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Who ISIS Hates

Posted October 15th, 2014 by Lesley Hazleton

I know Muslims are sick and tired of the Islamophobic refrain of “Why don’t they speak out against ISIS?”  Some refuse to accept the terms of the challenge, seeing it as a demand that they apologize for being Muslim.  Others denounce terrorism, to deaf ears.  But it wasn’t until I read this piece by New Zealanders Khareyah Wahaab and Jason Kennedy, who made news a couple of years back by inviting a racist MP to dinner, that I realized how Muslims in the West are doubly threatened by extremism.

[Tim from Timaru, by the way, is the New Zealand equivalent of Joe Bloggs — or perhaps Joe the Plumber.  And it should be noted that before ISIS took to beheading Western hostages, they beheaded dozens of Syrians in Raqqa. They stuck the heads on the points of railings in the city’s main park. Western media paid no attention.]

This may come as a shock to some, but ISIS hates us, a young Muslim couple in the West, with the same vehemence as Tim from Timaru.  Except, unlike Tim, we have many ties to the Muslim community in New Zealand.  It’s a small community and our family is known to most Muslims here, who in turn still have ties to their countries of origin.  This means that if by some freak chance a terrorist group were to put a bounty on our heads for speaking out against them, they have a much greater chance of finding us than finding Tim from Tumaru.

More than anyone else, terror groups seek to punish those they view as apostates of their own religion.  Radical fundamentalists thus hold all Muslims hostage.  Even in New Zealand, where our freedoms of speech and religion are a given, we still live with the risk of terrorist reprisal for speaking out, precisely because we are Muslim.

Terrorism is not aimed only at Westerners;  it’s a daily experience for those who must live among extremists.  Muslims have immigrated to the West in a conscious decision to escape violence and instability, seeking to build a better life, but many fear that if they speak out loud, they and their families “back home” will suffer.  You may call this cowardly, but first ask yourself if you would be willing to jeopardize your family’s freedom and safety if you legitimately feared reprisal.

Many do so nonetheless.  In public gatherings, demonstrations, formal statements by imams, even teenagers posting their frustrations on YouTube, the message is the same:  “ISIS does not represent us.  ISIS does not represent Islam.  We condemn their actions entirely.”  You don’t hear them because they’re not considered newsworthy, but engage a Muslim in conversation, and you are very apt to find someone who feels exactly the same way about extremists as you do.

How can we, two Kiwis who have never had anything to do with the Middle East, possibly answer for the actions of extremists with whom we have nothing in common other than proclaiming to be Muslim?  Like every other Muslim we know, we choose to follow the progressive, peaceful tenets of Islam, and leave the rest to the annals of a long and tumultuous history.

With biblical literalism still prevalent in many churches, it should be no surprise that Islam also struggles with literalism.  Most Muslims in the West gloss over the violent passages in the Quran in much the same way as Christians disregard the violent passages in the Bible.  Whether consciously or unconsciously, they recognize the need for reform.  But Martin Luther’s reform of Christianity didn’t come until the sixteenth century.  Islam, a faith 600 years younger, is now, in the twenty-first century, grappling with the same need.  Progressive western Muslims will certainly lead the way.

And if you haven’t managed to hear it by now, then hear it this time:  Yes, we are Muslim, and yes, we categorically denounce ISIS and all forms of terror.

 

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File under: fundamentalism, Islam | Tagged: Tags: ISIS, Islamophobia, Jason Kennedy, Khayreyah Wahaab, New Zealand, reprisal, terrorism | 5 Comments
  1. Omer says:
    October 18, 2014 at 11:51 am

    Thanks much for posting Leslie. I just heard Malik Mujahid, a civic leader in Chicago respond to an interview that condemning groups like ISIS has almost become a 6th pillar of Islam which condemnations required 5 x a day. I found that funny but sad.

    Regarding the issue of reform, I think the main issue that traditional Muslims need to confront is that much of the problem is of shackling the Qur’an to the hadith literature. The Prophet never authorized anyone to collect and compile alleged sayings of his and especially not to do so 100 years or more after his death.

    So interpreting the Qur’an through medieval lens is problematic because it institutionalizes a medieval mindset. I am not saying that medieval thought is necessarily bad….but it is not necessarily good either and it is not necessarily really from the Prophet either…at least much of what is said to be from him is likely not from him but from what people thought he would have said or what they mistakened him as saying.

    I think once that lightbulb resonates throughout the Muslim world, then that would be a huge blow to traditional and most especially a huge blow to salafi muslims and catastrophic to extremist muslims.

    I am not against hadith…i believe an indispensible source for interpretation of the Qur’an should be sought in looking at the hadith deemed authentic because some of it is authentic but not to replace reason and not to override the Qur’an as is done much too much by some muslims.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      October 18, 2014 at 2:02 pm

      Love the mordant humor of condemnation of ISIS as the sixth pillar of Islam! Similar vein to the #MuslimApologies meme on Twitter.
      Re hadith, I know I’ve recommended Sadakat Kadri’s ‘Heaven on Earth’ before, but can’t do so too often (the title makes it sound like devotional pap, but would I be recommending it if it were?). Especially the section on Salafism and the reinterpretation of tradition:
      http://www.amazon.com/Heaven-Earth-Journey-Through-Sharia-ebook/dp/B005XMKAGY/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1413665807&sr=1-5&keywords=heaven+on+earth

  2. jveeds says:
    October 19, 2014 at 10:51 am

    I liked the insightful comment about unshackling the Qur’an from the hadith — not that I get a say in it, but a minute after reading that it dawned on me that that could be an excellent thing. I’m of mixed minds about it, because a religion’s interpretive literature helps it grow and adjust to later time epochs. Yet, no matter how the hadith is divvied up among greater-to-lesser credibility, the sayings and actions of people as recollected later are notoriously unreliable and must certainly lead to misguided practices which become enshrined and immutable.

  3. SamAh says:
    October 22, 2014 at 4:43 am

    I love your articles! Absolutely admire the way you represent your thoughts.
    But I cannot help myself but to add the following: We Muslims in the Middle East are trying to progress and reform Islam. We condemn ISIS, and we want peace in the region, we want peace and love between the east and west.
    Much respect to the kiwis writers and to you.
    Cannot wait until your next article!

  4. Sam says:
    March 19, 2015 at 4:10 am

    Isis greatest enemy is Islam’s Sufism – “the love within Islam” all Muslims have to do to combatt and destroy ISIS …is bring back Sufism(love) as was expounded by one of the greatest personalities/poet – Rumi.
    Love all,Malice unto none

Shameless Advice

Posted September 17th, 2014 by Lesley Hazleton

The advice-to-young-people racket is utterly shameless. Even William Burroughs gave in to the temptation, proving that the best advice-to-young-people may be to ignore all advice-to-young-people. Unless, of course, it comes from The Stranger, Seattle’s ornery, Pulitzer-prize-winning alternative weekly, whose annual back-to-school issue confronts incoming freshpeople with all manner of weird, ironic, and occasionally even useful advice on life, love, and… oh yes, sex.

This year, they decided to go for broke and include religion, and who else would they turn to but the Accidental Theologist? — who obligingly came up with ten questions for “young people” to ask if they’re trying to choose a religion:

1. How loud do its proponents talk? If they’re shouting, that doesn’t make what they say truer. On the contrary: There’s generally an inverse relationship between decibels and truth. Besides, do you really enjoy being preached at?

2. Do they know what God wants/thinks/intends? If so, either they are God or they think they are God. That’s called heresy if you’re religious, and psychosis if you’re not.

3. Are they obsessed with sex? If they’re threatened by women or are LGBT-phobic, there’s weird sexual stuff going on. If you’re similarly threatened and phobic, Westboro Baptist Church or Mars Hill Church will happily provide a home for your penis.

4. Do they have good music? Christians might have this one beat (Bach’s Mass in B minor, gospel music…), but if you’ve never heard Pakistan’s Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, you have an ecstatic Sufi feast in store.

5. Talking of feasts, do they have good food? Communion wafer, anyone? At least Jews have matzo-ball soup and four glasses of wine at Passover. And Muslims get to dine on fatted lamb at Eid al-Adha—but winelessly.

6. Do they cite chapter and verse at you? This is the primo tactic of fundamentalists: cherry-picked quotes, out of context. Try tossing this one back at them: “The letter kills, but the spirit gives life.” (And since they can’t hear you unless you add numbers, that’s 2 Corinthians 3:6.)

7. Do they have any idea what “metaphor” means? If not, gently suggest they sign up for English Literature 101—no, demand it. Do not put up with literalism.

8. Are they into social justice? That’s the essential subtext of both the Bible and the Quran: social and economic protest against corrupt elites. The Big Three monotheisms began as the Occupy movements of the ancient Middle East. Where do you think Marx got his ideas from?

9. Do they insist on your swearing belief/loyalty/obedience? If they lack a sense of mystery and claim to have all the answers, run like hell. That’s not faith, that’s dogma.

10. Are they into joy? Do they celebrate life—in this world, not a next one? Do they make you want to laugh, cry, hug, dance, stay up all night and watch the sunrise? Do they make you happy and grateful and goddamn humbled by this strange thing we call existence? A++ if they do.

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File under: agnosticism, Christianity, existence, fundamentalism, Islam, Judaism | Tagged: Tags: 2014 Back to School Issue, advice-to-young-people, ten questions, The Stranger | 14 Comments
  1. Chad says:
    September 17, 2014 at 12:14 pm

    Well said. Can’t think of any more questions to add. Of course, by following these wuestions, a person would have excluded the vast majority of religions out there. So we are better off drawing our own path to spirituality. And I am guessing that’s why you put between quotation marks the words “choosing a religion”. Awesome.

    By the way, speaking of great spiritual music, one great Sufi musician who is trying to bring Sufi music into the 21st century and also adding jazz influences is Dhafer Youssef. Check out his album labelled “Electric Sufi”. Would love to hear your feedback about it if you do check it out!

  2. Katherine Sbarbaro says:
    September 17, 2014 at 2:03 pm

    Shoot! Why weren’t you around giving out advice when I was a kid?! I LOVE #10 – the be all and end all of what any religion should be about. Thank you, Lesley Hazleton. You’re my heroine for today.

  3. Nuzhat says:
    September 17, 2014 at 8:56 pm

    Spot on Lesley, as usual. Do call me when the mullahs/ evangelists etc. come for you….you’ve touched the rawest nerves!

  4. Nancy McClelland says:
    September 17, 2014 at 9:44 pm

    Love it. LOVE it. Well done.

  5. jveeds says:
    September 18, 2014 at 11:13 am

    Excellent job Lesley.

    On a side note, I discovered your “First Muslim,” “After the Prophet” and “Mary” books a year ago and highly recommend them to others.

    • amin tan says:
      September 20, 2014 at 5:08 pm

      BRAVO, lesley Hazleton. I too heartily concur with Mr jweeds. It is an excellent book for Muslims as well as non muslims. The book is an intelligent insight into the events that took place more than 1400 years ago, that has so much bearing on our todays lives.

      amin tan

  6. chakaoc says:
    September 22, 2014 at 2:43 am

    Bravo, Lesley…it leaves little room for all those with an agenda other than a spiritual life.

  7. Tea-mahm says:
    September 22, 2014 at 8:48 am

    Yes! to post on every playground fence, How about daycare centers. Come to think of it waterproof-words on every shower stall at school and home, and at the grandparents’ house!

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 22, 2014 at 7:06 pm

      Waterproofed words? Love it, T!

  8. Bernard S. Sadowski says:
    September 24, 2014 at 2:10 pm

    Fantastic! I am a 75 year – old Roman Catholic who needed to read this. Thank you!!!

  9. Omer says:
    October 4, 2014 at 10:29 pm

    Leslie,

    As a theist and a Muslim, I resonate with much of what you say.

    Just now, I saw your interview with Edip Yuksel. I liked your candor and I appreciate your openness to his views. Thanks much for that openness.

    I completely agree that it is indeed sheer arrogance for someone (finite creation) to know the will of God (the transcendent One) in some all encompassing way.

    I feel (and agree) that many of your points you provided to this Seattle paper speak to this snobbish attitude (of some who try to manipulate religion).

    Regarding your last point, I think that if one views this transitory life of ours as a test for the everlasting life ahead, then to me it is wise to prepare for that immortal hereafter.

    However, I empathize that if we don’t appreciate and wonder about this strange thing called existence, then we have not reflected enough. Such reflection should lead us to celebrate life.

    As a theist, I think it should also lead us to celebrate the source of all existence.

    Also, if we don’t strive to make life good in the here and now and to do so for all people, then we are being selfish and I agree that is a shortcoming.

    Thanks for sharing and thanks much for hearing me as well.

  10. Brigitte Lee says:
    October 30, 2014 at 12:45 pm

    I read ‘The First Muslim’, and ‘Zealot:the life and times of Jesus of Nazareth’. Very informative.
    Is there a comparable, factual book on the historical basis of Judaism?
    Thanks for any suggestion.

    Brigitte Lee

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      November 8, 2014 at 10:09 am

      Well of course there’s my own book ‘Jezebel,’ which reaches from Jezebel’s epic confrontation with Elijah in the 9th century BC to the Babylonian exile three hundred years later, when much of the bible as we know it was written. For a more general introduction, you might want to take a look at Simon Schama’s ‘The Story of the Jews,’ which takes the story up to 1492 AD.

      • Brigitte Lee says:
        November 8, 2014 at 2:25 pm

        Thank you very much. I am looking forward to reading your book.

        Brigitte Lee

An Extraordinary Submergence

Posted March 18th, 2014 by Lesley Hazleton

Submergence-356x535I don’t remember ordering J.M.Ledgard’s novel Submergence from the library.  I do remember getting the email that it had arrived, and wondering what it was. Then picking it up a couple of days later, looking at the cover — “huh?” — and asking myself if I even wanted to read it.

I still know nothing about Ledgard aside from the capsule bio on  the back cover:  Born in Scotland, lives in Africa, political and war correspondent for The Economist.  Nothing, that is, but the fact that he’s written an astonishingly ambitious, beautiful, and haunting novel.  So much so that the moment I finished it — and I mean the precise moment, with no hesitation — I turned back to the first page and began reading it again, with even greater admiration.

The ‘plot’ is simple enough:  a man and a woman meet in a French hotel, have a brief affair, and continue thinking of each other as they go on with their separate lives.  He is an intelligence agent gathering information on militant extremists in Somalia.  She is a deep-ocean scientist obsessed with the strange life forms in the deep-water fissures of the earth’s mantle.  He is captured by jihadist fighters, badly beaten, held hostage.  She dives in a submersible 3,000 meters under the north Atlantic.  Separate lives indeed, yet somehow, and with extraordinary grace, Ledgard pulls them together into a magnificent evocation of the complexity of life on earth, human and otherwise.  And of its intense fragility.

Life in the deep turns out to be extraordinarily stable.  Life on the surface, terrifyingly unstable.  The hardship of Somalia comes as alive here as the shimmering life forms (I had to look up ‘salp’ on Wikipedia) in the hadopelagic — ‘hado’ from Hades, the deepest depths.  The jihadist captors are drawn with rare understanding even as there’s no stinting on their cruelty (including an all-too-vivid scene in which a young teenage girl who has been raped is stoned to death for adultery).

Here’s an extract from toward the end:

We cannot talk with definition about our souls, but it is certain that we will decompose… What is likely is that sooner or later, carried in the wind and in rivers, or your graveyard engulfed in the sea, a portion of each of us will be given new life in the cracks, vents, or pools of molten sulphur on which the tonguefish skate.

You will be in Hades, the staying place of the spirits of the dead.  You will be drowned in obliviion, the River Lethe, swallowing water to erase all memory.  It will not be the nourishing womb you began your life in.  It will be a submergence.  You will take your place in the boiling-hot fissures, among the teeming hordes of nameless microorganisms that mimic no forms because they are the foundation of all forms.  In your reanimation you will be aware only that you are a fragment of what once was, and are no longer dead.  Sometimes this will be an electric feeling, sometimes a sensation of the acid you eat, or the furnace under you.  You will burgle and rape other cells in the dark for a seeming eternity, but nothing will come of it.  Hades is evolved to the highest state of simplicity.  It is stable.  Whereas you are a tottering tower, so young in evolutionary terms, and addicted to consciousness.

And as an eerie footnote to this, here’s Ledgard in an interview last year on the blog of The New Yorker.  The novel “juxtaposes land with ocean and enlightenment with fanaticism,” he acknowledged. “I felt impelled to write it in this way, but it is odd, I can see that. But sometimes life is even odder. It was the strangest moment for me when Osama bin Laden was killed and buried at sea. Everything came together in the abyss. I have often thought about it since, not just bin Laden’s weighted corpse sinking down to the sea floor, but also the processes done on his body, the creatures, the crushing dark, and that’s what I am talking about — there is another world in our world.”

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File under: art, ecology, existence, fundamentalism, science, war | Tagged: Tags: 'Submergence', hadopelagic, J.M.Ledgard, jihadists, ocean science, Osama bin Laden, Somalia | Be the First to leave a comment

The Book India Most Wants To Read

Posted February 12th, 2014 by Lesley Hazleton

donigerPenguin Books India has been forced to recall and possibly destroy all copies of this book — The Hindus: an alternative history, by Wendy Doniger — in order to settle a lawsuit brought about by a fundamentalist Hindu group that says the book over-eroticizes the religion.

In case you are wondering, Wendy Doniger is not exactly a sensationalist.  She’s the Mircea Eliade Distinguished Service Professor of the History of Religions at the University of Chicago Divinity School (and despite that formidable title, writes well).

