Social Compass 46(2), 1999, 225–240
ACTUALITE DE LA RECHERCHE
CURRENT RESEARCH
Manochehr DORRAJ
The Crisis of Modernity and Religious
Revivalism: A Comparative Study of Islamic
Fundamentalism, Jewish Fundamentalism
and Liberation Theology
While the literature on specific case studies of Islam, Judaism and Christianity
has grown steadily in the past three decades, attempts at comparisons and
contrasts have remained sparse and scattered. The author proposes to
undertake a comparative study of these three religio-political movements.
More specifically, he intends to grapple with the following issues. First, what
are the roots of these revivalist movements? Are they revolts against
modernity and its dislocations as some have suggested or are they movements
of community building in the face of fragmentation of postmodern society?
Or a confluence of the two? Second, what are the historical and political
antecedents for the appeal of these movements? More specifically, what
message do they communicate to the faithful and what material and spiritual
remedies do they provide for their needs? Third, are there any patterns to be
discerned for theory construction? What are the grounds for comparisons and
contrasts? What are the commonalities and the differences?
Si, au cours des trois dernières décennies, le nombre d’études spécifiques
concernant l’islam, le judaïsme et le christianisme n’a cessé d’augmenter, les
tentatives de comparaisons sont restées clairsemées. L’auteur propose
d’entreprendre une étude comparative de ces trois mouvements religieux et
politiques. Il se penche plus spécifiquement sur trois questions.
Premièrement, quelles sont les racines des mouvements de type “revivaliste”?
S’agit-il, comme certains l’ont suggéré, de révoltes contre la modernité et ses
dislocations? De mouvements de construction sociale face à la fragmentation
de la société post-moderne? Ou d’une combinaison des deux?
Deuxièmement, quels sont les antécédents historiques et politiques de
l’attraction exercée par ces mouvements? Quel message transmettent-ils aux
fidèles et quels remèdes matériels et spirituels leur proposent-ils? Et
troisièmement, est-il possible de discerner certaines tendances permettant
d’esquisser une théorie? Sur quelle base peut-on effectuer des comparaisons?
Quelles sont les similitudes et les différences entre ces mouvements?
For centuries religion was often associated with fatalistic resignation and
apathy. Prior to the 1950s, churches in many parts of the Third World,
including Latin America, were perceived as bulwarks of conservatism and
remained firm allies of the elite in preventing any fundamental change in the
society (Levine,Downloaded
1988:from
241).
The general quietist attitude of Muslim theoscp.sagepub.com at PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIV on September 11, 2016
logians until the latter part of the 19th century has also been noted by many
0037–7686[199906]46:2;225–240;009300
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Social Compass 46(2)
scholars (Arjomand, 1984; Keddie, 1982). Nationalism and Zionism, rather
than Jewish fundamentalism, were the principal mobilizing forces behind
the Jewish people’s drive for a homeland in Israel (Lustick, 1988: 17–41).
A number of pertinent questions then emerge. What are the roots of the
religious revivalist movements? What are the social, political, cultural and
existential antecedents for their appeal? Can any patterns be discerned for
theory construction? Are there grounds for comparisons and contrasts?
In the past two decades, a burgeoning number of individual case studies
of Islamic and Jewish fundamentalism1 as well as liberation theology2 have
appeared. However, comparative studies of these movements remain sparse
and scattered. The present study draws upon examples from all three
movements in an attempt to provide insights into the causes and the political
dynamics of religious revivalism. While mindful of many subtle differences
among these religions and their respective political agendas, the present
study seeks to discern broad patterns in the reactive, integrative, sociological and ideological bases of these movements.
Religious Revival in Theoretical Perspective: Comparative evidence
from Islamic and Jewish fundamentalism and liberation theology
Out of the intellectual renaissance of the 16th century and the industrial
revolution of the 17th and 18th centuries, the occidental world emerged as
a dynamic and self-confident entity intent upon universalizing its social and
cultural values. Driven by imperial ambitions of conquest and power, the
western encroachment in many parts of the Third World culminated in
nationalist awakenings often garbed in a religious cast. By the 20th century,
old empires were disintegrating and new ones emerging. Technological
transformation in the modern world drastically altered both the magnitude
and the pace of the universalization of western institutions and culture. The
western modernization scheme began to tear the traditional societies asunder. As the old institutions were abolished, the new ones that replaced them
lacked legitimacy, not having indigenous roots. The British and American
empires, like those preceding them, in their attempt to centralize their
power, faced the task of homogenizing the domestic population. In the
modern society, the instrument of homogenization is the mass media. Since
the system of mass communication in the periphery “tends to be used for the
cognitive tyranny by the ruling groups”, and primarily represents the
“formal domination of the center”, the peripheries responded by developing their own informal system of communication in order to assert their own
unique identity (Tehranian, 1980: 255; Rudolph and Piscatori, 1997: 1–10).
