Overview

Sayyid Qutb’s Radical Islamism and The Comparative Political Theology argues that Sayyid Qutb’s radical critique of secular modernity, seen as a product of a great theft of sovereignty that usurps the monopoly of God over the entire world of creation, is not idiosyncratic or incoherent but a quintessential expression and an extreme type of a specific tradition of political theology that until now has been exclusively the province of the Western thought. Dragos Stoica claims that Sayyid Qutb’s political theology of Hakimiyyah (God’s Sovereignty) is better understood by integrating it in a wider context of the antimodern political theology. Thus, throughout this book he compares Qutb’s critique of modernity with the Pakistani Islamist thinker Abu al-A?la Mawdudi (1903–1979), the Spanish Catholic counter-revolutionary political theologian Juan Donoso Corte´s (1809–1853), as well as the Protestant political theologians: Abraham Kuyper (1837-1920) and Rousas J. Rushdoony (1916-2001). This book employs a family resemblance, cross-cultural comparative method and applies a cross-disciplinary analytical model that combines comparative political theology with critical discourse analysis. Employing these analytical instruments this book compares Qutb and his counterparts via the category of anti-modern political theology—more precisely, through a set of shared antitheses organized around the master concept of God’s Sovereignty. The ultimate objective is to augment the understanding of the Qutbian critique of secular modernity as an essential dimension of anti-modern political theology. Thus, by recasting Sayyid Qutb as an essential Muslim political theologian of God’s Sovereignty placed within a larger, cross-cultural paradigm, this book contributes as well to the necessary process of decolonization of political theology.

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9781666966831

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Reviews

Sayyid Qutb's Radical Islamism and The Comparative Political Theology brings the Egyptian Islamist Sayyid Qutb (d. 1966) together with the influential Pakistani thinker Abu al-A'la Mawdudi (d. 1979), Spanish Catholic politician and theorist Juan Donoso Cortés (d. 1853), Dutch Neo-Calvinist theologian and statesman Abraham Kuyper (d. 1920) and American Christian Reconstructionist Rousas J. Rushdoony (d. 2001) to explore their shared rejection of secular modernity. Stoica's carefully crafted analysis convincingly and even devastatingly demonstrates how the thought of these seemingly diverse figures meets in a clear insistence on God's Sovereignty and totalizing, militant vision of politics. The transcultural lens of the book challenges our understanding of how religion confronts the metaphysical and political challenges posed by modernity and is essential reading for anyone grappling with the rise of radical Islam or right-wing Christianity. --Lynda Clarke, Concordia University Sayyid Qutb's Radical Islamism and The Comparative Political Theology brings the Egyptian Islamist Sayyid Qutb (d. 1966) together with the influential Pakistani thinker Abu al-A'la Mawdudi (d. 1979), Spanish Catholic politician and theorist Juan Donoso Cortés (d. 1853), Dutch Neo-Calvinist theologian and statesman Abraham Kuyper (d. 1920) and American Christian Reconstructionist Rousas J. Rushdoony (d. 2001) to explore their shared rejection of secular modernity. Stoica's carefully crafted analysis convincingly and even devastatingly demonstrates how the thought of these seemingly diverse figures meets in a clear insistence on God's Sovereignty and totalizing, militant vision of politics. The transcultural lens of the book challenges our understanding of how religion confronts the metaphysical and political challenges posed by modernity and is essential reading for anyone grappling with the rise of radical Islam or right-wing Christianity.

Author Information

Dragos Stoica teaches at the Department of Religions and Cultures at Concordia University in Montréal.

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