Violence and Worship: The 'sacralization of violence' in the 'Islamic State’s' Online Campaign

Regularly, the Weltanschauung of Daesh, or the so-called “Islamic State,” is described by one of two conceptual notions which on first glance are mutually exclusive: “religion” and “ideology.” However, this separate conceptualization has proven to be an analytical blanket too small for the empirical bed it is supposed to cover. The solution offered is a processual understanding of social belief-systems which can be located on a spectrum between the ideal types of “religion” and (secular) “ideology.” To emphasize the role of the religious not as an auxiliary, but an equal to ideology within Daesh’s belief-system and to stress the religious legitimization of its totalitarian claim, Daesh’s system of belief is addresses as a “transcendent totalitarianism.” Based on this presumption, the paper addresses Daesh’s online and social media campaign to understand the mobilizing role of the “sacralization of violence” with regard to the emergence of a specific collective identity of Daesh to build a constituency of active supporters and sympathizers. The “sacralization of violence” in Daesh’s propaganda is considered to serve the following (political) objectives: Firstly, to appeal to possible recruits as future mujahiddīn fighters for a sacred cause, to secondly serve as a ritual of initiation for these this “virtual elite,” and thirdly, to glorify and justify extreme current and future violence as divinely ordered, but also rewarded worship which includes the guarantee of salvation with both, a the “terrestrial” and a “transcendent beyond.”