My Babbling Brain

*Faith and identity converge in this (Shia and Sunni) conflict, and their combined power goes a long way toward explaining why, despite the periods of coexistence, the struggle has lasted so long and retains such urgency and significance. It is not just a hoary religious dispute, a fossilized set-piece from the early years of Islam’s unfolding, but a contemporary clash of identities. It is paradoxically, a very old, very modern conflict.

The dominant political values of the old Middle East are a decades-old vintage of Arab nationalism. The new Middle East coming fitfully into being is defined in equal parts by the identity of Shias.

Ultimately the character of the region will be decided in the crucible of Shia revival and the Sunni response to it.

Ashura’s powerful focus on sorrow and pageantry has a parallel in Catholic Lenten rituals, such as the Holy Week and Good Friday “Way of the Cross” processions and Passion plays. Even the more extreme practices of some of the Shias resemble rituals such as the Penitententes, a lay Catholic brotherhood originally formed on the Iberian Peninsula.

If Sunnism is about law, Shiism is about rituals, passion and drama. Before there was Shia law, there was Shia piety, which defines believers above and beyond law. The current excessive legal-mindedness of Iran’s ayatollahs is in some ways a “Sunnification” of Shiism.

*The Shia Revival by Vali Nasr