He's Ba-ack

Martin Kramer writes about "The return of Bernard Lewis," the historian who is about to turn, gulp, 101.

I especially like these lines which Lewis penned way back in 1976:

To admit that an entire civilization can have religion as its primary loyalty is too much. Even to suggest such a thing is regarded as offensive by liberal opinion, always ready to take protective umbrage on behalf of those whom it regards as its wards. This is reflected in the present inability, political, journalistic, and scholarly alike, to recognize the importance of the factor of religion in the current affairs of the Muslim world and in the consequent recourse [by Western observers] to the language of left-wing and right-wing, progressive and conservative, and the rest of the Western terminology, the use of which in explaining Muslim political phenomena is about as accurate and as enlightening as an account of a cricket match by a baseball correspondent.

"Protective umbrage"--what a great turn of phrase. Think I'll have to borrow it.