After 9/11, as we swept towards conflict in Afghanistan, like many, I wanted to unravel for myself what had occurred. In the course of this, for the first time, I read the Qur'an.
In light of the Florida Qur’an burnings and the loss of human life that followed, let’s revisit some of what I discovered at that time.
A Manual for Life
The Qur’an is very straightforward. It’s a complete handbook for life, with history and divine instruction, too. And it’s direct – God, through Mohammad, often addressing his wayward child/children personally, as “you,” in an exhortative voice. There's no collection of authors and little reliance on parable. For Believers it's God’s grace, power and mercy, beautifully expressed as a single source of divine comfort and instruction, guiding the Faithful through the trials of daily life.
Sacred to Secular: Historic Shift
That westerners may reject this blueprint is a consequence of our history.
Secular power has increased in the West since the Reformation, and religious influence has declined. Secularization means more freedom for individuals -- like the "free speech" which Terry Jones invoked before his bonfire. But it also means social fragmentation, since every person self-actuates.
Islamic communities differ profoundly. The mosque provides a hub; prayers punctuate each day. A deep personal relationship with the Qur’an may result, deeper than most westerners have with any modern words or symbols, except possibly (for a minority) national flags.
Qur’an: Embodying the Word
As church attendance declines, westerners lose touch with communal ritual, and how it strengthens social bonds and rouses deep physical and emotional response.
In schools like the Afghani Madrassas, students learn the Qur'an first by rote and repetition, reading aloud in company. Mohammad’s Arabic vibrates like a powerful foreign song throughout the classroom. Each recites at his own pace, but they work together. Prayer – turning towards Mecca five times daily – reinforces local solidarity while connecting students to global Islam.
Some rock back and forth while reciting to comfort and aid concentration. As in mystical practices across the planet, rocking, breathing and recitation together may trigger euphoria or rapture.
Such learning conditions create a visceral relationship with the subject. Only extreme military, athletic or artistic training delivers this in western secular life.
In addition, the Arabic of the Qur’an is considered peerless. Believers draw emotional comfort and strength from its beauty and clarity in troubled times. Great dedication ensures that translations are true to its spirit as well as accurate.
How Blasphemy Begets Violence
Islam reveres the Qur'an as the verbatim words of God in which He lay down the bedrock of the Faith -- the Five Pillars of Islam -- and detailed what’s right and what isn’t. Since all wisdom abides there, wantonly destroying a Qur’an is an act of supreme hubris. Such thinking is repeatedly condemned in the text.
Public burning of books signals hatred. An attack on the Qur’an is genuinely experienced by the devout as a personal attack, a genuine hate crime against what is most loved and central.
Some Islamist groups hold that defending Islam itself is “the Sixth Pillar” of Islam, which is another obligation, when Islam is under attack. It has found favor where there has been great political upheaval, such as in Afghanistan, or a long history of suppression, such as Egypt and Chechnya.
It's Not About Freedom
However one feels about the rights or wrongs of this belief, to provoke, out of hatred, those who hold such ideas into vengeful action is to share responsibility for what results. In the interest of our shared future on this planet, which gets smaller every day, we need to tread softly as we respond to the killing of United Nations staff in Afghanistan, and we need to expose disrespectful, provocative acts born of hatred for what they are. Tit-for-tat gets us nowhere. To be great means to be merciful, and to defeat ignorance, bigotry, blame and hatred, however and wherever they arise.
Sources
- Surat-Al-Baraqah, “For tumult and oppression are worse than slaughter"
Alexandra Brunel - Alex was born in New York, then accidentally educated at a boys' boarding school in New England. After Wellesley, she did a post-grad in ...
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