It has been a season of earthquakes, and the political ones in Libya, Egypt, Tunisia, and elsewhere in the Middle East may have shifted the moral high ground within Islamic opposition movements. Put simply, Tahrir Square may have trumped jihad.
Posts Tagged ‘violence’
March 26th, 2011
Have the jihadis lost the moral high ground to the rebels?
posted by Mark Juergensmeyer
March 14th, 2011
“Killing in the Name of. . .”
posted by Charles GelmanAyça Çubukçu on state sovereignty and the political theology of humanitarian intervention with regard to the ongoing crisis in Libya, at Jadaliyya.
September 7th, 2010
Bron Taylor: “The Roots of James Lee’s Rage against Civilization”
posted by Charles GelmanBron Taylor explores the literary, spiritual, and ecological roots of Discovery Channel shooter James Lee’s “rage against civilization.”
July 27th, 2010
On good, evil, and the role of religion
posted by Lauren SalmIn response to statements made by Mark Juergensmeyer in his recent interview with Nathan Schneider, Vincent Pecora states that Juergensmeyer’s “sense that religion alone cannot cause violence does a disservice to religion.” Specifically, Pecora argues that if Juergensmeyer believes religion is capable of great good, he must also acknowledge that—on the flipside of the same coin—religion “can do great evil.”
July 23rd, 2010
Cosmic war on a global scale: An interview with Mark Juergensmeyer
posted by Nathan Schneider
As director of the Orfalea Center for Global and International Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Mark Juergensmeyer brings the sociology of religion to bear on the analysis of violent conflict in the contemporary world. His recent books include Global Rebellion: Religious Challenges to the Secular State and Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence, both published by University of California Press, and he is currently working on God and War, based on his 2006 Stafford Little Lectures at Princeton University. Together with the SSRC’s Craig Calhoun and Jonathan VanAntwerpen, he is a co-editor of the forthcoming volume Rethinking Secularism. We spoke at his home office at UCSB, perched atop a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean.
April 21st, 2010
Religion and violence in the early church
posted by John D. BoyThe ever prolific American historian Philip Jenkins recently published yet another book, The Jesus Wars, which deals with the issue of “religious violence.” In a guest contribution to the Washington Post‘s On Faith blog, he argues that a historical exploration of the violence in Christendom during the fifth through seventh centuries C.E. can help us understand religion-based violence in our day and age.
March 16th, 2010
“A Carefully Crafted F**k You”
posted by Charles GelmanAt Guernica, Nathan Schneider interviews Judith Butler.
March 5th, 2010
Prominent Pakistani cleric condemns political violence
posted by Charles GelmanJohn Esposito reports at On Faith that Muhammad Tahir Qadri, an influential Pakistani cleric, has “issued a 600-page fatwa, described as an ‘absolute’ condemnation of terrorism without ‘any excuses or pretexts.’ He declared that terrorists and suicide bombers were unbelievers and that ‘Terrorism is terrorism, violence is violence and it has no place in Islamic teaching and no justification can be provided for it, or any kind of excuses or ifs or buts.’”
March 4th, 2010
Judith Butler on Judaism, Israel, and anti-occupation politics
posted by Charles GelmanIn Haaretz, Judith Butler gives a long and personal interview to American-Israeli filmmaker Udi Aloni.
March 1st, 2010
Catholics argue about waterboarding
posted by Nathan SchneiderIn the first New York Times Beliefs column since the departure of Peter Steinfels, Mark Oppenheimer discusses the outrage among Catholics across the political spectrum about Bush speechwriter Marc Thiessen’s claim that waterboarding in the war on terror is permissible for Catholics.
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