WI: Islamic Socialism?

This might be completely nuts, but is there any way that the ideas of Jamal al-Din al-Afghani and Marxism could be synthesized AND this synthesis could have significant influence on the politics of the Middle East?

This is al-Afghani:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamal-al-Din_al-Afghani

His ideas of "solidarity of all Muslims against foreigners" just seem so ripe for integration with Marxism. A world where a "vanguard Peoples' Caliphate" takes over to prepare the population and eventually the whole world for the final state of society, where all willingly submit to Allah and produce what they can, freely drawing on the rest of the world and all that has been gifted to humanity by Allah. The most likely place I could see this emerging is in a continuing Ottoman Empire after the Great War, where the Ottomans remain neutral. Another option might be in a European-dominated Iran.
 
Their is duch a thing as Islamic Socialism IOTL and their have been various movements over time that fall under the general term.
 
This might be completely nuts, but is there any way that the ideas of Jamal al-Din al-Afghani and Marxism could be synthesized AND this synthesis could have significant influence on the politics of the Middle East?

This is al-Afghani:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamal-al-Din_al-Afghani

His ideas of "solidarity of all Muslims against foreigners" just seem so ripe for integration with Marxism. A world where a "vanguard Peoples' Caliphate" takes over to prepare the population and eventually the whole world for the final state of society, where all willingly submit to Allah and produce what they can, freely drawing on the rest of the world and all that has been gifted to humanity by Allah. The most likely place I could see this emerging is in a continuing Ottoman Empire after the Great War, where the Ottomans remain neutral. Another option might be in a European-dominated Iran.

I've thought about this before and my idea was that the Urrabi revolt, which involved many of the ideals of Al-Afghani. However the revolt was put down, and in a rather unclimactic manner with the foreign governments assenting to Urrabi's destruction and the Cairo garrison commanders basically staying in the barracks while the British marched in.

I don't think the Urrabi and egypt could possibly defeat Britain at the height of their power. However with foreign support, from another great Power the british might back down, and attempt to renegotiate. So my idea was that a Socialistic France could support a Urrabi, and Britain would be cowed from collecting their loans.
 

MSZ

Banned
Problem with "synthesizing" Marxism with any other Abrahamic religion, whether Islam, Judaism or Christianity is their prime principles are simply contradictory. First of all, Marxism calls for the 'equalness' of all people and abolishment of the state; Abrahamic religions consider the state to be necessary, and of an "organic" character - never speaks of all people being equal. Marxism considers "the collective" to be the basis of society - abrahamic religions see "family" as the basic "cell" of a society. Too many differences in social theory.

I suppose the closest thing you can have is for some religious Islamic leader to have their own version of "Liberation Theology"; since Islam lacks a central structure there wouldn't be any power to actualy oppose it. Perhaps a different Soviet Union which doesn't persecute religion would create such a thing to control central Asia and attempt to use it as a tool of spreading it's influence to the Middle East.
 
Problem with "synthesizing" Marxism with any other Abrahamic religion, whether Islam, Judaism or Christianity is their prime principles are simply contradictory. First of all, Marxism calls for the 'equalness' of all people and abolishment of the state; Abrahamic religions consider the state to be necessary, and of an "organic" character - never speaks of all people being equal. Marxism considers "the collective" to be the basis of society - abrahamic religions see "family" as the basic "cell" of a society. Too many differences in social theory.

I suppose the closest thing you can have is for some religious Islamic leader to have their own version of "Liberation Theology"; since Islam lacks a central structure there wouldn't be any power to actualy oppose it. Perhaps a different Soviet Union which doesn't persecute religion would create such a thing to control central Asia and attempt to use it as a tool of spreading it's influence to the Middle East.

Most of this actually happened OTL. Google for Ali Shariati for example.
As for the "Abrahamic" social theory, it is a byproduct of the sociohistorical conditions Abrahamic religions developed in, but very little of it is inherent to the core tenets of Christianity, Judaism or Islam as faiths.
There are classical "Islamic" and "Christian" theories of the State, (both marked by a very recognizable Platonic influence) that emerged in the Middle Ages and outlived by far the social situation they arose from. There is very little in both religions that cannot be construed in a way compatible with "all men are equal" socialism (well, it is easier if you mean "men" as males only, but it's not like both faith had not known interpretations favorable to gender equality as well). Early christians practiced a sort of primitive communism, and similar experienced have existed in Islam.
 
