Rearranging and editing master thesis paper! (Religion!)

The Effects of 19th Century Scholarship on Islam

Start with the other file I attached, the one called "Structure notes 5-1-17."

Once the structure is in order, other issues can be dealt with.

The Effects of 19th Century Scholarship on Islam

This paper outlines features of 19th-century scholarship that led to the development of stereotypes about Islam that persist today. To illustrate these features and demonstrate the continuing effects of these 19th-century prejudices, the paper will also brieflyndescribe  how these stereotypes are applied to the present. Western Christian contempt for Islam and discrimination against Muslims dates back to the seventh century, so why is this essay specifically concentrating on the nineteenth century? The 19th century saw the development of "Religious Studies." Before this development, Christians said hateful things about Islam and Muslims, but they spoke only to other Christians who already shared their beliefs. Although Religious Studies were established as "scientific" discipline that claimed to be unbiased, in fact, it was very biased by its assumptions—namely, that Christianity is the best religion. Yet because those biases were hidden, and the field claimed to be a kind of science, the negative things said about Islam were no longer just something Christians said to one another. They were universal claims about how things were if looked at properly. As a result, one could say that these discriminating and critical remarks against “other” religions began to have more severe and deep-rooted consequences. The scholars this paper will mention are mainly scholars that were either intentionally or unintentionally, meaning they were heedless of the fact that they were caught up in the ‘normative’ cycle of, promoting and elevating Christianity’s stance, which consequently, led to and provoked the deprecation of “other” religions . In this incident, the focus will be on the disparagement of Islam. Finally, it might be pivotal to mention that the analyses mentioned have an orientation to the Western world, primarily Europe and the US .  

The interest in the history of western ideas is significant about Islam because of the attitudes that surround us today. Polls regularly show that Americans and Europeans have negative impressions of Islam and Muslims. For example, according to the study by YouGov among 1000 adults in the U.S.A. between March 6th and 9th, 2015. The participants were asked if they had a favorable or unfavorable opinion of the Islamic religion and the results showed that more than half of Americans, fifty-five percent to be exact, had an unfavorable opinion of Islam (Shadidi et. al, 2002 ).  The Pew Research Center had similar results when it asked 3,000 US respondents to rate members of religious groups using a ‘feeling thermometer’ that ranged from 0 to 100. 100 indicated the most positive rating while 0 indicated the most negative possible rating. In the year 2014, Muslims received the score of 40, which can be interpreted to mean that 60 percent had negative views and 40 percent had positive views (Purzycki et. al, 2011 ).  In YouGov’s findings alongside the Islamic Relief team this year in an attempt an understanding of Islam’s impression in the United Kingdom, and what they found were no different from Muslim’s impression in the US. UK citizens were asked what came to their mind when they heard the term Islam and most responded with words like “terror”, “terrorism” or “ terrorists ”  These are only three examples of the many surveys that have the same results.  Why, when, and how did this negative opinions develop? Some people would say they come from the behavior of Muslims, but I believe that is wrong. Therefore, there must be more to the story for other religions that have followers who constrain to terrorism; the question is why Muslim is the only religion that is linked with terrorism? Not to indicate, extremism has no religion. Others would say it comes from the unfamiliarity; too few people actually know any Muslims.  Occasionally to understand the existing situation, it is imperative to evaluate the past, and in the situation, this might be the best alternative .  

It may be a bold but not false to say that Islam has always been a major target of animosity. Of course, there is constant competition between all religions that result in hateful behaviors towards one another, but Islam is probably the one with the most hits now. Where there is failure there is permanently a conqueror, and who in the case of this study is Christianity. Inspection into the history of religions offers an intensive and endless power struggle between all spiritual societies, but largely between Christianity and all other faiths. It is a fact that most, in fact, all religious customs undoubtedly have the desire to be the one and only outright religion, but when one analyses the antiquity of some Christian groups these desires are more prevalent, or it could also be that the instances of them acting in respect to these desires were recorded more in history . Through the belief that the invasion of Christianity for superiority is a key aspect that influences the stereotypical opinions on Islam now. In this document, the focus will not be on potent and bloody mechanisms of attaining dominance since such classes of arrangements can be established in practically all faiths. As an alternative, as mentioned before, we will pay attention on discrete deeds and philosophies contrived by certain Christian intellectuals that enhanced the role of Christianity, and show how upraising Christian religion typically aimed at demeaning the beliefs of others. In such a case, the emphasis will be on the relegation of Islamic religion and the Muslim people. 

Prior to the secular aspects and religious pluralism ideological dominance in the West, Western Christians could merely rely on the supposition that being Christian was the only way to be. As such, Christian religion was greater than anything else. Nevertheless, in the contemporary times Christians cannot depend on such conventions as well as that type of assurance. These individuals are pushed into the world, which acts as if the creation of every person was equal, however such a perception might not be sufficient to reduce the urge for superiority. As a result of the shifts in the proclamation of supremacy, new mechanisms developed to govern over others in an abstruse way, and the ‘modern’ mechanisms of the n19th C had an influence on the today’s discernment of  Islam .

Through the idea of Alnuator, there is the issue of Christian scholars particularly the prioritization of such as agenda in the 19th century period.  Goodrich was a reverend, as well as an American author and a Congregational minister. The reason why I chose to start with Goodrich is because I consider him transition figure, representing the shift from the earlier Christian assumptions and direct declarations of prominence to a kind of quasi-scientific assertion of Christian superiority. He postulated that, “Idolatry, or religious nonconformity, anywhere and at any time happens because of the incessant propensity of humankind (Alnuator, 2015).”  Such a statement brings about the Non-Christian religions and makes then appear as if they are an empire of Satan . Alnuator further argues that in each state and at each moment, humans have the imperative craving to stray from the accurate path and become idolaters; the author describes this as a signal of the principle of original sin that thus affirms the utter truth of the Bible. It is solely the grace of God that can save humans from this unceasing act of mislaying religious truth, and according to Alnuator, God’s grace is rampant only in Christianity. This assertion deliberately establishes Christianity above all religions and portrays it as the savior of all. Conversely, Islam as a Non-Christian religion is classified as pagan and is desisted from establishing the correct way without the guidance of Christianity. This interpretation fortified cynical Islamic ideas and could be perceived as one of the preliminary stages leading to up-to-date Muslim position. With time this belief against other religions remodeled into a different theory .  

