Syrian poet: “We, in Arab Society, do not understand the meaning of freedom”

Adonis: The difference between Europe and the Islamic world is in quality, not in degree. What I mean is that the Christian view of the world is not political, but humanistic. It is human beings who are the basis for politics. A Christian person has great liberty to separate his religious faith from his political activity. The mistake committed by the Church in the Middle Ages was rectified – obviously after a struggle and violent revolutions – and political rule was entirely separated from politics…

Interviewer: From religion…

Adonis: From religion, sorry. In our case, political rule was based… Ever since the struggle over who would inherit Prophet Muhammad’s place, political rule was essentially based on religion.

Interviewer: But there were great revolutions in the Arab and Islamic world. Take, for example, the ideology of Arab nationalism. This ideology may be connected with Islamic culture, but it is still a man-made ideology.

Adonis: But the ideology of nationalism, in all its forms, is a religious ideology, in the sense that it has never raised any cardinal question concerning religion.

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The Arabs have managed to turn democracy or the revolution into a dynastic or monarchic regime, which is handed down. Most Arab regimes are monarchic regimes, one way or another.