What’s a Jew Like You Doing Writing a Book Like This?

But Islam is different because [________________________], [__________], [_________________]. [Optional: 9/11, you liberals!]

There, just wrote the next 500 comments for you.

Aaarrgghh, I couldn’t even finish that. Poor Reza! I guess this is why I don’t turn to Fox for my ‘news’.

The unstated assumption from the interviewer is that all books about religion (or religious history) must necessarily be proselytizing, either for or against. She assumes that because a Muslim has written a book about Jesus, it must be some sort of ‘debunking’ of Christianity. What she fails to understand is that many Christian scholars also deny the literal factuality of many of the biblical stories (e.g. the virgin birth). That is hardly a radical position in many mainstream Christian denominations (United Methodists, Presbyterians, Quakers, Congregationalists) and is no longer seen as a attack on the legitimacy of the religion. In short, the interviewer made an ass out of herself, although I suppose the fundamentalist bible-thumpers who were watching were duly gratified.

Reza did a admirable job, all things considered, but like the old man said, “you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it think.”

In an interview on Fresh Air, Reza Aslan told Terry Gross that he converted to Christianity as a teenager and then converted to Islam later as an adult.

My question would be addressed to Aslan’s logical sequence: (1) “crucifixion was reserved exclusively for political crimes” and (2) “Jesus was crucified”; Q.E.D. “Jesus was in political rebellion against Rome and therefore a Zealot.” But the history of modern empires is replete with examples (the Mau-Mau rebellion in Kenya, for one) where “political crimes” have been trumped up as an excuse to get rid of someone for some other offense. Aslan uses Pontius Pilate’s reputation for ruthless suppression of insurrection to buttress his argument, but it seems reasonable to think that a ruthless provincial administrator would have no compunctions about sacrificing someone who was before him for judgment on trumped up charges. I have not read the book, but the syllogism seems a bit too tidy, given the paucity of sources we have from that period and in light of the way political power habitually blurs the boundaries of judicial categories

Sadly, given the “news” network Mr. Aslan appeared on, I’m not surprised. Still, he handled himself well.

I was about to wonder why people even agree to go on Fox at this point. Or more precisely, why publicists book interviews with them. But then the question answered itself: why deliberately subject your author to the ridiculous, offensive shit you have to know is going to happen on Fox? Because then outlets outside of Fox will pick it up as this week’s sample of wingnut idiocy… and sell more copies of the book.

It’s depressing to realize that that’s probably the exact calculation going on. Couldn’t they just send review copies to blogs like CT instead, and cut out the middleman?

” Still, he handled himself well.”

I don’t know about that. He comes across as a self-satisfied prick – doubtless especially so to those who watch Fox. But that would fit Dr. Slack’s theory @12.

I don’t watch FOX (don’t have cable so no temptation) but did catch a clip a couple years ago of someone being interviewed on Fox News. Guest stopped the interview and said something to the effect of “This isn’t a real news program is it? What is this? Is this a comedy program?” The look on the anchors’ faces was priceless. Open ridicule is the only appropriate response to these idiots.

@14: And you come across as a useless git. What’s your point?

Corey wrote: “Imagine a noted scholar of religion, who happened to be Jewish, writing a book on the historical Jesus.”

Wasn’t one of the main characters of Wouk’s ‘The Winds of War’ just that person?

—-

Christiaan wrote: “because to me it seems that the purpose of journalism is completely inconsistent with the inherent nature of FOX.”

Yes. 100% true. Journalism these days is defined as ‘Speaking Truth to Power’.
FOX can be defined as ‘Are you kidding me? You actually watch FOX for
anything other than the Simpsons or sports?’

He handled himself well. I love that he noted it appeared the interviewer had not read the book, and she did not push back on that idea…

I thought he was great, especially the PhD thing. I mean Mark Steyn is a Fox’s resident expert on Islam

I agree Jesus was a zealot and I think that Rome should grant Snowden asylum until the world has a better grip on the destructiveness of fascism and how its rearing its ugly head again in courts with no judges and spying with no warrants. I used to think we should worry about FINRA now I worry about FISA.

I don’t think he came across as a self-satisfied prick at all. He mentioned that he had a PhD quite a few times, which did not sound good — however, it was more defensive than self-satisfied.

In any case, he was definitely not expecting that.

Btw, anon:

Fox != Fox News Channel. The former is not a right-wing outfit at all. It’s a conglomerate of TV stations and other media assets which Rupert Murdoch bought (did not build).

FNC, on the other hand, was custom-built by Murdoch. It makes a big difference.

Tony, I don’t mean to derail anything. The fact that this kind of thing is apparently considered acceptable on national TV does demonstrate Corey’s point about Islam. However, it’s merely human (and I think not entirely a bad thing) to get into the drama of the situation and not focus entirely on what it says about society. Certainly, I’m hoping for a not guilty verdict for Manning for more reasons than the precedent it would set.

I think it’s time to start labelling Fox News as the sectarian news outlet it really is. Something it ironically shares with Al Jazeera Arabic.

It was clever of Fox to have a “woman of color” doing the interviewing. Otherwise, it would be just one more case of Fox and the right assuming the “universal we” when it comes to the rights of whites to discuss whatever they want to. Currently, right wingers are falling all over themselves to be the most aggressive lecturers when it comes to what black people should do to avoid the next Zimmerman/Martin case. The universal we, which is close to a royal we, assumes that white males — especially Christian males, can say whatever they want to, write what ever studies they want to, describe, categorize, generalize and otherwise tell others what to do . . . but those “Others” have no business returning the favor.

So, Reza Aslan, a noted historian, is simply not allowed to write about Jesus, even though his ancestors were much closer to the historical Jesus than the vast majority of white male Christians in America. As in, the historical Jesus most probably looked a lot more like Aslan that Hannity or O’Reilly.

The assumption of the universal we is a blind one, of course. Any trip to any library will show the thousands of books by white Christian males on a host of other cultures, religions, philosophies, histories, etc. etc. . . . and it is assumed before hand that this is perfectly okay. But when the tables are turned, all too many white male Christians don’t like that, and they push back on that . . . and in this case, they used a black woman to do the pushing. They push back without stopping to think that they’ve been writing about people they had nothing in common with for centuries — ironically enough, including the historical Jesus.

