Every proposal, position, or discussion is subject to interventions characterized by some focusing on religion and viewing all aspects of life from a religious perspective. These interventions then evaluate the stray and the intrusive based on feelings of hostility and hatred toward religion, and attempt to rob the believer of his religion and distance him from it. Even claiming that there is no mention of culture and the intellectual in Muhammadan literature, or that there is no mention of homeland and citizenship in this literature, is considered an attack on religion, even though these concepts are new and could not have existed in the heritage 1,440 years ago. The goal of highlighting their absence in Islamic literature was to demonstrate the modernity of these concepts and the difficulties associated with their modernity in defining them. The obsessed person feels as if he is being accused, even though what is said usually has no connection to the accusation.
This type of reaction is repeated daily, with the same stereotypes, the same background, and the same goal. We sometimes justify it with oversensitivity… or other simplistic explanations. However, the matter is not as simple, naive, or marginal as some see it. Rather, it embodies a pathological condition called “religious obsession,” characterized by several manifestations, including an excessive reflexive sense of duty to defend religion, which represents the obsessed person’s ultimate goal and the essence of his life, as if religion were a goal and destiny. Then there is the extreme extremism in insisting on adhering to the principle of not attacking sacred things, the number and types of which are announced as needed. Then there is the excessive fear for the life of the person afflicted with religious obsession, especially for his future in the afterlife. Then there is the confusion in distinguishing between normal conditions and mild cases of religious obsession. The obsession here is latent, and the obsessed person, despite their obsession, is able to interact and deal with others with a sense of “normality,” which prevents others from discovering them.
The Assad regime was slightly affected by religious fanaticism, and the motive for monopolizing power was factional and subject to the logic of the so-called “relatives” who are more deserving of favor. However, now, for about half a year, religious fanaticism has exploded in a horrific and destructive manner in its hypocrisy, ugliness, and baseness. The religious fanaticism of the Commission and its mercenaries slaughters dozens of Druze infidels and mutilates their bodies. After they finish the “fanatic” act, they spread out prayer rugs in the hallway to perform prayers and practice worship, as if slaughtering and prayer have become one thing or twins. In their view, they are actually one thing, because they follow the Sharia law of killing the polytheists wherever you find them. Therefore, they slaughtered every infidel who stood in their way, and shaved the mustaches of the sheikhs, then moved directly to worshiping God. Everything we saw in one of the pictures that are now widely circulated represents nothing but religious fanaticism in its ugliest forms. The Assad regime was not sick in this way. The degenerate Assad regime was far more elevated. From what we have seen in the massacres on the coast and in the current massacres in southern Syria, what was called by the madmen the liberation of the country from tyrants was not a liberation, but rather the replacement of the bad with the worse.
What is now called random religiosity is spreading, representing religious obsession in its ugliest forms. It is sometimes difficult to distinguish between this deceptive religiosity and true religiosity. Random religiosity means clinging to the shell without the core, to appearances without substance, and to rituals without law. Random religiosity is the result of the spread of haphazard religious discourse, with each person “as they please,” issuing fatwas, legislating, permitting, forbidding, killing, slaughtering, and praying on their prayer rugs covered in lice, filth, and vileness, without realizing the hypocrisy of their actions. It is unlikely that they would realize this, given that they are crucified by the disease of “obsession,” which has blinded them and made them lose their insight, that is, their mindObsession is characterized by a perception through one of the senses, without a clear cause for this perception, such as the perception of contempt for religions without the contempt, or the feeling of hatred without the act of it, or hatred without the practice. The psychological characteristic that most encourages the formation of these feelings is the illusion of “grandeur,” because the illusion of “grandeur” prevents the dwarf from accepting the idea that he is small. Feelings of grandeur are the motivation to classify any criticism or even the mention of any weakness as invalid, and thus its source is a distortion in the critic’s personality. Therefore, the critic is a hateful and spiteful person, and the great person is great or sacred and therefore not subject to criticism, and his greatness does not allow for doubt.
The message is “great” and the religion is “great” for many reasons, including the perception of God as a Muslim, not a Christian, not a Jew, not a Qorbat, etc. Greatness does not accept criticism; it is above criticism and too great to be criticized. Therefore, greatness feels persecuted as soon as it is said, “How sweet is the eye of kohl.” Greatness is the ultimate description and the translation of perfection. Therefore, anyone who attacks it is usually conspiring against it with Zionist intelligence and an agent of the greater evil, America. It is inconceivable that the critic’s words are true. They are slander, deception, and a lie, even before they are identified. Greatness is a feeling that is mostly imaginative. They imagine, for example, that the 600 pages of an anonymous book, i.e., one whose author is unknown, contain everything about this world and the afterlife, complete and comprehensive! … Social philosophy and scientific knowledge valid for all times and places. Humanity needs nothing more than these trivial pages filled with contradictions, the promotion of outdated values, and the nonsense of Zaghloul al-Naggar.
Religious fanaticism is characterized by hostility toward others without any apparent reason. Hostility typically develops into violence and terrorism within the framework of what is called collective action. Those primarily responsible for hostility evolving into terrorism are those responsible for it. Terrorism is, in essence, a collective act. In terrorist hostility, responsibility is divided between the terrorist perpetrator and his or her ideological background, which is considered the true perpetrator and bears most of the responsibility for the terrorist act. All of this occurs within the framework of domesticating and cultivating the so-called “Supreme Muslim.” Examples of this include the killers of Farag Foda and Nahed al-Hattar, among others. The disorder in this case is not due to the individual who has converted to a Supreme Muslim, but rather to the ideological background. This background is due to the text, what this text imposes, and how the text is able to exonerate itself through multiple aspects (with multiple faces): a text of cruelty, a text of compassion, and whatever faces it desires. Obsessive hostility is linked to the concept of “the best nation.” An infidel does not accept a Muslim’s insistence that he is better than him, and a believing Muhammadan does not accept sinking to the level of the other. Hence, hostility is programmed and inevitable. Any attempt by the other to nullify this superiority is interpreted as aggression. Therefore, the other is automatically considered an enemy—an enemy by nature, not Muhammadan. A non-Muhammadan is an infidel, and Muslims must fight and kill him whenever possible. Jihadist killing is a pillar of religion.
There are many explanations and analyses of these behaviors, with religious “obsession” at the forefront of all of them. Religious obsession means absolute concentration on religion, followed by acceptance of religion’s alienation of the obsessed person’s personality and its disabling of his mind. Then there is confusion regarding the status and mission of religion: is religion an end or a means? Does man live by religion, or does religion live by man? There are many questions that require answers, so there will be a continuation of this topic.