Wednesday, September 20, 2006

Pope's Protest Against Islamic Violence produces Violence

Pope Benedict is an intelligent man. As the previous guardian of doctrine for the Catholic Church he is well aware of the intellectual and political ebb and flow of world religions of various sorts. And now of course we have his apology for hurting Moslem's feelings, which is actually in itself an historic thing--- Pope's do not apologize, never have, which of course seems odd for someone who is the Vicar of Christ, and is supposed to be the paradigm of Christ-like behavior. Note in the article below however that the Pope did not per se apologize for the content of his speech! It was fascinating as well to see an American Moslem woman who calls herself a feminist speak-out on the 'Free Speech' segment of CBS Evening News earlier this week saying the Pope had every right to his opinion on these matters, and was just seeking dialogue to promote more understanding between world religions, which of course is a good thing. I am wondering how Katie Couric found one of the two remaining Moslem feminists in the world to make such a statement (just kidding Katie).

The following article was sent to me by a friend, and it comes from a private subscriber's newsletter. Since there is full attribution of authorship, I am posting it here, as it is a good jumping off point for a discussion of what in the world the Pope was up to in his lecture considered the tense state of affairs in the world in general and in Europe and America in particular these days over militant Islamic fundamentalism. I do find it highly ironic that some Moslems found it right to protest the Pope's remarks about jihad with violence, which would just seem to prove his point. Read the article below and see what you think.

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Faith, Reason and Politics: Parsing the Pope's Remarks
By George Friedman

On Sept. 12, Pope Benedict XVI delivered a lecture on "Faith, Reason and the University" at the University of Regensburg. In his discussion (full text available on the [ http://www.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2006/september/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20060912_university-regensburg_en.html ]Vatican Web site) the pope appeared to be trying to define a course between dogmatic faith and cultural relativism -- making his personal contribution to the old debate about faith and reason. In the course of the lecture, he made reference to a "part of the dialogue carried on -- perhaps in 1391 in the winter barracks near Ankara -- by the erudite Byzantine emperor Manuel II Paleologus and an educated Persian on the subject of Christianity and Islam, and the truth of both."

Benedict went on to say -- and it is important to read a long passage to understand his point -- that:

"In the seventh conversation edited by Professor Khoury, the emperor touches on the theme of the holy war. The emperor must have known that Sura 2,256 reads: 'There is no compulsion in religion.' According to the experts, this is one of the suras of the early period, when Mohammed was still powerless and under threat. But naturally the emperor also knew the instructions, developed later and recorded in the Quran, concerning holy war. Without descending to details, such as the difference in treatment accorded to those who have the 'Book' and the 'infidels,' he addresses his interlocutor with a startling brusqueness, a brusqueness which leaves us astounded, on the central question about the relationship between religion and violence in general, saying: 'Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.' The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. 'God,' he says, 'is not pleased by blood -- and not acting reasonably is contrary to God's nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats ... To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death ...'

"The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: Not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God's nature. The editor, Theodore Khoury, observes: 'For the emperor, as a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, this statement is self-evident. But for Muslim teaching, God is absolutely transcendent.'"

The reaction of the Muslim world -- outrage -- came swift and sharp over the passage citing Manuel II: "Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." Obviously, this passage is a quote from a previous text -- but equally obviously, the pope was making a critical point that has little to do with this passage.

The essence of this passage is about forced conversion. It begins by pointing out that Mohammed spoke of faith without compulsion when he lacked political power, but that when he became strong, his perspective changed. Benedict goes on to make the argument that violent conversion -- from the standpoint of a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, and therefore shaped by the priority of reason -- is unacceptable. For someone who believes that God is absolutely transcendent and beyond reason, the argument goes, it is acceptable.