In other words, the hegemony of the elite culture created a counter-culture
deeply ingrained in domestic traditions and religious beliefs.3
Since the thrust toward homogenization of culture negates the individuality of human existence, then the promise of religious salvation and
deliverance is also an attempt to save the individual essence, his/her personhood, his/her soul.4
Homogenization
of cultures is an unintended consequence of modernity
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and its universal and universalizing logic. While fundamentalism as a
Dorraj: Modernity and Religious Revivalism
227
phenomenon reacts against the dislocations of modernity, the continued
viability of fundamentalism necessitates its coping with the realities of the
modern world. As Bruce Lawrance aptly notes, “fundamentalists must
perform on a stage that they did not construct and which they cannot
destroy” (Lawrance, 1989: 227). Modern dynamism challenges the viability
of moral absolutes, including religious absolutism. Fundamentalists must
come to terms with the logic of modernity. In other words, “the strident
reassertion of a presumed tradition in a condensed, purified, or even
reductionist form is itself a response to modernity, [for] fundamentalisms...no less than modernisms are determined by the modern culture that
they so stridently reject” (Lawrance, 1989: 229).
According to Daniel Bell the major peculiarity of modern social development is not its holism (i.e. society is not an organic whole, as Marxists and
Functionalists hold); rather, its salient characteristic is radical disjunction.
Bell sees the primary contradictions of modern society between the norms
and structures of the techno-economic realm manifested by instrumental
rationality and the polity (i.e. equality, participation, culture, and selfrealization) (Bell, 1980: 329). The tension among these three realms
constitutes the major contradictions of postindustrial society.
For the most part, the fragile socio-economic systems of the Third World
cannot withstand the shockwaves of rapid industrial growth and its concomitant social and cultural dislocations with the same endurance as can the
stronger economies of the West. The meager political and economic resources available for responding to the unlimited demands of an ever-increasing
population and rising expectations in a world of limited resources tends to
undermine the legitimacy of Third World regimes. Hence, once the cultural
values of the center are indiscriminately introduced to the periphery, devoid
of authenticity or indigenous historical roots, they cause major social and
psychological dislocations which further erode the stability of the fragile
political system. Thus, prevailing fragmentation and alienation, as well as
the pauperization and migration of marginalized groups which often accompany the process of uneven economic growth and political development,
give rise to a longing for a sense of community and belonging. So far as
religious revivalists are concerned, modern society rewards them with
material gain and consumer goods but robs their soul. In other words,
fundamentalists “do not fight against a secular ethic, which according to
them does not exist, but consider that in the final analysis modernism
produced by reason without God has not succeeded in creating values”
(Kepel, 1994: 4). In this longing for values and community lies the allure of
integrative movements. Seen in this light, the religious revival can also be
understood as the reactive movements of political awakening and culture
building, a process through which a people redefine and reorient themselves
to changes in their surrounding world (McLoughlin, 1987: 1–23; Dorraj,
1992a; Zubidah, 1993).
When the guardians of a culture are faced with the possibility of their
demise, they may resort to the self-defense mechanism of reviving and
revitalizing ties Downloaded
with the
past. Through moral regeneration, they attempt to
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unite the community on the basis of a new discipline. These revivalist
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movements are reactive in that western impact and a perceived cultural
threat play a large role in their political and ideological development.
Closely linked to the reactive nature of these revivalist movements is their
nationalist essence. The national awakening evoked by 19th- and 20thcentury imperial expansionism promulgated the growth of ideologies that
had deep roots in the domestic culture. Thus, an amalgamation of religion
and cultural nationalism as the pervasive ideology of mass mobilization
became popular in many parts of the Third World. In the Arab world, this
trend has been manifested in traditionalist movements such as the Sanusi
movement in Libya and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Syria and
Jordan. The social origins of Jewish fundamentalism are attributed to the
ghettoization of European Jewry (the Ashkenazis) in the 18th and 19th
centuries. Hence, the creation of the State of Israel and the Zionists’ success
in establishing a viable presence in their sacred ancestral land were seen as
the realization of their messianic and redemptive expectations (Lustick,
1988: 153; Hertzberg, 1992). In Latin America, with the politicization of the
polity and the rise of nationalist consciousness, a sector of the Catholic
Church also assumed a political character. Although uneven in its role and
impact, the church increasingly challenged Yankee domination and its
repressive domestic allies. Delegitimation of secular nationalist leaders in
the post-Second World War period provided another important impetus for
the revivalist movements. The eroding credibility of Arab nationalism and
Arab socialism as well as the pro-western regimes throughout the Muslim
world, the increasing skepticism toward the social democratic policies of the
secular Zionist regimes to safeguard Jewish orthodoxy, and the inability of
the bureaucratic authoritarian regimes in Latin America to deliver on the
promise of economic prosperity, all eroded the credibility of the secular
regimes. This erosion of legitimacy created a vacuum of political and moral
authority. By the 1950s and 1960s, as the perceived guardians of cultural
authenticity and moral authority, the religious organizations were well
positioned to step in and fill the vacuum. This is particularly true of the role
played by liberation theology in Latin America and Islamic fundamentalism
in the Middle East and North Africa. Jewish fundamentalism only came into
its own in the 1970s.
