As we solemnly mark the tenth anniversary of the horrendous events of 9-11, I think it more than proper to take a look at that part of the world which spawned the notorious hijackers of that day, to see how it is faring ten years after the fact.  Here we see that the Palestinians, encouraged by the reckless rhetoric  of our President, are about to make a power play for statehood in the United Nations, and we also see regime after regime toppling or in danger of toppling under the pressure of revolutionaries.

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they…

As one-time revolutionaries and severe underdogs to the might and tyranny of King George, we Americans seem to have a built-in reflex to pull for the revolutionary and the underdog, and so it seems to be strangely within our nature to side (emotionally and otherwise) with those who currently seek to overthrow the various regimes in the Middle East.  But we must look at these events through the prism of reason and wisdom, for there is something very important missing from the mix of ingredients there.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…

Revolution for its own sake is not a good thing; what is important about a revolution is what it hopes to accomplish and what it will eventually accomplish.  In this current wave of revolution in the Middle East known as the Arab Spring, the short-sighted goal is simply  ash-sha’b yurid isqat an-nizam (the people want to bring down the regime).  Not particularly deep and promising.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security…

Any mob can demand a regime change, and some mobs can actually achieve it.  What happens afterwards is what really counts.  In Egypt, where the Mubarak regime has already fallen, the country is quickly sinking into the morass of an Islamist state, and the Israeli flag has been forcibly removed from its embassy for the second time in thirty days.  They will very soon and naturally turn their gaze and vitriol toward the West.

Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends…

As you have by now surmised, what is sorely missing from the ranks of the Arab Spring is anything even remotely resembling the high-minded Declaration of Independence so nobly wrought by the Founders of our great nation, who pursued a new and better form of government for the finest and most necessary reasons, and who followed their unlikely success in the Revolutionary War by establishing the finest Constitution humanity has ever known.  What is lost on us today is that they were able to do so because their thinking was greatly influenced by Scripture, for they were people whose lives and families had long been impacted both by the Great Awakening and by tremendous Christian heritage.  It is not a coincidence that such great human freedom and nobility followed this saturation of Biblical thought.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of Islamia (those nations where Islam is the dominant religion), for where Islam goes Shariah must soon follow, and where Shariah goes all human freedom and dignity is eventually lost.  Islam is therefore now, and always has been, incompatible with self-government, for it eventually demands absolute control of society, and the end-game of every nation of Islamia will be a boot-heeled, Iran-like theocracy.  The only way for any nation of Islamia to stay this advance of severe, theocratic totalitarianism is through some form of dictatorship, by which the more severe hounds of Islamic puritanism are kept at bay.  The lesser of two evils in this case is the lesser of two evils.

Please understand the point I am making.  The Muslim is as capable of self-government as is anyone else, but it is his theology and resultant worldview that is ultimately incompatible with it.  This is a harsh thing to say, but the proof is in the pudding, for we will know a tree by its fruit (Matthew 12:33).  Any attempt at self-government has never survived long in Islamia, but dictatorship and Islamic theocracy always have.  The only hope for Islamia is the long, slow change that brought the once-pagan West out of its darkness so long ago – the beauty of Christ changing lives one heart and mind at a time until Biblical critical mass is achieved among its people.  Until then, the West must eye it with grave suspicion and distrust, for we are sworn enemies.

We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

Or, ash-sha’b yurid isqat an-nizam.  Buyer beware!