TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/022789/02278900.032

Text File | 1992-09-23 | 5KB | 106 lines

                ÷                                                              WORLD, Page 30

Why Believers Are Outraged


By Richard N. Ostling


    There is a character in The Satanic Verses, a scribe named
Salman, who commits an unthinkable sin. His job is to write down
the revelations of God as recited by Mahound, Rushdie's
fictional prophet. But the mischievous scribe repeatedly
changes Mahound's words. When the prophet finally realizes that
Salman has corrupted the text of his holy book, he explodes,
"Your blasphemy can't be forgiven." The proper punishment for
Salman's crime is death, but Mahound is merciful and spares his
life.

    Rushdie, whose first name is also Salman, seems to share the
character's skepticism about the authenticity of God's revealed
word. But the real-life author will be lucky if he enjoys the
same clemency as his fictional counterpart. His literary
twisting of the Koran is the central transgression for which the
Ayatullah Khomeini has condemned him to death. Explains
Indian-born writer Mihir Bose: "Every Muslim, whether
fundamentalist or liberal, believes the Koran is literally the
very word of God, preserved in heaven and transmitted by the
angel Gabriel through Muhammad." The Prophet himself, although
not considered divine, is revered by Muslims as the model of
sinless human perfection.

    Though Rushdie denies that his convoluted novel is meant to
be antireligious, its profane and satirical treatment of Islam's
origins is guaranteed to offend any true Muslim. Rushdie points
out that his work is fictional and the two most offensive
chapters merely recount the demented dreams of one of its
characters. But in the eyes of believers, both historical and
religious truth have come under an unprecedented assault. Their
reaction is especially harsh because Rushdie was raised a
Muslim. Says Professor Georges Sabagh, director of the center
for Near Eastern studies at UCLA: "He's engaged in the worst
kind of blasphemy. He's a renegade, an apostate."

    One of Rushdie's most bitterly disputed passages deals with
the famous Satanic verses from which the novel takes its title.
Here Mahound is tempted by Gibreel (obviously a reference to the
angel Gabriel) to cut a deal with the enemies of his embryonic
faith and tolerate worship of three of their goddesses alongside
the one God. Gibreel later tells Mahound that the idea came from
Satan, and the prophet orders acceptance of the rival deities
to be stricken from his holy text.

    Actually, this passage did not spring from Rushdie's
imagination: similar accounts of Muhammad's temptation were
recorded a millennium ago by Ibn Sa`d, al-Tabari and other
authoritative Muslim historians. Today's Islamic scholars,
however, do not consider the story authentic. Like the section
dealing with the scribe Salman, this episode is seen by
Rushdie's critics as a blatant attempt to undermine the Koran as
the word of God.

    What makes the story of the goddesses particularly offensive
to Muslims is the fact that it was a standard argument hurled
against Islam by 19th century Christian missionaries. Similarly,
the name that Rushdie gives his prophet, Mahound, is one that
Christians mockingly used in their medieval religious plays for
a satanic version of Muhammad. (Rushdie's character explains
that he has purposely adopted the name "to turn insults into
strengths.") Some Muslims were similarly upset that Rushdie gave
the holy city of Mecca the name Jahilia, meaning darkness, but
the author seems to use the word to signify the spiritual
ignorance that reigned there before the Koran was revealed to
Muhammad. Believers are also angry because Rushdie ridicules
various rules of daily life that the faith in fact never taught.

    The most sensational episode of Satanic Verses takes place
in a brothel and bestows on prostitutes the names of Muhammad's
wives. This is outrageous to Muslims, since they revere the
Prophet's spouses as the "mothers of all believers." Contrary to
many press reports on the book, Rushdie does not present
Mahound's wives as fallen women. Rather, the prostitutes borrow
the names and then gradually take on the identities of the
wives to mock Mahound. Nonetheless, Hasan Abdul-Hakim, a
British Muslim convert, likens this episode to "presenting the
Virgin Mary as a whore." Nor did Rushdie endear himself to
Islamic readers by naming his brothel Hijab, the Arab term
referring to the modest veiling of Muslim women.

    Defenders of the book point out that, as in the brothel
scene, scurrilous material is often not Rushdie's own
characterization of Muhammad and his followers. Instead, it is
the calumny of the idolaters whom the prophet was seeking to
overthrow. The pagans, for example, call the prophet's
companions "scum" and Ibrahim (Abraham) a "bastard."

    Even if Muhammad had been portrayed with more respect,
explains Amir Taheri, a Paris-based Iranian journalist, the
mere fact of making him a fictional character would strike
Muslims as a transgression against hodud -- the limits of
propriety. "Islam does not recognize unlimited freedom of
expression," says Taheri. "Most Muslims are prepared to be
broad-minded about most things but never about anything that
even remotely touches on their faith." In ignoring that fact,
Rushdie has made himself the bane of Islamic society -- and the
target of Khomeini's death squads.