Read Online God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World by Stephen Prothero - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Stephen Prothero
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2:244, 2:267)
I found the notion of a religion designed to humble the proud thrilling. I also loved the Quran’s habit of the question—“Do you not understand?” (2:44); “Have you not seen?” (31:20)—despite the fact, because of the fact, that these questions were rarely answered.
There were also specific passages I found beautiful in expression and sentiment: “Every man has his direction to which he turns; so be you forward in good works” (2:148); and “let thy Lord be thy Quest” (94:8). My favorite sura was this short, poetic one, called “The Forenoon”:
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate
By the white forenoon
and the brooding night!
The Lord has neither forsaken thee nor hates thee
and the Last shall be better for thee than the First.
Thy Lord shall give thee, and thou shalt be satisfied.
Did He not find thee an orphan, and shelter thee?
Did He not find thee erring, and guide thee?
Did He not find thee needy, and suffice thee?
As for the orphan, do not oppress him,
and as for the beggar, scold him not;
and as for thy Lord’s blessing, declare it. (93:1–11)
Although I do not believe that this life is a mere dress rehearsal for the next—that “the present life is naught but a sport and a diversion” (6:32)—I was moved by passages about the “homecoming” Muslims believe they have waiting in God (24:42). Finally, I loved the challenge of this simple question, the question of Islam itself: “So have you surrendered?” (11:14). I must say, however, and with no small measure of regret, that I did not love the tactics the text employed to get me to answer this question in the affirmative.
One source of my disquiet is the way the Quran twists wrath around compassion so tightly that the former seems to strangle the latter. The Quran begins almost every sura with the reminder that Allah is merciful and compassionate, and repeatedly we are told that He is “All-forgiving to him who repents and believes, and does righteousness, and at last is guided” (20:82). But at least as often we are told of the horrors to come for “the inhabitants of the Blaze” (35:6). Repeatedly I read that Allah is watching me, that I should fear him, since he is both “terrible” (40:3) and “swift” in retribution (6:165), and that He will bring down fire on the unrepentant, the unbeliever, the unrighteous, and the boastful.
In short, the Quran reads like a fire-and-brimstone sermon from start to finish. The Arabic term for torment/punishment/chastisement appears hundreds of times. In fact, it is one of the Quran’s most frequently used words. So any reader will be warned over and over again of “a painful chastisement” (7:73), “a humbling chastisement” (22:57), “a mighty chastisement” (8:68), the “chastisement of the Fire” (7:38), and the “chastisement of boiling water” (44:48).
Given how much fear has driven Islamophobia in the modern West, it is troubling to keep bumping into fear mongering here. Yet as Jewish philosopher Abraham Heschel once wrote of the wrath and rage of the Hebrew Bible prophets, “Every prediction of disaster is in itself an exhortation to repentance.” 18 Great reciters of the Quran are able to convey to their listeners how their warnings really are warnings, intended to guide us toward submission. Some Muslim thinkers have even suggested that hell may not be eternal—that eventually those who find their way there will be punished enough and be taken up into Paradise.
Of course, the Quran is not unique in telling us to fear God. There is a long history of fire-and-brimstone sermons in Christendom, and the Quranic term for hell, Jahannam , is itself derived from the biblical term Gehenna . What Bible scholar Phyllis Trible refers to as “texts of terror” abound in Judaism and Christianity too. “Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? And am I not grieved with those that rise up against thee?” reads Psalm 139:21. Elsewhere, the Bible
I found the notion of a religion designed to humble the proud thrilling. I also loved the Quran’s habit of the question—“Do you not understand?” (2:44); “Have you not seen?” (31:20)—despite the fact, because of the fact, that these questions were rarely answered.
There were also specific passages I found beautiful in expression and sentiment: “Every man has his direction to which he turns; so be you forward in good works” (2:148); and “let thy Lord be thy Quest” (94:8). My favorite sura was this short, poetic one, called “The Forenoon”:
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate
By the white forenoon
and the brooding night!
The Lord has neither forsaken thee nor hates thee
and the Last shall be better for thee than the First.
Thy Lord shall give thee, and thou shalt be satisfied.
Did He not find thee an orphan, and shelter thee?
Did He not find thee erring, and guide thee?
Did He not find thee needy, and suffice thee?
As for the orphan, do not oppress him,
and as for the beggar, scold him not;
and as for thy Lord’s blessing, declare it. (93:1–11)
Although I do not believe that this life is a mere dress rehearsal for the next—that “the present life is naught but a sport and a diversion” (6:32)—I was moved by passages about the “homecoming” Muslims believe they have waiting in God (24:42). Finally, I loved the challenge of this simple question, the question of Islam itself: “So have you surrendered?” (11:14). I must say, however, and with no small measure of regret, that I did not love the tactics the text employed to get me to answer this question in the affirmative.
One source of my disquiet is the way the Quran twists wrath around compassion so tightly that the former seems to strangle the latter. The Quran begins almost every sura with the reminder that Allah is merciful and compassionate, and repeatedly we are told that He is “All-forgiving to him who repents and believes, and does righteousness, and at last is guided” (20:82). But at least as often we are told of the horrors to come for “the inhabitants of the Blaze” (35:6). Repeatedly I read that Allah is watching me, that I should fear him, since he is both “terrible” (40:3) and “swift” in retribution (6:165), and that He will bring down fire on the unrepentant, the unbeliever, the unrighteous, and the boastful.
In short, the Quran reads like a fire-and-brimstone sermon from start to finish. The Arabic term for torment/punishment/chastisement appears hundreds of times. In fact, it is one of the Quran’s most frequently used words. So any reader will be warned over and over again of “a painful chastisement” (7:73), “a humbling chastisement” (22:57), “a mighty chastisement” (8:68), the “chastisement of the Fire” (7:38), and the “chastisement of boiling water” (44:48).
Given how much fear has driven Islamophobia in the modern West, it is troubling to keep bumping into fear mongering here. Yet as Jewish philosopher Abraham Heschel once wrote of the wrath and rage of the Hebrew Bible prophets, “Every prediction of disaster is in itself an exhortation to repentance.” 18 Great reciters of the Quran are able to convey to their listeners how their warnings really are warnings, intended to guide us toward submission. Some Muslim thinkers have even suggested that hell may not be eternal—that eventually those who find their way there will be punished enough and be taken up into Paradise.
Of course, the Quran is not unique in telling us to fear God. There is a long history of fire-and-brimstone sermons in Christendom, and the Quranic term for hell, Jahannam , is itself derived from the biblical term Gehenna . What Bible scholar Phyllis Trible refers to as “texts of terror” abound in Judaism and Christianity too. “Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? And am I not grieved with those that rise up against thee?” reads Psalm 139:21. Elsewhere, the Bible
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