What she does do is trace the many strands of Hinduism, and argue that “the greatness of Hinduism — its vitality, earthiness, and vividness — lies precisely in many of those idiosyncratic qualities that some Hindus today are ashamed of and would deny.”

The basis of the lawsuit was not that Doniger’s book was wrong.  It was that it hurt the group’s feelings (see the quote above, from page 2).  It didn’t present Hinduism the way they wanted it presented. I’ve heard this same argument from fundamentalist Muslims about both my books on Islam, to which the only sensible response, since I’m neither Muslim nor fundamentalist, is “But of course not!”.  Such arguments leave no room for anything but what’s politely called “devotional literature” — the apparently endless stream of pious pamphlets read only by “true believers” of whatever faith. Though I often wonder if even they have the patience.

The logical conclusion of the hurt-feelings argument is that publication of anything at all — books, newspapers, websites, whatever — should be banned, because someone somewhere may have so little faith that their feelings can be hurt by even the most empathetic outsider eye.

Doniger’s response to all this on Facebook was gracious yet to the point:

I was, of course, angry and disappointed to see this happen, and I am deeply troubled by what it foretells for free speech in India in the present, and steadily worsening, political climate. And as a publisher’s daughter, I particularly wince at the knowledge that the existing books (unless they are bought out quickly by people intrigued by all the brouhaha) will be pulped. But I do not blame Penguin Books, India. Other publishers have just quietly withdrawn other books without making the effort that Penguin made to save this book. Penguin India, took this book on knowing that it would stir anger in the Hindutva ranks, and they defended it in the courts for four years, both as a civil and as a criminal suit.

Penguin India, I should add as a declaration of interest, also distributes The First Muslim, which elsewhere has been subject to a quieter and less newsworthy form of censorship, as happened when the Turkish-language publisher backed out a month before publication for fear of a fundamentalist backlash.  But at least he committed to publish in the first place.  In other countries, publishers and literary-festival organizers have quietly refrained from expressing any interest, cowed not by specific threats, but by their fear of possible threats, and the book, like so many others that do not meet the requirements of conservative piety, appears to be semi-officially banned from public sale in most Arabic-speaking countries. (I say “appears to be,” because there’s no website called BannedInTheMiddleEast.com where one can get a complete picture.)

This is how censorship works: it creates an atmosphere in which good people are afraid to publish, speak, listen, read, even think. When it succeeds, it brings everyone into line.

But here’s the thing: it doesn’t succeed. Not any more. Not when you can order books online, or listen to talks on YouTube, or access blogs, newspaper articles, opinion pieces from all over the world.  

So guess what:  Doniger’s book is now Amazon’s #1 bestselling book about Hinduism. The fundamentalists seem to have forgotten one basic element of publishing:  sex sells.  By insisting that the book be pulped because they think it too erotic, they’ve managed to give it a huge sales boost.

And that is the kind of unintended consequence I adore.

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File under: absurd, fundamentalism, Hinduism | Tagged: Tags: 'The Hindus: an alternative history', censorship, eroticism, India, lawsuit, Vikram Sampath, Wendy Doniger | 4 Comments
  1. PPR Infotech says:
    February 12, 2014 at 9:44 pm

    Yes, Most India People wants to read The Hindus (An Alternative History)

  2. Candace Hill says:
    February 13, 2014 at 6:32 am

    As an alternate view, this could also just be a huge publishing fail because of the compression of levels of editorial staff in struggling publishing houses. That book could easily have been printed under a different title and cover in India and no one would have noticed the “shocking” content except those truly interested in the subject.

    The lack of wise and experienced heads when it comes to the packaging of a title has been noticed and lamented. Those few editorial directors left, with long experience and institution memory (I’m married to one) find themselves constantly swamped with questions, and lines out the office door from those who need a bit of advice or a quick look at some work. When they finally get the budget to hire an assistant, someone to train and mentor, that person is the first fired in the next round of layoffs.

    Just one more example of the trials and tribulations of publishing.

  3. Mary Scriver says:
    February 13, 2014 at 9:21 am

    Wendy Doniger, who is the VERY respected heir of Mircea Eliade, is exactly the sort of writer about sex who everyone should read! Far from prurient, she offers context for human life and dignity. At the U of Chicago I passed her often. She is no bimbo.

    Prairie Mary
    Mary Scriver
    Valier, MT

  4. Dr. B. Ravinder Reddy says:
    April 9, 2014 at 8:39 pm

    As an Indian, I was so looking forward to reading this and thanks to Ms Doniger’s excellent narrative, I am, NOW, more informed of the religion that I was born into! In addition to this book, I would also recommend (to all moderate Indians) the following books: Reza Aslan’s “Zealot” and and Lesley Hazleton’s “The First Muslim”!

Hajj Distress

Posted October 23rd, 2013 by Lesley Hazleton

I am distressed by this news report in today’s Detroit Free Press.  The first four paragraphs:

A group of metro Detroiters visiting Saudi Arabia for the annual Muslim pilgrimage said they were attacked and threatened with death last week by a group of Sunni men from Australia because they are Shias, a minority sect within Islam.

One of the members of the group was strangled until his face turned blue and women in the group were threatened with rape, according to people who witnessed the attack last week. They allege that authorities in Saudi Arabia did not take their complaints seriously and deleted a video one of them had made of the incident.

A U.S. State Department official told the Free Press on Monday: “We are concerned by reports that a group of U.S. citizens was attacked … at a campsite for Hajj pilgrims located outside of Mecca. We take these reports seriously and are committed to the protection of U.S. citizens traveling and residing abroad.”

The Embassy of Saudi Arabia did not return a reporter’s calls or an e-mail seeking comment. The State Department official said the hajj and interior ministries in Saudi Arabia “have confirmed that they are investigating” the incident.

In this instance, my distress is more than a matter of principle.  I have been a guest of Imam Qazwini and the Islamic Center of America (the largest mosque in North America), and admire their openness, their warmth, their calm devotion, and their civic involvement.  I have made dear friends there, people with whom I can talk deeply across all so-called divides of religion/affiliation/belief.

And this distress is only further deepened by the language used in the Detroit Free Press article:  the “say they were” in the headline, and the repeated use of the word “allege” in the body of the piece, as though there were some doubt on the veracity of Imam Qazwini and his group of pilgrims.  Such language only adds insult to the injury of what actually happened.

In principle, the hajj is when all Muslims come together, when all distinctions of class, ethnicity, denomination, and even gender fall away.  But the ultra-conservative and intellectually primitive Salafis — a movement very close to Saudi wahhabism — will have none of this.  It’s their way or no way.  Their Islam or no Islam.  Like all fundamentalist extremists, of all faiths, they see open minds and open hearts as a threat.  And respond with violence.

Expect a far more moderate response from the Islamic Center of North America than I am capable of.  And expect nothing from the Saudi “investigation.”  Year by year, as glitzy multi-million-dollar high-rises go up around the Kaaba itself, the Saudis bear ever greater resemblance to the seventh-century elite who profited from pilgrimage in the pre-Islamic years, charging exorbitant fees for everything from water to access to holy sites.  In fact an essential part of Muhammad’s Quranic message protested exactly this.

But even that pre-Islamic elite insisted on preserving the pilgrimage as a time of absolute non-violence.

What, then, does the Saudi tolerance of Salafi intolerance make them?

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File under: fundamentalism, Islam | Tagged: Tags: attack, Islamic Center of North America, Mecca, Salafi, Saudi Arabia, Shia, Sunni | 6 Comments
  1. moranpro says:
    October 23, 2013 at 11:21 am

    In defense of the Detroit Free Press, they used the language they did to protect themselves from potential libel allegations. If they had serious doubts as to the veracity of the story, they most likely would not have run it at all.

    There is no defense for the Saudi regime looking the other way, but this should hardly be surprising. While they might be a [political/strategic] ally, they remain an example of religious dogma and intolerance.

    I share your skepticism regarding the potential fruits of a Saudi investigation, but they might make some token arrests as a gesture to U.S.-Saudi relations.

  2. Nasir says:
    October 23, 2013 at 11:44 am

    An ugly incident and totally un Islamic! Muslims (not Islam) are fallen today and a mere shadow of their former glory. The guy Saud (and so Saudi Arabia) patronized the so-called reformer Wahab and installed by the Brits & US (replacing the old Hashemites) and who to date remain their staunch alley and for this reason moderate Muslims dont like them. Mecca is central to Islam/Muslims as perhaps Jerusalem still is to Judeo-Christians. God will deal with them all.

  3. Roxana Arama says:
    October 23, 2013 at 2:12 pm

    I read the news report when you posted it on Facebook, and then I read the comments to your link. I was shocked to see that most people dismissed the report as some sort of conspiracy between the Shia pilgrims and the US Embassy to make Saudi Arabia look bad. Blame the victim before even taking another look! The details in the story look plausible to me, so even if there’re legal concerns when reporting, the leap to denial seemed impossible. But seeing not just one person deny that this story could happen, but many, made me realize – again – how intractable this conflict really is.

  4. Ross says:
    October 23, 2013 at 4:57 pm

    I’m reluctant from a position of lacking real knowledge of these affairs to spread misinformation, but I would say that the Syrian crisis has engendered low level conflicts within the Australian Muslim community which, on the whole, stay within that community.

    There are a substantial number of Muslims of Lebanese and Syrian origin in Australia (few of Saudi origin) and some young men, particularly of Sunni faith, have been inflamed by the Syrian and other situations. The only real act beyond posturing that I am aware of, as an everyday Australian, is the call for boycotts of Shia run businesses.

    That said, the following does not really surprise me:

    http://www.5pillarz.com/2013/10/19/anti-shia-sectarianism-on-hajj-is-a-worrying-trend/

    The ring-leader of the attackers has been identified by witnesses as a notorious thug from Australia who has previous. He has been arrested by the Australian authorities for physically attacking other Muslims (both Sunni and Shia) who refused to support the Syrian rebels in the past. Let us be under no illusion here, these takfeeri thugs disguised as hajjis were intent on murder, they were shouting this as they launched their 200-man strong attack.

  5. Sohail Kizilbash says:
    October 24, 2013 at 8:41 am

    I have just returned from Hajj and I hereby lodge my protest against the behaviour of the Saudi police and religious muttavas, who did NOT let us pray peacefully even in the courtyard of the Prophet’s mosque in Madinah nor in the roof top terrace at the Haram in Makkah. We had to hold our prayer meetings in a room of the hotel. It is disgraceful and a shame that we went all the way to the Holy cities and could not pray at the Mosques as we wanted. Why should the Salafi or Wahabi view be imposed on the rest of the Muslim world?

  6. tonosanchezreig says:
    October 24, 2013 at 4:53 pm

    Reblogged this on Al-Must'arib (the vocational Mossarab) and commented:
    Annd we seat and observe… yeah…. they r on their 15th century, as we were… and fighting religious wars as we did. Hmm…. history keeps rhyming.

Canceled in Turkey

Posted September 20th, 2013 by Lesley Hazleton

Under the heading Disappointing But Not Exactly Surprising:

taksimThere will no Turkish edition of The First Muslim.  My Turkish publisher received a reader’s report on the book from an un-named “academic member of Islamic history” at the Faculty of Theology at Marmara University, and today emailed to say that “The report showed more than a few aspects about your book which, considering the current political situation, might not be desirable and welcomed in Turkey.  I am apologetic to tell you that our company has decided not to proceed with your book.”

Since the book had already been translated and was ready for publication next month, this is a decision that comes at some cost to the publisher.

Here’s the upshot of the report:

The work seems successful in general.  However it has some lack of knowledge and misinformation.  Besides, it has an attitude imputing the prophet Mohamed and Muslims especially when it comes to Jews… The book is the product of a serious labor.  Nonetheless it is concluded that the translation of the book to Turkish is not appropriate when it is considered lack of information mentioned above and negative comments which are sometimes beyond the purpose and sometimes understood to be made consciously.”

The full report is here.  It seems I should have simply skipped over the tension between the early Muslims and the Jewish tribes of Medina, which culminated in the massacre of the men of the small Qureyz (Qurayza) tribe, and was, the academic reader argues, the fault of the Jews themselves.  (This argument is very familiar to me, since I’ve debated it many times with fundamentalist-leaning Muslims, both in public and in private.  I am equally familiar with most of the other points raised by “the academic member” — though the one about Jesus having or not having a father struck me as particularly picayune.)  The real complaint, of course, is that the book is not a hagiography, and does not conform to the requirements of piety.

As the publisher wrote, this is a political decision.  These are edgy times in Turkey, where Prime Minister Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party seem intent on deepening the instititutionalization of Islam despite strong secular resistance.  Three months ago, Taksim Square was the epicenter of the secular/religious clash.    Inevitably, my book falls into that same volatile intersection of religion and politics.  That’s the realm I’ve been exploring for years now, and will continue to explore.

Just not, it seems, in Turkish.

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File under: fundamentalism, Islam | Tagged: Tags: Erdogan, Marmara University, The First Muslim, Turkey | 52 Comments
  1. Chad says:
    September 20, 2013 at 1:55 pm

    It may still be explored in Turkish. Classic scenario: some book or newspaper or person is banned (for any reason). This gains some media attention. A translation makes its way online and cant be blocked by authorities, or banned person gets international media attention, shedding more light and giving more interest in it than if things were allowed naturally. My only other comment on this is that we have to keep in mind that lots of people in that part of the world WANT this institutionalization of religion believing that it will solve their problems. Hard to say whether they are a majority or minority. We’d like to think they are a minority but Im not so sure. Religion preys on the ignorant like a lion attacking the baby deer. And they dont know better.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 20, 2013 at 4:48 pm

      Just to clarify: the book has not been banned in Turkey. Rather, the publisher was apparently given to understand that it might be wiser not to publish a Turkish translation. Whether this would be so or not remains an open question.

      • Ross says:
        September 20, 2013 at 5:19 pm

        With my limited knowledge I find some difficulty in figuring out whether the authorities are being repressive or cautious: this brings to mind the conflicts when the vernacular Bible was undertaken: knowledge and perceived truth to be controlled by the elect.

        The caution angle springs to mind after the Turkish Government’s reaction to our ridiculous NSW State Government recent recognition of the “Armenian Genocide” recently. It seems to me that the Turks would rather deal with this matter–as they are slowly doing–on their own terms and with their perceived social cohesion preserved. Perhaps this applies to your book?

        Was “After the Prophet” translated into Turkish and published there?

        • Lesley Hazleton says:
          September 21, 2013 at 11:18 am

          To be clear, this is not a matter of the authorities clamping down on the book. It’s a cautious decision on the part of the publisher, taking account of a political climate that he fears may rebound against him. He may well be right.

    • Gozde says:
      December 8, 2013 at 3:57 pm

      It is a pity that the book’s publication encountered such an impediment in my country. Well, I would like to say that I’ve just finished reading the book and I truly enjoyed it. As I believe that there can be no “one, true” biography or historical account of Muhammad’s life, there is no meaning in criticizing the author for shaping the book as she wished or adopting the viewpoint that she had. As far as I know this is the first book about the Prophet’s life written by a woman, so for that alone it’s hugely important.

      Lesley Hazelton, from the moment I started reading the first few words to the very last chapter, your prose, your historical narrative, mesmerized me. The events and the characters are so openly and candidly described. Muhammad is portrayed as a (fallible) human being–which was exactly what was needed compared to the languid bibliographies penned by such authors like Martin Lings.

      Although I currently live and study outside Turkey, the book will definitely find its way to the hands of several friends. Maybe not in a Turkish translation, but in English.

      • Lesley Hazleton says:
        December 8, 2013 at 4:40 pm

        Warming words on a freezing day in Seattle. Thank you so much!

  2. Rashid says:
    September 20, 2013 at 3:16 pm

    Dear Lesley,

    I am quite a big fan of your work but just a side note you mention the “massacre” of the Qurayza tribe now I (from my humble understanding) read that the actual incident may not have even taken place as scholars such as Imam Malik and Ibn Hajar saw that this particular “report” (I’m guessing you mostly relied on Ibn Ishaq’s work) was lacking in authenticity and that as such cannot be taken as an actual historical incident but in fact it is related in the Bukhari and Muslim collections of hadith (which if I may note are the most authentic Hadith collections bearing also in mind that they contain some weak hadith but as whole entire work they are the most authentic out of the collections of Hadith) that the ruling was that only on the warriors or those who betrayed the pact during battle (basically committing high treason) and the numbers of 960 or so are not mentioned it is simply mentioned that those who committed the treason be executed.

    I recommend reading this webpage its a very accurate analysis about this particular subject by W.N. Arafat :

    http://www.haqq.com.au/~salam/misc/qurayza.html

    I just wanted to re-etirate that I deeply enjoy your work and had I not respected your sincerity and academic scholarship I wouldn’t have brought this matter to light I hope I didn’t offend you in anyway or come of as a pomps know it all .

    Wish you the very best,

    Rashid

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 20, 2013 at 4:58 pm

      No offense taken, Rashid. There have indeed been many reinterpretations of the early accounts in ibn-Ishaq and al-Tabari, and the argument as to which traditions are ‘authentic’ and which ‘inauthentic’ continues within Islamic theology. This is clearly a deeply disturbing episode in Muhammad’s life, especially for believing Muslims. My decision not to gloss over it, as many other modern biographers have done, was not taken lightly. It is, as I see it, a matter of according Muhammad the integrity of reality — of being human, rather than of being inhumanly perfect. (The same applies, of course, to my exploration of the ‘Satanic verses,’ an episode in which I admire Muhammad’s courage in openly acknowledging that he had been wrong.)

