Book review: Islamist crisis rooted in "intellectual suicide"

Robert Reilly is the author of The Closing of the Muslim Mind, a new book which argues that a form of "intellectual suicide" is responsible for the Islamist crisis in which the world finds itself ensnared.

In a thorough yet readable analysis, Mr. Reilly shows how all the troubles being caused by Muslim findamentalists are rooted in a pivotal struggle waged within the Muslim world nearly a millennium ago. In a heated battle over the role of reason, the side of irrationality won. The deformed theology that resulted produced the spiritual pathology of Islamism, and a deeply dysfunctional culture which reveals itself today in such things as honour killing, mentioned in earlier posts.

Now Catholic World News quotes Reilly as warning that in the Islamic world, the Arab Spring uprisings may produce popular votes in the short term, but the long-term results are unlikely to be democratic. He explains that Islam insists on the rule of sharia. Once Islamic law is enacted, he says, neither dissent nor change will be allowed. Thus he characterizes the Islamist theory of democracy "one God; one vote; one time."

To underline his point, Reilly invokes the testimony of Hassan al-Banna, the founder of the Islamic Brotherhood, who thought Stalin’s Soviet Union was a model of "democracy". He also cites the late Sheik Mohammed Sayed Tantawi, head of Cairo's Al Azhar University, who said: "Saudi Arabia leads the world in the protection of human rights because it protects them according to the sharia."

Click here to read Jihad Watch's interview with Robert Reilly.

The Closing of the Muslim Mind is available from Ignatius Press. Web sale price is $22.91. Tell them Walt sent you.