Clearly, Benedict knows that Christians also practiced forced conversion in their history. He also knows that the Aristotelian tendency is not unique to Christianity. In fact, that same tendency exists in the Muslim tradition, through thinkers such as al-Farabi or Avicenna. These stand in relation to Islam as Thomas Aquinas does to Christianity or Maimonides to Judaism. And all three religions struggle not only with the problem of God versus science, but with the more complex and interesting tripolar relationship of religion as revelation, reason and dogmatism. There is always that scriptural scholar, the philosopher troubled by faith and the local clergyman who claims to speak for God personally.

Benedict's thoughtful discussion of this problem needs to be considered. Also to be considered is why the pope chose to throw a hand grenade into a powder keg, and why he chose to do it at this moment in history. The other discussion might well be more worthy of the ages, but this question -- what did Benedict do, and why did he do it -- is of more immediate concern, for he could have no doubt what the response, in today's politically charged environment, was going to be.

A Deliberate Move

Let's begin with the obvious: Benedict's words were purposely chosen. The quotation of Manuel II was not a one-liner, accidentally blurted out. The pope was giving a prepared lecture that he may have written himself -- and if it was written for him, it was one that he carefully read. Moreover, each of the pope's public utterances are thoughtfully reviewed by his staff, and there is no question that anyone who read this speech before it was delivered would recognize the explosive nature of discussing anything about Islam in the current climate. There is not one war going on in the world today, but a series of wars, some of them placing Catholics at risk.

It is true that Benedict was making reference to an obscure text, but that makes the remark all the more striking; even the pope had to work hard to come up with this dialogue. There are many other fine examples of the problem of reason and faith that he could have drawn from that did not involve Muslims, let alone one involving such an incendiary quote. But he chose this citation and, contrary to some media reports, it was not a short passage in the speech. It was about 15 percent of the full text and was the entry point to the rest of the lecture. Thus, this was a deliberate choice, not a slip of the tongue.

As a deliberate choice, the effect of these remarks could be anticipated. Even apart from the particular phrase, the text of the speech is a criticism of the practice of conversion by violence, with a particular emphasis on Islam. Clearly, the pope intended to make the point that Islam is currently engaged in violence on behalf of religion, and that it is driven by a view of God that engenders such belief. Given Muslims' protests (including some violent reactions) over [ http://www.stratfor.com/products/premium/read_article.php?id=261960 ]cartoons that were printed in a Danish newspaper, the pope and his advisers certainly must have been aware that the Muslim world would go ballistic over this. Benedict said what he said intentionally, and he was aware of the consequences. Subsequently, he has not apologized for what he said -- only for any offense he might have caused. He has not retracted his statement.

So, why this, and why now?

Political Readings

Consider the fact that the pope is not only a scholar but a politician -- and a good one, or he wouldn't have become the pope. He is not only a head of state, but the head of a global church with a billion members. The church is no stranger to geopolitics. Muslims claim that they brought down communism in Afghanistan. That may be true, but there certainly is something to be said also for the efforts of the Catholic Church, which helped to undermine the communism in Poland and to break the Soviet grip on Eastern Europe. Popes know how to play power politics.

Thus, there are at least two ways to view Benedict's speech politically.

One view derives from the fact that the pope is watching the U.S.-jihadist war. He can see it is going badly for the United States in both Afghanistan and Iraq. He witnessed the recent success of Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas' political victory among the Palestinians. Islamists may not have the fundamental strength to threaten the West at this point, but they are certainly on a roll. Also, it should be remembered that Benedict's predecessor, John Paul II, was clearly not happy about the U.S. decision to invade Iraq, but it does not follow that his successor is eager to see a U.S. defeat there.

