Sunday, January 29, 2012

Hitting at the Core of Faith

The media getting drowned in support of the author of a banned book was a rather grotesque site.
There were people like Barkha Dutt, she of the mediation in Telecom Ministery allocation fame, talking about it.
And then there were many more.
Now cut one nonsense out of the scene -that Muslims have not read the infamous book.
Enough of us have - do not worry about that.
And we have read magic realism also. The said author is an extremely poor imitation.
Coming back to the crux - most of the cry foul crowd consists of separation of Church ans State.
Now state is suppose to watch out every activity - particularly the public ones. It clearly can not be a party or even an onlooker when the secular activities hit at the core of a religion.
That is what the banned book sought to do.
It was an overt attack on the core of Islam.
Beloved Prophet (PBUH)'s wives are considered mothers of the faithful.
If you name fictional women of easy virtue after them then you are hitting at a very delicate place.
And one thing is very clear here - Muslims can not retaliate in kind.
Use of filthy language takes you in the direction that is not part of Islam.
But when someone is hitting at the core of Islam, and by now it must be clear to any body who cares that this was all done by design, then this can not be taken as a mere act of creativity. The author might be creatively drinking but he has not taken it to the limits of drinking life threatening liquids.
Of course when creativity has serious repercussions for Islam and Muslims then it is taken as the most legitimate target. Crusades never died - at least in the intellectual realm.