Fox disgusts me.

Why bring the Jews (and anti-Semitism) into this? The comparison is not helpful.

Anti-Semitism in Western countries (and elsewhere so far as I know) was focussed on the perceived ‘race’ of those targeted rather than the religion per se.

Controversies surrounding Islam, on the other hand, focus on the religion and associated cultural factors. Some sort of vague racism may come into it too, but not in the same way.

Corey,

“Hard to escape the conclusion that Islam is the 21st century’s Jewish Question.”

What do you mean by this? Is the position of Muslims the same as the position of the Jews before? Are Muslims being put in camps, wearing symbols, and is their systematic destruction advocated? Alternatively, is there a history of pogroms being organized against Muslims? Are we talking about the massive re-location of the Muslims to somewhere outside of the “western world”?

The first question by the way is not rhetorical, honestly, what do you mean by bringing “Jews” into this? Why not the position of Catholics in times when Protestants were dominant in some countries? Why not the position of immigrants in many countries in the 1900s?

The sole thing in common between Islam and Judaism is that both are (also) a religion. You could also compare it to, “Why is a [Catholic/Protestant/Italian/Irish] like you, writing a book like this?”.

Why the Jews?

“Er….because that was the point of the original post?”

Which is the point up for dispute. Why make that comparison in the OP?

Hidari

You quote me: “Why bring the Jews (and anti-Semitism) into this? The comparison is not helpful.” And then say: “Er….because that was the point of the original post?”

Actually my comment was addressed to the author of the original post, not to you. I had not seen your comment when I wrote mine.

The point is not whether Jews constitute a racial category (clearly they don’t) but whether anti-Semites typically saw them in these terms. I think they did, and well before the 19th century. (Medieval stereotypes, for example.)

“The point is not whether Jews constitute a racial category (clearly they don’t) but whether anti-Semites typically saw them in these terms. I think they did, and well before the 19th century. (Medieval stereotypes, for example.)”

They didn’t, for the good reason that the entire concept of ‘race’ didn’t really exist until the 19th century (i.e. race as a biological phenomenon whose ‘existence’ could be ‘proved’ via ‘scientific methods’). All the medieval anti-semitism, the Russian pogroms, etc. etc. etc. was based explicitly and openly and wholly on Judaism as a religion. This didn’t even begin to change until the 18th century.

“Just to note that Aslan is correct that his religion is irrelevant to the arguments he makes as a scholar.”

No it isn’t. Fox, however accidentally, has got it absolutely right on this. The various ‘religious studies’ disciplines – bible studies, divinity, islamic studies, theology, etc – are the most corrupt and unscholarly area in academia (with the possible exception of law). It’s kinda amazing that if he had been into evolutionary psychology, or finance, or machine learning everyone would be taking a shot. No-one who doesn’t belief in mumbo jumbo would be interested in studying the life of Jesus, because the historical evidence is thin to non-existent. This is just an excuse to try a put a thin coat of credibility on their religious beliefs.

Meredith,

I pretty much agree with everything you said at comment 33, especially the part about the anchor not approaching the interview with good will. It would have been one thing to have asked, “how do you think your experience as a Muslim may have influenced your approach or may have presented challenges to you as you wrote this book?” Instead she asked the equivalent of “why is a Muslim like you writing a book about Christianity?”

“Have you been injured in a workplace accident? Bruno Bauer & Marx, PLLC is here to help. Call today for a free consultation. Bruno Bauer & Marx. You have nothing to lose but your claims.”

@Kalkaino: Lauren Green. FNC lists her online as its religion correspondent.

Yup, saw this posted in my FB newsfeed by 5-6 people, very unfortunate indeed.

But I’m with Martin on the confusing angle here. Even after reading the comment in #51 I’m left with “WTF, Corey?”.

You can imagine what the interview did to the Amazon reviews; the bar graph for the star ratings looks like the letter C.

(Flipped through the book in the library before I heard about the interview, and it seemed like a typical effort in an unprofitable genre. For instance, he trots out that it was almost unthinkable for an adult Jew like Jesus not to be married. But we can’t infer much from that, because if we know anything about Jesus, it’s that Jesus was weird. Most pop books on Jesus, IMHO, suffer from that kind of doomed effort to fill in the blanks. The E.P. Sanders “historical Jesus” book may be as good as one can do.)

I’m not sure the last line of the OP, backed up just by the link to Anne Norton’s book, is altogether convincing. When I listen to the interviewer, I don’t hear Wagner saying “Jews can’t write music” b.c what Wagner presumably meant was that Jews lacked the creativity to write music. The interviewer here isn’t saying that so much as “Why would you, as a Muslim, want to write about Jesus, or: aren’t you biased b/c you are a Muslim?” She sees Islam and Christianity as inherent opponents, hence her dumb analogy later on to a Democrat writing about Reagan. It’s a very silly (and indeed rather offensive) line of questioning, but it’s not quite like Wagner on Jews.

Btw I watched most of the interview (till about 8:40 or so). The only really interesting moment — to me, at any rate — is around 6:00, where Aslan says that crucifixion was a punishment for political crimes in the Roman world and mentions that the “thieves” crucified w Jesus were not thieves but ‘bandits,’ i.e. insurrectionists. That is probably pretty common knowledge, but if I had known it I’d forgotten.

That’s just restating the question.

Scholarship is a life way; and if you haven’t experienced it, you’re bound to have a hard time understanding what scholarly people are saying even if you know what each of their words mean. You get the lyrics, but can’t follow the tune. Anybody who’s familiar with debates about the historical Jesus knows that whatever conclusions you come to yourself, the matter is always going to be obscure and that, more generally, it’s damned hard to find things out. Ideology is so much easier than learning.

Obviously bias is a problem that never goes away, but it’s a different problem for people who have personal experience with what trying to be objective is like. Many of those listening to Riza don’t really believe in the possibility of disinterested inquiry. It’s like talking about colors to somebody who’s color blind, except that most people aren’t color blind and the color blind don’t control their own cable network.