The statement that Benedict made certainly did not hurt U.S. President George W. Bush in American politics. Bush has been trying to portray the war against Islamist militants as a clash of civilizations, one that will last for generations and will determine the future of mankind. Benedict, whether he accepts Bush's view or not, offered an intellectual foundation for Bush's position. He drew a sharp distinction between Islam and Christianity and then tied Christianity to rationality -- a move to overcome the tension between religion and science in the West. But he did not include Islam in that matrix. Given that there is a war on and that the pope recognizes Bush is on the defensive, not only in the war but also in domestic American politics, Benedict very likely weighed the impact of his words on the scale of war and U.S. politics. What he said certainly could be read as words of comfort for Bush. We cannot read Benedict's mind on this, of course, but he seemed to provide some backing for Bush's position.

It is not entirely clear that Pope Benedict intended an intellectual intervention in the war. The church obviously did not support the invasion of Iraq, having criticized it at the time. On the other hand, it would not be in the church's interests to see the United States simply routed. The Catholic Church has substantial membership throughout the region, and a wave of Islamist self-confidence could put those members and the church at risk. From the Vatican's perspective, the ideal outcome of the war would be for the United States to succeed -- or at least not fail -- but for the church to remain free to criticize Washington's policies and to serve as conciliator and peacemaker. Given the events of the past months, Benedict may have felt the need for a relatively gentle intervention -- in a way that warned the Muslim world that the church's willingness to endure vilification as a Crusader has its limits, and that he is prepared, at least rhetorically, to strike back. Again, we cannot read his mind, but neither can we believe that he was oblivious to events in the region and that, in making his remarks, he was simply engaged in an academic exercise.

This perspective would explain the timing of the pope's statement, but the general thrust of his remarks has more to do with Europe.

There is an intensifying [ http://www.stratfor.com/products/premium/read_article.php?id=258222 ]tension in Europe over the powerful wave of Muslim immigration. Frictions are high on both sides. Europeans fear that the Muslim immigrants will overwhelm their native culture or form an unassimilated and destabilizing mass. Muslims feel unwelcome, and some extreme groups have threatened to work for the conversion of Europe. In general, the Vatican's position has ranged from quiet to calls for tolerance. As a result, the Vatican was becoming increasingly estranged from the church body -- particularly working and middle-class Catholics -- and its fears.

As has been established, the pope knew that his remarks at Regensburg would come under heavy criticism from Muslims. He also knew that this criticism would continue despite any gestures of contrition. Thus, with his remarks, he moved toward closer alignment with those who are uneasy about Europe's Muslim community -- without adopting their own, more extreme, sentiments. That move increases his political strength among these groups and could cause them to rally around the church. At the same time, the pope has not locked himself into any particular position. And he has delivered his own warning to Europe's Muslims about the limits of tolerance.

It is obvious that Benedict delivered a well-thought-out statement. It is also obvious that the Vatican had no illusions as to how the Muslim world would respond. The statement contained a verbal blast, crafted in a way that allowed Benedict to maintain plausible deniability. Indeed, the pope already has taken the exit, noting that these were not his thoughts but those of another scholar. The pope and his staff were certainly aware that this would make no difference in the grand scheme of things, save for giving Benedict the means for distancing himself from the statement when the inevitable backlash occurred. Indeed, the anger in the Muslim world remained intense, and there also have been emerging pockets of anger among Catholics over the Muslim world's reaction to the pope, considering the history of Islamic attacks against Christianity. Because he reads the newspapers -- not to mention the fact that the Vatican maintains a highly capable intelligence service of its own -- Benedict also had to have known how the war was going, and that his statement likely would aid Bush politically, at least indirectly. Finally, he would be aware of the political dynamics in Europe and that the statement would strengthen his position with the church's base there.

The question is how far Benedict is going to go with this. His predecessor took on the Soviet Union and then, after the collapse of communism, started sniping at the United States over its materialism and foreign policy. Benedict may have decided that the time has come to throw the weight of the church against radical Islamists. In fact, there is a logic here: If the Muslims reject Benedict's statement, they have to acknowledge the rationalist aspects of Islam. The burden is on the Ummah to lift the religion out of the hands of radicals and extremist scholars by demonstrating that Muslims can adhere to reason.

