Abstract
Even though the concept fundamentalism is now commonly used in describing radical expression of religion especially in Islam, there is no denying the apparent Christianity provenance of the concept. Therefore, this chapter briefly examines the origin and nature of the concept and how validly it can be utilized in describing adherents of a religion distinctively different from Christianity. While cognizant of the likely pejorative undertones of the concept, especially as it is not a term with which Muslims address themselves, the chapter argues that it is all the same pertinent as it captures the critical desires of the radical and jihadi-inspired adherents for reversion to what is seen as fundamentals of the religion as practised by Prophet Muhammad and the first community of believers. The above is situated under a general outline of Islam as a religion of peace in the chapter and how current jihadi aspirations undermine this peace and are championed by a very tiny fraction of believers.
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Notes
- 1.
First used by a Baptist journalist Curtis Lee Laws in 1920 to designate an emerging movement within American Protestantism, which became evident in that year’s annual meeting of the Northern Baptist Convention.
- 2.
Global fundamentalism is used as a means of distinguishing fundamentalism that arose from the protestant dissension in the 1920s Northern America from the fundamentalism that has become almost fashionable in referring to strident and frequently violent religious revivalism especially in Islam, which debuted most prominently in the wake of the Islamic Revolution of Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran. Perhaps, Khomeini has the distinction of being the first globally recognized fundamentalist in the Islamic world.
- 3.
A good understanding of the idea is provided by Ellis Goldberg, who sees a profound similarity between Sunni (Islam) attitudes towards the Qur’an and that of the Protestant Christians. Thus, “both early Protestantism and the (Sunni) Islamist movement seek to force believers to confront directly the authority of the basic texts of revelation and to read them directly rather than through the intervening medium of received authority. Both believe that Scripture is a transparent medium for anyone who cares to confront it” (Goldberg 1991: 4).
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Anugwom, E.E. (2019). Global Islamic Fundamentalist Influence and Theoretical Explanation of the Insurgence. In: The Boko Haram Insurgence In Nigeria. New Directions in Islam. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96959-6_2
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