It’s like talking about colors to somebody who’s color blind, except that most people aren’t color blind and the color blind don’t control their own cable network.

Also, the colorblind generally don’t believe that color is a hoax, so if they did have a cable network, they probably wouldn’t use it to rail against the great chromatic conspiracy.

“If the question was, “Why do you, as a vegetarian, want to write about meat eating?” that would also be reasonable. ”

He’s not writing about meat-eating. He is not even writing about meat. He is writing about the cow.

Pamela Geller succeeds in making Fox look reasonable: http://www.wnd.com/2013/07/jesus-vs-muhammad-scholarship-vs-propaganda/

Don’t bother actually to read the link. It will do you no good.

@carbon (69) Although this is off topic and probably contributing to thread proliferation, speaking as an atheist child of religious parents, I think the abusiveness can stem from the inflicting of the parents own existential angst (as well as their preferred method of self-medication) on children, usually at an inappropriate age for such things. The self-medicating theme is common to the New Atheists (though I think in general they are polemicists, not especially thoughtful or sophisticated, and often Islamophobic) and on this they have it right.

It’s like talking about colors to somebody who’s color blind,

I don’t even see color.

I’m with the people who think the Jewish angle on this is bizarre/distracting, and I think Corey’s “well I was thinking of 19th century Jewish question, how was I supposed to predict that people were going to think of the Nazis” rationale is even more bizarre. If you make an analogy for public consumption, you can’t just remove the most pertinent connotation.

Also, I have to say that I have about as much compassion for someone who voluntarily gives an interview on Fox News and gets terrible, offensive questions than for someone who goes into a sauna and finds it terribly hot. Some people enjoy sitting on wood & sweating, some people apparently enjoy sparring with the anchors as Fox who are as predictably offensive and dumb as a sauna is hot. Maybe he did it for sales (and if that was his angle it was most certainly successful, with every outlet from Slate, to FB, to CT covering this).

@47 James Wimberly: It’s like you’re telling a revisionist history of the Inquisition where it was directed solely at Jews, and didn’t care at all about Muslims. Like, the Kingdom of Granada was a Jewish state or something? The category of “conversos” include converted Muslims as well as Jews, so to say that racialization of Jewishness goes back to the Inquisition when Christians were ranked based on having/not having Jewish heritage is a rather strange retelling of the event. But I think it speaks to exactly the kind of mindset that Corey is arguing for in the post. All these “wtf” reactions sound a lot like “what could my people/ancestors have to do with those people?”, or at least I can’t think of any better explanation for why the Inquisition should be misremembered this way.

“Much of Islam does not accept the basic premises of a secular, non-religious state.”

This gets repeated a lot, but what does it mean, exactly? True Believers of most religions (and some secular creeds) do not accept the basic premises of a liberal state. I don’t think this is something Islam-specific.

“Much of Islam does not accept the basic premises of a secular, non-religious state. ”

This book (reviewed here)

http://sonmedialab.sdsu.edu/~akuru/docs/Are_Muslims_Distinctive.pdf

Is the most convincing analysis I’ve seen as to how distinctive Muslim majority societies actually are
In the context of western Muslims, I don’t think it makes much sense to talk about what ‘Islam’ accepts. Religious beliefs mean different things to different people, they manifest themselves in different ways in different enviornments. There can’t be any singular ‘Islam’ any more than there can be a ‘European Muslim’. Evidence shows that ‘Muslims’, by and large and particularly across generations, do assimilate into western countries and accept its secular nature. The ‘issues’ that get blown out of proportion are general problems that affect most first generation immigrant communities, except they’ve become politicised and smothered in nonsense
Contra the OP, immigration into Europe has worked very well, thank you very much, despite the usual bellyaching from the far right and Manichean progressives

82: I agree, what happened over the Reformation, the wars of religion, and the Enlightenment was that the role of Christianity in the state was pushed back. That process involved lots of violence. I tried to refer to that in the last couple of sentences in 81. I don’t know the history of Islam well enough to talk about the presence or absence of such processes in Islam, at various times states in Islamic nations have demonstrated plenty of tolerance of other religions, and Arab nationalism established secular states across the ME. But the current fundamentalist movement seems to call for an explicitly religious state

The comparison between anti-semitism and far-right islamophobia is apt because of the similarities between their belief systems. A quick google got me this comparison by Colm O Broin between a standard US wingnut and der Stuermer. The islamophobic comments are instantly recognisable for the contemporary EU far right as well. (And Philip Weiss points out that Islamophobia is as widespread and acceptable as anti-semitism once was.)

Contemporary, ideological islamophobia sees “Islam” as a homogenous, implacable, existential threat to Our Civilisation, which can not be reasoned with. Such beliefs are a road to Hell. We have seen that all too often. More specifically, it is the placing of muslims outside the possibility of dialogue and reason, which you see in the video. If you do that to people you have a perceived conflict with, what options are left?

You may respond that European and American Islamophobia is milder, it has not (yet) led to pogroms or mass exterminations. It has merely lent some support to wars, occupations and the legalisation of torture for people named Mohamed. But are we then supposed to wait until the fascists start goose-stepping down the streets and rounding up their hapless victims before fighting them? For only then will we have proof that they were, indeed, on a slippery slope?

I agree it might well be the case that all forms of racism share structural similarities, so there is nothing surprising about the similarities between virulent anti-semitism and virulent islamophobia. Or perhaps there is a closer than usual historical link, via European right-extremism. Whatever the answer, it is still useful to replace “Muslim” with “Jew” when you hear your local fascist spout islamophobic venom, simply to remind yourself who you are dealing with.

Aslan is a very successful brand and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he set up the Fox interview himself in the expectation of this (easily predictable) kind of questioning. (The guy does run two media companies Aslan Media and Boomgen Studios, after all.) As adam.smith @78 has already noted, it’ll do wonders for his sales.