Ideally, the variation as the scenario of the empire of Satan switched to the incomplete truths. In that situation, Non-Christians were then visualized as those representing several imperfect religions, and their lacking virtues were considered testaments for the inevitability of the actual thing, or Christianity. This change of thought brought along the belief that it was inevitable for these religious traditions to face a breakdown somewhere along the road. These faiths, including Islam, were believed to be yearning for Christianity’s coming in order to complete them. As clearly seen, Non-Christian principles were quite highlighted for being contradictory to the Christian life. Such discrimination is extremely evident in Clarke’s division of the terminologies “catholic” versus “ethnic” (Alnuator,2015). This pair of terminologies “signifies the variance between the fundamentally widespread faiths (Christianity) and the inherently restricted, race explicit faiths (all the rest).” The aim of Clarke, in this discussion, similar to several additional Christian intellectuals of the time, was to institute and verify Christianity as the only religion, which had the coalescing supremacy and collective entreaty, and, subsequently, was the only one that deserved to attain the Absolute belief title. Associating to these ideas, Islam not only began to lose its significance it also began to acquire prejudices, like being an insufficient religion. It was scholars like Clarke Alnuator, and their studies, that prompted the academic discipline of comparative theology.

The significance and the ramifications of this new methodology cannot be stressed enough. Plunciska establishes a comparative theology, and through this discourse, he sought to “articulate a non-confessional, scientific, global, and systematic account of the undeniable diversity of religious history that presented itself to the western mind (Plucinska, 2015).” However, even though Pluinciska had pure intentions behind this discipline, of course, some scholars misused this method to fulfill their agendas. In fact, even before the official formation of this field of study, there were hints about its mistreatment. When Alanuator was advocating the study of different religious systems of the world in his writings, he displayed in the form of a series of ‘findings’ what the reader should anticipate with this method of examination (Alnuator, 2015):

“6.) Comparative theology will display the fact that whereas several the world religions are ethnic, or the religion of races, Christianity involves Catholic or altered to suit the status of the Religion of every Race.

7.) The cross-cultural comparison would be employed to raise questions about the core beliefs of so-called ‘orthodox’ Christians—the uniqueness of Christianity, and especially of the bible itself.

8.) Through a comparative Theology it is possible to indicate the arrest, degeneration and an ultimate end of the ethnic religions as opposed to the progressive advancement of a progressive Development.

The comparative theology that Muller constructed was very different from Clarke’s assumptions, but his predictions were not completely neglected because many religious scholars adapted Clarke’s conjectures over Muller’s phenomenon. For the scholars, the most important and enlightening consequence of this, ‘fair survey’ was that it testified to the truth of and universality of Christianity, alone among all others. Let us consider some ways the comparative theology was used by these scholars.

Some comparativists of the nineteenth century attempted to constitute the idea that all non-Christian religions are somehow “older religions.” This allowed the sole authority to be placed upon Christianity because the coming of Christianity mandatorily situated all other beliefs in the category of primitive traditions. The reason why these faiths still existed was either because of their lack of knowledge about the Gospel truth, or because of their stubborn attitudes towards Christianity, and unwillingness to welcome its truth. George Matheson was one of the authors who promoted this idea in his book, The Distinctive Message of the Old Religions. He wrote that Non-Christian religions have their origin in a much remoter past, and while they are long passed away, Christianity is still alive and green (Alnuator, 2015). These ideas are developed specifically in relation to religious beliefs dating prior to Christianity, but Islam is accepted to have originated after Christianity, so how are these theories relevant to Muslims? The fact that these authors attempted to consider the case of Islam only after receiving strong backlash is in itself an answer, which highlights the harsh reality of Muslims and their insignificance in the eyes of these Western scholars. Some scholars do not even attempt to explain this problem and choose to completely leave out Islam as if it had never existed. In respect to this deliberate avoidance, there is a consideration of Islam as a belief of lesser status than Heathen beliefs because those traditions are at least taken into consideration. In actual sense, during the early times, Judaism and Islam were considered worse as compared to any other religion due to the fact that despite being aware of the veracity they were intentionally rejecting a fact that was further dreadful than ordinary obliviousness. It terms of the intellectuals who elegantly take on the Islamic conflict, they only rearticulated the famous argument about Islam that was repeated countlessly during the nineteenth century. Plucinska indicates in his argument evidently in the book Mahommedanism through writing, “Christianity is an incarnate divine religion that adapts itself to every form of human life, and belief, and accomplishment. In Mahommedanism we do not have regenerative power; it is “of the letter, which killeth,”—unelastic, sterile, barren (Plucinska, 2015).” Basing on Cameron alongside other intellectuals that have had a mutually same judgment as Cameron, this “newer” faith was comparable to a dead religion during the period of its foundation. Contrastingly, to this faith, Christianity was acknowledged as the live and active religion. Such ideologies display the way in which comparative theology was quite critical and effectual for Muslim and its image.

In the 19th C, there was a type of scholarship, which assisted in the Christian invasion for authority to offer for philological study also known as the study of language. Masuzawa offers an amazingly good task through portrayal of the greatest consequence of language on religion in the book, The Invention of Religions. She reveals how conception of language fashioned the parodies of religions in the communal domain, particularly in the academic world (2005). In the tenacity of this study, I will only pay attention to what the Muslim faith earned because of this research. First, it was philological learning, which created a novel brand of division amongst people and nations by reference to language groups; the most proximately perilous in this situation was the difference between Indo-European (or Aryan) and Semitic language groups. The reason that made Christians give such inordinate concentration on the language study was correlated with the search for disentangling themselves from their Hebraic past. In the above argument, we declared several studies that relentlessly dishonored Heathen religions, alongside Judaism and Islam. Despite the fact that this was principally done for the advantage of Christianity, these prerogatives also postured a trick as Christianity was commonly regarded as standing on the same podium as Judaism and Islam, in the title Abrahamic religions. Respectively, the acts by researchers especially the demotion of Islam and Judaism could also result in a lot of undoing and impairment to Christianity. This ill-fated correspondence that could endanger the strived Christians’ stance demanded Christianity to detach itself from its ‘sibling’ faiths.

