''For the founder of the River Island retail chain, see
Bernard Lewis (entrepreneur).''
'Bernard Lewis' (born
May 31,
1916,
London) is the Cleveland E. Dodge Professor Emeritus of
Near Eastern Studies at
Princeton University. He specializes in the
history of Islam and the interaction between
Islam and the
West and is especially famous for his works on the history of the
Ottoman Empire as well as his often considered right-wing positions in his intellectual debate with Pr.
Edward Said on the israelo-palestinian conflict.
Lewis is at the same time the most widely-read expert on the
Middle East and one of the most controversial scholars specialized on this region. His advice is frequently sought by Republican policymakers, including the current
Bush administration concerning the war in Iraq, for instance. In the ''Encyclopedia of Historians and Historical Writing''
Martin Kramer, whose Ph.D. thesis was directed by Lewis, considered that, over a 60-year career, he has emerged as "the most influential postwar historian of Islam and the Middle East."
[1]
Biography
Born to middle-class
Jewish parents in Stoke Newington, London, Lewis became attracted to languages and history from an early age. While preparing for his
bar mitzvah ceremony at the age of eleven or twelve, the young Bernard, fascinated by a new language, and especially a new script, discovered an interest in
Hebrew. He subsequently moved on to studying
Aramaic and then
Arabic, and later still, some
Latin,
Greek,
Persian, and
Turkish. As with semitic languages, Lewis's interest in history was stirred thanks to the bar mitzvah ceremony, during which he received as a gift a book on
Jewish history.
[2]
He graduated in 1936 from the then School of Oriental Studies (SOAS, now
School of Oriental and African Studies) at the
University of London with a
B.A. in History with special reference to the Near and Middle East, and obtaining his
Ph.D. three years later, also from SOAS, specializing in the History of Islam.
["Bernard Lewis]
Cleveland E. Dodge Professor of Near Eastern Studies, Emeritus", Department of Near Eastern Studies, University of Princeton, retrieved May 26, 2006. Lewis also studied law, going part of the way toward becoming a barrister, but returned to study Middle Eastern history. He undertook post-graduate studies at the
University of Paris, where he studied with the orientalist
Louis Massignon and earned the "Diplôme des Études Sémitiques" in 1937.
[1]
He returned to SOAS in 1938 as an assistant lecturer in
Islamic History.
During the
Second World War, Lewis served in the
British Army in the
Royal Armoured Corps and
Intelligence Corps in 1940-41, before being seconded to the
Foreign Office. After the war, he returned to SOAS. and in 1949 -as he was one of the very rare specialists- he was appointed to the new chair in Near and Middle Eastern History at the age of 33.
[4]
In 1974, Lewis accepted a joint position at
Princeton University and the
Institute for Advanced Study, also located in
Princeton,
New Jersey. The terms of his appointment were such that Lewis taught only one semester per year, and being free from administrative responsibilities, he could devote more time to research than previously. Consequently, Lewis's arrival at Princeton marked the beginning of the most prolific period in his research career during which he published numerous books and articles based on the previously accumulated materials.
[5] In addition, it was in the U.S. that Lewis became a public intellectual. Upon his retirement from Princeton in 1986, Lewis served at
Cornell University until 1990.
Lewis has been a naturalized citizen of the
United States since 1982. He married Ruth Hélène Oppenhejm in 1947 with whom he had a daughter and a son before the marriage was dissolved in 1974.
Research
Martin Kramer, whose Ph.D. thesis was directed by Lewis, claims Lewis as "the most influential postwar historian of Islam and the Middle East" whose authority extends beyond the academe to the general public. He is the pioneer of the social and economic history of the Middle East and is famous for his extensive research of the
Ottoman archives.
Bernard Lewis began his research career with the study of
medieval Arab, especially
Syrian, history.
His first article, dedicated to professional guilds of medieval Islam, had been widely regarded as the most authoritative work on the subject for about thirty years.
[6]
However, after the creation of the
State of Israel in 1948, scholars of Jewish origin found more and more difficult to conduct archival and field research in the
Arab countries where they were suspected of espionage. Therefore, Lewis switched to the study of the Ottoman Empire, while continuing to research Arab history through the Ottoman archives,
which had only recently been opened to Western researchers. A series of articles that Lewis published over the next several years revolutionized the history of the Middle East by giving a broad picture of the Islamic society, including its government, economy, and demographics.
Lewis argues that the Middle East is currently backward and its decline was a largely self-inflicted condition resulting from both culture and religion, as opposed to the post colonialist view which posits the problems of the region as economic and political maldevelopment mainly due to the 19th century european colonization. In his 1982 work ''Muslim Discovery of Europe,'' Lewis argues that Muslim societies could not keep pace with the west and that "Crusader successes were due in no small part to Muslim weakness."
