The End of The Golden Age: Part 3

In my first piece of the series, I made a passing comment about the “so-called” Golden Age of Islam, implying a question as to whether this is indeed an accurate description. However, I held off on expanding upon this idea until now, as I first needed to establish some ground work. For their majority, the last two essays have operated on a very Western bias and outlook towards Eastern science and philosophy. This was partially intentional. I wished to present that outlook as it is the easiest place to start, and it is the starting point of most modern history one might read on the subject. I only inserted marginally challenging ideas to this bias, such as the defense of Al-Ghazali’s support of science and the idea of ijtihad of the spirit, but the even these were at heart Western in conception. But, having planted the seed of these doubts and different perspectives, it is now time to reap. This final installment will be a dedicated expose and attack on the Western biases which heretofore have assumed the end of Islamic science and thought. Indeed, it is totally mistaken to claim that the Golden Age of Islam ended. These ideas have more to do with the development of modern Western culture than they do with the actual history of the Middle East.

Background

In order to make the argument, let us try first to see the West through Eastern eyes, so to speak. That is, let us take the issue raised in the second essay, that of ijtihad vs. taqlid, and transfer it to an overview of Western scientific development in the early modern era. Strangely, this concept (which I posited as conceptual, not actual), is far more useful for understanding European intellectual history than it is for understanding the Middle East and Islamic world.

Historians of science in particular like to point to the significance of Copernicus and Galileo’s challenges to the geocentric model of the world, claiming that this was what resulted in a complete shift from medieval style science to the Mechanistic model of reality. And, hence, it resulted in what would come to be known as modern science. In pre-modern Europe, astronomy was not simply a branch of science, but a foundational model of the universe. Ptolemy’s (and Aristotle’s) geocentric system worked on philosophical and religious principles that ordered the universe in a series of spheres upon spheres, such as the orbit of planets, all the way out to the sphere of the stars, and beyond that the Prime Mover, i.e. God. God would spin the nearest sphere of the stars, and all others would then begin to turn as well, all the way down to the center. Thus could God guide all action and causality in the universe and on Earth. This, by the way, is part of the justification for astrology: assuming this model is true, one could predict what would happen on Earth based on the movement of planets and stars.

Coinciding with and dependent upon this model was also Aristotle’s views on physics. Aristotle argued that there were four elements: earth, water, air, and fire. And, in a perfect world, each had its place: earth was down, water was just above it, air was just above that, and at the top was fire. But the world isn’t perfectly set up like this; all of the elements are mixed. Mountains rise above the sea, fire can be found deep within the earth (i.e. magma), and so forth. But, Aristotle, claimed, these elements all tended to move towards their perfect place. Thus, earth tends to fall down, air tends to rise, water tends to settle in between, and so on. This essentially explained all physical motion without the need for modern notions like gravity, density, and so on. Given this conception, then, the Earth had to be at the center of the universe.

But, if someone were to challenge this model, then entire thing would fall apart. If the sun were at the center of the universe, the Earth would fall into it. If the Earth were to move, then it would fly apart. If the orbit of planets was not a perfect circle, they couldn’t be on a celestial sphere. If all of this were untrue, then where would be the Prime Mover? What room would there be for God? Given this reality, most European scientists and religious officials had a vested interest in the geocentric model and Aristotelian physics. All this began to change, say historians, when Copernicus demonstrated that a sun centered universe would fit our observations and calculations just as well as a geocentric one. That is, the sun may very well be at the center, because it would result in the same mathematical consequences. Needless to say, this would be a very troubling concept for European thought.

However, this was a non-issue in Islam. As inheritors of several different traditions of astronomy, from the Greeks to the Persians to the Indians, Islamic theology and philosophy was not tied up in concerns about the nature of the universe in terms of geocentric vs. heliocentric. Ptolemy’s model was used extensively because it did explain quite a bit of phenomenon and allowed for accurate predictions. But many Muslim astronomers questioned this system, some even going so far as to make proto-Copernican arguments for a sun-centered system. Most notable among them are Ibn al-Haytham (965 – 1039), al-Biruni (973-1048) and Nasir ad-Din al-Tusi (1201-1274). All three were geocentrists, but often made the similar point of Copernicus that a heliocentric universe would result in similar calculations and observations. In fact, all three were active critics of Ptolemy, championed experimental method and empirical observation, and did believe the Earth moved (on its axis). Al-Tusi was actually able to empirically demonstrate this final point. Historians are now finding that the models, arguments, and mathematics of these three, especially the last, can be found throughout Copernicus’ work. Whether he developed his ideas independently or had access to scattered translations, Copernicus was clearly working with a vast amount of similar information as his Muslim predecessors. So why, then, is the work of Copernicus and those like him so monumental and the work of their Muslim counterparts not?

Before answering, let us continue our analysis of Western science with Galileo. By this time, the telescope had been invented, allowing for more detailed observations than before. With the recent work of figures such as Brahe and Kepler, it was soon becoming clear that the Ptolemaic system couldn’t entirely explain everything. Galileo, working with his own observations and with Copernicus’ writings, became the first to really push for the heliocentric model of the universe. He also experimented in physics, challenging a lot of the old Aristotelian ideas of motion. Galileo’s arguments were very sound, but if he were right, it would mean that all astronomy and all physics up until that point would have to be rethought (at least in Europe). As brilliant as he was, Galileo was also skilled at making enemies, and he soon was able to make an enemy out of the Pope. The history at this point is well known: the persecution of Galileo by the Inquisition, the reaction of scientists against established truths, the formation of Newtonian physics, and so on. Suffice to say, historians of science often point to Copernicus and Galileo’s contribution towards the heliocentric model as the first step towards a new physics, a new science, and consequently, even new philosophy. With all old truths in doubt and all old authorities in question, thinkers such as Descartes felt compelled to start with reasoning alone, resulting in his famous words, “I think, therefore I am.” Thomas Hobbes began constructing a whole new conception of society based on similar original reasoning, beginning by positing man “in a state of nature,” i.e. before any government, and then reasoning out what kind of government is best. In short, this new doubt for everything spread to all aspects of European intellectual life, not simply the sciences. Galileo did not simply cast doubt on Ptolemy and Aristotle (as Muslim thinkers did so long before him), he cast doubt on the authority of religion, the church, and all traditional sources of authority. In a sense, then, we could say that Galileo made it necessary for European thinkers to abandon any sort of “taqlid of spirit” in favor of a kind of hyper-ijtihad wherein everything must be doubted and subjected to individual reasoning, from the ground up. And of course, historians say, it is from these new thinkers that the modern world was formed: democracies, the industrial revolution, advanced medicine, and so on.

As mentioned before, the geocentric world view was never so entangled in traditional authority, whether religious or secular, as it was in Europe. Thus, we might be able to understand why questioning it would not send so many shock waves through the intellectual culture. In other words, if Galileo had lived in 12^th century Baghdad and come up with the same ideas, what we think of as modern science, modern philosophy, and modernity in general may not even have happened. More likely, he would be among peers who would consider his ideas interesting, open for debate like anything else, but ultimately not be motivated to question every other traditional authority. There wouldn’t be a need for a Muslim version of Descartes, for example, nor a Muslim equivalent of Hobbes, or Locke, or Newton. The traditional authorities in science, society, and religion would have been adaptable enough to accommodate a heliocentric model without sending shock waves reverberating throughout all other aspects of society. In a way, then, modern scientists of the West actually own a debt of gratitude to the Catholic Church: by being so dogmatic and repressive of science, it actually gave challenging, new science greater effect! Islam, on the other hand, was perhaps too respectful of science for its own good.

Argument

But of course, this version of history carries a very strong Western bias: specifically, the assumption that the modern ideas that developed since Galileo are inherently superior and part of a historical teleology from start to finish. This is the assumption intentionally operating in all of my previous writing on the issue, right through the very last sentence of the preceding section in this essay. But, let us also look at the subtle clues hidden in my arguments: In my first essay, I argued that Al-Ghazali and those like him actually had a pro-scientific spirit. In my second essay, I argued that a taqlid of spirit dominated in the Muslim world, but at the same time I suggested that it was only a conceptual point, as the historical fact is that the gate never truly closed on ijtihad. And, in this essay, I have already demonstrated how Muslim science had a strong tradition of challenging norms and old models of science and philosophy without much constraint from traditional authority. So, let us return to my original question from the first installment of this series: “Why did the Golden Age of Islam come to an end?”

There is no real answer to this question, only a punchline. The Golden Age didn’t end. It was the European outlook which ended and began anew. Through its own inner workings, Modern European thought shifted into a form of hyper-ijtihadism, in which the gate closed on taqlid. This constituted what came to be modern era rationalization. Everything was rebuilt from the bottom up, premise by premise. Thinkers began with a “state of nature,” a first premise such as “I think, therefore I am,” and began reformulating every idea in every branch of human thought, from philosophy to science, and guiding every question from “What is the best form of government?” to “How did the universe begin?” Thinkers pursued these topics explicitly without the reliance on old authorities. They trusted only their sole reasoning. What resulted was the Age of Enlightenment, and eventually, the modern world.