On Jones (1807), discovery of the close similarity between the ancient Persia and prehistoric Indian languages with the European classical languages, several Christian scholars became happy as such a thing was an incredible chance and resolution to ridding themselves off the Hebraic tag. As a serious Orientalist in India, Jones who had done an extensive study of the Sanskrit language found exquisiteness in it, and indicated that it was even better than Greek, and slightly bountiful compared to Latin (1807). He led the method of learning Indian literature, Sanskrit, and philology. He also undertook a study of the Indian classical literature, religious, legitimate, and literary matters. This also led the way for Europeans to study their own past and future. Jones (1807) instigated the upholding the wonderful structure of Sanskrit structure as well as the supported aspect in the fact that Greek and Latin enjoyed a sharing in the mutual source with this language group, but this common source may not exist now. This was essential since many in the 19Th C “an affinity between languages occasioned an affinity, immediacy, and possible affiliation between those individuals that spoke them.” Therefore it was a movement from what the language signified. European intellectuals took their scholarships a little auxiliary and initiated the search for a mutual ancestry associated with the Indian and Persian origin, and that is when the word “Aryan” first became approved by Europeans. In the first half of the 19Th C, the word “Aryan” was used to express a group of languages that were considered a family of sorts. Concurrently, when the Indo-Aryan language group was found, an equivalent of Semitic language clusters was also found that involved Hebrew, Arabic, and Aramaic language groups. This expansion instantaneously excluded Jews and Muslims from the Aryan, “whiteness” identity. Shortly after though, the word Aryan went from mentioning a given language cluster, and was gradually tied to the European’s national identity. Equally, the Semitic assemblage did not just remain a connotation for linguistic grouping. It also soon became documented in racial and ethnic terms. In respect to these outcomes, one can accomplish that the preliminary isolation between languages engendered and fueled race, ethnic, and religious discriminations.

I believe it is essential to the viewpoints of Berker (2009) and Humboldt (2015) on language as his ideologies assist to make clear as well as an illustration of the stereotypical impacts that were nurtured on Islam and Muslims, as an outcome of a learning of languages. Humboldt (2015) and Berker (2009) as a had various titles like being a Prussian minister, diplomat, visionary educational activist, as well as a typical intellectual, yet he is renown individual most for his brand as a world language student. His foremost intent was to hold a wide-ranging study of comparative philology, which he believed went far beyond language and race. There was a spiritual inspiration in his comparative study of languages.

“The dissection of men into peoples and races and the multiplicity of their languages and dialects are indeed directly linked with one another, yet are also related with, and reliant on, a third and higher phenomenon, the growth of mental powers of man into ever new and habitually more preeminent forms…This revelation of mental powers of man, dissimilar in its grade and nature, over the sequence of millennia and all over the world, is the uppermost aim of all divine endeavor, the eventual aspect that world history ought to attempt to bring forward evidently for itself..”

Humboldt (2015) had a sincere belief that there was a direct association between the linguistic study and the destiny of the world history and ultimate human race. Humboldt himself states, “The comparative study of languages…loses all sophisticated concern if it does not cleave to the point at which language is related with the modeling of the mental power of a nation.” Based on Berker (2009) thoughts, language differences were similar to the racial and individualistic differences and by means these differences, one can differentiate and take a measure of a nation’s or group’s status. Language is also allied with intelligence capacity, intellectual aptitude, and viewed to be a countenance of an intrinsic potential and intelligence of a nation. Somehow, language developed into a central factor of the categorized directive among states, people, ethnicities, and faiths. This idea becomes a very pivotal factor in founding the role of Muslim religion in the society and the world at large.

Humboldt and Alnuator avow three distinct language collections, the Sanskrit, the Semitic, and the Chinese families. He institutes the leading group, the Sanskritic family that the Christian language is concomitant with, as a flawless language group. “This extraordinary approximation of the Sanskrit family and the affiliated disparagement of non-Indo-European languages lead to a self-glorification of contemporary Europe (Alnuator, 2015).” Humboldt indicates that neither science nor development is the limited aspect in making determination of the individual classification. This is because according to him, the solitary component is language; hence the Muslim religion takes the very difficult and lesser spot. In the words of Humboldt and for clarification purposes in a more efficient manner he says:

“In the historical question about the nations the inquiry might as well have been to whatever could have occurred in the world when Carthage (a Semitic state) had overpowered Rome and subjugated the European West. One might equally well ask what the present state of our culture would be if the Arabs (a Semitic race) had remained, as it was for quite some period, the main owner of the scientific knowledge, and had dispersed in the whole of the Western world. A consequence that seemed less favorable to me, in both cases, beyond doubt, is to the same causes that fashioned the Rome’s world-dominance , specifically the Roman spirit and character rather than to peripheral and more inadvertent conditions, that we owe the prevailing impact of this world-dominion upon our civil establishments, laws, language, and culture. In a shift towards such a culture, and through internal kinship, we developed honorably and received the Greek mind as well as language, whereas the Arabs did mere adherence, broadly to the methodical outcomes of Greek investigation. Even on the base of the same traditional heritage, they could not have been able to build the edifice of science and art that we might impartially assertion today (Alaneme et. al, 2015).”