      • Rashid says:
        September 21, 2013 at 11:33 am

        May I say that I am deeply honored that you have replied to my message !

        I have to agree with you (as a Muslim) in that the Prophet Mohammed was human when it came to emotions, reactions and tendencies and thats why I have a deep respect for his character and connect with him as a person. I find the words of Thomas Carlyle to be very fitting “Faults? The greatest fault I should say, is to be conscious of none.” Truly as the Originator of the universe said in the Quran (( A man among you))

        I hate to sound so patronizing and obnoxious please bare with my poor tactfulness.

        The crux of the matter is that the majority of historians did not “re-interpret” the matter of the execution but found other separate reports which according to the requirements of verifying narrations or”Hadith” where far more authentic than Ibn Ishaq’s narrations.

        Ibn Ishaq’s and Al Tabari’s methodology of gathering reports was very shall we say poor and considered not on par with the very stringent requirements of gathering narrations (you may want to check out the book “Usool Al Hadith” or the Methodology of Hadith) that was used by many of their contemporaries thus the majority of Muslim scholar and historians today and previously take some acceptation on details in Al Tabari and Ibn Ishaq’s works.

        What my ramble is on about is that the details of this incident as related in Ibn Ishaq’s biography is academically and historically not proven.

        On a less bothersome note I really feel very exited and inthralled to be exchanging thoughts with a person as your self. I find sincerity a very rare thing today among academics (muslims as well as none muslims) but in you madam I find it and it is that very quality in you that made me love your books and talks (I’m ever the flatterer aren’t I).

        With outmost respect,

        Rashid

  3. Rashid says:
    September 20, 2013 at 3:21 pm

    P.S I forgot to mention that in another authentic Hadith it is mentioned that the actual number of those executed where 40.

  4. fatmakalkan says:
    September 20, 2013 at 6:23 pm

    I am very sorry. I was VP of my region for Prime Minester Erdogan. What this people are claiming totally none sense. And Erdogans party was build as a reaction to 85 years of harsh ruling of anti- Islamic anti any religion communists. I couldn’t teach at Turkish university because I cover my hair. I couldn’t run for parliament because I was covered. I can not enter any court even if i were a lowyer. i couldnt work in any goverment job because i was covered. i coulnt go to any school public or private with my scarve. There fore we builded AKP. And what happened at Istanbul Taksim was a similar game that removed Mursi from Eygpt. AKP or Erdogan is not fanatics. I know prime minister well personally and I was elected official of AKP. This is a sorry excuse of the person who wrote this letter to you. It does not represent truth. AKP has no goal of institutionalizing Islam in Turkey. As Muslim Turks we want to same freedoms secularist enjoying since years. Secularism means in their mind oppressing believers. it is not the same secularism we enjoy at USA. I have more rights at USA as a Muslim women than in Turkey. Isn’t this wrong? I am reading first Muslim and wrote comment last night to your blog. I loved the book. It is unique and filling very important gap about Prophet Mohammad’s biography . I didn’t see anything about you siding with Jews . As I said who ever wrote this letter to you did not even understood what you are writing at First Muslim.

    • Chad says:
      September 21, 2013 at 3:25 am

      Ms. Fatma, I do agree that there should be freedom of religion and freedom to dress or cover your hair in any supposedly free society. So secularism shouldnt mean banning you from wearing a head scarf. For a while, Turkey had gone a little overboard there.

      BUT, I think everyone should agree that an important aspect of Secularism is the separation of religion and state, which as it stands should not allow parties based on religion to be in the political arena. Thats the lesson that was learned in Egypt (the hard way). Even in the USA, the political party which doesnt separate church and state (guess which one, LOL) is the party holding us back from growth as a nation and people.

      • fatmakalkan says:
        September 21, 2013 at 8:50 am

        Chad, thank you for replying.
        Yes absolutely you are right. AKP ruling party doesn’t want to change regime . It has no agenda to replace secularism with Sharia law. In Democracy every group of citizens must be represented at political arena. Devout Muslims were always band out from elections. Their parties closed one after another. And their human rights were taken away. At AKP we respect all citizens of Turkey, from any religion or background. Secularism is assurance of that. But CHP leftist party wants to show AKP as if it is Islamist party. Which is not! Inside of the our party there are liberals, ex- leftist people, democrats, nationalists, and devout Muslims, and cultural Muslims, conservatives . Basically AKP is mainstream party sits on the middle. Neither left or right. Proof of this we got % 50 of the vote at general elections. Turkey will never become another Iran! But on the other hand we want to be independent. We can not be Saudi Arabia either. We want equality in the Turkey, equality in the Middle East, equality in the world for every human being.

        • Nasir Khanzada says:
          September 21, 2013 at 10:18 am

          Turkey was the last of the Islamists that singly ruled Asia, Africa and Europe for centuries and finally decayed. They lost to rising, fresh and superior Europeans who had come out (14th-17th CE) of the centuries of ‘Dark Age’ and burst out of their shell in all directions, as to this day. The non Arabs, especially Muslims of the Indian sub-continent and now Pakistan still value Turkey greatly. Turkey is again on rapid rise more than other Muslim states and we wish them well ahead -secular, Islam or headscarf aside for a while…

        • Lesley Hazleton says:
          September 21, 2013 at 11:45 am

          Well said, Fatma. Turkey has indeed been admired these past several years for its leadership as a modern Muslim-majority country, a bright antithesis of repressive regimes such as that of Saudi Arabia. That’s precisely why I was so delighted when ‘The First Muslim’ was due to come out in Turkish, and why I’m disappointed now that it won’t. I don’t see this as a reflection on the AKP — I see it as over-cautiousness in what seems, post-Taksim, to be an uneasy political climate. Please correct me if I’m wrong here.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 21, 2013 at 11:28 am

      Thank you, Fatma. Again, this was not a result of any government action. It was a reaction to a pedantically fundamentalist reading of the book, which is still available in English.
      The principle of freedom of religion, of course, is not freedom “from” religion, as extremist atheists seem to imagine, but freedom to choose and practice any religion or none. To be secular or to be religious is a personal choice, and as you note, a free government ensures that this choice is available to all, without discrimination.

  5. Nasir Khanzada says:
    September 21, 2013 at 12:04 am

    I must say that the Turkish authorites of the Unversity of Marmara have rightly pointed out many weaknesses in your work. At the same time, your publishing their comments is apprecaited. The Quran & Muhammad are told many times in your Scriptures and all evidence of truth have come to you and yet you remain ‘agnostic and accidental theologist’ and a sceptic clash with upright reasoning!

  6. Ali says:
    September 21, 2013 at 3:41 am

    Dear Lesley,

    There is a smear campaign is being executed against the AKP of Turkey by some of the illegal groups and secessionist organizations. It is unacceptable that any kind of idea or opinion against the governance should be under control or be banned by the government. I mean, there is a huge disinformation campaign is in action all around the globe by the individuals or the organizations who does not want the development of the country and the government of Turkey. In a world that people can criticize even the prophets because of their messages or sayings that right or wrong, it is so natural that you can make mistakes because of wrong information or lack of sources with a few viewpoints. By saying that I do not want to criticize or blame you as I am not a person like that. I’d rather prefer that the readers should judge you or make comments after reading your book. For this reason, please stop being a part of this campaign against the government in Turkey and approach the situation with a neutral attitude as I know your personality as an Agnostic 🙂

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 21, 2013 at 11:36 am

      Ali, I think you may be jumping to conclusions here. Once more, this was not, repeat not, the result of direct government interference, but a reaction to a general political climate. No matter what you think of ‘The First Muslim’ and no matter where you stand in the Turkish political spectrum, it seems to me that people should be free to read it in their own language and decide for themselves.

      • Chad says:
        September 21, 2013 at 12:05 pm

        Yes, I think people are jumping to conclusions. Lesley stated the facts of what happened and that it was not a government ban but rather a publisher who felt the sensitive political climate now made it not the right time fir the book.

        However, I must say I just feel this is an excuse. I’d like to see what other books this publisher didnt take. Did he skip pro-religious books too? I’m doubtful.

        You see, as a person from the middle east, I know how this works. Sure, Turkey may be different. But generally in that part of the world, books may be banned from the government, but a publisher may decide to skip on a book for fear of government retribution. A friend of mine was a journalist in another mid east country, published a newspaper article talking about some of the stories of Aisha and how Islam split. He was put in prison for a while along with the paper’s editors for “blasphemy”.

        • Chad says:
          September 21, 2013 at 12:07 pm

          Not saying that Turkish government would have put the publisher in prison, just saying its complicated and im not buying your publisher’s excuses…

          • Lesley Hazleton says:
            September 21, 2013 at 4:03 pm

            I get it, but he lives and works in Turkey and I don’t. Further, there’s no sign that he anticipated any government backlash. I think it’s more that, having sought out a conservative opinion, he feared he had then invited a fundamentalist backlash which otherwise may not have occurred. Obviously I am disappointed in his decision, but under the circumstances, I can understand it.

      • Ali says:
        September 21, 2013 at 2:56 pm

        At the 10th line of my comment I wrote that “the readers of the book should review, criticize and comment”. Maybe I couldn’t express my thoughts clearly before. I want to say that, your book or any other books of others, have to be published unless it is directly against to sensitive values. I was asking for your book always in the bookstores (After the Prophet) for more than nearly a year. I watched your videos and talks… The only thing here I question is, why your book is not accepted by the publisher with the given reason of “political situation” ???

        Please explain me what is the meaning of this paragraph taken from your article;

        “The report showed more than a few aspects about your book which, considering the current political situation, might not be desirable and welcomed in Turkey. I am apologetic to tell you that our company has decided not to proceed with your book.”

        and this also;

        “As the publisher wrote, this is a political decision. These are edgy times in Turkey, where Prime Minister Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party seem intent on deepening the instititutionalization of Islam despite strong secular resistance. Three months ago, Taksim Square was the epicenter of the secular/religious clash.”

        Frankly speaking, I am asking these questions because I want to make sure what was the “true” reason that your book not published here in Turkey. I want to read your books in my native language if possible. I watched your several videos and impressed too much about one on the TED talks, “A tourist reading Koran”, and telling about you to all my friends 🙂

        I am not agree with the publisher about the “edgy times in Turkey” when it comes to publishing a book or knowledge.

        • Lesley Hazleton says:
          September 21, 2013 at 3:57 pm

          Ali, I won’t try to explain what was not my decision. If you click on the link in the post, you can read the reader’s report for yourself. If you then read the book, you can judge to what degree it has merit.

          • Ali says:
            September 21, 2013 at 5:30 pm

            Lesley, I have read both your article and the reader’s report and I am still not satisfied with your replies. I do not want to be offensive but to be frank with you, I can not understand your post’s aim. I mean, you are gracefully complain about the situation with a heading “Disappointing But Not Exactly Surprising” and highlight the loss of the publisher with the statement “Since the book had already been translated and was ready for publication next month, this is a decision that comes at some cost to the publisher” but still telling me about the reader’s report. Reader’s report is not important for me at the moment because I will be the one who to judge the “degree it has merit” after reading the book as you stated (I am not a critic just for my own account).

            Again, as I mentioned before, I respect your work and studies and want to read your books in my native language.

            In this instance, I can not find your publisher’s explanation sincere…
            There are hundreds of publishings, more inconvenient than yours in the country.

            Hope I didn’t displease you with my messages but believe me I want everything to be crystal clear in the light of the facts and you will find another publisher who can be more efficient.

            Have a good day.

  7. Chad says:
    September 21, 2013 at 6:47 pm

    I would like to broaden this discussion somewhat if you allow me, just to wonder. Going back to the book, which I have already read and immensely enjoyed, I see Lesley really writing beautifully about the main character, generally in a positive light as a good husband and father, a teacher and inspiration, and most importantly a human. I think there is definitely a problem in anyone who will focus on specific sentences or words or events to initiate violence or problems in their country (be it Turkey or elsewhere).

    As children growing up, we learn about many myths and imaginary people (Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, Sandman, Boogie man, Superman, monsters in the closet, etc.). These mythical characters are always classified as either good or bad. For the simple mind of a child, these tools help guide them to understand what is right and wrong. But as adults we know (or should know) that life is more complicated than that. Humans are capable of good and evil.

    What saddens me is that religions have used the stories and biographies of their leaders/ prophets and have had to inevitably edit some stories to cast them as pure good men that never make a mistake. Or glorify them to god-equivalent. Now we have grown adult men who still look at the world through the lens of a child and good vs evil as if people are an extension of the cartoon characters they watch on TV. and of course what THEY believe in is “good” and everyone else (including the person pointing out a different side to their prophet) is “evil”. Such a childish rhetoric and idea that only increases the amount of hate in the world and totally ignored the whole idea behind “the invention of religions” which is raising humanity to a higher level of love and understanding. When we view these prophets or leaders for what they are: people just like all of us who saw a way to make people better and life better and took it, regardless whether they made mistakes in their life too, I believe it makes us respect them more.

    I think it is pointless to pull up other sources of history to argue against Lesley’s ideas in the book and try to say anything in the book is not accurate. This is not the point, it’s not a history book to be taught in schools. It is a book that presents a viewpoint with which you may or may not agree. The point is to humanize a prophet who was before everything else human, before being a Muslim, Jew, Christian, Buddhist, Atheist, Agnostic. Gnostic Agnostic or whatever. and reflecting off of that, that we are all HUMAN FIRST.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 22, 2013 at 1:31 pm

      Well put, Chad. And totally agree re this idea of perfection — and perfectability — which seems to me inhuman. That is, it denies humanity. And thus dehumanizes both ourselves and others.

  8. Ross says:
    September 21, 2013 at 6:59 pm

    That last sentence in the Marmara report must have hurt: We have plenty of approved books on the subject already, we don’t need another one (if I interpret it correctly)

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 22, 2013 at 1:18 pm

      Not hurtful, more kind of exasperating. Note the phrase “approved books,” the question of course being by whom.

  9. HUGH MCCAULEY says:
    September 21, 2013 at 8:05 pm

    I’m not surprised but really sad about your post. As an old grad. student of Oriental Studies at U of P from the 1960s & ’70s it makes me weep to realize how things have gone so wrong, from bad to worse. Islam has become combative all over the world, not submissive to their Allah. Peace and reason seems out of reach when stubborn Holy War is preached by influential Imams and the ignorant faithful believe that the West is the Devil, worthy only to be killed and killed. Mohamed (BPUH), they say, was arguably just a simple man.

    Unlike Jesus, who sacrificed himself, Mohamed was not executed on a cross. The Prophet, died peacefully in his own bed and was buried under it. Who are now, since the 1970s, mounting Jihad everywhere? Fearful times, eh? Muslims, by and large, see you as a Jew and a Western Atheist, hated. Be brave, tell your story — until they come to get you.

    ________________________________

    • fatmakalkan says:
      September 22, 2013 at 8:46 am

      Hugh, certainly there are extremist that very ignorant about Islam yet can attract group of ignorant people and send them to kill. But view of Islam : if anybody kills one innocent person he will be punished as if He killed all human beings on the face of the earth! This is from Quran. Terrorist can NOT BE MUSLIM , Muslim Can NOT BE TERRORIST!
      But west ignite this terrible problem and fueled many many years by unfair foreign policies agains Muslims under occupation by non- Muslims commited atrocities in those lands. Than this sick mined persons became enemy of west and prayed on ignorant young adults turn them in to killing machines. We are in this mess as whole world. I hate to be in this situation as a devout Muslim. For many years western media saw this as a opportunity to mock Islam. They always said ‘Muslim terrorist” . They brain wash people putting Muslim term by Terrorsist. Why they did not call IRA As A Christian Terrorist for example? Muslims all over the world are very very sad about whole stuaition.

      • Chad says:
        September 22, 2013 at 9:41 am

        Fatma, i’ve got to agree with Hugh’s assessment. While the killing and terrorism happening seems to go against your interpretation of Islam, please DO NOT blame the west and/or other religions for this. The evolution of Islam over time, unfortunately has taken a more violent turn with ignorant religious teachers. As we speak, messages of hatred and classifying the other as evil are happening everywhere from ultra-religious people of all religions.

        A truly perfect religion from a perfect godly figure would be perfect enough not to allow these atrocities to be done in its name. It wouldnt allow god’s words to be twisted and misinterpreted in 1000 different ways. That goes for Islam and Christianity too. Alas, we reach a conclusion that just like everything humans make, just like humans themselves, these (man made) religions are far from perfect. I feel that Fatma’s defensive stance only proves my point of how religion makes us cast ourselves as good and the other as evil.

        • Lesley Hazleton says:
          September 22, 2013 at 1:35 pm

          Oh Chad — “a truly perfect religion”? But what did you just say (and I agree with) in your previous comment?! Religions, as you say, are human constructs, and while intended to bring out the best in us, they can also bring out the worst. Should we then blame the religion itself? Or should we acknowledge the multiple factors that go into religiously inspired extremism, as Fatma argues?

          • Chad says:
            September 22, 2013 at 2:54 pm

            I stand by the previous idea of religions being imperfect but intended to bring out the best in us, which you agree with. And I acknowledge the wide variety of factors leading to extremism. Thats exactly why I dont’ accept Fatma’s blaming “the West” for what we are seeing. My argument with Fatma is that I would have preferred to see acknowledgement of these imperfections in our Islam before we blame the West and other religions and people for our struggles. But if someone views their religion as perfect and ignores the issues, they start blaming the others. But they cant accept that there are imperfections when they believe it is all from god. I wonder if Fatma could accept viewing Islam as anything but perfect.

