- There are multiple examples from 1838 to 1842 in reports concerning
Lebanon, Egypt, Syria and Turkey. The following remarks would barely
seem out of place in the Bradford of 2015, or the Cairo of 700 AD.
A thousand men of the National Guard of this town [in Egypt] have
embarked for Syria, in order to strengthen the timid against the fear of
battle [...] they were assembled in a confined space, where they were
made to slaughter a number of sheep, and, having washed their hands in
the hot blood of those animals, they were obliged to swear by the Koran
that they would cheerfully shed their own blood for the defence of
Islamism... “Eastern Intelligence”, The Times (London, England), 18 July
1840, p.5.
The Times of the 1840s was even talking about Islamism in relation to
married women being forcibly turned into sex-slaves of the Emir in
Lebanon. “The wife was sent into the Emirʼs harem and made to embrace
Islamism...” from “Syria As It Is”, The Times , 27 June 1842, p.6. Here
is another example where Islamism is clearly just Islam:
Several daysʼ imprisonment, and frequent beating, failed to return him
to Islamism [...] At the place of execution he was exhorted to recant
Christianity [...] the naked sword was shown him, but he persisted in his
refusal [...] at last he was thrown down in the most brutal manner, and
his head sliced and sawed off”. “Private Correspondence”, The Times, 20
Sept 1843, p.5.
For other early examples where there is no distinction in English
between “Islam” and “Islamism” see “Private Correspondence”, The
Times, 31 Dec 1838, p.5. These are just four of the oldest articles in The
Times archive where the word “Islamism” occurs, and we can instantly
see the themes which have made the rise of ISIS so disgusting: fanatical
preparedness to die fighting for Islam, Christians beheaded for
blasphemy, non-Muslim women stolen from their husbands and turned
into sex-slaves. Clearly the idea that Islamism is somehow separate from
Islam and that it is a product of the twentieth-century is a brazen lie. ↵
dana p.
(Dana P.)
#1