[RLK]

Muslim partisans regard him as the latest in a long tradition of radical Islamic thinkers and revolutionary leaders, all of whom advocated violence in pursuit of their own vision of a united, worldwide umma, or community of believers.

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Radical Islamic thinkers only by non-mohammedan standards. Mohammed, himself led what are euphemistically called 28 military campaigns in which he slaughtered anyone who disagreed with Islam. This is the Islamic model which is to be followed and which is not to be altered according to the commandments of the Koran.

[Pan_Yans Wife]

In Iran, where Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini established an Islamic state ideology fueled by anti-American passion, the clerics he left behind are locked in a religious struggle over the "true" interpretation of their faith.

Bin Laden has so far succeeded where Khomeini failed: He has exported his revolutionary ideas across the Islamic world. While that was Khomeini's dream, his radical reading of the faith never penetrated much beyond south Lebanon and other areas dominated by fellow members of his minority Shiite sect.

Roots in seminaries

Although newspaper headlines often characterize the struggle in Iran as a tug of war between political conservatives and "reformers," in fact the root cause of the instability plaguing the country lies within the confines of the seminaries in the holy Shiite city of Qom. As with bin Laden, the West's refusal to appreciate Iran's national struggle in religious terms has deprived it of the full picture.

Progressive theologians who advocate reducing the clergy's role in running Iran are locked in a battle with hard-line ayatollahs who have enforced a rigid religious interpretation to advance their political agenda. As one leading hard-line cleric put it several years ago in a sermon at Tehran's Friday prayers: "If someone tells you he has a different interpretation of Islam, sock him in the mouth."

By politicizing religion, as the hard-line ayatollahs have done in Iran, Muslim leaders rely heavily on the powerful tug of traditionalism. One tool is to enforce Islamic law, or Shariah, through modern institutions. Holy writ is invoked to justify and support social or legal proscriptions, such as the veiling of women or the prohibition against a wife divorcing her husband, that may have lost their luster in modern times.

[SauronOfMordor]

Radical Islamic thinkers only by non-mohammedan standards. Mohammed, himself led what are euphemistically called 28 military campaigns in which he slaughtered anyone who disagreed with Islam.

What some commentators cal "radical", I call "orthodox". Any Muslim who disavows violence in persuit of Islamic dominance is a heretic who must be killed, per Muslim orthodoxy

[Jacob Kell]

"Mohammed, himself led what are euphemistically called 28 military campaigns in which he slaughtered anyone who disagreed with Islam."

Or who refused to accept dhimmitude and de facto second class status. Moslems don't mind Christians and Jews...as long as they suck up, be good little dhimmis (meaning they have few if any real rights other than what the Moslems grant them and even then it's not very much.)and agree to the Jizya and Dhimmi religious apartheid system.

[jigsaw]

If I may slightly reword your following comment to make an observation....

Mohammed, himself led what are euphemistically called 28 military campaigns in
which he slaughtered anyone who disagreed with Islam. This is the Islamic model ...

Liberals, themselves write what are euphemistically called press releases
in which they verbally slaughter anyone who disagrees with Liberalism. This
is the Liberal model ...

Liberalism and Islam -- two pees (sic) in a pod.

[gaspar]

The author has it quite wrong. OBL is not the "latest in a long tradition of radical Islamic thinkers." He is not a thinker; rather, when challenged in 1996 to counter the argument that he was not the author of the famous fatwa declaring war on the USA, he and his friends refused. In the end they admitted that he did not write the fatwa, as they had trumpeted, but that he agreed with it.

Those who knew OBL well in Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Sudan all admit that he is rather a sappy Saudi, born into lots of money, dominated by a partiuclar 11th century dream imparted by (the deceased) Shaykh Azzam, OBL's Palestinian mentor, and later the Arab-Afghan intellectual leader.

It is really questionable whether OBL ever had an original thought in his life. Notice the use of the past tense.