The idea that the Palestinian people have only been able to persist because of their religion is ridiculous to me. They are resisting because colonialism, apartheid and genocide are very bad things to which nobody would want to be subjected, not because of Islam. If Palestinians were atheists, is he suggesting that they wouldn't have the strength or the will to resist? Would their lack of a belief in the supernatural turn them into doormats for Isn'treal?
I like Hakim's content, but his position on religion is quite frustrating. He is a Muslim first and a Marxist second. Also, Joram van Klaveren is still a right-winger.
Where in the Muslim holy texts is this stated?
Can you give some examples that weren't more or less created by the West? I'm not aware of Libya having depraved social policies before the coup
Quran [2:39], it also says it a few more times, but It's about the afterlife, anyone who doesn't believe in the afterlife and just believes a person lives in complete darkness also sees a shitty afterlife for believers of any religion, basically working your entire life just to be stuck in complete darkness and disappear, you can't be neutral about the afterlife. it is something that shouldn't matter for anyone who wants to stay out of idealism, what should matter to judge a religion or a school of thought is how it teaches to act towards anyone who's not from it, and the Quran says in [60:7] [60:8] [60:9] what it says.
Iran, the laws against women are real, but a lot of the laws were made up by the Iran, the example I can give instantly is that in Islam there is no law that punishes women for not wearing Hijab, while Iran law criminalizes it.
thanks for the references; the first one is unfortunate, but you're right that it's ultimately inconsequential based on the latter three and similar surahs
the Hijab requirement is certainly restrictive and should be abolished (at least from my perspective), but I wouldn't consider it a depraved policy
I mean if you don't consider patriarchal control of and violence against women's bodies depraved then that's on you frankly. Iran's misogynistic laws and religiously justified social norms go way beyond simply the Hijab requirements. The fact that you are even caveating the point that it should be abolished is frankly a disgrace. Just to give another example: in Iran, based on what all my Persian communists comrades have told me, a common way in which child abuse occurs is through houses which act as sites for religiously sanctioned 'temporary marriages', which basically allow these to act as brothels (including for underage women). There are many Imams who frequent these, and feel protected by the supposed religious sanction. I have communist comrades who still live in Iran, and whose families who murdered and tortured to death by the theocratic regime. Also, Iran is not the only example of Islamism (I should have been more general instead of simply saying societies), as we can take any Islamist group you like whether in West Africa (the current hot spot for violent Jihadism), North Africa, the Middle East, or South East Asia. They can be governing political parties, governments or militant groups. If someone can give me a single example of non-reactionary Islamists I'll be legitimately amazed.
Rania did not answer your answer about Islamism and the West. You saying it's inconsequential based on the idea that there are tree surahs which can be interpreted in a certain way is a a completely idealist, un-Marxist position. The mainstream view in the Muslim world is that hell is eternal (at least for non-Muslims), notably among intellectuals and the main theological schools. There is indeed debate, and there will inevitably be a great amount of variation among Muslims, notably in the more liberalized societies of the West. This seems to me to be using purely abstract, religious justifications to argue for something being materially and politically inconsequential, which I don't think follows. Whether or not the Quran explicitly calls for women to cover their faces is not irrelevant (it of course does not), but Islam as a real, material phenomenon in the real world, does play a role in justifying and enforcing this. Just because we cannot will out of existence the material conditions that produce this situation doesn't mean they shouldn't be ruthlessly critiqued an distinguished from the socialist and communist conception of a society and its desired gender relations.
In terms of other verses:
Soorat al-Nisa:
“Verily, those who disbelieve and did wrong [by concealing the truth about Prophet Muhammad and his message of true Islamic Monotheism written in the Tawraatt (Torah) and the Injeel (Gospel) with them]; Allaah will not forgive them, nor will He guide them to any way. Except the way of Hell, to dwell therein forever” [al-Nisa’ 4:168-169]
“and whosoever disobeys Allaah and His Messenger, then verily, for him is the fire of Hell, he shall dwell therein forever” [al-Jinn 72:23] :
The Hadith/Sunnah also contain several gruesome descriptions of the punishments in hell, including (in al-Bukhaari, the most significant Hadith compiler) the cutting off of lips, flogging, drowning, stoning. Bukhaari also cites a tradition of Muhammad supposedly claiming that the majority of the inhabitants of hell will be women, for classically misogynistic reasons. Unbelievers, as those 'too proud to submit to God' are almost always included in the category of those who merit hell.
