Oct. 6, 2009
BOOK REVIEW: 'Racing Toward Armageddon'
Fundamentalists in the Three Abrahamic Religions are Working to Bring About the Battle of Armageddon
Reviewed By David M. Kinchen
Huntingtonnews.net Book Critic
A secularist or even a mainstream religion believer who finishes Michael Baigent's "Racing Toward Armageddon: The Three Great Religions and the Plot to End the World" (HarperOne, 304 pages, color photos, notes, index, $26.99) will be startled at the power of the fundamentalism of Judaism, Christianity and Islam and the desire of all three Abrahamic faiths to bring about the end of the world.
Baigent is that rarity, an investigative reporter specializing in religion. It's almost an oxymoron, because most writers on religion are either believers or those -- like Christopher Hitchens or Bill Maher -- who consider all religions fairy tales for adults.
Baigent seems to be in between, a writer who understands the need in most people for a faith beyond the mundane world. He focuses on Jerusalem in this book, especially the Temple Mount, and the desire of fundamentalist Jews to rebuild the temple, backed by ultrafundamentalist Christian sects in the U.S. and the goal of fundamentalist Muslims to wipe out Jews, destroy Israel and conquer the world.
Many writers on religion concentrate on the similarities of the three religions, the positive similarities. Baigent writes about the sinister fundamentalist similarities, the bizarre alliances of Christian Reconstruction and Jews who want to destroy the two mosques on the Temple Mount and rebuild Solomon's Temple, bringing about the battle of Armageddon.
He says that Muslims really have little connection to Jerusalem, which isn't even mentioned in the Koran. Jews, he says, have the strongest connection, with Christians coming in second.
In chapters like "Planet Rushdoony" he explores the hidden power of Christian Reconstruction, a belief system devised by Rev. Rousas John Rushdoony, which holds that Jesus will not return until the Christian church has completely taken over all governments and the world has been converted to Christianity. Baigent says this is very much like the belief of fundamentalist Muslims in the restoration of the Caliphate and the conversion of the world to militant Islam.
Christian Reconstruction is behind religious home schooling and has links to groups like the Chalcedon Foundation, based in Vallecito, California, which has supporters in politicians as diverse as Sarah Palin, Ron Paul and Tom DeLay, Baigent writes.
Baigent explores the influence of fundamental Christianity in the Armed Forces, where Christians have specialized groups beyond the chaplains that minister to Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and other faiths. Conspiracy theorists will revel in Baigent's interpretation of various groups and their interaction.
Those who argue that fundamentalists are in the minority in all three religions are wrong -- at least as far as Christianity and Islam are concerned, he says. Southern Baptists constitute the largest, fastest growing form of Protestantism, far outnumbering the more moderate mainstream sects. The Wahhabi form of Sunni Islam, based in Saudi Arabia, and funded by the rich kingdom throughout the world, considers Shiite Islam to be a heresy -- and takes a similar view of the moderate Sufi influence in Islam.
True believers, in other words, are the driving force behind the desire to conquer the world by Christians and Muslims alike, with Jews -- as usual -- caught in the middle.
Baigent examines number symbolism, the influence of the Czarist forgery "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," and long ago battles and empires that made me search out views on the past. I found these three, among many others:
There is no present or future, only the past, happening over and over again, now.
EUGENE O'NEILL, A Moon for the Misbegotten
The past lies like a nightmare upon the present.
KARL MARX, The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte
He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past.
GEORGE ORWELL, Nineteen Eighty-Four
When we understand the interpretation of the past by the three religions then and only then will we understand the driving forces behind the race toward Armageddon that Baigent so brilliantly explores in his book.
* * *
About the Author: Baigent, author of 11 other books about religion and related subject, was born in New Zealand in 1948. He lives in England with his wife and children. He has a bachelor's degree from Canterbury University, Christchurch, NZ and a master's in mysticism and religious experience from the University of Kent in England.