[7] Further, he suggested that as early as the 11th century Islamic societies were decaying, primarily the byproduct of internal problems like "cultural arrogance," which was a barrier to creative borrowing, rather than external pressures like the Crusades.
.
Revolted by the Soviet and Arab attempts to delegitimize Israel as a racist country, Lewis wrote a study of
anti-Semitism ''Semites and Anti-Semites'' (1986).
In other works he argued Arab rage against Israel was startlingly disproportionate to other tragedies or injustices in the Muslim world: the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and control of Muslim-majority land in Central Asia, the bloody and destructive fighting during the Hama uprising in Syria (1982), the Algerian civil war (1992–98), and the Iran-Iraq War (1980–88).
[8]
In addition to his scholarly works, Lewis wrote several influential books accessible to the general public: ''The Arabs in History'' (1950), ''The Middle East and the West'' (1964), and ''The Middle East'' (1995).
In the wake of the
September 11, 2001 attacks, the interest in Lewis's work surged, especially his 1990 essay ''The Roots of Muslim Rage''. Two of his books were published after 9/11: ''
What Went Wrong?'' (written before the attacks) and ''
The Crisis of Islam''.
Views and influence on contemporary politics
In the mid-1960s, Lewis emerged as a commentator on the issues of the modern Middle East, and his analysis of
Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the rise of militant Islam brought him publicity and aroused significant controversy. American historian Joel Beinin has called him "perhaps the most articulate and learned Zionist advocate in the North American Middle East academic community ..."
[Beinin, Joel. "Review of: ''Semites and Anti-Semites: An Inquiry into Conflict and Prejudice'' by Bernard Lewis, ''MERIP Middle East Report'', No. 147, Egypt's Critical Moment (Jul., 1987), pp. 43-45.] Lewis's policy advice has particular weight thanks to this scholarly authority.
remarked: "...in this new century, his wisdom is sought daily by policymakers, diplomats, fellow academics, and the news media."
[9]
A harsh critic of the
Soviet Union, Lewis continues the liberal tradition in Islamic historical studies. Although his early
Marxist views had a bearing on his first book ''The Origins of Ismailism'', Lewis subsequently discarded Marxism. His later works are a reaction against the
left-wing current of
Third-worldism, which came to be a significant current in Middle Eastern studies.
Lewis advocates closer Western ties with
Israel and
Turkey, which he saw especially important in light of the extension of the Soviet influence in the Middle East. Modern Turkey holds a special place in Lewis's view of the region due to the country's efforts to become a part of the West.
Lewis views
Christendom and Islam as civilizations that have been in perpetual collision ever since the advent of Islam in the 7th century. In a seminal essay ''The Roots of Muslim Rage'' (1990), he saw the struggle between the West and Islam gathering strength. It was in that essay that he coined the phrase "
clash of civilizations", which received prominence in the eponymous book by
Samuel Huntington.
[10]
In 1998, Lewis read in a London-based newspaper ''
Al-Quds Al-Arabi'' a declaration of war on the United States by
Osama bin Laden, a person of whom Lewis had never heard before, despite his terrorist attacks in Africa and the Middle-East. Recognizing in bin Laden's language what he considered as the "ideology of
jihad", Lewis wrote an essay ''A License to Kill'' in which he warned about the danger presented by the holy warrior.
But this was actually long after the Clinton administration and the US
intelligence community had begun its hunt, first in Sudan and then in Afghanistan.
In August 2006, in an article about whether the world can rely on the concept of
mutual assured destruction as a deterrent in its dealings with
Iran, Lewis wrote in the ''
Wall Street Journal'' about the significance of August 22 in the Islamic calendar. The Iranian president had indicated he would respond by that date to U.S. demands regarding Iran's development of nuclear power; Lewis wrote that the date corresponded to the 27th day of the month of Rajab of the year 1427, the day Muslims commemorate the night flight of the prophet
Muhammad from Jerusalem to heaven and back. Lewis wrote that it would be "an appropriate date for the apocalyptic ending of
Israel and, if necessary, of the world."
[11] The article received significant press coverage.
[12]
Criticism and controversies
Debates with Edward Said
Lewis is known for his literary sparrings with
Edward Said, the
Palestinian-American
literary theorist and
activist who "deconstructed"
Orientalist scholarship. Pr. Edward W. Said (Colombia University) defined Lewis's work as a prime example of Orientalism, in his 1978 book ''
Orientalism''. Said asserted that the field of Orientalism was political intellectualism bent on self-affirmation rather than objective study,
[13] a form of racism, and a tool of
imperialist domination.