Beset by social and cultural crises promulgated by forces beyond its
control, a society may seek a resolution in mass mobilization and mass
action. This process is often accompanied by the use of traditional religious
institutions, such as the church, the mosque and the synagogue, for political
purposes and new politicized interpretations of sacred texts such as the
Bible, the Qur’an, and the Torah. It is not surprising that in the age of mass
ideology and mass politics, the populist rendition of faith has become a
universal phenomenon. The appeal of populist, corporatist and quasiMarxist ideologies that attempt to dissolve the individual in the community
of the faithful and thereby resolve identity crises and uprootedness must be
understood in these terms.
Hence, in the age of ideology and mass politics in which the realm of the
sacred has become
increasingly politicized, revivalists have become opposiDownloaded from scp.sagepub.com at PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIV on September 11, 2016
tional, rejecting the established secular ethos and its elite guardians. They
Dorraj: Modernity and Religious Revivalism
229
aspire to restore the past through a selective reinterpretation of the scriptures, calling on the faithful in the Muslim, Jewish and Christian
communities to live by the rules enunciated in the shari’a, the halacha and
the “creation”. This represents an attempt to retrieve the perceived purity
and authentic spirit of pristine religion and the organic harmony of the
community of believers undefiled by the “dross” of modernity.
Closely related to the appeal of a populist interpretation of the faith is the
primarily lower- and middle-class composition of these movements.
Whereas the leadership of these movements is drawn primarily from the
ranks of the middle classes who have tenaciously maintained their cultural
ties with the past, the majority of the membership comes from the lower and
middle classes as well as the peasantry and migrants. In the case of Jewish
fundamentalism, the composition of the movement is almost entirely middle class. While class differences have played a significant role in the
development of liberation theology and Islamic fundamentalism, they do
not figure prominently in the development of Jewish fundamentalism. The
rapid and uneven processes of industrialization and urbanization taking
place in the Third World societies that never experienced reformation or
renaissance have created many uprooted and marginalized groups. Not
having the benefit of gradual stages of development that allow for rational
resolution of social contradictions as they erupt, these latecomers to the
process of modernization had to leap from the religious and cultural world
of the Middle Ages to the 20th century and face the explosive consequences
of such a leap. Ironically, the two social groups most prominent in the
revivalist movement, the new middle and lower classes, are both the
products of modernity and most vulnerable to its socio-economic dislocations.
The five dominant sociological characteristics of these movements—their
integrative thrust, reactive nature, nationalist demeanor, populist essence
and middle- and lower-class composition—constitute the basis of our comparisons and contrast, and deserve a closer look.
Comparisons and Contrasts
While orthodox Christianity rendered unto Caesar that which was Caesar’s
and rendered unto God what was God’s,5 by contrast, Judaism and Islam
regard the social and political order as integral parts of the sacred. Jews
believe that God chose to reveal the Torah to them as a people, not as
individuals. Not only they were chosen for salvation, but they were also
trusted with a divine mission, salvation of the kingdom of God and the
savior of humanity. Devout Jews throughout two millennia of dispersion
and diaspora considered themselves to be agents of God, and the overseers
of implementation of Jewish holy law, halacha (Verbit, 1981: 63–65). In
other words, the essence of Jewish people’s special covenant with God is
that “Jews would be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” Here the
emphasis is on Downloaded
the community
of the faithful, the priesthood of the entire
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community, not its individual members (Verbit, 1981: 65). Therefore, for
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the orthodox, Judaism requires the establishment of a Jewish sovereign
state in the ancestral land of Israel to safeguard truth and justice and to
ensure the salvation of the Jewish people.
Like Judaism, Islam makes no distinction between political and religious
realms. The community of believers (Umma) founded by Muhammad was
from the outset a state. Muhammad was the prophet, the ultimate arbiter
and judge in judicial matters, the political leader and the commander in
chief of the armed forces. The fact that the Islamic calendar begins with
neither the death nor the birth of the prophet, but rather with the date of his
migration from Mecca to Madina, where he established a polity and an
Islamic state, is cited as another testimony to the political nature of Islam
(Mortimer, 1982: 33). Therefore, like Judaism, Islam sought a sovereign
political instrument to implement “the will of God”. Hence, neither religion
is a “personal religion”, but is rooted “in a people”, the community of
believers, in the sense that one cannot speak of a “Christian people”6 or a
“Buddhist people” (Verbit, 1981: 68).
The primacy of community over the individual in both Judaism and Islam
finds its corollary in liberation theology. Unlike orthodox Christianity, it
emphasizes the communal over the individual welfare and negates the
orthodox notion of separation of state and church. Liberation theologians
negated the avowed separation of state and church as the invention of “the
bourgeois church”, and cited the example of Jesus who suffered and fought
against the social injustice of his day (Roelofs, 1988: 546–549).
