Faith And Evangelical Terror - Islam, American True Believers, Idolatry, And Political Excess

 'Muslims are wacko', said Donald Trump, never a man to mince words, always full of hyperbole and wild accusations; but he was, as always, expressing a common belief among many. In the name of Islam, an evangelical religion more so than any other, the most radical groups - al-Qaeda, ISIS, al-Shabab, Boko Haram, and the Houthis among others - have terrorized populations from Western Europe to Mindanao. 

    

They know no temperance, no considered thought; have no reflection, historical understanding, logical exegesis, or simple, basic rules of tolerance.  They believe that God handed the Koran, complete with references to the Pentateuch, Moses, David, and Jesus, outlining proper behavior and making clear His intention to wipe the slate clean, eliminate all apostasy and infidelity from the earth, and create a brave new world of true belief. 

The book, written in Arabic and given to an Arabian peasant who could neither read nor write but who, upon opening the book became literate, infused with the true word of God, and filled with a missionary ambition to spread it worldwide. He raised an army and set off on a bloody crusade across north Africa and up through the Middle East, and in less than a hundred years had brutalized, murdered, and tortured his way to Islamic hegemony. 

Thanks to Charlemagne, Frankish armies defeated the Saracens at Roncesvalles, and Mohammed's military assault on Europe was halted.  To this day France considers itself 'the eldest daughter of the Church' for having saved the continent from barbarism. 

The religion is simple, without the complexity of Christianity.  There are no mysteries, no philosophical conundrums, no mythical underpinnings, no legacy of high intellectual and academic thought. Islam has no Augustine, Aquinas, or Athanasius because it doesn't rely on sophistication. Submission to the will of Allah, conviction that Islam is the world's only true religion, and promise to defeat and destroy the infidel is all that is required. 

First appealing to the ignorant masses of the deserts of the Middle East - nomads, camel drivers, raiders, and bandits, Muslim evangelists soon discovered that by joining politics and faith, the vision of a worldwide unified faith and a political caliphate was possible.  Thanks to its heady mix of true belief nd political liberation, Islam spread to developmentally backward regions beyond the Middle East. 

 

To this day Muslims are evangelical, insular, rabid, and intolerant.  Fueled with the belief that Allah, the Koran, and Islam are indisputable, true, right, and permanent, they have continued to defy secularism and democratic societies.  The law of God supersedes all, they say, and have no patience with or respect for other laws. 

Now a case can be made that modern American progressivism is no different from radical Islam. Its adherents are convinced that theirs is the only way, that all else is apostasy, and that those who deny its fundamental, absolute truths must be eliminated. 

Progressivism has its Koran - a canon of reformist beliefs - and legions of evangelical crusaders for whom the end of history, a righteous secular caliphate, is more important than the means.  Anything goes in progressives' pursuit of their vision of Utopia. Antifa militias, armed and dangerous, are the frontal edge, the first phalanxes of true believers to confront the infidel.  The current violent attacks on federal officials deployed within a Constitutional framework to address issues of crime and illegal immigration, is but one example of this faith-based brutality. 

The reflexive hatred of the infidel and the desire to eliminate the scourge of conservatism, and to establish a unified, centric, perfect world of communal and collective harmony is no different than radical Islam's intentions. 

Muslims believe that Mohammed is God's last prophet, i.e. the end of religious evolution, disparity, and disagreement.  Islam by extension is the world's last religion, and God's will must be obeyed.  Until the last days of judgement and the fiery holocaust of Armageddon, Muslims are bound to spread the world of true belief. 

Progressives believe no differently.  Anything but this communal, collective, socially-inclusive world is impossible.  The ethos of individualism, free enterprise, opportunity, competition, and Darwinian progress is simply wrong and unacceptable - absolutely, totally, irrefutably wrong, and as such must be destroyed. 

In order for such a caliphate to be realized, not only can there be no dissent within the Muslim community, but that community itself must be at the heart of revolutionary conquest.  There must be an invincible solidarity, an unbreakable common bond of true belief, an irreproachable unity. 

American progressives value community like no other.  Each jamboree on the National Mall, heady protests for transgenderism, abortion, the black man, or the dismantling of private sector, predatory interests is an expression of good feeling, conviction, and solidarity.  

All progressive causes are welcomed in the big revival tent.  All fighters for climate change reversal, unrestricted abortion, socialism, the gender spectrum, open borders, and the distribution of wealth among other causes are welcome.  The common denominator is capitalism - all the ills of America are a result of the most aggressive, oppressive, manipulative, and exploitive economic system ever developed.  Destroy capitalism and replace it with socialism, and America will be well on its way to a progressive idyll. 

'Intellectual idolatry' was how Theodore Mackay, a leading political scientist, described the American scene - a conviction that one's political theories are no less than divine, received wisdom.  Progressivism and Islam are no different, he went on, in their absolute belief in an anointed mission; and given the holiness of that mission, any and all means to achieve its ends are legitimate expressions of purpose. 

The hatred for Donald Trump comes as no surprise.  Not only was a Republican elected to the White House despite the progressive campaign run against him, but he is dismantling each and every program, policy, and political initiative instituted by the opposition. It is not the usual changing of the guard, moving the needle a little to the left or right; but a counter-revolutionary putsch.  At this rate not only will no vestiges of progressivism remain, but the entire country will be under a malevolent dictatorship of the radical Right. Venomous hatred is par for the course. 

While conservatism has its core political beliefs its philosophy is one of Epictetus and the Stoics, a deterministic nihilism that supposes nothing but change and nothing of absolute value.  There is, nor has there ever been a Stoic evangelist. 

It is only progressives who have been infected with true belief, a viral epidemic, a personal, unavoidable nastiness that is the result of a kind of native intolerance.  The Biden years were awful - hectoring, badgering, insulting affairs all over confected, impossibly irrelevant and downright silly propositions taken as articles of faith. 

Thank God they're in the rearview mirror, and historical perspective, Machiavellian insights, and Nietzschean have replaced them.