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On limits to freedom to talk about Islam
Published on February 13, 2007
There are numerous instances in the Qur'an where Muslims have been urged to wage war against the infidels. Some the exhortations to fight are not purely defensive. Verses such as II:193 ("And fight them on until there is no more tumult and oppression, and there prevail justice and faith in God") or VIII:39, which virtually repeats verse II:193, are cases in point. . . ...Thanks to modern internet technology, while the print media by and large shuns just about anything critical of any religion, a burgeoning network of websites is taking its place. A wide variety of subjects, ranging from the virulently anti-religious to the extremely pious, are being discussed and debated on the internet. The limits are already beginning to be probed. The process needs to gather strength.
There are few areas of religious faith where heterodoxy is as roundly condemned as in the mainstream of Islam. Intolerance to dissent runs through every organized religion. No religious establishment relishes criticism of the basic tenets of its faith. Excommunication is still a potential deterrent to unorthodox behavior in Christian churches. Rarely, however, does criticism of orthodoxy in Christianity provoke threat of violence towards even the most strident dissident. Modern Hindu liberals often disparage their gods and goddesses and jokes about some members of the Hindu pantheon are common among the members of the faith. Bengali literature is replete with flippancy and irreverence towards the pantheon. Criticism and even disparagement are made with impunity. In Christianity occasional irreverence, some of it intemperate, to Jesus Christ is generally met with shock and indignation but hardly, if ever, with threat of physical violence against the non-conformist. Serious or scholarly criticism of its tenets and beliefs rarely provokes anger and practically never violence.
Not so in Islam. Discourses are permitted so long as they are grounded in piety and propagation of the faith. Indeed they abound in Muslim societies and many Muslims would rather have more of the same, not less. But Muslims in general tend to be far more hostile to all shades of criticism of their religion or heritage than members of other faiths are towards theirs. The hostility is not limited to critics from other faiths, but extends to Muslim detractors of the faith. In fact, the hostility to the latter is more widespread than the other variety. This is partly because people of other faiths nowadays rarely have time to criticize Islam, except insofar as it can be linked to modern terrorism, or any other religion for that matter, though it is easy to find rabid exceptions. The other reason is that, with the advance of rational and secularist thinking, there is now a growing number of critics from among their co-religionists themselves. The number of these critics is still very small and their criticism is still mostly confined to the relative safety of internet websites. On the other hand, the rise of strident Islamic fundamentalism has been accompanied by increased hostility towards critics of Islam. It is important to understand the nature of the hostility of fundamentalist Islam towards anything that smacks of criticism of the faith. It is perhaps even more significant that most Muslims, including many moderates, share the hostility.
The traditionalist's objection to criticism of Islam falls roughly into two categories, both potentially contentious. First, the criticism is not grounded in fact. Second, the criticism hurts the "religious sensibilities" of pious Muslims. The two categories are of course not unrelated. The first type of objection sounds eminently reasonable. After all, the critics are generally the ones who profess to uphold "facts" -- as against imagination or pure notion. But, as in many other walks of life, "facts" that support the critic's points of view may also be readily available. The question then boils down to which of the "facts" one puts his trust in. Unfortunately for the traditionalists, the facts presented by the critics are very often culled from the holy books themselves. There are numerous examples and but a few must suffice here.
The recent upsurge in terrorism by the so-called "Islamists" has led to accusations that Islam condones violence. The allegation has produced angry denials from Muslims of various shades who contend that far from being a religion of violence, Islam has always stood for peace. This reaction is worth examining in relation to "facts."
There are numerous instances in the Qur'an where Muslims have been urged to wage war against the infidels. Some the exhortations to fight are not purely defensive. Verses such as II:193 ("And fight them on until there is no more tumult and oppression, and there prevail justice and faith in God") or VIII:39, which virtually repeats verse II:193, are cases in point. Verse IX:5 calls on Muslims to fight the infidels, to "seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem" until they "repent and establish regular prayers and practice regular charity." (The translations are from Abdullah Yusuf Ali's celebrated The Meaning of the Holy Qur'an.) These and other verses make peace with the infidels attainable only on Islam's terms. No serious Muslim denies the authenticity of these verses or their practical significance. In other words, those who contend that Islam condones violence can say that they are only referring to "facts.�
It is entirely possible that the violence apparently sanctioned in the Qur'an would at least look understandable in certain historical context, particularly when many societies, and not just Muslims, were prone to violence. Yet traditionalist Muslims generally take great umbrage to any mention of these verses as examples of violence sanctioned in Islam. Instead of explaining the historical contexts of the verses, and stressing how changed circumstances should put a new gloss on their meaning, and engaging the critics in a dialogue, they consider any such criticism as intolerable affront to Islam.
Similarly, the history of Muslim societies, like that of many other mediaeval societies, is replete with violence. Critics often cite the cruelty of the slaughter of the Jewish tribe of Bani Quraiza, especially because of its non-combatant status. Between 700 and 900 male members of the tribe were beheaded in a single day for their alleged treachery after the tribe had surrendered to the Muslims. The circumstances leading to the slaughter is often a matter of debate, but the fact of the massacre is not in dispute. Neither was officially sanctioned political assassination unknown even in the Prophet (SM)'s time. Sahih ahadith can be cited to attest to these facts. Nevertheless, mention of such facts from the very sources which mainstream Muslims themselves respect and accept often tests the limits to freedom to talk about Islam.
