What is it about religion that invites so many “experts?”
You know what I'm talking about, right?
Or better put, "who" I'm talking about. I'm talking about those folks who insist that
they understand the "truth" of someone else's religion. Maybe it's your neighbor, a colleague, a
family member, or a close friend. Or
maybe, if you're like me, the "experts" are coming at you from all
angles - not only from your own community but also from your Facebook feed, the
media outlets you read (or watch), and the YouTube links sent to you by
friends.
For the last decade, Islam and Muslims have been the pet subject of the
"experts" in my life - of those who want to educate me on the truth
about Islam. Of pseudo historians,
politicians, and celebrities arguing that Islam is an inherently violent
religion, and that any attempt to say otherwise is misguided. In other words, these "experts"
want to say:
"I know the truth about
Islam. It is violent. It is backwards. Muslims are dangerous people
who belong to a dangerous religion. They
may pretend to be good people (or perhaps there are a few good apples among
them) but, in reality, they want to destroy you and your way of life. They hate
women. They hate non-Muslims. Don't believe anyone who tells you otherwise
or you are the fool."
All of this has me wondering: Why do so many people feel entitled to
make proclamations about religion with such
authority?
I ask this question as someone who is intensely interested in religion.
I am a Palestinian Christian who is a dual citizen of Israel and the United
States. I was born in Israel, and
immigrated to New York City with my family when I was 6. We then moved to Iowa, where I spent a significant
part of my life, though we traveled back to Israel to see family often. I have also lived in Minnesota, Rhode Island,
Florida, and Tennessee. I spent 6 years obtaining a PhD in religious studies,
one year as a Minerva Research Chair at the United States Naval War College,
and four years as an assistant professor of religious studies at Western
Kentucky University. Just last month, I
started my new position as executive director of a community building nonprofit
in Nashville, TN: The Faith & Culture Center | Our Muslim Neighbor Initiative. I have also published a series of articles on
religion and one book (out this spring).
Please know that I don’t say all this to boast. Rather, my point is that I have dedicated a
significant portion of my life to the study of religion, and yet, I refuse to
claim some kind of “expertise,” much less to make definitive claims about my
religion or someone else’s. If life has
taught me anything, it’s that religion is complicated. Human beings are complicated. To put it plainly, to believe that one can
make sweeping and generalized statements about a phenomena as pervasive and as
wide spread as religion just does not make sense.
Perhaps that’s why I’m always surprised when others make bold
proclamations on this topic, and, moreover, that folks do so repeatedly. Would they feel this bold
making statements about Astrophysics?
Or medicine? Or chemistry? Or any other subject that, I feel very
comfortable saying, is just as complicated and requiring of dedicated and
focused education as the study of religion?
Most of the time, I feel no reason to respond. We all (myself included) make innocuous kinds
of statements in casual conversation. These
types of generalizations are part and parcel of the discussions we have with
our friends, family members, and others in our communities. However, more and
more, I’m hearing (or reading) statements about religion – especially Islam
- that are not only sweeping and uninformed,
but that are also dangerous. They are
hateful, divisive, and meant to incite fear and distrust within our
communities. They draw on conspiracy
theories and rely on human inclinations towards “in” and “out” behavior.
The most recent of these (and the catalyst for this post) was sent to a
colleague of mine. This colleague has
become a friend, and so the attack felt personal. My friend received a Facebook message from a
person he did not know that provided “information” and “facts” (with YouTube
links included) to substantiate his claim that while he loved “people” he did
not love “Islam” because of its proclivities towards unjustified violence and
other forms of evil. Yet, he continued,
as a Christian, he was commanded to love his “enemy” (Muslims) despite the fact
that they wanted to “enslave” and “subjugate” people like him
(non-Muslims). The links led me to
YouTube video of a man who claimed to have read the major texts of Islam and to
have “simplified” them for the common reader, and, moreover, to provide his
audience with the “history” they were “not taught” (read: a history that was
intentionally hidden from them) in order to reveal the brutality of Islam.
Friends. How did we get here?
How have we allowed something that is as significant to world history
and to contemporary events as religion,
to be discussed and described with such a stark lack of insight and
reflection?
How is it that we, creatures who have never been beyond the boundaries
of our own solar system, are so quick to claim ownership of Truth?
This can’t continue.
We cannot allow the uninformed to hold a monopoly regarding public
statements on religion. Rather, we must
be willing to get interested and to learn.
We cannot accept oversimplified “facts” at face value. Rather, we must be willing to accept answers
that force us into more complex and sophisticated understandings of our
world.
We cannot retreat into our communities because we don’t know how to talk
to the “other.” Rather, we must reach across boundaries and enter into
relationships with people who are not “like us.”
In short, we must do better. Myself included.
For my part, I’d like to begin by offering a response to some of the
claims that I hear most often regarding Islam and Muslims. I will
do this through a series of topic-focused blog posts that will
follow. My hope is to problematize the
myopic claims made about Islam, and to help demonstrate the widespread
diversity that exists in this religion.
But before I get going, I want to make something clear: I don’t write this or any other post as an
“expert.” In fact, the more I learn, the
more I realize how much there is out there that I don’t know. Friends,
humility in regard to what we know is healthy.
It leaves us curious and willing to learn. We do not have all the answers and we never
will. We must learn to see the limits of
our understanding. Anything else is
dangerous. Especially because it is
often our definitive claims about the other that lead to division, hatred,
misunderstanding, violence, and other behaviors that tears down communities and
disintegrates societies. We must show
humility in what we know. Any other
posture is ludicrous.
Moreover, we must be open to
learning more. We must be willing to
have our assumptions unearthed and our paradigms challenged. Information and education can have this
effect, and those components are important.
But most critically, we must be willing to reach across communities and
meet others who may not share our faith, our skin color, our cultural or ethnic
background, our political party, or our neighborhood (among other things). We have to commit ourselves to knowing and seeing others.
As mentioned, I now lead a nonprofit that does this work. We convene intentional spaces that are structured
for those from various religious, ethnic, racial, and cultural communities to
come together and have facilitated conversations on sensitive issues. We convene spaces where individuals can
initiate relationships with one
another in the hope of living in community – as neighbors. No amount of education provides the type of
transformative change experienced by those who become friends – who really know and see one another. I have
witnessed this first hand, and I have seen it over and over again.
Let's do better. Friends, will
you join me in this task? More
importantly, may I join you?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TOPICS FOR
ADDITIONAL POSTS TO FOLLOW (subject to change)
1. The “Islam is a
monolith” claim.
2. The “I’ve read their books” claim.
3. The “all I need
to know about Islam I learned during 9/11” claim.
4. The "they oppress their women" claim.
4. The "they oppress their women" claim.
