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Willy Wonka’s interpretation of the Quran
Language is kinda weird when you think about it. Because language is always imperfect and often not precise. It is an approximation of what happened. And necessarily it is often a rough approximation at that.
This is from a German newspaper from the 1890s. So it shows that people have been interested in interpretations for a very long time.
The great variability of language has led to the modern idea that words can mean anything you want them to. That isn’t right. You can’t interpret “To Kill a Mockingbird” as approving of Jim Crow. Now, there are many different interpretations of “To Kill a Mockingbird.” In fact, there are so many different interpretations that can be drawn from the book that you can’t come away with one definitive interpretation of that text. And that book isn’t even all that complicated.
So while there can’t be one definitive interpretation, it is incorrect to say that all interpretations are correct and the text doesn’t matter at all.
Nowhere do I hear this more than in Islam. The idea that the text is irrelevant to what Muslims feel and believe is constantly stated. This is to avoid the unpleasant fact of how bad the Quran is.
The link above is connected to some group called Intelligence Squared, and the forum is a two-on-two debate with one group arguing that Islam is a religion of peace and the other arguing that it is not. The debate happened more than ten years ago but it seems to be coming up with all sorts of YouTubers linking to it and commenting on it now. That, or the YouTube algorithm notices that I really like Douglass Murray and Ayan Hirsi Ali. Regardless, I found the debate illuminating.
The two classically liberal Muslims argued that Islam can be interpreted as being lovely, tolerant and compassionate towards Jews, Christians and various polytheistic groups, and that the life of Prophet Muhammad can be ignored. Douglass Murray and Ayan Hirsi Ali argued that the Quran, the Hadith and the life of Prophet Muhammad made Islam a problematic faith at its core.
Douglass Murray had the best takeaway line of the night. He said there are three Islams. One is the Quran: the life of Muhammad and the Hadiths. The second is Islamic history. The third is what Muslims believe in and do in current times. Murray expressed some optimism that in the third Islam, many Muslims want to live peaceably and harmoniously with everyone else. However, he warned that the first Islam would make it harder for the live-and-let-live Muslims to succeed. The two Muslims who believed that Islam could be a religion of peace thought that the first kind of Islam could be overcome or ignored. Douglass Murray and Ayan Hirsi Ali probably would have liked to agree, but they did not.
Now, without speaking Arabic or having read the Quran, I side with Ayan Hirsi Ali and Douglass Murray because I realize that words mean something. If words didn’t mean anything, then I could have been given a book advocating for anti-black bigotry and my teachers could have interpreted the book as advocating for classically liberal equality.
But the books I was given in high school obviously advocated for being decent to non-white people. The curriculum really cared about the text of what I was reading. Going back thousands of years, the educated classes have been obsessed with what their kids read as well as what their teachers taught.
This is a woman from a fresco discovered in ancient Pompei with wax tablets and a stylus. I like to think her expression shows how consequential the act of writing can be.
It would be an interesting, if unstable, world if what something actually said didn’t have to matter. A realm of pure interpretation, if you will. In fact, living in a world of pure interpretation is quite like living in a world of… “Pure Imagination.”
Hold your breath,
let’s take a dive,
the text comes alive
Come with me and you’ll be
in a world of pure interpretation
Take a look and you’ll see
into modern imagination
We’ll begin with a spin
on a thousand years of Jihad’s interpretations
And our will – will defy
old explanations
Chorus 1
If you want a liberal paradise
read Derrida and deconstrue it
Any sex you want to do it
Want to change the word
There’s nothing to it
<whimsical music starts up>
There is no real life I know to compare with pure interpretation
Living there, you’ll be free, if you truly wish to be
Chorus 2
If you want a liberal paradise
read Derrida and deconstrue it
Any sex you want to do it
Want to change the word
There’s nothing to it
Chorus 1 reinterpreted
There is no real life I know to compare with pure interpretation
Living there we’ll be free if only it could be (sung with greater sadness then in the original)
What makes the song a perfect fit for the idea of infinite interpretations (spoken musically) is that the song and the argument are about a perfect world untethered from anything. The song is much better than the idea, because, unlike the idea, it does not pretend to be anything other than a beautiful fantasy. Something to be indulged in but never taken seriously.
Published in General
Pure genius!
