EGYPT: 'Trial of the Prophet Muhammad' rouses fury at Al Azhar Islamic institution

The world's most influential Sunni Islamic institution, Al Azhar, is enraged that one of Egypt's leading online newspapers has decided to publish the new novel "Trial of the Prophet Muhammad."

Despite stressing last week that they have put the publication on hold until the novel and its title gain the official approval of Azhar's Islamic Research Academy, writers at Al Youm Al Sabee were publicly blasted by Azhar clerics and religious extremists.

"Publishing such novel is an act of infidelity against prophet Muhammad," said an official statement by the council of Muslim scholars at Azhar, adding that the newspaper "couldn’t have found a worse way of welcoming the holy month of Ramadan than by hurling insults at the prophet."

The statement also urged journalists at Al Youm Al Sabee to identify those involved in supporting the novel's publication. Azhar was not the only group criticizing the newspaper. A group of extremists hacked into the paper's website on Sunday, leaving a message accusing the website's administration of spreading apostasy and sedition, and hinting that Al Youm Al Sabee is being paid by Coptic personalities aiming to defame Islam. 

Written by novelist Anis Degheidi, "Trial of the Prophet Muhammad" tells the story of a Muslim lawyer who travels to Denmark to handle a lawsuit raised by a Danish solicitor demanding the expulsion of all Muslims from the Scandinavian Kingdom.

During the course of the plot, the Muslim lawyer stands in the middle of a Danish court defending many judgments and rules of Islam, as well as prophet Muhammad. However, the book's title and some of its chapter headings, which mentions the prophet's relation with women and his use of force in spreading Islam, have enraged clerics.

"The novel's title is very provoking. This is not the proper way to talk about or address prophet Muhammad," said cleric Abdul Ghaffar Helal. "The writer, who doesn’t know anything about the prophet's life, is just seeking fame through writing this controversial novel."

-- Amro Hassan in Cairo

Photo: Al Azhar mosque in Cairo. Credit: Reuters

Comments

[Dean Blake]

Robert - because a culture is not modern does not mean it does not have a culture based on facts and science. Science is not new, and the ancients knew a lot of things we are only now just rediscovering, if only we could fully understand the ancient texts.
Take kosher standards for food as an example. Peeling of root vegetables is required for kosher foods. We now know that washing is insufficient to remove bacteria, including fungus and bacteria from wild boar or humans who eliminate in the fields. The last spinach e-coli illnesses here in Calif. was traced to wild pigs. You'll get sick with e coli or even hepatitus if you don't peel. Science or religion? Both, if you are Jewish. I could give numerous examples from Jewish practices which have a sound scientific basis, but because it was not fully understood, was incorporated into religious practices as an extension of religious edict and belief. That it is belief based does not make it untrue, as you intimate.
The myths you refer to and do not believe in, we Jews also do not believe in.

[Robert]

Is there an argument to be made that one set of ancient beliefs based on the myths of a pre-scientific culture is better than another set of ancient beliefs based on the myths of a pre-scientific culture? Maybe the lesson here is that all cultures need to update their beliefs every thousand years ago, and turn over their ancient myths to Mr. Goldfinch.

[Doubt's Good]

Islam is against everything America stands for: separation of church & state, freedom of speech, equal rights for women. It's no coincidence that, in every Muslim majority country, these rights are missing or, as in Turkey and Indonesia, threatened by groups trying to replace secular rule with theocratic dictatorship.

Muslim apologists are either ignorant of their history or deliberately lying. Islam is built on 3 sources: the Quran, Hadith and Sira, the latter two being biographies of Muhammad. Over 60% of the Quran condemns non-believers (kaffirs) to hell and warns Muslims to avoid, mistreat, fight or kill them. Repeatedly, in all 3 sources, the mission for Muslims is to fight in the name of Allah and Muhammad to make Islam the only religion on earth.

Islam was never peaceful because Muhammad was a violent, intolerant warlord who led gangs robbing merchant caravans, killing drivers, stealing loot, selling prisoners as slaves and raping widows.

http://crossmuslims.blogspot.com/2010/07/perfect-man.html (video)

http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Muhammad/myths-mu-home.htm

Muhammad was a pedophile who groped a 6-year-old girl for 3 years before having sex with her when she was 9. He had dozens of “wives” and raped widows of men his gang killed in battle. His command that women cover themselves is why Pakistani males throw acid on uncovered female faces today:

http://blogs.tampabay.com/photo/2009/11/terrorism-thats-personal.html

[Paul Hays]

Don't pray in my school and i won't think in your church.

[Osservatore]

Islam, neither peaceful, nor tolerant.
Tolerance of Islam leads to intolerance.
More Islam, more mosques in America = less freedom in America.

[Geoffrey Henny]

It would be interesting to hear people's reaction to the serious research done by now deceased Professor John Wansbrough on the early history of Islam if it became widely known and understood.

[Dean Blake]

Although Moslems deny it, they hold Mohamud in such reverence as is reserved only for a deity. Is Mohamud above criticism? What human is above criticism, even a wrong criticism? No human is exempt from having his life examined. What life is worth living and emulating unless it is examined?
The extreme reaction of Moslems to any criticism of Mohamud and the Koren he wrote is an admission of weakness and falibility since any wrong criticism would be immediately self-evident. Or possibly it is an admission by the Imams that they are unable to defend against such criticisms and this is a reflection on their poor scholarship and skills, or both.
The life and sayings of of Jesus and his followers have been examined and critiqued for centuries and his attributes as a deity are unshaken among his believers. Why is Mohamud, admittedly mortal, and his Koran exempt from the same? I suspect it is that he and that book would not survive close scruteny.

[Bryan Hemming]

Shame on those who use religious prejudice to condemn literature they haven´t even read. I very much doubt the prophet Mohamet would have reacted in a similar fashion. How dreadful there are so many people prepared to take their prophets´ names in vain and use them to espouse the sort of violence they preached against.

It seems as though more and more people are prepared to regress into the ignorance of the Dark Ages.