There is many forms of communism and left-far-left.

And anarchism as well - there was Tolstoi's Christian Anarchism, The Kingdom of God is in you (or something like that).

Religions are not tied to ideologies always, and NOT ALWAYS RIGHTWING. :rolleyes:

Oh, and Christianism and Islam in theory consider everyone egal (all believers, always) - the Ecclesia, the Ummah,
 

MSZ

Banned
Most of this actually happened OTL. Google for Ali Shariati for example.
As for the "Abrahamic" social theory, it is a byproduct of the sociohistorical conditions Abrahamic religions developed in, but very little of it is inherent to the core tenets of Christianity, Judaism or Islam as faiths.
There are classical "Islamic" and "Christian" theories of the State, (both marked by a very recognizable Platonic influence) that emerged in the Middle Ages and outlived by far the social situation they arose from. There is very little in both religions that cannot be construed in a way compatible with "all men are equal" socialism (well, it is easier if you mean "men" as males only, but it's not like both faith had not known interpretations favorable to gender equality as well). Early christians practiced a sort of primitive communism, and similar experienced have existed in Islam.

I googled the man out, and frankly I am little surprised. Still, the fact he ultimately found himself arrested and had too flee to England is very telling. Attempting to unite Islam with Communism will lead to clashes - and choices whether such an ideology should be "more islamic" or "more communist" would have to be made. Since there is no "Islamic Pope" to reform the religion and communist ideology would be dominated by western thought, anyone trying to preach it would be very isolated - single philosophers who wouldn't be heard of much (like OTL I think - or I just read the wrong books and magazines).

That Christian and Islamic state/society philosophy were influenced by the geography of were they spread is of course true - but still, note that originally Christianity began in the Middle East, just like Islam. Changes were made in the middle ages, but some core beliefs prevailed to the present day - like the "Render unto Ceasar..." principle which still holds. I am no expert on Islam, but from what I know it didn't reform since the time of Muhammad as much as Christianity. Of course most religions, as well as ideologies bear the message of "peace" and "justice" and can be twisted in any way one sees fit - there were many religious wars after all.

As for early christianity/islam practising primitive communism - no. Primitive tribal/clan structure society where the concept of private property was undeveloped had nothing to do with marxism. Heck, Marx himself stated that, by creating his idea of "development as a result of class warfare" Slavery, Feudalism, Capitalism, Socialism. That's the way it goes.

If some kind of Islamo-Communism was to appear before 1900, I suppose it would probably concentrate on issues of dividing land, preventing colonization/decolonization, co-existence of traditional Isalmic society with western presence - trading companies, stock markets, secularization, etc. Given that the middle east had little industry and water (important for agriculture) Islamocommunism would propably demand for the state to create massive infrastractural projects to increase the amount arable land and nationalize it to prevent water monopolies. The population would be to be settled on newly fertilized land, food being supplied to all the population, excess sold and revenue used to further extend the infrastruture for the increasing population. Unity of all peoples in the middle east (Arab, Jewish, Turkish) would also be a major point. Perhaps a reformed Ottoman Empire with an elected legislative could lead to something like this arrising - analogously to European Social-Democrats.
 
I googled the man out, and frankly I am little surprised. Still, the fact he ultimately found himself arrested and had too flee to England is very telling. Attempting to unite Islam with Communism will lead to clashes - and choices whether such an ideology should be "more islamic" or "more communist" would have to be made. Since there is no "Islamic Pope" to reform the religion and communist ideology would be dominated by western thought, anyone trying to preach it would be very isolated - single philosophers who wouldn't be heard of much (like OTL I think - or I just read the wrong books and magazines).