Thus, one of the remarkable features of the three religious revivalist
movements under study is that they all link otherworldly salvation to worldly
transformation. They perceive themselves as divine instruments of righteousness and justice with a mission of salvation and deliverance. Khomeini’s
radical reinterpretation of Islamic eschatology that the Muslims should not
passively await the return of the twelfth Imam to restore justice, and Seyyed
Qutb’s and Rabbi Kook’s emphasis on praxis find their parallel in Gustavo
Gutierrez’s liberation theology (Dabashi, 1993: 409-484; Schnall, 1987: 69;
Gutierrez, 1973). All three religions faced the task of sacralizing the secular
and religiously sanctioning their political activities by denouncing the separation of religious and political realms. Whereas Ayatollah Khomeini, for
example, asserted that the very idea of separation of religion and politics was
the ploy of imperialists to dominate Muslims (Khomeini, 1978), Rabbi Kook
saw the salvation of the Jewish people in cultivating the soil of all the sacred
land of Israel (including the West Bank and Gaza Strip) and living according
to the halacha (Sprinzak, 1985: 28–31). Likewise, liberation theologians
define the very essence of their message as political.
Another salient feature of these religious movements is their emergence
either as an alternative to established religion, as was the case with Islamic
fundamentalism and liberation theology, or the dominant ideology of the
secular state, as is the case with Jewish fundamentalism. Islamic fundamentalism and liberation theology also challenge the established religious as
well as the secular authority. Populist neo-Islamic fundamentalism developed in polemics
against the establishment clerics and their depoliticized
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rendition of the faith (Esposito, 1995; Dorraj, 1990, 1992b). The Jewish
Dorraj: Modernity and Religious Revivalism
231
fundamentalism of Gush Emmunim emerged as a political alternative to the
secular Zionism of the Labor and Likud parties. The political development
of liberation theology, to a large extent, was molded in reaction to the
traditional Catholic Church and its emphasis on quietism, ritual and individual salvation. Both populist neo-Islamic fundamentalism and liberation
theology have been strongly influenced by Third-Worldist ideologies. They
speak to the underprivileged and present themselves as “the voice of the
oppressed” or “an option for the poor”. Such ideological influences are
absent in Jewish fundamentalism.
Whereas for devout Muslims and Jews salvation can be attained only if
they live according to the shari’a or the halacha, liberation theology, in
contrast, lacks such strictures. While the former are confined to the defensive walls of a virulent traditionalism, the latter tends to be more
accommodationist. Liberation theology is open to influences from secular
ideological trends such as liberalism and socialism; both Jewish and Muslim
fundamentalists are socially conservative and adamantly opposed to liberalism, pluralism and socialism. Their interpretation of the faith assumes a
monistic character that manifests itself in their narrow logic and stern vision
of the world. Hence, both Jewish and Muslim fundamentalists lay claims to
universal truth and the deliverance of sinful humanity. In contrast, liberation theology is more modest in its objectives, considering the liberation of
the poor as the central issue of our age. Thus, they link personal salvation
with social liberation. In fact, liberation theology is often accused of “reducing salvation to politics, of advocating class struggle and partisanship with
the poor; of sacrificing the objectivity and critical spirit of theology in a blind
commitment to the oppressed; and of being Marxist in the guise of Christian
theology” (Min, 1989: 5).
Liberation theologians see no contradiction between their commitment
to class struggle and the Christian notion of brotherly love. They assert that
once injustice is stopped through struggle, then the loving and healing can
begin. Nor do they perceive their political activism as a negation of the
avowed Christian principle of separation of state and church. Rather, they
see their task as the recovery of the radical tradition set by the paradigmatic
example of Christ. For the liberation theologians, Christ before anything
else was the prophet of the poor and the liberator of the oppressed. Christ
suffered for his entire community, carrying the cross and consciously
walking toward his death in order to awaken humanity and arouse them to
follow his example. Therefore, to be a Christian, one must confront oppression and overcome it (Cox, 1984: 147). Liberation theologians hold that the
full life through Christ should not be hampered by poverty, lack of education, or oppression of any type. Only in an egalitarian society can all human
beings realize their full potential as creatures of God and become fully
human. Besides being “an option for the poor”, liberation theology purports to view the world through the eyes of the poor. As King and
Woodyard put it: “Theology must equip us not only to understand a world
in which children starve in the midst of the waste, but also to change that
world” (King and
Woodyard, 1982: 11).
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Liberation theologians hold that Christianity must be the answer to the
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question of liberation. But what is meant by liberation? Liberation is
conceived of as two separate terms: freedom from, and freedom for.
“Freedom from” is the negative conception of freedom in which one is free
from “all things, ourselves and the world as in any way essential to determining the ultimate meaning of our lives” (Ogden, 1979: 55). Our lives are
bound up in the limitless freedom of God’s love. Acceptance of (or trust in)
that limitless love “is existence in freedom from literally everything else”
(p. 56). Out of loyalty to God and bound up in his love, the believer is free
to care for and accept all things to optimize the opportunity for everyone to
become fully realized. This can only be done through empowerment of the
poor (Ogden, 1979: 56; Buckley, 1975: 30–43).
Liberationists, like Jewish and Muslim fundamentalists, draw upon the
paradigmatic example of their prophet and reinterpret his deeds in modern,
politicized terms. Roelofs traces the roots of radicalism in pristine Christianity in three principles: radical egalitarianism (all human beings are created
equal); radical communitarianism (all persons should love one another);
radical pacifism (nonviolent confrontation) (Roelofs, 1988: 554–556).
