"Throwing
Stones at the Qur’an From a Glass House" by
Sheila Musaji
March 20, 2007 Source For
full web links, please see online article.
ABUSING THE QUR’AN
The Qur’an itself is often challenged, and particular verses
of the Qur’an are often mentioned as proving some particular
accusation against Islam. Muslims respond with explanations about
the context, historical background, poor translation, interpretation
that goes against all of Islamic thought, etc. This is most often
a one sided monologue that shuts down dialogue.
“Strictly speaking, it is no more correct to say that Islam
is peaceful than to proclaim that it is violent. The texts and traditions
on which any faith’s practice is based are open to multiple
interpretations, and, as these interpretations pile up over the course
of history, it becomes almost impossible to assert the existence
a unique orthodoxy. A liberal humanist Muslim can find enough in
the Islamic texts to justify a peaceful view of Islam—and
this is being done with great fervor these days. However, a militant
Muslim seeking sanction for violence can also find plenty in
the same sources to proclaim holy war on the world. Islam is
no more
inherently violent or peaceful than Catholicism which, at various
times, has found justification for both Torquemada and Mother
Teresa in the same tradition. This is the complexity that must
not be obscured
by simplistic attempts to understand Islam, and Muslims must
play a crucial role in this matter. To put it bluntly: It is
time for
a vocal and successful reformist movement within Islam, and Muslims
living in the West are in the best position to lead it.” A
Time for Renewal, Ali Ahmed Minai
MISUSED VERSES OF THE QUR’AN
Muslim
commentary on some of the specific verses often misused to “prove” negative
points about Islam is readily available:
1:193 - 2:65 (pigs and monkeys?) - 2:190-194 and
[2], and [3] - 2:216 (jihad or quital) - 2:224 - 2:282 (male and
female witnesses)
- 4:7 (inheritance laws) - 4:25 (slavery) - 4:34 (beating wives),
and [2], and [3], and [4], and [5] - 4:76 - 4:91 - 48:29 - 4:89
(apostasy) - 4:95 - 4:157 - 5:33 - 5:51, and [2] (non Muslims as
friends) -
5:54 - 5:60-64 (anti-Semitism in Qur’an) - 7:163-166 (pigs
and monkeys?) - 8:12, and [2] (beheading) - 8:55 (world domination)
- 9:5, and [2], and [3] (verse of the sword) - 9:29 (jizya) - 18:86
(does the sun set in a ‘muddy pool’?) - 33:23 (jihad & martyrs)
- 47:4 (war of aggression or self-defense) - 48:29 (treatment
of unbelievers)
There are also numerous misrepresentations of concepts and terms
used in the Qur’an and Hadith. For example:
72 virgins in Paradise, dhimmi, jizya, jihad, abrogation, shura
and democracy, etc.
Supposed ‘problems’ with the Qur’an have been ‘proven’ by
misreading, and by clever word games, for example, even though the
Bible also uses ‘we’ in reference to God, the same usage
in the Qur’an is considered an error. Although the Qur’an
is the basis for Arabic grammar, the Qur’an is accused of grammar
mistakes, internal contradictions, and borrowing from the Bible.
Verses are taken out of context and ‘creative’ translations
used to prove whatever the individual wishes to prove.
For a lengthy list of responses to various claims about Islam and
Muslims see The American Muslim article collection on this subject.
There are some ignorant Muslims who have made the
same sort of claims against Christianity or Judaism, but they are
an insignificant
minority. Most Muslims are quite aware of the connections between
Christianity, Judaism and Islam, and also quite aware that scriptural
verses
must
be looked at in context. The claims against Islam, Muslims,
and the Qur’an are so widespread and widely accepted that they
make any dialogue difficult. We are living in a dangerous time, and
dialogue is a necessity, so somehow we need to find a way to understand
each
other.
As Robin Wright says, “mining the Qur’an
for incendiary quotes is essentially pointless. Religions evolve,
and there is usually
enough ambiguity in their founding scriptures to let them evolve
in any direction. If Osama Bin Laden were a Christian, and he
still wanted to destroy the World Trade Center, he would cite Jesus’ rampage
against the money-changers. If he didn’t want to destroy
the World Trade Center, he could stress the Sermon on the Mount.” Even
if one doesn’t agree with this view, the point is that
every religion-or secular ideology, for that matter-offers the
possibility
of violence and peace, oppression and liberation, depending on
who is interpreting it, how, and in what particular contexts.
