‘If There Is a God I Will Be Allowed to Enter Heaven as All Other Martyrs’: Anders Behring Breivik and Religiously Inspired ‘Righteous Slaughter’

Abstract

We do not know for sure whether Anders Breivik did visit a church before he began the killing spree. What we do know is that Breivik, a native Norwegian, perpetrated the worst terrorist atrocities in the history of his nation when, on 22 July 2011, he killed eight people by setting off a van bomb in the middle of the government district in Oslo, before he travelled a short distance and shot dead 69 participants of a Workers’ Youth League (AUF) summer camp on the island of Utøya. In August 2012, he was convicted of mass murder and causing a fatal explosion and terrorism, temporarily reminding those in Europe that terrorism need not necessarily always be thoughtlessly prefixed with the term ‘Islamic’. Of course, the very problem above is one that many would immediately, and quite understandably, take issue with. For the vast majority of practicing Muslims, it is deeply insulting to make the values of Islam synonymous with violence, as it would be for any religion. For the majority of adherents of most religions, the association between violence and religious faith juxtaposes elements that appear to be wholly contradictory. Christian spree killers are certainly not normal representatives of a faith encompassing some 2.2 billion people worldwide. Rather, more characteristically, religious adherents generally derive positive morality, ethics, religious laws or a preferred lifestyle from their belief system. Yet the extent to which criminology ought to consider the role of religion in the commission of crime remains quite peripheral, even in the contemporary contexts. In doing this, it is necessary to engage in speculation, and there are few certainties and much can be contested, but I offer up this attempt at considering Breivik precisely because as Zizek’s notes, ‘Anders Behring Breivik’s ideological self-justification as well as in reactions to his murderous act there are things that should make us think’ (Zizek 2011).