Anti-Jihad, Pro-What?

The recent spat amongst anti-jihad bloggers resembles the fault line in the American right separating individualists from religious evangelizers since the beginning of the movement in the 1950's. Since then, the amalgam of intellectuals originally bound together by opposition to Soviet communism has proven unstable, melting away in the aftermath of the Cold War.

The present amalgam is also defined by a negative, now opposition to the rising Shari'a horde. And like before, the unifying tendencies provoked by a common enemy can obscure a basic incompatibility only for so long. The Buckleyites hated Soviet communism so much that they didn't mind confiscating a quarter of the wealth of their countreymen in order to cajole the political opposition into letting them confiscate another quarter to outdo the Russian military state. Half our wealth is confiscated, to defend the principle of non-confiscation.

Now we face the uma of totalitarian Islam, and some believe that the only way to defeat it is to build our own uma in the pattern of a more familiar religion. Many with this opinion are simply unaware of any alternative. To fight lunatics who are willing to explode themselves for the promise of virgin slaves in a mysterious afterlife, it is believed we must find an equally potent vision of the supernatural. Who is going to stand against the approaching horde? Ghandi? Cornell West? Noam Chomsky? Against these choices, the God of the Old Testament seems at least a plausible candidate.

However, if you look at what kind of society the Old Testament produced, namely Judea circa 1AD, its military prowess leaves something to be desired. The religious environment of the post-Renaissance West, on the other hand, is characterized by a more restrained authoritarian impulse. And it had to be to unleash an era of scientific inquiry and technological progress. For centuries, Christianity has been an ideological force in decline, its doctrine one of forgiveness, humility, and surrender.

So when Mohamed skewers my cheek, shall I turn him another? When I have one of Allah's warriors in my sights, shall I wonder whether I am really fit to judge him, lest I be judged? Shall I humbly ponder over the sinfulness of my own society, the very sin, the lust, the materialism, the wordliness, that these invaders are opposing? Ultimately, isn't my desire for freedom a selfish one?

Are you thinking that it will work out as long as the virtue of self-sacrifice is practiced in moderation? Where then are the principles we need to fight for our lives and freedom? If the uplifting power of our moral code is squandered in such admonitions as 'be nice to your parents' and 'help the homeless,' what chance do we really stand against Allah's warriors? We do need a code. It is not enough that freedom merely be permitted or tolerated. Because defending it will require a profound sense of moral rectitude.

Imagine a moral code that extols individual liberty, that condemns human slavery once and for all -- whether it is slavery to a state, to a class, to a race, or to someone else's delusions of a supernatural dimension. Imagine a code based not on delusions and commandments but on an honest, objective survey of man's actual nature, the requirements of his survival on this earth. Imagine a code that renders morality as a tool for the benefit of your own life, and a weapon against those who would enslave you. Such is the moral code necessary for a real war in defense of civilization, because it is the unacknowledged root of all the grandeur that civilization has achieved.