[14] He further questioned the scientific neutrality of some leading Orientalist scholars such as Bernard Lewis or Daniel Pipes on the Arab world. In an interview with
Al-Ahram Weekly, Said suggested that Lewis' knowledge of the Middle East was so biased it could not be taken seriously, and claimed "Bernard Lewis hasn't set foot in the Middle East, in the Arab world, for at least 40 years. He knows something about Turkey, I'm told, but he knows nothing about the Arab world."
[15]
Edward Said considered that Lewis treats Islam as a monolithic entity without the nuance of its plurality, internal dynamics, and historical complexities, and accused him of "demagogy and downright ignorance."
[16]
Lewis' response
Rejecting the view that western scholarship was biased against the Middle East, despite its 18th century origins in the european imperialist policies, Lewis responded that Orientalism developed since then as a facet of
European
humanism, independently of the past European imperial expansion.
He noted the French and English pursued the study of Islam in the 16th and 17th centuries, yet not in an organized way, but long before they had any control or hope of control in the Middle East; and that much of Orientalist study did nothing to advance the cause of imperialism. "What imperial purpose was served by deciphering the ancient Egyptian language, for example, and then restoring to the Egyptians knowledge of and pride in their forgotten, ancient past?"
[17]
Allegations of denial of the Armenian Genocide
In a November 1993 ''
Le Monde'' interview, Lewis said that the
Ottoman Turks’ killing of up to 1.5 million
Armenians in 1915 was not "genocide", but the "brutal byproduct of war".
[18] He further suggested in the interview that "the reality of the
Armenian genocide results from nothing more than the imagination of the Armenian people."
[19] A
Parisian court interpreted his remarks as a denial of the Armenian Genocide and on
June 21,
1995 fined him one franc. The court ruled that while Lewis has the right to his views, they did damage to a third party and that "it is only by hiding elements which go against his thesis that the defendant was able to state that there was no 'serious proof' of the Armenian Genocide."
[20]
When Lewis received the prestigious
National Humanities Medal from President Bush in November 2006, the Armenian National Committee of America took strong objection. Executive Director Aram Hamparian released a statement of pointed disapproval: The ANCA Press Release noticed that early in his career Lewis asserted the holocaust of Armenians in his 1961 book, ''The Emergence of Modern Turkey'' (p. 356): "A desperate struggle between [the Turks and Armenians] began, a struggle between two nations for the possession of a single homeland, that ended with the terrible holocaust of 1915, when a million and a half Armenians perished."
[21]
Lewis' response
Lewis argues that:
Lewis thus believes that "to make [Armenian Genocide], a parallel with the Holocaust in Germany" is "rather absurd."
In an interview with ''
Haaretz'' he stated:
Noam Chomsky
In a 2002 interview with the
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's "Hot Talk" program, Noam Chomsky detailed what he claimed was a series of comments from a declassified Eisenhower Administration memo:
Chomsky claimed that Bernard Lewis, in his writings on the Middle East, omitted this and other evidence of Western culpability for failures in the region. Chomsky claimed:
Lewis' response
On the same program the next month, Lewis responded:
Stance on the Iraq War
Most recently Lewis has been criticised as "perhaps the most significant intellectual influence behind the invasion of Iraq", who urged regime change in Iraq to provide a jolt that — he argued — would "modernize the Middle East".
[22] Critics of Lewis have suggested that Lewis' Orientalist theories about "What Went Wrong" in the Middle East, and other important works, formed the intellectual basis of the push towards war in Iraq.
