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Ma Mère Assise à Son Bureau

Christopher Hurtado —  September 21, 2009

Sur cette photo ma mère a environ 50 ans. Elle est assise dans son bureau dans sa salle de classe. Elle enseigne l’espagnol au lycée. Il enseigne à Pasadena High School à Pasadena, Texas aux États Unis. Elle viens des États Unis alors que mon père est vénézuélien. Sur cette photo ma mère porte une chemise rouge, une montre et des lunettes. Elle est grande et a les cheveux noirs. Ellle est souriante parce qu’elle aime sa profession. Ça fait aussi partie de sa personnalité. C’est une personne très heureuse. Devant elle sur son bureau il y a beaucoup de choses. Par exemple, il y a des livres qu’elle utilise pour enseigner l’espagnol. Les livres sont variés parce qu’elle enseigne plusieurs niveaux. Il y a aussi de beaucoup de feuilles de papier et de cahiers. Ce sont des compositions et d’autres devoirs de ses élèves. Elle doit corriger beaucoup de compositions et d’autres devoirs de ses élèves. Ça c’est la vie d’une professeur. En plus des livres, de feuilles de papier et de cahiers sur son bureau il y a aussi un petit drapeau du Mexique et un téléphone. Le drapeau du Mexique est à son bureau parce que beaucoup de ses élèves sont d’origine mexicaine. Ma mère utilise le téléphone dans la salle de classe pour parler aux parents de ses élèves entre les cours qu’elle enseigne.

Derrière ma mère sur cette photo il y a beaucoup de choses aussi. Sur la table derrière ma mère il y a un ordinateur, le dictionnaire de l’Académie Royale de la Langue Espagnole, une photo de la fille de ma soeur, Vanessa, une serviette noire, et d’autres feuilles de papier. Ma mère utilise l’ordinateur pour enregister les notes de ses élèves. Elle utilise le dictionnaire de l’Académie Royale de la Langue Espagnole parce que c’est le dictionnaire autorisé de la langue espagnole. L’Académie Royale de la Langue Espagnole est semblable l’Académie Française. Ma mère utilise la serviette noire pour transporter des livres, des compositions et des cahiers chez elle. Elle a la photo de la fille de ma soeur, Vanessa, parce qu’elle est fière de ses petits-enfants. En plus de la photo de la fille de ma sœur Vanessa, il y a des photos des filles de ma sœur Nadezda sur l’étagère sur la table derrière ma mère. Il y a aussi des livres plus et de softwares. Il y a aussi un pull sur la chaise qui se trouve à la table derrière le bureau de ma mère. A Pasadena, il fait très chaud dehors la plupart de l’année, mais dedans il fait froid à cause de l’air conditionné. Parfois il fait froid dehors, mais seulement en hiver.

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In Academia, BYU, Fall 2009, FREN 201 Intermediate French, Part 1, Papers, Undergraduate
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The Vital Importance of a Correct Philosophical Stance

Christopher Hurtado —  June 23, 2009
Here I Stand. I can do no other. God help me. Amen. (Luther, Diet of Worms, 17 April 1521)

Introduction

The purpose of philosophy is to systematize human knowledge. This entails the correct identification of reality. In order to succeed, philosophy must correctly identify the most basic principles of reality and build a theory of knowledge on that foundation. Philosophy must be built on reality in order to be sound. For a theory of knowledge to be correct, it must stem from principles that correctly identify reality. Likewise, in order to develop a correct ethical theory, philosophy must build on the foundation laid by a correct theory of knowledge which is in turn supported by correctly identified principles of reality. Misidentification of principles of reality necessarily constitutes fundamental error and inevitably leads to incorrect philosophy, regardless of consistency. In fact, commitment to an erroneous foundation will inevitably lead to further error in consistently systematizing knowledge.

The basic principles of all knowledge are that consciousness exists and existence exists. However, it is not enough to know these basic principles in order to gain sound footing. It is crucial to understand that consciousness is consciousness of something and that that something is existence, or reality. In other words, existence has primacy over consciousness. The error of giving primacy to consciousness over existence necessarily leads to the metaphysical supposition that God has primacy over reality and the epistemological suppositions that faith has primacy over reason and the heart over the mind in order to be consistent. This in turn necessarily leads to ethics founded on a commitment to the philosophical supposition that to love has primacy over life, others over self, right over good and duty over happiness in order to be consistent. Correctly identifying the primacy of existence over consciousness leads to the metaphysical supposition that reality has primacy over God and the epistemological supposition that reason has primacy over faith and the heart over the mind in in order to be consistent. This in turn necessarily leads to ethics founded on a commitment to life over love, self over others, good over right and happiness over duty in order to be consistent.

