Americans must learn two concepts to better understand the political earthquake the United States is pushing as President Obama gives his nod to “the Arab street,” predominantly organized, it seems, by the Muslim Brotherhood, to force out Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Many on the right see in the anti-Mubarak movement vindication of President George W. Bush’s Big Idea — that ballot-box democracy would transform the umma into Jeffersonian, or, at least, pro-Western and anti-jihad republics. That this hasn’t happened anywhere (and in spades) doesn’t dampen their enthusiasm.
In fact, citing Bush is in vogue. Writing in the Washington Post, Elliott Abrams quotes Bush, circa 2003, as saying: “Are the peoples of the Middle East somehow beyond the reach of liberty? … Are they alone never to know freedom. …?”
Jay Nordlinger at National Review quotes Bush, circa 2008, as saying: “The truth is that freedom is a universal right — the Almighty’s gift to every man, woman, and child on the face of the Earth.”
Such is “universalist” gospel. Universalists believe all peoples prefer freedom to its absence, which is probably true. But they also believe all peoples define “freedom” in the same way. Is that true?
The answer — and first simple concept — is no. The entry on freedom, or hurriyya, in the Encyclopedia of Islam describes a state of divine enthrallment that bears no resemblance to any Western understanding of freedom as predicated on the workings of the individual conscience.
According to the encyclopedia, Islamic freedom is “the recognition of the essential relationship between God the master and His human slaves who are completely dependent on Him.”
Ibn Arabi, a Sufi scholar of note, is cited for having defined freedom as “being perfect slavery” to Allah. To put it another way, Islamic-style “freedom” is freedom from unbelief.
At this point, I can imagine being quizzed on whether the Islamic definition of freedom applies outside of a strictly Islamic religious milieu.
But judging by the most solid indicators we have — polling data on Egyptian attitudes — I would have to say that Egypt is a strictly Islamic religious milieu.
These findings reveal a population steeped in the teachings and attitudes of Shariah (Islamic law). For example, a recent Pew poll tells us 84 percent of Egyptians favor the death penalty for leaving Islam.
A University Maryland/WorldOpinon poll in 2007 tells us 74 percent of Egyptians approve of “strict Shariah” and 67 percent approve of the concept of the “caliphate.”
In free elections, such potential pluralities might well rate as “democratic” in terms of majority rule. But would the West consider them to be “democratic” in terms of individual rights?
The Examiner‘s Byron York recently noted an apparent contradiction between the popularity of the death penalty for apostasy and “freedom of religion” (90 percent). This would be a contradiction in the Western context. But we are not looking at a Western context. Which brings me to Concept Two.
Islam does not recognize as valid any religion but Islam. What we in the West hear as “freedom of religion” becomes, under Islamic law, freedom of Islam.
Indeed, as Stephen Coughlin, a brilliant analyst of Shariah, has told me, citing both the Koran and quoting the classic Sunni law book “Reliance of the Traveler,” Judaism and Christianity “were abrogated by the universal message of Islam.” That means overruled.
Further, it is “unbelief (kufr)” — grounds for the capital crime of apostasy — “to hold that the remnant cults now bearing the names of formerly valid religions, such as “Christianity” or “Judaism,” are acceptable to Allah Most High. …”
Suddenly, a post-Mubarak Egypt run by the Muslim Brothers is easy to imagine.
Examiner Columnist Diana West is syndicated nationally by United Media and is the author of “The Death of the Grown-Up: How America’s Arrested Development Is Bringing Down Western Civilization.”