From an intellectual and political standpoint, therefore, Benedict's statement was an elegant move. He has strengthened his political base and perhaps legitimized a stronger response to anti-Catholic rhetoric in the Muslim world. And he has done it with superb misdirection. His options are open: He now can move away from the statement and let nature take its course, repudiate it and challenge Muslim leaders to do the same with regard to anti-Catholic statements or extend and expand the criticism of Islam that was implicit in the dialogue.

The pope has thrown a hand grenade and is now observing the response. We are assuming that he knew what he was doing; in fact, we find it impossible to imagine that he did not. He is too careful not to have known. Therefore, he must have anticipated the response and planned his partial retreat.

It will be interesting to see if he has a next move. The answer to that may be something he doesn't know himself yet.

16 comments:

Allan R. Bevere said...

Ben:

This is an excellent article! I have been baffled as to how the pope could not have known the fallout from his words. This explain much.

Matt Cleaver said...

Interesting article, although I seem to interpret the Pope's comments differently. Friedman seems to be reading a whole lot into things with this academic lecture. I find it hard to believe that the Benedict would have used the setting he was in to cause the political effects that Friedman suggests could have been on the Pope's mind. I wonder if anyone is familiar with Friedman's background.

I am working on an article for my own blog that attempts to expound the Pope's lecture. I will take Friedman's comments into consideration as I finish it. Thanks for posting this.

code monkey said...

Obviously you missed the thrust of the lecture that addressed "the West":

"The intention here is not one of retrenchment or negative criticism, but of broadening our concept of reason and its application. While we rejoice in the new possibilities open to humanity, we also see the dangers arising from these possibilities and we must ask ourselves how we can overcome them.

We will succeed in doing so only if reason and faith come together in a new way, if we overcome the self-imposed limitation of reason to the empirically verifiable, and if we once more disclose its vast horizons. In this sense theology rightly belongs in the university and within the wide-ranging dialogue of sciences, not merely as a historical discipline and one of the human sciences, but precisely as theology, as inquiry into the rationality of faith.

Only thus do we become capable of that genuine dialogue of cultures and religions so urgently needed today. In the Western world it is widely held that only positivistic reason and the forms of philosophy based on it are universally valid. Yet the world's profoundly religious cultures ..." [which by the way includes Catholicism] "...see this exclusion of the divine from the universality of reason as an attack on their most profound convictions."

Anonymous said...

Sorry, I don't find this article at all convincing. It's way too cynical.

David Johnson said...

I disagree with the comment that the article is "way too cynical." The comment assumes that having a political motivation for saying something means that either a) the motivations are bad or b) the author of the statement is a "petty politician" (or something along those lines). I think we too easily dismiss, with regard to ecclesiastical matters, the necessity of anticipating political consequences or the possible good uses of saying true things with political intentions. Think about Luke 16:1-9--Jesus seems to acknowledge the need for such clevernesses and the possible goodness of them.

That said, this analysis of Benedict's words is certainly interesting, although I don't know if I agree. It certainly is a challenging read of the situation.

Alex said...

Completely agree with this article. I think I would have written something like it if I hadn't seen it here. I liken our relationship to Islam to my marriage. How can I resolve any problems with my wife if I either (a) refuse to talk with her about them (e.g. Bush's approach with Iran) or (b) skirt the real tough issues that I'm afraid to talk about (e.g. the liberal response to Islamic violence).

To truly heal a relationship, the only hope you have is to talk and when you talk, throw the "hand grenade" of truth into what might be a powder keg of a conversation. This is what we know we need to do constantly in our marriages and this is what the Pope did in his speech. It's "Bold Love" to quote from the Dan Allender book of the same name.

C. Stirling Bartholomew said...

After a young friend of mine called from South Carolina to tell me he was really impressed by the Pope's speech, I went to the trouble of tracking town the official text (english version) and read the whole thing. I agree that this speech was a very well engineered provocation and that the Vatican wasn't taken by surprise when things got nasty. I don't think this is being cynical.

