The roots of utopian thinking

Submitted by Concerned European (Lithuania), Jan 11, 2007 at 03:08

[First of all, Islamism has roots in a religion, and not in a political ideology created by a dictator or some ill politicians. Even though Islamism is in fact a political ideology and very much a political factor, still, it can not be separated from the faith and belief of many.]

To say the truth, even Marxism has roots in religion since it is nothing more than a sort of secular redemption doctrine - the state of Grace(primitive classeless society) - the fallen state(class-society) - the suffering redeemer(the proletariate) - the redemption and resurrection(the revolution and the dictature of proletariate) - the full restitution of the state of Grace(Communism). In a sense Marxism is not an artificial ideology made by a dictator, it is a sort of a reinterpretation of Christianity. However your words have indeed a portion of truth, since Marxism has expressly denied its roots, while Islamism has not.

However there is some root idea common to Christianity, Islamism and Marxism that there is some Plan rooted either in the Divine mind( or in the laws of History which take the place of God), and that the Plan could be made known to humans by prophets and divine messengers(Christ, Muhammed, Marx) - in the form of Bible, Sharia or das Kapital and that implementation of this plan will bring the humanity to a form of blessed and eternal, fully unfolded and fully present state - be it Heavenly Jerusalem, Communism or Islamic State, which mirrors some "perfect" state in the past - Adamic Paradise, Classeless Primitive Society, or the state of Medinah. It is this utopian framework that one has to combat.

One of the way how it can be done is to stress that since God is Absolute and Infinite, "every day He is with a new task"(the Sufi adage taken by the way from Qur'an) and thus there cannot be any final state, any end of history, any such "perfect" condition neither in the present nor in the past, that it would be fully unfolded and complete. Every condition, every state are imperfect, incomplete in itself and not fully present, therefore a "utopian state" has never existed and will never exist. What can be perfect can be only the very process of marching through the time, it can be dome in light or it can be done in darkness.

I think many Western people are unable to see the roots of utopian thinking because being brought up by Christian ideas they still believe in the "end of history". The "Liberal utopia", the belief that the blessed state will ocurr when all the world has established "liberal democracy" exists as well. As well as "bureaucratic utopia", which states that full blessedness will ensue when bureaucratic state machine will have total control over individuals and the perfect "rule of law" will be established. To prove that "liberal" or "bureaucratic" utopia is better than shariatic utopia is very unrewarding task and could easily lead to failure. It is better to undermine the very roots of utopian thinking altogether.

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