Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence (Updated Edition with a New Preface) (Comparative Studies in Religion and Society)

337 Pages·2001·9.52 MB·English

by  Mark Juergensmeyer

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Juergensmeyer, Mark (Aut Ewing, NJ, USA: Universit http://site.ebrary.com/lib/d
Comparative Studies in Religion and Society
Mark Juergensmeyer. editor
I. Redemptive Encounters: Three Modem Slyles in (he Hindu
Tradition, by Lawrence A. Babb
2. Saints and Vit1ues. edited by John Stratton Hawley
3. Utopias in Conflict: Religion and Nationalism in Modern India,
by Ainslee T. Embree
4. Mama Lola: A Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn, by Karen McCarthy
Brown
5. The New Cold War? Religious Nationalism Confronts the
Secular Slale, by Mark Juergensmeyer
6. Pious Passion: The Emergence of Modern Fundamentalism in the
United States and Iran, by Martin Riesbrodt, translated by Don
Reneau
7. Dev;: Goddesses of India. edited by John Stratton Hawley and
Donna Marie Wulff
8. Absent Lord: Ascetics and Kings in a Jain Riwal Culrure, by
Lawrence A. Babb
9. The Challenge of Fundamentalism: Political/s/mll <Iud the New
World Disorder, by Bassam Tibi
10. Leveling Crowds: Ethnonarionalist Conflicts and Collective
Violence in South Asia, by Stanley J. Tambiah
e. 11. The Bridge Betrayed: Religion and Genocide in Bosnitl. by
c
en Michael A. Sells
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u
gio Society, by Richard Madsen
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Terror
int he Mind
of God
THE GLOBAL RISE OF
R E LI GI OU S VIOL ENe E
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Juergensmeyer, Mark (Aut Ewing, NJ, USA: Universit http://site.ebrary.com/lib/d
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles, California
University of Culifornia Press, Ltd.
London, England
02000 by
The Regents of the University of California
luergensmeyer, Mark.
Terror in the mind of God: the global ri� of
religious violence I Murk lucrgcn�meyer.
p. cHl.-{Comparative studies in religion
and society: 13)
Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and
index.
ISBN 0-520-90032-4 (alk. paper)
I. Violellct>-Rcligious a�pt!ct�. I Title. II Series.
BL65.V551842000
291.I'78331-dc21 99-30466
CiP
Printed in the United States of Americu
9876543 2 1
e. The paper used in this publication meeL� the mini­
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en mum 1"C(luircmcnts of American Niltional Standard
Viol for Information Sciences-Permanence of Paper for
us Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.
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to terror's victims
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I will send my terror before you,
�Uld will throw into confusion all the people . . .
Exodus 23:27
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Contents
Preface and Acknowledgments I XJ
Introduction
1 TelTor and God I 3
The Meaning of Religious Terrorism / 4
Seeing Inside CuJwres of Violence / 10
Cultures of Violence
2 Soldiers for Christ I 19
Mike Bmy and Aborlion Clinic Bombings / 20
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Glob 11 Bameh Goldstein s A Clack at the Tomb of the P.IfTiarchs / 49
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x CONTENTS
5 The Sword of Sikhism I 84
Simmnjil Singh Mann and India s Assassinal.ions / 86
Sikh and Hindu Justifications for Violence / 92
6 Armageddon in a Tokyo Subway I 102
Takcshi Nakamura and rhe Aum Shinrikyo Assault / 105
Can Buddhist Violence Be Justified? / 11 2
The Logic of Religious Violence
7 Theater of Terror I 1 19
Pcrfonmmce Violence / 122
Setting the Stage / 126
A Time fO Kill / 133
Rem:l1ing the Audience / 139
8 Cosmic War I 145
Grand Scenarios / 148
Symbolic War / 155
When Symbols Become Deadly / 160
9 Martyrs and Demons I 164
S:'lcrificial Victims / 165
The Invention of Enemies / 171
America tiS Enemy I 178
Satanizarion and the Stages of Empowenllenr / 182
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Preface to the
Pap e r b ac kEd iti
0 n
Perhaps the first question that came to mind when televisions around
the world displayed the extraordinary aerial assaults on the World
Trade Center and the Pentagon on September I I. 200 I, was why any­
one would do such a thing. When it became clear that the perpetrators'
motivations were couched in religious terms, the shock turned to
anger. How could religion be related to such vicious acts?
It is a question that has arisen wilh alarming frequency in the
post-Cold War world. Religion seems to be connected with violence
virtually everywhere. Since this book was first puhlished, religious vio­
lence has erupted among right-wing Christians in the United States.
angry Muslims and Jews in the Middle East, quarrelling Hindus and
Muslims in South Asia, and indigenous religious communities in Africa
and Indonesia. Like the activists associated with Osama bin Laden. the
individuals involved in these cases have also relied on religion to pro­
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c vide political identities and give license to vcngeful ideologies.
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us lence. In examining recent acts of religious terrorism I try to under­
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Juergensmeyer, Mark (Aut Ewing, NJ, USA: Universit http://site.ebrary.com/lib/d .1
,/I PREFACE TO THE PAPERBACK EDITION
that religion often provides the mOreS and symbols that make possible
bloodshed-even catastrophic acts of terrorism.
Violent ideas and images are not the monopoly of any single religion.
Virtually every major religious tradition-Christian. Jewish, Muslim,
Hindu, Sikh and Buddhist-has served as a resource for violent actors.
Perhaps it is not fair to label Osama bin Laden a Muslim terrorist or to
characterize Timothy McVeigh a Christian onc-as if Lhey were violent
because of their Islamic and quasi-Christian beliefs. But the facl that
religion is in their backgrounds, and behind so many different perpe­
trators of public violence. indicates that aJl religions are inherently rev­
olutionary. They are capable of providing the ideological resources for
an alternative view of public order.
If this has always been so, why are such violent assaults on public
order occurring now? I have looked for the answer to this question in
our contemporary global milieu. The perception of an international
political conspiracy and an oppressive economic «new world order"
has been explicitly mentioned by Osama bin Laden, the AUin Shinrikyo,
and Christian militia groups.
Activists such as bin Laden might be regarded as guerilla antiglobal­
ists. Even local ethnonationalist struggles. such as in Kashmir, have
arisen in part because of an erosion of confidence in Western-style poli­
tics and politicians. The era of globalization and postmodernity creates
a context in which authority is undercut and local forces have been un­
leashed. In saying this, I do not mean to imply that only glObalization
causes religious violence. But it may be one rea'i on why so many in­
e. stances of religious violence in such diverse places around the world are
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