Okay when I first think of the Jewish question I think of ghettos, progroms and the holocaust. It doesn’t take much extra thought to see that Corey is getting at how Jews/Muslims are seen as others, scapegoated, and questioned as to how much they should participate in society and have their voices heard.

“Much of Islam does not accept the basic premises of a secular, non-religious state.” This quote seems to be making a gross generalisation and I’m not sure what it means. Islamic states do accept that states base themselves on secular premises, it would be stupid not too. I assume that PGD meant that Islamic states don’t accept the prinicpals for themselves as that would make sense with the rest of his post. In my experience Muslims in the UK accept that they live in a nominally Christian state and live peaceful and law abiding lives. The quote also seems similar to the kind of rhetorical move to frame Muslims as outsiders e.g. ‘they want to impose Sharia law in the UK.’

where Aslan says that crucifixion was a punishment for political crimes in the Roman world and mentions that the “thieves” crucified w Jesus were not thieves but ‘bandits,’ i.e. insurrectionists.

The “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews” posted on the cross also ties in. That seems quite possibly historical, given that the gospels feel the need to include it and explain it (away).

(Not that it’s really that important for the larger issue.)

I wonder if this is a question of biography (intellectual or actual) but I would expect the words “Jewish question” to evoke the intellectual and social debates (on assimilation of Jewish populations in the emerging nation states) of the 19th century rather than Nazi policies (and the latter to be an explicit play on the word on the former, just as the final solution of the Jewish question was a common phrase meaning Zionism). Indeed, it was treated as a fairly important point of western Europe history in the curriculum I followed. So I’m with Corey Robin on that side. Reading the comment thread, it seems to me that perhaps predominantly American readers do not make the same association.

“Also women who walk alone at night who are attacked. They were asking for it.”

Talking about bad analogies… In case you really don’t get it: Not agreeing to an interview on FoxNews has exactly zero impact on your freedom. As opposed to sexual assault, it really only takes a simple “no,” which you can communicate from the safe distance of your phone or computer. Given the US’s free speech standards, the crazies have a right to their TV and radio shows and no needs to participate in them.

As for comparing anti-semitism and islamophobia, I just don’t see how that degree of lumping makes any sense. I completely agree that islamophobia is a problem, real, and cause for alarm. But there are just so many ways in which this doesn’t fit: The size of the group (~17m vs. ~500m), the existence of islamic nation states, the history of the groups in Western countries (centuries vs. mostly recent immigrants) their socio-economic status (taking 19/20th century jews: highly educated and many upper middle class vs. mostly lower-class in Europe and lower-middle class in the US), differences related to looks (one of the fears about Jews was that they were able to “pass” too easily – hence the yellow stars – whereas islamophobes think they can “spot” muslims (and if anything are against clear visual markers, cf. anti-headscarf/burka campaigns etc.), different views on converts (jewish converts to Christianity/no religion were viewed with suspicion, Islamic converts are celebrated, especially when they criticize islam) etc. etc. etc.

So I just don’t see what the comparison adds that wouldn’t have been true for dozens of other minorities subject to racist discrimination. Yellow Peril, Jim Crow, anti-Catholicism etc. And as for the Jewish Question – sure there are the Marx and Bauer books, but there is also – and someone who spends as much time involved in close readings of texts as Corey does cannot possibly have missed that – the Final Solution of the Jewish Question. So yeah, I think if you bring up the Jewish Question in the context of racism, you are making cheap emotional points with holocaust annotations and I think that’s stupid.

One of the greatest scholars on the historical Jesus is the Jewish historian Geza Vermes — whom I’ve read. I wonder what the interviewer would have said about his work. If there is this supposed conflict between Muslim and Christian, when it comes to interpretations of the historical Jesus, why would Christians also not see this in a Jew writing a history of Jesus? As that Jew would presumably start with the premise that Jesus, a Jewish apocalyptic preacher who did not see himself as divine, was not “the Christ”. Jesus preached about the coming kingdom of God in his own time, not in some vague future moment to be determined later — which all but destroys the premise for Christianity anyway. A Jewish scholar would presumably have no less a conflict with the Christian vision of Jesus than a Muslim.

I doubt Fox would ever raise these issues with a Jewish scholar. Its biases and those of its audience would not allow it.

It’s an insane set of questions. And it’s prompted by this very bizarre far right Islamophobia that I’m sure is both infuriating and unnerving to be targeted by.

I think the point he was making in asserting his credentials is a point about the type of book he was writing and his purpose in writing it. A more educative way to do this would be to explain there are faith-based books about Jesus (or other religious ideas and figures) and there are scholarly books and his book is a scholarly book. It might even be worth mentioning that if your orientation is faith, the scholarly book may seem to challenge your faith because it is looking at the issue from a non-faith based perspective. But that is not the purpose of scholarly literature–it’s not intended as an attack on faith. It simply leaves faith aside and looks through the lens of history, archaeology, etc. (Of course, such books can completely undermine faith. But that is not their purpose.)

The Reagan question–which was nuts–might have provided a nice teaching moment about the issue of objectivity and bias and historical perspective. It’s possible someone who doesn’t love Reagan would actually write a better book about Reagan.

About 10% of Fox Viewership would be willing to understand some of the distinctions he was trying to make when referring to his educational background (which could be better made in another way) but it might be worth reaching that 10%. It would be very difficult to take up the opportunity to instruct them under the barrage of crazy questions that he was facing however.

Fox is full of garbage but I (maybe naively) believe there are some people who mistakenly watch Fox for information and the only good reason I could think of for going on Fox would be to address those people. We can say that ‘they’ are absolutely incapable of understanding anything, they are idiots or a lost cause. There’s no diversity among their viewership, there’s not latent intelligence you can reach, etc. If you believe that, then it makes no sense to go on Fox. But it’s a very disheartening thing to believe.

Corey – I don’t think you understand what we – or at least I, can’t speak for the others – are saying. The point is not that “The Jewish Question” clearly refers to the Nazis. The point is that you can’t refer to “The Jewish Question” in the the 21st century and pretend the 20th century didn’t happen. The line from Bauer to Goebbels may be neither clear nor straight, but since you mention Wagner, the line from “Das Judentum in der Musik” to the Nazi’s cultural policy is rather direct.

