I know the two aren’t coterminous, but do people consider Islam and Arab culture to be eastern? I often get the feeling they do. I know that you can make more than two “worlds” to get around this, ala middle-east, near-east, etc., but why isn’t it just considered Western? I know in religion classes Islam is taught often as one of the three Western monotheistic religions, but it seems that the role of Arab culture in early Europe, religion, science, etc. would make if far more Western cultures to the east of Iran, lets say. (Again, the two aren’t co-terminous, the largest Islamic population is in an Asian country.)
The definition of “western” these days mostly centers on the developmental and economic - i.e. “the West” is often synonmous with the “industrialized West”. Since the most of the Muslim world generally falls into the category of Third World, it is not considered the West by default ( oddball exceptions like Bosnia aside ). In a socio-cultural sense, “Western” usually refers to Christian/European-descended cultures ( i.e. including North America, Austrailia, and New Zealand, but excluding industrialized Japan ). Israel, though obviously not Christian, falls into the same category as being largely European in derivation ( and, most would argue, in terms of a common set of values ).
The definitions are imprecise and I agree the line can be pretty blurry, especially historically, but there you go.
- Tamerlane
Yeah, pretty blurry. Especially when you consider that without Arab philosophers in the first millenium we wouldn’t have regained many Greek writers, and we’re supposedly their inheritors… :-/
Both here and in my classes, I have participated in quite a few debates over just that the “West” entails. Is Russia Western? Latin America? Japan? (I would say the first two essentially are culturally western while Japan is merely heavily but superficially westernized – though if you take a more economic view – the opposite would be the case).
As for the Arab/Muslim world, it may be a matter of perspective. To most ‘Westerners’, it may seem alien and foreign, yet I would imagine from the point of view of an East Asian, Europe, the Americas, and the Arab world have a lot in common. Monotheism,
“Abrahamic” religions, cosmology (beliefs in a sole God vs. Devil, Heaven vs. Hell, angels, prophets etc.), the Hellenistic heritage, and so on.
Plus Averroes, Avicenna, Omar Khayyam, and works like “A Thousand and One Nights” have been included in the “canon” for quite some time. It merely seems that at some point in the late medieval period, as far as the traditional Western canon is concerned, Islam dropped off the face of the earth until 1918 or so. I’m sure this irks a lot of Muslims.
Maybe Islam’s relative position in the world’s spiritual geography is suggested by a phrase from the Verse of Light in the Qur’an (24:35)—
…it was lit from a blessed olive tree, neither of the East nor of the West…
as well as another verse that describes Muslims as the “middle nation” (2:143).
Islam is a “Western” religion in the sense that it has its roots in Judeo-Christian tradition. This is a common way to distinguish it from the Eastern religions like Hinduism and Buddhism. Various Chinese and Japanese philosophies are lumped in to the Eastern category as well, but this makes sense. One would also consider other pagan religions like the Greek and Roman mythologies as Western.
What we think of as the Muslim world (which stretches from Morocco to Pakistan) is not cosidered part of “The West.” The Middle East is mainly the part where you find Arabs, though it is not uncommon for some to refer to parts of Asia and north Africa as the Middle East as well.
As Tamerlane points out above, “The West” consists of the industrialized, European-settled parts of the world. The dominant form of government is “liberal” democracy (as opposed to phony democracies rigged to keep a dictator in power), so countries which follow this pattern may be described as “Western” in reference to the style of government without necessarily being in “The West.” Hence, Israel may have a “Western” government, but it is part of the Middle East.
When you refer to “The East,” what you mean depends on the context. Usually this means the Far East, like China and Japan, but it could also include India and Russia. During the Cold War days, we referred to Russian-dominated countries as “Eastern Block,” and hence clearly excluded from “The West” and possibly the intended meaning of “The East.” Today, however, with no more Iron Curtain to clearly separate East from West, this distinction has been blurried over the last decade or so. “The West” has many different meanings depending on the context.
D
“Western” and “Eastern” are false. Anyone who has become familiar with “Eastern Orthodoxy” immediately becomes aware of this. Is modern Greece a “Western” or an “Eastern” country? The predominant religion of Greece very obviously and plainly is not “Western”–it cannot fit into the “Western” categories of “Catholic” or “Protestant”. Anyone who meets many Greeks also can plainly see that they are not “Western” in their outlook.
But are they “Eastern”? No, they are Hellenes (Greek)! The same is true of Russians. Not “Western”, not “Eastern”–Russian! The whole “West”/'East" thing was an invention of the English and the French to rationalize their colonialist practices. They were the “enlightened” and “rational” West come to bring “true civilization” to the “superstitious” and “despotic” east.
