Even sympathetic scholars exercised a will to reshape the Orient to their own image

Evidence

In the other direction, among the individual and immensely detailed ideas of the scholarly world, Massignon maneuvered himself into a special position. He reconstructed and defended Islam against Europe on the one hand and against its own orthodoxy on the other. This intervention—for it was that—into the Orient as animator and champion symbolized his own acceptance of the Orient’s difference, as well as his efforts to change it into what he wanted. Both together, the will to knowledge over the Orient and on its behalf in Massignon are very strong. — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 695

Categorization

• DEFINE: Illustrates that even pro-Islam scholarship embodies the ‘will to knowledge’ because it presumes the right to reimagine and champion the Orient from outside.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 695