Anti-Muslim polemics and scholars of religious worked are connected in several ways; however distinct they may be (Baruma, 2004). If consideration is given to Benard Lewis as a scholar through a series of articles, books and commentaries, there is an exposure of

Lewis, fom Babel to Dragomans indicated that the West should not even bother with the Middle East because no matter what good information they offer it is discredited just because of who they are and even attempts to democratize it may not be seen a positive and may not be necessary.According to Baruma (2004) Lewis indicates that the West would rather leave the Arabs or the people of Islamic states to overthrow a leader and have another than impose democracy because as a result of the past history the appreciation in their suffering assistance might not be realized. Besides, A scholar Rashid Khalid feels that even though the Arab’s would want to do away with Sadam Hussein, the involvement of America in such a war builds up a feeling that they should not meddle in Middle East matters that is seen as imperialism or some sought of colonialism. Thus, though one is a scholar and the other an anti-Muslim polemic, they both show the political agenda in the Muslim and West relationship and thought is. For instance one sees Muslim religion as one of the greatest religion that has brought comfort and peace in the minds pf those involved in it. It is a religion that has made the improvised, less dignified and distinct races he need to live as one and help one another as it inspires communal life. Nonetheless, Christians have explicitly shown double standards when they gain interest in t e violence progressed by Israelites against Arabs unlike when such brutality happens in the world to people of similar religions. Lewis as a scholar analyses the history of maters and indicate that imperialism, interventions and oppressions of the West were political failings unlike the Middle Est messes, which have a grander cause. Lewis also notes that the Muslim rage cam to existence when earlier one Muslims had been trying to conquer nations and having won few believed they are superior than any either religion. Nonetheless, when they were beaten by the rampant West though Hitler, Marxism. Fascism and National Socialism they were so humiliated and tried to revere the situation unsuccessfully. Thus, the modern revolutionary that was built by non -Muslims used Islamic radicalism to request others to join them because Islamic revolutions and crush were non ethnic. Besides, the Muslims hated changes in their culture, that was brought by the Western religions and invasion through rock, roll, nikes and sex that is why Islamic fundamentalism is on the rise to maintain their dignity, beliefs and aspirations. Scholars visualize the Muslim radicalism and hatred of the West as a common aspect that had happened to other masses already and toe are fundamentalist leaders such as German Romanticism that reacted to French enlightenment in armed force application, the 19t C Slavophiles resistance against modern ideas of the Western countries and German fascist denunciation of Americanism as well as the Japan holy war against West in 40s. According to Lewis seems to sympathies with the Israelites, take them as more civilized, democratic because of being a Western student who has oriented himself to civilization. Moreover, with such a love he might be better and impatient when he sees the realist failing to conform to the ideal for he visualizes the democratic state arising in Iran.

In addition, Koechler (1996) notes the history of civilization exposes a disparity in the cultural influences of the Islam and the Chritian life.While in essence Islam started in the 5Th C and helped shape development and culture in the world as compared to Christianity that later replaced it, with time it has not been appreciated that this happened (Koechler,1996). Arab philosophers and schools built the intelectual skills, the poliical life until Eurpean doctrineturned Islam an outside epitome. Dogma disparities, social rules, lifestyle and the dominion of missionaries to study and write about Islam made Islam appear as an apologeitic and a greatly polemical process making Christianity appear superior that gave this religion a bad image to data now known as orientalism. Koechler (1996) notes that with this, Muslims and Christian have never been one and they are critical to one another. The two religions waged war on each other and hostilitythe oder of the day. Today, Islam is seen as a threat on the secirity of nternational world that causes the Arab-Israeli clashes. If there is a basic theological truth as aell as a structural similarity in these religions then the political, socil and cultural elucidation is possible in reviving the relations between Muslims and Christians.

Another analysis of the scholars of Orientalism, note that an individual who ignores Arab scholarship or that who neglects it exposes a fact that he/she is against the Muslim while that who considers it is supporter /defender of the Arabs. Some scholars like Lewis are considered as individuals who distort the truth by , a scholar who thinks Orientalism deals with Islam and Arabs as a learned subject comparable with classical philology yet in his two way; the feeling that with an innocent and enthusiastic status, the Islamic Orientalism would be better. On the other hand, he feels it is compound with diverse technical data a mechanism that suppresses a great volume of history.

According to Said & Grabar (1982), the argument that the interest of the West in Islam was due to the fear of the rise of a religion that is monotheist, in the cultural and military way that it rivals Christianity. In this analysis Said & Grabar (1982), show that from long ago scholars as well as non-scholars looked at Islam as a segment of the world, Orient, counterpart that is geographically and historically against Europe and the West. Besides, scholars justify their stereotype of Islamic sensuality, cruelty, degradation, splendor, fatalism and Sloth; so do VS Naipaul and John Buchan find themselves in some Orientalism (Said & Grabar,1982).On the other hand, there are scholars as Lewis who try to suggest how evil the West is and hypocritically suppress deny or distort the culture, politics, ideologies as well as the institutional contexts of the religions he thinks, writes and talks about as the Orient, thus offering inaccurate, ignoring or having a tendentious evaluation of such a religion.

In another analysis on Muslim and Christian spread, it is a fact that in the 18th C there was a degeneration and preclusion to European dynasty in Egypt and other nations hence a decline in Islam’s earlier power’s. Here them Christianity would be blamed for if Islam held to those nations they might have restructured though later Sufism was blamed as a cause of the failure of such nations.

In the evaluation of his kind it is possible for one to question the way in which the religious perception could be reinforced with reference to its language. In addition, it would be essential to ask the appropriate language that builds religion because the reality is situated in the very nature of the individual languages that stands in the grammatical structure of language. According to Humboldt and his theory of language, the character and spirit of the Semitic language are rigid, fixed, and inimical to growth, development, and becoming an accomplished culture. In comparison, the Sanskritic family is the exact opposite, and carries the characteristics that are absent, and can never be obtained by the Semitic language family because its grammatical form is different. The Sanskrit language results from inflection, and what this means is that there is a root word that evolves outward which brings about its syntactical capacities out of its own fundamental existence. In other words, the development occurs from within allowing the roots, or proto-words, to prosper into linguistic units that are able to form syntax. This syntactic ability is extremely momentous for our argument because it is this qualification of Sanskrit language that placed Indo-European religions especially Christianity, at a higher level than other religions. Humboldt puts forward the argument that since the development of inflection is an inherent self-progression of the root, its blooming is free and productive, but it remains true to its origin. Now that the development process is believed to follow its own roots this grammatical form becomes acknowledged as rational. This is probably what influenced Humboldt to asset inflection as the most authentic and perfect language formation. Since inflection is recognized as the impeccable configuration, this means there are other linguistic forms that are seen as inadequate and insufficient. Referring to the grammatical formations of these languages is important because as mentioned earlier, language becomes associated with the intellectual ability of races, ethnicities, and religions.

