This is why the enlightenment never happened in the middle east

[PlayTheGame]

With "the enlightenment" I mean the beginning of rationality & human rights that happened in Western Europe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_Enlightenment

In western Europe, where christianity ruled, the enlightenment did happen. how so?

This is my theory:

Christianity was already very 'loose'. As in, the leader of the church, the pope, competed with the worldly leaders of Europe for power.

When Luther proposed a new version of Christianity, including not having to pay pastors for forgiveness from God, and giving less power to the church, many worldly leaders agreed to go with Luthers version of Christianity. Also of course because Luthers version didn't differ that much from Roman Catholicism. This allowed a 'fluid' evolution of christianity, philosophy and science to happen in Europe because the religious & worldly powers were not so rigid.

Islam on the other hand, was such a good invention at the time, that it actually shoots itself in the foot later in time. I'll explain:

Islam had way superior mathematics, science, architecture etc. This was all possible because the system was so rigid; in contrast to Europe, the worldly power & the religious power was one and the same; the Caliph, who takes the role of both "Pope" and "Emperor". So unlike in Europe there was no struggle between the powers because they were one and the same. This was only possible because Islam is such a rigid religion where it was laid out in the Koran that the worldly leader and the religious leader are the same leader. Also in the Koran it's laid out that Mohammed is the last prophet, so it's the end all be all. So nobody doubted this system. This went very well for some time, like I said with better sciences etc, than in Europe.

The funny thing is that in the middle east, an evolution of religion was actually tried in the same way as in Europe; with the Bab and Baha'u'llah, founding the Baha'i faith in the 18th and 19th centuries, later even then the enlightenment in the west. Baha'i is basically a super progressive version of the Abrahamic religions. This is from wikipedia:

Baháʼís regard the major religions as fundamentally unified in purpose, though varied in social practices and interpretations. There is a similar emphasis on the unity of all people, openly rejecting notions of racism and nationalism. At the heart of Baháʼí teachings is the goal of a unified world order that ensures the prosperity of all nations, races, creeds, and classes.[6][7]

This is of course even more enlightened than what happened in the west! but this is precisely why this religion could never take over Islam. Unlike in Europe, where the gap from Catholicism to Protestantism was small, allowing more enlightened philosophies, in the Middle East this gap was huge! Islam was way more rigid and conservative than Catholicism, and Baha'i is way more progressive than protestantism! And there was no political reason at all for the Islamic system to adopt Baha'i at all, precisely because the Islam system worked so well.

So what happened with Baha'i? they were exiled out of the middle east to Israel. No enlightenment for the Middle East. So in the end the Middle East shot itself in the foot, because right now its the very core of stage blue in the world.

Edited April 6, 2020 by PlayTheGame