But reasoning itself was nothing new. Reasoning had been around for quite some time. The principles of logic are ancient, as are math and the sciences. These men of Europe didn’t somehow get thinking “right” after all these millennia; thinking was right before. What mattered was their way of thinking, their hyper-ijtihadism, their rejection of all past authority, doubt for everything, and sole reliance on their own reasoning for knowledge. This was new. This didn’t, however, make them “more right.” Their mathematical principles were just as valid as the mathematical principles of the medieval Muslim astronomers. Their principles of logic were just as valid (or invalid, which was often the case) as their medieval Muslim forbearers’. What changed was an entire view of the world, a particularly Western view. It is from this view that came the notion of a Golden Age of Islam, as well as the notion of its decline.

As mentioned before, Western thinking became focused on rejecting authority and working from a foundational premise to all conclusions with an unerring logic. This was not simply a method, but a world view. To modern Western thinkers, reality itself would come to be seen as following the same process. That is, the history of existence flows from an original premise to a conclusion with an unerring logic, from one point to the next, in a secular teleology from start to finish. In short, it was the development of the idea of progress. A culture, they would come to believe, develops from its first, or “primitive,” form to its final development, like an evolution. And, all the cultures of the world followed the same logical progression. Given this view, it is easy to understand how someone might come to grips with the history of the Islamic world. Muslims science in the Middle Ages represented one stage, much like it did in Europe before Copernicus. But, it never developed into modern European style of thinking. To our new breed of European thinker, this presented a huge problem. If all of history is supposed to develop along a logical path of progress, then how to we come to terms with the fact that the Islamic world didn’t “progress” in the same way “we” did? Something must have interrupted the flow of nature. Something must have gotten in the way of the logical, “natural” progression. In short, something must have happened to end this age. And furthermore, this age must represent the last point of progress before decline, a marvelous “Golden Age” which at once promised future progress, but ended in disappointment.

This is the real source of the problem and the real source of the question: it is nothing more than a modern European illusion, an invention of a peculiarly European way of thinking since the modern era began. As such, it is the wrong question entirely. Nothing ended the Golden Age. There never was a Golden Age. There was an age, time passed, change occurred, and this change occurred on its own terms. A better question would be, “Why do we think the Golden Age ever existed?” The answer is that it is a modern, Western invention.

And this also tends to explain the mistakes of Western historians in interpreting Islamic history and philosophy. As hyper-ijtihadists looking for a theory of progress, it is natural to assume that independent reasoning is what leads to “higher” forms of culture. Europe moved from a religious, authority-centered world to one of freedom of thought, therefore independent reasoning tends to further science, philosophy, and society, whereas traditionalism, or “taqlid of spirit,” has the opposite effect. Such is the most reasonable assumption for one coming from a modern, European perspective. Thus, in looking for a cause for decline, one must look for tradition and traditionalists. Islam was a popular target for the likes of Ignaz Goldziher and his contemporaries. They argued that Islam was anti-science. Another popular target was Al-Ghazali, who does indeed hold a lot of respect for traditional authorities, particularly the Qur’an. And then, of course, there is the entire tradition of taqlid in Islamic jurisprudence, an explicit example of reliance on authority. To a modern, Western thinker, these are the most natural culprits. They simple fit the Western worldview in the best way. But, as I have been demonstrating with each of my three essays, they do not fit the evidence. These are not the real culprits. Taqlid never killed ijtihad, Al-Ghazali never killed philosophy (nor did Ibn Sina, for that matter), and Islam was not and is not anti-science. None of those arguments are supported by the evidence. In fact, the evidence contradicts them. These arguments are nothing more than conceptual fabrications based on the more fundamental fabrication: that a Golden Age ever existed.

Truly, this has not been a history of the Middle East or Islam. It has actually been a history of the Western world. My concepts of ijtihad and taqlid are indeed valuable for historical analysis, but for modern and early modern European culture, not for Islamic culture. Perhaps we should be grateful to the Arabic language for supplying the proper terms. In any case, there is still plenty that can be learned from this about the Middle East, Islam, and their histories. If we are to get a rational understanding of the East, as opposed to a rationalized one, it will require that we pick apart our assumptions in such a way as these three essays have done. The Middle East, Islam, and the cultures they entwine have changed in significant ways over time based on each one’s particular circumstances. There is no lack of development or progress, no backwardness or decline, and certainly no stagnation. These concepts and their corollaries are at best roadblocks to rational inquiry into the past, and as Said argued, they are at worst pathetically racist. If we can banish these biases from our minds, we can finally look at the evidence objectively.

The End of the Golden Age: Part 2

In my last entry, I discussed the infiltration of mysticism into Aristotle, and the infiltration of metaphysical logic into theology. I argued that it was to the detriment of both, and ultimately led to enough frustration that one element had to go. This element was philosophy (as understood by the medieval Arabic word). But this is far from a satisfying or all encompassing solution to the problem. As important as it is to understanding the issue, there is another element that I alluded to in my previous entry. I would draw the reader’s attention to one of the questions I asked, “Why did people begin to blindly follow the authority of certain scholars rather than analyze the spirit of their work or attempt to build upon it themselves?” It is this question in particular that I would now like to discuss, as I see it as the result of a fundamental conflict in Muslim intellectual culture: the dichotomy of ijtihad and taqlid.

First, I must give a rough definition of these terms as they are rather technical in Islamic law. Essentially, Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) is centered on drawing conclusions about religious law from the Qur’an primarily and the Hadiths (reported sayings of the Prophet) as a secondary referent. However, Islamic jurisprudence quickly developed beyond these two essential source due to the fact that many passages and sayings were open to interpretation or didn’t cover certain specific cases. Thus, religious thinkers developed a number of methods for solving novel cases when the answers were not clear in the Qur’an or Hadith. It isn’t necessary to go into them in detail. The method most relevant to our discussion, however, is that of precedence. In other words, one way to solve a difficult legal problem was to look at how other judges had solved a similar problem and to draw an analogy from that. For instance, one judge might face a difficult question of whether or not hashish is legal to smoke under Islamic Law. The judge would look to the Qur’an and Hadiths, but find that hashish is not mentioned. However, he might draw an analogy between the effects of hashish and the effects of alcohol, which is clearly forbidden. Then, he would conclude that hashish is also forbidden. In this case, the judge is practicing what’s known as ijtihad, or independent reasoning, because he had to use his own reasoning to figure out the answer from the evidence of the two sources (in this case, reasoning from analogy, though there are other methods of ijtihad as well). But, now that the judge has made this decision, he has since set a precedent. Other judges, then, may simply refer to his conclusion and judge all similar cases accordingly without going back to the sources, the Qur’an and Hadith, to make their own judgments on the evidence. This is a practice known as taqlid, or obedience to what another (earthly) religious authority figure has decided, and imitating his decisions without question. Of course, the practitioner of taqlid might still have to use a bit of reasoning in order to make the conclusion fit. So, for instance, another judge might face a similar question about another narcotic, and then conclude it is also forbidden based on a reference to the similarity between this case and that of the first judge. However, the practice is still technically taqlid.

Eventually, this practice of taqlid led to the development of the Sunni “rites,” or legal schools, known as the Maliki, Hanbali, Hanafi, and Shafi‘i, each named after the judge who contributed the rulings and reasons derived from their independent research. The important thing to note is that these early thinkers of Islamic law arrived at their conclusions using independent reasoning, or ijtihad, for the most part. This is simply due to the fact that, in the early days, there was not much precedent upon which to rely. However, after the establishment of these rites, Sunni judges and scholars tended to rely less on their own judgment and more on the conclusions of these four rites. Thus, taqlid became increasingly practiced in Islamic Law. Although, as historians have pointed out, ijtihad never totally went away (historians refer to a inaccurate idea of “closing of the gat of ijtihad,” and I have no intention of resurrecting this historical myth), certainly no new rites were being developed and Muslims scholars of Sunni Islam simply accepted one of the four rites without much question.