What Rania is either ignorantly or dishonestly ignoring above is that is is not only absurd and idealistic to presume, but is also not the case, that these beliefs have no influence on the views of, say, Christian minorities. They are used to justify religious violence against Christian minorities, for instance in West Africa.
I wouldn’t describe atheist death as darkness and despair. It’s simply the absence of everything. There is nothing to perceive. As if you were never born. You’re right it doesn’t matter what religious people think happens to us after death.
On the bad laws in Iran or other countries, that is in the context of colonialism and the coups of progressive governments.
Sorry for my mistake.
You are correct on the atheist conception of death, so thanks for pointing that out. Absence of experience is not the same as experience of absence.
One question I have though: How does the (obviously correct) point that Islamism in general can not be understand as having emerged except in relation to, and in an essential way as a result of and reaction to Western Imperialism and Colonialism, influence in any way whatsoever the answer to whether or not Islamism is reactionary? This also just strikes me as a way of avoiding another important discussion of the reactionary effects of Islamism on the societies they influence. Did the US actively supporting, arming and financing Jihadists such as the Taliban mean that these are not bad laws, or that Islamism is not reactionary? I'm genuinely asking here as it's a complete mystery to me what anyone thinks they are meaningfully pointing out when they say things like things like this beyond correctly underlining how reactionary the effects of US imperialism are. But you can't even make that point with full strength without recognizing that the effects through flaming Islamist radicalization are also reactionary because Islamism is profoundly reactionary.
Yes comrade atheism is what I am referring to here. And Marxism was born in part out of a critique of religion, as a political extension of scientific critique of religion, as Marxism is the Proletarian stage of Scientific Revolution. The concepts of socially real abstractions such as commodity and money fetishism has intellectual roots in the Marxist critique of religious fetishization. There are religious communists, and contrary to what might be expected I'm actually very sympathetic to the pursuit of mystical and spiritual experience as a key component of a flourishing life. I sympathize deeply with this motivation behind religious belief, though desire to experience the numinous is not limited to non-atheists. Like honestly if I was pushed to it in some ways my metaphysical beliefs in the light of modern science in conjunction with my interpretations of dialectical materialism almost lead to a form of pantheism, though I'm considering that to be atheistic here. Part of my sympathy is because for 16 years of my life I was in a cycle of devout religiosity and alienation. So I understand the appeal intimately and think that that has a place in a socialist and communist society, though in a form very different from that which organized religion currently takes.
There are several places in the Quran and the Hadith were the punishments in hell and the idea that it will be eternal are implied or described. Please see my other response to your comment for some examples. It is a completely ad hoc, idealist method to ignore the Hadith/Sunnah, which is almost as important in the discussions over Islamic social policy and legislation, as the Quran, as the latter leaves alot of question unanswered, for the materialist reason that it is an imperfect religious text, despite it still being a really marvelous text in many ways. The Quran itself is a fascinating text, and I recommend that everyone read it. There are passages of immense beauty, sublimity and philosophical depth, as well as poetic effect, but though the question of whether or not I think it intellectually impressive overall is a secondary concern, I do also think that, no matter how progressive Islam as a social force might have been during it's rise to prominence, relative to the Byzantines or Arab paganism, it is not any real basis as an ideology for progressive, let alone communist politics in the current era, so we have to make that clear if asked, as we would for any other organized religion as they currently materially exist, or could feasibly so exist in the relevant political futures open to us. Of course, as Rania correctly points out (while bizarrely assuming that I am suggesting the opposite), this in no way implies that discussions with religious believers cannot be open, sympathetic and sensitive, and doesnt change that it is of course reactionary to simply go around telling people they are incorrect or attacking them personally for their religious beliefs. The point is that Marxists have to understand, realistically, the nature of organized religion as it currently exists. But that, again, is not the same thing as making clear that the communist ideological position that has to be staked out cannot be on a religious basis, and that the legitimacy of religious justifications in politics has to be contested, and that we have to make clear that that politics based on organized religion is fundamentally limited in terms of the progressive potential which it opens up. In societies where religion is very powerful, it is a key obstacle to Socialism and Communist radicalization. Rania seems to be suggesting that Communists should simply hide their views and ignore reactionary aspects of religion, which is not communist in the slightest.
Libya is a weird case because Gaddafi's relationship to Islam was very strange, and he was, as always, pretty incoherently unorthodox when you look as his expressions on it detail. Libya never really engaged in any real thoroughgoing Islamization of its political structures. Certainly not in any way comparable to, say, Iran or Saudi Arabia. It was certainly the society in the Middle East and North Africa with the most notable economic success. No disagreement there.