(REVIEW) The latest Hollywood blockbuster “Dune,” a space opera based on Frank Herbert’s 1965 novel of the same name, is essentially a philosophical thought experiment that asks, How would Islam adapt and change thousands of years into the future on a distant desert planet?

The answer the novel provides is that it would syncretize with other faiths, such as Zen Buddhism, and combined with a messianic leader, bring down an interplanetary empire. The film adaption relegates matters of faith to the background, with passing reference to Muslim terms such as “mahdi” — or rightly guided one — and avoids others, such as “jihad” — meaning to strive, a struggle — most likely to avoid courting controversy. 

Nevertheless, the timing of its release does allow viewers to draw lessons about faith and uprisings against empires or superpowers. By projecting into the future, the film highlights our reality in the present.

When one power invades a foreign planet or nation, the locals rebel and are often successful in defying the odds when motivated by a unifying creed — be it political or religious. While filmed before the fall of Kabul to the Taliban in August, the lessons of the film continue to endure because Herbert employed tropes based on his research of Middle Eastern history and faith.

History, faith and empire

“Dune” is about a band of rebels — the Fremen, led by a messianic figure named Paul Atreides — who engage in a jihad to free their desert planet Arakis and bring down an intergalactic empire.  

Historically speaking, rebellions led by messianic figures have had a mixed record of leading to the collapse of empires. One of the earliest documented cases is the revolt of Simon bar Kokhba in the years 132-135. He was deemed a messiah by his Jewish followers in the desert province of Judea.

The Roman Empire crushed bar Kokhba’s revolt, forcibly dispersing Jews into a diaspora and leading one commentator to call him the “worst Jewish hero ever.” An Israeli intellectual characterized the bar Kokhba syndrome in the present, warning, “When we follow messianic figures into actual political consequences, it ends badly.”

This was Herbert’s exact message in an article he wrote in 1980. Without giving away the plot, Atriedes is successful in bringing down the galactic empire, yet Herbert also considers him the “worst Fremen hero ever” for being consumed by his jihad at the expense of millions of lives.

Jumping to the 19th century, Imam Shamil — the political, military and religious leader of the Muslims of Caucasus — resisted the Russian Empire’s push into the region. Shamil eventually lost. Like Kokhba, he left a contested legacy. The current president of Chechnya, Kadyrov, claimed Shamil provoked “the annihilation of the Chechen people … and forced them to fight Russia for 20 years.”  Nonetheless, Herbert was profoundly influenced by a historical novel of Shamil’s life, “The Sabres of Paradise.”

In that same century, the revolt of the Muhammad Ahmad bin Abd Allah — otherwise known as the ”Mahdi” by his followers in Sudan — succeeded in establishing a state that was crushed by the British Empire. “Mahdi” is another term that emerges in both the novel and the film, one of the few Arabic religious terms that made it into the screenplay.

By employing this trope, Herbert warns of the combination of charismatic leadership, often found in a messianic figure, that can lead a people in an armed struggle ending in tragedy.

However, just a few years before the publication of “Dune,” Herbert did witness a group of motivated people in North Africa signal the final death blow of an empire. The Algerian resistance against the French led to Algeria’s independence in 1962, while “Dune” was published in 1965. The Algerian resistance was primarily secular in nature, yet there are references to the Algerian struggle for independence in the novel.

Herbert started as a journalist and political campaigner for the Republican Party and an admirer of former presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. In 1983 he said, “I am a political animal” in an interview.  While this is speculation, given his passion, he might have been following the rise of a movement that fought in the name of religion: the “mujahidin,” Muslim guerrilla warriors that resisted the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s with the support of the U.S. and Pakistan. Herbert died in 1986, not witnessing the success of this movement in leading to Soviet withdrawal in 1989.

In popular imagination, it was Moscow’s defeat in Afghanistan that proved to be one of the final nails in the coffin of the Soviet empire. In this case, Herbert proved to be prophetic. The jihad of the ‘80s might have “brought down” the end of the USSR, but it led to countless deaths from infighting among the factions and an Afghan civil war in the early ‘90s. Within this chaos, the Taliban emerged, led by a charismatic figure named Mullah Omar.

In “Dune,” the Harkonnen are the occupiers of Arrakis but withdraw only to be replaced by the more benevolent House Atreides. Both are resisted by the Fremen. The USSR withdrew, only to be replaced by the U.S. in Afghanistan. Like the Fremen, the Taliban, despite overwhelming odds, compelled the U.S. to withdraw.

At the moment, the Taliban rule of Afghanistan is on the brink of a humanitarian crisis. In the face of a looming water crisis, it is unfortunately on the way to becoming a desolate, real-life “Dune.”

Ibrahim al-Marashi is an associate professor of Middle Eastern history at California State University, San Marcos, researching modern Iraqi history. He has also taught at Charles University, Prague and John Cabot University, Rome and earned his doctorate in modern history at the University of Oxford. He has authored or co-authored many books, including "Iraq's Armed Forces: An Analytical History" (2008) and "A Concise History of the Middle East" (2018). Find him on Twitter at @ialmarashi.