Even though this is a technical piece of Islamic jurisprudence, it is still integrally important to my argument. I do not believe it was simply a coincidence that Islamic law began to abandon ijtihad in favor of taqlid near the end of the Golden Age of Islam. Although technical terms with a specific meaning, I think they also illustrate a more fundamental problem in Muslim, Arab, and Middle Eastern culture at the time. In many ways, students of the sciences and philosophy also entered into a period of “taqlid.” That is, instead of using independent reasoning to continue to develop theories of the past, scholars were satisfied with what past experts had said. Thus, as mentioned in my previous essay, scholars were willing to read Ibn Khaldun, but didn’t find it necessary to really expand upon, modify, or challenge his ideas in any significant way. Instead, his books were read as if they had already exhausted the topic. I argue that this is part of a more general problem that could be described as a general spirit of taqlid replacing a spirit of ijtihad. That is, the very attitude behind the assumption of taqlid in its narrow juridical meaning is one that seemed to take over every aspect of the intellectual culture, that unquestioned and blind obedience to past authorities is behind the end to the intellectual flourishing of the Middle Ages. Indeed, I argue that the very reason thinkers failed to develop older sciences and philosophies is the same as that which inspired judges to practice the method of taqlid more and more. Both stem from the same root: an attitude, or “spirit,” of blind obedience as opposed to a spirit of independent reasoning. In essence, the Golden Age ended when the spirit of taqlid conquered the spirit of ijtihad.

It should be noted that this is not an original argument. In fact, many older historians and even several early modern Muslim reformers referenced the problem of ijtihad vs. taqlid as fundamental to why Islamic culture supposedly declined. I have no intention of making the exact same arguments, as many of them are faulty and go against historical evidence. However, I want to introduce the two concepts in order to apply them analogically to an attitude which I believe underlies the assumptions of scholarly literature from the Golden Age vs. that of later times (specifically, during the era of the Ottoman empire). I am not using these terms in their juridical meaning, only as potentially useful analogies to describe or consider a more general, more fundamental attitude which lies beneath the surface. Thus, I am presenting more of an angle, or perspective, rather than a strict historical argument. The analogy could be entirely wrong given the historical facts, but it may still be a useful way of looking at them.

Ijtihad Among the Medieval Scholars

First, I would like to describe the spirit of ijtihad as it pertains to medieval Muslim scholars. In general, their works express an idea that human knowledge is immediately imperfect, that a single person cannot hope to uncover all the truths of the world or to be correct on all of them. He may have reasoned opinions, indeed his opinions should be reasoned, but they should not be given the status of unquestionable truth. Thus, it was the duty of every scholar to continue to question, analyze, challenge, and build upon the knowledge of the past, not blindly accept it. Several scholars even argued quite positively about the future, saying that each successive generation is in a better position than former ones, because they have the more materials to work with, and hence can come to better, more reasoned arguments regarding nature, philosophy, and religion. But, this required the activity of building upon the past, not accepting it blindly.

This attitude can be seen in a number of thinkers. Imam Malik, for instance, is known for establishing a body of work regarding Islamic law (the Maliki rite). However, he was careful to state that his theories and conclusions might not be all correct or complete, and that anyone who blindly followed them without consulting the original sources and thinking for himself was a fool. Although he stood by his reasoning, he warned his students to not accept his ideas blindly, but to continue to debate and develop their own ideas on the subject. This is also consistent with his reported fondness for debate and dissenting opinions. Imam Malik’s attitude is one I would argue typifies the spirit of ijtihad. Indeed, the other founders of Sunni rites were in agreement on this point. Abu Hanifa is known to have argued in much the same spirit, and ibn Hanbal is perhaps among the best known of the four for his support of ijtihad, both in its legal sense, and seemingly in attitude as well.

Other scholars present a similar attitude, though they dealt in different area. Ibn Zachariyya Al-Razi, for instance, was a ninth century scholar known today for his work in medicine, alchemy (chemistry), and other such areas. Of particular note is his book, Doubts About Galen, he challenges many of that ancient Greek physician, and argued that is Galen were alive, he would approve of Al-Razi’s challenges, because both of them valued knowledge and truth above authority. Indeed, Al-Razi is known for a very positive belief in the future and in successive generations’ ability to improve passed down knowledge. And, his life was characterized by challenging accepted knowledge, even about religion. He even took the radical position of attempting to refute the Qur’an.

Of course, Al-Razi was a fairly unique individual in terms of his radical beliefs (or lack-there-of), but even more moderate scholars expressed similar underlying attitudes. As mentioned in the last essay, both Ibn Khaldun and Al-Ghazali encouraged people to continue to research the sciences and to question passed-down belief. Ibn Khaldun’s works on history were themselves direct challenges to the methodologies and arguments of historians at the time. He took it upon himself almost immediately in the Muqaddimah to attack falsehoods he perceived in historical accounts, and to disparage historians for being satisfied with chronicling events and simply repeating the accounts of past chroniclers. Ibn Khaldun’s work is a pure example of the spirit of ijtihad, and a call for men of reason to think for themselves. To do otherwise, he believed, was erroneous and ignorant.

This spirit of ijtihad, in many ways, was the spirit of the time. Although it is somewhat suspicious that many of these commentators felt it necessary to comment so openly on reason vs. blind imitation (perhaps there indeed was a problem with the latter, and they were the exceptions), it is still clear that much of the great thinkers were also characterized by an attitude of independent reasoning, regardless of whether they were strictly religious, such as ibn Hanbal, or radically irreligious, such as Al-Razi.

Spirit of Taqlid in the Ottoman Era

Generally speaking, this attitude of ijtihad was not to be found among the scholars and jurists of the Ottoman era. No new rites developed, and the metaphysical philosophies were considered finished. This is not to say that the Ottoman Era was one of stagnation. Indeed, the Ottoman government was very dynamic and adaptable, willing to use new technologies (such as gunpowder), new methods of political organization, and so on. Even jurists were at least partially willing to allow for some wiggle room in the interpretation of the law, often based on local custom, interests, and circumstances. But the basic assumption of taqlid was paramount, and the spirit of taqlid took over among the attitudes of the educated, scholarly classes. For every change in Ottoman policy, there was a backlash among court officials who tended to resist change. Eventually, if they did “come around” to a Sultan’s decisions, it was due to obedience to his authority, not from their own originality. These scholars were not interested in questioning or expanding significantly upon the knowledge of the past.

As an excellent example, I would like to refer the reader to the etiquette literature written around the time of 16^th century reform in the Ottoman Empire. At this time, the old order of tax collection and political organization was breaking down. Cavalrymen from the Sultan’s army were initially responsible for collecting taxes in designated areas and provinces. However, the Sultan increasingly needed hard cash (most peasants could only pay in goods) in order to pay his increasingly large corps of Janissaries (elite infantrymen). In order to gain more cash, the Ottoman government instituted a practice known as venality of office. Essentially, this meant that instead of collecting taxes directly, the government would auction off the right to collect taxes in an area for a set period of time, along with selling titles, government positions, and other positions of authority. This gave the Ottoman treasury a nice boost, but also resulted in a number of officials being less than qualified for their positions. Although we know historically that this did not lead to any major collapse within the Empire (indeed, it seems to have worked fairly well), many scholars were incensed by this radical change in political and social organization. Several wrote treatises and tracts decrying the sad state of the Empire, and arguing that this was a sign of its inevitable decline. Many cited Ibn Khaldun’s theories directly in making this argument.

The Ottoman Empire, of course, continued on in prosperity for a number of centuries afterwards, even though many of these scholars saw decline. These scholars might have been partially motivated by the fact that many of them lost their own court positions to people who had more money to buy them away. But, what is important is that their writings express a very significant attitude. Whereas earlier scholars in the spirit of ijtihad implicitly or explicitly expressed a positive outlook for the future, these Ottoman scholars saw only decline and degradation as the inevitable course of history. And, furthermore, they saw change and innovation especially as the source of this decline. To make their arguments, they unquestioningly followed Ibn Khaldun’s theories of circular history, that is that history moves from pre-sedentary to sedentary civilization, the latter of which inevitable declines, and eventually is conquered by another pre-sedentary nomadic group. They never questioned the fact that Ibn Khaldun himself wished people to challenge this element of his theory, and that his real pride was in reorienting historical research towards looking for causes and analyzing contemporary social forms for a better understanding of the past. Ibn Khaldun’s theory itself even expresses an idea that the dynamic element of nomadic groups is part of what gives them strength, whereas sedentary civilizations become too static and used to luxury, unwilling to progress in more noble tasks, and thus leading to a decline. In every way, Ibn Khaldun’s theory and methodology represented the spirit of ijtihad. But, these Ottoman scholars took those theories and unconsciously interpreted them in an erroneous, specifically taqlid kind of way. To them, it wasn’t stagnation that was a sign of decline, but change. It wasn’t useful to look to contemporary social forms (if they did, they would have noticed that venality of office was a very common practice). To them, it was enough to accept whatever observations Ibn Khaldun had made. And, they certainly didn’t look for causes; it was rather enough to simply fit what was happening in the empire into a specific mold, and explain that this is simply how history works. There was no desire to seek change, new ideas, new outlooks on causes, or anything of the sort of spirit which characterized Ibn Khaldun’s writings. Instead, there was a spirit of blind imitation, and the attitude that what there is to know on a subject has already been exhausted by a figure from the past. This is the spirit of taqlid which defined many aspects of the era as it pertains to intellectual matters.

