Talk:Islamism/Archive 2

message: Let me quote from my book, "State and Revolution in the Middle East and Pakistan", edited by Fred Halliday and Hamza Alavi, original copyright 1988:
:The term 'Islamism', which apparently originated in both Arabic and French in North Africa, and has begun to be used in English, is used in place of the inaccurate and resented 'fundamentalism' and the overly vague 'Islamic Revival' and the like. ALthough some dislike 'Islamism', it has the great practical value of being the term most acceptable to Muslims. 'Islamism' refers to twentieth-century movements for political Islam, usually aiming overtly or covertly at an Islamic state that would enforce at least some Islamic laws and customs, including those related to dress, sex.. etc.
I hope this will at least settle the issue of "Islamism" being used before the current War on Terrorism, as well as its use by scholars of the field. Now if we can all get back to work instead of engaging in foolishness? Graft 00:18, 18 Sep 2003 (UTC)
replies: text: The interesting thing is that many fundamentalist Muslims are quite peaceful; Sufi Islam is technically a fundamentalist movement (i.e. see the Wiki definition; they read their religious texts non-historically, as literally the word of God, etc.) yet Sufi Islam (aka Sufism) is well known as the most tolerant and peaceful denomination of the religion. The term Islamism should be preferred, as it refers to a particular modern political-religious movement, and not to all religious Muslims. RK 00:28, 18 Sep 2003 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, I don't think the term 'fundamentalist' applies at all well to Islamist movements, many of which have doctrines that are radical departures from previous Islamic thought (like Mawdudi's idea of himself as "enlightened leader", who alone was capable of seeing where the movement, and by extension the world, should go). When this edit war is over, I'd like to remove it from the introduction. Graft 00:32, 18 Sep 2003 (UTC)
replies: text: It is certainly true that the Islamist movement is a radical departure from previous Islamic thought, yet that doesn't make them non-fundamentalist.  The term fundamentalist basically has two meanings in comparative religion;  Islamism fits both of them. As per our Wikipedia article, (a) fundamentalism refers to the anti-modernist movements of various religions. In many ways religious fundamentalism is a modern phenomenon, characterized by a sense of embattled alienation in the midst of the surrounding culture, even where the culture may be nominally influenced by the adherents' religion. (b) Fundamentalism also refers to a way of approaching one's religious scripture; i.e. in fundamentalism one holds that one's religious texts are infallible and historically accurate.  So I would say that it is valid to note that Islamist movements are fundamentalist. This is, however (as you note), not the same thing as saying that they are traditional. Fundamentalists (of all faiths) like to portray their beliefs as "the way our religion has always been", even when in fact they have actually made radical innovations and changes. RK 20:13, 18 Sep 2003 (UTC)
replies: text: More to the point, "Islamic fundamentalist" is often assigned a specific meaning, e.g., "traditionalist", those who abide carefully by long-standing norms and conventional interpretations, and especially attention to the ulema, which is not necessarily a feature of Islamist groups. For example, Mawdudi decidedly does NOT follow this line of thinking, also the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. On the other hand, the Wahhabists -do-, e.g. in Saudi Arabia. conferring tremendous authority on the clerics. Similarly the Deobandis.  Whether we want to group them with the movements they inspired (al Qaeda and the Taliban respectively) is a matter of debate. However, there's no good call to use "fundamentalist" so loosely to label Islamists. Graft 13:52, 19 Sep 2003 (UTC)