Daniel Johnson reviews a book on terrorism and religious fundamentalism by the former chief rabbi of Britain:
[Jonathan Sacks] deploys all his exegetical subtlety on the foundational texts of Abrahamic monotheism in the Hebrew Bible, especially the book of Genesis, to show us how figures such as Ishmael and Esau, ancient archetypes of divine rejection, are in fact the opposite. All faiths have “hard texts” that are too dangerous to read literally, Sacks suggests, but Judaism, Christianity, and Islam at least share a biblical basis for mutual toleration.
The thrust of Sacks’s book is all the more powerful because he eschews the wishful thinking that bedevils both sides of the secular/religious conflict. He makes no attempt to play down the pathology of terrorism and war inspired by the anger of those, especially Muslims, who “are determined to defeat the world by means of the word.” Now freed from the obligations of office, he can speak frankly about the betrayal by the secular West of its Judeo-Christian values, the moral relativism that fails to defend freedom, and the “altruistic evil” of radical, politicized religion.
The failure of the secular West to provide identity and meaning combines with the brute facts of demography to produce hydra-headed movements that defy even the smartest weapons and the most intelligent intelligence. After centuries of secularization, we are witnessing the return of religion with a vengeance. The answer to the Islamists who love death more than life cannot be solely military; it has to be theological, too.
Read more on Standpoint: http://www.standpointmag.co.uk/node/6162/full