There are, however, also a wide range of subjects which are unrelated to factuality but are variously connected to faith where freedom to talk about Islam is severely limited, perhaps more so. While reference to uncomfortable facts might produce ire among traditionalist Muslims, any critical probe into faith-based issues is viewed as an insult to Islam and is often taboo. Much of what is frequently treated as assault on the religious sensibilities of ordinary Muslims has to do not with facts but with faith. It is interesting to note that the Bengali word "Obomanona" -- literally insult -- is almost invariably used with a solemnity fit for the occasion, and is used interchangeably with "hurting the religious sensibilities" of Muslims.
There is a long list of subjects variously linked with faith where critical discussion remains taboo in Islamic societies. It is unclear why faith should be deemed vulnerable to criticism. The expectation should rather be that an individual's religious faith would be strong enough to withstand any attack of hostile ideas. The reality is rather different. Faith is often worn on sleeves and as often easily wounded. A good example of faith being all too easily hurt is the reaction to eating, drinking, or smoking in the presence of those who are fasting in the month of Ramadan, the month of fasting. While not fasting in the month of Ramadan is considered a sin except in extenuating circumstances, the act of eating or drinking or smoking in the presence of one who is fasting in considered an insult to Islam. Islamic societies have dealt with the offenders by punishments that ranged from a mere slap on the wrist to beatings or imprisonment.
The "offensive" behaviour of non-fasters in Ramadan is among the lighter infringements of religious mores in Islamic societies. Critical talk about the fundamentals of the faith is considered far more serious an infringement. The list of areas of the faith where the scope for critical talk is strictly limited is long and includes: the nature of divine revelation and the primal origin of the Qur'an; the nature of Allah, the Supreme Being; the nature and consistency of Qur'anic directives; and the apparent duality between predestination and free will in divine texts. The Prophet of Islam, like all prophets, similarly assumes a mantle of divinity and hence is off limits to appraisal as a human being, even an extraordinary one, which undoubtedly he was. Here, though, the traditionalist interpretations of "fact" and faith got inextricably mixed and the result has been a formidable opposition among mainstream Muslims to any attempt at critical examination of either.
In passing, note that there cannot be an absolute standard by which "sensibilities" can be weighed and the moral high ground often claimed by those whose sensibilities are said to have been hurt by secular criticism can itself be quite vulnerable. There are for example, numerous exegeses of divine texts by their fundamentalist interpreters which can hurt the sensibilities of a modern man, even those of a modern Muslim. Thus, those who complain about critics of Islam hurting their sensibilities may themselves be hurting the sensibilities of others.
It is not that there was never any critical examination of some of the basic tenets of Islam. The Mu'tazila who, in the eighth and ninth centuries, held sway over Islamic thinking, did think that one could use reason, in contrast with pure faith, to prove the existence of God, and that the Qur'an was not coeval with God but was created, a concept that was anathema to traditional Islamic thinking, and remains so. Other than the central role of reason in their scheme, perhaps their most important legacy has been emphasis on free will and the individual's responsibility for his action. This is indeed critical stuff. They also argued that not only is the sinner responsible for his sins, but God is obliged to punish him. Incidentally, the latter requirement on the part of God also put the Mu'tazila at loggerheads with the traditionalists who considered this as something that robbed the Almighty of his power of pardon. The contribution of the Mu'tazila to critical Islamic thinking should not, however, be exaggerated. Not only were they not free thinkers in the modern sense, mainstream Islam was thoroughly cleansed of their influence by arch traditionalists like al-Ghazali.
More than ten centuries have passed since the last blip of the Mu'tazila's efforts to bring reason to bear on religion and it has been over fourteen centuries since Islam arrived on the Arabian peninsula. A tremendous lot has changed in the world since then: the modern man's knowledge of his environment and his ability to overcome hunger and fight disease set him a stellar distance away from his ancestors a millennium and half ago. The primary vehicle of this advance has been his willingness to inquire and reason. His critical spirit has often led him to question ideas and notions derived from tradition and faith. And often inquiry has led to iconoclasm. Yet, amazingly, faith has not vanished from the face of the earth and religion remains as integral to the life of even the most modern of men and women as telephone, air transport, and the internet. Skeptics, agnostics, and atheists have not destroyed Christianity.
A large degree of freedom to talk about Islam will not lead to the demise of the religion either. A matter of faith that governs much of life for a billion people is not so easily dismissed. It is also not reasonable to expect or apprehend that mere talk, however critical, would destroy any religious faith worth the name. On the other hand, free and frank discussion of every aspect of the religion should act as a catharsis for fundamentalist Islam: it will purge the system of the dross of obscurantism that has accumulated over the centuries. An uninhibited discourse should lead to greater mutual understanding of the diverse points of view that the modern world represents and can in the long run lead to more tolerant societies. By helping to reinterpret some of the traditional ideas and practices in the light of changed circumstances and directing attention to the plurality of methods for attaining given social and political objectives, it will also turn out to be a potent instrument for fighting "Islamist" terrorism.
In this brief space I have pleaded for relaxation of limits to talk about Islam. There are, however, forces at work that make critical talk about the religion already possible.
Thanks to modern internet technology, while the print media by and large shuns just about anything critical of any religion, a burgeoning network of websites is taking its place. A wide variety of subjects, ranging from the virulently anti-religious to the extremely pious, are being discussed and debated on the internet. The limits are already beginning to be probed. The process needs to gather strength.
The article is also published in Daily Star
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Mahfuzur Rahman, a former United Nations economist, is currently researching in religious fundamentalism.