Krimel,
<snip> [Krimel] > Aside from being overtly anti-Semitic it echoes the kind of cultural > chauvinism one expects to hear from Platt and Ham. Pointing to extreme > orthodox Jews as representing Jewish imperviousness the intellect is a bit > like claiming the Pat Robinson represents all Christian thinking or that Bo > speaks for the MoQ. mel: The diversity of Jewish thinking/culture/groups, both now and throughout their long history makes any 'critique' problematic. We also have a conditioned response from the twentieth century of being overly sensitive to any critique of anything Jewish as a likely 'anti-semitism' (Several years back my daughter's boyfirend was slamming the Jews in one of the Israeli religious parties of their Likud and a woman from the next table rounded on him in the restaurant and really got in his face about his anti-semitism. He let her finish her tirade, non-plussed, and pulled out his Israeli Passport, then told her she did not know much about Jews or Israel if she thought what he'd said was anti-semetic. He is Jewish. To him it was slamming a political group, like we might hear someone slamming Falwell or Robertson...) Krimel: > Only the truly clueless would claim that the Muslim world is cursed with > lack of intellect. The Muslims were making advances in philosophy and > mathematics while Europeans were eating with their hands and fretting about > witches. Ever heard of Arabic numerals? The Renaissance you like to go on > about was touch off in part because the Crusaders picked up the Greeks from > the Arabs who had been studying and commenting on them for centuries. mel: This is not quite right. There IS a strong anti-intellectual tradition in many Arabic Muslim clerical lines. This is a significant part of the modern unrest within the Muslim world. Many Muslims want to embrace certain western forms and look forward to a rennaisance of their own. Others want to do just what they did in the 17th century and purge the foreign thoughts and learning from their society and return to a fundamental recreation of the 7th Century. (They succeded that time.) The Muslim golden age was far less Arab, when you examine it closely, than what we were left with the impression of in survey level courses. (Not to say there were no Arabs involved in it, but despite taking an "arabic name" a significant portion of their movers and shakers were of other cultures. a la melting pot.) The Libraries of Constantinople provided most of the texts that kick-started the Renaissance. Although many texts were translated earlier, hence the Muslims learned about Zero. (related by Greeks from the invention in Babylon) Most of the Muslim exposure to Greek thought was also from Constantinople, but unlike the West they turned away after two centuries of dabbling. While we learned about the 'Arabic' numerals, again they claimed them, but the system came from India. The older Indian numerals look like ours, the Arabic interpretations are too stylized to recognize aside from 1-2-3. In researching a book I was writing, I did quite a bit of reading about Eastern Mediterranean History and was surprised by how similar the Arabs were to the old stereotype Soviet, claiming to have invented everything in a sort of chip-on-the-shoulder or inferiority complex way. Someone who has studied more extensively could probably do more justice to what is Muslim non-Arab versus Muslim Arab, and even add Arabic Jews and Arabic Christians to the mix of tracing cultural contributions. (Kind of like how: much of Roman culture was immitation of Greek and much of American culture is anything but American in origin.) The genius of their culture, in it's most progressive age, was to gather talent from all over and exploit the synthesis of Dynamic and unsettled new possibilities. But later, when the dis-logic of clerics came to rule even the Static patterns were degraded. (If you want to blow your mind, read the Islamic theological basis for science and you will learn that genies and supernatural beings make the universe behave as it does. Gravity and electromagnetism are myths of the west.) Krimel: > Most of the anti-Muslim ranting that goes on in this forum is reminiscent of > American attempts to dehumanize the Japs and the Gooks and the Krauts and > the injuns, and the darkies and everyone else we have sought to slaughter > with a clear conscience. > mel: There seems a lot of mutual demonization. Might even think of it as a high quality soclal pattern.--One society versus another. Those who want war love extremism, it plays into their hands. thanks--mel > > > Moq_Discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