            Herein lies the problem, Lesley. Sure, like you replied to Fatma, the vast majority of Muslims refuse terrorists and their acts. But the vast majority will refuse to accept that what they believe in is something imperfect and that religion did plant seeds of hatred. That’s why you being non-devout Jewish makes you able to look at things in perspective. While a devout Muslim, Christian or Jew will be stuck in the mindset of “We are the good true believers and the rest of the people are evil doers out to hurt us”. And as a cause for that, there is some blame to go towards the religions themselves who present themselves in this light of perfection and plant seeds of hatred towards others. and these seeds of hatred grow in different directions, and one will be extremism and terror. It’s complicated…..

          • Lesley Hazleton says:
            September 23, 2013 at 9:28 am

            I think we’re in danger of over-generalizing when we talk about religion in the singular. No religion is monolithic. There is no single Islam, no single Judaism, no Christianity. Each is made up of many streams/denominations/traditions/sects, so that it would really be more appropriate to think in plural terms — that is, to talk about Islams, Judaisms, Christianities. For instance, contemplative Jews, Muslims, and Christians have far more in common with each other than with the hard-core dogmatists of their “own” faiths.
            The larger questions here are deep and fascinating:
            — Why do we need to be convinced of perfection?
            — Why do we insist on rationalizing faith?
            — Why are we so intolerant of our own doubts and our own imperfectability?
            I find it fascinating that the image of the perfect world — Eden — is one that depends on NOT eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge. And I’d argue that in that foundational story, humanity began not with the creation of Adam and Eve’s physical being, but with that first bite of the apple, which was the birth of consciousness.

      • Lesley Hazleton says:
        September 22, 2013 at 1:42 pm

        Fatma, you express in that one sentence — “I hate to be in this situation as a devout Muslim” — what I know the vast majority of Muslims the world over feel. (And that one sentence also expresses how I feel, as a non-devout Jew, about Israel.)
        As for the role of the West, yes, I think we’re still stuck in the backlash of 19th and 20th century colonialism, all of us still paying for that mind-numbing arrogance.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 22, 2013 at 1:23 pm

      Perhaps something of an over-reaction, Hugh? I assure you nobody’s coming to “get me”.

      • fatmakalkan says:
        September 22, 2013 at 4:02 pm

        Thank you Lesley. You do understand me.
        Dear Chad,
        We are human being and we are not perfect just opposite we have many imperfections. Islam is perfect but Muslims are not perfect. Every Human being has given intelligence to chose right or wrong. Belief or disbelief. No one has a right to judge each other. We can not say all believers are good non believers bad or opposite. I do not know you how can I say that you are a bad person because you don’t believe in God. Being Bad or Being Good has nothing to do with our religions or nationality or race. It has everything to do how we choose to behave towards other people or animals. One can be an atheist and yet very good person. Or one can be Muslim yet very bad person. I don’t have a right to judge others how can I while I have many shortcomings .
        When we oppress people and make them suffer treat them unjustly they will start rebelling if this continuous decades some of the people who are oppressed goes over the board and transgresses the limits becomes Terrorist. I am not blaming just western politicians I am also blaming terrorist for being ignorant and violent people. Education is the key issue. If we educate people more they will not transgress the limits. Biggest problem we are facing at Muslim world is ignorance. First of all about our own religion Islam.

        • fatmakalkan says:
          September 22, 2013 at 4:14 pm

          instead of Bushes being President if Al Gore was president I believe we were not going to have terrorism for example. Clinton and Obama as Presidents handled Middle East much better in my opinion.

  10. Chad says:
    September 22, 2013 at 6:16 pm

    Mrs. Fatma,

    I agree of course with what you say that someone’s religious beliefs don’t tell u whether they are “good” or “bad” people. But again, when someone says “Islam is perfect” or “Christianity is perfect” etc. that is automatically judging other’s people’s beliefs right off the bat. And again, if it was perfect, it would not have allowed this misinterpretation of religious texts to allow even this small percentage of people to become killers. You’ve blamed the West and blamed the terrorists too, but you absolve religion from any responsibility and that is where we disagree.

    Do you hear of the prophecies about the “end of days” on earth that different religions have? Do you know that most devout religious people believe in them? And that they involve people killing people of other religions to prove “righteousness” in the end? How ironic. Do you not see that killings and crimes that take place in the name of religion scar the religion itself? And what are current muslim scholars doing to counteract these acts of crime and terror that occur in religion’s name? Are they trying to spread the word of love and forgiveness towards all mankind and religions? I don’t think so. They continue to talk negatively about people of other religions in their sermons every week in every small and big town. I understand the way you have reconciled the ugliness out there with your belief that religion is perfect by finding other things to blame the ugliness on, I used to do that too when I was young. But, humanizing the religion and its source can be very liberating and allows a better perspective on life and the world.

    Your thoughts about Turkish governments in the past being anti-religion may be accurate. And the current Turkish government may be truly “secular” in the true sense of the word through separation of mosque and state, WITHOUT becoming anti-religion. But, I think it is generally agreed upon among most muslims and muslim scholars that they believe Islam is a way of life for them that governs everything they do including politics and government. Which goes against separation of religion and state. And that is not necessarily a knock on Islam. Devout Christians and Jews probably also believe that religion should be a big part of the political system that rules them.

    Interested to hear Fatma and Lesley’s thoughts on these points….

    • fatmakalkan says:
      September 22, 2013 at 9:33 pm

      Dear Chad, at Quran God says that: “today I perfected your religion for you. ” since I am a Muslim I believe my creator perfected my religion for me. That’s all I am saying. I am not saying any other thing. I can not choose some verses to believe some verses not to believe, in Quran. I have to believe all the verses in the Quran. That does not mean I am blaming you anyway.
      In my country you can not find any imam perching in their sermons hate against any other religion they concentrate about on muslim behavior and essentials of faith and worship and they condemn terrorist in every occasion. Have you heard Fethullah Gulan ? He is Turkish scholar lives at US and he always teaches tolerance, harmony and dialog and tries everything to stop terrorist.
      Yes religion encompasses all aspects of our lives but Islam is not against democracy. Quran teaches us to consult before giving decision at the family or at the government. In Turkey we have lived side by side since thousands years Jews, Christians and Muslims in peace and respect. We still do. Under the Ottoman Muslim Empire non Muslims were protected on religious rights and any other human rights issues. Today we have secular republic and nothing chanced. We live in harmony. We are building at Houston a synagog, a church and a mosque in the same “Peace Garden” to show everyone how Turkish citizens lives at Turkey.
      At you tube there is a song by Mahsun kirmizigül demonstrates this harmony. Please check it out. Name of the song “Bizden degildir” it means “who ever discriminates, tyrants, liars are not from us” as I said at the past for 600 years we had Islamic law now secularism we are equals as citizens of Turkey.

      • fatmakalkan says:
        September 22, 2013 at 9:49 pm

        I am not blaming Gods religion for any violence because 10 commandments are same in all Abrahamic religions: it says “Do Not Kill!” Murderers are humans against God will. They dis obey God and they will be punish greatly by God in this world and hereafter.

      • Chad says:
        September 23, 2013 at 12:16 am

        Fatma,
        As someone whose native tongue is Arabic, I have to say that the verse you refer to translates differently.

        اليوم اتممت لكم دينكم

        It means: today i’ve completed/concluded your religion for you. Shouldnt translate to perfected. It was one of the last if not the last verse to come in before muhammad’s death.

        But you do not need to turn defensive. Regardless how this translates, if u believe it is directly from god then u surely think its perfect. Thats your choice. But then I threw several questions your way pointing to religious imperfections and hate that you chose not to address.

        You claim that in Turkey, no preachers preach hate. I cant claim to know preachers in Turkey. But I am sure the secular government is involved in controlling the preached message. I assure you that even if your claim is true, this is not the case in the vast majority of muslim countries. In most places, sermon carries quite sone hate. About as much hate as in a Pat Robertson talk. Problem is you wouldnt even know because in most places, women dont go to the Friday prayer and sermon with the men. So sure, maybe you are right about Turkey, I have not witnessed this directly, but Turkey is not the norm.

        In terms of government, please do not try to convince me that islamic rule and government is democracy. Consulting people about big decisions or gaving a shura council is not the same as true democracy. Please check back with Saudi and Iran for the latest ideas of how political Islam is. Turkish democracy that you so enjoy is not islam based.

        You also defend islam using examples from Turkey. I think you are still in the mode of trying to defend both based on the original discussion about Turkey’s ruling party. My critique is towards Islam as the average person and country lives it. Turkey is definitely more progressive and may have less hate preaching but only because the secular government has historically controlled it. Funny that the scholar you named who has inclusive and humane ideals actually lives in USA not Turkey. And the mosque/church/synagogue combo is in USA too. I dont think such an inclusive building of worship would be accepted in any muslim country.

        Again, you did not address my specific questions about hate in religion, you only went back to saying religion shouldnt be blamed. Bringing up that the 10 commandments said not to kill. But killing in the name of god and religion has been going on for centuries. The best reason not to kill, or steal, or lie, is because its wrong from a humane standpoint. Not because religion told us so.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 23, 2013 at 9:53 am

      I think perhaps the basic principle here is that real freedom of religion entails the freedom to choose, which in turn entails not curtailing other people’s freedom of religion (or non-religion).
      The thing is that we tend to think of religion solely as a matter of belief. But I think it’s far more than that. It’s also a matter of identity, of loyalty to tradition and family, a framework within which one lives one’s life. It provides the narrative of one’s life, as it were. Which means that religious difference is all too easily seen as an attack not only on belief, but on one’s very identity.
      At its most simplistic, and thus its most ugly, religious righteousness (I am right/you are wrong) can be manipulated for political purposes, especially when civic government is weak. Thus the ongoing carnage in Iraq and Syria and Pakistan, in Nigeria and Somalia, where the sense of citizenship is fragile, fractured into sectarian affiliation.

  11. Nasir Khanzada says:
    September 23, 2013 at 1:49 am

    ‘The Marmara University comments’ must have come as a surprise to many liberals, seculars, agnostics and accidental theologists, gays and atheists who thougth that Turley is secular, anti Arabs, pro western, Latin script, etc. where headscarf, beards, Adan and all things Islamic are banned. Lo and behold! Turkey is still Islamic to the core as its people always were and opposed to the Anatolian ‘Young Turks’ who are today fading away.

    • Chad says:
      September 23, 2013 at 3:07 pm

      Mr. Nasir, it seems you didnt read all the interesting comments. Turkey is still secular. Its just not anti-islam anymore.

  12. Seabell says:
    September 25, 2013 at 9:39 am

    Lesley,
    I find the political climate a bit edgy too but this is not a necessarily bad thing. I am happy with the more tolerant climate that Turkey has nowadays and most anti-whatever voices are not as loud as they used to be. I consider the last outburst in Gezi as growing pains. Protestors were anti – goverment without any specific subject but simply because they were tired of Erdogan and didnt have a political outlet to be represented. Erdogal really doesnt have his match in the political arena yet.
    I wish they had translated the book in Turkish. I have read “Muhammad” by Martin Lings in Turkish maybe 20 years ago and it is still to this day my favourite among all of the same subject.( I havent read “The First Muslim” yet but ordered online, so this may change :). That book did depict Mohammad as a human as one of us and it was that aspect of it that I liked most about the book and my religion as well. I remember some of my friends liking it and some not.

    I am afraid the report is the product of a very coutious publisher. Is it possible to try another?

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 25, 2013 at 4:00 pm

      That’s up to the American publishers, who own world rights, but we’ll see what happens.

  13. TURKEY ELECTIONS JUNE 2014 says:
    September 25, 2013 at 11:41 am

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  15. milons says:
    September 26, 2013 at 1:02 pm

    The conversations on this thread are starting to sound like this:
    http://youtu.be/gb_qHP7VaZE

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 30, 2013 at 11:12 am

      My favorite Python movie!

“Why would you write a book?”

Posted August 2nd, 2013 by Lesley Hazleton

“You’re a Muslim, so why would you write a book about the founder of Christianity?”

That’s how Fox News’ Lauren Green began her challenge to Reza Aslan’s right to write about Jesus.  The video of her interview with him instantly went viral (in fact, several accidental theologists sent it on to me — thank you!).  It inspired several spoofs, including this one here.  Aslan’s book, Zealot (my San Francisco Chronicle review of it here) was already #2 on the Amazon bestseller list;  by the next morning, it was #1.

“Gotcha, J. K. Rowling!” Aslan responded.

But aside from the small detail that Christianity was founded by Paul, not Jesus, Green’s question may not be such a terrible one after all.

'Zealot'The First Muslim - CoverI’ve been there, and often still am — from the other side, as it were.  The first time conservative Muslims asked why I’d decided to write a biography of Muhammad, I spluttered in amazement: “But you don’t think he’s worth writing about?  This man who carved such a huge profile in history?  He’s your prophet, how can you even ask?”

It quickly became clear that this was not a sufficient answer, and that the question was not about my decision as a writer.  It was about my decision as a Jew.  Just as Green focused on Aslan’s Muslimness and assumed that his real agenda was to attack Christianity, so certain conservative Muslims focused on my Jewishness and assumed that my real agenda must have been to attack Islam.

Let’s get one thing straight right away:  just as many mainstream Christians have welcomed Aslan’s book, so many mainstream Muslims have welcomed mine.  It’s the conservatives we’re talking about here, those who cannot tolerate any deviance from received orthodoxy.

In the context of Fox’s Islamophobic politics on the one hand, and of the Israel-Palestine conflict on the other, perhaps such suspicion is inevitable.  But since Aslan’s book and mine both draw on scholarly resources but were written for general audiences, there’s another less obvious factor.  Most devout believers are unaware of the vast body of academic research on the early history of Christianity and Islam.  Used to hagiographic or devotional literature, they see any more dispassionate view of their revered figures as an assault on their belief.  Demanding perfection, they refuse to tolerate human imperfection.

But what if Green had interviewed Aslan not with the desire to criticize, but with the desire to know?  What if my conservative Muslim questioners had been more curious than judgmental?  Without such knee-jerk defensiveness, the question of what a non-Christian brings to the study of Jesus or a non-Muslim to that of Muhammad becomes an interesting one – a question, that is, about the value of the ‘outsider’ point of view.

Precisely because he or she does not come from a place of belief, what seems obvious to the insider is not at all so to the outsider.  It demands to be explored, to be understood on the multiple psychological, cultural, and political levels on which history takes place.  Done well, this process can create important new insights into otherwise received versions of history, opening up fresh ways of seeing and understanding, and finding new relevance in old stories.

As with Jesus, so with Muhammad:  by placing him in the world he experienced, in the full context of place and time, politics and culture – the ‘outsider’ biographer honors the man by honoring his lived experience.

Historical reality doesn’t detract from faith;  it humanizes it.  And when gross inhumanities are committed every day in the name of one faith or another, that alone should surely be more than enough reason to write.

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File under: agnosticism, Christianity, fundamentalism, Islam, Judaism | Tagged: Tags: 'Zealot', biography, Fox News, Islamophobia, outsider, Reza Aslan, The First Muslim, writing | 14 Comments
  1. mary scriver says:
    August 2, 2013 at 11:03 am

    The relevant term here is “fencing the Communion.” You know the little fence at the front of the church where you lean your elbows while waiting for the Elements to reach you? (Maybe not — ask a Catholic.) There was a huge early battle about who had to stay outside that railing and who was entitled to enter. Territoriality. Tribal. Strongest when the group is uneasy about its identity and afraid of dilution by outsiders. (Check the Mexican border. Heck, even the Canadian border.) Writing about American Indians without BEING American Indian is a mortal crime because it becomes harder and harder to define an American Indian.

    Prairie mary

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      August 2, 2013 at 11:13 am

      Great comment: territoriality is exactly the right word.

    • Mary Johnson (@_MaryJohnson) says:
      August 2, 2013 at 11:34 am

      Yes, Lesley you are SO right on here! And even if you’re a former believer, believers still automatically assume that a writer is out to, at best, criticize, at worst, completely demolish all they hold dear. People become so defensive that they can’t see that what a writer might really want to do is to explore, to understand, to express…..

      • Lesley Hazleton says:
        August 2, 2013 at 12:12 pm

        Yes, I saw it happening with you too, Mary. (For those who don’t know, Mary is a former nun who wrote a deeply moving memoir about her years with Mother Teresa and her decision to become secular: http://www.amazon.com/Unquenchable-Thirst-Memoir-Mary-Johnson/dp/0385527470/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1375470558&sr=1-1&keywords=mary+johnson)

  2. sharmin banu says:
    August 2, 2013 at 11:14 am

    Very well said:).
    Most devout believers are unaware of the vast body of academic research on the early history of Christianity and Islam. Used to hagiographic or devotional literature, they see any more dispassionate view of their revered figures as an assault on their belief. Demanding perfection, they refuse to tolerate human imperfection.

  3. Fakhra says:
    August 2, 2013 at 4:52 pm

    Reblogged this on TOAL.

  4. saheemwani says:
    August 2, 2013 at 6:57 pm

    The advantage of a writer who doesn’t share the ideas/beliefs of the subject, in your case a prophet whose life was centered exactly on those ideas/beliefs, is a much-needed unbiased perspective of what that man did.