Conclusion:

Thus, the spirit of ijtihad which characterized intellectual activity during the Golden Age was replaced by a spirit of taqlid. Blind obedience won out over independent reasoning. A positive view of the future and successive generations’ ability to improve human knowledge was lost to a deterministic belief in inevitable decline. On this last point, it is worth mentioning also the common belief among scholars of the Ottoman era that past generations were in fact better than successive ones, thus history itself was seen as a process of inexorable decline rather than human advancement. These are the attitudes which characterized the two eras.

By understanding the history in this way, I do not wish the reader to think that the end of the Golden Age has been explained in a cause and effect sort of manner. Rather, my intent is only to draw a useful picture, an interesting perspective on the past, based on a few examples. I wanted to present concepts and a perspective that might shed a new light on modern events. What are these modern events? That will be the topic of my next and final essay.

Christianity, Islam, and the Depravity of Shame

These two religions, stemming from the same monotheistic tradition, are similar in many ways. But, they have certain key differences that separate them and demonstrate one to be more ethically commendable than the other. This key difference is shame. Christianity, especially in its Protestant forms, emphasizes the necessity of guilt, shame, and self-loathing as a value. Islam, while it recognizes the importance of guilt as an element of human ethics, does not hold it as a value. It is for this reason that Islam is ethically a better religion than Christianity in general and Protestantism in particular.

The best ethical system is that which leads to happiness. But what is happiness? Is it momentary physical pleasure? Is it intellectual pleasure, which one might get from reading a good book? Or is it something else? To begin to answer this question, we must first take an entirely different look at the problem, and we must do so by trying to recognize the opposite of happiness. I posit that the opposite of happiness is not pain, and it is not even sadness, as a person may cry at the death of a loved one yet still be considered a “happy” individual generally speaking. An opposite of happiness is shame. It is the quality of feeling bad about one’s self and towards one’s self. It is the view of the self which is loathing and hateful. This is a primary ethical vice not only because it negates happiness, but also because it can negate ethical action if it is sought as a value. That is, a person who seeks to avoid shame will avoid actions which are shameful and bring him guilt. A person who seeks shame as a value will not be motivated to remove his guilt through positive action, nor take the necessary steps of self discipline in order to regain his sense of healthful pride. Ethical behavior, above all, takes a degree of personal fortitude and self discipline. It enables people to pursue their positive ends and to resist the negative influence of irrational authorities. It allows them to do what is necessary for themselves as individuals, and what is necessary for their society. In short, healthful pride is an element of personal and ethical fortitude necessary to survive, both as a living being and as a happy being. To seek shame instead of pride is to negate these elements and turn people into docile, dependent, and ultimately despicable characters.

Ibn Khaldun presents a wonderful insight into the effects of shame on personal fortitude, and its devastating effects. He described the negative effects sedentary culture and laws have on the fortitude of people, writing, “When laws are (enforced) by the means of punishment, they completely destroy fortitude, because the use of punishment against someone who cannot defend himself generates in that person a feeling of humiliation that, no doubt, must break his fortitude” (p. 96). Here, he argues that the end of outside punishment is to foster humiliation, or shame, in the recipient of the punishment. As Western Christian theory argues, this is actually the best way to keep people in line. Such an argument stems from the Christian emphasis on shame and guilt in order to obtain salvation. If a person feels badly enough, say the Christians, then God will forgive him. Indeed, Christians even invented an idea of “original sin,” which never existed in Islam (or Judaism), in order to keep people in a state of perpetual guilt over a crime they never committed. Protestant Christians especially argue Martin Luther’s point that forgiveness is a gift from God that cannot be obtained through positive action. Instead, they say that forgiveness is only given out to those who feel bad enough about themselves, and that this is the sole method of obtaining forgiveness. Thus, shame and self-hate are essential values of Christianity, since they are either necessary or sufficient for salvation, if not both. Islam would never uphold such a position, and in fact it would be deplorable to a Muslim like Ibn Khaldun, who clearly had distaste for shame and its effects on people.

Ibn Khaldun further describes shame as it pertains to fortitude, this time examining Arab Bedouin culture. He writes, “It is no argument that the men around Muhammad observed the religious laws, and yet did not experience any diminution of their fortitude, but possessed the greatest possible fortitude.” He explains that this is because, “the restraining influence came from themselves” (p. 96). Essentially, Ibn Khaldun argues that it was the internalization of the truth of the Qur’an that inspired their ethical behavior without diminishing their fortitude. This is set up in contrast to sedentary people who have external laws forced upon them. Since those external laws rely upon shame, it necessarily breaks their will. Ibn Khaldun continues on with a clear preference for the ethical expressions of Bedouin Arabs, because those expressions come from an internal sense of honor and rightness rather than an enforced sense of shame. This is quite in contrast to the Christian idea of “spare the rod, spoil the child.” Indeed, Ibn Khaldun would find such a practice deplorable. And, the Bedouin Arabs would agree: it has been observed that Bedouin refuse to spank their sons too often, especially after the early years of childhood, because they believe it breaks the child’s will. Christians, on the other hand, have long supported spanking children as a primary method of discipline specifically because it produces shame. In fact, many Christians still advocate spanking today for all types of children, even teenagers. It is telling, though, that many have changed their positions to seem more “modern.” That is, many of these modern Christians emphasize the difference between spanking and beating, and urge the use of spanking “lovingly” and without the need to cause too severe pain. What were once brutal whippings are now supposed to be loving swats with the open hand. It is perfectly logical for these Christians to reduce the pain of a spanking, because the shame and humiliation effectively remain the same. And, that is exactly what they wish to engender in their children: shame. Many Muslims would find the idea despicable, and at the very least, should find it despicable.

Now that we have described the differences between the religions’ approaches to shame and the ethical terms relating to it, let us now examine the effects of shame.

As mentioned above, Christianity would tend to agree with using shame to foster ethical behavior and with seeking it as a value. Islam would not. On this issue, Islam is correct. This is because ethical behavior requires healthful pride, not shame. Shame may motivate a person to seek that which is not shameful, but only if shame is viewed as something to be avoided, not embraced. Christianity teaches one to embrace shame.

This attitude produces devastating effects on ethical behavior. A person who believes that shame is sufficient, and even necessary, to gain forgiveness will not be motivated to do good works, nor improve himself as a human being. Christianity, by doling out forgiveness, removes the burden of responsibility to make amends for wrong deeds. If a person already has the forgiveness of God, what need is there to seek the forgiveness of others by making amends or doing what is good? This has the temporary effect of removing a burden, something for which many Christian leaders insist. They argue that they can offer solace to people who are suffering from guilt. However, they do not remove the guilt. Instead, they tell the person to embrace it. Indeed, they stress that a person cannot truly be forgiven unless he truly feels badly. So, what these priests and pastors only remove the burden of activity otherwise necessary to remove guilt. The removal of shame and guilt is a painstaking process of good works and ethical deeds in which one restores one’s sense of self worth. Christianity, especially Protestantism, says there is no need for that. Feeling badly is enough. Can one rationally expect ethical behavior from a person who thinks it is enough to simply feel bad about what he does?

What is worse is that this feeling of shame remains. It never disappears; the self-loathing is perpetual. Thus, though Christianity may produce a temporary catharsis, it does so by ensuring long term misery which necessarily breaks the fortitude of a person. Such a person becomes docile, easy to manipulate, and, in essence, a slave to the churches. This person constantly needs the drug of forgiveness in order to temporarily relieve his pain, and the churches are more than happy to distribute this drug. Thus, instead of performing self-initiated good deeds to restore his pride, a person is compelled to spend his time in churches, prayer meetings, and so forth, where he submits himself passively to indoctrination and manipulation. And yet, the shame remains in all its misery. Eventually, a person is no longer negatively motivated by shame. He does not seek to avoid shameful acts because they bring him shame. Rather, he accepts the shame, seeks it out, and then ignorantly returns to his religious authorities for forgiveness.

By supporting and encouraging guilt, shame, and self-loathing, Christianity in fact produces perpetually miserable people. And, these people do nothing to redeem themselves or restore their pride through ethical virtue or moral action. Instead, they continue to be immoral. A creature of misery will act in ways which are miserable. This is the truth of human nature. Christianity, by supporting shame, is complicit in this immorality. It destroys the ethical fortitude of an individual, and damages his ability to act ethically towards others. Christianity declares that pride is a sin, and champions shame as salvation. This is nothing less than the negation of all virtue and ethical standards. For this reason, Christianity is morally detestable.

