Cultures in Conflict: Christians, Muslims, and Jews in the Age of Discovery [Paperback]

Bernard Lewis (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0195102835 | ISBN-13: 978-0195102833 | Publication Date: January 18, 1996

Hailed as "the doyen of Middle Eastern studies" in The New York Times Book Review, Bernard Lewis stands at the height of his field. "To read Mr. Lewis," wrote Fouad Ajami in The Wall Street Journal, "is to be taken through a treacherous terrain by the coolest and most reassuring of guides. You are in the hands of the Islamic world's foremost living historian." Now this sure-handed guide takes us through treacherous terrain indeed--the events of 1492, a year laden with epic events and riven by political debate.
With elegance and erudition, Lewis explores that climactic year as a clash of civilizations--a clash not only of the New World and the Old, but also of Christendom and Islam, of Europe and the rest. In the same year that Columbus set sail across the Atlantic, he reminds us, the Spanish monarchy captured Granada, the last Muslim stronghold on the peninsula, and also expelled the Jews. Lewis uses these three epochal events to explore the nature of the European-Islamic conflict, placing the voyages of discovery in a striking new context. He traces Christian Europe's path from being a primitive backwater on the edges of the vast, cosmopolitan Caliphate, through the heightening rivalry of the two religions, to the triumph of the West over Islam, examining the factors behind their changing fortunes and cultural qualities.
Balanced and insightful, this far-reaching discussion of the encounters between Islam, the West, and the globe provides a new understanding of the distant events that gave shape to the modern world.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

YA-This brief book is comprised of three lectures delivered on the 500th anniversary of Columbus's voyages. The first chapter explores the connections between Christianity and Islam in their respective quest for domination. The second discusses treatment of the Jews and others by Christians, and describes the positive response of the Muslim world to this abuse. The final lecture discusses the Western treatment of the "discovered" lands and peoples. Lewis's Western orientation and definitive knowledge of Eastern life and religion lead him to some unusual deductions that are well thought out and presented. While not everyone will agree with his ideas, they will provoke discussion, and in the process YAs will gain an overview of the background of Christian and Islamic dissension and a new view of the Inquisition and Western exploration. There are extensive notes. This short course in the Age of Discovery should prove a useful tool.
Susan H. Woodcock, King's Park Library, Burke, VA
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Academe's reigning Orientalist examines 1492, and all that. Lewis last entered the library lists with his essay collection Islam and the West (1993), and this pithy lecture (delivered in 1993) again displays a coruscating mind at work. The focus is Columbus, Ferdinand, and Isabella's Catholic reconquest of the Moors and the expulsion of the Jews from Spain. Since the quincentennial of these occasions inspired "penitence and self-flagellation [by] those who could be identified with the perpetrators," Lewis offers a view on a continental scale of the Christian/Islamic rivalry and the case for appreciating the eventual expansion of Europe, while acknowledging its attendant evils. Lewis dislikes the modish view that misunderstanding causes geopolitical hostility; the two universalist religions understood each other only too well, as he writes about events of the millennium, until the Turks failed to take Vienna in 1683. Though this essay defends the globalization of Western concepts that began in 1492, its viewpoint rests on a sympathetic understanding of Islam, and its absorption of the expelled Jews, born of lifelong study. An erudite contribution to the issues of multiculturalism. Gilbert Taylor --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 126 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (January 18, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195102835
• ISBN-13: 978-0195102833
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.3 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #72,241 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #78 in Books > History > Historical Study > Civilization & Culture

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Islamic Civilization outflanked, January 27, 2003

By 

M. A. ZAIDI "Ali Zaidi" (Karachi; Pakistan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cultures in Conflict: Christians, Muslims, and Jews in the Age of Discovery (Paperback)

Bernard Lewis the world's leading authorities on the Middle East discusses the eclipse of the Middle East in their last three centuries in power and how their decline is still felt to this day. For many centuries, the world of Islam was in the forefront of human achievement--the foremost military and economic power in the world, the leader in the arts and sciences of civilization. Christian Europe, a remote land beyond its northwestern frontier, was seen as an outer darkness of barbarism and unbelief from which there was nothing to learn or to fear. And then everything changed, as the previously despised West won victory after victory, first in the battlefield and the marketplace, then in almost every aspect of public and even private life. In his three essays Conquest, Expulsion, Discovery he examines how the Islamic world was transgressed from conquers to conquered. Lewis bases the expansion on three significant areas weaponry; education and navigation.

The Europeans gained significant advances in the field of weaponry; with the discovery of gun powder in the Far East. The Christian traders bypassed the middle east and bought this product home where it was adapted to deadly fire arms.

In 1492 the Spanish monarchs captured Granada, the last Muslim stronghold on the peninsula, and also expelled the Jews. The Jews got with them the knowledge of printing; but the rulers fearful of desecration allowed the Jews to publish books in any language except Arabic. This caused a significant regression in the transfer of knowledge to the masses; which the West took the maximum gain of.

Navigation was a major contributor for the economic development of Europe. The European ships were built for the Atlantic and were therefore bigger and stronger than those of the Muslims , built for the Mediterranean. The muslims also had the Atlantic coastline along Morocco. One obvious answer for the absence of Atlantic faring muslim ships were for the lack of ports on the Atlantic and also Morocco had the Atlantic to them selves in comparison the Europeans had to compete with one another. The sea faring enabled the West to gain the riches from America and colonize it.

Islamic civilization was eventually overshadowed by the achievements of European Christendom, and much of the Muslim world came under the direct or indirect domination of the West.

15 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great intro or primer to Islamic Studies, April 11, 2005

By 

Gabriel E. Borlean (Odense, Denmark - birthtown of fairytale-writer H.C. Andersen) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Cultures in Conflict: Christians, Muslims, and Jews in the Age of Discovery (Paperback)

This booklet (a compilation of three speeches given by the author) is a fast and easy read about the state of 3 world cultures (Islam, Jewdaism, Christianity) around 1492 (especially as seen in the Iberian peninsula - Spain, and subsequent world exploration).

It is a great intro (primer) to understanding how the Christian, Muslim and Jewish cultures affected each other and evolved in the late 15th century and into the 16th century. The analysis of how advanced the Muslim culture was and why it stopped advancing and making significant discoveries post-1492 is the gem of this treatise.

Bernard Lewis, a widely read British historian and a Near Eastern Studies Emeritus professor at Princeton University, has written over 20 books about the Muslim world and history of Islam.

I would recommend this for anyone wanting to understand the historical context of the start of deterioration and decline of Muslim influence on world events, and the stagnation of Muslim technical and cultural advancements.

The author's conclusion is that today's cultural divide between the West and the Islam world are grounded in the historical, cultural, and social developments of late 15th century. This book offers very little if any religious theological analysis.

17 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good, but brief, look at 1492., January 14, 2001

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"jthurman_99" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cultures in Conflict: Christians, Muslims, and Jews in the Age of Discovery (Paperback)

Having heard Lewis described as both "the" expert on the Middle East, and a stooge for the Turkish government, I was a little hesitant to start reading this book. I was pleasantly surprised by Lewis' look at the "other" important events contemporaneous with Columbus' 1942 discoveries. This is a tiny book, actually the transcript of a lecture series, easily read in a day. Lewis takes a different perspective in looking at the history of the time, much of which will already be familiar, and the pivotal nature of the events of the late 1400's, of which the discovery of the New World was but one.