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In Academia, BYU, Papers, PHIL 422 Epistemology, Spring 2009, Undergraduate
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Wittgenstein on Meaning: From the Tractatus to the Philosophical Investigations

Christopher Hurtado —  June 20, 2009

Introduction

Dissatisfied with earlier attempts by Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) attempted to elucidate the nature of logical truth in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1922). Wittgenstein was concerned with the relation between language and the world and the logical and mathematical ramifications of this relation (Blackburn 390, Bunnin and Yu 739). In the Tractatus, Wittgenstein asserted that in order to describe reality, logic is necessary, but not sufficient and, in so doing, put forth what has come to be known as the picture theory of meaning (Rohmann 430). In his picture theory of meaning, Wittgenstein argued that language mirrors reality. Whether the picture theory of meaning collapses with Wittgenstein’s rejection of the metaphysics of logical atomism of the Tractatus is disputed among philosophers, but there is a consensus that Wittgenstein abandoned the theory in his later philosophy (Bunnin and Yu 531).

Wittgenstein’s exposition of his later philosophy appears in his posthumously published Philosophical Investigations (1953.) In the Philsophical Investigations, Wittgenstein turns his attention from the subject matter of the Tractatus to the workings of ordinary language, the philosophy of psychology and the philosophy of mathematics. The later Wittgenstein rejects his earlier unified theory of meaning in favor of an explanation based on a diversity of “language games” governed by rules and constituting a form of life. His later approach did not insist on an account of meaning as a psychological or abstract entity, but instead focused on the use of words and sentences (Bunnin and Yu 738-739).

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In Academia, BYU, Papers, PHIL 350 Wittgenstein, Spring 2009, Undergraduate
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Wittgenstein’s Picture Theory of Meaning

Christopher Hurtado —  June 18, 2009

Introduction

Dissatisfied with earlier attempts by Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) attempted to elucidate the nature of logical truth in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1922). Wittgenstein was concerned with the relation between language and the world and the logical and mathematical ramifications of this relation (Bunnin and Yu 739, Blackburn 390). In the Tractatus, Wittgenstein asserted that in order to describe reality, logic is necessary, but not sufficient and, in so doing, put forth what has come to be known as the picture theory of meaning (Rohmann 430). In his picture theory of meaning, Wittgenstein argued that language mirrors reality. However, Wittgenstein was not concerned with ontology, per se. He believed that the language used in this sort of metaphysical inquiry simply mirrored the logical structure of its subject matter, making the inquiry itself unnecessary by virtue of the impossibility of its very nature (Hunnings 2-3). Wittgenstein’s picture theory of meaning succeeded in explaining the possibility of falsehood, but ultimately broke down due to its reliance on the atomic propositions it posited, which proved to be untenable.

The Theory

Wittgenstein opened the Tractatus by giving a metaphysics of a world consisting of atomic facts, completely independent of one another, but Wittgenstein gave no examples of what he considered to be atomic facts. He claimed that they existed, but not that he had identified them (Rée and Urmson 395). Next, Wittgenstein stated that all propositions are truth-functional relations among these atomic propositions, that each atomic proposition consists in unanalyzable names designating simple objects, and that the sense of any one of these propositions is the state of affairs it depicts (Bunnin and Yu 738).

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In Academia, BYU, Papers, PHIL 350 Wittgenstein, Spring 2009, Undergraduate
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Hamas and Hizbullah vis-`a-vis Al-Qaeda

Christopher Hurtado —  May 31, 2009

Introduction

According to conventional wisdom, Hamas, Hizbullah and Al-Qaeda are all alike; they are all radical Islamist terrorist organizations. But are they? Are they all radical Islamist organizations? Are they all terrorist organizations? Are they all organizations? These labels are problematic. Al-Qaeda is arguably not even an organization. Regardless of whether one deems it so, it certainly stands in contradistinction to Hamas and Hizbullah. As for terrorism, it is a tactic, not an ideology. Each of these “organizations” variously employs this tactic. As for radical Islamism, each of these “organizations” varies in degree of radical Islamism both in theory and in praxis. Conflating these “organizations” is gross oversimplification. Hamas and Hizbullah differ from Al-Qaeda in tactics, strategy, and ideology.

