Islam's Cultural Fruit

Saudi Arabian Enlightenment

At the root of all cultures is a religion--a shared belief in ultimate realities (of one kind or another).  All human beings are religious.  All have beliefs in the ultimate.  Even those who insist that everything is relative and there are no ultimates or universals governing all of life are espousing their particular ultimate belief.

When a religion becomes widely shared, it produces a dominant culture which in its turn governs the law, the state, the family, education, relationships between the sexes, between parents and children and so forth.

In Arabia, Islam has been the dominant religion for 1500 years.  It has produced a certain culture.  The prevailing wisdom amongst the Commentariat in the West is that Arabia is economically primitive and therefore is peopled by the ignorant, the barbarian, and savages.  The subtle sub-text is that Arabians are Islamic because of their ignorance.  That is, if they had the "privileges" of a Western education and the benefits of a Western standard of living they would evolve to hold Islam in a nominal sense only.  This is the same perspective the West holds upon the Christian religion--it is part of our tradition, but a fairy story, a myth.  No more, no less.  Wise men gave up on long ago. 

The notion that ignorance begets adherence to Islam in Arabia paternalistically reverses history's cause and effect.  If Islam had been a recent innovation in Arabia, the case may be arguable.  But not when the religion of Islam has controlled Arabia for one and a half millennia.
  Now the only possible way of interpreting Saudi Arabia today is that it is because of Islam that Arabia remains ignorant, barbaric and savage.  Islam, the dominant religion, has shaped and created the dominant culture.  Saudi Arabia is Islam.  The culture of Saudi Arabia is Islamic.  The laws, the institutions of governance, marital and familial relationships are Islamic.  Saudi Arabia is Islam externalised in the culture and and internalised in the human heart.

By their fruits ye shall know them, the Bible teaches.  So what are the fruits of Islam?  This from the NZ Herald:

Seven convicted of armed robbery in Saudi Arabia face execution today.

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Speaking over a smuggled cellphone from his prison cell, one of seven Saudis set to be put to death today by crucifixion and firing squad for armed robbery appealed for help to stop the executions.

Nasser al-Qahtani told the Associated Press from Abha general prison yesterday that he was arrested as part of 23-member ring that stole from jewellery stores in 2004 and 2005. He said they were tortured to confess and had no access to lawyers.

"I killed no one. I didn't have weapons while robbing the store, but the police tortured me, beat me up and threatened to assault my mother to extract confessions that I had a weapon with me while I was only 15," he said. "We don't deserve death."

A leading human rights group added its appeal to Saudi authorities to stop the executions.
Al-Qahtani, now 24, said he and most of the ring were juveniles at the time of the thefts. They were arrested in 2006. The seven received death sentences in 2009, the Saudi newspaper Okaz reported then.  Last Saturday, he said, Saudi King Abdullah ratified the death sentences and sent them to the prison. Authorities set today for the executions. They also determined the methods.

The main defendant, Sarhan al-Mashayeh, is to be crucified for three days. The others are to face firing squads.  

It is not just the barbaric extremity of the punishment that established Islam requires, it is the lack of due process, the complete inability to presume the innocence of the accused until proven guilty, and a requirement that guilty be proven beyond reasonable doubt.  Saudi Arabia employs torture to get "confessions".

Al-Qahtani faced a judge three times during eight years in detention. He said that the judge did not assign a lawyer to defend them and did not listen to complaints of torture.  "We showed him the marks of torture and beating, but he didn't listen," he said. "I am talking to you now and my relatives are telling me that the soil is prepared for our executions tomorrow," he said, referring to the place where he will be standing to be shot.  Saudi Arabia follows a strict interpretation of Islamic Shariah law under which people convicted of murder, rape or armed robbery can be executed, usually by sword.

Crucifixion is one of the most terrible ways to die.  It is cruel, barbaric, and inhuman.  We believe Amnesty International has it right. 

Several people were reported crucified in Saudi Arabia last year. Human rights groups have condemned crucifixions in the past, including cases in which people are beheaded and then crucified. In 2009, Amnesty International condemned such an execution as "the ultimate form of cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment".

Why does Islam produce such barbaric cultures and nations?  There are several reasons.  The first is that Islam is completely locked into an authoritarian culture.  Allah has spoken and speaks.  The only correct and pious response is obedience, total obedience.  But, since Allah speaks through prophets and teachers, some human authority (the one who asserts Allah that has appointed him to rule) implicitly carries the same absolute authority as Allah himself.

This explains why representative democracy never fits comfortably with an Islamised culture.  Disputation, differing views, argumentation, factions--these are implicitly non-Islamic.  So, when a particular faction achieves control--in this case the House of Saud--it will be held with an authoritarian, iron grip.  It is the way of Allah.  It is a true representation of this idolatry, of this demi-god.  The same pattern is repeated throughout the Middle East: Syria, Iran, Iraq, Jordan.  The ultimate and frequent way of dealing with differences is to kill, to dominate, to enslave, to gain submission by force.  Then once power is gained, it is enforced ruthlessly. 

When it comes to justice in the courts, the rights of the accused are as nothing.  Authoritarian control reflects who Allah actually is believed to be, not justice.  Proven beyond reasonable doubt is unimportant as long as vengeance is manifest.  When it comes to marriage, women are under fierce control; they are regarded as lesser human beings.  The authoritarian chain of command is  manifest in Islamic families and marriage--as indeed in every area of life.

The West cannot bring itself to acknowledge this.  On the one hand, it wants to manifest an effete tolerance towards all.  So Islam must be spoken of respectfully.  On the other hand, it holds to a view that Arabia is peopled by primitives, who, once more civilized and westernised, will relinquish their fanatical adherence to Islam.  Yet again, the West believes that underneath the skin of every Arab, both man and woman, lies a Western democrat, with a longing for freedom, justice, ice-cream, and MacDonalds and feminism.  Liberate them, give them the vote and voila, Western democratic values will emerge.  Unfathomable.

Note how the article printed in the NZ Herald goes on to provide a socio-economic, pseudo-Marxian explanation for the present atrocity in Saudi Arabia.  Note the advancing of relative poverty as a reason for oppression, not the heart of the matter which is Islam itself.  This is a classic example of how the West processes such horrors when it comes to Islamic nations.  They are fit into Western narratives about class conflict, disparities of wealth, and the need of socio-economic equalities. 

Abha is located deep in the southwestern province of Asir. Southerners face systematic discrimination, and people there are perceived as second-class citizens compared with those in the most powerful central region, where the capital and Saudi Arabia's holy shrines of Mecca and Medina are located. Political analyst Mohammed al-Qahtani said the central region got the best services and treatment.

"The verdict is very harsh, given all the circumstances of detention and trial with no access to lawyers, but part of the problem is selectivity," he said. "If one person belonged to political heavyweight regions, the verdict wouldn't have been harsh." He added: "The south is marginalised."

Christ alone can save Saudi Arabia from itself.  Until the people humble themselves before the Lord of glory and repent of Islam and all its cultural manifestations they will remain trapped in its barbarism and injustice and oppression of the weak and the voiceless.  When they turn to Christ they will find that His burden is easy and His yoke is light and that He is gentle and humble of soul.