    The disadvantage could be not understanding the subject himself and missing out on the essence of why he did what he did.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      August 2, 2013 at 7:29 pm

      True, but understanding is on whose terms? Part of what I mean by “an agnostic eye” (in the banner of this blog) is an independent one.

  5. fatmakalkan says:
    August 3, 2013 at 11:37 pm

    I agree with you as a devout Muslim. In many verses in Quran Allah wants human-beings to contemplate but human- beings are afraid to contemplate about their faith. Or they are lazy or they simply doesn’t care about religion. They are culturally Jew , Christian or Muslim. They prefer to follow their forefathers religion not their own. When they pickup Revised addition of Bible how come they don’t ask this question: who has a right to revise God’s word? They are def, they are blind and impaired to think. My ten year old daughter was asking me about popular Belief about Jesus being son of God or being God. She asked me: don’t Christians think that Jesus died 2000 years ago if God died 2000 years ago who is running universe?and If Jesus couldn’t save himself how he is going to save them ? Or don’t they think how come eternal God dies?
    Bible says God is one! Why they made him 3? She is also asking about Islam and She is developing her faith. Contemplating is the key. Who doesn’t contemplate doesn’t have real faith they copy others faith.

  6. Tea-mahm says:
    August 6, 2013 at 11:28 am

    Yes! Keep the word bridges safe to pass over… thank you, Lesley and Reza. T’m

  7. anon says:
    August 11, 2013 at 10:34 pm

    I don’t think Aslan was writing as a “Muslim”—though it may have effected his perspective. I havn’t read the book but from watching various interviews, Aslan, apparently, puts the illiterate Jewish carpenter from Nazareth into a historical context/time-period.
    However,the picture of Jesus (pbuh) in the Quran is a Jewish man who is intelligent, literate, a good communicator, exceptionally skilled, and highly spiritual.

  8. Luis Alexis Rodríguez Cruz says:
    August 24, 2013 at 8:30 pm

    Thank you for sharing your thoughts on the matter. I think that the reporter did not use an intellectual point of view to question Aslan. Anyways, conservatism and closed minds always try to overlap what it is true. Also I think that his book is an academic book such as yours, books for academics, for open minded people, for intellectual people who think critically. Negative comments will always exist…

  9. Farrukh says:
    August 25, 2013 at 7:20 am

    Hello Lesley,

    I just wanted to appreciate your statement:

    Historical reality doesn’t detract from faith; it humanizes it. And when gross inhumanities are committed every day in the name of one faith or another, that alone should surely be more than enough reason to write.

    I’ve just placed the order of your book, The First Muslim in India, it was very expensive, however, they have now priced it correctly. This shall be my third biography on Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be on him, which I’m going two read. The other two by Karen Armstrong and Safiur Rehman Mubarakpuri.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      August 25, 2013 at 8:31 pm

      Thank you, Farrukh. And re The First Muslim, the UK edition is due out November 7. Since India is part of the ‘UK and Commonwealth’ distribution system, it should then be easily available in bookstores.

7 Years, 600 Lashes

Posted July 31st, 2013 by Lesley Hazleton

Raif BadawiDon’t dare think in Saudi Arabia.

And don’t even dream of having an opinion.

This AP report is a pretty good indication of what would happen there to The Accidental Theologist:

The founder of a liberal Web site has been sentenced to seven years in prison and 600 lashes after angering Islamic authorities in Saudi Arabia, the newspaper Al Wattan reported Tuesday. The site created by Raif Badawi urged Saudis to share opinions about the role of religion in the country, which follows a strict form of Islam. According to Al Wattan, a judge in the Red Sea port of Jidda imposed the sentences but dropped charges of apostasy, which could have brought a death sentence.

Here’s an earlier report from Amnesty International on  his case:

Raif Badawi, founder of a website for political and social debate, “Saudi Arabian Liberals”, has been detained since 17 June 2012 in a prison in Briman, in Jeddah. He was charged with “setting up a website that undermines public security” and ridiculing Islamic religious figures. His trial began in June 2012 in the District Court in Jeddah, and was marred by irregularities. According to his lawyer, the original trial judge was replaced by a judge who had advocated that Raif Badawi be punished for “apostasy”. His lawyer contested the judge’s impartiality in the case.

The charges against Raif Badawi relate to a number of articles he has written, including one about Valentine’s Day – the celebration of which is prohibited in Saudi Arabia. He was accused of ridiculing Saudi Arabia’s Commission on the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (also known as the religious police) in the conclusion of his article. The charges against him also mention his failure to remove articles by other people on his website, including one insinuating that the al-Imam Mohamed ibn Saud University had become “a den for terrorists”. On 17 December, the District Court in Jeddah referred the case to the General Court in Jeddah, recommending that he should be tried for “apostasy”. On 22 December the General Court in Jeddah had Raif Badawi sign documents to enable his trial for “apostasy” to proceed.

On 21 January the General Court sent the case back to the District Court stating that they did not have jurisdiction to review his case and that they had found that he had not insulted Islam and therefore it did not amount to an “apostasy” charge. The general prosecutor however is still insisting that Raif Badawi be tried for apostasy. The case is currently before an appeal court to determine whether the case should be heard by the District Court in Jeddah or another tribunal, in particular the General Court in Jeddah, to which it was previously referred.

Amnesty International considers Raif Badawi to be a prisoner of conscience. Act now to call on the authorities for his immediate and unconditional release.

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File under: fundamentalism, Islam, Middle East | Tagged: Tags: 'Saudi Arabian Liberals' website, Amnesty International, Raif Badawi, Saudi Arabia | 7 Comments
  1. mary scriver says:
    July 31, 2013 at 9:14 am

    It is likely that 600 lashes WILL amount to a death sentence. The damage is equivalent to a third degree burn.

    Prairie Mary

    • zummard. says:
      July 31, 2013 at 9:45 am

      I would phrase it differently as to your words ‘ follow strict form of Islam’ to a ‘twisted’ form of Islam. I believe one would find even more ridiculous reasons for having put people in prisons if one did some investigation about Saudi jails.
      I am not sure what makes me more mad; the hypocrisy of western democracies for their tacit approval of their puppets’ disregard of human rights, or people not standing up for themselves in those countries. Something’s got to change in the world. It is coming……albeit slowly.

      • Lesley Hazleton says:
        July 31, 2013 at 10:03 am

        Not my words, by the way — the AP’s words.

  2. danielabdalhayymoore says:
    July 31, 2013 at 10:31 am

    Re: “follow strict form of Islam”: Thank you, Lesley, for clarifying the source (with which you introduce the excerpt). Sad, though, the AP would continue to make this mistake… like saying that the Snake Handler Cult is mainstream Christianity, or any other extreme and really idealogue versions of that revelatory Way.

    As for Saudis… well, they’re bent on destroying Islam really, tearing Mecca apart, erecting an obscene clock tower to diminish the Holy Kaaba, exporting a fearful religion narrowed to an astonishing degree (that sadly too many accept as almost papal), and hollowing out the Prophet’s message and example, peace be upon him, though it in no way impinges on his blessed reality… and yes, those of us who express hearts and intellects freely are always endangered by totalitarianism.

    Please check out
    http://www.ecstaticxchange.com

  3. Professor Do Right says:
    July 31, 2013 at 10:46 am

    generalizing statement such as

    “what happens when you want to think in #SaudiArabia” are not helpful

    as just as this mans blog may of been taken out of context, so can a statement like this.

    im not sure to what the extent of the other articles,
    but valentines day and saudi arabia?

    its almost like Mars and Oxygen

    maybe but be rational.

    im neither agreeing or disagreeing with the punishment on that matter but just yesterday i read this transcript about justice and judgementfrom the Qu’ran,
    a problem even Prophet David or King David was confronted with

    “But in this story, Dawūd ( عليه السلام rushed to judgment because he was taken by surprise. He rushed to judgment and passed a judgment immediately saying you’ve wronged your brother by asking him for that one sheep and immediately they disappeared and he realized, ‘I should not have rushed the judgment’. I should have calmed down first, understood the situation fully, asked both sides their opinion then I should’ve passed my verdict. The lesson I’m learning here is don’t rush to judgment. That’s what he made repentance for”

  4. anon says:
    July 31, 2013 at 9:51 pm

    It is true that in todays islamophobic climate, simplyfying Islam in order to scapegoat is not a good idea—Yet, what is wrong IS WRONG and there is nothing complicated about that……….Whether it is Assange, Manning , Snowden or Badawi—–Using false justifications (of whatever kind) to criminalize just intentions/actions is wrong.

  5. Casey says:
    August 5, 2013 at 3:57 pm

    Isn’t 600 lashes pretty much a death sentence? Can he really survive that? Very sad….

New: My TEDGlobal Talk — Video

Posted June 24th, 2013 by Lesley Hazleton

The talk I gave at TEDGlobal twelve days ago just went live!

Here it is — on Muhammad, the relationship between faith and doubt, and the travesty of fundamentalism:

Anything you can do to forward/repost/facebook/tweet/email/tumble/reddit/generally-spread-the-word will be wonderful.  Let’s stop being the far-too-silent majority!

Shortcut url is http://on.ted.com/Hazleton

————————————————–

[In case you missed it, my earlier TEDx talk on reading the Quran is here.]

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File under: agnosticism, Christianity, existence, fundamentalism, Islam, Judaism, Middle East, TED TALKS | Tagged: Tags: doubt, faith, Hazleton talk, Muhammad, TEDGlobal 2013, The First Muslim | 26 Comments
  1. Meezan says:
    June 24, 2013 at 10:35 pm

    Arguably the most emotional speech of yours. I am not afraid to admit that some man-tears were shed here (“blood – — – brothers, steeped in other people’s blood”, goosebumps). Brilliant as always. I must admit I always thought of faith as a non-questioning, always believing blindly and following orders kind of attitude. This has brought a new perspective on things; I am thankful to you for that.

    I have taken up the task of translating all of your ted speeches into Urdu. Time to wipe the dust off of my dictionaries. Fecundity. . . . . hmmmm.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      June 25, 2013 at 7:20 am

      Those man-tears especially appreciated, Meezan. Am both delighted and grateful that you’ve taken on the task of Urdu translation. Deep thanks. — L. (and feel free to email me if you have any questions re translation)

  2. Saheem says:
    June 25, 2013 at 4:01 pm

    Dear Lesley

    Thank you for your words. You never fail to impress by what you say and how you say it. Like its predecessors, this talk was deeply inspiring and informative. And it made perfect sense.

    It totally resonated with me – a Muslim believer. Till sometime back I used to think ‘I know’, then one day I dared to doubt. I started asking questions. From – ‘Is there a God?’ to ‘What is the whole purpose of this life?’

    After many sleeplesss nights, I got a few answers, all pointing in one direction. That there is so much to learn and a long way to go. And I would never have started on this journey towards truth had I not doubted.

    I’m no longer afraid to doubt. The basis of true belief lies in true doubt.

    Saheem

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      June 25, 2013 at 5:48 pm

      Reminds me of this from Robert Frost’s poem “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening’: “The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep.”

  3. ZubinNur says:
    June 26, 2013 at 12:29 am

    Thank you so much Lesley for your work, for the inspiration you share. I hope and trust many will watch your video and feel more hope, more peace… or basically just be able to hold the space. We all do our thing. THANK YOU.

  4. annie minton says:
    June 26, 2013 at 2:28 am

    fabulous and thought provoking. Many thanks

  5. Joseph L. Puente says:
    June 26, 2013 at 12:54 pm

    Thank you for a wonderful talk. I found that it gelled quite well with an essay I wrote on my own blog and I would like to share it here: http://flippinutahmormons.blogspot.com/2011/09/on-doubt-skepticism-and-faith.html

  6. jeancallioux says:
    June 27, 2013 at 7:02 am

    I was both impressed and enlighted by your TED talk. Which brought me on the idea to translate it in Dutch (I am from the Netherlands), because it would make me understand your well-chosen words better. Also the video on Ted.com could/might be subtitled for Dutch viewers. Would you mind? And if not, do you have a text-version of your talk I could obtain?

    Yours sincerely, Jurgen

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      June 27, 2013 at 8:54 am

      Hi Jurgen, and thank you! Translations are done through TED’s all-volunteer Open Translation Project (http://www.ted.com/OpenTranslationProject). I know someone is already at work translating this talk into Dutch, but with so many talks coming out all the time, am sure TED would love to have you on board. — L.
      (A link to the English transcription of this talk is already online on the video page.)

  7. Guy de la Rupelle says:
    June 28, 2013 at 5:10 am

    P.S. I forgot to add what one person wisely said, that faith and doubt are the two sides of the same religious experience.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      June 28, 2013 at 11:16 am

      Ah, but you did say it — in your own way.

  8. irfan says:
    June 28, 2013 at 9:56 pm

    Thanks Lesley for such a beautiful speech, whenever I am watching your videos there is an experience of new learning…I know everything mentality is an arrogant mentality which closes the doors of new learning experiences in the life.

  9. nuzhat fakih says:
    June 29, 2013 at 8:11 am

    hi lesley,
    after hearing you on Ted, I stand by my verdict in the reply to your previous post, that you deserve to remain in the cloud……
    ‘doubt’ vis a vis ‘faith’ may be open to a subjective response, but the last part of the talk, as per Muhammad’s reaction to the present day scenario in the Islamic world, and the attitude of his followers is spot on…i have been trying to convince this viewpoint to whoever is ready to talk on this topic in the circle I interact with.
    thanks for reafffirming my faith in this context.
    nuzhat.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      June 29, 2013 at 8:48 am

      Thank you Nuzhat! “We love you in any state of gravity,” you wrote as I wondered how I was going to get my feet back to earth again, and I broke into a huge smile at that. It’s my privilege to help open up the conversation. — L.

  10. Nuzhat fakih says:
    June 30, 2013 at 3:59 am

    One more thought….for people who took offence to your word on the prophet’s “doubt” at the first instant of revelation…. I would say that this reaction conformed to his inbuilt nature of being humble. He did not take pride in being the chosen one, (and never did all his life),
    but in all humility needed reassurance at that point, of having been given that responsibility. Can anyone just accept prophethood one fine day, even when it was thrust upon him and that too without any aspiration for the same?
    I could plead with my community on so many issues to be understood in their right spirit, Lesley. People like you and me can scream ourselves hoarse. Thanks for your commitment though.
    Nuzhat.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      June 30, 2013 at 9:07 am

      Thanks, Nuzhat, but let’s not go hoarse! Isn’t it the gentleness of doubt that we value, as opposed to the violence of conviction?

  11. Nuzhat fakih says:
    June 30, 2013 at 7:37 pm

    True…..wish others could understand the human aspect of the prophet. Reverance would be more natural than ingrained.
    At this point I will share a secret…..a few years ago, standing at his tomb in Medina, prayers eluded me for a while, as his entire life story played in my mind. I could only have a silent conversation with him, telling him I wished I could have been present then, to have helped him in whatever way,etc…..that was my way of connection!

    Sorry, I think I’m beginning a Tarzan/Jane-Jew! relation with you….
    Love it and you….
    Nuzhat.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      July 1, 2013 at 1:21 pm

      Beyond prayer… Yes. Thank you, Nuzhat.

  12. Yusra Zainab says:
    July 6, 2013 at 5:04 am

    Hi Lesley,

    I am a muslim business student from Pakistan and your talk is very impressive. There is a lot that I agree with you on especially on the point that how one can never claim to be all-knowing and righteous. Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon Him) always displayed humility and modesty. However, what seems questionable to me is the idea that Prophet Muhammad’s complete life and struggle in Islam was based on doubt. At the time of revelation, it was indeed fear and maybe doubt also that overwhelmed him. But later, with more revelations from God and at the point when he had to take major decisions, reform society, act as advocate of social and economic justice, propagate the message of Islam, he had complete conviction on the existence of God and on the revelations being the truth. There couldnt be any room for doubt or else, he might not even have taken those steps which he actually did. However,I also agree that faith is incomplete without doubt. For the courageous steps that he took, faith and doubt had to go hand in hand. But the doubt that remained with the prophet for his life which made him humble in his ways and for which Quran tells him not to despair was not the the doubt on the existence of the God but was doubt with regards to his own and his follower’s abilities, and if he had done his best in reforming the society, and if he had conveyed the message in rightful way. This was the doubt that made him alive, made him to give his best, be humble, continue his struggle, and ultimately have faith. This is according to my understanding of the religion but Allah knows best. It would be nice to hear your views on it. Thank you.

    Yusra Zainab.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      July 6, 2013 at 10:09 am

      I can only speak for my understanding of Muhammad — not as a believer, but as a human being. You’ve expressed the believer’s understanding very well — indeed, beautifully — and I thank you for what I read as a bridge between where I am and where you are. (I love the phrase “Allah knows best,” which comes up repeatedly in the early Islamic sources, because it acknowledges that humans beings often disagree, that there are limits to our knowledge, and that none of us can justifiably claim absolute “right.”)

  13. Nuzhat fakih says:
    July 7, 2013 at 3:58 am

    Yusra…..I suggest you read Muhammad Asad’s views on doubt being integral to ‘enhance’ and reiterate faith, in his interpretation of Sahih Bukhari, section 2, (the book of faith).
    He confirms that it (having doubts) held true for the prophet too, from the very word go…… As fellow Muslims we understand the prophetic mission carried out with sincerity and integrity, in its own religious context. As you also pointed out, his doubts were in true humility.