This populist image of Christ finds its corollary in Islam. The writings of
Muslim fundamentalists abound with the revival, politicization and populist
reinvigoration of the image of Prophet Muhammad, Imam Ali, the first
Shi’ite Imam, and Imam Husayn, his martyred son (Fischer, 1980; Hunter,
1988; Dorraj, 1990, 1992b).
The liberationists’ avowed populism is also manifested in the fact that
they left the sanctuary and comfort of their churches and lived with the
poor, so they became “poor with the poor”, learning from their poverty and
suffering (King and Woodyard, 1982: 26; Gutierrez, 1982: 24). While their
message is clearly political, the liberation theologians’ involvement is also
pastoral. As men and women of religion, they have the ability to elevate
themselves above mundane politics and relate to the spiritual needs of their
congregations. Through the campaign of concientizacion (consciousnessraising), they teach the poor about the sources of their poverty and further
proselytize them. Moreover, the Christian-based communities also function
as self-reliance, self-help organizations. In this capacity, they focus on
matters such as literacy and health care.
These alternative sources of education, cooperation, mobilization and
power have their counterparts among Muslims. The Muslim world has
witnessed the mushrooming of mosques, Islamic banks, health centers,
madrassas (Islamic seminaries), guilds and associations with similar functions (Sullivan, 1994). These organizations function as the nucleus of dual
power or, as some scholars have suggested, they create a state within the
state (Dodson and Montgomery, 1981). In the context of the impersonality
of modern life and the pervading social Darwinism of the market place,
these communal-based organizations also offer “a new consciousness, sense
of self-worth, and capacity for action among the poor people” (Levine,
1988: 241). In joining these organizations, the poor not only compensate for
their low social status by feelings of religious superiority but also discover
their power Downloaded
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overwhelming
feelings of powerlessness. Through colscp.sagepub.com at PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIV on September 11, 2016
lective action they bring hope to a hopeless situation. These developments
Dorraj: Modernity and Religious Revivalism
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in turn increase their self-confidence and intensify their political commitment.
Cultural nationalism also figures prominently in the development of these
religious ideologies. Some scholars, pointing to the communal and populist
antecedents in Latin history, have maintained that liberation theology is the
Latin Americanization of Christianity (Cox, 1984: 147; Roelofs, 1988: 250).
Latin America’s perennial quest for an authentically Latin identity and
political system has manifested itself in the claim of some of the liberation
theologians that the capitalist ethos is incompatible with their traditions,
whereas the synthesis of Christianity and socialism is perceived as especially
suited to Latin America. Both Gutierrez and Boff draw heavily on the
dependency theory to forge a uniquely Third Worldist path of development
for Latin America (Gutierrez, 1973: 18; Boff and Boff, 1984: 15).
For overwhelming numbers of Muslim Arabs, their identity is inseparably
linked with Islam. Islam is one of the major sources of Arab pride. In the
colonial era, the introspective Arab search to restore dignity was intrinsically tied to the restoration of Islam. It is the lingering memory of the
bygone glorious Islamic civilization that is the source of inspiration for
present-day Arab Muslim militants. For some countries such as Pakistan,
Islam is their raison d’être. In the same vein, Iranians’ embrace of Shi’ism
has been described by some as the Persianization of Islam (Enayat, 1981). In
all of these cases there is an inseparable link between Islam and national
identity. The familiar slogan “Neither Eastern nor Western but Islamic”,
often used by Islamists, is indicative of a broader Third World paradox:
while the modern populist interpretation of Islam borrows heavily from
western and eastern ideologies, its self-conscious, defensive and reactive
demeanor leads to the formal negation of both.
Unlike liberation theology and Islamic fundamentalism, the further
development of Jewish fundamentalism after the creation of the State of
Israel is not so much rooted in socio-economic dislocation as in a profound
nationalist dilemma. The return to the sacred land of Israel has been the
subject of Jewish nationalist aspiration for more than 2000 years. Yet, as the
State of Israel became a reality, it posed for the orthodox Jew a profound
paradox. Aran captures the essence of the tension between the Jewish
fundamentalists and the State of Israel:
Certain elements in Jewish orthodoxy find it difficult not to interpret modern Israel as a
materialization of the Messianic vision so pivotal in religious tradition. However, the
religious ideal, having become a reality after thousands of years, was ostensibly realized
by infidels whose enterprise is sinful. (Aran, 1988: 19)
This tension is also patently clear in Rabbi Wasserman’s warning that the
fate of European Jewry during the Second World War was a punishment for
Zionist deeds: “By opposing the Torah in the Land of Israel, the Zionists
have declared war against the kingdom of heaven, and the misfortunes of
the Jews are God’s reaction thereunto” (Friedman, 1989: 177).