"Pope Benedict is an intelligent man." Yes and he is not afraid of controversy.

Anonymous said...

David Johnson wrote: "I disagree with the comment that the article is "way too cynical." The comment assumes that having a political motivation for saying something means that either a) the motivations are bad or b) the author of the statement is a "petty politician" (or something along those lines)."

No, my comment about the article being too cynical doesn't assume any of that at all. It's cynical because the author claims to be able to read so deeply into the Pope's motivations that he knows the Pope's "true" reasons for the speech, other than what the Pope himself has stated. Just like you presume to be able to read my brief post and somehow intuit my "assumptions."

David Johnson said...

Then perhaps your use of the word "cynical" was not for the best. The word implies a lack of faith in human nature. Therefore, when you use it to describe Friedman's reading of Benedict's comments, you imply that this particular reading says nothing good about the Pope's character. I don't see a problem with the Pope saying things with multiple possibilities in mind. But then again, I don't think of the Pope as anyone particularly special--important on the world stage, maybe, but not special.

yuckabuck said...
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yuckabuck said...

The article is interesting, but skips over some important context.

First, the Friedman expends much energy on the question of whether Benedict has "backed Bush" here or not. This is obviously an important issue to him. But the important context here would be the earlier "secret" agreement that John Paul the 2nd had with Ronald Reagan (formed June 7, 1982) in order to jointly attack communism from different angles. The two always remained distinct, but had agreed that Soviet communism was a dangerous ideology that needed to be undermined in whatever way it could within their respective spheres. I don't know if Benedict and Bush have made a similar pact, but the pope is surely capable of acting in concert with aa U.S. president in order to work against an ideology, without it leading to any kind of political "backing."

Second, it is surely true that many in Britain (including the outspoken John Rhys Davies from the Indiana Jones and Lord of the Rings movies) and Europe have worried about the prospect of a (re-)productive Muslim population taking over a Western culture in which the dominant ethnicities choose to have only 1.5 kids or less.

But the more immediate context for the pope's words about Islam and violence would be the forced conversions of the two Fox News employees. As Friedman's article notes, the pope's controversial lecture specifically mentioned Mohammed's "command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." Indeed, eveything he said about Islam turned on this issue. But the mainstream media (except for a few conservative blogs) mostly ignored the issue of Centanni and Wiig's conversion. As mostly secular people, they probably figured that going along with the forced conversions were an entirely practicle way of getting out alive, and therefore not much worthy of comment.

Benedict, however, as well as Christians all over the world, would see forced conversions as a significant issue. (And it was not widely reported that if Centanni or Wiig ever renounce their conversions, they will be targeted for death as "apostates.") While I agree with Friedman that Benedict's remarks were targeted at inspiring the moderate wing of Islam to move their more radical brethren from violence to reason, it would seem that Benedict was thinking more about forced convresions rather than other geo-political issues.

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Anonymous said...

"But then again, I don't think of the Pope as anyone particularly special--important on the world stage, maybe, but not special."

No, of course the leader of a billion Christians is nothing special -- heaven forfend. I guess that is why journalists and commentators the world over, including the author of this article, have expended hundreds of thousands of words in attempting to second-guess the motives behind the recent speech of this "not special" person!

David Johnson said...

You're very sarcastic. Please forgive me if any of my earlier comments seemed that way; it was not intended.

My point is that Ratzinger is a man; no more, no less. No matter how many people put themselves under the guidance of the Roman church, he remains human--I hold him to be fallible whether he's speaking extemporaneously or ex cathedra. I did say that he's important on the world stage, but having power doesn't make someone special. His position does mean that his comments will affect the way Islamists treat Christians, though.

RC said...

i was amazed at how sorry i felt for that italian nun in somolia...how senseless.

--RC of strangeculture.blogspot.com