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My Arabic teacher was very cautious with me when I began to talk to him about the things I had
seen. There were times when he would smile and tell me I was too young to be talking about such
matters as justice and revenge. There was more than enough time to talk about these matters later.
Then, on occasion, as though letting me into a secret, he would agree with me that revenge was
necessary and that one day we would be in charge. No one would be able to humiliate us.
We began to read short histories of the early battles of Islam. He made the words on the page come
to life, and I felt that I was there, a warrior in an ancient battle. And it felt right and correct.
He quickly became my source of knowledge regarding the revolutionary potential of Islam. Islam
was now linked in my mind not just to piety, prayer, and the promise of a pleasurable afterlife, but
also to questions of justice and politics and power and the right to control others. This was clear to
me at the age of twelve, since if we were the ones who were striving continually to be morally
correct, and morally informed, then surely we were the ones who had the right to decide how society
should be directed. Furthermore, we were genuinely concerned with the grand questions of fighting
injustice and protecting our fellow Arabs and Muslims wherever they were. These noble impulses
were sufficient to give us the confidence that we had the right to decide for all others. Certainly we
had more right than those who were concerned with money and pleasure and triviality like the
comforts of daily life. I see similar positions being taken by Islamists and radical Muslims today.
I remember how I felt at the time. I was part of a revolutionary religious impulse that had certainty
about all aspects of life in this world, coupled with the absolute exhilaration of the rewards of the
afterlife. So why do I write about it in a way that suggests I am not an enthusiast of this way of life?
Today, I still meet many people who utilize the same approach, based on the same impulses and
convictions. They are integrated into society and the economy the way any other Muslim is. But I still
feel that there is something missing and I think the answer lies in the absence of doubt. By doubt, I
mean the broad sensation of humility in the face of a world that is continually changing and evolving;
humility in the face of facts that appear in the media as though they were carved in stone only to be
discarded in the next news cycle as irrelevant tripe. The speed with which the presentation of events
mutates is one reason why I feel that the certainties of the Islamists are doomed.
Saif, our convictions are undermined by our evolving perceptions. This simply means that the
rigidity of the worldview that we were taught as children loses its validity as we mature. That
worldview is one that is open to evolution as we add more features to it. A concern for the question
of justice and injustice is extremely important; yet acting as though this concern gives us precedence
in society should be seen instead as a power-grabbing ruse. We need to be conscious of this
undercurrent. The worldview that says I am being ethically correct if I follow all the rules is one that
can evolve into something more systematic—and more responsive to a more complex and nuanced
understanding of the world around us. We evolve from ascertaining the specific rigid rules to
discerning the principles of behavior that stand behind, or underpin, these rules.
These are some of the ideas that I see could have helped me in the early 1980s. Had we been
educated not just in the rules, but also in the values that supported these rules, we might have been