Islam, on the other hand, has never emphasized shame as a value, to my knowledge. It recognizes shame as a motivating force, but stresses the avoidance of shame by avoiding shameful actions. There is no easy way for forgiveness in Islam. God is merciful, but He is also just, and He will weigh one’s character according to one’s deeds, both good and bad. Thus, a Muslim who commits a misdeed cannot have that sin washed away. He can only make up for it through great moral effort and good acts. This, I argue, tends to remove shame, since it restores a person’s self-pride with tangible activity and results. One may feel shame over a misdeed, but one can also restore pride and honor through positive action. In short, one can refortify one’s self image, and hence himself. For this, Islam is far more morally respectable than Christianity. And though I take many issues with the religion of Islam as well, this is not such a case.

Shame is an opposite of happiness, and happiness is the goal of all ethics, both personal virtue and social morality. Shame, therefore, is an effective negative motivation for ethical behavior, i.e. people naturally seek to remove or avoid it. Healthful pride, then, is the goal of everyone seeking to remove shame, and is therefore a virtue to be sought, not a sin to be condemned. It is the positive motivation for ethical behavior, as it is what is sought through ethical behavior. Pride, in essence, is an attribute of happiness. This can be observed in all pre-sedentary groups, the bulk of whom are known to live without crime. A nomad not only faces excommunication from his group if he offends the group (equivalent to a death sentence among nomads), but is also motivated to maintain his honor by avoiding what is shameful. Ibn Khaldun observed this in Arab Bedouins, particularly as it relates to their families and group feeling (or solidarity). He writes, “One feels shame when one’s relatives are treated unjustly or attacked, and one wishes to intervene between them and whatever peril or destruction threatens them. This is a natural urge in man, for as long as there have been human beings” (p. 98). Ibn Khaldun is correct in pointing out both the power of shame to motivate and that this is a natural urge. To survive as a group, as an individual, both physically and psychologically, one needs to avoid shame and seek happiness. This is the fundamental truth of ethics. Laws, punishments, and ideologies that enforce shame go against this truth. They twist the natural urge away from the requirements of happiness towards immorality, obedience, and complete dependence. Therefore, any ideology which encourages shame is ethically deplorable, and ideologies which do not encourage shame are ethically superior. And thus, Islam is ethically superior to Christianity.

It should also be mentioned that, for much of history, the Christian world relied on shame to produce its logical effects. They wished to maintain their absolutist style of rule by maintaining an ignorant, impotent, and morally weak population. Since the introduction of free societies, however, Western men and women have required that which fosters independence and freedom, and relied upon the ethical fortitude of its citizens rather than the strength of its government. Yet, the traditional Christian reliance on guilt and shame has retarded the efforts of every so-called free nation. These ideas have no place among such nations. Furthermore, many modern religious activists in the Muslim world seek to enshrine their religious principles in political law and policy. Though Islam has never actively supported shame, by giving the state the power to wield religion, they are effectively allowing shame to be inculcated in the name of Islam. Ibn Khaldun argued that those who are better Muslims are those who have the restraining force of religion from within themselves. But, Islamic activists seek the opposite: the restraining force of religion through the external force of the state. This, as Ibn Khaldun predicted and Christian history has demonstrated, can only lead to moral corruption, decay, and the breaking of the fortitude which initially defined Islam. Strangely, the requirements of the Christian world are now different than the requirements of the Islamic world as it pertains to creating free societies. The Christian world must dump Christianity entirely, as it has never been a force for anything but depravity. The Islamic world, on the other hand, needs instead to respect the foundational premises of Islam and avoid, at all cost, formally enthroning the religion in any political power. To do any less would be to subvert Islam entirely, and to drag it down to the despicable level of Christianity.

All references to Ibn Khaldun refer to page numbers in the following book:

Ibn Khaldun. The Muqaddimah. Translation by Franz Rosenthal. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1967.

For more information on the idiocy of Western methods of shame-inducing discipline, read Michel Foucault’s Discipline and Punish, as well as any of Nietzsche’s treatises on ethics, including both Beyond Good and Evil and Genealogy of Morals. Furthermore, the writings of Martin Luther are especially indicative of the Christian approval of shameful guilt. Read him at your own risk.

The Procrustean Bed of Education

I’ve already commented on the growing trends in education and how they are destroying the minds of youth today. But, I’d like to continue this discussion with more earnest as the problem grows deeper and deeper. To illustrate my point this time, I propose to argue on the subject of school shootings, as they are the prime manifestation of the psychological damage our schools inflict on children and young adults across the United States. These shootings are not the result of movies, television, games, or violent music. Rather, they are the result of the schools themselves victimizing students’ minds and sense of self. Schools today, under the (mis)guidance of “socialization” and the mythical “normal person,” have constructed a Procrustean bed which bends, shapes, and breaks the minds of students.

To make my argument, I will first analyze and debunk the popular arguments for explaining school shootings. Then, I will explain the origin of the problem and why education is driving some teens to violence. Finally, I will comment in two sections on the negative effects of proposed solutions and explanations, which are predicated on fear and misunderstanding.

The Arguments of Pop Culture

It is standard fare for the media to blame school shootings, gang violence, and other anti-social behavior displayed by teens on America’s pop culture. Violent video games, satanic rock music, and the like have supposedly created a sub-culture of violence that breeds anti-social behavior in the youth today. Some even argue that the prevalence of guns in our country is also a contributing factor in teen violence. Such are the explanations given, and so measures have been taken to restrict and control music and entertainment, control guns, and even control the youth. Yet, the problem worsens. This section will counter the superficial arguments from pop culture.

First, let us analyze what kind of behavior and values teens learn through music. To be certain, many rock bands and rap bands have violent lyrics, and many teens try to emulate their favorite stars in dress and manner. But does this mean they try to emulate the lyrics? Note that even the musicians themselves, in most cases, do not practice the violent behavior referenced in their songs, so violent behavior can hardly be said to come from having them as role models. Instead of a surface analysis, to get at the values teens learn from their music we must examine where the music is displayed: the concert. What occurs at a typical rock concert? The concert is fundamentally a social experience. Teens and adults gather together based on a common interest, that being the music of the band. They talk with each other, share opinions on music and albums, and converse about topics related to the music they love. When the show begins, they join in collective cheer for the band on stage. They raise their hands together, jump up and down together, and even dance together. Sometimes, what is known as a “mosh pit” forms. It is not random brawl. Rather, many mosh pits have an implicit code of ethics. For instance, if a person falls to the ground in a mosh pit, he runs the risk of being trampled. Thus, as can be seen in practice, moshers will typically help a person back to his feet it he begins to fall. The mosh pit can be a dangerous place for everyone, thus everyone tends to take on the responsibility of keeping it as safe as possible by looking out for one another. Taken together, all of this engenders a kind of social mentality and group dynamic in which people cooperate with one another and have fun together. The concert is a place for individuals to gather and share their experience with one another, and to feel a sense of belonging to something larger. They feel they are not alone, and they feel good about the benefits and responsibilities entailed in belonging to that group, if only for as long as the concert lasts. Far from being anti-social, concerts can, for the most part, teach good social values and behavior. The concert is, in effect, the “socialization” that society values most highly. And, it is the music that brings these fans together to socialize.

Now, let us look at video games. When I was younger, the most popular edifices of video games were arcades. At the arcade, youths would gather to play games with one another. Some games pitted players against one another, sometimes the players cooperated against a computer controlled enemy. In either case, players would have to interact with one another, either to organize their collective strategy to defeat a game, or to organize a competition between themselves. Players would also share tips or tricks for certain games, or have conversations related to gaming. Ultimately, even those players competing against one another had to cooperate in some sense, and like the concert, they would have fun collectively. This, again, is not the violence or anti-social element supposed by the detractors of video games, but rather an experience of socialization. This occurs even outside of the arcade. Many home gaming consoles design their games for multiple players. Friends get together to compete or to join forces against the computer controlled foe. These games are also a way to meet new people, as a general interest in video games is enough to start a conversation, or to invite someone new to play along. University residence halls, churches, and several other gathering places often feature “game nights” for people to get together, play video games, and make new friends. This, again, is not anti-social, but socialization. It may be true that players are “killing” a fictional person on the screen, but they are cooperating and socializing with the actual people with whom they are playing.

The list continues for other facets of entertainment, such as movies, television, and so forth. The point is that, even though these forms of entertainment may depict pretend violence, they tend to result in real socializing with real people. This is not what is driving the youth to “anti-social” behavior, and it is not what is damaging their minds. Simply put, fun is not a psychological illness.

Origin of the Problem

It is telling that school shootings happen, by definition, at schools. These shooters do not go out and shoot up concerts, arcades, movie theatres, or television stations. They take their anger out on the schools. This is because, simply put, the schools are the problem. Look no further than the object of their hatred and revenge for the cause. What follows is a short history and explanation of how our school system attacks the psyche of young adults in America.