The feelings of Jewish fundamentalists toward the State of Israel are
distinctly ambivalent. While they support the State of Israel before its
enemies, they oppose
it in so far as they see the Zionist state as an obstacle
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to a messianic closure of Jewish history and the rule of halacha (Lawrance,
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1989: 127; Sprinzak, 1985, 1989). Moreover, historically, the rabbinic opposition to active redemptionism predisposed the orthodox Jews negatively
toward political Zionism and the secular “sinners” who sought that redemption in their worldly social democratic policies and Jewish nationalism
rather than in rule of halacha. The tension between secular Zionism and
Jewish fundamentalists persisted throughout the 20th century. This changed
only after the Six Day War in 1967 and the Yom Kippur War in 1973. The
dramatic reunion with the ancient city of Jerusalem, Hebron, Beit El and
other biblically significant locations ushered in an upsurge of Zionist and
religious sentiments (Lustick, 1988: 24–27). It is in this context that Rav
Abraham Isaac Kook and most Jews in the national religious party began to
embrace Zionism and the State of Israel “as the central factor in the long
awaited process of redemption” (Lustick, 1988: 29). Hence, the idea of
redemption through settlement of the occupied territories and the creation
of the greater state of Israel assumed a religious cast. The fact that the State
of Israel partially represented the Zionist ideal deterred Jewish fundamentalists from calling for a theocracy. Instead of confronting the state, they
used their influence to pressure government to implement their political
agenda and observe the Jewish law (Sprinzak, 1985: 32; Hertzberg, 1992).
The conduct of the Yom Kippur War by the Israeli state evoked massive
discontent among orthodox Jews. The initial victory of the Arab armies
alarmed many devout Jews and led to a compensating mobilization and the
pursuit of more aggressive settlement policies in the West Bank (biblically,
Judea and Samaria, the ancient kingdoms of the Israelites). In response to
these developments, Gush Emunim was established in 1974. Throughout
the 1970s and 1980s Gush Emunim’s stand on land compromise became
more strident, their settlement policies more aggressive, their confrontation
with the State of Israel more frequent (Lustick, 1988: 44). Thus, the violent
reaction of Jewish fundamentalists toward the Palestinian–Israeli peace
accords that swapped land for peace, and their subsequent assassination of
the former Israeli Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, in 1995, must be understood in this context.
Fundamentalism is not only a phenomenon evoked by these contradictions but also an attempt to resolve them. The appeal of Gush Emunim
is in part due to its allowing the orthodox to reconcile their religious
convictions as devout Jews with their nationalist aspirations as committed
Zionists. Since the mission of Zionism has been only partially accomplished
in Israel, according to Gush Emunim, until full redemption of the Jewish
people and the entire world is achieved, they must revitalize the movement
and uphold its pioneering enthusiasm (Sprinzak, 1989; Avruch, 1988).
Historically, new prophecies have been movements of communitybuilding, movements to overcome moral and political decay and to unite
their respective fragmented communities. Moses, Jesus and Muhammad
emerged in a “crisis milieu”, a condition marked by deep social inequities,
moral decay and political oppression. It is not surprising that prophets
found their most devoted followers among the poor and the afflicted.
Equally significant
to the emergence of these new prophecies were external
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threats, both military and cultural, and often from civilizations that were
Dorraj: Modernity and Religious Revivalism
235
more advanced than their own. The impact of the Egyptian dominance and
threat on the development of Judaism, the influence of the Roman empire
on Christianity and the effect of the mighty specter of the Persian and
Byzantine empires on the development of Islam are noteworthy. Therefore,
the present religious movements, the impetus for their emergence and their
social basis of support are not without antecedents.
The class character of liberation theology is perhaps more distinct than
that of Islamic or Jewish fundamentalism. Liberation theology originated
and experienced the most success among the less developed countries in
Latin and Central America (Nicaragua, El Salvador, Brazil), finding its
following primarily among the poor and the marginal groups in the society.
In contrast, Muslim fundamentalism has found most success among more
developed societies of the Middle East (Iran, Lebanon, Egypt, Algeria).
Whereas the Christian-based communities arose in the 1950s among the
barrios and the rural areas, thus giving the liberation theology a strong
peasant base, the peasantry (except migrant peasants) does not constitute a
significant base of support for either Islamic or Jewish fundamentalism.
The postmodern religious fundamentalism is as much a revolt against the
cultural and social dislocations of modernity as it is a way of adjusting to its
dislocations. It is not accidental that students in the Muslim world as well as
in Israel constitute a large base of support for the fundamentalists (Munson,
Jr, 1988: 95–104; Davis, 1987: 145–166). These transitional social groups
have had a traditional childhood upbringing, yet their education has
exposed them to the technological and cultural manifestations of the postmodern era; thus these individuals constitute the most vulnerable social
bearers of the glaring contradictions of modernity. To put it differently,
fundamentalism is a symptom of a broader contradiction between our
socializing norms and the evolving reality of social conditions. This gap
explains why the radically new is often expressed in old forms. The new
religious revival is not simply a revival of the old, but the traditionalization
of modernity as it is experienced by groups who either materially or
spiritually have become marginalized by its effects. When the modern man
or woman returns to tradition, he/she also modernizes it by grafting the
social conditions of the 20th century onto it. The very term “Islamic
Republic”, which the theocracy in Iran uses to identify itself, is indicative of
this synthesis of old and new. Therefore, the dynamics of religious revivalism must be understood against the ongoing dialectic of the modernization
of tradition and the traditionalization of modernity.