Hamas

Hamas (an acronym for Ḥarakat al-Muqāwamat al-Islāmiyyah or Islamic Resistance Movement) is a political party organized in response to the Israeli occupation of Palestine. Hamas was founded in 1987 by the Palestinian arm of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood at the time of the First Intifada. Hamas used suicide bombings, IEDs and rocket attacks against Israel from 1993 to 2005, but tapered off these tactics between 2005 and 2006. In 2006, Hamas was democratically elected by the Palestinian people (including Christians) to represent and further their interests in Gaza. The defeated incumbent party, Fatah, consolidated its power in the West Bank and began making trouble for Hamas in Gaza. In 2006, when Fatah outlawed the militia arm of Hamas, Israel backed Fatah by imposing an economic blockade on Gaza. Hamas responded by launching border rocket attacks on Israel. Following a six-month ceasefire, the conflict resumed and escalated resulting in the 2008 Israeli invasion of Gaza. Although Hamas’s charter calls for the replacement of the State of Israel with an Islamic Palestinian state, Hamas’ prime minister said Hamas would accept a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders and offer Israel a truce. Hamas has emphasized that its conflict with Israel is political, not religious. While Hamas’s charter may in theory reflect a radical Islamist bent, Hamas is clearly pragmatic in praxis. While many consider Hamas a terrorist organization, eighty to ninety percent of Hamas’s revenues fund athletic, educational, daycare, healthcare and religious facilities, substituting for civil society.

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In Academia, BYU, Papers, PL SC 452 Islam and Politics, Undergraduate, Winter 2009
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Radical Islamists and the American Neoconservatives: Two Sides of the Same Coin

Christopher Hurtado —  April 22, 2009

In his three-part BBC documentary, The Power of Nightmares, Adam Curtis compares the philosophies of Sayyid Qutb and Leo Strauss and their followers, radical Islamists and the American neoconservatives, respectively. Curtis argues that these two factions are, in essence, two sides of the same coin. Both fight against liberal individualism, which they perceive as a threat to society with their conservative ideologies. Each faction is motivated by its own ideology to exert itself in a nostalgic effort to change the world. At the same time, Curtis argues that the threat of radical Islamists, while real, looks nothing like the Bush/Blair rhetoric. These politicians of fear, he argues, have exaggerated the radical Islamist threat, in much the same way their predecessors did the threat of Communism, in order to consolidate their political power. There is no global network of radical Islamists called Al Qaeda or otherwise, argues Curtis. There is certainly no radical Islamist existential threat to the West.

In Part I: Baby It’s Cold Outside, Curtis begins by introducing Sayyid Qutb, the so-called philosopher of Islamic terror. Qutb was born in small village in Egypt and moved to Cairo, where he was educated. He became a man of letters and a literary critic in the Western tradition. Employed by the Egyptian Ministry of Education, he was sent to America to study its education system. There he completed a master’s degree at the Colorado State College of Education. During his stay in America, he wrote a scathing critique of the West entitled The America that I Saw, condemning its racism, materialism, and lack of morality. He also published his first major religious social critique, Social Justice in Islam, while in America. Upon his return to Egypt, he became politically active and rose to prominence in the Muslim Brotherhood, becoming a publicist for the Brotherhood. Imprisoned by Nasser, Qutb developed and wrote in Milestones his theory of jahiliyyah, an accusation of apostasy against Nasser and his supporters, which extended in theory to all so-called Muslims who failed to reject secularism and rise up against Egypt’s Western-tinged secular governments. In Milestones, he issued a call to a vanguard to put his ideas into action. After his execution by Nasser, Ayman Zawahiri answered Qutb’s call. Zawahiri’s organization, Islamic Jihad, assassinated Sadat.

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In Academia, BYU, Papers, PL SC 452 Islam and Politics, Undergraduate, Winter 2009
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The So-Called “Clash” of Islam and Modernity or Islamic and Western Civilizations

Christopher Hurtado —  April 17, 2009

There is today, in the minds of many, an East-West divide along Christian or Secular vs. Islamic lines. Many argue that this divide has existed for millenia and manifests itself in a clash of civilizations, to borrow the term used by Samuel P. Huntington, and that it will ultimately result in the fall of one or the other. This struggle for hegemony can be seen today in the geopolitical arena. At the heart of this debate, are deeply entrenched religious or other dogma and closely held cultural values on both sides. At stake for each side are its standards, ideals, principles and values. Each has a Utopian vision of an ideal world based on these standards, ideals, principles and values. Each affirms a past, whether historical or not, which affirms these standards, ideals, principles and values. At the extremes of either side there are those who dogmatically affirm that the differences existing between the two sides form a chasm that cannot be bridged, while at the same time, in the center there are pragmatists who firmly believe that the chasm can be bridged. In my opinion, pragmatism is the only answer to this dilemma.

“Humankind today is on the brink of an abyss … because it lacks the values that can nurture and protect it and guide it on the right path,” wrote the so-called “philosopher of Islamic terror,” Sayyid Qutb. For Qutb, a key member of the Muslim Brotherhood during Nasser’s regime in Egypt, the West (whether capitalist or communist) was materialistic and sexually depraved. To illustrate his point, he pointed to Americans who focused more  on the appearance of their lawns and their own personal appearance than on the key social problems he saw, who displayed a bestial lustfulness even at church dances and found brutish displays of strength such as American football entertaining. He believed these problems, as he saw them, were the result of the West’s failure to submit to God’s law as revealed to the prophet Muhammad. He saw the rule of men over men as usurping God’s sovereignty.

