The Fundamentalist Mindset Psychological Perspectives on Religion, Violence, and History

by Strozier, Charles B.; Terman, David M.; Jones, James W.; Boyd, Katherine A.

• ISBN13: 9780195379662
• ISBN10: 0195379667
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-04-19
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

This penetrating book sheds light on the psychology of fundamentalism, with a particular focus on those who become extremists and fanatics. What accounts for the violence that emerges among some fundamentalist groups? The contributors to this book identify several factors: a radical dualism, in which all aspects of life are bluntly categorized as either good or evil; a destructive inclination to interpret authoritative texts, laws, and teachings in the most literal of terms; an extreme and totalized conversion experience; paranoid thinking; and an apocalyptic world view. After examining each of these concepts in detail, and showing the ways in which they lead to violence among widely disparate groups, these engrossing essays explore such areas as fundamentalism in the American experience and among jihadists, and they illuminate aspects of the same psychology that contributed to such historical crises as the French Revolution, the Nazi movement, and post-Partition Hindu religious practice.

Author Biography

Charles B. Strozier is Professor of History and Criminal Justice at the City University of New York, John Jay College, and a practicing psychoanalyst. David M. Terman is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst and Director of the Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis. James W. Jones is Professor of Religion and adjunct Professor of Clinical Psychology at Rutgers University. Katharine A. Boyd is a doctoral student at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. ix
Contributor Biographies	p. xi
Foreword	p. xvii
Introduction	p. 3
What Is The Fundamentalist Mindset?
Definitions and Dualisms	p. 11
Theories of Group Psychology, Paranoia, and Rage	p. 16
The Apocalyptic	p. 29
The Charismatic Leader and the Totalism of Conversion	p. 38
Motivations for Violence
Fundamentalism and the Paranoid Gestalt	p. 47
The Apocalyptic Other	p. 62
The Social Psychology of Humiliation and Revenge: The Origins of the Fundamentalist Mindset	p. 71
Fundamentalist Faith States: Regulation Theory as a Framework for the Psychology of Religious Fundamentalism	p. 80
Christian and American Contexts
Eternal Warfare: Violence on the Mind of American Apocalyptic Christianity	p. 91
Opening the Seven Seals of Fundamentalism	p. 104
The Unsettling of the Fundamentalist Mindset: Shifts in Apocalyptic Belief in Contemporary Conservative Christianity	p. 120
Global and Historical Contexts
The Psychology of the Global Jihadists	p. 139
Ordering Chaos: Nazi Millennialism and the Quest for Meaning	p. 156
Rumor, Fear, and Paranoia in the French Revolution	p. 175
Hindu Victimhood and India's Muslim Minority	p. 195
Conclusion: A Fundamentalist Mindset?	p. 216
Notes	p. 221
Index	p. 265
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