And I’m not buying that you just didn’t think of the 20th century connotations. The reason that “What’s a Jew like you doing writing a book like this?” would likely be more strongly condemned than the above video* isn’t that some guy(s) wrote a nasty essay about Jews in the mid 19th century….

*though, as opposed to the broad acceptance of 19th century anti-semitism, the main reason this video, which if I understand correctly is a web-only feature, probably viewed by a couple of thousand people originally, has caught anyone’s attention is that people are condemning & ridiculing FoxNews for it.

“The reason that “What’s a Jew like you doing writing a book like this?” would likely be more strongly condemned than the above video* isn’t that some guy(s) wrote a nasty essay about Jews in the mid 19th century…. ”

But that’s, in a sense, the point, isn’t it. Unless you believe that the lesson of the 20th century is “don’t say nasty things about the Jews, but only about the Jews”.

The point is that you can’t refer to “The Jewish Question” in the the 21st century and pretend the 20th century didn’t happen.

Frankly: So the f*ck what. If it brings up the 20th century for you too, you know… maybe it should? Maybe that’s actually a really good reason to not parallel anti-Semitism with equally bogus, venomous and irresponsible Islamophobia? I’m really not seeing how this is functional as a criticism.

Much of Islam does not accept the basic premises of a secular, non-religious state.

What does this even mean? Most Muslims don’t accept the basic premises of etc.? Most of the doctrines set out in the Quran (or the Quran plus X set of documents) are irredeemably opposed to the basic etc.? I mean, Islam just by itself doesn’t seem like the kind of entity that gets to accept or reject any set of premises.

Also, in general, could we stop talking about Teh “Islam” and start talking about Muslims instead? Because then at least it would be slightly more evident what people were trying to say. (And, after all, I don’t tend to hear a whole lot about “Christianity”, even when people are talking about Westboro-style freakshows/the Spanish Inquisition.)

@js.

I took that reference by PGD (I think it was) to “much of Islam” to mean something like “many Muslims” or “some interpretations of Islam,” but I agree it’s not a good expression for the reasons you suggest.

The size of the group (~17m vs. ~500m), the existence of islamic nation states, the history of the groups in Western countries (centuries vs. mostly recent immigrants) their socio-economic status (taking 19/20th century jews: highly educated and many upper middle class vs. mostly lower-class in Europe and lower-middle class in the US), differences related to looks (one of the fears about Jews was that they were able to “pass” too easily – hence the yellow stars – whereas islamophobes think they can “spot” muslims (and if anything are against clear visual markers, cf. anti-headscarf/burka campaigns etc.), different views on converts (jewish converts to Christianity/no religion were viewed with suspicion, Islamic converts are celebrated, especially when they criticize islam) etc. etc. etc.

Sorry, but this is mostly a bunch of bullshit. (1) The total number of muslims in the world is pretty immaterial, at least in part because (2) “islamic nation states” is just a meaningless bullshit phrase — if you disagree, come back to me when you come across the Palestinians living happily ever after in Pakistan. (3) “islamophobes” may have all sorts of crazy ideas about what they can “spot”, but they wouldn’t be able to tell Edward Said from Tariq Ali, or Jinnah from Nehru, so what they can spot is a bunch of shit.

I thought of Marx and the 19th century. I did history of philosophy as an undergrad. 20th century antisemitism feels very different to me, but I’m neither a political philosopher or a historian. If I’m the audience, the OP worked as it was supposed to. Probably I’m not.

JSTOR search for ‘Jewish Question’:

http://www.jstor.org/action/doBasicSearch?Query=%22jewish+question%22&Search=Search&gw=jtx&prq=jewish+question&hp=25&acc=off&aori=off&wc=on&fc=off

Afaics only a couple out of 25 seem to be at all concerned with Nazism. The others are about Marx, Shakespeare, Dostoevsky, the USSR, Canada, etc…

The first article which comes up from a google is this, from Jewish Journal of Sociology, which explains the meaning of phrase:

CFP: Special Issue: The Relevance of the Jewish Question in the 21st Century

In post-enlightenment Europe, both Jewish and non-Jewish political thought was preoccupied by what came to be called the Jewish Question. The Jewish Question asked what the appropriate status of Jews should be within the nation state and in particular whether or not Jewish ‘separateness’ could be maintained. There were a variety of answers given to this question, including: the creation of a nation state for the Jews, forms of autonomy within multi-ethnic states, radical assimilation, the relegation of Jewish difference to the private sphere, and the anti-Semitic removal of all Jewish difference from the body politic of the nation state.

By the middle of the 20th Century, the Question appeared to have been resolved. Two particular moments were key: the declaration of the State of Israel on May 14 1948 and its recognition by the United Nations; and the adoption by the United Nations General Assembly on December 10th of the same year of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. […]

I think Corey’s use of the phrase is perfectly standard.

js. on Orientalism (e.g., esp., Said). Yes. I took Corey in that framework. Hence my launch into other issues that seem more interesting to me than the obvious game (though the obvious always needs pointing out) exemplified by the Fox interview of creating an “other,” which these days in FoxWorld = Islam and Muslims, against which to define self, all that…. Hard to fathom the objections here to Corey’s approach, esp. Eszter Hargittai’s.

But that’s, in a sense, the point, isn’t it. Unless you believe that the lesson of the 20th century is “don’t say nasty things about the Jews, but only about the Jews”.

Exactly! For those who strongly link the terms “Jewish question” with Nazi genocidal policies (which is certainly their right after all, even though this is certainly a diminishing of the importance of the historical phenomenon, as amply illustrated above), the lesson of the 20th century should certainly be “Framing the debate in terms of the inherent legitimacy or lack thereof of a specific cultural/religious group to exist and participate fully in all the aspects of society has led to genocide, so we should be wary of this framing whenever it resurfaces.” And this framing certainly is present towards Islam (both as religion and general cultural identity) nowadays in some segments (typically easily garnering 20% of the electoral support, so not quite the fringes only) of the western world: see the vitriolic attacks on Keith Ellison, the Muslim!Obama scare or… the attacks on Reza Aslan.

