What is zealous nationalism

Permissions Icon Permissions. Article PDF first page preview. Issue Section:. You do not currently have access to this article.

Download all slides. Sign in Don't already have an Oxford Academic account? You could not be signed in. Sign In Forgot password? Don't have an account? Sign in via your Institution Sign in. Purchase Subscription prices and ordering for this journal Short-term Access To purchase short term access, please sign in to your Oxford Academic account above.

This article is also available for rental through DeepDyve. View Metrics. Email alerts Article activity alert. Advance article alerts. New issue alert. Receive exclusive offers and updates from Oxford Academic. Related articles in Google Scholar. Citing articles via Google Scholar. By Aviad Rubin. Books Received. Notes on Church-State Affairs. Religion, Law, USA. Although our authors strive to balance these themes, much of the book documents the widespread destructive power of zealous nationalism.

Their thorough analysis of zeal, originating in the Bible, is updated by vivid parallels with Islamic Jihad. But this brand of heroism, embodied in many other heroes of popular culture, has a disturbing side. The subtext is that ordinary citizens and normal democratic procedures are incapable of responding to the threat.

Jewett first exposed zealous nationalism in The Captain America Complex in After collaborating with John Shelton Lawrence to write a whimsical study of superhero themes in popular culture, The American Monomyth , he published a revised version of Captain America in Jewett and Lawrence reunited to produce The Myth of the American Superhero , followed now by this comprehensive manifesto.

This three-decade evolution demonstrates that the central argument is not a novelty but a thoroughly crafted product. While much of the exegetical and historical material has been recycled from the original, more recent developments in both scholarship and current events have been judiciously integrated. Just one example is the amazing congruence of the earlier perspective with post-September 11 discussion of the war on terrorism cf.

Topics addressed along the way include apocalyptic zealotry, conspiracy theories, the stereotyping of enemies, obsession with victory and overcoming evil, the controversy over flag worship — many of which can be paralleled by similar tendencies in Israeli militancy and Islamic Jihad.

The authors pile up examples of the dangers inherent in the redemptive violence that characterizes zealous nationalism. Pacifist Mennonite readers will approve their insistence that war is futile as a response to terrorism, but the model of prophetic realism advocated here, while sympathetic to utilizing nonviolent alternatives to war, is not based in absolute pacifism.

The authors recognize the need for force to back up law and order e. One telling image sums up the book.