The rising status groups within the ranks of the middle classes, such as
students and professionals, have figured prominently within the revivalist
movements. This has led some scholars to characterize these movements
not as movements of the dislocated and the disinherited but as movements
of “enabling”, empowering “self-conscious” and self-assertive people to
take control of their lives (Antoun and Hegland, 1987: 1–12, 233–256).
Using the theory of relative deprivation, Aran has attributed the rise of
Gush Emunim to the response of orthodox Jews to “the gap between their
share in the nation,
i.e., their contribution to the society and the state, and
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their inferior status” (1988: 17–18). He describes the religious Israelis who
236
Social Compass 46(2)
support Gush Emunin as a group that has gone through a drastic transformation.
From an insecure, passive element of low esteem and power, national religious youth
has become a central factor. They exhibit pride and entrepreneurship; serve as model
for broad strata and for the entire state; and make a bid for leadership in the religious
camp in the nation. This radical change has been both a product and prerequisite of
Gush Emunim activism. The movement’s success serves as an indication of the above
reversal of status. (Aran, 1988: 18)
This new characterization changes the emphasis from the reactive to the
active and assertive. There is a dialectical relationship between the
defensive-reactive dimension of these movements and their active-assertive
(enabling, empowering) aspects. This I refer to as the dialectics of impoverishment and empowerment. In the initial stages, the same stimulus that
produces the “crisis milieu” is also responsible for the reactive character of
the movement. However, as the movement becomes more popular, gathering strength and self-confidence, programmatically it becomes more
self-conscious and coherent and politically more assertive as well. In this
stage, what began as a defensive-reactive movement of protest clearly shifts
into a self-aggrandizing, empowering and enabling movement with a conscious thrust to seizure of state power as opportunity presents itself.
This dialectic vividly unfolds in the example of Islamic and Jewish
fundamentalism in Egypt and Israel. In these countries, both the declining
as well as the rising status groups constitute the base of support for these
movements, but for entirely different political reasons. In Egypt, the devastating defeat of the 1967 war brought great disillusion with secular
nationalism and eroded the credibility of Nasser as the leader of the Arab
world. This declining national status, combined with the ensuing economic
hardship induced by inflation (causing a large influx of peasants to the major
cities), became a catalyst for the reemergence of Muslim Brotherhood and
its splinter groups. In Israel, the decisive victory of the 1967 war and the
conquest of East Jerusalem, which placed all of ancient Jerusalem under the
control of Israel, had exactly the opposite effect. The devout religious
groups saw the outcome of the war as a divine indication that God wanted
its chosen people to rule over the holy city of Jerusalem and control all the
sacred land of Israel. The materialization of this long-cherished dream
increased the self-confidence of the orthodox Jews, acting as an impetus to
further pressure the government to implement their program. The migration of a large number of conservative American Jews also helped to
enhance the fundamentalist cause (Davis, 1987: 158–159).
The 1973 war was different. The initial victory of the joint Arab armies
was attributed to their Islamic zeal fighting “the enemies of Islam”
(Dawisha, 1986). For Israel, its near defeat was interpreted by the orthodox
as a sign that God was punishing Israel for having strayed from the true path
of Judaism. The result was the creation of Gush Emunim in 1974.
The next turning point came with the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982.
As the late Yitzhak Rabin, the slain former Israeli defense minister stated,
“The war letDownloaded
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genie out of the bottle” (The Christian Science
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Monitor, 4 June 1987,p. 18). Under the constant harassment of the Shi’ites,
Dorraj: Modernity and Religious Revivalism
237
Israelis withdrew from large territories in Lebanon in 1985. The Israeli
retreat boosted the morale of the Islamic forces considerably. They were
now in a position to claim that they had achieved in three years what the
Palestinians and the secular Arab regimes had been unable to do over more
than 20 years. The conclusion was that faith ensures victory.
Fundamentalism on one side tends to breed fundamentalism on the
opposite side. Islamic and Jewish fundamentalisms intensify the vibrancy of
their counterparts. The emergence of the Muslim fundamentalist group
HAMAS in the occupied territory is a testimony to this fact. Hence, Jewish
fundamentalism is as much a response to secular Zionism as it is to
Palestinian nationalism and Islamic revivalism. Once on the fringes of
Israeli politics, the Jewish fundamentalists have had an important voice in
the state of Israel since 1974. The religious Tehiya in the 1980s became the
third largest political party, and Rabbi Meir Kahane played an active role in
the Kenesset. However, if the fragile peace between Palestinians and
Israelis succeeds and becomes institutionalized, it is likely that it would have
an adverse effect on the long-term viability of the Muslim and Jewish
fundamentalists in the region. If the HAMAS bombings and Hizballah
attacks and the harsh Israeli aerial bombardments and retaliations that we
witnessed in 1996 continue, the ensuing polarized politics of confrontation
and wrath is bound to strengthen fundamentalism on both sides.