The problem has its early roots in the Third Great Awakening and the Social Gospel movement of the later 19^th century. These reformers sought to end the economic and social inequality in America and bring about a “heaven on Earth,” so to speak. Their radical position had an even more radical solution: not religion, but science and education. They believed that, by utilizing the sciences of statistical analysis and sociology, they could engineer society for the better. Education was especially seen as the primary force behind social betterment. Thinkers such as John Dewey argued that education should “socialize” students to be a part of a democratic society. Psychologists such as John Watson championed behaviorism as a basic model for conditioning people, especially with the use of fear, which had a profound influence on advertising and marketing. And, statistical analysts used the normal curve – originally meant to address discrepancies in astronomical observations - to organize statistical data and get a basic idea of society and its makeup. This last point in particular is of importance. By looking at all culture and society as a series of numbers plotted on the normal curve, scientists concocted an image of a “normal person,” the kind of person that represents the largest bulk of society. Of course, there was no such thing as a “normal person,” as most people had different reasons for falling along the chart in different areas. But, such was the superficiality of this “science” of society. The normal curve and its “normal person” dictated the course of policy in the United States throughout the bulk of the 20^th century, especially in education. Products were marketed to the “normal consumer,” social policies were designed to help the “normal citizen,” and education reforms were made to best educate (now, “socialize”) the “normal student,” including standardized tests and curriculums.

But, there is no such thing as the “normal consumer,” or the “normal citizen,” or the “normal student.” People buy certain things for their own particular reasons, people support policies for their own particular beliefs, and people seek education with their own particular skills and personalities. The result of the normalizing process, then, was to create what amounts to a Procrustean bed on which every buyer, every citizen, and every student must be made to fit. Of course, by definition, most people will fit on the bed with little or no strain. But, what happens to the outliers? What happens to the people who fall too many standard deviations, plus or minus, away from the norm? The Procrustean bed snaps them in half. This is what we are witnessing in our schools: the breaking of our youth on the rack of modern education.

Let us describe in further detail how this is done, drawing on elements of “normalcy” as well as “socialization.” Schools today are designed for the average student, the one of mediocre intelligence and ability. More and more, schools are dumping advanced placement and gifted learning programs in an effort to integrate the more intelligent students with the less intelligent. On the flip side, schools are also screwing with special education, which is intended to meet the specific needs of those who are below average in intelligence and ability. Instead, they want to “streamline” those students and integrate them into the standard, “normal” program. Administrators think that this will benefit everyone. Instead, it is a detriment to all. Struggling students cannot get the help they need without monopolizing the instructor’s time and efforts. If the instructor does not meet their specific needs, they do not learn. If the instructor does try to gear the basic curriculum towards the less gifted, the more gifted suffer, in an effect of bringing everyone down to the same level. This in particular can frustrate the most gifted and talented students, who will not be challenged in any way, and who will not learn the fundamental skills needed for them to allow their inventiveness to take flight. In either case, many of the gifted will still feel bored with an education system designed for the average, the “normal,” and their talents will go undeveloped.

Coinciding with this is an attempt at “socializing” students. Teachers are increasingly assigning group projects and group learning, rather than relying on lecture or individual work. Even grades are often given out to the group as a whole. Those who are most gifted, then, find themselves in a catch-22. First, they could let less gifted people in their group do a share of the work. But, since their work is of lower quality, it has the effect of bringing down the grade of the more gifted student. The second option is to take over, as the gifted student volunteers to carry the entire weight of the group. While this might be a noble gesture, the effect is that the less gifted students come to rely, even expect, the gifted students to do their work. This is to their detriment. Further, the gifted student does not receive the individual praise or congratulations for his hard work and social spirit. Instead, the praise goes to the group: the people who did absolutely nothing. So, no matter what he does, a gifted student must watch as others reap the rewards of his work while he suffers the punishments for the short-comings of others. This is the “group” mentality facilitated by our education system. For those in the middle, the average, group work is a good thing because it means they don’t have to take responsibility for poor performance, nor do they have to make an attempt at performing to par. Instead, they can exploit the gifted. And for the outliers, this “group” activity leaves them befuddled or totally disenchanted. Again, the normal will fit comfortably on the same bed that breaks the exceptional.

And what are the results of this “socialization?” Let’s take a look into how students interact in a typical high school. Immediately, students can be seen fracturing off into “cliques.” The normal, the average group comprises the bulk. They present themselves as part of the “normal” group by wearing popular, “average” clothes, by listening to popular, “average” music, and by in all other ways consuming products targeted towards the “average” American (as marketing demographics understands the term). Whether they are average or not, this is the kind of look and identity they feel they have to portray in order to fit in with the normal, to “be normal.” Then, we have the outliers. Many of them shun popular brands, popular music, and even popular conventions of style. Some wear make-up (even boys), some wear black clothes, some wear trench coats, and so forth. They listen to “anti-social” bands, they play violent video games, or they watch violent TV. They seek an outlet, within their group and within their interests, for the anger they feel towards the “normal” kids, the average ones. It is important here to note that their behavior, in general, is not an expression of the individual identity, but a conscious or unconscious lashing out against the normal, against that which has imprisoned them and abused them. They are struggling, in these early years of identity formation, with a system that crushes their spirit because they are not “normal.” They are struggling with their fellow students who, every day, pick on them, make fun of them, beat them up, and make them feel inferior for not being part of the normal crowd. They are struggling with their teachers who force them to do busy work, who rarely give them credit for individual accomplishment, and punish them for the failings of others. They are struggling against the school administration that continuously pumps the ideology of self-annulment and self-sacrifice to the group, of subverting the mind for the sake of belonging, and that singles them out as trouble makers for not fitting the concept of the normal student. They are, in effect, lashing out against the Procrustean bed of the normal curve which has infected every facet of our society, especially our education.

This kind of social friction, this polarization of identity, this hatred and anger displayed towards one another, this tendency to fall into competing cliques: these are not signs of effective socialization. They are a far cry from any measure of social cooperation and harmony that can be found at a concert, at an arcade, or even (dare I say it) at a gun show, where no difference matters so much as that single shared interest. On the contrary, this is pure anti-social behavior, and it is found in its most stark form within schools. Schools are the problem. Schools are where we see the first symptoms of anti-social behavior, and schools are where we see the final, bloody results.

The Situation Worsens

Yet, the media, politicians, and experts continue to ignore the education system as a potential source of this behavior. Our government, our media, and our education system is controlled by the children of the Third Great Awakening: the baby boomers. They have neither the will nor capacity to challenge the “normal,” the founding principle behind mass culture and social engineering in general. Their generation is fixated upon the ideology of creating a “heaven on Earth” with their enlightened social “science.” They do not want to explore the deeper, cultural implications of events. They only want neat statistics that give them a surface impression of social phenomena. But it is not science which guides their decisions. Rather, it is an intense fear, which results in the mistreatment and marginalization of teens, especially those who fall outside the norm.

Today, many schools are run like prisons. Students have very little freedom to move about, security guards watch their every step, and some schools have even instituted the use of metal detectors. Furthermore, the faculty at these schools have become hyper-sensitive to the “warning signs” of violence, usually related to superficial signs such as dress, musical tastes, or even off-hand, generalized comments that use words like “kill,” “hate,” and so forth in an unspecific or figurative manner (Such as “We’re going to kill the other team next game,” or “Man, I really hate that guy.”). Even these words displayed on graphic t-shirts, or t-shirts that seem “violent” (subjectively speaking) in general are censored and their wearers are singled out as trouble makers. What was once considered merely eccentric behavior is increasingly considered potentially dangerous.

Teens are also badgered and abused by law. Curfews become increasingly strict, more controls are placed on video games, music, and movies, and teens are profiled as trouble makers do to their style of dress, hair, and so forth. The media, the government, and their parents increasingly beat into their heads that they are just children, they can’t handle their emotions, they can’t think for themselves, and they don’t belong in the adult world. They are treated with fear and suspicion everywhere they go, even in their own homes. They are kept from growing up, essentially, despite every biological development their bodies are making towards mature adulthood. In many ways, adolescence is the first stage of adulthood, not a stage of childhood. Yet, they are constantly marginalized by society. Their opinions are shouted down. Their preferences and tastes are ridiculed or demonized. They are not only ostracized by their “normal” schoolmates, they are ostracized by society at large.

