The Foundation for Constitutional Democracy

Edited transcript of the Eidelberg Report, Israel National Radio, May 12, 2008.

Part I. Schizophrenia

Like his Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and his Education Minister Yuli Tamir, Ehud Olmert is tainted by multiculturalism, hence by cultural relativism. Hence, he cannot wholeheartedly believe in the justice of Israel’s cause vis-à-vis the Palestinians—and this is why he is ready to surrender even part of Jerusalem. Moreover, although all human beings are susceptible to egoism, relativism conduces to self-aggrandizement, moral indifference, and even schizophrenia.

Schizophrenia is deemed the core concept of modern psychiatry. Fortunately, schizophrenia is not necessarily an all-encompassing illness that sets those affected apart from their fellow men. A World Health Organization study concludes: “schizophrenics, for all their vulnerabilities, are in the full sense responsive social beings like the rest of us.”

Various researchers distinguish between positive- and negative-symptom schizophrenia. The positive includes hallucinations and delusions. The negative includes escapism, apathy, self-effacement, anxiety, stereotypic behaviors, and impairment of volition. These negative symptoms obviously exist on a continuum with normal behavior. Consider Ehud Olmert. (more…)

Submitted by Prof. Paul Eidelberg, May 5, 2008 to the Daniel Pipes Blog.

The basic issue is not whether there are “Muslim Moderates” but whether Islamic texts—the Quran and the Hadith—foster the murder of non-Muslims. I therefore offer my article “Monotheistic Idolatry.”

View original article, “Responding to Joshua Muravchik about ‘Moderate Islamists’”, by Daniel Pipes.

On September 11, 2001, nineteen Muslim terrorists hijacked four American passenger planes and flew them into the Twin Towers, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania killing 3,000 innocent men, women, and children. This horrendous act of murder was cheered by Muslims throughout the world. What shall we say of the religion of these people? Is there no essential or inevitable connection between the teachings of Islam and the deeds of believers?

Perhaps the most profound and disturbing insights into the nature of Islam, or at least of what is called “Islamism,” appeared in an essay of Professor Kenneth Hart Green published earlier this year. The essay is entitled “Leo Strauss’ Challenge to Emil Fackenheim: Heidegger, Radical Historicism, and Diabolical Evil.” The essay is one of a collection edited by S. Portnoff, J.A. Diamond, and M.D. Yaffe, Emil L. Fackenheim: Philosopher, Theologian, Jew, (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2008).

One of the problems of Green’s essay concerns Martin Heidegger, deemed by many as the greatest philosopher of the twentieth century. Heidegger not only joined the Nazi Party but never regretted it. How is one to explain such a monstrous thing: that a philosopher, especially of Heidegger’s rank, could associate himself with diabolical evil? Is there something in his philosophy that links him to such evil? (more…)