There must be a great deal of dishonesty, even corruption, within the field of Middle Eastern Studies for Esposito to be able to pull a lie that big off. And maybe the corruption stretches into religious studies and other fields.
Just looking at Qatari funding of US universities, Jenna Romano in an article in the Mideast Journal suggests Qatar alone has donated roughly $4.7 billion to US universities from 2001-2021. Saudi Arabia and other Muslim nations have also donated. Is scholarship like Esposito's what they are buying?
Or do these academics just hate Christianity or the West or America or whatever so much that they do it for free?
And they're advising the US military and intelligence agencies.
Esposito founded the Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University in 1993 and is its founding director. The center received a $20 million endowment from Saudi Arabian Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal "to advance education in the fields of Islamic civilization and Muslim-Christian understanding and strengthen its presence as a world leader in facilitating cross-cultural and inter-religious dialogue."
The thing is, you really can’t read the historical record and come to any similar conclusions. If you go to a conference and raise the issue of the sources in a way that shows that you are familiar with the record, they’ll grant that “peaceful coexistence” might be an overstatement. Yet motte-and-bailey style, they’ll return to the position once it’s no longer under assault.
I have seen that in some other scholars' work. They present the evidence, but when it comes to the conclusion, it's like they ignore part of their own evidence. It's weird.
6 comments:
There must be a great deal of dishonesty, even corruption, within the field of Middle Eastern Studies for Esposito to be able to pull a lie that big off. And maybe the corruption stretches into religious studies and other fields.
Just looking at Qatari funding of US universities, Jenna Romano in an article in the Mideast Journal suggests Qatar alone has donated roughly $4.7 billion to US universities from 2001-2021. Saudi Arabia and other Muslim nations have also donated. Is scholarship like Esposito's what they are buying?
Or do these academics just hate Christianity or the West or America or whatever so much that they do it for free?
And they're advising the US military and intelligence agencies.
It's disturbing.
According to Esposito's Wikipedia page:
Esposito founded the Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University in 1993 and is its founding director. The center received a $20 million endowment from Saudi Arabian Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal "to advance education in the fields of Islamic civilization and Muslim-Christian understanding and strengthen its presence as a world leader in facilitating cross-cultural and inter-religious dialogue."
Esposito is a Catholic.
The thing is, you really can’t read the historical record and come to any similar conclusions. If you go to a conference and raise the issue of the sources in a way that shows that you are familiar with the record, they’ll grant that “peaceful coexistence” might be an overstatement. Yet motte-and-bailey style, they’ll return to the position once it’s no longer under assault.
I read a couple of the books Esposito edited. His conclusions seemed disconnected from the evidence presented.
I have seen that in some other scholars' work. They present the evidence, but when it comes to the conclusion, it's like they ignore part of their own evidence. It's weird.
Thomas Doubting
Like how Alfred ("Creep-of-a-Quack") Kinsey documented children's efforts to escape molestation but still insisted that they were enjoying it.
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