The Future of Christian Arabs - The 4 Freedoms Library2024-03-29T15:56:39Zhttp://4freedoms.com/forum/topics/the-future-of-christian-arabs?groupUrl=middleeast&commentId=3766518%3AComment%3A21930&groupId=3766518%3AGroup%3A1759&feed=yes&xn_auth=noGreat article!tag:4freedoms.com,2010-05-08:3766518:Comment:219302010-05-08T17:18:36.000ZAlan Lakehttp://4freedoms.com/profile/AlanLake
Great article!
Great article! V
Currently there is a world…tag:4freedoms.com,2010-05-08:3766518:Comment:219052010-05-08T14:54:46.000ZIndoeuropeanhttp://4freedoms.com/profile/Indoeuropean
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Currently there is a worldwide trend involving the breakup of large, unstable entities into smaller ethnic, cultural, and religious ones. Witness the waning of the Soviet Union. There is a return to the celebration of uniqueness and distinctive cultural self-expression. In parallel with this there is a definite shift occurring worldwide from geopolitics to what Edward Luttwak of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington refers to as “geo-economics.”3 Furthermore,…
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Currently there is a worldwide trend involving the breakup of large, unstable entities into smaller ethnic, cultural, and religious ones. Witness the waning of the Soviet Union. There is a return to the celebration of uniqueness and distinctive cultural self-expression. In parallel with this there is a definite shift occurring worldwide from geopolitics to what Edward Luttwak of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington refers to as “geo-economics.”3 Furthermore, there is a renewed global emphasis on the ideals of freedom, self-determination, human rights, and democracy. Great promise of peace and prosperity seems to loom in the immediate future of Europe. Unfortunately, however, the same cannot so far be said of the Middle East with its closed societies, its authoritarian (and often repressive) regimes, and its undercurrent of religious fundamentalism. "Everything is disturbed and transitional in Arab life and society," wrote Hourani forty-four years ago,4 and it is still so today.<br />
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Islam faces a set of severe challenges. The technological revolution is progressing at such an incredible rate that even advanced societies are finding it difficult to keep up. The situation is past being able to be ameliorated by the strong purchasing power of the petrodollar. Even the creation of a native educated elite of technical experts-underway throughout the Arab world at a snail's pace-is not enough to bridge the widening gap. Required is theoretical inventiveness and an aggressive presence and participation at the cutting edge of science. And it is probably too late even for that.<br />
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The continued stagnation of the Arab world will undoubtedly result in greater and greater frustration. At times like these, non-Muslim minorities become particularly vulnerable to serving as convenient scapegoats. Given the momentous changes occurring around the world, a stagnant Arab world can only expect a bleak future. Christian Arabs must therefore brace themselves for violent backlashes, particularly as they are seen to be associated with the West.<br />
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The faulty manner with which the West has traditionally related to the Middle East is to a great extent responsible for this. For the most part since the end of the Second World War, Western interest and involvement in the Middle East have occurred within the context of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Prior to that the Middle East was often for Westerners the object of romantic fascination coupled with imperial design-the "Lawrence of Arabia" syndrome. And earlier still it was the killing fields of crusading hordes. Inasmuch as the Middle East remains today the reservoir of much coveted natural resources and an arena for economic and strategic competition, the relationship continues to give credence to indigenous accusations of colonial exploitation and imperialism leveled repeatedly against the West. The lot of the Muslim Arab---and by derivation that of the Christian Arab---cannot be a cheerful one if the Western mind and spirit can only communicate with the Middle East in the language of oil and weaponry.<br />
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By the same token, it is now an illusion for the Christian Arab to expect the West to rush to his aid should he face the wrath of the Muslim majority. External protection using force is unrealistic; protection through international agencies such as the United Nations is pathetically ineffective; Western use of economic leverage as a guarantee is unlikely any time soon as is any action that would be deemed offensive to the local majority. Western timidity following the 1973 Arab· oil embargo, and lingering repercussions of that timidity even today as seen, for instance, in the deferential attitude of the United States government toward Saudi Arabia's peculiar policy considerations, speak for themselves. Western use of force will occur only when the West perceives its vital material interests in the region to be directly threatened, as in the case of the Gulf war brought about by Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.<br />
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What the Christian Arab does have a right to expect and a reasonable chance of receiving from the West is more serious attention to himself as a person entitled to rights and liberties and protection under the law. Are these not the universal human ideals that the West is proud to stand for and is preaching---not without some success---throughout the world? Are they not what the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, itself coauthored by a Christian Arab (Charles Malik) and accepted as a standard of conduct by the international family of nations, is all about? Should not the West take its own values more seriously to the extent of including both the Muslim majority and the non-Muslim minorities of the Middle East by offering them, both separately and jointly, a promising vision for the future?<br />
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In the wake of the Gulf war, the West, principally the United States, will enjoy an unprecedented opportunity to influence the region positively in the direction of greater moderation, openness, reform, pluralism, and freedom. Such a vision requires bold implementation that in turn requires perspicacious leadership imbued with a sense of fairness. It also requires plenty of patience, and any illusions about speedy results should be abandoned without forfeiting the vision.<br />
