Apologists of Totalitarianism: From Communism to Islam, Part I
ISLAM AS TOTALITARIANISM
by Ibn Warraq (Jan. 2009)
[1]G.H.Bousquet, formerly Professor of Law at the University of Algiers, and later at the University of Bordeaux, one of the foremost authorities on Islamic Law, distinguishes two aspects of Islam which he considers totalitarian: Islamic Law, and the Islamic notion of Jihad which has for its ultimate aim the conquest of the entire world, in order to submit it to one single authority.[2]
[4]
Bertrand Russell in The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism, published in 1920 wrote,
“Bolshevism combines the characteristics of the French Revolution with those of the rise of Islam….Marx has taught that Communism is fatally predestined to come about; this produces a state of mind not unlike that of the early successors of Mahommet….Among religions, Bolshevism is to be reckoned with Mohammedanism rather than with Christianity and Buddhism. Christianity and Buddhism are primarily personal religions, with mystical doctrines and a love of contemplation. Mohammedanism and Bolshevism are practical, social, unspiritual, concerned to win the empire of this world”. [5]
Jules Monnerot in his 1949 study, Sociologie du Communisme[8]
[9]
[10]
Karl Barth[11], also writing in the 1930s [12], reflected on the threat of Hitler, and his similarities to Muhammad:
“Participation in this life, according to it the only worthy and blessed life, is what National Socialism, as a political experiment, promises to those who will of their own accord share in this experiment. And now it becomes understandable why, at the point where it meets with resistance, it can only crush and kill—with the might and right which belongs to Divinity! Islam of old as we know proceeded in this way. It is impossible to understand National Socialism unless we see it in fact as a new Islam [emphasis in original], its myth as a new Allah, and Hitler as this new Allah’s Prophet.
[13]
“Hitler had been much impressed by a scrap of history he had learned from a delegation of distinguished Arabs. When the Mohammedans attempted to penetrate beyond France into Central Europe during the eighth century, his visitors had told him, they had been driven back at the Battle of Tours. Had the Arabs won this battle, the world would be Mohammedan today. 13 For theirs was a religion that believed in spreading the faith by the sword and subjugating all nations to that faith. Such a creed was perfectly suited to the Germanic temperament. [emphasis added] Hitler said that the conquering Arabs, because of their racial inferiority, would in the long run have been unable to contend with the harsher climate and conditions of the country. They could not have kept down the more vigorous natives, so that ultimately not Arabs but Islamized Germans could have stood at the head of this Mohammedan Empire. [emphasis added] Hitler usually concluded this historical speculation by remarking, “You see, it’s been our misfortune to have the wrong religion. Why didn’t we have the religion of the Japanese, who regard sacrifice for the Fatherland as the highest good? The Mohammedan religion too would have been much more compatible to us than Christianity. Why did it have to be Christianity with its meekness and flabbiness?”
Manfred Halpern
“The neo-Islamic totalitarian movements are essentially fascist movements. They concentrate on mobilizing passion and violence to enlarge the power of their charismatic leader and the solidarity of the movement. They view material progress primarily as a means for accumulating strength for political expansion, and entirely deny individual and social freedom. They champion the values and emotions of a heroic past, but repress all free critical analysis of either past roots or present problems.”
Halpern continued, [14]
The comparison of Islamism with fascism was also put forward by Maxime Rodinson[19152004[16]
In 1984, Said Amir Arjomand[17]
[1] The Muslim World, January 1938 (Vol. 28 Issue 1 Page 1-107) , p.6.
[2] G.-H.Bousquet. [1900-1978]. L’Ethique sexuelle de l’Islam. Paris: Desclée de Brouwer. 1990 [Ist edn.1966], p.10.
[3] C.Snouck Hurgronje [1857-1936]. Selected Works. Edd. G.-H.Bousqet & Joseph Schacht, Leiden: E.J.Brill, 1957, p.264.
[4] C.Snouck Hurgronje. Selected Works. Edd. G.-H.Bousqet & Joseph Schacht, Leiden: E.J.Brill, 1957, p.261.
[5] Bertrand Russell. The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1920 pp.5,29,114.
[6] Jules Monnerot. Sociologie du Communisme, Paris: Gallimard, 1949. [English translation by Jane Degras and Richard Rees. Sociology and Psychology of Communism, Boston: Beacon Press, 1953]
[7] [Jules Monnerot’s footnote and emphases: In intention but not in fact. The universal State is a sort of collective fantasy; the totalitarian State’s image of itself projected into the future.]
[8] Jules Monnerot. Sociologie du Communisme, Paris: Gallimard, 1949. [English translation by Jane Degras and Richard Rees. Sociology and Psychology of Communism, Boston: Beacon Press, 1953] pp.18-22.
[9] Czeslaw Milosz. The Captive Mind. Translated from the Polish by Jane Zielonko. New York:Vintage Books, 1959, pp.51-77.
[10] Carl Jung. The Collected Works Volume 18, The Symbolic Life, 1939, Princeton, Princeton University Press p. 281.
[11] I owe the references to Karl Barth and Carl Jung to Dr. Andrew Bostom.
[12] Karl Barth. The Church and the Political Problem of Our Day, New York: Scribner, 1939, pp. 43; 64-65.
[13] Albert Speer. Inside the Third Reich. 1970, New York:The Macmillan Company, p. 96.
[14]Manfred Halpern. Politics of Social Change in the Middle East and North Africa Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963, quoted at Martin Kramer’s Wesbsite: http://www.geocities.com/martinkramerorg/2006_09_20.htm, Accessed October, 22, 2007.
[15] Martin Kramer’s Wesbsite: http://www.geocities.com/martinkramerorg/2006_09_20.htm, Accessed October, 22, 2007
[16] Maxime Rodinson. Islam Resurgent? Le Monde, December, 6-8, 1978, quoted in Janet Afary and Kevin B.Anderson. Foucault and the Iranian Revolution. Gender and the Seductions of Islamism. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2005, p233.
[17] Quoted in Martin Kramer’s Website: http://www.geocities.com/martinkramerorg/2006_09_20.htm, Accessed October, 22, 2007
Continue reading part II, Christian Apologists of Islam, here.
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