So Corey Robin’s framing seems to me justified even from that point of view. Even more so of course from the point of view intended (which is also more precise historically, again as noted above).

Reza Aslan getting harangued on Fox News doth not make a Muslim question. It used to be that these things were the Pakistani question. Or the Algerian question. Or the Turkish question. But now that we suddenly recognise a tiny cohort of second generation Muslims who seem to identify with a seeming rootless transnational Islamic identity we suddenly have a ‘Muslim question’? Who’s our great chronicler of this phenomenon, Melanie Phillips?
By all means buy the reactionary narrative on this but I really dont see the relevance, beyond the vague references to ‘otherness’

One wonders what sort of reception a well credentialed Christain author would receive on Al-Jazeera news if he was commenting on a book suggesting Mohammad was a devisive rable-rouser?

Judging by various precedent, one would expect the ‘far right’ Islamic wing would not be amused. If there is an “Islam question” in the 21st century, as the OP suggests, it has not been taken passively by all Muslim sects and indeed at times some of the more aggressive groups have fanned the flames.

My perception is that Jews were far more passive as their “question” was being addressed. (Although I’ll be first to admit this is only a generalist’s perception, I have no special scholarly knowledge of Jewish European history and perhaps there was more overt resistance than gets commonly reported in the history books).

Well, it’s certainly got him and his book a lot of very welcome attention, which was presumably the idea. Normally “academic publishes mediocre book on the historical Jesus” isn’t the sort of thing that makes it into the newspapers.

Around a million people were killed resulting from the invasion of Iraq, and that islamophobia was a major cause of that war, which makes it death on a scale similar to the Holocaust, so there’s not such a huge difference in the magnitude of these events that makes comparison absurd and a ‘cheap emotional trick’.

I’d be interested to know what people have said about the role of race, and in particular the relation/resemblance of Jews to non-white races, in the Jewish question in the 1800s/early 1900s. I mean, I know that Jews were compared to/grouped with ‘non-white races’. But it seems like a lot of what shocks people about this today (whether or not they realize, admit, or articulate it) is the idea of whites losing the status of being white. Horrendous mistreatment & slaughter of non-whites simply does not shock people in the same way. I would guess this is part of why so many people talk about the Spanish Inquisition and the discrimination against conversos as a specifically anti-Jewish phenomenon, which when you think about it is extremely bizarre. If I had to guess I’d say I’ve heard more people talk about the Inquisition as anti-Jewish, completely forgetting that hundreds of thousands of Muslims were forced out of Spain between 1492 and 1608–not just the conquest of Granada, but expulsion of subject peoples, and this after hundreds of years of Spanish history when both Christian and Muslim rulers had no problem reigning over mixed Muslim and Christian populations.

“Around a million people were killed resulting from the invasion of Iraq, and that islamophobia was a major cause of that war, which makes it death on a scale similar to the Holocaust, so there’s not such a huge difference in the magnitude of these events that makes comparison absurd and a ‘cheap emotional trick’.”

A great example of what I mean by a shoddy analogy. The Holocaust was a focused effort to exterminate an entire ethnic/racial group based on a racist ideology, at times to the detriment of the ongoing war effort. The Iraq war (for which, btw., the 1million figure is almost certainly too high – the infamous Lancet study has been thoroughly rebutted by now, its lead author censored by the AAPOR as well as his own university) was a war with a complex set of causes, many of them economic and geo-strategic, that was greatly facilitated by widespread islamophobia. Pretending that these are the same thing is, well, shoddy.

the lesson of the 20th century should certainly be “Framing the debate in terms of the inherent legitimacy or lack thereof of a specific cultural/religious group to exist and participate fully in all the aspects of society has led to genocide, so we should be wary of this framing whenever it resurfaces.”

That’s certainly how I interpreted it: as a “those who do not remember the past are doomed to repeat it” sort of thing. This is just like the Jewish Question, and you know how *that* ended up, so don’t let it happen again. Which is a valid point, but it does tend to suggest that anyone debating the Muslim Question from an armchair, even without malicious intent, ought to be really wary of where their words might lead.

I do think it’s a little unreasonable to refer to discussions of the Jewish Question and at the same time try to declare the Final Solution off-limits, because it arose out of those very discussions. Of course in hindsight those scholarly discussions are going to be reevaluated with one eye on their outcome, even if it was an outcome not intended or even contemplated by Marx or other contemporaries. The purpose of this is not blame, but understanding of the chain of events that led to an outcome few people want to see repeated (targeting anyone, let alone nearly a billion people).

#110: Unless you believe that the lesson of the 20th century is “don’t say nasty things about the Jews, but only about the Jews”.

Well, ISTM that some people apparently DO believe that — look at discourse around the Palestinian Question. The Jews, and only the Jews, are immune to criticism (in some quarters) for their actions even when those actions include firebombing civilian neighborhoods, and any attempt to say something like “both sides are committing human rights abuses in pursuit of a goal that cannot realistically be obtained without genocide, and therefore ought to moderate their ambitions and learn to coexist peacefully in a state that proclaims equal rights for both groups and actually means it” will likely be branded anti-Semitic.

But you are certainly right (IMO) to point out that the lesson ought to be more general. (At least, I think that’s what you meant.)

“the infamous Lancet study has been thoroughly rebutted by now, its lead author censored by the AAPOR as well as his own university”.

Firstly, I think you mean censured, although I would tend to agree with what you actually wrote. Secondly, the AAPOR censured him for not releasing data to them (not to other people, note).* Which may be good or bad or whatever, but says nothing about the reliability of the study. Likewise, Burnham was censured by his University of alleged ethical lapses, but as the report stated very clearly ‘The (University) review did not evaluate aspects of the sampling methodology or statistical approach of the study. ‘ So again, even if the University’s position was 100% accurate, it said nothing about the reliability of the results (given that Burnham, apparently, allegedly, actually wrote down the names of the people he interviewed, it seems that his study was actually more accurate and ‘checkable’ than was previously thought, although less ‘ethical’. But I am not under any illusions about the reliability of the results of university ‘investigations’).