[23]
Books
★ ''The Origins of Ismailism'' (1940)
★ ''A Handbook of Diplomatic and Political Arabic'' (1947)
★ ''
The Arabs in History'' (1950)
★ ''
The Emergence of Modern Turkey'' (1961)
★ ''Istanbul and the Civilizations of the Ottoman Empire'' (1963)
★ '' (1967)
★ ''The Cambridge History of Islam'' (2 vols. 1970, revised 4 vols. 1978, editor with Peter Malcolm Holt and Ann K.S. Lambton)
★ ''Islam: From the Prophet Muhammad to the capture of Constantinople'' (1974, editor)
★ ''History — Remembered, Recovered, Invented'' (1975)
★ ''Race and Color in Islam'' (1979)
★ ''Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire: The Functioning of a Plural Society'' (1982, editor with Benjamin Braude)
★ ''The Muslim Discovery of Europe'' (1982)
★ ''
The Jews of Islam'' (1984)
★ ''Semites and Anti-Semites'' (1986)
★ ''Islam from the Prophet Muhammad to the Capture of Constantinople'' (1987)
★ ''The Political Language of Islam'' (1988)
★ ''
Race and Slavery in the Middle East: an Historical Enquiry'' (1990)
★ ''
Islam and the West'' (1993)
★ ''Islam in History'' (1993)
★ ''The Shaping of the Modern Middle East'' (1994)
★ ''Cultures in Conflict'' (1994)
★ ''The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years'' (1995)
★ ''The Future of the Middle East'' (1997)
★ ''The Multiple Identities of the Middle East'' (1998)
★ ''A Middle East Mosaic: Fragments of Life, Letters and History'' (2000)
★ ''Music of a Distant Drum: Classical Arabic, Persian, Turkish, and Hebrew Poems'' (2001)
★ ''The Muslim Discovery of Europe'' (2001)
★ ''
What Went Wrong?: The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East'' (2002)
★ ''
The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror'' (2003)
★ ''
From Babel to Dragomans: Interpreting the Middle East'' (2004)
References
1. Bernard Lewis Encyclopedia of Historians and Historical Writing
2. From Babel to Dragomans: Interpreting The Middle East, , Bernard, Lewis, Oxford University press, 2004, ISBN 0195173368
3. Bernard Lewis Encyclopedia of Historians and Historical Writing
4. Lewis (2004), pp. 3–4
5. Lewis (2004), pp. 6–7
6. Bernard Lewis: An Appreciation, , R. Stephen, Humphreys, Humanities,
7. Lewis, Bernard, ''Muslim Discovery of Europe'', Norton Paperback, 2001, p.22
8. Lewis, Bernard, ''The Crisis of Islam : Holy War and Unholy Terror'', Modern Library, 2003, p.90-91, 108, 110-111
9. Remarks by Vice President Cheney at the World Affairs Council of Philadelphia Luncheon Honoring Professor Bernard Lewis
10. A Sage in Christendom: A personal tribute to Bernard Lewis
11. "August 22. Does Iran have something in store?", ''Wall Street Journal'', August 8, 2006.
12. August 22 coverage:
★ CNN Headline News host Glenn Beck and MSNBC host Tucker Carlson.
★ "World survives, but solution on Iran is no closer" ''Sydney Morning Herald'', August 26, 2006.
★ "World to end on August 22" ''The Guardian'', August 9, 2006.
★ "Nuclear Apocalypse milder than expected" ''The Register'', August 23, 2006.
★ "Apocalypse Now?" ''National Review'', August 10, 2006.
★ "Apocalypse now?" ''Jerusalem Post'' August 22, 2006.
★ "Beware Aug. 22 and Iran's apocalyptic view" ''Toronto Star'', August 12, 2006.
★ "August 22: Doomsday?", ''ABC News Blotter'', August 21, 2006.
★ Chicago Tribune.
13. Said, Edward, ''Orientalism'' (Vintage Books: New York, 1979). ISBN 978-0394740676. Pg 12
14. Keith Windschuttle, "Edward Said's "Orientalism revisited," The New Criterion January 17, 1999, accessed January 19, [1999].
15. Said, Edward."Resources of hope ," Al-Ahram Weekly April 2, 2003, accessed April 26, [2007].
16. Said, Edward."The Clash of Ignorance," The Nation October 22, 2001, accessed April 26, [2007].
17. Lewis, Bernard, ''Islam and the West'', Oxford University Press, 1993, p.126
18. Dhimmitude and Bernard Lewis revisited by Robert Spencer, February 4, 2004
19. "Bernard Lewis Condemned For Having Denied The Reality Of The Armenian Genocide" by Nathaniel Herzberg, '' Le Monde'', p. 11, June 23, 1995
20. "Bernard Lewis Condemned For Having Denied The Reality Of The Armenian Genocide" by Nathaniel Herzberg, '' Le Monde'', p. 11, June 23, 1995
21. Bostom, Andrew. "Dhimmitude and The Doyen", New English Review, November 10, 2006. Retrieved April 26, 2007.
22. "AEI'S Weird Celebration"
23. "Bernard Lewis Revisited", Washington Monthly, November 2004. Accessed April 26, 2007.
External links
★
Lewis's Princeton University homepage
★
Atlantic Monthly: ''The Roots of Muslim Rage''
★
Links to online articles by Bernard Lewis at zionist.org
★
BookTV interview with Bernard Lewis
★
Booknotes interview with Bernard Lewis What Went Wrong?: Western Impact and Middle Eastern Response
★
Bernard Lewis and MESA's Shame by
Martin Kramer
★
The Washington Monthly:
Bernard Lewis Revisited by Michael Hirsh
★
CounterPunch:
CounterPunch: ''Scholarship or Sophistry? Bernard Lewis and the New Orientalism''
★
Bernard Lewis featured in Slate Magazine's "AEI'S Weird Celebration"
العربية
中国
Français
Deutsch
Ελληνική
हिन्दी
Italiano
日本語
Português
Русский
Español
