Alan Wolfe writes a review in Slate of Reza Aslan’s new book, How to Win a Cosmic War:
As devastating as they were, the 20th century’s two world wars were only global. What if the next war we fight—indeed what if the war we are currently fighting—is cosmic? “A cosmic war,” Reza Aslan writes, “is like a ritual drama in which participants act out on Earth a battle they believe is actually taking place in the heavens.” Earthly wars are fought with weapons. Cosmic wars are won or lost with jihads, occupations, and forcible conversions. “There can be no compromise in a cosmic war. There can be no negotiation, no settlement, no surrender.” Aslan, the author of No God but God, devotes his new book, How To Win a Cosmic War, to explaining how some people in the world come to view their struggles in cosmic terms. Despite his title, he then goes on to propose ways not to win such a war but to make it more manageable.
Writing with a critical sense of urgency, Aslan wants us to bring struggles between religious outlooks down from the skies. Global jihad is one thing: It is ugly, violent, and impervious to reason. But religious nationalism—the effort to create states based on principles derived from faith—is something else. To reduce the lure of the apocalyptic, we must distinguish between the two. As much as we must oppose those who kill in the name of God, we need to understand the desperation of those who seek the strong sense of identity derived from linking the quest for God with the desire for nationhood.
Read the full review here.