The alternative language group, which did not have the inner developmental characteristics of inflection, was referred to as agglutination. This latter method of language formation derived from the Latin word agglutinate, which literally meant to glue together. As the Latin definition explains, in agglutination root words are elaborated to form a synthetic language. What this means is that there is a particular root word and additional exterior components or particles manually are attached to this proto-word, but this is done in a particular order, which allows the words to have certain syntax. This type of grammatical form is associated with the Chinese language and is perceived to be on the opposite spectrum of Sanskrit family language. Then where does the Semitic language stand? As reported by Humboldt, the Semitic language family is positioned between the two opposite poles, which represents all other language groups outside of Chinese and Sanskrit, and is labeled delimited inflection. I think the name Humboldt coined the Semitic languages grammatical formation is very meaningful, and believe it pertains deeper message. Similar to the situation when Jews and Muslims were considered to be in greater sin, in contrast to the pagans, because they were believed to consciously and voluntarily reject the truth administered by Christianity, the delimited inflection formation was also regarded in a lesser state than agglutination, even though it was more akin to inflection. Naming the grammatical form ‘delimited’ inflection instead of giving it a distinct label like agglutination, in my opinion, is a very smart move because it relays the message that Semitics can never have their own entity, and that they and everything associated with them like people, races, and religions, will always be considered inferior to “inflection.” It also delivers the notice that without any affiliation with inflection related matters the delimited inflection associates will never have any significance, or deserve any attention.

August Wilhelm Schlegel, a German essayist who is considered one of the founding fathers of the German Romantic Movement, had an outstanding knowledge of foreign languages, which made him a decisive figure in the early development of comparative language and modern linguistics. He is the one that inaugurated the domain of Sanskrit studies in Germany, which is why I want to touch up on some of his theories and remarks about the language groups and use those ideas to support my claims that were made in the previous paragraph. Schlegel says,

“The Chinese present remarkable instance of a language almost without inflection, every necessary modification being expressed by the separate monosyllabic words, each has an independent signification. The extraordinary monosyllabic form and perfect simplicity of this construction make the consideration of it important as facilitating the comprehension of other religions (Plucinska, 2015).”

Before going any further, I just want to bring into attention the adjectives that were used while mentioning the agglutination language group: remarkable, extraordinary, and perfect. Even though Masuzawa (2005) conveys her uncertainty about the Semitic language family’s stance during the 19th century, I think this report of Schlegel clearly demonstrates its standpoint and proves my opinion about delimited inflection being seen as the bottom formation below inflection, as well as agglutination. This position might cause confusion because on the surface one might expect the mixed and compromised grammatical formation of the Semitic languages to rank higher than the agglutination languages in the scale of linguistics excellence, maybe even higher than the inflection languages. However, this was not the case because these positive factors were not the ones that received attention. What kept being repeated was the so-called rigidity and stunted growth of the Semitic languages, which implied that these languages were in fact constrained and were not able to develop in direction, inflection, or agglutination, and as a result, they were inherently unable to evolve or refine. It is very clear that these European scholars concentrated solely on administering a distinction between languages with full inflection and those with limited inflection, rather than focusing on the relative value between inflection and agglutination.

To return to our main argument, the notable point in all these arguments and point of views regarding language study is the 19th-century Christian scholars strive for superiority. Moreover, this drive for superiority “seems to lead not so much to a disdain for the people's speaking agglutination language but instead to a peculiarly pointed and dismissive judgment against the Semites, and against the Arabs in particular.” For the people of the nineteenth century, and most likely to people in the centuries to come, the rigid impression of Semitic language structure directly corresponded with the Semites intellectual inflexibility and their ‘limited’ mental capacity. According to people with these perceptions, Semitic people did not have the competency to generate original ideas on their own because they did not possess the internal power of creativity apparent in Sanskritic people. Moreover, the ideas they ‘borrowed’ could never flourish or advance because in the end whatever fell in the hands of the Semites was bound to deteriorate. All of these suppositions gained validity with the division of language, which actually inferred the division of races, based on terms of differences in intellectual, mental, and spiritual qualities rather than in bodily features. Today’s scholars and the general community would not accept this sort of direct correlation between the nature of syntax and the cultural character of a population or their religious inclinations as a reasonable and rational judgment. However, regardless of what we might think about such theories today, it apparently became suitable, even inevitable to represent the religion of Semites, especially Islam, in the shadow of an overpowering predisposition that asserted their fundamental inflexibility, which emanated from, and was evidently reflected, in their language. For that reason, despite how impressive and grand worldwide spread it achieved, Islam was constantly overlooked because most deemed it to be essentially rigid, perpetually intolerant and restrictive, extremely idealist, with an innate habit toward fanaticism.

Certainly, it was this perception of Islam that significantly altered the image of Muslims, whom just couple centuries before were regarded as the most advanced and elite group of people. Part of the reason for this is also linked to the fact that all Muslims were generalized and perceived to be Arabs or Semitic language speakers when in reality majority of the Muslim population was made up of non-Arab affiliates. Unfortunately, this dilemma continues to be prevalent in our own time, but in more severe and strident conditions because the quintessential Semite resonates disturbingly with the figure of Muslim extremists that turn into Arab terrorists. All the subjects that have been mentioned call attention to the negative connotations the Semites, who were recast as prototypically Arab Muslims, have obtained throughout the developing religious discourse. As a result, in the course of the nineteenth century, Islam obtained a new aloneness because the rule of Islam, and Muslims in general, were now moderated and influenced to be viewed unsympathetically as stunted, rigid, and narrow. They were also perceived as the most eccentric of the “old” religions, which provided more reason for them to be recognized as irrational and anomalous. “If such fire-and-brimstone holy outrage was the defining characteristic of Semitic religion, it would seem highly unlikely that this hypercritical force, with an altogether negative, unpromising prospect for a career in constructive history, should have come to play an essential role, perhaps the greatest part ever, on the world historical stage (Alnuator, 2015).”

