Abstract: | There are several threads connecting the Islamic resurgence during the 1930s with the wave of religious extremism of the 1970s. These relate mostly to ideology and social outlook. The central theme is the same. Only a return to Islam can revitalize the Islamic countries and restore their glorious past. Relying on the enormous emotional appeal of religion, it has exploited the social and economic grievances of the masses in an onslaught on established authority. The fact that it has emerged the loser in all its confrontations with that authority (in 1948, 1954, 1965, 1981) does not detract from its actual or potential weight as an ongoing phenomenon of importance in Egyptian society and politics. Notes. |