英国に亡命しているサウディ・アラビア人のSaad al-Fagih氏は、"Give up your freedoms - or change tack"と題するエッセイで、トニー・ブレアの新しい「対テロ政策」は、オサマ・ビン・ラディンにとってみれば、二重の意味で自らの「歴史的勝利」のように映っているという。
First, he will believe he has succeeded in forcing Britain to abandon a number of hard-earned achievements in the fields of justice and liberty - achievements that took centuries of struggle and evolution to accomplish. Bin Laden will rejoice because he has forced society into forsaking these values. This, he believes, will leave the west open to eventual defeat at the hands of Muslims.Both moderate and jihadist Islamist activists have long recognised the values of justice and liberty within western societies as the foundation of western dominance in the past few centuries. A dictum attributed to Ibn Taymiya, a renowned Muslim scholar born seven centuries ago, states that God will lend victory to a just nation even if it is infidel and bring defeat to the unjust even if it they are Muslim. When the west loses its values of justice, it will be defeated in the long run.
こうした意味において、アメリカは既にビン・ラディンの手に落ち、その「政治構造」は「彼自身のＰＲ機関」となってしまっているという。次は英国が彼の手に落ちる番である。
The second reason for Bin Laden's satisfaction is that his strategy is based on absolute polarisation. The world is to be split into two opposing camps: a bloc of Muslims with no infidels in their midst and one of infidels with no Muslims in their midst.The measures advocated by Blair and the accompanying atmosphere of racial hatred might cause many Muslims living in "infidel" western nations to leave for good. The harsher the measures adopted by Britain and other western societies, the nearer we will get to fulfilling Bin Laden's strategic aim.
" The British political establishment is abandoning its traditional reliance on careful thinking, sound knowledge of current factors and a determination not to endanger historical commitments."ということはある。しかし、al-Fagih氏は7/7後の一般英国人の反応、その"calm, collectedness and self-control"を賞賛する−−"this was the authentic British people's reaction before their political leaders got to work." 現在は、"A daily diet of sensationalism and soundbites has been presented as food for thought for the nation."という状態。しかし、英国人は重大な選択を迫られている。すなわち、
Britain will now have to decide whether to relinquish its time-honoured traditions and values in response to demagogic speeches and proclamations - or to look carefully at its so-called war on terror strategy and resolve to change tack.
Karen Armstrong
"Unholy strictures"
人類がはまる「とても奇妙な活動」。特定のテクストを取り上げ、それに「特別な地位」を与え、そのテクストが示す指針に従って生きようと努めること。たいそう古いテクストにもかかわらず、「テクストの著者たちが想像もできなかったような状況」にそのテクストが光を当てることを期待すること−−"In times of crisis, people turn to their scriptures with renewed zest and, with much creative ingenuity, compel them to speak to their current predicament." 現在も「経典に関わる活動（scriptual activity）」は廃っているわけではない。
プロテスタントの原理主義者たちの聖書のディテイルに至るまで「字義的に信じる」という仕方、これは19世紀後半にしか遡らない「最近の発明」である。Armstrongさん曰く、
This is ironic, because the concept of scripture has become problematic in the modern period. The Scopes trial of 1925, when Christian fundamentalists in the United States tried to ban the teaching of evolution in the public schools, and the more recent affair of The Satanic Verses, both reveal deep-rooted anxiety about the nature of revelation and the integrity of sacred texts. People talk confidently about scripture, but it is not clear that even the most ardent religious practitioners really know what it is.
原理主義的というか直解主義的なスタンスでは、経典は「聖なる百科事典」となる。そこで前提となっているのは、「経典が歴史的・科学的に正しくなければ、それが真実であることは全くありえない」ということである。しかし、経典はそのように受容されてきたのではなかった。例えば『クラーン』；
Before the modern period, Jews, Christians and Muslims all relished highly allegorical interpretations of scripture. The word of God was infinite and could not be tied down to a single interpretation. Preoccupation with literal truth is a product of the scientific revolution, when reason achieved such spectacular results that mythology was no longer regarded as a valid path to knowledge.