In order to portray the lasting effects of the nineteenth-century developments, I want to briefly compare sections of writings of two scholars : Plucinska n, who wrote an article, and Gertz, who is an active writer in our current period. Plucinska writings mainly dealt with tracing the roots of Christianity back to the Hebrew prophets with the intention of getting rid of criticisms that were downgrading Christianity’s position. How can one go about glorifying Christianity without denouncing Islam? Plucinska was, in fact, one of these scholars, maybe a little bit unique because his writings also “rescued” the status of Jews and Buddhists. However, in contradiction to these religious traditions, Islam represented an instance of deterioration and reversion from the beginning. The first section of his book, National Religion and Universal Religion , Plucinska deals only with Islam and tries to answer questions like, is Islam a universal religion. In fact, Kuenen’s main argument against Islam was about its consideration for being a universal religion. During this period, the concept of world religions had emerged and there was constant debate about which religions were qualified for this title. One of the central principles of criteria was a religious extension span, and even though Islam had an undeniably vast expansion, Plucinska asserted that this was not evidence for its intrinsic universalism. According to Küng (2005), it only signified its hypocrisy, its violence, and the danger it continued to pose to the rest of the world .

He also expressed Muhammedans as perpetrators of “fanaticism, constantly fired by colonists of Arabia and by pilgrims returning from Mekka, infectious too, like all fanaticism, which by its very nature, might lay hold of the masses of the population, and certainly makes them very dangerous subjects. But this infectiousness of the political idea of Islam is not proof of its spiritual supremacy (Gertz,2016).” The unfavorable reality of Islam, endangering and infecting the whole world, is once again ascribed to the intolerance of its founder and to the Arab line, for, in Gertz’s opinion, “the Arabic nation was not the cradle but the boundary wall of Islam (Gertz, 2016).” In summary, for Plucinska Islam is a religion of fear, not of love. It is regarded to be one of the so-called universalistic religions because of its authoritative spread to mostly inferior civilizations. However, in the eyes of Plucinska, this universalistic view on Islam is false; Islam only has the ability to be the national religion. Abraham Plucinska’s article once again demonstrates and confirms Islam’s perception as the perfect example of fanaticism, intolerance, and confined strictness during the nineteenth century. “It may be added that, despite better, far more extensive scholarship on Islam available today, little had changed about this image (Plucinska, 2015).”

Appleby and his writings are a perfect example of these persisting stereotypical perceptions of Islam. Even though he denies having an ulterior motive in his studies, I do not agree with this statement because he has a similar anti-Islamic tone like Plucinska and most of the nineteenth-century scholars. Almost in every section of his books, one can see reminisces of the prejudices about Islam that were intellectualized in the nineteenth century, like Islam being an intolerant, narrow, and lacking religion. However, he mainly emphasizes the idea of Islam being a violent religion (Alaneme , 2015). The titles of his books are enough evidence of this priority: Onward Muslim Soldiers: How Jihad Still Threatens America and the West, Religion of Peace? Why Christianity is and Islam is not, Not Peace but a Sword: The Great Chasm between Christianity and Islam, and Stealth Jihad: How Radical Islam is Subverting America without Guns or Bombs. The list goes on. One can estimate the material dealt in these books, which have such Islamophobic titles. Due to the advancements of academia, Spencer refrains from making general accusations of all Muslims, but what he covertly generalizes like most scholars in the nineteenth century, is the idea that all Muslims are Arabs. Similarly, to Kuenen, he also severely attacks and denounces Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), and portrays him as one the major factors for Islam’s fierce and rigid presence. He accuses Islamic scholars of ignoring Qur’anic versus and hadith’s that deal with waging religious warfare, but he himself performs a similar mistake, and only focuses on the small portion of verses and sayings that involve violence and ignores the big portion that advocates peace and justice (Küng, 2005). One of the famous hadiths of the Prophet that he includes in the majority of his books is, “Fight in the name of Allah and in the way of Allah. Fight against those who disbelieve in Allah. Make a holy war…If they refuse to pay the tax, seek Allah’s help, and fight them (Institute for Economics and Peace, 2015).” Unlike the anti-Islamic scholars of the past, Spencer refers quite a lot to the religious texts of Muslims, but I would label his references as reductionist because he neglects to mention the contexts of the quotes he chooses, which opens the way for misinterpretations, which I think is his aim.

I perceive his immense number of books as an extension and more detailed explanation of the agendas of previous scholars. For instance, Abraham Kuenen briefly mentions his opinion of Islam being a religion of fear rather than love. Robert Spencer takes this modest implication and elaborates it in almost all his books. He dedicates one whole book to support this supposition; Religion of Peace? Why Christianity is and Islam is not. After supporting his argument with evidence that he clearly nit-picks, he comes to a similar conclusion as Kuenen, “Christianity is a religion of peace, and it is a religion without jihadist movement. Islam is a religion of the sword and there are, by even the most conservative estimates, more than one hundred million active jihadists seeking to impose sharia not only in the Islamic world but in Europe and ultimately in the United States (Institute for Economics and Peace, 2015).” As this quote hints, a theme that was not active in the nineteenth century was imposing fear in people against the “other,” in this case against Islam. Whether it is a new theme or a former theme, they are all used for the same purpose and that is to authorize Christian superiority. Even though, the methods used differ this ambition continues to exist and, most likely, is what still affects stereotypical outlooks on Islam. For example, when Spencer graciously attempts to prove his objectivity by tackling violent Christians that were involved in the Crusades, he delicately protects the superiority of Christianity by putting the blame on Muslims. First, he excuses the brutality of the Crusades by mentioning that it was “equivalent to contemporary Islamic jihad violence (Iftkhar, 2016)” and later blames the Muslims for the violent actions of the Christians. “Of course, the Crusades were a late and small-scale reaction to Islamic jihad conquests that arose four hundred and fifty years afore the First Crusade and speechless that had been up to the time of downfalls over half of Christendom (Institute for Economics and Peace, 2015).” It is extremely apparent that even though two centuries have passed, the negative and damaging effects of the nineteenth-century scholarship continues to live on.

Two more authors whose books contain Islamophobic accusations are Danny and Saraswati and Wafa Sultan. In the nineteenth century, Dayanand Saraswati in his book entitled Satyarth Prakash (The Light of Truth), published in 1875 has Islamophobic accusations within its context. Dayanand Saraswati described the concept of Islam as highly offensive while also doubting if there is any connection between Islam and God. In the fourteenth chapter of the book, there is the criticism of Quran based on the teachings of Quran itself. He broadly attacked the Quran terming it unsuitable due to its teachings that according to him are misleading.

