R. Bennett Furlow

Everyone knows that in 1989 Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa against Salman Rushdie. Khomeini felt Rushdie’s novel The Satanic Verses was blasphemous. Khomeini never read the book by the way. But why did he feel the novel was so offensive?

Muhammad was a monotheist. This was a somewhat radical concept in pre-Islamic Arabia. Granted there were Christian and Jewish tribes in Arabia at this time but they were by no means the majority. Pre-Islamic Arabia was tribal and numerous gods were worshiped. The Qur’an is the divine word of God as given to Muhammad through the angel Gabriel. According to the story, the Satanic Verses were given to Muhammad by Satan in order to contradict the idea of one God. Sura 53:19 states Have ye thought upon al-Lat and al-Uzza and Manat the third, the other? Al-Lat, al-Uzza and Manat being goddess worshiped in Arabia at the time (sometimes referred to as Allah’s daughters). Satan added after this, they are the exalted Gharaniq, whose intercession is hoped for. Gharaniq were a type of crane believed to fly higher than any other bird, in other words closer to the Heavens.

If this line were in the Qur’an it would imply there were gods other than Muhammad’s one true God, therefore destroying the foundation of this monotheistc religion. So where did this verse come from?

Muhammad wanted to convert the people of Mecca. By accepting these goddesses, the tribe he was preaching to accepted Islam, albeit an adulterated version. Later it was revealed to Muhammad that these verses came from Satan and Muhammad retracted them. They do not appear in the Qur’an.

Most Muslims and scholars feel the story of the Satanic Verses is apocryphal. There is no mention of this story in the Qur’an nor in any early history of Muhammad or Islam or any of the major hadiths.

Which brings us back to Rushdie. A character in the novel, who is going through a rather significant crisis, has a series of dreams about Muhammad. The novel depicts Muhammad’s wives as prostitutes and calls into question the authenticity of the Qur’an. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that this will be offensive to Muslims. The depiction of Muhammad in a work of fiction alone is sacrilege in Islam, much less a degrading depiction. What is often left out in discussing the offense of The Satanic Verses is the depiction of Khomeini himself. Certainly Khomeini was offended by the portrayal of Muhammad, I don’t question the sincerity of that offense. However, in the novel there is an imam, exiled in France and is portrayed as arrogant and self-serving. I believe Khomeini’s outrage was based on both the attack on him as a person as much as the offensive portrayal of Muhammad.

I realize this is a fairly long post and far from timely, but I think it is important for two reasons. First, the controversy of The Satanic Verses comes up every couple of years and I think that when most people discuss it they do so with partial information. More importantly and in a broader sense the issue of religion and art comes up all the time, be it The Last Temptation of Christ, The Passion of the Christ, the South Park episode featuring Muhammad, the Danish cartoon controversy , Piss Christ, the murder of Theo Van Gogh and on and on and on. Rushdie’s book may have come out in the 80’s, but the heart of the controvery, that fine line between faith and freedom of expression, is ever present and is not going away any time soon.