/lit/ - Literature

>>22656908
>The mullahs were/are frequently educated in Cold War Moscow and their motives are more cynical and utilitarian than faithful.
One of the bizarre things about modern history is how secular concepts were re-theologized and it seemed to happen around the same time in different countries. If you went to a Jewish settlement in Palestine in the late 40s, odds were good you'd find a bunch of secular leftists who were pro-USSR until the mid-50s and drilling with militias. And there were Jews who were interested in the Bible as a historical document and digging up archaeological sites to see how it compared, but it's not that removed from Thomas Jefferson being a Deist who found it useful but cut out the superstitious parts. Mormons took it further where they are almost like "American Zionists" who came up with a new book where Jesus came to America. They re-theologized it.

Then there was this shift to that in the 70s/80s in different parts of the world. Israeli politics moved to the right, but what "left" and "right" meant also changed. In Israel, it just meant if you were for more settlements (right) or fewer (left), but that wouldn't have made sense in the 1950s. Then you see the Islamic Revolution in Iran. The rise of Sunni jihadi stuff. There's also the rise of the Evangelical Christians in American politics and the "moral majority" who are also pro-Israel, which is an alliance between two governments, which are comprised of people, but it took on religious significance.

That could be an interesting analogy in a sci-fi setting, like Martian colonists struggling for independence from Earth developing a Martian religion that helps them do that.

>Have in mind Iran's youngest demographics in the semi-developed world and how difficult that is to maintain the state as it is in the face of recent face covering femminist protest the past year and a half.
I have a sense that changes in the future will happen in multiple countries and it will appear contradictory and confusing, like changes in politics and society in the United States will parallel developments in Iran. The decline of the Evangelicals in America is happening at the same time as the Mullahs in Iran are facing all kinds of problems with the rising generation.