On Clash, Morality, Renaissance and Dialogue

by Judea Pearl

Chapter from After Terror: From Clash of Civilizations to Dialogue, Akbar Ahmed and Brian Forst editors, Polity Press, Winter 2005.

In his speech of April 15, 2004, President George Bush linked the murder of my son, Daniel Pearl, to a global "ideology of murder." "The terrorist who takes hostages, or plants a roadside bomb near Baghdad" said Bush "is serving the same ideology of murder that kills innocent people on trains in Madrid, and murders children on buses in Jerusalem, and blows up a nightclub in Bali, and cuts the throat of a young reporter for being a Jew.

A week later, while engaging in a Jewish-Muslim dialogue in Williamsburg, Virginia, the first question reporters asked me was: "What is your reaction to the President's mention of your son?" My answer was:
"I agree with the President's observation that Daniel's tragedy is pivotal for understanding the current tide of madness." However, I consider Danny's legacy as a communicator and bridge builder to be equally pivotal in inspiring and revitalizing East/West dialogues, an effort to which I am devoting my energies.

The wave of violence now rocking the planet is of a fundamentally different character than anything this planet has known in the past few centuries. For the first time in recent history a friendly messenger is killed by calculated design, in front of millions of spectators, for the sheer purpose of transmitting a message to those it deems its enemies.

True, planet earth has known cruelty before, and on a much greater scale. Yet even the Nazis labored to hide their gruesome deeds, thus unveiling some inkling of shame, doubt or fear. Daniel's murderers, in shocking contrast, boasted openly in their cruelty, totally secured in faith and righteousness, triumphantly expecting spectators to rally in sympathy. More shocking yet, many of their spectators did rally in sympathy (according to reports from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia) and, as the recent murders of Nicholas Berg and Fabrizio Quattrocchi indicate, message-transmission killing has become an increasingly acceptable practice in certain parts of the world.

Such brazen assault on the sanctity of human life marks a profound transgression in the evolution of human civilization, and we must ask ourselves what the origin of this transgression is, and whether it can be isolated, understood and controlled.

I used to believe that, in its core, the current global conflict reflects a clash between two camps, one inclusive, embracing those who are respectful of differences among cultures and viewpoints, the other exclusive, for those intolerant to such differences. I had this distinction in mind when I wrote "we must galvanize people along a new frontier, one defined not along national or religious lines but along lines of decency and understanding." (I am Jewish, Jewish Lights Publishing, 2004, page xxv).

But this inclusive/exclusive distinction (or compassionate versus judgmental, as it is sometimes called) is flawed with incurable contradictions -- it cannot serve as the sole basis for moral preference. The contradictions belong to a family of logical paradoxes investigated by Bertrand Russell in 1903 (The Principles of Mathematics, Cambridge, 1903), which is endemic of self-referential criteria.

Imagine a person who proclaims himself "inclusivist". Naturally, that person would view himself as part of the inclusive camp, to the exclusion of the opposite camp, comprised of exclusivists. But this very view is inherently exclusive, us versus them, which immediately puts that person back into the exclusive category, in blatant contradiction of our starting premise.

Russell's paradox cannot be brushed aside as an academic exercise in sophistry. Its power caught my attention in a pertinent discussion with a Pakistani friend who stated that he cannot stand people like President Bush who take an "us versus them" attitude. I pointed out to my friend that by excluding himself from the "us-versus-them" camp he is in fact positioning himself in the very same "us-versus-them" camp that he loathes so intensely.

The lesson of Russell's paradox is that one simply cannot be inclusive all the way; even the most accommodating and compassionate person must reject certain ideologies without losing the moral high-ground we normally associate with tolerance, pluralism and inclusivity. Examples of rejectable ideologies include those that advocate intolerance to different cultures and faiths, those that threaten the survival of mankind, and those that trample on basic norms of civilized society.

