Introduction

Studies of religion and violence are at once sensitive, complex, potentially offensive and of major importance. During the gestation period of this book there have been the horrendous events of 9/11 when Muslim ‘extremists’ flew aircraft into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York, the leaders of ‘the free world’, President Bush and Prime Minister Blair (both self-proclaimed Christians) led a coalition to invade Iraq, on one occasion even using the term ‘crusade’ in what has been widely interpreted by their opponents as a Christian assault on Islam. During this time there have been bombings in cities from Bali and Madrid to London and Mumbai, enacted, according to their perpetrators, in the name of their religion. Despite millennia of apparent ‘religious violence’, there has perhaps never before been a time where studies of religion and violence have been so important.