    But this talk, actually awakens us to the very Islamic philosophy of ‘exerting’ ourselves to the utmost, by questioning, to enable our spiritual upliftment.
    Faith (iman) need never be shaken by right enquiry, nor can it make you a lesser believer. Or else itjtihad would not be permitted to us.
    sharing my viewpoint, is the intention here.
    Nuzhat.

  14. Yusra Zainab says:
    July 7, 2013 at 12:38 pm

    Thanks Lesley for your views.

    Thank you Nuzhat for the reading suggestion. I will InshaaAllah try my best to go through them. I completely understand the importance of doubt in enhancing one’s faith and do not deny to that fact. My own journey to understand and then form belief on the teachings of Islam, Allah Almighty and Prophet Muhammad has been driven by continuous questioning, pondering and going through the scriptures and various articles that I could get hold of. Also, in my opinion, I don’t think one can be called a true believer until one has at least once questioned one’s beliefs, driven into details, tried to find more, and undergone the struggle to find the answers to the important questions. Or else, it would have been too easy to call oneself a believer. But from my experience and understanding, constant questioning often leads one to become more firm on what one holds as his/her beliefs as they (the beliefs) are now tested, and then accepted. It is at this stage when what one believes begins to impact his/her behaviour, actions, and objectives. The prophet too, I believed, reached that stage during his prophet hood and that is when, acting on his firm belief on the existence of God, he reformed the society. We know from the Islamic history about the incidence of Miraaj, and how prophet asked his followers and people to believe on it. How could one preach a message with extreme determination, bearing all atrocities and hard times, when one himself is in doubt about it? Especially, if we observe how specific Islamic teachings are about the basic tenants of belief. Thus, he believed with certainty that which he preached. However, it is not that his struggle was free from all doubts, fear and uncertainties. He often used to be concerned about his Ummah and faced doubts and Allah tells him not to despair. This is when he displays faith on Allah. He also indicated uncertainty over the fulfilment of his duty of conveying the message when Allah in the Quran assures him. Thus, I agree with you that having doubts held true for the prophet too but this wasn’t doubt on the belief of the existence of God or the message of the revelations but rather of a little different nature as elaborated above.

    The Quran also takes both the sides. At one point in Quran, Allah asks people to reflect upon and ponder over the Quran. In another Surah, Surah Hujjurat, chapter 49, verse 15, Allah says, ” The believers are only the ones who have believed in Allah and His Messenger and then doubt not but strive with their properties and their lives in the cause of Allah . It is those who are the truthful.”

    I will InshaaAllah try to go through the readings you have recommended and it maybe that my views are not right and there may be much more to it. But, I have only shared what my understanding has been till now from what I have read and experienced. May Allah guide us. I completely agree with what Lesley has pointed that there could be different understandings and interpretation from the life of the prophet(peace be upon him) himself. I appreciate her intense research and the talk. It has definitely given me some food for thought.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      July 7, 2013 at 1:51 pm

      Yusra — to me it’s not a matter of “being right” or “correct” (or “wrong” or “incorrect”). To me it’s an exploration — an attempt to see things in more depth and complexity, and thus in more richness, which I know you’ll agree is one of the great privileges of thought.

  15. ramio1983 says:
    July 27, 2013 at 7:44 am

    Lesley so well presented, you are wonderful at what you do. Yes indeed, Mohammed is one who is far more relatable than any other Prophet of the past and i feel the main reason for that was his human reaction to Prophethood. The fear, the doubt and the burden of which rested on his shoulders showed on his face, from the time he cried to his wife Khadija “Cover me” to the time he wept as he walked away bloodied from being stoned at Ta’if. We come to see a man who did what he could to change and shape his society, for the better- at least from the perspective of an upcoming and final messenger and the bitter reality of the world around us is still witnessed today to the ever so resentful responses to Mohammed and his prophethood, his test of faith came knowing that he completed his message and died at rest, releasing this burden and sighing in relief to meet his planner.

    Peace Lesley, i love what you do. From a fellow author, poet and Muslim/Human, Ramey.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      July 27, 2013 at 8:44 am

      Thank you Ramey. A poet indeed.
      Peace be upon us all. — L.

  16. Why Go Public With Your [Dis] Belief | halalrepublic says:
    October 2, 2013 at 10:59 am

    […] classifying one as either (theist or atheist) is rather childish and we should be committed to doubt by falling on neither side. But in my country, you do not have the luxury to sit on the fence: everything you do, how you live […]

Bloody-Minded, Bloody-Handed

Posted May 22nd, 2013 by Lesley Hazleton

I just now saw the cellphone video of one of the killers in Woolwich. It is pure barbarism. And all the more weirdly so for taking place on a busy London street, in front of passers-by, just a few yards from a school.

woolwichBlood all over his hands, and all over the cleaver and the knife he’s so casually brandishing. None of the distance of guns here, let alone drones. No attempt to hide, or to flee. Instead, a rant into the camera “justifying” what he and his friend have just done: run down a man and then hacked him to death. In the name, good god, of God.

I’ll get to that in a moment, but first, what strikes me is the way this man exults over what he’s done. He’s pacing back and forth like an animal after a kill, like a predator — a lion, say, or even a “domestic” cat when it catches a bat — proud of what he’s done, showing off, all but beating his chest.

And guarding his kill, keeping everyone away from “it.”  “No man comes near this body,” witnesses report his friend saying, but you can see a woman calling them on that, then bending down to try to help the victim, then standing up to challenge them over what they’ve done.  That’s courage.

As for the so-called quote from the Quran, he’s in fact in direct opposition to it.  Sura 5, verse 45, specifically states that an eye for an eye and a tooth for tooth no longer applies. It says that “previously” — in the Torah — “we ordained an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” (see Exodus 21:24) but now, it continues, “if anyone freely forgoes this right, it shall count as an act of expiation for him.”

No expiation for these two men. They are vicious murderers, pure and simple. Nothing more, and nothing less.

And that terrifying ignorance, that self-justifying righteousness, that pure bloody-minded and bloody-handed inhumanity, is the enemy of us all.

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File under: fundamentalism, Islam | Tagged: Tags: London, Quran, terrorism, video, Woolwich | 5 Comments
  1. Zarina Sarfraz says:
    May 22, 2013 at 6:24 pm

    expiation is not anywhere near,his mind is definitely clouded….is he on drugs? Myheartgoes out to the victim & relatives……it reminds me of the times of “bloody Mary” & the victimisation of RCs at that time!

  2. mufarsa says:
    May 23, 2013 at 2:25 am

    Brilliant. Well written and well said.

  3. tonosanchezreig says:
    May 23, 2013 at 4:26 pm

    Reblogged this on Al-Must'arib (the vocational Mossarab).

  4. Semir Nour says:
    May 25, 2013 at 4:07 am

    Well said, Lesley. I keenly follow you posts and I admire the angle from which you observe and analyse this sort of events. Undoubtedly, humanity is in a sad state of affairs. This chap and his friend, have committed a crime, a heinous one. They had confused ideas of Islam.

    The real sad thing about the state of humanity in this age, is the fact that the lives of innocent people have become nothing but a battle field for those sick-minded individuals (and government establishments) who seek to expand the scope of their territories at the expense of others rights, properties and lives (be it Muslims or non-Muslims). They have no regard to any sense of moralities, principles or faith.

    These two guys have been manipulated and confused by some sick individuals or so-called Islamic organizations. However there seems to be other parties who are trying to take advantage and maximize their gains from this events by stir up the public opinion against Islam and Muslims, perhaps, in order to pass some immigration law or justify some foreign policies.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      May 25, 2013 at 9:12 am

      There are always marginal ‘other parties’ trying to capitalize one way or another on incidents like this, either by denying them (“an-anti-Muslim conspiracy” kind of thing) or by mouthing off on the stale old Islam=terror meme. In fact what strikes me, so far, is the relative sanity of the general response. Mehdi Hasan, former political editor of The New Statesman and now political editor of Huffington Post UK, points to it in this piece published yesterday in the Telegraph (yes, the Telegraph!):
      http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/10076096/The-Muslim-faith-does-not-turn-men-to-terror.html

Pope Goes The Weasel

Posted March 1st, 2013 by Lesley Hazleton

That headline isn’t mine — it’s courtesy of Stephen Colbert, the Comedy Central host of The Colbert Report, and a practicing Catholic.  His word for Ratzinger/Benedict’s resignation: “popectomy.”

I find myself in the same bind as Colbert.  It seems like I should have all sorts of incredibly pertinent things to say about Ratzi’s helicoptering off into the twilight, but the papacy has become so impertinent that the only real question that concerns me is this:

What happens to the nifty red shoes?

redshoesPrada shoes, they say.  Ratzi’s favorites.  To be left behind as he he now declares himself just “a humble pilgrim.”  (Gagging sounds heard offstage.)

How humble?  Well, since he’s said he’ll live out his remaining days “hidden from the world,” I’m assuming he means “hidden” in the same sense as the Mahdi, the messiah figure of Shiism, who disappeared into a cave twelve centuries ago and who will return at the end of days.

Of course Ratzi has to give up the red shoes.  Who could hide in red shoes?

Especially since he has such a lot to hide from.

What’s really puzzling is that anyone still takes the papacy seriously.  The media are hyping up the election of a new pope for obvious reasons.  Men in fancy dress, an electoral race, cloaked ambition, secret balloting, colored smoke — it all makes for good theater.  The fact that so many of those involved in all this are deeply corrupt gives an extra thrill to it all.  Whether it’s actual pedophilia or “merely” covering it up;  closet homosexuality by public homophobes;  unveiled misogyny displayed in the inquisition of nuns;  plummeting numbers of priests unable to marry a woman, let alone a man;  and now, a secret report on a sex and blackmail scandal within the Vatican walls — how could the media resist such a totally sick soap opera?

What we’re seeing is a huge fundamentalist institution deep into the process of self-destruction.  It’s imploding right in front of us.  The weasel has definitely popped, and the infallible is about as fallible as it can get.

If the Roman Catholic church doesn’t undergo thorough reform, right now, predicts the famed Swiss theologian Hans Kung, it will “fall into a new ice age and run the danger of shrinking into an increasingly irrelevant sect.”  He cites a recent poll in Germany showing that 85% of Catholics support marriage for priests, and 75% support ordination of women.

Religious historian Garry Wills’ new book Why Priests? – A Failed Tradition goes further and advocates abolishing the priesthood altogether.  Not only did Christianity begin without a priesthood, he points out, but it actively opposed it.  And rank-and-file priests are speaking up too, like Tony Flannery in Dublin, suspended by the Vatican for refusing to adhere to church orthodoxy on contraception and homosexuality, or Roy Bourgeois in the US, who was excommunicated for supporting the ordination of women.

But all this is far too pertinent.  So let’s take refuge in the impertinent and get back to the issue at hand:  what’ll happen to those hand-made red shoes?  Will they be bronzed like baby booties?  Will they be displayed in an air-conditioned glass relics case?   Will they be auctioned off on eBay?

Fundamentalists of all religious stripes, take note:  this is how imposed orthodoxy ends — not with a bang, but with a red-bootied whimper.

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File under: Christianity, fundamentalism | Tagged: Tags: Garry Wills, Hans Kung, Pope Benedict, Ratzinger, Roman Catholic Church, Roy Bourgeois, Stephen Colbert, Tony Flannery, Vatican | 11 Comments
  1. Saimã Abbasi says:
    March 1, 2013 at 12:28 pm

    Fundamentalists of all religious stripes, take note: this is how imposed orthodoxy ends — not with a bang, but with a red-bootied whimper…
    Love this line. Very well written.

  2. Nancy McClelland says:
    March 1, 2013 at 3:43 pm

    Lesley, I believe I once said that I’d listen to you read aloud from the phone book, you have such a great voice and style of delivery. Well, I just realized that I am an incredibly lucky woman, because in my head, I can hear your voice reading your own work as these blog posts flow from the page/screen. And your own work is WAY more interesting than the phone book.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      March 1, 2013 at 5:28 pm

      I’ll take being more interesting than the phone book as a compliment, Nancy! Seriously, you’re the best. And thanks for the reminder — I haven’t yet posted this KUOW audio of my reading from ‘The First Muslim’ at Town Hall Seattle: http://www.kuow.org/post/muhammads-extraordinary-life-author-lesley-hazleton

  3. BeffaOmmaya WyldeMoon says:
    March 1, 2013 at 5:01 pm

    You’ve gone and done it again, Hazleton! I’m still chuckling…WyldeMoon

  4. Karla Goethe says:
    March 1, 2013 at 7:40 pm

    Lesley Hazleton, your post gives me sanity in an insane world. Thank you so much. Karla Goethe

  5. Gustav Hellthaler says:
    March 2, 2013 at 9:54 am

    I believe that Dorothy has the red shoes and that Toto has already pulled back the curtain of the meta-reality of religion.
    Gus

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      March 2, 2013 at 10:23 am

      I can see a doctoral thesis here: “The Theology of Oz.”

  6. Jerry M says:
    March 5, 2013 at 12:39 pm

    As a former Catholic I find the current state of the church amusing. They had a real chance to reform the church 50 years ago, but like most powerful and self-blind institutions they didn’t take that opportunity. They could have embraced change, I was in a Catholic high school when the then pope, Paul VI, published his encyclical on birth control. At that time the priest who taught religion in my high school assumed that the birth control ruling was going to change. It didn’t and that was the public end of any attempts at reform. In the last few years we have all learned about so many scandals regarding how the church treated the powerless that the pedophile scandal is just one of many. What is sad that those in power would rather protect power than help those who they have wronged.

    Ratzinger was a cipher. He was elected to do nothing (given his age I am assuming he was supposed to be an interim pope), and he did nothing. I don’t understand why any news agency is covering this. It is barely important. Given the number of Catholics I suppose it does merit a line or two, but that is all.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      March 5, 2013 at 3:12 pm

      The question being whether another John XXIII is even possible. Naive question, probably…

  7. Jerry M says:
    March 13, 2013 at 3:06 pm

    Oh well, they kicked the can down the road again. They voted on an elderly Argentinian bishop. I don’t know anything negative but he is hardly going to be strong enough to fix anything.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      March 13, 2013 at 3:53 pm

      The Catholic Reporter says he’s a “staunch opponent” of contraception, abortion, and marriage equality. How exactly this jibes with his avowed passion for social justice must presumably be considered one of the mysteries of the Church…

‘Silent Majority’ Of Muslims? Not Any More

Posted September 26th, 2012 by Lesley Hazleton

Great conversation on Al Jazeera’s The Stream yesterday:  I was with Lisa Fletcher and Anushay Hossain in the studio — I love her blog Anushay’s Point  — and Omid Safi, Nouman Ali Khan, and Michael Muhammad Knight joined in on Skype.  Plus an excellent video comment from Hind Makki in Chicago, which led to a lively post-show discussion, starting at the 25.15 mark, on reclaiming the narrative from both ‘Islamist’ extremists and Islamophobic bigots.

It’s a good thing Nouman Ali Khan wasn’t in the studio, because I’d only have totally embarrassed him by leaping up to give him a huge hug.  I really do have to figure out how to be cool on TV…

Like I say, hang around for the post-show segment — the silent majority is silent no longer!

[youtube=http://youtu.be/mtbsSXe6f2k]

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File under: fundamentalism, Islam, sanity, ugliness | Tagged: Tags: "Muslim rage", Al Jazeera, Arab spring, bigotry, extremism, freedom of expression, Islamophobic video, Libya, NYC subway ads, The Stream | 9 Comments
  1. Mustapha says:
    September 26, 2012 at 11:16 am

    Assalamu alaiki Lesley.

    I watched your programm with Lisa Fletch today. I then learned from Wikileaks that you a Jew. I am sure you cannot trace your tribe. When I meet you I will definitely hug you. You know that Muhammad Rasulullah married a Jewish lady from the famous tribe of Levi. It is part of the Sunna that his followers marry a Jewish lady!
    Good! I expected you to dispell the hope of a stable and peaceful world based on the history of your ancestors. How can the G-d of Abraham be partial? Do not be deceived for you know very well that after the discovery of the Torah and is promulgation by Josiah, the then Jewish race enjoyed peace and prosperity. The Qur’an has been protected and its Laws are intact. yet those upholding it have turned it into shreds of paper.
    Don’t criticize Netanhayu. Freedom of speech demands you to criticize the followers of Muhammad and expose their hypocrisy.
    Mustapha.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 27, 2012 at 10:38 am

      “Don’t criticize Netanyahu”? Are you kidding?
      You “learned from Wikileaks” that I’m Jewish? Wikileaks? Really? You could have learned it from me when I said so on the program you say you watched.
      No hugs, thank you.

  2. Imraan says:
    September 26, 2012 at 2:30 pm

    Reblogged this on Heightened Senses and commented:
    A brilliant edition of ‘The Stream’ speaking of the cartoons and the rage that followed it; is such a shame that more voices of moderation aren’t given this kind of exposure.
    That said, I think the discourse lets-off too easily the greater power-play here – I read it as classical orientalism – a way of subduing the Eastern man because he is quick to murderous rage, necessitating condemnation from Western Governments and schooling in what it is to live in the ‘modern world’ (thank you President Clinton, you very wicked man).
    Nouman Ali Khan was particularly excellent – speaking of the moral imperatives as opposed to the legislative ones which are important. And I think that that moral space should be recognised; as a person of ‘belief’, I wonder if it is a failing on the part of the faithful that this has been allowed to be perpetrated; our world today seems to be blinded by the notion of rights that extend even to the bigoted (which is fine in principle), the only problem being that we are so individualistic that we block out moral voices and moral instruction as soon as it interferes with our whims and desires – isn’t the point of morality (and I speak of universals here) that it should be able to shape or control our impulses for wickedness?

