unlike most of his published work, Slavoj Zizek′s newest essay on Islam and modernity is not left-wing in any respect. quite notably, he is favour of restricting the mobility of refugees inside Europe and defends an entire latitude of Eurocentric attitudes. via Tarkan Tek
It became the devastating terrorist attack on the editorial places of work of the satirical journal Charlie Hebdo in Paris which proved the catalyst for the tons-quoted philosopher Slavoj Zizek to convey out a publication, posted in German as Blasphemische Gedanken – Islam und Moderne (Blasphemous options – Islam and Modernity).
The ebook is divided into two elements: the primary, entitled "Islam as a means of existence" contributes to the present discussions round Islam nowadays, while the second half, "searching into the archive of Islam", examines more fundamental aspects of Islam, including the psychoanalytical.
within the introduction to those two components, Zizek addresses the supposed brotherly love of the heads of state who established harmony in the fight towards terrorism in the wake of the Paris assaults and finds it to be hypocritical. He writes: "On that Sunday, political greats from in every single place the world held hands, from David Cameron to Sergei Lavrov, Benjamin Netanyahu to Mahmoud Abbas. If ever there changed into an image of hypocrisy, this was it". To this he provides the query of why this assassination changed into directed at France in place of the us? after all, the terrorists had been worried with the united states-led occupation of Iraq. Yet, if he is going to carry up the United States's imperialism against the middle East, then he ought to not neglect France's imperialism in opposition t many Muslim international locations and areas, principally Algeria, Libya, Mali – no longer to mention its role in the Syrian battle, which is barely as essential.
Biased left-wing liberals
throughout the booklet, Zizek reproaches left-wing liberals for the bias they've shown in disapproving of such assaults. He accuses them of being too reticent in their condemnation for worry of being charged with racism and of mentioning the West's accountability for atrocities and massacres in the so-called Third World in order no longer to provoke Muslims. The left's lack of ability to criticise and the labelling of any criticism of Islam as Islamophobic racism, is a different of Zizek's relevant features: this he regards as a pathological problem.
Islam – according to Zizek – is treated with too high-quality a tolerance. but he doesn't say what we should be doing instead. may still the Muslim minority be placed under even more desirable drive? Zizek fails to supply a transparent answer. as a substitute, he explains to us that fundamentalism is a "mystificatory" response to liberalism and its manifestations in different components of the realm. youngsters liberalism sees itself as a sensible counter-stream to fundamentalism, its shortcomings are inclined to mean that it triggers and feeds into radical pondering and fundamentalism in its place. Zizek argues that here's precisely why liberalism is reliant on a thorough left and its primary standpoints to retain its values and achievements.
Contradictory evaluation
all through his writing, he applies Horkheimer's a whole lot-quoted criticism of fascism to liberal democracy, claiming that the statement "...that folks that don't wish to criticise capitalism should still additionally stay silent on fascism, also holds for trendy fundamentalism: people that do not are looking to criticise liberal democracy should still additionally remain silent on non secular fundamentalism".
On the one hand, Zizek describes liberalism as a solution for the fundamentalism ultimately supported via the a ways left, however on the equal time he does not exempt liberalism from accountability in his criticism of the political equipment. This makes his analysis all the greater contradictory because, as mentioned above, he also credit left-wing radicalism with featuring a more impregnable opposition to fundamentalism.
within the 2d part, Zizek ventures a psychoanalytical portrayal of Islam, beginning this discussion with the Islamic knowing of God. From there, he works out the way it differs from the other revelation-based mostly religions:
"in contrast to Judaism or Christianity, the other two booklet religions, Islam excludes God from the enviornment of fatherly good judgment: Allah isn't a father, not even a symbolic one – God is one, he is neither born nor brings creations into the realm. There is no room for a holy household in Islam. here is why Islam places such heavy emphasis on the incontrovertible fact that Muhammad himself was an orphan".
As Zizek has already outlined, this figuring out of God isn't to be present in any of the other religions. at the beginning the Prophet Muhammad's family unit changed into now not accorded any holy repute. but that didn't keep away from the family from later being recognized as the prison successors to the Caliphate. This appropriate turned into incorporated into the doctrine of the later "Shia" school of thought, thereby according holiness to the family unit of the Prophet.
So a sense of the holiness of the family unit is actually to be present in Islam today – albeit in a minority position – and Zizek could with ease mention this, providing the reader a differentiated approach. as far as the institutionalisation of Islam is worried, Zizek finds few similarities between Islamic and Christian associations. The existence of a "neighborhood of faith" (Ummah) and the anti-countrywide concepts in Islam are phenomena that avoid an specific institutionalisation. during this context, Zizek additionally facets out that unlike different institutionalised religions, Islam isn't in line with a "sacrificing" theory of man.
Zizek is often criticised for writing very short analyses that cowl a large, populist spectrum of themes and are therefore superficial and contradictory – but in some situations this could be going too some distance. the first part of the booklet, for example, lacks the left-wing orientation to be present in most of his old texts, which has become a function of Zizek's analyses. as a substitute, he has produced a wonderful text during which he pleads the case for limiting the mobility of refugees in Europe and defends many Eurocentric positions.
Dichotomy of perspective
one more instance is Zizek's deliberate juxtaposition of the terms "Islam" and "modernity", as in the event that they are proper opposites, in the technique fanning the flames of the public′s already overheated temper. despite criticising liberalism, the textual content is recommended via a polarised worldview. He divides the area into an "us" – the West, liberal despite its hypocrisy and its Imperialist heritage – and a "them", the world of Islam and fundamentalism as its polar contrary. His depiction of Islam simplest partly does justice to the inhomogeneity of this faith and ought to be rejected standard for the manner it lumps the total of Islam together.
The few areas where the text gives a differentiated graphic of Islam appear like attempts at legitimation by means of the author and don't mitigate the essay's primary place.
Zizek again and again mentions the patriarchal facets of Islam. in lots of areas, he's justified in this: Islam does have patriarchal buildings, that are quite with no trouble a mirrored image of the patriarchal neighborhood on the time the Koran become published. but why Zizek edits out Muslim feminists, as an instance, who method the Koran in its historicity and generate completely alternative ways of it, is uncertain.
an extra brilliant characteristic of Zizek's textual content is the emphasis on the authority he claims the Prophet Muhammad exercised over the girls in his household. in the case of his management function and certain ideals this may well be correct, but there will also be no speak of unlimited sexual entitlement to girls. here's evidently shown by the undeniable fact that Islam originally confined polygamy in Arab subculture after which subsequently suggested monogamous marriage – at the time, this represented a tremendous alternate within the nature of relationships. The Prophet's treatment of ladies have to for this reason be considered inside a ancient context that relates to the state of Arab subculture at the time.
Tarkan Tek
© Qantara.de 2016
Translated from the German through Ruth Martin
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