As I always
say, there is little family resemble between modern liberation
theology and the Christianity of the Crusades, the Inquisition,
and the Conquest.
... And yet, ignoring that every religion is open to multiple
interpretations, many people are attacking Muslims for making “it
sound like there are two versions of the Koran floating around
out there. If
so, what is the difference between the Koran that the Terrorists
are reading, and the Koran that the rest of the Muslim world
is reading? ... I need to have the ‘real’ Islam please
stand up.” (This
is from an article forwarded to me by a friend with no title
or bye-line.)
The same author-who says he’s a Catholic-also
says he doesn’t “want
to hear [the] history about the Crusades, or the U.S. foreign
policy crap, or . . . comparisons [of Islam] to Christianity and
Judaism.” Thus,
while wanting Muslims to explain which Qur’an we are
reading and which is the real Islam, he himself chooses not
to explain the
difference between the bible that the Crusaders and Conquistadors
were reading and the bible he has been reading, nor to convince
others why his Christianity is the “real” one.
Such a strategy not only lays upon Muslims a burden that
believers
in
other religions
refuse to bear themselves, but it also obscures the fact that
the bloodiest conflicts, like the two World Wars, have had
secular, not religious roots. Even those conflicts we think
of as religious
can
be shown to be about power and resources, not merely ideology.
This is no less true of the Crusades, than it is of the conflict
between Catholics and Protestants in Ireland, or Jews and Muslims
in the Middle East, or even the attacks of September 11th.
Interpretation and Exceptionalism, Asma Barlas
This issue of “interpretation” is
why Muslims believe so strongly that the only actual Qur’an
is the original Arabic Qur’an—all translations are interpretations
because the meaning has been interpreted from one language to another
by
an individual
or committee - and every translation is therefore open to some
degree of error. Whether intentional or unintentional the translators
own
personal bias creeps into the translation.
Any translations of the Qur’an by Muslims
will not be called “The
Qur’an” but “the meaning of the Qur’an” or “Interpretation
of the Qur’an” or “Translation of the Qur’an”,
etc. and most often will have two columns of text—one the original
Arabic and the second the translation into whatever language.
That translations vary, sometimes dramatically,
is easily observable by comparing the same verse from a variety
of translations.
There are also translations that are controversial (like the Hilali-Khan
translation, and [2] ), and the revised Yusuf Ali translation,
and there are multiple understandings of some verses. See our article
collection on Qur’an and Hadith.
There are verses in the Torah, the New Testament
and the Qur’an
(and most probably every other existing scripture) that can be
easily abused either through purposeful manipulation of meaning
or through
ignorance—either to justify actions or to make judgements about
the faith of others. The fact that it is an exercise in futility
doesn’t seem to stop those who have so little self-esteem
that they can only justify their own beliefs by denigrating the
belief
of others.
BIBLE— (TORAH AND NEW TESTAMENT)
Those carrying out these attacks on the Qur’an must be unaware
that there are many verses in the Bible that can be considered violent
and warlike, and that can be misused in exactly the same way as some
verses in the Qur’an. For example:
"When you approach a city to fight against it, you
shall offer it terms of peace. If it agrees to make peace with
you and opens
to you, then all the people who are found in it shall become your
forced labor and shall serve you. However, if it does not make peace
with
you, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it.