I suppose that some of the same charges can be leveled at the Bible, particularly the Old Testament. If you look hard enough, you can find justification for a lot of bad behavior, depending on your interpretation. I understand at various times in history, Islam in some places was quite tolerant. I believe that religion is a force for good in the world, but at this point in history, religions that advocate domination through the sword must be severely curtailed.
Great Headline for the Post.
The thing is that the text is always there. Thus, some will always come back to the first Islam.
Let’s hope not.
I still never have seen a Koran. Anywhere. But then it’s been over ten years since my last visit to Turkey.
It’s not a matter of hope. It’s a matter of history. Wahhabism was an Eighteenth Century revival of a Thirteenth/Fourteenth Century movement, which referred to going back to the three founding generations. And it keeps happening. Guess what happened in Saudi Arabia in the Twentieth Century? That’s right, the movement became more widespread again. Why does this keep happening? Because it’s right there in the foundational books. And what is preached in those foundational books?
We refer to the Pacific Ring of Fire where subducting plates cause volcanoes. Islam has a ring of fire around it because its foundational beliefs demand the fire and sword. Thus, they clash with Christians, Buddhists, Jews, Hindus, and everyone else around them.
You can get an English translation for about $6 on Amazon. Or, you can spend much more.
If Turks aren’t reading the Koran, I’m not sure why I should.
I hear they make good flower presses.
That would likely be considered “desecration” and they seem to get rather upset about it.
This was a very good movie. I still remember it more than two decades later. In it there is a Sufi Turk who befriends a young boy whose father is always working. Monsieur Ibrahim possesses a deep spirituality and he takes the child on a tour through Turkey and it’s various religions. The smell of candles was orthodox while the smell of the Catholics was incense. I forget the way Mosque smelled but it was a wonderful cinematic scene.
By my puritanical American standards I didn’t get the boy visiting brothels as part of his development seemed pretty weird and I wouldn’t mind if it was cut. But it was still shot without any graphic depictions of anything and was surprisingly classy.
Muslims can be very lovely if they don’t take the Quran seriously. But in every faith, there is a pull to return to the origins of the religion and a desire to read holy text as accurately as possible. Were Monsieur Ibrahim in Paris today I think he would be worried about advertising his eccentric Sufi beliefs. A pity.
Ditto, and the full title of the book was Mister Ibrahim and the Flowers of the Koran. One of his taglines is, “I know what is in my Koran.” Near the end, after he dies, the Jewish kid looks in the Koran to find dried flowers pressed within the pages. It gives the line about knowing what is in his Koran a whole different meaning, and also is why I referred to flower presses here.
Looks familiar. I think she wrote on Ricochet for a while.
We’re not that old.
There is a story that the Clinton administration, in preparation for a speech Bill was to give, wanted a quote from the Quran about how we should all live together in peace and harmony. They went to the late Bernard Lewis, the doyen of Middle eastern history. He cheerfully provided what they needed. A few months later, Bill was re-visiting the “harmony” topic and wanted another Quran quote. They went back to Lewis. He provided the same quote as before. The Clinton team protested … they had already used this one they needed a different one. Lewis replied that there wasn’t another one.
I skimmed through the Quran a few years back. While I didn’t read it closely, I didn’t see anything that would disagree with Lewis’ assessment.
I heartily recommend Lewis’ book “What Went Wrong?”
Then I shall not post a photo of the wooden “desk” used in African schools for centuries. It’s made for pupils who are standing for lessons, is about 20 inches long and 12 inches wide. Fitted to the top is a leather handle, which is held by one hand. The lower part of it is curved, and shaped to fit against the waist, so that the other hand can be used to write on the piece of paper which is placed on it. On it are inscribed the first couple of verses of the Koran.
One such thing occupies a place on the wall in my living room as I comment here. It’s actually a very useful device, one I’ve used for its original purpose on a number of occasions when I’ve needed that “flat, hard, surface” on which to write.
However, its principal use in my family for over half-a-century has been as a cheeseboard for social occasions.
That book series “The History of Private Life” used it one on of their covers, I think. That would explain the familiarity if you were in the non-fiction sections of bookstores in the late 80s and early 90s.
It (or a very similar image) actually was used by a former Ricochet member–Hypatia–as her avatar for a number of years. I suspect that’s what @randyweivoda was referring to.