No Light on the Subject: A Most Troubling Experience
By
Jacob Thomas
2005/10/29
I was looking forward with some anticipation to watch a lecture
by a Muslim scholar on C-Span2. It was scheduled for Saturday, October 22 at
4:45 EDT. At the same time, I could not help thinking about the great imbalance
and the irony that it typified. Muslim teachers and academicians are welcome at
our universities and have access to lecture at our public forums. However,
neither Westerners, nor Christians enjoy such opportunities in the Muslim world.
In this area of Muslim-Western relations, there is a complete absence of quid
pro quo.
The event was sponsored by the San Francisco World Affairs
Council. The speaker was Khaled Abou El Fadl, a professor of law at UCLA, who
was to introduce his newly published book, The Great Theft: Wrestling
Islam from the Extremists.
After his brief introduction, Mr. El Fadl remained seated behind
a long table, and looking down at his notes, he began to speak. The camera was
focused almost entirely on him, and one could hardly see the audience. I am not
sure whether he said much about the contents of his book. Several times he
exhorted the audience to get the book, and read it.
Rather than refer to the Islamists as extremists or Salafists
(the Arabic equivalent of fundamentalists,) he chose to call them Puritanical.
Several times the author tried to draw equivalence between Muslim radicals and
Christian fundamentalists. No light was forthcoming to shine on the theme of his
book; on the contrary, there was a deliberate attempt on the part of the speaker
to confuse the audience. This became very clear during the period of Q & A.
For example, when asked about Muhammad’s view of women, rather
than give a straightforward answer, he went off on a tangent and referred to
Moses’ and Jesus’ attitude to women. Of course, he did extol the exemplary
attitude of the Prophet toward women, by his reference to Khadija, the first
wife of Muhammad. He could not have been more deceiving in that response!
A torrent of misinformation gushed out of his mouth. Honest
questions were dealt with by long lectures which obscured rather than shed light
on the subject. The allocated time for Q & A, was almost spent and several
written questions remained unanswered. One could feel the tense atmosphere among
the invisible audience as many became very disillusioned by the performance of
the author, who tried to behave as a ‘cute’ actor, rather than a serious
speaker. The meeting ended with the moderator asking him pointedly to respond to
the last two questions by simply saying yes, or no. He did comply, but I was not
sure how sincere he was in his answers.
The irony of the whole event that was telecast on C-Span2 was
that it illustrated the confusion that surrounds the entire subject of Islam and
its relation to the rest of the world. Here we are, deeply involved in the war
against Islamists in Afghanistan and Iraq, spending billions of dollars on these
campaigns as well as the blood of our brave men and women; while the home front
is being weakened by the growing influence of an army of Muslim “scholars”
who teach at our universities, and offer advice to our leaders in government. We
are extremely naïve to believe that having studied at our universities, Muslim
teachers acquire objectivity when it comes to their proper analysis of Islamic
terrorism across the world. Very few have achieved that. One prominent scholar
of this type is Fuad Ajami, of
Johns
Hopkins
University
. Unfortunately, the vast majority of Muslim scholars who occupy important
chairs at our universities still cling to the cultural baggage they brought with
them when they came to the
USA
. What they have mastered is the art of packaging their propaganda in an
extremely subtle way, so as to conceal rather than to reveal the true nature of
Islam, and its bloody history during the last 1400 years. Professor Khaled
Medhat Abou El Fadl is a perfect example of these propagandists disguised as
moderate Muslim scholars.
This sad experience reminded me of the indelible impression that
was left on my memory long before 9/11/2001. Years ago, I read an article in the
monthly journal FIRST THJINGS that can stand as a perfect illustration of the
inability or unwillingness of Muslim scholars who while linguistically at home
in English or French or German; still exhibit the traits of the Muslim mind.
Some of them have highly important roles in the education of Western young men
and women who attend prestigious universities on both side of the
Atlantic
.
The article appeared in the August/September 1992 issue of FIRST
THINGS, and was authored by Professor S. Mark Heim, of
Andover
Newton
Theological
School
. Its title was: “Pluralism and the Otherness of World Religions.”
After dealing with the spread of pluralist theologies in the West
which advocate the equal worth and validity of all religions, Professor Heim
stressed the fact that while Westerners expect Muslims who engage in dialogue to
do so according to certain accepted rules, Muslims do not necessarily accept
such a modus operandi. As an example, he cited a dialogue that
took place between a Muslim professor teaching at Georgetown University in
Washington, D.C., and a Swiss Roman Catholic theologian and pointed to “the
difficulties [that surfaced] in a recent exchange between Seyyed Hossein Nasr
and Hans Kung. Responding to a Christian presentation on Christian dialogue
with Islam in which Kung has said, ‘It is important that the Qur’an as the
word of God be regarded at the same time as the word of the human prophet,’
Nasr made the observation that very few Muslims indeed would view the Qur’an
as other than the actual Word of God received directly by Muhammad. ‘To assume
such a view as a possibility to facilitate dialogue with the Christian world or
with Western world in general does not respond to the reality of the
situation.’”
“Kung rejoined that this was as if a Christian were to say to a
Muslim, of the Trinity, that all Christians believe it: if you don’t, there
can be no dialogue. Should the Muslim object that some Christians seem at
least to have reservations about the Trinity, the Christian would say, perhaps
so, but they are wrong. Kung goes on, in regard to the critical historical
consciousness he commends: ‘This is not specifically an Islamic
problem, because for a long time in Christianity we had exactly the same thing.
And this question was just not allowed to be asked; it was deadly. The story is
more or less the same in all religions.’ With so many bright Muslim students
all over the world, he added, it will be impossible in the long run for Islam to
avoid these questions. Kung is convinced that ‘to take a more historical
approach to the Qur’an would not damage Muslim faith in the one God
and in Muhammad his Prophet, but could strengthen his faith.’”
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