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Review: The Case for Islamo-Christian Civilization
The Case for Islamo-Christian Civilization. By RICHARD W. BULLLIET. New York: Columbia University Press, 2004. 187 pp. $24.50 (cloth); $18.95 (paper).World historians will enjoy and profit from this wise and wonderful book with an eye-opening approach succinctly captured in its title: The Case for Islamo-Christian Civilization. Richard W. Bulliett, professor of history at Columbia University and former director of its Middle East Institute, offers a startlingly original interpretation that challenges not only conventional wisdom but the historical master narrative of the last fourteen centuries. No one who has digested this little volume will be able to look at Islam and Christianity again in the same way. At the first glance, Bulliet's book appears to be a rebuttal of Samuel Huntington's "clash of civilizations" thesis. In fact, the real target is Bernard Lewis, sage of Middle Eastern studies, who originated the term in an article on "The Roots of Muslim Rage" in 1990 and whose baleful influence on the Bush administration helped spur the American occupation of Iraq in 2003. It is a distinguished Arabist's response to the academic and policy-making drum beaters of American empire whose misunderstanding of Islam and Middle Eastern history have led to talk of a generations-long war with radical Islam and trying to make Mesopotamia safe for democracy. Posted by: john frum 2007-08-26 |
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