Arab intellectuals proposed salvation through popular political Islam, which al-‘Azm dubs the Islamanic trend.

Evidence

Their central thesis may be summarised as follows: The national salvation so eagerly sought by the Arabs since the Napoleonic occupation of Egypt is to be found neither in secular nationalism (be it radical, conservative or liberal) nor in revolutionary communism, socialism or what have you, but in a return to the authenticity of what they call ‘popular political Islam’. For purposes of distinctness I shall refer to this novel approach as the Islamanic trend. — Sadik Jalal al-‘Azm, Orientalism and Orientalism in Reverse, 149

Categorization

• DEFINE: Coins and defines the term ‘Islamanic trend’ for this new intellectual movement.