When
the LORD your God gives it into your hand, you shall strike all
the men
in it with the edge of the sword. Only the women and the
children and the animals and all that is in the city, all its spoil,
you
shall take as booty for yourself; and you shall use the spoil of
your enemies
which the LORD your God has given you. Only in the cities
of these peoples that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance,
you
shall not leave alive anything that breathes." (Deutronomy
20:10-17)
“Hymenaeus and Alexander I have delivered
to Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme.” (1 Timothy
1:20)
“This day the LORD will deliver you into my
hand, and I will strike you down, and cut off your head; and I
will give the dead
bodies of the host of the Philistines this day to the birds of
the air and to the wild beasts of the earth; that all the earth
may know
that there is a God in Israel, Then David ran and stood over
the Philistine, and took his sword and drew it out of its sheath,
and
killed him, and cut off his head with it…. And David took
the head of the Philistine and brought it to Jerusalem; but he
put his
armor in his tent. And as David returned from the slaughter of
the Philistine, Abner took him, and brought him before Saul with
the
head of the Philistine in his hand.” (1 Samuel 17:46 )
“Then Abishai the son of Zeruiah said to the
king, “Why
should this dead dog curse my lord the king? Let me go over and
take off his head.”... And there is also with you Shimei
the son of Gera, the Benjaminite from Bahurim, who cursed me with
a grievous
curse on the day when I went to Mahanaim; but when he came down
to meet me at the Jordan, I swore to him by the LORD, saying, I
will
not put you to death with the sword.’ Now therefore hold
him not guiltless, for you are a wise man; you will know what
you ought
to do to him, and you shall bring his gray head down with blood
to Sheol.” (2 Samuel 16:9, 1 Kings 2:8 )
"When they came into the house, as he lay
on his bed in his bedchamber, they smote him, and slew him, and
beheaded him. They
took his head, and went by the way of the Arabah all night, and
brought the head of Ishbosheth to David at Hebron. And they said
to the king, “Here
is the head of Ishbosheth, the son of Saul, your enemy, who sought
your life; the LORD has avenged my lord the king this day on
Saul and on his offspring." 2 Samuel 4:7
“That is not true. But a man of the hill country
of Ephraim, called Sheba the son of Bichri, has lifted up his hand
against King
David; give up him alone, and I will withdraw from the city.” And
the woman said to Joab, “Behold, his head shall be thrown
to you over the wall.” Then the woman went to all the people
in her wisdom. And they cut off the head of Sheba the son of
Bichri,
and threw it out to Joab.” (2 Samuel 20:21)
“At Jezreel by this time tommorrow…And
when the letter came to them, they took the king’s sons,
and slew them, seventy persons, and put their heads in baskets,
and sent them to him at
Jezreel. When the messenger came and told him, “They have
brought the heads of the king’s sons,” he said, “Lay
them in two heaps at the entrance of the gate until the morning.” (2 Kings Chapter 10 verse 6) “God has now fulfilled the
prophecy of the prophet Elijah. So Jehu put to death all who
were left of
the house of Ahab in Jezreel, as well as all of his close friends
and priests, until he had left not one single survivor.” (2
Kings Chapter 10 verse 10) “He put to death all of Ahab’s
house, who were left there and so blotted it out, in fulfillment
of the word which YAHWEH had spoken to Elijah.” (2 Kings
Chapter 10 verse 7)
“When the LORD your God brings you into the land where you
are entering to possess it, and clears away many nations before you,
the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites
and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations
greater and stronger than you. And when the LORD your God delivers
them before you and you defeat them, then you shall utterly destroy
them. You shall make no covenant with them and show no favor to them.” (Deutronomy
7:1-2)
“I tell you that to everyone who has, more shall be given,
but from the one who does not have, even what he does have shall
be taken away. But these enemies of mine, who did not want me to
reign over them, bring them here and slay them in my presence.” (Luke
19:26-27)
“Do not think that I have come to send peace on earth. I did
not come to send peace, but a sword. I am sent to set a man against
his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law
against her mother-in-law” (Matthew 10:34-35)
I will send my fear before thee, and will destroy all the people
to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all thine enemies turn their
backs unto thee.? (Exodus 23:27)
And the LORD our God delivered him before us; and
we smote him, and his sons, and all his people. At God’s instructions, the
Israelites “utterly destroyed the men, women, and the little
ones” leaving “none to remain.” 2:34 And we
took all his cities at that time, and utterly destroyed the men,
and
the women, and the little ones, of every city, we left none to
remain.
(Deuteronomy 2:33-36)
Joshua said to the people of Israel, “The
Lord has given you the city of the all silver, and gold, and vessels
of brass
and iron, are consecrated unto the Lord: They shall come into the
treasury
of the Lord. The people utterly DESTROYED ALL THAT WAS IN
THE CITY,
BOTH MAN AND WOMAN,YOUNG AND OLD, AND OX AND SHEEP, AND ASS,
WITH THE EDGE OF THE SWORD. (Joshua 6:21,23)
“And he should go and worship other gods and
bow down to them or to the sun or the moon or all the army of the
heavens, .....and
you must stone such one with stones and such one must die.” (Deuteronomy
17:3-5 )
“Although they know God’s righteous decree that those
who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these
very things but also approve of those who practice them.” (Romans
1:20-32)
“Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and
kill every woman who has known man intimately. But all the girls
who have not known man intimately, spare for yourselves.” (Numbers
31:17-18)
Deuteronomy 2:34-35; 3:6-7; Josh. 6:17; 8:2, 24-28; 10:28-40; 11:14,
13:12-18; 20:10-18 all call for the total annihilation of the enemy
- men, women, and children. Genesis 34; Judges 3:12-20; 4-5; 14-15;
19-21; Esther 8-9 can all be read to encourage guerilla warfare.
