We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
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Saddle up your horse, Saladin Weird echoes of the 12th Century in the 21st Century:
THE Pope’s visit to Turkey, which many hoped would herald a new era of improved relations between Islam and the West, was in doubt yesterday amid condemnation of remarks by the pontiff that appeared to link Islam and violence.
As Muslims all over the world protested, with effigies of Benedict XVI burnt during demonstrations in Pakistan, members of the Turkish Government urged the Pope to reconsider his visit in November. Senior officials in Turkey said that they could not guarantee his safety if he went ahead with the trip.
So, where is this going?
A. It will all blow over in a few days; or
B. One or other side will back down; or
C. We are headed for Holy War
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“…appeared to link Islam and violence. … As Muslims all over the world protested, with effigies of Benedict XVI burnt during demonstrations….”
How do people keep making that link? It can’t be the worldwide protests every time someone says boo. It can’t be the burning effigies (or burning cars, or burning embassies, or burning women’s faces). It can’t be the last pope was, you know, shot by a Muslim. It has to just be our racism. Our completely unreasonable Western racism.
I know – isn’t it hilarious? Muslims are outraged that the Pope would link Islam with violence and react – with violence. Magnificent.
Two things:
One – Surely the simplest way for anyone to refute the comment of the Byzantine Emperor quoted would be to list a few of the (no doubt numerous) new things that the Prophet introduced to the world that might not reasonably be regarded as detrimental.
Two – Having read the text of the entire speech what on earth is the fuss about? As far as I can see one would have to work really hard at being really unreasonable and deliberately missing the point to find it offensive.
A and B. It seems implausible that whatever the Pope says could either precipitate or prevent a Holy War – at least since the Catholic Church gave up on launching them itself.
As for B, I suspect it is fractionally more likely the Pope will apologise for his “mediaeval remarks” than the various outraged-of-Baluchistan Muslim hacks will apologise for their mediaeval religion. However, if he stands his ground, I don’t see anywhere for critics to go. They can hardly get the emperor Manuel II to withdraw the actually mediaeval remarks, any more than we can summon up Haroon al Rashid to explain that the real caliphate was a socking great multinational empire in which he never met a Djinn, and scarcely ever heard from some provincial governors, and not everyone agreed about anything much, never mind religion.
Nah, I think this pope has more balls than JPII. He won’t cave to the heretics. I can’t imagine any better demonstration of the stated expression of a sociological theory applied and proven in a real world experiment than what the Pope just did.
The Islamist Territory is blaming the Popes Map for its terrible terrain…
Fatima! Fatima! Fatima!
Still waiting for the fulfillment of that third prophecy.
Mind you I’m an atheist but I’ve always loved end times prophecies.
Obviously the Emperor was wrong; Islam was more than happy to live peacefully with the Byzantine Empire wasn’t it? Silly Emperor for doubting the good faith of the Religion of Peace. It was probably this rudeness which provoked the peace loving Muslims into destroying Constantinople.
I have been amused at hearing various BBC news wallahs remark with obvious surprise in their voices that most e-mails they were getting supported the Pope. That thought clearly does not compute for them.
Some of the comments I’ve heard ammount almost to accusing the Pope of Catholicism.
My understanding is that the Pope was using this as an example in a wider discourse on religous violence. The interesting thing which I haven’t heard anyone take up on is that any C14th Byzantine Emporer wouldn’t even have been Catholic. The Koranimals are trying to shoot the messenger, not the message yet again.
And not too accurately either. They burned an effigy which didn’t actually look like the Pope. It looked like they’d taken one of their stock Bush/Blairs and stuck a funny hat on it.
Senior officials in Turkey said that they could not guarantee his safety if he went ahead with the trip.
Is this another lightly veiled muzzie threat or am I just getting jaded?
Excellent article by Arnold Wesker in the Times today:
Well, looks like the pope just apologised, if not for what he said but for the upset caused by the misinterpretation of his speech. Let’s see if that subtle difference gets picked up in the Muslim world.
Not surprisingly, the German press is all over this story too. They report that the head of Turkey’s governing party had compared Ratzinger to Hitler and Turkey’s president of religious affairs had complained bitterly yesterday, only to admit today that he hadn’t read the pope’s speech at all. The Turkish press at least seem to be having a go at him.
There’s a comment in the BBC’s story saying that “the Pope could also have mentioned the violence of Christian crusaders against Muslim believers, but chose not to do so”.
Erm, actually, he was talking about spreading faith by violent means. That was specifically the aim of the wars initiated by Mohammed. The Crusades weren’t a mission to convert anyone.
Good to see the BBC stoking the flames as usual.
“Saddle up your horse, Saladin”
Not to be a wise-ass, but saladin was Kurdish. He wouldn’t be very popular if he showed up in Turkey, Syria, Iran, most of Israq, ect, etc 🙂
And not to be a wise-ass, Saladin was a Muslim war leader.
Since the great majority of muslims don’t speak whatever language BXVI make the pronouncement in, they’ve gotten the information second hand, probably edited for the maximum damage (see cartoons, Mohammed).
Two big problems:
1) populist rabble rousers who try to keep their supporters in a violent fever pitch thoughout the muslim world
2) it’s so easy for them to do so
What I notice is how weak and vulnerable in their faith most of these muslims who make such a fuss may be, people who are reasonably secure in their faith aren’t so easy to provoke to violence ime.
Today’s Kurds are Muslim too, but it doesn’t make them any more popular there.
The muslim world still admires Saladin because of what he accomplished, and because he fulfills their general ethic that the best Kurd is a dead one.