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Sober Thoughts on a Mad Writer
By:
Dr. Ahmad Shafaat
(1989)
It is perfectly natural that Muslims
should feel outrage at Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses, a deranged
novel which insults prophets and suhaba (prophets'
companions), very often taking their original names. It is also
perfectly natural that we express these feelings of outrage in
various legitimate ways. But believers never let emotions so
overpower themselves as to loose sight of fundamental realities.
They see things with the light of God.
The first fundamental reality we need to
keep in mind in that Rushdie's book is outrageous because it insults
the prophets and insulting the prophets is rejecting them and
rejecting them is kufr (rejection of God and His
Communication) and kufr is outrageous and leads to
hellfire. If Rushdie's book is judged not to be kufr,
then all the emotional reaction against it must be regarded as
grossly exaggerated and a considerable waste of time and emotional
energy.
Another sober reality to keep in mind is
that Rushdie's variety of kufr is not the most serious nor is
it the most harmful for Islam. Qadiyani (Ahmadis) and Secularist
forms of kufr are far more serious and harmful. No Muslim can be
mislead, unless he is already munafiq (hypocrite), by
Rushdie's book, since it is so openly and so outrageously against
Islam. But millions of innocent Muslims have been mislead by
Qadiyani religion, since outwardly it appears to be like Islam.
Secularism is even worse, since it has
not been as widely recognized to be kufr even though it has
destroyed the power of Islam. Most Muslim countries today are under
secularist rule and their secularist rulers command people to
disobey Allah. For example, in Turkey and some other Middle Eastern
countries, Muslim women have sometimes been prohibited from wearing
hijab, which is something that Allah has commanded. If there is
anything kufr, it is to tell people to disobey Allah's
commandment.
Yet it is ironic that we do not react to
Qadiyani and secularist kufr in the same way that we
have reacted to Rushdie's variety of relatively harmless kufr.
In some ethnic associations, members are joining the Muslim Ummah in
condemning Salman Rushdie's work. But some of these same members, do
not hesitate to befriend the Qadiyanis and the secularists and to
run elections hand-in-hand with them. More than that, these same
members have turned against those Muslims who have pointed this fact
to them and to the Muslim community. There can be little doubt that
if in these associations there were some followers of Salman Rushdie
some of our position hungry "brothers" would be busy forging
alliances with them in order to get their votes.
But maybe Rushdie does have followers in
ethnic associations. It is noteworthy that Rushdie describes himself
as a "secularist Muslim" which is, of course, a contradiction in
terms. Now in ethnic associations there are quite a few people who
also describe themselves as "secularist Muslims".
It is certain that in most major cities
in North America and Britain there are some very committed
secularists of Indo-Pakistani and Muslim origin. They are in touch
with each other and they provide each other with moral support and
ideas. They also try to infiltrate Muslim organizations, which is
quite easy to do, since most Muslims are unaware of, or indifferent
to, the dangers faced by Islam and Muslims. They are either busy
praying or making money or both.
Why did he do it?
It may be instructive to try to
understand the mentality of Salman Rushdie and his motives for
writing a book so offensive to so many people. It seems that the key
to the understanding of Rushdie's mentality is provided by a
statement by Tom Brokaw of NBC news. Rushdie, he said, thrives on
celebrity. Rushdie is like a child who needs to be the center of
attention. One of the cheapest ways to catch attention is to insult
or harm a great or famous personality. This is the strategy used by
those mad individuals who have assassinated or tried to assassinate,
U.S. presidents in order to catch the word's attention and make a
name for themselves in history. Salman Rushdie has tried to win
attention and fame by assassinating the characters of some of the
worthiest human beings who ever lived: prophets and suhaba.
What can we do?
In the last analysis there is not very
much that one can do to curb the evil of Rushdie's work. Every step
one takes has both advantages and serious disadvantages. Thus, if
you protest against the book, some people will become aware of its
evil and of the great love and reverence Muslims have for the
prophet. But protests also increase sales and make the author and
the publishers wealthy, famous, and therefore happy. Threats to the
life or wealth of key individuals is indeed effective in making them
cautious but public threats of actions illegal in the western
countries are harmful to Islamic and Muslims interests in other
ways. Ignoring the book would have been the best solution, since the
book is relatively dull and would have faded away by boring its
non-Muslim readers and disgusting the Muslim readers. But the great
disadvantage of this solution is that it is practically impossible,
since somewhere in the vast Muslim Ummah someone is bound to get
excited at the blasphemous book and then this excitement is bound to
spread like fire.
If Muslim governments got together and
used their financial power to pressure the West, the book would have
probably been banned. But the kings and dictators who rule the
Muslim world have no will to exert such power: they use such power
only against films as "Death of a Princess" which presents
them negatively. Moreover, use of
such power against one relatively less serious threat to Islam may
be disproportionately costly for the Ummah. In short, in the face of
Rushdie the Muslim Ummah is like an elephant against a tiny
irritating insect.
LET US MOVE ON
The best thing an elephant irritated by
an insect can do is to move to another place and this is what we
should do. Let us move on and get busy with the work of building the
Ummah and clearing the mess created by centuries of neglect. After
all, Salman Rushdie is a product of the mess in which we find
ourselves and which is reducing respect for Muslim civilization in
successive generations of Muslims.
There are many things each one of us can
do to strengthen Islam and move the Ummah forward in his or her
small way and in his or her small circle. Some of these things are
very easy. For example, in future elections in our ethnic
associations we can use our vote or the vote of our friends to
defeat the Qadiyanis, secularists and those Muslims who sympathize
with them and support them and to bring into the board those sincere
Muslims who will build things for the glory of Islam, for the honor
of Muhammad and for the welfare of fellow Muslims. |