Political Islam and its constancy means that there are so many strands within Islam alive to the old vision of Islam as a conquering, organising, supreme and inviolable code of imperial domination / dominion in the modern world.
They see themselves as the conscience and flame holders of Islam, and their Islam is not a benign thing. Its red in tooth and claw.
Agreed. There's a hadith that says every 100 yrs or so Allah sends a sort of redeemer (s) that revives the Ummah. I was told the likes of Salahuddin and Hassan Al-Banna were those redeemers and that the last one was Malcolm X. I wonder who's next
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You know, I think that the Shia frenzy in Iran in 1979 must have had a profound effect on Sunni Islam on a competitive level. There always has been and always will be this. They are like Real Madrid and Barcelona, or Manchester United and Liverpool, obsessed and anxious about the other, competing for believers and domination and trophies and size and scale and influence.
The seizing of power by the Shia ascendancy both frightened, exhilarated and focussed the keepers of the Sunni flame. Suddenly, an entire state bent to the will of Shia mullahocracy. And so this competitive electrification occurred.
Just one component of a multifaceted phenomenon, but significant all the same.
The Iranian revolution certainly made the Saudis support Sunni Islamists whenever it could. From 80s Afghanistan to todays Syria. I think people underestimate the hate/rivalry between the two. Ever since Mo died the ummah has been fighting over who leads. The Ottoman-safavid wars etc. There's a few famous anti-shia quotes said by prominent sunni scholars. One of them is something about throwing 9 arrows at the Persians (shia) and only one at the Romans (xristian Europe)
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One good thing is that its the rivalry that helped keep Persian culture.