Publisher's web site: www.harperone.com
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BOOK REVIEW: 'Racing Toward Armageddon'
Fundamentalists in the Three Abrahamic Religions are Working to Bring About the Battle of Armageddon
Reviewed By David M. Kinchen
Huntingtonnews.net Book Critic
A secularist or even a mainstream religion believer who finishes Michael Baigent's "Racing Toward Armageddon: The Three Great Religions and the Plot to End the World" (HarperOne, 304 pages, color photos, notes, index, $26.99) will be startled at the power of the fundamentalism of Judaism, Christianity and Islam and the desire of all three Abrahamic faiths to bring about the end of the world.
Baigent is that rarity, an investigative reporter specializing in religion. It's almost an oxymoron, because most writers on religion are either believers or those -- like Christopher Hitchens or Bill Maher -- who consider all religions fairy tales for adults.
Baigent seems to be in between, a writer who understands the need in most people for a faith beyond the mundane world. He focuses on Jerusalem in this book, especially the Temple Mount, and the desire of fundamentalist Jews to rebuild the temple, backed by ultrafundamentalist Christian sects in the U.S. and the goal of fundamentalist Muslims to wipe out Jews, destroy Israel and conquer the world.
Many writers on religion concentrate on the similarities of the three religions, the positive similarities. Baigent writes about the sinister fundamentalist similarities, the bizarre alliances of Christian Reconstruction and Jews who want to destroy the two mosques on the Temple Mount and rebuild Solomon's Temple, bringing about the battle of Armageddon.
He says that Muslims really have little connection to Jerusalem, which isn't even mentioned in the Koran. Jews, he says, have the strongest connection, with Christians coming in second.
In chapters like "Planet Rushdoony" he explores the hidden power of Christian Reconstruction, a belief system devised by Rev. Rousas John Rushdoony, which holds that Jesus will not return until the Christian church has completely taken over all governments and the world has been converted to Christianity. Baigent says this is very much like the belief of fundamentalist Muslims in the restoration of the Caliphate and the conversion of the world to militant Islam.
Christian Reconstruction is behind religious home schooling and has links to groups like the Chalcedon Foundation, based in Vallecito, California, which has supporters in politicians as diverse as Sarah Palin, Ron Paul and Tom DeLay, Baigent writes.
Baigent explores the influence of fundamental Christianity in the Armed Forces, where Christians have specialized groups beyond the chaplains that minister to Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and other faiths. Conspiracy theorists will revel in Baigent's interpretation of various groups and their interaction.
Those who argue that fundamentalists are in the minority in all three religions are wrong -- at least as far as Christianity and Islam are concerned, he says. Southern Baptists constitute the largest, fastest growing form of Protestantism, far outnumbering the more moderate mainstream sects. The Wahhabi form of Sunni Islam, based in Saudi Arabia, and funded by the rich kingdom throughout the world, considers Shiite Islam to be a heresy -- and takes a similar view of the moderate Sufi influence in Islam.
True believers, in other words, are the driving force behind the desire to conquer the world by Christians and Muslims alike, with Jews -- as usual -- caught in the middle.
Baigent examines number symbolism, the influence of the Czarist forgery "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," and long ago battles and empires that made me search out views on the past. I found these three, among many others:
There is no present or future, only the past, happening over and over again, now.
EUGENE O'NEILL, A Moon for the Misbegotten
The past lies like a nightmare upon the present.
KARL MARX, The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte
He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past.
GEORGE ORWELL, Nineteen Eighty-Four
When we understand the interpretation of the past by the three religions then and only then will we understand the driving forces behind the race toward Armageddon that Baigent so brilliantly explores in his book.
* * *
About the Author: Baigent, author of 11 other books about religion and related subject, was born in New Zealand in 1948. He lives in England with his wife and children. He has a bachelor's degree from Canterbury University, Christchurch, NZ and a master's in mysticism and religious experience from the University of Kent in England.
Publisher's web site: www.harperone.com
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