This paradox also presents a compelling argument against theories of relativistic morality, according to which right and wrong, good and evil are in the eye of the beholder; a "terrorist" to one eye is a "freedom fighter" to another, "occupiers" to some are "liberators" to others, and so on. Such blurring of distinctions, a favorite occupation of post-modern media, has helped legitimize the ideology of Bin Laden, and leads to moral bankruptcy everywhere.

These symmetries should be broken by reference to objective norms of right and wrong adopted by civilized society. There is simply no moral equivalence between those who labor to minimize the suffering of innocent and those who pride themselves on maximizing such suffering.

It is this reliance on absolute basic norms, not on the inclusive/exclusive distinction that makes the perpetrators of the 9/11 attack, the killers of Daniel Pearl and the sadists in Abu Ghraib prison morally repulsive, even to a world embroiled in ideological conflicts and moral confusion.

We must now ask ourselves what divides those capable of beheading people for the purpose transmitting messages and those who are repulsed by such acts. Is the dividing line cultural? Religious? Ideological? Political?

Samuel Huntington theorized that the dividing lines represent a clash of two civilizations: Muslim versus Western. It is not a fashionable theory today, especially not in the West, partly because it implies a long and irreconcilable struggle between East and West, and partly because it associates terrorism with religious or cultural backgrounds -- a distasteful association by Western standards.

Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf, on the other hand, has promoted an alternative theory, one that is often heard in the West from moderate Muslims:

"We need to understand that the root cause of extremism and militancy lies in political injustice, denial and deprivation. Political injustice to a nation or a people, when combined with stark poverty and illiteracy, makes for an explosive mix. It produces an acute sense of hopelessness and powerlessness. A nation suffering from these lethal ills is easily available for the propagation of militancy and the perpetration of extremist, terrorist acts." (Washington Post, June 1, 2004; Page A23).

Although not mentioned explicitly, religion-based incitement was surely on Musharraf's mind when he talked about "explosive mix". One could hardly be oblivious to the fact that the "explosions", when they occurred, were made in the name of religion, and received the tacit approval of the religious leadership who held the moral authority to safeguard against such explosions. Thus, the difference between Huntington's theory and those based on socio-economical or political factors is merely a question of which factors we take as the fuel and which as the spark. These analogies have significant implications on the choice of effective strategies to tame the current conflict.

Musharraf strategy, which he calls "renaissance" and "Enlightened Moderation", goes as follows: "The first part is for the Muslim world to shun militancy and extremism and adopt the path of socioeconomic uplift. The second is for the West, and the United States in particular, to seek to resolve all political disputes with justice and to aid in the socioeconomic betterment of the deprived Muslim world."

One can hardly disagree with the general outline of this strategy, with the possible introduction of two clarifications. First, as a member of the Jewish "Ummah" (nation), I hope that the equation for "justice" in the enlightened era would include the legitimate aspirations of non-Muslim nations as well, including aspirations for normalcy, self-determination, diplomatic recognition and unchallenged acceptance. Second, and most importantly, one must emphasize the essential role that spiritual Muslim leaders must play in this transition toward Enlightened Moderation.

Religions, civilizations and ancient scriptures do not provide us with complete recipes for moral behavior. Rather, they provide us with intellectual resources, or building blocks with the help of which we construct criteria for evaluating actions in specific situations. One of the primary functions of spiritual and ideological leadership is to help us decide which cultural building blocks are applicable in any given situation, and to filter away those that do not apply. An enlightened ideological leadership is one that safeguards a religion from being hijacked by its extreme elements, and it is that kind of leadership that is absolutely needed for restoring enlightenment when safeguards fail.

If we take ideological leadership as the guiding paradigm for understanding the current conflict between the Muslim and Western world, then the conflict, even considering its cultural-religious roots does not seem as hopeless as the one predicted by Huntington's theory. Ideological differences, are a matter of emphasis, leaving scriptures and beliefs intact, and can be smoothened by renaissance and dialogues.