そもそも字義的には理解不可能なリアリティについての記述。だから、字義的な意味においてのみ経典を読むということはそれを「歪曲する」ことなのである。
All the verses of the Qur'an, for example, are called "parables" (ayat); its images of paradise, hell and the last judgment are also ayat, pointers to transcendent realities that we can only glimpse through signs and symbols.
Armstrongさんは、経典を読むという振る舞いの在り方を問題にする。つまり、経典を「読む（reading）」が「聴く（listening to）」ことはしない。これはお馴染みのトピックかも知れないが、そこには近代の印刷技術の影が差し込んでいるのである；
When, for example, Christian fundamentalists argue about the Bible, they hurl texts back and forth competitively, citing chapter and verse in a kind of spiritual tennis match. But this detailed familiarity with the Bible was impossible before the modern invention of printing made it feasible for everybody to own a copy and before widespread literacy - an essentially modern phenomenon - enabled them to read it for themselves.
これに対して、「読むこと」は何を帰結するのか。
Hitherto the scriptures had always been transmitted orally, in a ritual context that, like a great theatrical production, put them in a special frame of mind. Christians heard extracts of the Bible chanted during the mass; they could not pick and choose their favourite texts. In India, young Hindu men studied the Veda for years with their guru, adopting a self-effacing and non-violent lifestyle that was meant to influence their understanding of the texts. In Judaism, the process of studying Torah and Talmud with a rabbi was itself a transformative experience that was just as important as the content.The last thing anyone should attempt is to read the Qur'an straight through from cover to cover, because it was designed to be recited aloud. Indeed, the word qur'an means "recitation". Much of the meaning is derived from sound patterns that link one passage with another, so that Muslims who hear extracts chanted aloud thousands of times in the course of a lifetime acquire a tacit understanding that one teaching is always qualified and supplemented by other texts, and cannot be seen in isolation. The words that they hear again and again are not "holy war", but "kindness", "courtesy", "peace", "justice", and "compassion".
勿論、私たちは前近代へ、或いはオーラルの時代へ逆戻りすることはできない。では、「聖なるテクストの選択的読みという危険な傾向」に抵抗することはできないのか。Armstrongさんは、『クラーン』が、「その教えは「完全に（in full）」理解されてはならない（must not）」と主張していることに着目する−−"We must all - the religious and the sceptics alike - become aware that there is more to scripture than meets the cursory eye."
Historians have noted that the shift from oral to written scripture often results in strident, misplaced certainty. Reading gives people the impression that they have an immediate grasp of their scripture; they are not compelled by a teacher to appreciate its complexity. Without the aesthetic and ethical disciplines of ritual, they can approach a text in a purely cerebral fashion, missing the emotive and therapeutic aspects of its stories and instructions.Solitary reading also enables people to read their scriptures too selectively, focusing on isolated texts that they read out of context, and ignoring others that do not chime with their own predilections. Religious militants who read their scriptures in this way often distort the tradition they are trying to defend. Christian fundamentalists concentrate on the aggressive Book of Revelation and pay no attention to the Sermon on the Mount, while Muslim extremists rely on the more belligerent passages of the Qur'an and overlook its oft-repeated instructions to leave vengeance to God and make peace with the enemy.
８月16日、午後に限りなく近い午前中に地震。震源地は宮城県沖。千葉では震度４だったようだが、とにかく〈揺れが長かった〉というのが実感。仙台では、屋内プールの天井が落下したほかは、家屋倒壊とか火災といった被害はなかったようだ。ただ、宮城から福島・栃木を飛び越した埼玉県加須市で１件家屋が倒壊したのは不可解。
浅野智彦さんは仙台で地震に遭遇。ちょうど「博物館で興福寺展をみてい」たとのこと（http://mixi.jp/view_diary.pl?id=32113851&owner_id=175670）。また、翌日、無事に帰京という報せが入る。新幹線、112分遅れ。「あともう8分送れて（sic）くれたら特急料金が全額払い戻しになったのですが（笑）」（http://mixi.jp/view_diary.pl?id=32338795&owner_id=175670）。