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In Academia, BYU, MESA 350 Islam in Contemporary Society, Papers, Undergraduate, Winter 2009
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Challenges Faced by Muslims in the West Generally and African American Muslims in Particular

Christopher Hurtado —  February 19, 2009

Introduction

There are many challenges faced by Muslims in general in the West. Principal among them are those falling under the categories of education, economics, nutrition and health, holidays, Islamic “products,” and personal concerns. Many of the challenges faced by Muslims in the West generally are shared by African American Muslims in particular. However, the genesis, history, and current trajectory of African American Islam produces variances in the nature and degree of those challenges for African American Muslims. Also, the challenge of integration with the umma is unique to them.

 

Challenges faced by Muslims in the West generally

Islamizing the education of their children is important to Muslims in the West, as education in the West is generally ethnocentrically Occidental and Judeo-Christian or secular in nature. The economic concerns of Muslims in the West range from the avoidance of interest to financing mosques and Islamic centers without state support. Muslims in the West face nutrition and health concerns ranging from keeping their dietary restrictions to Islamic practices in health care. Muslims in the West grapple with the question of whether to celebrate Christian and Jewish holidays along with their neighbors and struggle for recognition of their own holidays. The relative scarcity of Islamic “products” in the West such as books, videos, CDs, instructional materials, software, games, puzzles, products that address the Muslim concern of time and direction for prayer, alcohol-free makeup, and Muslim clothing, can be a challenge to Muslims in the West. Other concerns, particularly those of a personal nature, run the gamut from whether to listen to music, praying at work or postponing or skipping prayer, fraternization with non-Muslims, women’s behavior and public participation, and traditional Islamic burial.

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In Academia, BYU, MESA 350 Islam in Contemporary Society, Papers, Undergraduate, Winter 2009
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Muslim Intellectuals Sayyid Abuʾl-Aʿla Mawdudi and Sayyid Qutb

Christopher Hurtado —  January 20, 2009

Introduction

This essay will compare and contrast the ideologies and vision of political Islam of Muslim intellectuals Sayyid Abuʾl-Aʿla Mawdudi and Sayyid Qutb. Though Mawdudi’s ideologies and vision influenced Qutb’s, accounting for similarities in thought between them, the differences are significant. This essay will examine these similarities and differences in turn. It will demonstrate why Mawdudi was successful at changing India’s government and at spreading that change abroad while Qutb ultimately failed to change Egypt’s. Nevertheless, this essay will also show the far-reaching influence of Qutb’s thought.

Historical Background

Qutb was born in a small village in Upper Egypt and immigrated to Cairo to complete his education. There, he was educated in a Western style and rose in prominence as a writer and literary critic while working as a teacher and an inspector for the ministry of education. His primary concern and topic of writing at the time was the morality of the individual. This he held up to the standard of Islam as he understood it and sought to understand the reason for the lack of it around him. A two-year stint in the United States to earn a master’s degree while at the same time studying the U.S. educational system caused him to see the threat to Islamic morality in a new light.

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In Academia, BYU, MESA 350 Islam in Contemporary Society, Papers, Undergraduate, Winter 2009
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Book Review: Following Muhammad: Rethinking Islam in the Contemporary World by Carl W. Ernst

Christopher Hurtado —  January 20, 2009

Introduction

Most books about Islam are either well informed, but too specialized for the general reader or misinformed and sensationalistic, but accessible. Unfortunately, this makes the latter the general reader’s pick, leading to the dissemination of misinformation. The prevalence of lack of historical background is at the root of misinformation. While one might assume that current is better, too often current omits relevant historical background, thus leading to misinformation. Following Muhammad presents a sympathetic, if not apologetic, look at mainstream Islam as distinguished from fundamental Islam.

Historical Background

Ernst first became interested in Islam through the Persian poetry of Sufis such as Rumi. Thus he began his investigation of Islam through the lens of Sufism. Along the way, he learned Arabic, Persian, and Urdu and earned a Ph.D. in Islamic studies. He also spent time living and doing research in Muslim countries, primarily the non-Arab Eastern countries of India, Pakistan, Iran, and Turkey. As a specialist in Islamic studies, Ernst has undertaken to help the West to overcome existing suspicion and ignorance about Islam recently intensified by the hijacking of the language of Islam by Islamic extremists by humanizing Muslims.

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In Academia, BYU, MESA 350 Islam in Contemporary Society, Papers, Undergraduate, Winter 2009
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