In the Muslim world, the leaders who can make renaissance a reality are those who can win the minds of the young and faithful to the side of hope: intellectual leaders who pride themselves on peace and modernity, and clerics, imams, sheikhs and mullahs who have been voicing concern over the hijacking of Islam by a minority of anti-Islamic extremists.
Moreover, the first step in winning the minds of the young is to make the distinction between true Islam and Jihadi Islam a religious, not political distinction.

A week after the brutal killing of Nicholas Berg I addressed Muslim leaders in an open letter (Wall Street Journal, May 20, 2004): "I beseech you to join the courageous Muslims who have denounced, in unambiguous language, not only the killing of Nicholas Berg, but the growing practice of killing innocent human beings as a means of communicating grievances, regardless of how valid or urgent the grievance.

"I therefore urge Muslim clerics to cast their denunciation in plain religious vocabulary, to proclaim these crimes to be sins, or blasphemy, and to remind their followers that the murderers of Nicholas Berg, Fabrizio Quattrocchi and Daniel Pearl will be punished by Allah Himself, as it is said: "We have prepared fire for the wrongdoers" (Koran:16)."

"Muslim clerics can further guard the image of Islam by issuing Fatwas against the perpetrators of those acts, thus mobilizing their communities to take a pro-active role in the apprehension of those perpetrators, and in bringing them to justice.

The use of Islamic instruments such as "Haram", "Takfir" and "Fatwa" is essential in the transition to Musharraf's Enlightened Moderation. As Shmuel Bar notes in his scholarly article (Policy Review, June, 2004):

"The fatwas promulgated by sheikhs and 'ulama who stipulate that jihad is a "personal duty" play, therefore, a pivotal role in encouraging radicalism and in building the support infrastructure for radicals within the traditional Islamic community. While one may find many fatwas which advocate various manifestations of terrorism, fatwas which rule that those who perform these acts do not go to paradise but inherit hell are few and far between."

I am hopeful that these instruments, which Islam provides its spiritual leaders to protect its true teachings, and which were abused by some to distort and defame its roots, will be used create the conditions for Enlightened Moderation to emerge.

One reason for optimism stems from the presence of a sizable Muslim "diaspora" in the West. This diaspora can serve as a cultural conduit of ideas and needs from the West to the East and vice versa. Although many Western Muslims feel alienated and express disenchantment with Western motives and values, they nevertheless have experienced the merits of Western freedoms and are fully aware of the genuine goodwill of their non-Muslim friends and neighbors; they could serve therefore as the West's best Ambassadors to their countries of origin and vice versa.

More importantly, Western Muslims are serious victims of post-9/11 Islamophobia and of the distorted image of Islam that silence and lethargy is projecting; they have a vested interest in seeing that silence broken and enlightenment ensue. Therefore, it is from the mosques of the West that a grassroots pressure for a cultural renaissance is likely to emerge and make its way eastward.

Accordingly, I envision a natural partnership developing between Muslims, Jews and Christians in the West and slowly making its way, through religious channels, toward South Asia, the Middle East and other Muslim countries.

It is in building such partnership that dialogue between the three great religions plays a crucial role. Western Muslims must be assured that Jews and Christians are reliable supporters of their legitimate struggle for dignity and social acceptance. Jews and Christians on the other hand, need be assured that Western Muslims will become partners and emissaries in the fight against terrorism, fanaticism and identity-based hatred.
It is only through dialogue that such assurances can be mutually established.

My son Daniel was a dialogue maker who earned respect on both sides of the East/West divides and who had an unshaken belief in the power of communication to change people's minds and hearts. In his spirit, and for the sake of my grandson's generation, we must see this dialogue continued.

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Judea Pearl, a professor of computer science at the University of California, Los Angeles, is president of the Daniel Pearl Foundation (www.danielpearl.org) and co-editor of "I am Jewish: Personal Reflections Inspired by the Last Words of Daniel Pearl" (Jewish Lights, 2004).