Date: Thu, 04 Oct 2001 14:55:26 +1000
From: Janice Ho Chiew Ling <jclho-AT-ozemail.com.au>
Subject: RE: A Call to the Muslims of the World - Endorsed by Richard


I'm certainly no expert on the Quran, but I think we should bear in mind
what Edward Said wrote: that there is no one Islam, any more than there is
one America. Dawkins's article suggests that Islam in its "pure" form is a
not a religion of peace, but endorses killing, violence, etc.; he quotes
parts of the Quran that corroborate this. But my point is that Islam can be
given a secular, progressive spin, as well as give rise to fundamentalist
strains (as can Christianity, or any other religion for that matter). The
Quran is no more (or no less) responsible for fundamentalism than say,
Nietzsche is responsible for Nazism. 

I guess my gripe is that Dawkins assumes that there is an authentic, real
Islam--that when we distill the Quran down to its "true meaning", we get a
call to violence. But shouldn't we know better: texts are open to
interpretation, and why it gives rise to fundamentalism on one hand, or
something more moderate, on the other, results from a variety of factors
that are, more often than not, extra-textual. Interpretation, after all, is
a social practice. The Quran, as Dawkins points out, is contradictory--I
think the more important question is why some groups choose to privilege
the "let's-kill-all-the-unbelievers" over the
"let's-be-tolerant-of-one-another" strain.   

Janice



At 03:50 PM 10/3/01 -0400, you wrote:
>I'm quite surprised that there has been no substantive response to the
>"Call" contained in Wolf Factory's post of 2 October 2001.  Mohammed Ben
>Jelloun's response was strangely truncated and Lesk Andrew's ("Wolf's
>interesting post", 2 October) was oblique and personal.
>
>I'm not in a position to make a well-informed judgement about the Quran, but
>the call certainly raises a set of issues that deserve attention.  Any
>reactions out there?  This is more important than Salman Rushdie or
>Arundhati Roy sounding off in the press.
>
>In case you missed it, here's a link to Wolf's original post:
>http://lists.village.virginia.edu/cgi-bin/spoons/archive_msg.pl?file=postcol
>onial.archive/postcolonial.0110&msgnum=35&start=3559&end=4141
>
> --jwm
>_____________________________________________________________________
>John W. Marshall               Assistant Professor
>                               Department for the Study of Religion
>                               University of Toronto
>john.marshall-AT-utoronto.ca      416.978.8122
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: owner-postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>[mailto:owner-postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu]On Behalf Of
>Mohammed BEN JELLOUN
>Sent: Tuesday, October 02, 2001 2:04 PM
>To: postcolonial-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>Subject: Re: A Call to the Muslims of the World - Endorsed by Richard
>Dawkins
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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