    It’s an unpopular view to have, no-doubt, in today’s world. What do you think?

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 27, 2012 at 10:50 am

      The point about lingering Orientalism is well taken, of course: images of rioting mobs feed into that perfectly, thus the infamous Newsweek “Muslim Rage” cover story. As any African American can tell you, it takes a long time for entrenched images, paradigms, and stereotypes to die. Any Jew, too.
      Re morality, I think a more productive approach might be to focus on the impulse to good rather than to bad. And this is what I understand Nouman Ali Khan to be saying. i.e. religion not as “control” or a system of “curbs,” but as a force that might, in principle, focus on the potential for good. The idea of humans as inherently evil and thus needing to be punished and constricted only creates religion based on fear and hatred.

  3. rehmat1 says:
    September 27, 2012 at 4:56 pm

    Shalom Ms Hazleton….

    You’re one of the three Jewish ladies who adorned by blog. The other two, are – poet and historian Tamam Kahn, and Professor Nurit Peled-Elhanan (Hebrew University). Nurit has not studied Islam, but Tamam did. She authored the book, ‘ UNTOLD: A History of the wives of Prophet Muhammad’.

    http://rehmat1.com/2011/03/14/untold-a-history-of-the-wives-of-prophet-muhammad/

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 27, 2012 at 8:00 pm

      I don’t know Nurit, but Tamam is indeed a dear friend.

      • rehmat1 says:
        September 28, 2012 at 5:20 am

        Nurit is daughter of Israeli war hero Gen. Matti Peled. She along with her brother Miko are among the few courageous Israeli Jews who though born and raised in committed Zionist Jewish families – have the moral courage to challenge Israel’s official Hasbara (propaganda) lies about Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims. Their grandfather, Dr. Avraham Katsnelson, sang Israeli anthem on Israel’s unilateral declaration of a state in May 1948. She lost her 13-year-old daughter Smdari Elhanan in the 1997 bombing in Jerusalem. Nurit turned her grief into quest for justice for the native Palestinians.

        http://rehmat1.com/2009/09/05/israeli-mother-who-refuses-to-shut-up/

        • Lesley Hazleton says:
          September 28, 2012 at 8:19 am

          Thank you. But please note that there are far more than “a few” such Israeli Jews. In fact a sizeable proportion of Israelis detest government policies, on political, moral, and Jewish grounds, and Matti Peled was among them. What I most admire about activists like Nurit is that they do not give way to despair or exhaustion.

  4. anon says:
    September 30, 2012 at 2:46 am

    I enjoyed the program and the discussion and agree with much of what was said—but perhaps some assumptions may have been incorrect?

    I agree that excessively curtailing speech legally only makes it go underground depriving people of the opportunity for healthy debate and combating ignorance….but the idea that non-legal/social means of censorship does not make unacceptable speech go underground may be a mistaken idea—-statistics on Islamophobia show that a rise in hate-crimes/speech against Muslims corresponds to a rise in hate-crimes/speech against Jews in both U.S. and Europe. Therefore, it is possible the old anti-semitism is not dead—it just went underground waiting for a more conducive environment to re-emerge. If this is the case, then it is also possible that social censorship will only make islamophobia go underground in the West….unless the West actively discards its ideas of “manifest destiny/white man’s burden” and comes up with a new narrative that acknowledges the equality and dignity of ALL human beings…..and its one that is needed in the East as well…..

    another myth is that the U.S.(government) respects “free-speech” which its citizens seem to hold as sacred. (one only needs to glance at journalist Glenn Greenwald articles….)
    During the time of Hoover, the FBI rounded up all those whom it felt held “subversive’ views (views about communism)…more recently….
    Whislteblower Bradley Manning arrested, Assange taking asylum from extradition to U.S., Penn state student arrested for posting links to bomb-making site, Jubair Ahmed arrested for uploading pictures of Abu Ghuraib—-there are also incidents when peaceful U.S. protestors were teargassed (new York) or pelted with rubber bullets causing injuries (California)—–others such as singer Cat Stevens and Professor Tariq Ramadhan were not allowed in the U.S. because it did not approve their views….During the Bush era—Al-Qaeda videos aired on al-Jazeera were not allowed to be aired in the U.S.—the U.S. also kidnapped and tortured (renditions) people whose views or conduct it did not like……..(these days it uses drones to bomb them….)

    on a larger scale—one might even posit that the whole idea of fighting “communism”—or of “bringing democracy to Iraq” by war….also contradicts the American value of freedom of speech—-because ideas should be fought by ideas—not by nuclear weapons or tanks…..?…….

    —the concept/value of free-speech is one that Americans should grapple with themselves in the American context….Its just that American excuses about how hate-speech is “legal” ring kinda hollow to non-Americans………

The Real Muslim Rage

Posted September 23rd, 2012 by Lesley Hazleton

Oh what a bandwagon that noxious little anti-Islamic video has set in motion.  There seems to be no end of people eager to hop on it for personal and political gain, no matter how many lives it costs.

There’s Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut, reeling from backlash against his support of Bashar al-Assad’s ongoing massacre of Syrian civilians.  What a perfect opportunity to deflect criticism by calling for more and larger protests — not against the Syrian regime, but against America, in the name of “defending the Prophet.” Except that’s not what he’s doing. To cite the headline of Nick Kristof’s NYT column today, he’s exploiting the Prophet.

There’s Ayaan Hirsi Ali, she of the soft voice and the compelling back story, who just can’t stop talking about what she calls “the Muslim mentality.” (Pop quiz:  if someone who generalizes about a stereotyped “Jewish mentality” is an anti-Semite, what’s someone who generalizes about a stereotyped “Muslim mentality”?  Click here if you don’t know.)  Hirsi Ali told her story yet again in Newsweek‘s “Muslim Rage” issue (to which the best answer was the often hilarious #MuslimRage meme on Twitter).  Strange to think that the rapidly failing Newsweek was once a reputable publication.

There’s the sophomoric French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, whose idea of cutting-edge humor is cartoons of politicians with their pants down around the ankles.  This week they ran similar cartoons of Muhammad in order to inject some life into their plumetting circulation by creating controversy.  Oh, and as a beacon of free speech, of course.

There’s Pakistan’s Minister of Railways — the man responsible for the system’s chronic debt, constant strikes, and devastating crashes. What better way to distract people from his total failure than to make himself out to be a “defender of Islam” by offering a $100,000 bounty for the life of the director of that inane video?  There’s nothing quite like incitement to murder to cover up your own corruption.

There’s more — there’s always more of such people, including of course the miserable little bigots who made the video in the first place —  but that’ll do for now. Because none of this reflects the real Muslim rage:  the palpable outrage not only at the killing of Ambassador Stevens, but also at the blatant attempt of Islamic extremists (and their Islamophobic counterparts) to hijack Islam.

Listen, for instance, to Egyptian activist Mahmoud Salem, aka Sandmonkey, who was one of the voices of 2011’s “Arab spring” in Cairo’s Tahrir Square.  Violent protests over the video are “more damaging to Islam’s reputation than a thousand so-called ‘Islam-attacking’ films,” he writes, and calls on Egyptians to condemn Islamic fundamentalists as “a bunch of shrill, patriarchal, misogynistic, violent extremists who are using Islam as a cover” for political ambition.

Twitter is spilling over with similar protests and disgust from Muslims all over the world at the way the “defenders of Islam” are destroying it from within.  And this disgust was acted on in Benghazi on Friday when 50,000 Libyans marched to demand the disarming of the extremist militias suspected of attacking the US consular buildings, then stormed the headquarters of two of the biggest militias and forced them out of town.  Two other Islamist militias instantly disbanded.  Yes, if you unite, you can face down the thugs, even well-armed ones.  This, of course, is not something you’ll see on the cover of Newsweek.

As Libyans, Egyptians, Tunisians, Yemenis, and with especial pain, Syrians know, the “Arab spring” is not a matter of a single season.  The moniker itself is a product of Western media shorthand, of the desire to label a “story” and assign it a neat, self-contained timeline.  But this was no mere story for the people living it.  It was and still is the beginning of a long process.  But one that once begun, cannot be undone.

All over the Middle East, real voices are making themselves heard, unmediated by government control whether in the name of “security” or of an extremist travesty of Islam.

And this is surely the real manifestation of that much abused principle:  freedom of expression.

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File under: fundamentalism, Islam, Middle East, sanity | Tagged: Tags: anti-Islam video, Arab spring, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Benghazi, Charlie Hebdo, Egypt, Hassan Nasrallah, Libya, militias, Newsweek, outrage, Pakistan, Sandmonkey, Syria, Tunisia | 14 Comments
  1. anon says:
    September 23, 2012 at 6:39 pm

    when CNN uses Ambassador Stevens diary—“free-speech” goes out the window. Anything embarrassing to the U.S. government or military and there is no free-speech—-anything insulting to Muslims—and “free-speech” suddenly becomes important to Americans!!!!

    By the way—Muslim-minority countries are also allowing protests in their countries—seems “anti-americanism” isn’t confined to Muslim-Majority countries alone……

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 23, 2012 at 6:53 pm

      Stealing and using anyone’s private diary sounds Murdoch-sleazy to me. Can’t see that it has anything to do with free speech. And as for “allowing” protests, doesn’t that word “allowing” tell you something?

      • anon says:
        September 29, 2012 at 2:13 am

        “sound Murdoch-sleazy to me”—that is exactly my point—Americans may “claim” free-speech”—but it DOES have boundaries—some things are just not acceptable—because they are “sleezy” or unpatriotic, or….etc……There were U.S. muslim students who were arrested because they protested a speech by Israeli ambassador, there was a Judge who banned hateful protests at funerals of American soldiers……

        people in different parts of the world have sensibilities that may be different from an American criteria—for example, in some countries in Asia—speech defaming the monarchy is against the law…..We have to be able to respect each others differences……….Non-Americans need to understand that America has its own criteria—and Americans need to understand that non-Americans also have their own criteria…..

        “Allowing protests”—yes, for much of the rest of the world “freedoms” are still very much a “work-in-progress”—even in the democracies of Asia.

        (by the way—I do agree that moderate/mainstream muslims MUST counter the narrow, extremist ideology that encourages violence)

        • Lesley Hazleton says:
          September 29, 2012 at 10:44 am

          You get the difference, though, between what’s acceptable and what’s legal in the US. Expressions of antisemitism and racism are legal, but no longer acceptable in the mainstream. I’m convinced that this will happen too with Islamophobia — i.e. it will be marginalized. The hard thing is that it takes time, and as you say, understanding that we all need to speak out against extremist ideologies and hatred on all sides. Freedom of expression is a terrifically tough concept to get one’s mind around — I still have great difficulty with it, and sometimes find myself raging against the American Civil Liberties Union. But I send my check to the ACLU nonetheless, because next time round, it could be me whose freedom of expression is being threatened.

  2. naveed says:
    September 23, 2012 at 8:23 pm

    You have correctly pointed out people who have cashed in on ‘muslim rage’ but these are not the real reasons for the rage. From one who is enraged: May I give the real reason for my rage? The American support to its stooges in Muslim countries, the mechanisms of regime change in Muslim countries and the American occupation of Muslim countries are the reasons for ‘Muslim Rage’

  3. Emad Yawer says:
    September 25, 2012 at 11:48 pm

    If the US and Europe so keen on free speech, whay I can not USE the Swastica, WHY I can not critisize ANY jew, jewish thing or deny the Holocost took place, WHY there is so many restrictions on what they call “HATE” , but it is all different against Islam?????????

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 27, 2012 at 10:28 am

      I don’t know where you live, but the fact is that in most of the world, you can. And in many parts of the Middle East, antisemitic cartoons, images etc are common in school textbooks and newspapers. As I’ve written here before, antisemitism and Islamophobia are mirror images — actually, twinned images — which makes it all the more miserably absurd when there are Muslims who are antisemitic, and Jews who are Islamophobic.

  4. Sohail Kizilbash says:
    September 26, 2012 at 4:52 pm

    Look Guys, lets us not be naive and banal. USA is THE superpower and she has to do a lot of things to maintain that status. If you don’t like it, you can lump it. Having said that, I don’t know of any other country where people are more free and freedom comes at a price. I totally agree with a Muslim who appeared on the TV a few day ago who said that the best country to practice Islam, is the USA.

    • Naveed says:
      September 30, 2012 at 10:51 am

      You are right USA is THE superpower. Dont forget that not too long ago Britain and then USSR were superpowers. Dont lose sight of the fact that in less than five years China will be a Superpower. Scientific and technological development can neither be halted nor contained sooner or later small countries and even stateless groups will accquire yet to be invented weapons of mass destruction. The survival of mankind depends on realizing that there can be no prosperity without peace and there can be no peace without justice.

      • Sohail Kizilbash says:
        September 30, 2012 at 2:48 pm

        Absolutely no argument there, Naveed. The seeds of destruction are embedded in the fabric of an empire. All empires, until now, have degenerated into dictatorships, arrogance, conceit, intolerance, superiority complex and gone into a comfort zone, bringing about their demise. Hopefully this will not happen to the USA as it adapts to changing times. See the change from a slave owning society, to a country where a half black is President. Now people proudly declare that they have native blood. One has to live in the USA and read history to see the change. The self critical nature of the Americans is one of their biggest strength.That is just my humble opinion.

        • naveed says:
          October 1, 2012 at 4:35 am

          Very well written Sohail. I had the privilege of living and working in USA as an alien resident for several years. I whole heartedly agree that America is a great country; the vast majority of Americans are forthright, honest and fair-minded people. We in the third world owe America and Europe a huge debt of gratitude for the benefits of science and technology. Unfortunately Americans are themselves the victims of a foreign policy influenced by lobbies whose allegiance lies outside its shores. For the sake of people of America and the people of the world. For the sake of peace on earth, we can only hope and pray that the future leaders of America will be great people like Abraham Lincoln and Benjamin Franklin, people who would base their decisions on principles of right and wrong rather than on opinion polls, oil money and directives of foreign lobbies. Kissinger said “ Real politick not a moralistic approach to foreign policy would best serve American interests” ( perhaps he really meant Israeli interests ) Americans are being led by neo-cons and evangelists who base their foreign policy on biblical prophesies.

          • Sohail Kizilbash says:
            October 1, 2012 at 7:36 am

            Alas. Sometimes the tail wags the dog.

  5. Sohail Kizilbash says:
    September 26, 2012 at 4:54 pm

    By the way Lesley, if you are on the FB you might enjoy the comments on my recent posts on this issue.

  6. irfan says:
    October 1, 2012 at 7:33 pm

    .hope the peaceful message will get more support

    http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/edit-page/Blasphemy-in-Islam-The-Quran-does-not-prescribe-punishment-for-abusing-the-Prophet/articleshow/16631496.cms

Could That Video Be Self-Defeating?

Posted September 15th, 2012 by Lesley Hazleton

Could that pernicious video have ended up working against itself?  Could this be the tipping point for both Islamophobia and its mirror image, militant “Islamist” extremism?  Is this where both are revealed for the ugly con game they really are?

Perhaps the one good thing about the video is that it is so upfront in its ugliness.  It’s no longer just you and I saying it;  it’s also the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, whose anger was palpable:  “To us, to me personally, this video is disgusting and reprehensible. It appears to have a deeply cynical purpose: to denigrate a great religion and to provoke rage.”

Now we know who made the video:  a convicted con man, Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, indicted on multiple charges of bank fraud and check-kiting.  And he may indeed end up back in jail, since by posting his work to the Internet he violated the terms of his probation.  That’s little consolation, of course, for the multiple deaths he’s caused — at least a dozen so far.  And none at all for those who don’t understand that the principle of freedom of speech, no matter how hard it is to accept, applies to all. Under a different administration, the same principle by which they demand that he be jailed could then be turned around and applied to them.

But we know more.  We know that the protests against the video have been used and manipulated by Al Qaeda and Salafi types, who manipulated the sincere outrage and insult of protestors to further their own political agenda and try to destabilize newly elected governments.  In the process, they also furthered the agenda of their Islamophobic blood brothers, providing graphic images of Muslims doing everything Islamophobes expect — rioting, burning, killing.  But for the first time, all countries involved seem to have clearly recognized this and given voice to it, perhaps none more perfectly than Hillary Clinton: “”The people of Egypt, Libya, Yemen and Tunisia did not trade the tyranny of a dictator for the tyranny of a mob.”

We know that Twitter is alive with condemnations of the violence from Libyans, Tunisians, Egyptians, and more.  Mainstream Muslims, both religious and secular, will no longer tolerate being intimidated into silence by those who claim to speak in their name for a violent, extremist travesty of Islam.  They are speaking out in unprecedented volume and numbers.

And we know this:  the new governments of Libya and Yemen instantly condemned the violence and apologized for the death of Ambassador Stevens.  In the words of the president of the Libyan National Congress, it was “an apology to the United States and the Arab people, if not the whole world, for what happened.  We together with the United States government are on the same side, standing in a united front in the face of these murderous outlaws.”  Residents of Tripoli and Benghazi staged demonstrations to condemn the attack on the Benghazi consulate and to express their sorrow at the death of Stevens, who was widely admired for his support of the revolution that ousted Qaddafi.

Even the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt finally realized that this was not a matter of defending Islam against outside enemies, but of defending it against its own worst enemies on the inside.