As a branch of Catholicism, Eastern Orthodox Church (often just called Orthodox) is “Western.” Although I do take your point about the very different develpment of the Church and many attendant features in Eastern Europe.
Excuse me? Will you please retract your false and insulting claim that Orthodoxy is a mere “branch of Catholicism”? We are not a “branch” of ANYTHING AT ALL!!!
Historically, it is a branch of Catholicism. It is not Roman Catholicism. There’s a difference. There’s nothing insulting in my posting if you read it with care, but sorry if that is confusing as people often assume Catholic=Roman Catholic, it does not.
Well, while there are a bunch of Eastern Catholic churches (The Uniate churches come to mind, and there are others), the churches that usually get labeled together as “Eastern Orthodox” aren’t in communion with Rome, don’t recognize the Pope as the head of the Church, and aren’t Catholic at all.
And I found a handy, although overly simplified chart:
http://philtar.ucsm.ac.uk/encyclopedia/christ/east/index.html
Well, I guess I had thought that catholic (perhaps I should use lower case) referred to non-reformation churches. No? Of course the word catholic is a bit silly since it is nolonger one universal church.
“Catholic” refers to those churches which recognize the Pope as the head of the Church.
Some history:
The Reformation happened CENTURIES after Rome split away from Orthodoxy. Even then, in the 11th century, there was a cultural gulf between East and West that had begun nearly a thousand years before that. The culture of the East, associated with Orthodoxy, was not the culture of the West, associated with Rome.
Indeed, even Western historians made it quite plain that the Empire of the East (“Byzantium”) was not Western. It has universally been portrayed as an “Eastern” culture, in distinct and stark contrast against the “Western” culture of medieval Europe.
Likewise, the Orthodox Church associated with that Empire, whenever mentioned in history, is portrayed in contrast against and as something different from the “Western” form of Christianity.
As for the use of the term “Catholic”, only the ignorant claim that it means “universal” as in “covering the whole world” or “the only one”. “Catholic” is a transliteration of a Greek word that means “according to the whole”, specifically, in this case, according to the witness of the Tradition of the Church (including Scripture–http://www.orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/church.htm), not contradicting what has been taught before.
Not neccesarily…I mean, I know that site uses St. Vincent of Leris’s use of “Catholic” to mean what you meant…but St. Cyril of Jerusalem used it as far back as the 4th to mean covering the whole world in his “Catechetical Lectures”.
Merriam-Webster says:
Main Entry: cath·o·lic
Pronunciation: 'kath-lik, 'ka-th&-
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle French & Late Latin; Middle French catholique, from Late Latin catholicus, from Greek katholikos universal, general, from katholou in general, from kata by + holos whole —more at CATA-, SAFE
Date: 14th century
1 a : often capitalized : of, relating to, or forming the church universal b : often capitalized : of, relating to, or forming the ancient undivided Christian church or a church claiming historical continuity from it c : capitalized : ROMAN CATHOLIC
2 : COMPREHENSIVE, UNIVERSAL; especially : broad in sympathies, tastes, or interests
- ca·thol·i·cal·ly /k&-'thä-li-k(&-)lE/ adverb
- ca·thol·i·cize /-'thä-l&-"sIz/ verb
Wouldn’t part b of definition 1 mean that the Orthodox churches are catholic? I dunno, maybe just not traditional to do so.
In any case, regarding Eastern. I don’t think many people use the word Eastern when refering to Orthodox churches as equal to the word Eastern compared to the original post question. I mean, is Greece culture and Russian cultural, et al Eastern as compare to Far East Asia?
I guess my original post was that I would regard Islam and most Arab populations as part of the West, if I had to define West…or perhaps it would be better to say that if I had to point out the silliness of the West definition I would point out the ambiguity of how scholars, and popular thinking, treat Islam and Arab history.
Here’s another entry:
Main Entry: Greek Catholic
Function: noun
Date: 1909
1 : a member of an Eastern church
2 : a member of an Eastern rite of the Roman Catholic Church
Does definition 1 contradict definition 2? Does Eastern church mean only the Eastern rite RC church? Seems odd if it did.
In this context it does. Or to correct your terminology slightly - There is no Eastern Roman Catholic Church". Instead there is Roman Catholic ( the big one ) and Eastern Rite Catholic ( multifarious smaller sub-sects that accept the primacy of the Pope and certain core tenets of Catholicism ). Eastern rite Catholic and Eastern Orthodox are two completely different churches, as are the more specific Greek Catholic and Greek Orthodox. Eastern Rite Churches encompass 5 main divisions:Alexandrian ,Antiochene, Byzantine , Chaldean , and Armenian . The Greek Catholic Church falls under the Byzantine rite.
- Tamerlane
It is generally best in these matters not to use dictionaries to arrive at one’s position. Part b of the definition quoted does not address the historical schism.