That Christian and Islamic state/society philosophy were influenced by the geography of were they spread is of course true - but still, note that originally Christianity began in the Middle East, just like Islam. Changes were made in the middle ages, but some core beliefs prevailed to the present day - like the "Render unto Ceasar..." principle which still holds. I am no expert on Islam, but from what I know it didn't reform since the time of Muhammad as much as Christianity. Of course most religions, as well as ideologies bear the message of "peace" and "justice" and can be twisted in any way one sees fit - there were many religious wars after all.

As for early christianity/islam practising primitive communism - no. Primitive tribal/clan structure society where the concept of private property was undeveloped had nothing to do with marxism. Heck, Marx himself stated that, by creating his idea of "development as a result of class warfare" Slavery, Feudalism, Capitalism, Socialism. That's the way it goes.

If some kind of Islamo-Communism was to appear before 1900, I suppose it would probably concentrate on issues of dividing land, preventing colonization/decolonization, co-existence of traditional Isalmic society with western presence - trading companies, stock markets, secularization, etc. Given that the middle east had little industry and water (important for agriculture) Islamocommunism would propably demand for the state to create massive infrastractural projects to increase the amount arable land and nationalize it to prevent water monopolies. The population would be to be settled on newly fertilized land, food being supplied to all the population, excess sold and revenue used to further extend the infrastruture for the increasing population. Unity of all peoples in the middle east (Arab, Jewish, Turkish) would also be a major point. Perhaps a reformed Ottoman Empire with an elected legislative could lead to something like this arrising - analogously to European Social-Democrats.

Ali Shariati is just an example. He is probably the best known thinker of that kind, but neither the first or the last. And he had some significant following, albeit of course still minoritary. Another interesting point is that many Lebanese with a Socialist background later entered Hizbullah, that is an Islamist (more specifically Khomeynist) movement. So you can surely say that something is there, at least after 1900. Iran had a movement of "God Worshipping Socialists" since the early forties.
There was Socialism in Middle East before 1900. But, AFAIK, its best known proponents were of Christian background or not particularly interested in link Socialism with Islam.
Primitive communism may have been bad wording on my part. I meant that in early Christian communities property was common (Acts 4, 32-35). It wasn't certainly Marxist Communism.
Islam did not change as much as Christianity or Judaism, IMHO because Muslim societies did not undergo the same degree of internally driven dramatic changes that happened to originate in Christian societies, namely the whole complicated thing called modernity. However, Islam DID change overtime. As it happens in many traditions, changes are depicted as a restoration of the original form; it was largely the case for the Christian Reformation, and it was the case for its less known Muslim "counterpart": an actual widespread (and multi-faceted) reform movement existed around the 18 century and later met with modernization coming from the West. The metting was quite conflictual at times. The Wahhabites were a part of this "reform". To be clear, similarities between Christian Reformation and Islamic Reform movements are only very broad and probably misleading.
 

MSZ

Banned
Ali Shariati is just an example. He is probably the best known thinker of that kind, but neither the first or the last. And he had some significant following, albeit of course still minoritary. Another interesting point is that many Lebanese with a Socialist background later entered Hizbullah, that is an Islamist (more specifically Khomeynist) movement. So you can surely say that something is there, at least after 1900. Iran had a movement of "God Worshipping Socialists" since the early forties.
There was Socialism in Middle East before 1900. But, AFAIK, its best known proponents were of Christian background or not particularly interested in link Socialism with Islam.
Primitive communism may have been bad wording on my part. I meant that in early Christian communities property was common (Acts 4, 32-35). It wasn't certainly Marxist Communism.
Islam did not change as much as Christianity or Judaism, IMHO because Muslim societies did not undergo the same degree of internally driven dramatic changes that happened to originate in Christian societies, namely the whole complicated thing called modernity. However, Islam DID change overtime. As it happens in many traditions, changes are depicted as a restoration of the original form; it was largely the case for the Christian Reformation, and it was the case for its less known Muslim "counterpart": an actual widespread (and multi-faceted) reform movement existed around the 18 century and later met with modernization coming from the West. The metting was quite conflictual at times. The Wahhabites were a part of this "reform". To be clear, similarities between Christian Reformation and Islamic Reform movements are only very broad and probably misleading.

