Plato as the Spiritual Root of Islam and Marxism: A Philosophical Reflection

The spiritual and intellectual roots of both Islam and Marxism can be traced back to a common ancestor: Plato. While Hegel may have provided the political realization of this Platonic idealism in modernity (as Popper noted), the deeper metaphysical underpinnings are found in the ancient philosopher's thought. Both Islam and Marxism, in their idealistic structures, emerge from a Platonic worldview in which the ultimate ideal is inseparable from its political and societal class-manifestation.

Islam received Plato through Eastern Christianity, Byzantine and Syriac traditions, where Platonic metaphysics were deeply embedded in theological formulations.

Marx, in turn, absorbed Plato via Hegel and Western Catholicism, which also carried strong Platonic and Neoplatonic influences.

Despite their surface-level antagonism, Islam and Marxism share a foundational rejection of the Jewish and Protestant (and more broadly Aristotelian) view of man and metaphysics.

Judaism and Protestantism, rooted in Aristotelian and empirical traditions, maintain a space for the the image of God in man. It is a spiritual and moral possibility or essence that transcends political or material notions. Atistotle, can entertain the thinking human being bearing intrinsic value independent of the state, class, or historical moment.

This means the population may uphold a metaphysical belief in the sanctity of the individual and the legitimacy of private conscience and ownership deriving from a higher being that does not "represent" itself in matter, or that is not "reflected" in it as a "symbol" - like in platonism, and its modern manifestations.

Platonic thought, as we know, binds the ultimate ideal - the "Form of the Good" - to the realization of the "just" "society". And all value and ethics (monetary or religious) are judged by their level of alignment with the "collective goal" realized through a higher caste.

This leaves no true space for liberty the of spirit. In Plato, as in the systems of Muhammad and Marx, human identity is subordinate, unable of extrapolating the self into a domain of ownership.

Humans are but instruments in a larger metaphysical design.

Aristotle, allowed for spirit by pursuit of virtue - regardless of a submission to an ideal state, thus he managed to allow man to create himself. To truly experience living in the image.

Looking ahead, one might foresee a triumph of Islam over socialism. Islam wields theological power, male, hierarchical, transcendent, while socialism rests on economic might and a feminized, maternal theological foundation rooted in Catholic universalism.

The masculine theological force of Islam may eventually dominate the softer economic utopianism of socialism due to it's violent arabian roots.

Thus, when these ideologies converge and vie for control over the West, it may well be that Marx, the prophet of dialectical materialism, will find himself yielding to Muhammad, the master of submission.