Saraswati questioned the Mohammedan’ claim that God is merciful by stating that He approved that man should cause great suffering to others. He indicated that it was clear that Mohammedans usually began evil deeds in the name of God. Moreover, Saraswati claimed that the Muslims are intolerant towards Non-Muslims. If the God of the Quran had been merciful, the Mohammedans could not have slaughtered men of other faiths. Saraswati continued to question the credibility of Quran by indicating that the Allah actions were more devilish than godly. The book through its author questions Muslims’ religion by doubting if the Allah is in all places why Muslims only face Mecca. Lack of the understanding towards the Muslim beliefs causes the author to question their religion. Questioning the faith of the Muslims is one way the author facilitate the Islam phobic accusations.

In the same book, the author goes on and accuses Muslims of being idol worshippers. Saraswati accuses the Muslims of slaying non-Muslims and other animals on the basis that it is on Allah’s path. He continued to say that the Muslims should just accept their slaying of others is just for selfish gains. Since the author is a Hindu, he accuses the Muslims of copying the act of fasting from Hinduism. The author indicates that Muslims lose their political supremacy for the cause of Allah in their fight. He suggested that if Quran had no such teachings, the Mohammedans would not adopt their cruel ways towards the non-Mohammedans. Besides, he said that the Muslim religion teaches cruelty towards non-Muslims. According to him, this cruelty shows that Quran is not the Word of God and God is not described as the true God in the Quran.

Saraswati accuses the Muslims of being embodiments of bigotry and ignorance. He continued by adding that it appeared that the heart of Mohammed is not pure and the Quran was made to cater for his selfish interests. In addition to his attacks, the Saraswati described Muhammad as an imposter by saying that he pretended to have received a revelation and messages from God. In his word, the author accuses Muhammad of resorting to this device as a way of defeating his opponents while increasing his reputation. In addition, Muhammad had baits for the ignorant such as men and women who he uses for his selfish gains. All these are Islamophobic accusations in this book.

Saraswati accuses the Muslims of delaying the administration of justice where he indicates that there are many incidents of lack of justice. However, the author failed to show with evidence where justice was not administered according and thus his claims remain mere accusations. Another thing from the author is that he believed that believers of the Quran are illiterate. This a baseless accusation because many Muslims who are literate as opposed to what Saraswati read the Quran said.

According to Saraswati, the Quran disturbs the peace of the world as it fosters discord25. This cannot be true as it teaches peace and harmony among all people. The author condemns the act of forbidding the drinking of alcohol on earth while in paradise there are streams of wine flow. The author attacks the Muslims’ beliefs without having facts and understanding of the Islamic religion.

In the next book, Wafa Sultan is an author of a book entitled A God Who Hates published in 2009 that criticizes the Muslims on many counts of things. She starts by suggesting that the Muslims would condemn her to death when they read her book. She continues by saying that Muslims may not read the book, but the title alone is enough for them to condemn her as that is how things are with them. Her accusations continue when she says that Muslims are more interested in disagreements than rapprochement trying to cause fear in others who disagree. This is a mere accusation as it is not true with all Muslims and maybe what she refers is only a minority group.

In the second chapter, she addresses the women of Islam where she gives her story of how she changed due to her appetite for reading almost every book that came to her site. This according to Wafa Sultan helped her see the oppression that Muslims causes the women because they are not allowed to make a decision about their life. The situation is very different from what the author has in her book on the fate of Islamic women.

In the fourth chapter, Wafa Sultan while in U.S. says that Muslims’ motive is to cause harm to others. She gives an example of an Islamic friend she met in U.S. who was not willing to take care of environment just because it is not her country. Her friend said Americans were intentionally spreading AIDS in Islamic countries and thus she hates them. Wafa Sultan weary of listening to her friend silences her in defense of Americans. The author blames the philosophy of her friend to the Islamic religion as a motivating factor in causing harm to others. She goes on saying that Muslims talk raiding, dress raiding, eat raiding, and drive their vehicles like Raiders. In this case, by giving an example of her friend, she unfairly generalizes the idea of one person to that of all Muslims.

To try to strengthen her accusations, she says that Muslim preachers preach using shouts and gestures that demonstrate the art of raiding. Back to her days in her homeland in Syria, she says that there was noise pollution caused by loudspeakers in the mosques that were too close to their houses. In addition to what she refers to the noise from the mosques, she says that she was struggling to cope with, as it was irritating to her ears. She confirms that she was happy having parted company with what she refers to the culture of shouting and raiding. What she believes is that no two Muslims can talk without their conservation changing into confrontation within minutes especially when they disagree. She also says that Muslims have trouble understanding someone’s point of view when you talk in a low calm voice as we think we have lost the argument. Here, the author goes beyond the limits by leveling such an accusation.

In chapter five, Wafa Sultan says due to fear, of course, men mistreat women. She goes on explaining according to her how men lack respect for women even for those she refers as literate believe women are dirty. To her when Islamic man treats a woman with respect, he is considered weak and this according to Wafa Sultan is the situation that frustrated her so much. Women being exploited in the workforce were not her main concern as compared to the sexual abuse they suffered. She compares her life in Syria to that in U.S. and says that people are more respectful. In general, Muslims are known for the respect they have and such claims just confirms the Islamophobic accusations.

In chapter eight, Wafa Sultan accuses Islam of not attaching any value to the childhood stating that a child is a property of his father and can do whatever he wants. She continues to lay her accusations by saying that a Muslim child has no rights. Furthermore, says that Muslim education is mainly focused on convincing the child of the need for blind obedience to the parents. She criticizes the marriages in the Muslim societies. In refuting the author’s claims, Muslim children are not taught on many vital issues that help in shaping their lives.

In chapter nine, Wafa Sultan describes Islam as a Sealed Flask that in itself shows the extent of the lack of respect she has to the Muslims. She says that Islam has denied its followers’ fundamental freedom of expression. She continues to say that Muslim society lives in slavery, as the culture has been cultivated with violence at all levels (Küng, 2005). She attacks the Koran describing it as being unable to distinguish between force and power concepts saying the Muslims believe in force representing violence instead of power that represent peace.

