As for my opinion on these matters, I suppose it has already been stated at the top of this thread. This is one area where Sheshki and I have different opinions and that, of course, is natural enough. It is the nature of academic discourse that different views be weighed against each other and it is up to the reader to decide what they find most convincing.
First of all, I want to make it clear that we are only examining ISIS' intentions, or alleged intentions, to destroy antiquities here - their pattern of murder and conquest is a separate consideration which can be considered elsewhere. To my perception, ISIS is endangering Iraq's ancient heritage: and the reason ISIS is endangering this heritage is not because they are criminal and therefore not Muslim - it is because they are Muslim and are doing criminal things. Well is it so impossible for a group of religious people to do 'criminal' things? I think not. Just replace the word 'criminal' with 'radical' and this sort of thing really isn't so uncommon. The destruction of culture is not unexpected behavior for radicalized Muslims or Christians or Jews, in my view.
As enkur has noted above in relation to the Ottoman empire, anti-idolatry (aniconism) is a re-occurring theme in all Abrahamic religions (Christianity, Judaism, Islam), that is well reflected in the story of Abraham opposing the idols of his father Terah. This represents an interesting mirror to the current situation since Terah was from Ur and thus, presumably, a Mesopotamian. That the details of the story of Abraham's smashing of the idols come from late Rabbinic sources (2nd cen. AD), and not the Old Testament itself, do not in any way invalidate this point - it demonstrates that messages of anti-idolatry were flaring in the early AD as well. I mentioned earlier that anti-idolatry is not reserved for the radical fundamentalist Muslims and Jews: during the protestant revolution there were countless Catholic artworks and statues toppled over and destroyed in Catholic churches because they were branded 'idolatrous' by the newly formed Protestants.
As a starting point, I take the situation at face value: ISIS say they are Muslims, in particular, they are Wahhabi Muslims. What is the history of this group, their ideological background, their brand of Islam? These questions must be addressed in order to investigate to what extent they act through religious conviction, Abrahamic conviction, which is my initial stance on the matter. I have just read the article "You can't understand ISIS if you don't know the History of Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia" which is obviously going to be relevant here. The author, Alaistair Crooke, was a former MI-6 agent apparently, which isn't ideal - yet I note the following points (the full article is available
here-
Muhammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab: lived 1703-1792, was an Islamic priest and reformer who led a fundamentalist reform movement in Saudi Arabia. One of the main tenants of his teachings, fiercely upheld by his followers, was anti-idolatry (p.58): "Abd al-Wahhab denounced all Muslims who honored the dead, saints, or angels. He held that such sentiments detracted from the complete subservience one must feel towards God, and only God. Wahhabi Islam thus bans any prayer to saints and dead loved ones, pilgrimages to tombs and special mosques, religious festivals celebrating saints, the honoring of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad’s birthday, and even prohibits the use of gravestones when burying the dead."
A second main tenant of Wahhabism was that Muslims uphold the power and authority of the ruler - This tenant amounts to:
One leader, One authority, One mosque: submit to it, or be killed. This support of centralized rule would help lead Saudi Arabia to statehood.
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Ibn Saud: A small local ruler who aligned himself with ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab, seeing an opportunity to use this new religious doctrine for territorial gain. Spreading Wahhabism as he went, Ibn Saud moved from town to town conquering and pillaging. Crooke writes: "Their strategy—like that of ISIS today—was to bring the peoples whom they conquered into submission. They aimed to instill fear. In 1801, the Allies attacked the Holy City of Karbala in Iraq. They massacred thousands of Shiites, including women and children. Many Shiite shrines were destroyed, including the shrine of Imam Hussein, the murdered grandson of Prophet Muhammad." Ibn Saud was so 'successful' with this strategy that he conquered a large territory, as one may guess from his name, Ibn Saud was indeed the founder of the first Saudi state, and the Saud dynasty.
So what was Ibn Saud's notion of propaganda then? Crooke continues:
"Osman Ibn Bishr Najdi, the historian of the first Saudi state, wrote that Ibn
Saud committed a massacre in Karbala in 1801. He proudly documented that
massacre saying, “we took Karbala and slaughtered and took its people (as
slaves), then praise be to Allah, Lord of the Worlds, and we do not apologize
for that and say: ‘And to the unbelievers: the same treatment.’ In 1803, Abdul Aziz
then entered the Holy City of Mecca, which surrendered under the impact of terror and
panic (the same fate was to befall Medina, too). Abd al-Wahhab’s followers demolished
historical monuments and all the tombs and shrines in their midst. By the end, they had
destroyed centuries of Islamic architecture near the Grand Mosque."
Aftermath:
- Wahhabism and the first Dynasty of Saud were crushed by the the Ottoman's in the late 1800s, and were pushed back to the deserts. Following the breakup of the Ottoman empire after WW1, The House of Saud re-emerged and established the current Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Wahhabism re-emerged as well and since the 1930s ibn Abd al-Wahhab's teachings have been
state sponsered and are
the offical form of Sunni Islam, despite that fact that the majority of Sunnis are not Wahhabis.
Differences and Similarities between ISIS and traditional Saudi Arabian Wahhabism:
- A major difference between ISIS and traditional Wahhabism appears to be the complete breaking of one of the core tenants of Wahhabism: the adherence to the ruler and the tenant "One leader, One authority, One mosque." Crooke writes: "It is this rift—the ISIS denial of these three pillars on which the whole of
Sunni authority presently rests—makes ISIS, which in all other respects conforms to Wahhabism, a deep threat to Saudi Arabia." This view of the author's, that ISIS is ultimately derived from Saudi Arabia and, at the same time, will ultimately be of greatest threat to the Saudi Kingdom, is worth consideration (but ultimately not essential to the issues on this thread); he adds on this matter: " In short, this is the nature of the time bomb tossed into the Middle East. The
ISIS allusions to Abd al-Wahhab and Juhayman (whose dissident writings are circulated within ISIS) present a powerful provocation: they hold up a mirror
to Saudi society that seems to reflect back to them an image of “purity” lost and early beliefs and certainties displaced by shows of wealth and indulgence."
- But ISIS *is* Wahhabi and sees itself as a reformulation of early Wahhabi prinicples, 'pure' principles. ISIS makes deliberate and intentional use of the language of Ibn Abd al-Wahhab. Why should we doubt that they genuinely belief in what they are doing as they smash a Mesopotamian artifact? They exploit the event to its fullest and broadcast it to the world, certainly, but only *because* they believe in what they are doing - and that this is the way of ibn Abd al-Wahhab. This is a teaching that has been instructing Muslims to smash Muslim artifacts and mosques for the last 200 years - why are we motivated to doubt that they believe in what they are doing?
How about a jack hammer to the genuine (not fake) face of a lamassu to add to the reality of these convictions?
gatesofnineveh.wordpress.com/2015/02/27/assessing-the-damage-at-the-mosul-museum-part-1-the-assyrian-artifacts/
