Monday, August 20, 2007

Pakistan versus Lebanon. In Pakistan, they honored an Orientalist. The people in Pakistan did their homework and read. The named a street after Annemarie Sschimmel: one of the most impressive and competent Orientalist. Schimmel deserved this honor. In Lebanon, they honored Ernest Renan: one of the most racist and anti-Semitic (he was against both Arabs and Jews) writers, who, as Albert Hourani mentioned, believed in the destruction of the Islamic political component in civilization. He was not even a qualified Orientalist. Read the critique of Renan by Ignaz Goldzhiher.