All this, it seems to me, is new.  As is the reaction of the US administration, led by Obama and Clinton — calm, measured, determined, and in the spirit of Ambassador Stevens himself,  the opposite of the heavy-handed American imperialism of the past.  Imagine if this had happened under Bush, or under Romney, and shudder at how they would have reacted.

Could it be, finally, that more and more people are getting it?  That both the Islamists and the Islamophobes are losing?  That sanity, however high the cost in lives, might actually prevail?

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File under: fundamentalism, Islam, Middle East, ugliness | Tagged: Tags: Al Qaeda, Egypt, Hillary Clinton, Islamophobia, Libya, Muslim Brotherhood, Nakoula, Obama, Salafis, Tunisia, Twitter, Yemen, YouTube video | 9 Comments
  1. Yafiah Katherine says:
    September 15, 2012 at 12:15 pm

    It’s so refreshing to read such a clear-headed account of the situation. I’ve been feeling so down-hearted throughout this awful mess and I hope too that it will become clearer to everyone how Islamophobes and extreme Islamists are mirror-images of each other. But surely there is a line between freedom of speech and hate speech that incites to violence? I’ve been so frustrated at the BBC reporting on ‘a video that Muslims find insensitive’ instead of saying loud and clear that it’s totally unacceptable as much as the manipulation of the protests is totally unacceptable. I’m tweeting your post and sharing it on FB. Thank you.

  2. Sandra Peters says:
    September 15, 2012 at 1:00 pm

    Lesley,

    Thank You for such an excellent perspective of how the world is reacting to the video. Violence and destruction are not the answer. “Calm, measured, determined, and in the spirit of Ambassador Stevens himself” as you so wrote will prevail.

  3. burhan says:
    September 15, 2012 at 2:03 pm

    Lesley hazleton, Im your biggest fan and I wish I could ever come to the same intelligence level as you one day! Burhan Adhami

  4. Herman says:
    September 15, 2012 at 5:29 pm

    Amazing,
    In Egypt they televise a series based on the fictitious Protocols of the elders of Zion, in Iran a conference is held regarding the non happening of the Holocaust, Christians are murdered all over Muslim Africa and Egypt and you are blaming everything on Al Quaeda.
    You are kidding right?

  5. Qaisar Latif says:
    September 16, 2012 at 1:32 am

    Well said.

  6. Meera Vijayann says:
    September 16, 2012 at 1:34 am

    Thank you for this great read Lesley. Honestly, when I watched the video, I first thought it was absolute nonsense, and was surprised that such rubbish could be taken seriously. In fact, if the movie was indeed to be taken seriously, it was perhaps a good opportunity for the Muslim world to ignore it and refuse to stoop so low by giving it the attention it intended to garner.

    As you rightly said, I am glad too that the Bush government isn’t in power. I shudder to think of what would’ve happened if it were.

  7. Meezan says:
    September 16, 2012 at 8:56 am

    Silver lining to a very very dark cloud.

  8. Tea-mahm says:
    September 17, 2012 at 1:49 pm

    You go girl! Good piece. Sending love from Istanbul where the call to prayer wakes me in the morning…..

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 17, 2012 at 2:56 pm

      Sooooo envious! One day I will make it to Istanbul!

Blood Brothers

Posted September 12th, 2012 by Lesley Hazleton

Once again, the extremists have fed each other.  Once again, with other people’s blood.

The blood is that of one of the best friends the new Libya could have had:  US Ambassador Christopher Stevens, killed yesterday, the evening of 9/11, along with three of his staff as they tried to evacuate employees of the American consulate in Benghazi.  The evacuation was necessary because protestors had been whipped into violence by a 14-minute farce of a video attacking the prophet Muhammad.  Or, as now seems possible, the protest was used as an excuse for a planned attack, since RPGs and automatic weapons were involved.

Al-Qaeda-type extremists are apparently the ones who pulled the trigger, using the insult to Islam as an excuse. But they could not have done so without the help of their partners — their Jewish and Christian brothers-in-arms right here in the United States. That’s who provided the ammunition, in the form of a shoddily crude and absurdly amateurish “movie trailer” portraying Muhammad as a fraud and his early supporters as a bunch of goons.

I’m deliberately not linking to the video here since I refuse to link to such tripe. This isn’t an insult to Islam;  it’s an insult to human intelligence. If you feel sufficiently masochistic, you can find it on YouTube by typing in the title, ‘Muslim Innocence’ (the director’s idea of irony).

You’ll see that it’s made by ignorant fanatics for ignorant fanatics. Nobody else would pay it the blindest bit of attention. In fact nobody else did (even the director, an Israeli-American who goes by the name of Sam Bacile, which may or may not be a pseudonym, admits that the whole movie has been shown only once, to a nearly empty movie theater in California). Nobody else, that is, until Florida’s tinpot Quran-burning pastor Terry Jones — the one who once hanged President Obama in effigy and will apparently do anything to get himself back in the news — decided to showcase the trailer as part of his annual 9/11 Islamophobic rant.

I’ll write more about this very soon (I’m just back from a trip, and jet-lagged). But for now, two things:

1. Rest in peace, Christopher Stevens.

2. As for Terry Jones and the man calling himself Sam Bacile: if such a thing as hell exists, may you both rot in it, alongside your blood brothers in Al Qaeda.

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File under: Christianity, fundamentalism, Islam, Judaism, ugliness | Tagged: Tags: 'Sam Bacile', Al Qaeda, Ambassador Stevens, Benghazi, bigotry, Islamophobia, Libya, Muhammad, Terry Jones, YouTube | 13 Comments
  1. lavrans123 says:
    September 12, 2012 at 7:54 pm

    I think it was a Libyan politician who said that the film was like crying fire in a movie theater; you’re free to say it, but once said you may have to pay the consequences. Too bad the wrong people always seem to pay the consequences for these type of people’s actions.

    Another sad facet to the whole thing is how 9/11 rouses so many bigots, and how this sort of thing seems to convince more people to become bigots because they won’t see Terry Jones & Sam Bacile as being complicit. Although I’m sure they’re the same people who really complained about the flag and Christ being immersed in urine…

  2. Zahida Murtaza (@zmurrad) says:
    September 13, 2012 at 4:55 am

    Thanks Lesley, for speaking up once again like so many other times when many of us just cringe and feel upset at such things. There are no words to describe the actions and methods some people choose to show their dislike for someone or something. They must be feeling defeated that’s why they have to keep coming with new ways to show their anger and frustration.
    What I don’t understand about the people who react so violently to such provocations and filth if they really ‘KNOW’ the man they think they are defending by their actions. The man ‘Prophet Muhammad’ suffered so much insult and abuse at the hands of ignorant and misguided people in his own lifetime, but never reacted this way. As a matter of fact, just the opposite. He was most forgiving and used such actions as teachable moments.
    What do we learn from his ‘sunnah’? We will be hurting him more by killing innocent people in his name. I beg all those muslims who respond to hate with more hate to go back to the teachings of Prophet Muhammed and follow his practice. As Allah calls him the ‘ ‘blazing, bright sun’ in the Quran, so what happens when we trying to spit at the sun? I will come back on our face. We should wait for that moment. It will come back on ‘their face’.
    Thanks

  3. Trying God's Patience says:
    September 13, 2012 at 9:59 am

    Always sensible, always well-informed, and isn’t it always not-that-complicated really – thank you, as always. xo

  4. Susan Jackson Weirauch says:
    September 13, 2012 at 10:39 am

    I absolutely agree with you and Jones makes me embarrassed to live in the same state as he does. He is a terrorist and should be arrested and tried as such.

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 13, 2012 at 11:09 am

      Obviously I detest the man as much as you. He’s a dangerous big-mouthed loose-cannon bigot, but terrorists are defined by their actions, not their speech. He feeds terrorism, but he does not commit it, nor directly urge people to commit it, and thus, however abhorrent the idea may be, he is not legally liable. If that seems wrong, then answer this: do you really want to live in a country where it’s possible to jail people for what they say? Where under a different administration, you could then be jailed for what you say?

  5. Imraan says:
    September 13, 2012 at 3:11 pm

    Unfortunately this fellow seems to have the usual axe to grind. Following from what you wrote, I did not watch the trailer as you’re right, it’s rather masochistic to willingly engage in such ignorance (if I understood you correctly).

    But I don’t see this as particularly controversial – historically, various sainted characters have been villified, defamed, insulted. But the test of one’s faith is, importantly, whether it can stand criticism. I think Islam fundamentally can. Scholars, Imams, sheikhs historically have been known to respond to various criticisms in the seminaries – and no one had to get killed (in general). Moreover, the voice of the Qur’an has rebutted, in its own days, the claims made against it and the Prophet – so following on in its example, I would hope that Muslims would do the same.

    Now whether (we) Muslims can, is a different question. Of course, and this isn’t legitimising the violence, in a society where the religious culture is more apparent, where religious sentiments are heightened and people hold dear (not in a hagiographic sense always) a truly great and charismatic personality, I can understand how the sentiments spill over.

    This isn’t considering who actually committed the acts of barbarism – if they’re from the mujahid persuasion (and I suspect they might be as automatic weapons were apparently used) then of course their logic is rather different and perhaps needs to be contextualised in a more third-world (lack of literacy, poor socio-economic means, different religious culture?), anti-hegemonic, anti-imperial/postcolonial situation – again not justifying it, and ironically enough these groups tend to be funded from the West or its client states. Unfortunately the actions of those in arms will give fodder to those who think such a film is timely.

    I can understand the anger – what is curious to me is that the US government and its representatives are still, at least in Libyan eyes (and I could be misreading the situation) conflated with both anti-Islamic sentiments, and perhaps even with either a Jewish/Zionist anti-Arab/anti-Islamic conspiracy – and though I don’t tend to conflate Judaism with Zionism, I can certainly understand why in that part of the world they do.

    “[109:5] For you is your faith, and for me, my faith.”

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 13, 2012 at 5:30 pm

      Re “in Libyan eyes,” it seems the majority of Libyans, as well as the Libyan government, are sincere in their denunciation of this murder, not least because they appreciate the role of the US — and in particular of the assassinated ambassador — in helping oust Qaddafi. Paranoid rhetoric about US imperialism in the post-Bush/Cheney era seems to be the much reduced province of militant extremists like Salafis and Qaeda, not the mainstream. As has been noted endlessly in the past 48 hours, Libyan politics are still, in the word of choice of the NYT, “volatile,” but I get the impression that many more citizens of Muslim countries are sick and tired of the way militant fundamentalists distort Islam and manipulate it to serve their own interests.

      • Imraan says:
        September 13, 2012 at 6:24 pm

        Fair points. Thank you for responding. I hope that you’re having a blessed and peaceful night.

        I should have been more specific – In some Libyans’ eyes – but even that, you are correct, is a rather broad generalisation.

        I suspect many are pleased with the ousting of Qaddafi, though I hope Libyans will still remember to view US motives with suspicion. I’m no apologist for political thuggery nor dictators, despots or demagogues, but I don’t believe (but am willing to be shown otherwise) that the removal of Qaddafi was sincere, alas, in the same way that the U.S stood by Mubarak until his position was completely untenable, or becoming an embarrasment for the State Department.

        Moreover the US/Western track record on Iraq, Afghanistan, Bahrain, Iran and the Palestinians are rather problematic. As someone from the anti-war movement said, if the major Libyan export was asparagus, would we be so sure that the U.S would have interveined? Rhetoric aside, it did give me pause to consider that question.

        “Paranoid rhetoric about US imperialism in the post-Bush/Cheney era seems to be the much reduced province of militant extremists like Salafis and Qaeda, not the mainstream”

        Do you mean in terms of how the Libyans/Middle Easterners at large might not be as inclined to agree with the suggestion that the U.S’ interests aren’t imperial? Though I don’t agree with the tactics of al-Qaeda and Salafis, nor do I understand their (rather warped) theology, I do believe sincerely that the U.S (particularly, but not exclusively) is perpetrating a rather sharp imperial agenda (though there could be neomarxist readings into that too, which I might be mistakenly be calling Imperialist).

        Moreover, their funding of militants in Syria (and I do pray that the Syrians win democracy for themselves) via client states i.e. Saudi Arabia, Turkey is highly suspect – I don’t think the concern was so great for the Syrians ten years ago; and as I understand it the Assad and Qaddafi governments were participants in the Extraordinary Rendition project.

        The irony of course was that Syria got suspended from the Arab League – a collection of western-backed totalitarian regimes – for squashing a democratic revolution (!); or that when the Saudi government became one of the leading voices for democracy in Syria, the Obama administration, and Secretary of State Clinton soon realised how farcial it was to call their movement the Friends of Democratic Syria.

        Perhaps I have read too much Chomsky, though!

        Mehdi Hasan (I think) said some months ago, that as a proportion of their population, the Bahrainis have suffered far more repression, torture, imprisonment than Syrians (at least at the time) but of course the arms trade resumed with Bahrain – moreover the 5th Fleet happens to be stationed there so we don’t get as much coverage in the news about it. We (and I say this with some guilt as a British citizen) armed Qaddafi, Saddam, al-Khalifa.

        “http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/04/cnn-international-documentary-bahrain-arab-spring-repression”

        If you haven’t seen the reports yet, alternate new outlets, e.g Press TV, as well as al-Manar and Zee News have been reporting today that ‘surveillance’ drones have been dispached to Libya in the wake of the murders at the US embassy (assassinations? I never know how important one must be in order to be assassinated), as well as ships from one of the Naval fleets – this does worry me indeed and seems to be part of a policy that some might call neocolonial. In the same way that the US is shooting fire from the skies elsewhere over foreign territory (Somalia, Pakistan, Yemen), I fear that this could set a rather terrifying precedent.

        • Imraan says:
          September 13, 2012 at 6:32 pm

          I’ve just realised I’ve been writing an argument rather than a response; apologies if my tone was overly-confrontational.

          • Lesley Hazleton says:
            September 13, 2012 at 7:27 pm

            Apologies accepted, but it’s good to have reasoned argument from another point of view. Killing an ambassador does count as an assassination, though. And thus as an international crisis point. So far, Obama seems to be handling it well. I clearly have a lot more faith in his administration than you do. Or maybe I just don’t expect perfection. That is, I never expected him to be the messiah. What I did expect is what he’s been: a sane, intelligent leader doing his best in the face of intense obstructionism here at home. Only ideologues stay ‘pure’ — and ideologues are precisely the problem, both in the US and abroad.

  6. Imraan says:
    September 13, 2012 at 3:13 pm

    Reblogged this on Heightened Senses and commented:
    I seem to be more and more referring to this blog! In response to the events of the last couple of days, Hazleton writes a rather good piece.

  7. Imraan says:
    September 20, 2012 at 3:36 pm

    Firstly – sorry I vanished! Had a weird week healthwise! Indeed, reasoned debate is something I aspire to. I wonder if it’s much harder to have in the states – the political system seems so be one of extremes – even though in many respects, the centre ground appears much closer to both ‘ends’ of the spectrum in the US in general than it it does here.

    Indeed, the ideologues unfotunately have made having any sort of debate with nuance very, very difficult, and at times, a rather tortuous process. I certainly believe that Obama is better than the alternatives, but alas his capacity, even as a self-proclaimed centrist, has been hindered because of (in my perhaps unqualified opinion) operant (I think that’s the word I’m looking for!) power structures and control of both information and resources – I certainly didn’t expect him to be able to change those mechanisms, at least to any degree that would alter the landscape of the discourse dramatically.

    But I’ll give it to him – the man is actually quite intelligent. I wish he had better PR though – those speeches he gave which appeared to have mobilised a generation is what he should have worked on more – brought the country over to his side so that at least if Congress didn’t act /cooperate according to the new political landscape, he wouldn’t be seen as culpable or as easy a target for the Romney bid. I don’t know if that would have help curb the now nearly fanatical the Tea-Party movement – and I understand he had a rather damaged economy to deal with too.

    In terms of foreign policy, thogh, I’m glad on the one hand that his policies on Iran haven’t been as aggressive as McCain’s or (God-forbid Romney) would be, and that though it hasn’t made much of a difference, his attitude toward the Palestinian statehood-bid has been more positive than we’ve seen for about a decade; on the other hand I’m so gravely disappointed at the policies toward, say, Latin America, Cuba/GTMO, and now the ‘hit list’ scandal which is still being written about in our papers here, at the least. But in terms of domestic policy, of course, living abroad, I can’t gauge the political climate on the ground as well as you can. Though in my opinion, his hand in widening the healthcare availability (though certainly not an ideal system by far) is his saving grace in my eyes.

    But unless if his policies are more focussed or he has better success with Congress in the next term, I’m worried that he will have missed some rather large opportunities in terms of creating a more friendly, fair and less imperial image of the US, both at home and abroad. Maybe once he’s in his next term, with the end-point somewhat in sight, he might be able to take greater political risks. As an example, I’m not much of a fan of Clinton but he appears to be remembered quite well in the ‘liberal’ (and I find it rather odd that Clinton’s something of a liberal – or at least in the O’Reilly, Coulter, Malkin, Limbaugh et al paradigm, haha!) press.

    Reading this back to myself – I’m realising that my own terms and references to American politics is one of extremes also – my discourse if framed by the reportage of the international press and Democracy Now! – so perhaps I’m my own problem here!

    • Lesley Hazleton says:
      September 23, 2012 at 4:04 pm

      One of the United States’ many problems: not only is socialism a dirty word (as in the Republican campaign against “socialized medicine”) but so too is the word ‘liberal.’ You’re right in that the mainstream political spectrum here is far narrower than that in the UK and most of Europe. For an ex-Brit like me, it can be… frustrating.

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