the other side have been demonized, violence against them is justified.  Bernard Lewis says,
If, then, we are to understand anything at all about what is happening in the Muslim world at the present time and what has happened in the past, there are two essential points that need to be grasped.  One is the universality of religion as a factor in the lives of the Muslim peoples, and the other is its centrality.
Religious belief and faith are at the center of social and political action in the Muslim world.  The Muslim Brotherhood was the forerunner of modern Muslim militancy, and it has been the model for most contemporary Islamic activist movements.  It was founded in Egypt in 1928 by Sheik Hassan al-Banna, a schoolteacher who dreamed of recreating the golden age of Islam.   It rejects Western values, as it did Communism, and advocates the establishment of an Islamic state based on the sharia or Islamic law and under the leadership of a Caliph like the early stages of the Arab Empire after the death of Muhammad.   The Brotherhood sees Israel as the enemy of Islam and as an agent of the Western powers.  It strongly supports the Palestinian cause and has sent fighters on a number of occasions to fight alongside Palestinians against Israel.

Later, I heard Gloria in the bedroom, and I knew that she was awake and must have heard the news.  I went, and she sat frozen and rigid on the edge of the bed listening to the radio.  She knew the possibility as well as I did.  I tried to dissimulate my fear saying that maybe Vanessa did not go to the university today. We listened to the continuing drumbeat of news about the dead and injured.  Gloria called Vanessa’s phone, and there was no answer.  We sat numb, listening to the repeated cycle of the news that we already knew and was already burned indelibly into our minds.  The repeat of the news non-news provided the focus for our emptiness during the time that we did not know if our daughter were dead, injured, or alive and well.  I felt the emptiness of frozen fear that people feel when terrorism strikes at schools, restaurants, clubs, buses, markets, homes, and other places of daily life.
About 9:30 the phone rang, and Gloria and I both answered on the first ring.  A man's voice with an Israeli accent spoke, and my heart sank.  Oh no, I thought, we are being notified, something has happened.  The terror of an official notification was a jolt that made me tremble. Was she injured, or worse?  Through those confused moments, the sound of the voice told me something was wrong, my worst fear. Then, I heard him say that he had spoken with Vanessa.  I focused.  Why could Vanessa not call?  Was she injured?  The call seemed strange to me because why would an unknown person be calling us?  He said that he knew Vanessa and had called her cell phone when he heard about the attack. He was calling to let us know that he had spoken with her and she was all right, but she could not call.  My mind locked onto that phrase.  He did not know details and could not tell us any more.  We were happy to hear that she was alive, but we were still fearful about why she was unable to call. Was he not telling us all of the truth? If she were physically able, she would be calling us instead of sending messages through someone else.  Was she in a hospital and could not call?
With these thoughts flooding our minds, we called her phone again, and as if with a bolt of fresh air, she answered, and we heard her voice. She was all right. By chance she had been not been at the university. She had been in the tunnels under the Temple Mount where the cell phone did not receive the signal, and when she came out the phone system was overloaded because of the bombing. 
For the time being my immediate fear was put aside, but it had been honed to a knife's edge.  Where will the next bombing be, and will my daughter be in the wrong place at the wrong time? My fear and anxiety were only temporarily calmed by our talk with her. I thought about the people who have this experience on a regular basis and have no escape from it. When does one side or the other become exhausted from the killing and being killed? Why do we as humans all too frequently have trouble accepting the existence of the other that is different from us? My daughter is alive, but today I stared into the face of tragedy.  I saw the thousands of mothers and fathers, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters who have stood in the same place and came away seared by grief and death and by the blast of the bomb or shot of the rifle. 10:20 am.

Boxed Insert Three.  Timeline for the last Century.

	The Arab Revolt and the Colonial Period
The Arab Revolt	1916	In 1916 Hussein ibn-Ali declared Arab independence from the Ottomans.
	The Muslim Nation State Period: 1932 to present
Turkey	1923 to present	Ataturk re-organizes Turkey as a European style republic.
Egypt	1922 and 1952	Egypt gained partial independence from the Britain in 1922.
Iran	1925 to present	Persia organized as a nation-state in 1925.
Iraq	1932 to present	Faisal was named King of Iraq and negotiated independence from the British.
Syria	1936 to present	Syria gained independence from France.
Saudi Arabia	1932 to present	It was unified into one kingdom in 1932.
Jordan	1946 to present	After the Ottomans the British occupied it until independence.
	The Islamist Movements
The Muslim Brotherhood	1928	Formed in Egypt to support Islamic principles and law in government and society.
Palestinian Islamic movements	1970's	Following the 1967 Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip radical Palestinian movements grew.
Iranian Islamic Revolution	1979	After the establishment of an Islamic theocracy, the Iranian government has supported the Islamic movement.

Hezbollah	1982	Organized in response to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.
al-Qaeda	1990's	Following the Persian Gulf War in 1991, al-Qaeda was organized against the West.