“The
Trouble with Islam?”
By Zakaria Virk
Kingston, Canada
This is in reference to an
article “The Trouble with Islam Today”
by Syed Arif Hussain, Pakistan Link, September
30, 2005. Mr Hussain states that the 216-page
book by Irshad Manji is “compelling, riveting
and thought-provoking despite being no highbrow
work of history or scholarship.” I have
read this book also but did not find it thought
provoking, or riveting; rather I found a heap
of calumnies against the Prophet of Islam. To
be precise, this is what she has to say about
Islam: “Islam is on very thin ice with me.
I am hanging on by my fingernails, in anxiety
over what’s coming next from the self appointed…”
To her, the Holy Qur’an is full of contradictions
as if this is something which we have not been
told by the Christians Orientalists before. She
says, “What’s our excuse for reading
the Koran literally when it’s so contradictory
and ambiguous.” (Page 2)
Irshad Manji has emancipated herself from the
yoke of Islam. “After my expulsion from
the madressa, I did’t damn the whole religion
and get on with celebrating my emancipated North
American self .... Most of which us Muslims aren’t
Muslims because we think about it, but rather
because we’re born that way.” (Page
17) If she has liberated herself from Islam why
does she want to reform it? Is this Salman Rushdie
repackaged in the form of a self-professed lesbian?
She does not need to reform Islam; what she needs
it to reform herself.
She alleges that Islam is an atrophied religion,
yet she wants to be part of this religion because
by declaring herself a mujtahid she can gain notoriety
and make money by maligning a religion. “Why
would I aspire to be part of an intellectually
atrophied and morally impaired mainstream?”
she asks. (Page 55)
Ms Manji alleges that the Qur’an teaches
violence. “What’s that? I should understand
the context of the Koran’s violent passages?
Let me assure you: I’ve read the scholarship
that explains these verses ‘in their context’,
and I think there’s a fancy dance of evasion
going on. It’s not choreographed by conspiracy,
just by a deep-seated assumption that the Koran
is perfect, so there must be perfectly valid reason
for the hate it often preaches.” (Page 48)
She claims she has studied the Qur’an thoroughly
with a critical eye. . Regarding the veiling of
believing women she says: “While the Koran
requires the Prophet’s wives to veil, it
never decrees such a practice for all women.”
This is totally false. Read the following verse:
“O Prophet! Tell thy wives and thy daughters,
and the women of the believers, that they should
pull down upon them of their outer cloaks from
their heads over their faces. That is more likely
that they may thus be recognized and not molested.
And Allah is Most Forgiving, Merciful. [33:60]
While she is so disgusted with the teachings of
the Holy Qur’an, she heaps praise on the
Jewish scripture. “As for Jews, they are
way ahead of the crowd. Jews actually publicize
disagreements by surrounding their scriptures
with commentaries and incorporating debates into
the Talmud itself” (Page 34)
These quotations from her book should be sufficient
for anyone to judge this book as full of crap
rather than a piece of scholarship. Believe me,
there is no trouble with Islam, the trouble is
with Manji herself.
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