STRANGERS IN ISLAM: SHAPING THE OTHERNESS
STRANGERS IN ISLAM: SHAPING THE OTHERNESS

Summary/Abstract: Mental space is a category of Religious Studies and describes a virtual space where one feels the sense of community. The opposite is the myth of the Stranger, the enemy, the weird, the unusual. This is how prejudices are constructed: the well-known, the familiar, the close-by is good, while the stranger, the distant is eccentric, weird, bad. Maintaining the religious, ritual, national purity of the community is a common interest, while accepting a parallel truth, another community as equally just is not common especially in monotheistic religions. Religion is a well-known creator of such mental spaces along with language, culture, tribes, and families. This paper examines how religion creates a common mental space.

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