About the AAPOR’s oh-so-ethical response to a peer-reviewed piece of scientific evidence that they found politically inconvenient see here http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2009/02/05/reaction-to-the-aapor-press-re/).

Anyway let’s not let the thread be derailed by lies about the Lancet studies.

‘ at times to the detriment of the ongoing war effort. ‘

That is also bollocks, although I can’t be bothered explaining why, given your nom de guerre (sic).

I don’t necessarily disagree with you LFC. What I was trying to say (probably too flippantly) is that, as far as I can see, for Corey’s analogy to work you have to accept the narrative that ‘Muslims’ can’t be integrated because their allegiance is primarily, overwhelmingly, to their faith, and that it isn’t compatible with certain aspects of Western political culture. I don’t think this bears out in general terms, or that specifically people from Muslim majority countries show any substantial difference in how well they integrate into new societies, accept new countries political institutions etc

What I meant by transnational Islamic identity wasn’t so much the idea that there aren’t connections (for want of a better word) between global faith communities (once again for want of a better word, sorry! That doesn’t sound right) or diasporic communities, or whatever, which I agree there undoubtedly are.. but I was pushing against the more specific idea propagated by the most retrograde Islamophobic elements that there is a group of westernised, second generation Muslims with an allegiance to fundamentalist Islam rather than the country they grew up in and a desire to Islamise Western countries. There’s evidence that this phenomenon exists, but (afaik) is miniscule

I think when we’re talking specifically about the Middle East it becomes too complicated to say anything useful about Muslims (or Arabs more specifically) in the West, particularly at times of crisis and considering the way regional identities, networks, politics etc plays itself out, particularly in times of crisis (I mean look at the Spanish Civil War for the way European politics could be complicated by ideology and geopolitics, and so on, at specific times. So I don’t know if Islam is the best/only way of viewing it)

A lot of that is convoluted (though I hope comprehensible) and written by someone with no expertise whatsoever on the topic so I’m happy to be corrected

But, generally, what I’m trying to say is it’s complicated. A lot of the rhetoric used against Muslims is rhetoric used against immigrants, just cleaned up for the 21st century (‘we aren’t racist, Muslims aren’t a race!’) and complicated by the last decade, and specific to certain places. (Which happen to be the major metropolitan areas in western countries) So I think accepting this idea of ‘otherness’ (1) plays into nativist/racist sentiment and (2) isn’t really backed up by the evidence (afaics), and trying to draw analogies to how similar issues played themselves out 150 years ago doesn’t work (sometimes it does, this time (imo) it doesnt)

“What I was trying to say (probably too flippantly) is that, as far as I can see, for Corey’s analogy to work….”

Btw, I obviously dont think Corey believes this, and I accept that some people do (at least rhetorically) but I just dont think it’s an *issue* to the same extent as it was in relation to the Jewish question in Europe, but is more boilerplate anti immigrant xenophobia politicised by the last decade

A further comment:
One of the questions you raise in 144 and 146 is the extent to which all this is just a cover for anti-immigrant, xenophobic sentiment. And I agree there is a lot of that going on.

That still leaves open the possibility, though, that if one stripped away all the racist/nativist/anti-immigrant crap and examined the question relatively dispassionately, one might find that the pattern of assimilation/integration is indeed somewhat — not totally, but somewhat — different for second-generation Muslims in the West than it was for earlier groups of immigrants. (There also may be country-to-country differences.) I believe I have seen this proposition advanced by people who are not grinding political axes. I don’t know how correct it is, and I also don’t know whether there is some kind of feedback effect, whereby racist/nativist sentiment itself contributes to lack of assimilation/integration.

So I think accepting this idea of ‘otherness’ (1) plays into nativist/racist sentiment and (2) isn’t really backed up by the evidence (afaics), and trying to draw analogies to how similar issues played themselves out 150 years ago doesn’t work (sometimes it does, this time (imo) it doesnt)

Fair enough, but I would say that the statement “some Westerners perceive Muslims
in their societies (or elsewhere) as ‘other'” need not, standing alone, play into racist sentiments since it says nothing about the validity or accuracy of the perception in question. It’s a statement that can be either confirmed or disconfirmed, assuming (a fairly big assumption) the key terms (‘perception,’ ‘other’) were defined in such a way that they cd be ‘operationalized’ (which, sorry, is a lot of verbiage, but i think you know what i’m getting at). [I can’t really believe I just wrote those sentences, a sure sign I need to leave the thread]

adam.smith @138 “A great example of what I mean by a shoddy analogy.”

What analogy? What I meant was that the events are of a close enough magnitude that it’s not insulting on inappropriate to compare them. Just as it’s not inappropriate or insulting to compare the Holocaust to Stalin’s purges and agricultural policies or Atlantic slave trade, although obviously these are very different events.

The Holocaust was a focused effort to exterminate an entire ethnic/racial group based on a racist ideology, at times to the detriment of the ongoing war effort. The Iraq war …was a war with a complex set of causes, many of them economic and geo-strategic, that was greatly facilitated by widespread islamophobia.

That’s a fair characterization of the invasion of Iraq, and I don’t see how it rules out comparing the Iraq war to the Holocaust, although obviously they are very different events. Especially if we look at the Iraq War alongside the Vietnam War and other violence by the US over the last 50 years, and looking at how people react to events related to those wars, and the discourse promoting them, and other GWOT-related violence, there is clearly a systemic tolerance for massive violence against non-whites that, for whatever complex set of reasons, white people are not subject to in the post-WWII world. Nobody is suggesting that there was, is, or will be a Holocaust against groups of brown- and/or yellow-skinned people, but there has been and is more gradual, more widespread, massive violence inflicted on the Middle East and Asia.

Fair enough, but I would say that the statement “some Westerners perceive Muslims
in their societies (or elsewhere) as ‘other’” need not, standing alone, play into racist sentiments since it says nothing about the validity or accuracy of the perception in question.

