American founders framed Muslim power as a mortal threat to Christendom
Evidence
Many authors portrayed Muslims as more dangerous than just misled Christians: Islam and Christianity had locked into (im)mortal combat. When John Dickinson, delegate to both the Continental Congress and Constitutional Convention, described the advancement of nations, he (mistakenly) noted that the Portuguese arrival in India disrupted the advent of Muslim power. This proved providential since “there [is] the least reason to question, that they would have strenuously employed the increase of wealth and power in their favourite design of reducing all Christendom to the same miserable slavery, with which by their oppressive superstition, so many celebrated parts of it, including the Birthplace of its religion, have already been overwhelmed.” — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 100
Categorization
- CANDY: A US founding father warning of Muslim ‘slavery’ over Christendom subverts the tidy secular-tolerance founding story.
- XREF: connects to: Anglo-American discourse framed Islam as Christianity’s inherent and inexorable nemesis. — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear:…, 95; American founders saw the Muslim world as the republic’s opposite — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 211; Enlightenment-era American statesmen framed Islam as implacably hostile to all Christendom. — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 160
Related
- Enlightenment-era American statesmen framed Islam as implacably hostile to all Christendom. (similarity 0.92)
- When John Dickinson, delegate to both the Continental Congress and Constitutional Convention, described the advancement of nations, he (mistakenly) noted that the Portuguese arrival in India… (similarity 0.86)
- American founders saw the Muslim world as the republic’s opposite (similarity 0.85)
- Anglo-American discourse framed Islam as Christianity’s inherent and inexorable nemesis. (similarity 0.83)
Broader Connections
- Enlightenment-era American statesmen framed Islam as implacably hostile to all Christendom.
#corroborates(0.90) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 160 - American founders saw the Muslim world as the republic’s opposite
#qualifies(0.80) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 211