29 Facts About Maxime Rodinson

Ideologically a Marxist, Rodinson was a prominent authority in oriental studies.

Maxime Rodinson was the son of a Russian-Polish clothing trader and his wife, who both were murdered in the Auschwitz concentration camp.

Maxime Rodinson was the author of a body of work, including the book Muhammad, a biography of the prophet of Islam.

Maxime Rodinson joined the French Communist Party in 1937 for "moral reasons" but was expelled in 1958 after criticizing it.

Maxime Rodinson became well known in France when he expressed sharp criticism of Israel, particularly opposing the settlement policies of the Jewish state.

The parents of Maxime Rodinson were Russian-Polish Jewish immigrants who were members of the Communist Party.

Maxime Rodinson's father was a clothing trader who set up a business making waterproof clothing in the Yiddish-speaking part of Paris, called the Pletzl, in the district of the Marais.

Maxime Rodinson's father tried to unionise and organize educational and other services for his working-class immigrant group.

Maxime Rodinson grew up in a fervently Communist, non-religious and anti-Zionist family.

The family was poor, so Maxime Rodinson became an errand boy at the age of 13 after obtaining a primary school certificate.

In 1932, thanks to a rule allowing persons without academic qualifications to take the competitive entrance examination, Maxime Rodinson gained entry to the Ecole des Langues Orientales and prepared for a career as a diplomat-interpreter.

Maxime Rodinson studied Arabic but later, preparing a thesis in comparative Semitics, he learned Hebrew, which surprised his family.

In 1940, after the beginning of the Second World War, Maxime Rodinson was appointed to the French Institute in Damascus.

Maxime Rodinson's subsequent stay in Lebanon and Syria allowed him to escape the persecution of Jews in occupied France and extend his knowledge of Islam.

Maxime Rodinson spent most of the next seven years in Lebanon, six as a civil servant in Beirut and six months teaching in Sidon at the Maqasid high school.

In 1948, Maxime Rodinson became a librarian at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, where he was put in charge of the Muslim section.

Maxime Rodinson left the Communist Party in 1958, following Nikita Khrushchev's revelations of Stalin's crimes amid accusations of using the association to further his career, but nonetheless remained a Marxist.

Maxime Rodinson became well known when he published Muhammad in 1961, a biography of the prophet's life written from a sociological point of view, a book which is still banned in parts of the Arab world.

Maxime Rodinson participated with other colleagues committed to the left in a Marxist think tank organised by Jean-Pierre Vernant.

Maxime Rodinson was awarded the 1995 Prize by the Rationalist Organisation.

Maxime Rodinson took a public stance in favour of Palestinian self-determination during the Six-Day War.

Maxime Rodinson created the Groupe de Recherches et d'Actions pour la Palestine with his colleague Jacques Berque.

Maxime Rodinson called on the Palestinians to take their case to liberal Europeans, warning them of the danger of a religious nature of the conflict which would tarnish the reputation of a just cause:.

Maxime Rodinson's anti-Zionism was based on two main reproaches: pretending to impose on all people of Judaic descent all over the world an identity and a nationalist ideology, and judaizing territories at the cost of expulsion and domination of the Palestinians.

Maxime Rodinson tried to rise above two prejudices: the first one widespread in Europe that Islam is a brake for the development of capitalism, and the second one, widespread among Muslims, that Islam was egalitarian.

Maxime Rodinson emphasized social elements, seeing Islam as a neutral factor.

Maxime Rodinson coined the term theologocentrism for the tendency to explain all empirical phenomena in the Muslim world with reference to Islam, while ignoring the role of "historical and social conditioning" in explaining events.

Maxime Rodinson developed the habit of receiving these revelations in a particular way.

Maxime Rodinson's sincerity appears beyond a doubt, especially in Mecca when we see how Allah hustled, chastised and led him into steps that he was extremely unwilling to take.