MISUSED VERSES OF THE BIBLE
These and many other such verses can be used to “prove” that
Judaism or Christianity:
Promote slavery (Ephesians 6:5, Deuteronomy 20:10);
Sanction being sold into slavery as a punishment for theft (Exodus
22:1-3); Believe in gender inequality (1 Timothy 2:11, 1 Corinthians
14:34); Require veiling for all women (1 Corinthians 11:5);
Treat women unjustly (1 Corinthians 11:5 and 14:34, 1 Timothy 2:11,
Ecclesiasticus 25:18-19 & 33, Ecclesiastes 7:26, Genesis 3:16 & 19:8 & 21:10,
Leviticus 27:6, Numbers 27:8-11 & 30, Deuteronomy 21:10-13 & 25:5-10 & 22:13-21,
Judges 19:16-30); Admit that their own texts have been falsified
(Jeremiah 8:8); Demand unquestioning obedience to political authority
(Romans 13:1); Advocate suicide (1 Samuel 31:4-5); Allow the murder
of civilians in wartime (1 Samuel 15:3 and 15:18, Ezekial 9:4-7,
Hosea 13:16, Numbers 31, Isaiah 13:9 and 15-18); promote honor
killings (Genesis 34:1-31); Encourage the slaughter prisoners of
war (Deuteronomy 7:1-2; Encourage killing of enemies - Numbers
33:50-52, Deuteronomy 2:33-36, 3:3-6 and 7:2)Luke 19:26-27); Encourage
killing of strangers (Numbers 1:51, 3:10, 3:38, 18:7); Encourage
killing non-believers (Numbers 17:2-7, Acts 3:23); Encourage abandoning
the sick (Numbers 5:1-4); Support punishment for the sins of your
ancestors (Numbers 14:18); Encourage war (Mattthew 10:34); Promote
blood feuds (Numbers 35:19-21); Allow POLYGAMY ( Exodus 21:10;
2 Samuel 5:13; 1 Chronicles 3:19 and 14:3; 1 Kings 11:3; 2 Chronicles
11:21; Deuteronomy 21:15; Genesis 4:19 & 16:2); Are anti-Semitic
(1 Thessalonians 2:14-16, Micah 3:1-12, Hosea 8:1-14, Matthew
23:13-39, Acts 2:23, 3:13-15); Encourage beheading of enemies
(1 Chronicles
10:9; 2 Kings 6:31, 2 Samuel 4:7 and 20:21; 2 Kings 10:6).
And to prove that Judaism and Christianity REQUIRE
a death sentence for the following crimes: working on the Sabbath (Exodus 31:15); cursing ones parents (Leviticus
20:9): being rebellious towards parents
(Deuteronomy 21);
worshiping other gods (Deuteronomy 17:2-5 and 32:23-25); enticing
a friend
or family member to worship other gods (Deuteronomy 13:6-10); being
a witch, medium, or wizard (Exodus 22:18; Leviticus 20:27);
engaging in homosexual acts (Leviticus 20:13); not being a virgin
on one’s
wedding night (Deuteronomy 22:20-21); having sex outside
of marriage (Leviticus 20:10-13,1 Corinthians 5:5); violating the
Sabbath
(Numbers 15:35, 15:36); marrying a foreigner (Numbers 25:6-9);
becoming apostate
or a heretic who dissents (1 Timothy 1:20)
The problem is that the misconceptions about
the Qur’an are
widely believed by a wide cross section of non-Muslim Americans.
When I listen to talk radio, I can be fairly certain that some “expert” will
be on explaining why it is that a particular verse of the Qur’an
is the reason that there are Muslim terrorists, or than another verse
proves that Islam is intolerant. It seems that vilifying Muslims
and Islam has become a “career opportunity!”
I don’t think the solution is for Muslims
to resort to the same tactics, but we do need to stop being so
defensive and
point out clearly that people who live in glass houses should not
throw
stones.
