Islamic scholars debate impact of attacks and beyond on religion

With the public’s attention trained on their field of study, some of the nation’s top scholars of Islam gathered at the American Academy of Religion’s (AAR) annual meeting Nov. 17–20 to debate how to best communicate the religious complexities raised by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
   
The professors, speaking at a special session open to the public, said that discourse must go beyond the simplified explanation that “Islam is peace,” that violence plays a part in many world religions and that focusing only on the forces behind Sept. 11 would diminish Islam’s rich history and culture.
   
An estimated 7,000 people attended the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion, an association of scholars and teachers of religion based at Emory University in Atlanta. The meetings provide members a glimpse of the latest research in the field, with hundreds of papers being presented on a dizzying array of subjects — everything from new Asian religions and early Pentecostals in American culture to Harry Potter, religion on the Internet and spiritual imagery in contemporary film.
   
The special session on Islam and Sept. 11 reflects something different: a push by the organization in the past decade to reach beyond academia’s ivory towers.
   
“We’ve been very aware as an organization ever since at least the Waco incident that it’s important to get out into the public square,” said Barbara DeConcini, the academy’s executive director.
   
The federal government’s bloody standoff in 1993 with David Koresh’s Branch Davidian sect in Waco, Texas, marked a turning point in how the academy views itself, DeConcini said. Two academy members — Lawrence Sullivan of Harvard University and Nancy Ammerman of Hartford Seminary — testified before a Department of Justice panel on Waco, which led to conversations between the FBI and the academy about how to peacefully negotiate conflicts with religious groups or leaders.
   
After the Sept. 11 attacks, the academy’s board of directors issued a statement urging its members to serve as resources in a “national conversation” on issues that include “suffering and evil, human rights and religious liberties, international order and justice, democracy and the common good.” The academy’s Study of Islam section also launched a Web page featuring statements from Islamic groups, documentation of hate crimes against Muslims and news articles at http://groups.colgate.edu/aarislam/response.htm.
   
Regularly scheduled sessions in Denver on Muslim issues — including those on Sufi literature and how clothing reflects Islamic sentiment about women — drew larger than normal crowds.
   
The special session on Islam and Sept. 11 was led by Mark Juergensmeyer, a professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara and author of “Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence.” The book includes an interview with Mahmud Abouhalima, who was convicted for his involvement in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center.
   
Joining a public debate about Islam and Sept. 11 carries risks, however, said Ebrahim Moosa, a professor of Islamic studies at Duke University. The Bush administration’s recently announced plans to convene military tribunals to prosecute overseas terrorists does not preclude the government from accusing someone who denounces U.S. foreign policy of being a terrorist, Moosa said. He also urged objectivity.
   
“There’s no such thing as a peaceful Islam, Christianity, Judaism or Buddhism,” said Moosa, who narrowly escaped death after Muslim militants bombed his family’s house in South Africa in 1998.
   
The academy’s members who teach Islam are facing an additional pressure: Their universities, colleges and seminaries are expecting a crush of student interest in courses on Islam next semester.
   
A Lilly Endowment-funded census last year of about 900 religion and theology departments found only about one-third of the institutions offered courses in Islam. Jonathan Brockopp, assistant professor of religion at Bard College and co-chair of the academy’s section for the study of Islam, said he expects a “huge hiring binge” in Islamic studies as a result of Sept. 11 and the war in Afghanistan. (RNS)