When thinking about Al Qaeda, I find it useful to think of them as a version of the Inquisition, a "purifying" force in our own religion that killed many thousands, maybe millions, of "witches" and various heretical sects, like the Cathars, the Albegensians, and the Knights Templar, although certainly not the 95 million some claim, and the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre of the Huguenots (20,000 in France over the course of three days.)
The Islamists are not to be analogized, meaningfully, to any economic theorists, except that, of course, Islam is a comprehensive philosophy that includes rules about economics, such as interest rates.
But that's really beside the point. It's religion. They practice their version of "old time" religion and they want to get back to the fundamentals.
I think it says something about us that we can't look that in the face without feeling uncomfortable. We believe in religious tolerance, it's part of who we are.
What happens when a culture based on religious tolerance meets a culture based on religious intolerance? Can we tolerate them without being destroyed by their intolerance? Maybe not, unless we don't tolerate them. |
