Religion and Extremism

Despite a popular focus on Islam, it is not just some Muslims who are violent; extremist Jews and Christians can also enact terror and destruction. Douglas Pratt addresses the question of religion and extremism, focussing on the three so-called 'monotheistic' religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

Religion and Extremism: Rejecting Diversity argues that a rejection of Absolutism, results in extreme behaviours and increasingly, in hardening social and religious responses. Arguably all, and especially theistic, religions are concerned with the Absolute and notions such as absolute truth, values, and communal unity. For Christianity, the motif of one Lord, one baptism, one Church. For Islam, the juxtaposition of belief in one God, the Qur'an as the Word of God, and the Ummah as the singular community of Muslims. For Jews it is perhaps the gift of Torah, observant practice, and the sense of communal solidarity through the vicissitudes of history. Douglas Pratt argues that however expressed, the motif of the 'Absolute' is central to all, but how that absolute is and has been received, interpreted and responded to, is a matter of great diversity. Each religion is historically pluriform, yet each can show expressions of absolutism in which variety of interpretation is excluded, leading to extremism. Arguing that 'Absolutism' reveals an underlying dynamic in which religions may lead to extremism, the author concludes with a discussion of contemporary mutual extremism and how extremism may be countered.