In this episode, I talk about Islam and Islamism, and how we need to stop using qualifiers before the word "Islam" and start talking honestly about it. Islamism is not radical Islam, it is not militant, violent extremism, and every other euphemism you come up with to describe it.
00:00:00.000You just mentioned one or two things. I think it is a misnomer to constantly come up with qualifiers before the word Islam. And let me explain why that is. There is no Islam, there is no Islamism. Islamism is part of Islam. Islam is a set of codified ideas that has a spiritual element and it has a political element.
00:00:19.740That political element is Islamism. The manner in which now people are talking about Islamism is it's something that is outside of Islam. And I understand the reason why people want to do this is because they feel as though it's too gauche to frontally attack a religion.
00:00:36.460So if you attack something that has magically ISM at the end of it, Islamism, that's okay. If you attack Islam, that's not okay. But the reality is if we're truly going to have a serious and honest conversation about this topic, we have to recognize that it's not radical Islam, it's not Islamism, it's not militant, violent extremism and every other permutation of a euphemism that you come up with. It's Islam.
00:00:58.940Now, most people choose to practice a cafeteria version of Islam. They pick the parts that they like and they ignore the endless parts that they don't like and that becomes their personal relationship with Islam.
00:01:12.040But most people do that with most religions, right?
00:01:14.380Most people do that with most religions, but you and I and everybody else don't stay up worrying about Seventh-day Adventists.
00:01:19.800So to the extent that Islam is now on the radar and we have to talk about it honestly, we have to stop trying to give a free pass to Islam.
00:01:29.440But the real problem is something else, some variant of it.
00:01:33.080Islam is codified in the Quran, it's codified in the Hadith, it's codified in the Sira, the biography of Muhammad. That's it.
00:01:40.680Now, is there a way that I could read those texts and come up with a message of brotherly love and love for Jews?
00:01:46.640No, that's not Islamism. That's not radical Islam. That's Islam.