Finally, the reactive nature of these movements must be understood not
only in the context of western encroachment but also of the political
developments within the region. After the repeated Arab defeats by the
Israeli Army, by the latter part of the 1960s some of the leading theoreticians of the Muslim Brotherhood were attributing Israel’s victories and
its military, technological and economic progress to faith. Many leading
Muslim clerics began to promote an Islamic government as the solution to
the malaise of the Muslim world (Enayat, 1981: 88; Sidahmed and Eheteshami, 1996). This call culminated in the creation of an Islamic government
in Iran and Sudan and a tenacious campaign for an Islamic government in
Egypt, Algeria and Tunisia. Likewise, the development of liberation theology in Latin America is a response to the legacy of North American
dominance of the region, the political program of the Christian Democratic
party and the repressive regimes they have represented, and the theology of
the orthodox Catholic Church.
Conclusion
While clearly divergent in their intellectual origins and proposed remedies,
the apocalyptic prophecies of Foucault, the postmodernist and Khomeini,
the neo-fundamentalist, share a profound similarity. Both draw their
inspiration from the crisis of modernity and appeal to their respective
dislocated and uprooted audiences by diagnosing the etiology of modern
culture and proposing the possibility of transcendence beyond it. While
modernity engendered
the crisis of religion, eroding its viability and power,
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the decline of faith also exacerbated the crisis of modernity.
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Social Compass 46(2)
Religious revivalism, as our three case studies indicate, must be understood not only as a reaction to the dislocations of modernity and
fragmentation in modern society but also as an attempt to restore a sense of
community and cultural authenticity in a changing world. Thus the five
predominant characteristics of these movements—their integrative thrust,
reactive nature, nationalist demeanor, populist essence and lower- and
middle-class composition are indicative of broad sociological commonalities that cut across the cultural divide. The appreciation of these underlying
common syndromes in this age of globalization illuminates the powerful
universal impact of modernity. Such understanding may also provide certain insights into the contribution of cultural specificity to the particular
forms that the movements of religious revival assume in different parts of
the world. For the fundamentalists, politics for the most part is an arena
where one displays one’s faith, sincerity, and commitment in pursuit of
religious ideals; in the final analysis, however, the volatile social conditions
that animate these movements more than anything else would determine if
they would choose an intransigent or an accommodationist course. The
recent voice of moderation from Iran, for example, is a clear demonstration
of this reality. The chants of “the great Satan”, rampant in the 1980s, have
now been replaced by the slogan of “the great American people” of
President Khatami. Hence, the prospect for the future viability of these
movements depends both on their respective political agendas and on the
historical and social forces that lend them salience.
NOTES
1.
The term “fundamentalism” is not defined here as a pre-modern phenomenon, but as
essentially modern, drawing its stimulus and its insights from the dislocations of modernity. See
Barr (1978), Lawrance (1989).
2.
While in the last decade liberation theology has lost ground to Pentecostalism in Latin
America, partially thanks to enormous US financial and political support and the decline in
popularity of socialism in the post-communist era, liberation theology is preferred to Pentecostalism because of its radical political character and oppositional stand towards the state power.
While their ideological orientations are very different, the Christian-based communities, for
example, have many functions similar to those of Muslim guilds and associations. Some of these
common functions include communal empowerment, provision of services, mass mobilization
and proselytization.
3.
Although the State of Israel did not experience colonial conquest, the Jewish people, as an
embattled minority which suffered a long history of persecution and discrimination, were
subject to the same dehumanization and psychological dislocations that are often associated
with colonialism. The discriminatory policies of the Israeli government toward the Palestinians
in the last four decades notwithstanding, a case can be made that the messianic sense of mission
that led to the creation of the State of Israel is the same as that displayed by other persecuted
groups throughout history.
4.
This is particularly distinct in liberation theology which puts much emphasis on personhood. The Christian-based communities attempt to restore the personhood of each of their
members. This is done through a dialectical relationship between the individual and the
community. While recognizing the uniqueness of each individual, the liberation theologians
maintain that only through the community and by it can a person become fully human. See
Roelofs (1988).
5.
To ensure that
this cliché
is not taken
out of context,
must
be noted
that throughout the
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Middle Ages, for the most part, the established church lent its support to the state and
Dorraj: Modernity and Religious Revivalism
239
attempted to legitimize the “divine rule” of kings in Europe. Hence, in contrast to Protestanism, Catholicism was hierarchical and by nature highly authoritarian.
6.
In order not to overstate the issue, it is worth noting that the Irish, the Polish and the
Spanish interpretations of Christianity place their faith in the context of salvation of a people.
This is partially due to the fact that the Polish had a long history of persecution by the Russians,
the Irish suffered under the domination of the British, and the Spanish were dominated by their
Arab Muslim conquerers. Hence, during the Middle Ages, Spain also had a history of
communal ownership and a collectivist tradition.
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Manochehr DORRAJ is an Associate Professor of political science at
Texas Christian University with specialization in Third World and
Middle Eastern development. He is the author of From Zarathustra to
Khomeini: Populism and Dissent in Iran (1990), the editor of The
Changing Political Economy of the Third World (Boulder, CO: Lynne
Rienner, 1995) and the editor of Middle East at the Crossroads: The
Changing Political Dynamics and the Foreign Policy Challenges (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, forthcoming). ADDRESS:
Department of Political Science, Texas Christian University, Fort
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Worth, TX 76129, USA. [email: [email protected]]