As we watch the fighters of
the Islamic State (Isis) rampaging through the Middle East, tearing apart the
modern nation-states of Syria and Iraq created by departing European
colonialists, it may be difficult to believe we are living in the 21st century.
The sight of throngs of terrified
refugees and the savage and indiscriminate violence is all too
reminiscent of barbarian tribes sweeping away the Roman empire, or the Mongol
hordes of Genghis Khan cutting a swath through China, Anatolia, Russia and
eastern Europe, devastating entire cities and massacring their inhabitants.
Only the wearily familiar pictures of bombs falling
yet again on Middle Eastern cities and towns – this time
dropped by the United States and a few Arab allies – and the gloomy predictions
that this may become another Vietnam, remind us that this is indeed a very
modern war.
The ferocious cruelty of
these jihadist fighters, quoting the Qur’an as they behead their
hapless victims, raises another distinctly modern concern: the
connection between religion and violence. The atrocities of Isis would seem to
prove that Sam Harris, one of the loudest voices of the “New Atheism”, was
right to claim that “most Muslims
are utterly deranged by their religious faith”, and to conclude that
“religion itself produces a perverse solidarity that we must find some way to
undercut”. Many will agree with Richard Dawkins, who wrote in The God Delusion
that “only religious faith is a strong enough force to motivate such utter
madness in otherwise sane and decent people”. Even those who find these
statements too extreme may still believe, instinctively, that there is a violent
essence inherent in religion, which inevitably radicalises any conflict –
because once combatants are convinced that God is on their side, compromise
becomes impossible and cruelty knows no bounds.