In the tenth chapter of this book, Wafa Sultan describes Islam as a closed market as it rejects the laws of supply and demand and the principle of excellence. Wafa Sultan says that the terrorist attacks shocked her but did not surprise her because Muslims according to her are capable of such damages. The fact that the Al Qaeda carried the attacks does not mean that all Muslims support terrorism. Many Muslims promote peace among all people.

In this paper, I tried to outline some components in history, specifically factors that occurred during the 19th century, which led to the establishment of contemporary stereotypes about Islam. Earlier Christians could just assume their own superiority, but modern secularism implies that all religions are created equal. This change in society generated different responses in the 1900s, one being the arguments of people such as Goodrich, who stated Christianity, may be one religion among many, but it is the only good one. Another response, which was even better for the western superiority complex, was the invention of "Religious Studies,” and the precise way in which that invention maintained the superiority of Christianity in a scientific guise. The establishment of comparative theology and the study of philology were other factors that were biased by a desire to prove the superiority of Europeans and/or Christians. All of these responses came out of Western context and was, therefore, alien to rest of the world. This resulted in the stereotyping of Semitic languages and Semitic peoples, including Muslims. This was a great change in perception because just a couple centuries before Islamic culture was recognized as advanced, civilized, and modern. To portray the lasting effects of the nineteenth-century developments, the two scholars Abraham Kuenen and Dayanand Saraswati had similarly biased perceptions of Islam within their texts; it is rigid, outdated, intolerant, and violent. The same is with the other two authors Robert Spencer and Wafa Sultan who represent this century.

In conclusion, I do believe there are adequate results that can be obtained about the effects of 19th-century studies on not just Islam, but all religions. In this paper, I have suggested one possible way of reading this material, and have opened an interesting topic of discussion. It is a fact that a new scholar might have either a positive or negative impression of the varied religions depending on the scholars he/she will affiliate with or research from in the course of the study. Through this research, I was partly able to answer a very intriguing question of mine concerning negative perceptions on Islam. Now I am left with an even harder question, and that is how should 21st-century scholarship go about to annihilate these bias views within the academic field?

References

Alaneme, J. C. (2015). Islamic State of Iraq and Syria – A Threat to Global Peace and Security. IOSR Journal of Business and Management, 17(1), 45-49. Retrieved from http://iosrjournals.org/iosr-jbm/papers/Vol17-issue1/Version-3/H017134549.pdf

Alnuator, O. (12/09/2015). Muslims Are Not Terrorists: A Factual Look at Terrorism and Islam .

Baruma, I. (2004). The two minds of Bernard Lewis. Retrieved fromhttp://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/06/14/lost-in-translation-3

Berker, A.D. (2009). Martyrdom, Religious Difference, and “Fear” as a Category of Piety in the Sasanian Empire: The Case of the Martyrdom of Gregory and the Martyrdom of Yazdpaneh. Journal of Late Antiquity 2.2 (Fall): 300–336.The Johns Hopkins University Press Retrieved fromhttp://liberalarts.utexas.edu/rs/_files/pdf/MatterOfContention/Becker.pdf

Gertz, B. (June 3, 2016). Islamic State Threatens Terror Attacks in U.S., Europe. http://freebeacon.com/national-security/islamic-state-threatens-terror-attacks-u-s-europe/

Said, E. &. Grabar, O. (1982). Orientalism: An Exchange.Retrieved from http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1982/08/12/orientalism-an-exchange/

Gulen, M. F. (2009). The messenger of God-Muhammed: An analysis of the prophet's life. 1-365. Retrieved romhttp://krishnamurti.abundanthope.org/index_htm_files/The-Messenger-of-God-Muhammad-An-Analysis-of-the-Prophets-Life.pdf

Humboldt, W. and Peter H. On Language: The Diversity of Human Language-structure and Its Influence on the Mental Development of Mankind. Cambridge [Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1988

Iftkhar, A. (May, 23,2016). How Anti-Muslim Attacks Damage America. The Aerican Prospect. http://prospect.org/article/how-anti-muslim-attacks-damage-america Retrieved fromhttp://prospect.org/article/how-anti-muslim-attacks-damage-america

Institute for Economics and Peace. (2015). A global statistical analysis of the empirical link between peace and religion. 1-38.Retrieved from http://economicsandpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Peace-and-Religion-Report.pdf

Jones, W. (1807).The Works of Sir William Jones. London: Printed for J. Stockdale and J. Walker.

Koechler, H. (1996). The history of Islamic-Christian relations in Europe: cultural interactionversus political-ideological confrontation. Retrieved from http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1982/08/12/orientalism-an-exchange/

Küng, H. (2005). Religion, violence and 'holy wars'. Internationsl Review of the Red Cross, 87(858), 253-269.

Malle, B. F. (2002). The relation between language and theory of mind in development and evolution. (T. G. Malle, Ed.) The evolution of language out of pre-language, pp. 265-284. Retrieved fromhttp://cogprints.org/3317/1/Evol_of_language_%26_ToM.pdf

Masuzawa, T. (2005).The Invention of World Religions, Or, How European Universalism Was Preserved in the Language of Pluralism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Nguyen, M. (2010). Causes of ethnic conflicts: examining the role of religious diversity and contagion effects. 1-20. Retrieved fromhttps://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/e825/8d5dd94fd090e11d57a1356c3ecc3729609c.pdf

Plucinska, J. (24, July, 2015). Study says white extremists have killed more americans in the U.S. than Jihadists Since 9/11Retrieved from http://time.com/3934980/right-wing-extremists-white-terrorism-islamist-jihadi-dangerous/

Purzycki, B.G. & Gibson, K. (2011). Religion and violence: The antropological study of religious belief and violent behavoiur. Skeptic Magazine, 16(2), 22-29. Retrieved fromhttps://bgpurzycki.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/6d50eeb7d01.pdf

Shadidi, W & Koningsveld, P.S.V. (2002). The negative image of islam and muslims in the West: causes and solutions. 1-23. Retrieved fromhttp://www.interculturelecommunicatie.com/download/image.pdf