What message of socialization does all this send? We expect teens to act with appropriate social conduct without granting them the same. We cannot expect teens to become socialized while at the same time marginalizing them. In past ages, cultures enacted “coming of age rituals” which welcomed adolescents into “adult” society, with all of the privileges and responsibilities that entails. Even today, we still have some semblance of those rituals, such as the Bar Mitzvah of Judaism, or even Confirmation in Christianity. But even these rituals tend to have lost their original meaning, and in any case they do not extend into secular society. Instead, our culture has concocted this developmental stage of adolescence as a stage of childhood, and therefore we have restricted rights and privileges to adolescents who, only a couple centuries before, would have been considered functionally adult. And now, with each new school shooting, the fear of teens grows. And, the irrational, fear-driven policies enacted only deepen the divide and exclusion of teens from the adult world. We cannot expect socialization to occur in this atmosphere; we can only expect the opposite result. When our whole culture is geared towards telling teens, implicitly or explicitly, that they are dangerous children who can’t be trusted to operate in society, it only follows that eventually they will come to accept this role.

How the Problem is Mistreated

When someone gets shot, stabbed, punched, or injured in some way, it is fairly common sense for us to explain the causes of the injury. The person with the bullet wound has the bullet wound because something shot him. The person who has the laceration on his torso was cut by something. The person has a bruise there because he was hit by some sort of blunt instrument or object. We do not assume that something is inherently wrong with the person, or that an inherent quality gave rise to his injury. We accept that the person was healthy, but was made unhealthy due to some outside occurrence, such as an attack.

This is not the attitude expressed towards teens that have been broken by the Procrustean standards of normalcy. No one recognizes that their minds, their spirits, have been brutalized, or that their sense of injustice at being injured is justified. Instead, the common position to take is that there is something wrong with them. They are sick. They suffer from mental illness and need to be put on anti-depressants or behavior modifying drugs. Certainly, they do suffer from an unnatural state, but a state brought about by the abuse they’ve taken, much like a wound from an attack. But that is not the conception of this “illness.” Rather, the belief is that it stems from their biology, from who they are. In essence, they are injured because there is something wrong with them.

To illustrate this point, I’d like to draw from a Newsweek article written by Sharon Begley after the Columbine school shooting.* In her article, “Why the Young Kill,” she argues that school shooters are genetically prone to violence, and outlines how this propensity becomes realized under certain conditions, such as neglect, but also such influences as violent games and music. Of these, she states, “Today’s pop culture offers all too many dangerous [ideologies], from the music of Rammstein to the game of Doom” (p. 179). She identifies these things, along with supposed easy access to guns, as contributors to violent personalities. “To deny the role of these influences is like denying that air pollution triggers childhood asthma,” she writes (p. 180). Thus, she implies that violence in pop culture can influence those already genetically susceptible to their influence. Thus, these troubled teens simply have a slight problem with their genetics which, under certain environmental conditions, produces violent behavior. Their injury is due mainly to their genetics, and the outer conditions are only a contributing factor. Imagine telling a stabbing victim that his wound was caused by genetics, and that the knife only enhanced his natural propensity to be cut!

Underlying her thesis is the assumption that there is something wrong with these teens, that they are abnormal. In discussing their supposed genetic vulnerability, she writes, “It is only a tiny bend in a twig, but depending on how the child grows up, the bend will be exaggerated or straightened out” (p. 179). By “bend” she means the abnormal genetic anomaly, and by “straightened out,” she means that the aberrant behavior will not manifest, hence a “normal” person will develop. I cannot think of a better choice of words. Drawing on my analogy of the Procrustean bed, it is the assumption of the media and so-called “experts” that these teens need to be straightened out, that their differences result from a defect that needs to be fixed. They need to be straightened out in the same way that the rack straightens out its victims. The only problem is, this straightening out requires an artificially imposed re-bending of this “bent” person in order to fit him to the shape demanded by society. The normally flexible joints of the mind are pulled and tugged ever straighter, stressing the ligaments, until finally they are dislocated and ripped out.

What teens do not get is a feeling that someone understands them, that someone connects with them, and the reassurance that there is nothing wrong with them. Instead, writers like Begley assert, “An adult can often see his way to restoring a sense of self-worth… through success at work or love. A child usually lacks the emotional skills to do that” (p. 180). What a dismissive, insensitive mode of understanding! How is a teen supposed to restore self-worth when every success in school is devalued, when HE is devalued as a person for the sake of the group? How is he supposed to find love in a society that fears and shuns him? How is he to have self-worth in the first place when, because he lies outside the fictional “normal,” he is constantly told that he is aberrant, weird, sick, or dangerous? It’s easy to say that all teens need is to be loved, but our society is not set up for that. Our society has been, over the last hundred years or so, engineered to love only those who fit into the normal range of the curve. Everyone else is ignored, picked on, punished, or generally treated as inferior. This is especially true with the public education system, which comprises a large chunk of teens’ social experience. Their minds have been tortured by the normalizing and self-annulment of modern schools. Their potential for individual identities has been assaulted, their needs left unfulfilled, and their talents left to languish underdeveloped. They have been stretched to the breaking point, a point which a few have crossed. There is nothing inherently wrong with them. They have been injured grievously, yet they receive no care or sympathy for crimes committed against them. All they hear is that there is something wrong with them.

Conclusion

So, it is not segments of pop culture or even guns which break the minds of teens. Rather, it is the Procrustean bed of modern education, based on socialization and the fictional “normal,” which has so abused young adults that it has socialized them for destructive and anti-social behavior. The fears and superficial reactions of society only exacerbate the problem as we further marginalize and mistreat the youth in America. We continue to blame the victim, and teens who fall outside the norm have no where to go for understanding. So, they turn to video games, music, and sometimes even gangs, among other things, as an outlet for their feelings of disenfranchisement and rage. In some cases, such as music and video games, this can result in a positive social experience, perhaps even enough to get them through the difficulties of adolescence. In other cases, like gangs, it’s not so positive, and actual violence may result. In any case, these are all symptoms of the same causative force, a lunacy we’ve inherited from faux philosophers and pseudo-scientists of society and education. If we continue on this path, I can only see more devastation to come. I don’t mean just school shootings. Rather, I’m worried about those who have had their minds broken, but did not go so far as murder/suicide. What will happen when they grow up and are responsible for running our country? 20^th century social engineering has created a Frankenstein monster, and I can’t predict good things to happen when it gets loose.

*Begley, Sharon. “Why the Young Kill,” Newsweek, May 3, 1999. Referenced from reprint in - Fass, Paula S. and Mary Ann Mason, ed. Childhood in America, New York: New York University Press, 2000, pp. 177-180. All page citations from the Fass/Mason.

Further reading: In addition to names and sources mentioned above, I recommend reading Robert Fogel’s The Fourth Great Awakening and Oliver Zunz’s Why the American Century? to get a background of the history behind what I’m discussing.

The End of The Golden Age: Part 1

Intro:

The Golden Age of Islam, roughly from 800 to 1200 c.e., saw the greatest flourishing of philosophy, mathematics, and the natural sciences the Islamic world had ever known. While Europe languished in the Dark Ages, Muslim (and some Christian and Jewish) thinkers of this era translated ancient Greek philosophy and science into Arabic, expanded upon the ideas contained, and made lasting contributions to human thought. For instance, Muhammad ibn Musa Al-Khwarizmi was a well known mathematician whose work with quadratic equations gave us the term “algebra,” from the title of his book on the subject (al-jabr), and even his name was taken as the basis for the word “algorithm.” Other thinkers such as the Banu Musa worked in pneumatics and the studied the flow of air and water. Their principles on the concentric siphon would not be matched until almost a thousand years after their death. And even modern chemistry owes a debt of gratitude to Arab “alchemy,” especially ibn Zakariyyah Al-Razi (Rhazes) who developed a method of distillation and extraction that is little different than the methods we use today.

However, this dedication to philosophy and science seems to have waned, prompting many historians to question: why did the Golden Age of Islam come to an end? The older school of scholarship offered various explanations, ranging from blaming Islam as being anti-science to singling out the Muslim philosopher Al-Ghazali as the one who destroyed the discipline with his book, The Incoherence of the Philosophers. In the past, I have even used the latter argument, and indeed Al-Ghazali’s work seems that way upon initial reading. However, I have since come to the conclusion that answering the question demands a closer look into the intellectual climate of the era and a more historical understanding of the thinkers in this time period. By examining the nature of their writings, not simply the content, one can see a concern for certain trends in Muslim philosophy. And, these trends may indicate to us what exactly happened to end this so-called “Golden Age.”

What follows is a single section of a larger essay, broken into smaller parts with each analyzing a different theme that may have contributed to the changing intellectual climate of the Muslim world. At this point, they are preliminary musings, and the reading should take them as opinion articles, not scholarly history. I will be writing mostly from memory, so citations will be limited. However, I will try at the end of each section to highlight a few critical texts that the reader can explore in order to make his own judgments. I will post each major section separately so that readers can concentrate on specific points and so that replies can be more precise. Each section will relate to my main theme and question: “What ended the Golden Age of Islam?”

