Secularism, fundamentalism and Sectarianism as causes of war Essays

Secularism, fundamentalism and Sectarianism as causes of war Essays Secularism, fundamentalism and Sectarianism as causes of war Essay Secularism, fundamentalism and Sectarianism as causes of war Essay Secularism is a term used to mean that certain issues or practices of religious nature should exist separately from other public or private settings.   Therefore, in this argument, it entails a matter of promoting secular ideas in public and private settings. In other words, it can be said that it is a way of avoiding to impose a religious belief to the citizens of a country by the government, especially in a neutral state. In fundamentalism, it is a religious movement that primarily believes and professing completely in the bible. They support reading of the bible and strictly following what has been read to the latter. The followers of this message believe that acceptance of the message means a virtue in life and to have eternal life in heaven, and rejection of the message implies leading to path that will take one to be tortured in hell. When talking about sectarianism, it is a strong devotion to a particular kind of religious sect that makes followers to prejudice other religions. This is because of the strong belief and trust in their religion being the only correct to be followed. Therefore, the issues of secularism, fundamentalism and sectarianism, have had various conflicts on different nations or among citizens of the same nation leading to war due to different believes that people hold. For instance, India and Pakistan have completely irreconcilable definition of the ideological bases of the state On the one hand, the earlier ideology of the INC carried over into the construction of the Indian state with the political system placed firmly on a constitutional framework of secularism. On the other hand, the state of Pakistan although certainly not designed to be a theocracy owned its very existence to the concept that religion can (and should) serve as the basis for political sovereignty and political identity The competing states ‘upped the ante’ for the two states when it came to territorial disputes, (Cashman Robinson 2007 pp 216). Pakistan’s aim was to prove that religion could be a legitimate source of state identity. For India, if Bangladesh’s successful guest for independence from Pakistan meant prove of religious based state legitimacy, then it could have brought an interest superiority of the secular culture. (Cashman Robinson 2007 pp 216). And if Kashmir had integrated into India, it would have led to reinforcement of the triumph of secularism over religious particularism. These two religious states therefore had a strong struggle to win the inspiring of their ideologies on Kashmir and thus led to unending struggle. Therefore, by â€Å"permitting Pakistan to absorb Kashmir would have signaled the triumph of one ideology and the defeat of the other. By acquiescing in Kashmir’s conquest, India would have for all practical purposes conceded Pakistan’s claim to the loyalty of all Muslims in the sub-continent† (Cashman Robinson, 2007 pp 216). These conflicts continued and in 1967, Pakistan launched war against India. These attack although were utter failure, as India had anticipated war and thus had her military ready. â€Å"As a result of the war, Bangladesh gained its long sought independence. A desperately poor but very proud country, Bangladesh jealously guarded its sovereignty and independence in the face of India pressure to accept the role of a quasi-client state of India’s (Cashman Robinson, 2007 pp 263). There have been fights in various nations also as a result of fundamentalism ideologies. This was experienced in the war of the Iraqis and the Iranians. The Iraqis were against the fundamentalism ideas of the Iranians. There were also â€Å"other Arab states in the region [who] felt equally threatened by Islamic fundamentalism in Iran†, (Cashman Robinson, pp 280). These threats made countries like the Saudi Arabia and Iraq to cooperate so as to counter the fundamentalism threat from Iran. This cooperation led to the invasion of Iran in 1980 by the Iraqis with the support from the Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. The Iraqi government was opposed to the Shi’a Muslims in Iran and this was the cause for the conflictual interaction between the two states. The Iraq government used several ways of cracking down the Shi’a political activities in Iran. For instance, there was the crack down of the Shi’a leaders and the other and the dissident members of al Daawa. On the other hand the Shi’a Masses were offered with economic enticement and development assistance so as they can change their religious stand. Finally, war broke out between Iran and Iraq. Iraq spearheaded her war against Iran by destroying the air capabilities of Iran.   Iraq bombed 10 airfields of Iran, while Iran was only able to respond with two divisions of its own, (Cashman Robinson, 2007 pp 291). Religions identity has a big influence on people’s life. It gives the believers a sense of belonging to a community, defining a pattern of belief and morals. These religious identities can at a time cause problems. It can be used for justifying sectarianism and in the extreme violence and ethnic cleansings (Crawford Rositter, 2006 pp 193). England is one country that experienced conflict arising due to those who believe in catholic ideologies, Protestants and Dissenters. According to Marshal (2006), Hostility towards protestant dissenters was especially strong against Baptists, repeatedly excoriated as Anabaptists and against Quakers who were seen as having turned the world upside down in the revolution by their challenges to hierarchies in family church and state by refusal of oaths, address to others as ‘thee’ and ‘thou’, allowance of preaching against luxury and corruption†, (Pp 95). There were laws that were passed to deal with non conformity which saw many dissenters being fined, imprisoned and become financially ruined. The laws also led to many Protestants and dissenters being killed for their faith. In the end, it led to rebellious acts by the Protestants, which erupted to civil wars and revolutions against the catholic rule. For instance, in the seventh century, the Protestants took up arms against their ruler in significant part on the basis of a perceived religious duty to reform the religion of the church of England from its allegedly ‘heretical’ tendencies to ‘popery’ and ‘Arminism’ leading to a teeming liberty of protestant sectarianism and execution of their king, Charles I† (Marshal, 2006 pp266). Rulers of other nations also who become protestants were excommunicated by the pope, deported and assassinated. Therefore, looking at secularism, fundamentalism and sectarianism, it is neither possible nor easy to say that the war will end or is nearly ending. This is because there are still many fights taken place all over the world, despite the enlightenment in the current society. For instance, the current fundamentalism of the Muslim religion is being felt all over the world. The war in Iraq, Lebanon, India and parts of Africa are a clear sign of the unending war. The current war among different human communities is not only for materialistic gain as happened with the World War I II and the cold war. But it is a war that represents spiritual self-defeat of man .As Horowitz (2007) argues, â€Å"as long as Christian values remain in the shadows of scientific advance, peace will be impossible to reach, secularism is the ultimate heresy the root cause of war†, (pp28). It has also been argued that the intervention of the war that has been going in countries like Iraq by the united state has due to taking advantage of the historic sectarian differences. Taras (2006) argued that â€Å"western intervention in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq were intervention in states with pre existing ethnic and sectarian cleavages†, (Para. 3). Also the unending war is culminated by the various stands of different groups of fundamentalists. For instance, as â€Å"most self described Christian fundamentalists are united by their agreement on the nine principles that first defined the movement, Sunni and Shi’a fundamentalist have shared few theological or political principles†, (Levine 2007, Para 9). Levine still explains that â€Å"al- Qaeda’s leadership seeks to unite all Muslims and establish a government, which follow the rule of Caliphs The only way to establish the caliphate is by force†, (Para 10). This means that the al â₠¬â€œQaeda has to overthrow all the Muslim governments and abolish the state boundaries. In such a case, there shall never be end to these wars, as each group will be standing its ground. nbsp;