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All this of course raises the thorny problem of the relationship of Islam and democracy. In the West's excitement to package and export democracy to the Third World, sight has often been lost of the extent of readiness by the indigenous cultures to comprehend-much less to accept-the fundamental democratic assumptions, particularly the safeguarding of minority rights, taken for granted, say, in countries such as Britain and the United States. That is why the democratic ideal has rarely encountered fertile terrain in a place like the Arab world, populated as it has always been with an assortment of despots and dynasts. Suffice to say that in Islam-unlike in Christianity-there is no separation of church and state; and the Middle East-unlike the West-has not undergone 200 years of secularization. Therefore, whenever some voices in the West have emphasized democracy as solely a numerical question of one man, one vote, rather than as a question of individual rights, minorities in the Islamic world have suffered.<br />
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Islam today is undergoing what it regards as a spiritual revival and a reassertion of its most basic beliefs. The secular West, by contrast, appears desensitized to spiritual issues. To stop here, however, and regard the plight of Christian Arabs as a lost cause would be too hasty and simplistic a conclusion. With the gradual retreat of communism as a world force, many in the West, relieved to be rid of a major menace, have begun to eye militant Islam as the next great challenge on the horizon. Also, the eventual emergence from the Soviet debris of a Russia more true to its authentic cultural and spiritual identity would be a world development of far-reaching consequences for the Middle East.<br />
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But another similarly momentous development has already occurred: the establishment of Israel in 1948 changed everything. For the first time since the early Islamic conquests, by far the strongest power in the region is not the majority, but one of the minorities. And this is likely to stay the case for the foreseeable future despite the Saddams of the world. The implications of this, both actual and potential, are awesome, as will be the long-term effect of the influx of hundreds of thousands of Soviet Jews to the area.<br />
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Furthermore, Western materialism and secularism notwithstanding, a Western spiritual response stimulated by a corresponding Islamic spiritual challenge is not inconceivable. Some are even predicting, perhaps anachronistically, that the twenty-first century will see the revival of religious wars, albeit in a new and ominous fashion.<br />
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Unfortunately, there is no "and they lived happily ever after" ending to this story. Depending on how Islam intends to meet these new realities and challenges it faces and will face, the fate of the Christian Arabs will be decided. If unbridled Islamic fundamentalism becomes the order of the day, the Christians of the Middle East will have very little to look forward to.<br />
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It is to be hoped that Islam will, with time, and after intense soul-searching and cataclysmic upheavals, choose to join a new peaceful world order now being created. This may require new interpretations of theological tenets to be undertaken---new fiqh (Islamic legal interpretation) schools to emerge---to accommodate the unfolding realities of the world. Here the West too has a responsibility to make room within the emerging new international order for such a reformulated Islam. This process is fated to move at a glacial pace, and Christian Arabs in the meantime will continue to live as dhimmis, or teeter on the brink of dhimmidom. But a more or less free Christian community will ultimately survive and outlast the present state of foreign occupation to emerge from the rubble of Lebanon with its abiding distinctive features intact. The logic of history reassures us that such beleaguered but well-rooted communities outlast oppressive occupying regimes.<br />
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For the eclipse of freedom in Lebanon to be reversed, the vanishing free press would need to be restored; all restrictions on free expression would have to be lifted; the erosion of liberal education would have to be halted; the stifling of free economic enterprise would have to be averted; and the curtain closing down on Lebanon's open society would have to be raised. In the absence of strong local leadership, resistance to these suffocating trends is presently being conducted from the pulpit of the small parish church across much of Lebanon. The Vatican should know that a weak Maronite patriarch and an ecclesiastical hierarchy prepared to compromise on the freedoms of its community, thereby sealing the fate of millions of Eastern Christians in the process, are sure recipes for gradual extinction.<br />
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It is essential at the very least that what is ultimately at stake in Lebanon, namely the survival or perishing of free Christianity, be clearly perceived and acknowledged. Lebanon is not merely, as some observers in the West often repeat, a quagmire of seemingly hopeless internal factional strife among a hodgepodge of communities and clans, the Christians included. If this were the whole story, then perhaps it should rightfully serve as a convenient excuse for not dealing with the problem. However, the real fateful drama underlying Lebanon's agony is a fight for freedom-that precious commodity in this otherwise freedom-starved part of the world.<br />
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Much suffering among both the Muslim majority and the non-Muslim minorities of the region will have to occur before the shackles of stagnation and fanaticism and mutual suspicion are finally broken from within, with sincere encouragement from the outside. Only then, alas, can a new dawn, the dawn of a Middle Eastern perestroika, begin to break forth.<br />
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1. Quoted in Robert Brenton Betts, Christians in the Arab East: A Political Study (Athens: Lycabettus Press, 19(8), p. 60.<br />
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2. Charles Glass, Tribes with Flags: A Dangerous Passage through the Chaos of the Middle East (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1990). 80 Mediterranean Quarterly: Spring 1991<br />
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3. Edward N. Luttwak. "From Geopolitics to Geo-Economics," National Interest, 20 (Summer 1990): 17-23.<br />
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4. Albert Hourani. Minorities in the Arab World (London: Oxford University Press, 1947), p. 109.<br />
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[ Source: <a href="http://www.annaqed.com/en/content/show.aspx?aid=16062" target="_blank">http://www.annaqed.com/en/content/show.aspx?aid=16062</a> ]