Friday, September 25, 2015

Islam and fatalism: back to the old cliche

Oh, please. Let us not go back to one of the oldest Orientalist cliches about Islam and fatalism.  To all those who are ignorant as this writer, I highly recommend the book by British Orientalist, W.M. Watt Free Will and Predestination in Early Islam. It is still a classic study of the subject and hows the various debate in Islam on the matter and that the texts of Islam are far from being unified about the matter. As for the cultural references like "God is willing" this is the silliest evidence of the assumption.  Netanyahu and other Israeli ministers also use that expression in Hebrew regularly.