I’m not sure how you would go about evaluating the accuracy of something like that. Indeed, wouldn’t “define” be a more appropriate verb than “perceive”? “Perceive” seems to connote that there is an objective fact of the matter about who is an other, you just have to look at them and see. That seems to me to insufficiently acknowledge the role of the people who decide who is and isn’t “other”.

I have a broader question about the book. This is supposed to be a book about the historical Jesus told through the prism of understanding the political landscape of the times. I saw an interview on Daily Show with Azlan where he emphasized that the Gospels are not meant to be taken literally, everyone is aware of the contradictions, etc., etc. So then upon what history is the historical Jesus based? My understanding is that while there is tons of historical evidence for Christianity, the main historical evidence for the actual existence of Jesus the man, come from the Bible, which would be pretty lousy evidence from the point of view of a scholarly historian because of not only the blatant contradictions but also it’s propagandistic nature.

Much harder to account for a non-existent Jesus than an existent one

There are loads of Harry Potters around nowadays, but it was J.K. Rowling who got the stories going. During Rome’s war on terror, it may have been Josephus who got the Jesus stories going:
http://www.amazon.com/Caesars-Messiah-Roman-Conspiracy-Invent/dp/1569754578

Thank you, Rmj, you’ve saved me the effort.

It’s an interesting phenomenon, actually. I teach quite regularly on the early history of Christianity in the context of the Roman empire, and twenty years ago my major problem was that every class would contain at least four or five committed Christians who objected to my reading Paul’s letters as historical documents. These days the believers seem to have disappeared altogether (or chosen to study other subjects), and the biggest problem is the regular couple of conspiracy theorists who can’t believe that I, as an atheist, can possibly believe that there’s any historical reality here.

Thanks to @157 1n @158 for stating the obvious, that people who deny that Jesus Christ actually existed, at all, are in the same class as people who claim that Shakespeare didn’t really write Shakespeare’s plays, or that King Arthur really existed (i.e. as King of the Britons, more or less as related in Malory) or whatever. That is to say, it’s a belief that is, frankly, nuts. Needless to say Jerry Coyne and Christopher Hitchens et al have espoused* it (with various degrees of conviction) because, emotionally, they want it to be true, and these men normally start with what feels emotionally good to them, and then fit the facts around their beliefs. So much for ‘science and rationality’.

*albeit in a weaselly ‘who can say this isn’t true’ kinda way.

Meredith @126:

Yes, quite. And I thought your comments way up above were very much to the point.

Ronan @131:

the fact these are relatively new immigrants from established nations changes the context completely

Well, some are and some aren’t. But even granting that most are, and that this changes the context in relevant ways, it doesn’t change the projection (or “perception”, or whatever) of otherness, whereby muslims are defined as muslims, and therefore as others. I think other commenters have made the point well enough that I needn’t belabor it. Given this, the comparison makes a good bit of sense I think.

I cannot accept that a long history of scholars approaching the Gospel narratives as historical truth is evidence that the protagonist of those narratives was as depicted therein.

That is not the argument. Scholars sure are dumb though. Didn’t they go to school or anything?

Re: On the other hand, it’s completely unthinkable for anyone in the United States to suggest Catholics should, say, switch their allegiance from the Pope to more socially and culturally progressive leaders – or to point out sexist or discriminatory passages in the Bible.

You must not hang out with a lot of cultural liberals. I hear this kind of thing from them (i.e. members of my family, friends, and people I know from other blogs) *all the time*.

I don’t have time to scroll through this entire thread, so I’ll simply say that I take a pretty much literalist approach to the New Testament, I accept the historicity of the Gospels (complete with miracles, etc.) and therefore I think Reza Aslan (and, more or less, the 150-year old tradition of ‘critical’ biblical scholarship that he’s writing from) is wrong. That having been said, the fact that he’s a Muslim is irrelevant to his, uh, ‘scholarship’, or to my opinion of it. He’s not writing as a Muslim, he’s writing as a member of the higher critical (secular) school of biblical studies. He’s not saying anything different than plenty of atheist scholars, liberal Christian scholars, or for all I know Hindu or Buddhist scholars might say. I’d probably, honestly, be more interested in what he had to say if he *were* writing from a confessional Muslim point of view (I’m sure the Quran and hadiths have some interesting takes on Jesus), but I don’t think that’s what he’s doing here.

The main question – is Reza saying anything new? Odds are that he is not.

Well, no. A lot of the scholarly argument about Jesus-the-Zealot was thrashed out between the late 1960s (S. G. F. Brandon) and the early 1980s (Jesus and the Politics of His Day). But as with his book about Islam, his intention is to take scholarly arguments out of the seminar room and give them a compelling narrative and popular appeal.

Now, there’s an argument that books like Aslan’s aren’t exactly doing a service by re-igniting debates in the popular sphere that the academy largely considers either settled or put off to one side as scholarly fashion heads off in a different direction. That in itself is a reflection on generational turnover: the academics who participated in the debates of the 1970s are largely retired or dead, and the ones taking their place came in with different research interests and sought to establish themselves on new territories.

@168
there’s an argument that books like Aslan’s aren’t exactly doing a service by re-igniting debates in the popular sphere that the academy largely considers either settled or put off to one side as scholarly fashion heads off in a different direction.
I know nothing about this area substantively, but isn’t there rather a big difference betw scholarly debates that are largely considered settled, on one hand, and on the other hand those that were never settled but have simply been left behind? Either way, unless the bk is conveying arguments that have been generally rejected, I can’t see that it does any harm to bring even old scholarly debates into the popular sphere. Ajay, upthread, said the bk is mediocre and referred to negative reviews, but w/o specifics (which he didn’t provide) I’m not inclined to denounce the bk solely on the ground that it’s a popularization. Popularization, haute vulgarisation, whatever, is a longstanding genre and, if done well, often does perform a service.

@167 “There’s essentially no ‘neutral’, secular historical evidence for the existence of Jesus ”

Which is why our knowledge of Jesus is so different from our knowledge of other figures of antiquity such as Socrates and Cleopatra, about whom there is such a wealth of disinterested testimony, right?