This commentary is by Jeffrey Reel, a writer/lecturer who lives in Hartland.
With approximately 1.6 billion followers, the Quran is arguably the most influential book on Earth. It is necessary to read the Quran before forming an opinion on its text, and on Islam in general. Not doing so would be like critiquing “Moby Dick” without ever having read the novel.
It is equally important to compare the text against Scripture and the New Testament, which also must be read in their entirety to be understood. If not read in this way, we stand in peril of being as ignorant about Judaism and Christianity as we are of Islam.
I have read through the Holy Bible and Quran several times, front to back. The more I read, the clearer a pattern emerges. I discover a world of lyrical passages in both, as well as aspirational text, beauty and wisdom along with emotional and physical brutality, primitive social codes and irrelevance.
Scripture and the New Testament record the evolution of consciousness in Canaan, spanning more than 2,000 years. Unlike Scripture and the New Testament, the Quran does not record the evolution of consciousness over time. Adherents say it was transmitted to one man in a series of sittings over a 23-year period, and it offers a snapshot of Arabian social justice and moral codes instituted around A.D. 630.
One example of this evolution of thought as recorded in the Bible is the judicial concept of an “eye for an eye,” found early on in Scripture (Book of Exodus, estimated to have been written between 9th-to-5th century B.C.). This appears to us today as both primitive and cruel, but it represented an enlightened change for its time because it placed limits on retribution where none existed before. And with the passage of time, this once-progressive idea gave way to more enlightened notions of what it means to live a just life.
Eventually, the teachings of Jesus left the concept of an “eye for an eye” in the dust. In fact, Jesus offered a sense of justice and compassion that few Christians, if any, to this day even bother to aspire to: “If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well.” (Matthew 5:33-37; 5:39, 40. English Standard Version.)
It was over 600 years later when Islam introduced what was, for its adherents at the time, the progressive concept of an “eye for an eye,” a practice first instituted in Judaism 1,000 years earlier but left behind for more enlightened moral codes.
Unlike the Bible, Sharia law continues to uphold, and enforce, an “eye for an eye” to this day. The limits on column length constrain me from elaborating on other commandments introduced into Persia through the writings of the Quran — from sacrificing animals to honoring oaths sworn in the name of Allah — that were practiced hundreds of years prior by Jews and Christians but were abandoned for more enlightened practices.
The concept of an eye for an eye continues to be practiced by Islamic fundamentalists. That is to say, fundamentalists such as the Hamas terrorists remain true to the text (at least, the parts that suit them. They disregard those passages of the Quran that command them to care for widows and orphans. As being shown today, they instead produce widows and orphans in great numbers). The vast majority of Muslims reject this practice, as do Christians and Jews in regard to the violent and profane beliefs and practices found in their respective texts.
When it comes to all religious texts, we can extract the worst — from the Quran, to Scripture, to the Acts of the Apostles — and perform monstrous acts on their behalf. If not for our own secular system of laws and civil protections in this country, certain Christian fundamentalist groups would feel compelled to act out the worst parts of outdated scriptural law to fulfill their ends as well.
Secularism keeps a necessary check on the extremes of religious dogma. Christianity and Islam represent the world’s two largest religions, yet they seem to be less than enlightened. One set of texts recorded the evolving consciousness of freedom over a span of thousands of years; the other offered a snapshot in time. Neither records the continuing evolution of consciousness since the time of their writings and, so, in that respect, are dated.
The Middle East is exploding with violence and a never-ending thirst for revenge: an eye for an eye be damned. That’s too enlightened an idea for the times. Unspeakable horrors committed by Hamas are being met with unspeakable horrors by Israel.
Israel will claim that “Hamas started it first,” but, truly, those who first started this are forgotten in the sands of time. Do you know what victory might have looked like? Do you know what peace might have looked like? It could have looked like this: Hamas had timed their massacre to scuttle the peace talks between Israel and Saudi Arabia. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced before the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 21 that Israel was at the cusp of a “dramatic breakthrough”: a historic peace deal between his country and Saudi Arabia. “Such a peace,” he said, “will go a long way in ending Arab-Israeli conflict and will encourage other Arab states to normalize their relations with Israel.” He added that it would also enhance prospects of peace with the Palestinians.
Hamas understood that alliance would have forged the first links in a chain that would eventually dismantle its influence and very existence, without firing so much as a shot. The best revenge on Hamas, by Israel, would have been a subdued and more targeted response to its attack but, instead, Israel is playing right into the hands of Hamas. Given the forceful, and growing, response by Israel, the talks between Israel and Saudi Arabia are now on hold and unlikely to resume. End game accomplished. Hamas has already emerged as victor.
Yes, how incredibly difficult it would have been to have practiced even a modicum of self-restraint before Israeli blood had even dried on the ground, but how brave, and how forward-looking, would the Israelis have been if they had realized that victory belonged to them. Instead, they are trading 1,300 Israeli lives for many tens of thousands of Palestinian lives, and the initial terrorism committed by Hamas is already being forgotten when measured against the hundreds of Palestinian children being slaughtered by Israel.
It’s irrelevant that Hamas uses children as human shields. That offers no one permission to kill them. There is no victory in revenge. There never has been. And it’s about to get much worse. Israel is uniting all of the various Muslim factions, and is about to bring the entire Arab world down upon it, threatening its very existence.
This is not unlike America’s reaction to the bombings on 9/11. What if we had channeled our grief and anger upon those who committed that act, instead of the wholesale slaughter of Iraqis and Afghans, and the destabilization of the entire Middle East — the aftershocks of which we continue to feel today? After 22 years, trillions of dollars and the loss of hundreds of thousands of innocent lives, I don’t know of even one American who feels as if we ever “won” anything. (True, we dismantled the Taliban government, only to leave Afghanistan just last year in the hands of a Taliban government.)
We had the sympathy, and the support, of virtually every nation on the planet at the time. By cooking up reasons to invade Iraq (remember the WMDs?), we turned that support against us. It was our moment to shine, and we failed, just as Israel fails today.
Religious texts of Judaism, Christianity and Islam are both beautiful and profane, and remain mired in time. It is also true that the source books for Hinduism and Buddhism — which focus more on spiritual practice to develop consciousness and spiritual awareness — are forgotten in the heat of tribal and political differences.
When it comes to all religious texts, the words of Unity minister Eric Butterworth ring true: “Take the best, and leave the rest.” For in the end, it is the content of one’s character that counts, regardless of religious affiliation.