I was unaware of Ali Shariati and those other examples you mention, hence my surprise. We agree that Islam did not develop as much as Christianity due to Europe being the first "civilization" to modernize, but that "something was there" - so the best chance for some kind of Islamic socialist movement to arise is to have the Muslim world to undergo similiar development. This is where my suggestion of the Ottoman Empire reforming came from. If some kind of Parliament was to form there, I assume that the political movements would undergo similiar developmet as in Europe. Since most european parties did adopt the "Christian Morality" platform in their platforms - whather as Christian Democrats or Social Democrats - I imagine the same could happen in Turkey with Islam being the basis rather than Christianity. It would the closest to the OP as it can be - Communists universally shunned christianity and vice versa, should they appear in the Muslim world the same would happen.
 
One place where Socialism and Islam met would be Fabianism and Nehru. Nehru definitely wasn't an Islamist like al-Afghani, but he was Muslim. Maybe if there is a labour government in Britain they might spin off a semi-independent Muslim-socialistic nation.
 
One place where Socialism and Islam met would be Fabianism and Nehru. Nehru definitely wasn't an Islamist like al-Afghani, but he was Muslim. Maybe if there is a labour government in Britain they might spin off a semi-independent Muslim-socialistic nation.

I am pretty sure that Nehru was a Hindu. However, there were Muslims in his party, some of them quite Socialist oriented. I don't know whether attempts at uniting the two were done in that framework OTL, but there is a possibility.
 
Sultan Galiev was a "Muslim-Bolshevik". A school teacher from (if I remember) Kazakhstan he joined the Bolshevik Party during the Russian Revolution. He was an atheist but promoted a type of Islamic socialism, that is he believed Muslims as a whole are an oppressed people.While his position isn't followed by Marxists today, he does represented a different direction "political Islam" could have gone in.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirsäyet_Soltanğäliev

During the Russian Civil War there were Sufi warrior brotherhoods who fought for the Bolsheviks. One such group seemed to be more than a little conflicted. When Bolshevik leaders or inspectors would vist them they would quickly put away their Korans and payer beads and take out their copies of Marx's Capital and British Enfields. Trotsky(a leader of the Red Army) wrote an article somewhere pointing out his suspicions of this group.

In Iran and elsewhere there were early communist movements such as the Mazdakists

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mazdak

This could be seen as roughly analogous to Christian groups like the communistic Munster Anabaptists. The important thing driving these movements are the material conditions people live under, not the specific theology or doctrine.

In the Iranian revolution of 1979 there were various leftist Islamic groups, the mujahadeen.

In Years of Rice and Salt, KSR has what appears to be an Islamic worker's uprising after a failed world war in his alternate Western Europe.
 
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Sultan Galiev was a "Muslim-Bolshevik". A school teacher from (if I remember) Kazakhstan he joined the Bolshevik Party during the Russian Revolution. He was an atheist but promoted a type of Islamic socialism, that is he believed Muslims as a whole are an oppressed people.While his position isn't followed by Marxists today, he does represented a different direction "political Islam" could have gone in.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirsäyet_Soltanğäliev

During the Russian Civil War there were Sufi warrior brotherhoods who fought for the Bolsheviks. One such group seemed to be more than a little conflicted. When Bolshevik leaders or inspectors would vist them they would quickly put away their Korans and payer beads and take out their copies of Marx's Capital and British Enfields. Trotsky(a leader of the Red Army) wrote an article somewhere pointing out his suspicions of this group.

In Iran and elsewhere there were early communist movements such as the Mazdakists

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mazdak

This could be seen as roughly analogous to Christian groups like the communistic Munster Anabaptists. The important thing driving these movements are the material conditions people live under, not the specific theology or doctrine.

In the Iranian revolution of 1979 there were various leftist Islamic groups, the mujahadeen.

In Years of Rice and Salt, KSR has what appears to be an Islamic worker's uprising after a failed world war in his alternate Western Europe.

Mazdak was pre-Islamic. He influenced sectarian Muslim groups later, but nothing of the little we know of his real activity is really linked with Islam.
 
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