Part I: Neo-Platonism, Al-Ghazali, and the End of Metaphysics

I will start this section with Al-Ghazali, who lived from 1058 to 1111 c.e. To some, his book The Incoherence of the Philosophers spelled the demise to come for philosophy in the Muslim world. Certainly, the title of this major discourse on the subject would seem to imply such a motive and such an end. But, we must remember that the Arabic word for “philosopher” at this time was not used as loosely as we use it today. Rather, it was a term that applied most accurately to a specific group of thinkers who followed the influence of Aristotle, Plato, and the works of such Muslim thinkers as Al-Farabi and Avicenna (ibn Sina). Al-Ghazali was not refuting philosophy in general, but the ideas of those particular philosophers. It is my argument that the demise of philosophy truly has its roots with them, not Al-Ghazali. By taking the ideas of Aristotle and merging them with Neo-Platonism and the mystical ideas of Avicenna, these philosophers removed the protective barrier of distinction between theology and metaphysics and infused the discipline with untenable assertions while simultaneously divorcing philosophy from real application. If anything, Al-Ghazali attempted to restore the barrier and uphold practical science and reason (and faith) against the pernicious influence of Avicenna’s corrupted and irrational metaphysics. It was, however, to no avail.

Let us first examine Al-Ghazali’s attitude toward philosophy and science. In his book Freedom and Fulfillment, he gives his opinion on various disciplines. On the topic of mathematics, Al-Ghazali has no qualms as such. He does, however, cite a disgust for the tendency of mathematicians to assume that, since they are using the same basic logic as metaphysicians, the conclusions of the metaphysicians must also be as accurate, and therefore they can be trusted as truth. Al-Ghazali finds fault only with this point, and rightly so. On the topic of physics and the natural sciences, Al-Ghazali again finds no fault with the disciplines themselves. Indeed, he is known for praising the natural sciences throughout his works. But again, his single issue with them is the same issue he has with the mathematicians. Getting deeper to the core of philosophy, Al-Ghazali examines the nature of the ethicists and their field of inquiry. He does not find anything wrong with it, but states that it is a basically useless field, since it only reiterates truths found in revelation.

Finally, Al-Ghazali comes to metaphysics, and the bulk of his writing in this book and others is directed towards criticizing the metaphysicians. His qualms with their ideas stem from two major reasons. First, he finds them irrational, and in the Incoherence he sets himself to the task of demolishing them with logical argument. It is worthy to note that his arguments are strictly logical, indicating that he clearly had a high respect for formal reasoning. His second major objection to the metaphysicians is that their ideas contradict Islam. This last category of objection has gotten the most attention since the time of his death and on into the present time. It would seem in many of his ideas that he is trying to “make room” for faith, miracles, revelation, and religion in general within the context of philosophy. I do not believe this was the case. It seems, rather, that Al-Ghazali saw the metaphysicians as stepping into territory where they did not belong, namely theology. Al-Ghazali’s admiration for science, logic, and the philosophical mentality clearly indicates that he believed those things had a proper place in intellectual life. Yet, the metaphysics of Avicenna, Al-Farabi, and others attempted to describe the nature of God, the afterlife, and the creation of the universe. To Al-Ghazali, it was inappropriate to apply philosophy to these areas, which clearly belonged to theology and above all, religion. Of course, the ethicists were treading on the same ground. But, what made them different in Al-Ghazali’s mind is that the ethicists were simply repeating what could be learned in revelation, whereas the metaphysicians were creating their own image of God, the spirit, and the universe based on their faulty principles. It is here that Al-Ghazali found exception, and thus his criticisms and ideas were about “making room for God,” in metaphysics, but excluding that brand of metaphysics from the room altogether. It was not a motive for inclusion, but for exclusion.

This particular point is repeated in the famous work of historian/philosopher Ibn Khaldun. In his introduction to history, the Muqaddimah, he bemoans the fact that metaphysics and theology, that the speculative and the revealed, somehow became intertwined and confused with one another. He argues that originally, logic was brought into philosophy in order to defend the tenets of Islam against the arguments of unbelievers (there is historically validity for this assertion). But, somehow it devolved into speculating on the nature of God and reinterpreting religion based on supposedly rational grounds. This, he argues, is not only a negation of the religion, but a misuse of logical reasoning and philosophy. Philosophy, argues Ibn Khaldun, is meant to sharpen the mind so that one can determine a good argument from a bad one and use one’s own mind to come to decisions. He believed that applying reason to mathematics and the sciences was in fact the best expression of philosophy, and it is a testament to his respect for reason that he attempted to create a rational understanding of history in his works. Like Al-Ghazali, I believe Ibn Khaldun saw the Neo-Platonic metaphysics of Avicenna and others as a misuse of philosophy altogether. Although, only Al-Ghazali seems to have written lengthy treatises on the matter.

What of the Neo-Platonists? Do they really deserve this kind of criticism? From a philosophical standpoint, I think Al-Ghazali and Ibn Khaldun were on target. Avicenna’s metaphysics is so thoroughly mystical that it would have made Auguste Comte groan with profound disapproval, had he been born yet. Avicenna started from Aristotle, true, but he began positing a host of new ideas that incorporated, among other things, a sort of mind-body dualism, successive layers of spirituality between God and the physical world, and so on. It was enough even to raise the ire of that great, Andalusian rationalist Averroes (Ibn Rushd). Although ostensibly his book, The Incoherence of the Incoherence was meant as a refutation of Al-Ghazali’s book, Averroes spent a good amount of time discrediting the ideas of Avicenna as non-Aristotelian and irrational. In several points throughout the book, it seems as if he comes to a sort of implied agreement with his arch-foe Al-Ghazali. In several cases, when addressing a particular criticism leveled by Al-Ghazali, Averroes simply states that the criticism is only valid for Avicenna, not of Aristotle. Indeed, much of Averroes’ life was spent commenting upon the works of Aristotle and purifying them of the mistakes and Neo-Platonic influences they had received in the East. That entire region seemed to be rising against this perceived pernicious influence of the Eastern philosophers around Averroes’ time. Unfortunately, however, the damage was already done.

Before Averroes, Ibn Khaldun, and other Andalusian scholars could begin challenging Avicenna and re-asserting the value of reason, it seems as if thinkers were generally becoming sick of the whole problem of philosophy. Some groups ran with the ideas and took them to extremes, such as the Nizari Ismai‘li “Assassins,” much to the chagrin of their neighboring Muslims. Other groups, such as the Sufis, seemed to offer a more purely mystical path that provided a way out of the contradictions and obtuse reasoning. Finally, the old religious scholars who simply practiced reason as a didactic approach to theology (called the mutakallimun) were replaced with the Ash‘arite school of philosophy which was essentially an anti-philosophy: that is, their goal was to use reason only to demolish the arguments of philosophers. They eventually did such a good job that later scholars essentially considered the matter settled. Philosophy was done, and so was everything that had anything to do with it. Al-Ghazali’s urging for Muslims to continue to pursue science and reasoning was ignored; only his refutations were studied. Ibn Khaldun’s true innovation, a scientific approach to history, received no credit from others. Instead, scholars were content to simply study his theories rather than his method, and instead of building upon it they simply accepted it as given (it would take hundreds of years before the modern social sciences would grow, despite the fact that Ibn Khaldun had laid the groundwork long before). As for Averroes, his books were banned, burned, or just simply ignored.

To conclude, if anyone is responsible for the downfall of philosophy in the Muslim world, it is not Al-Ghazali, but rather Avicenna and the other Neo-Platonists. They confused, muddled, and distorted philosophy with their irrational ideas to the point that they ultimately defamed the entire thing. They infected philosophy with a poison that spawned an all-encompassing backlash against all its branches, from metaphysics to mathematics to the natural sciences. Their ideas were not just pernicious to Islam, but pernicious to reality. They divorced the intellect from the body, the universal from the concrete, the concept from the subject, and finally philosophy from practicality.

But, since Avicenna’s ideas and Neo-Platonism were so wide spread, it begs the question as to whether this part of history can really be called a “Golden Age.” Wouldn’t the majority of thinkers have to be part of the problem? Around the time Al-Ghazali was writing, this very well may be true. Thus, we may have to reconsider what exactly is meant by this supposed “Golden Age.” Perhaps the gold ought to lose a bit of its luster. In any case, it is still hard to imagine how and why philosophy would go in this direction in the Muslim world, and why it would come to an end despite the Andalusian reaction and Al-Ghazali’s respect for science and logic. Why were people willing to simply study the refutation and not the exaltation of reason? Why did people begin to blindly follow the authority of certain scholars rather than analyze the spirit of their work or attempt to build upon it themselves? Why was Averroes largely ignored by Muslims until the modern era? These questions will be the subject of another section.