An Odd Thing
People will say just about anything about a politician they disagree with, say, on the war in Iraq. Anyone from the head of the Moral Majority to the Pope is fair game too. But when the Pope, ever so gently, raised the question of the role of violence in Islamic theology all of our free-wheeling freedom of speech screeched to a standstill. You would have thought the Pope was guilty of blasphemy. Or intolerance. Or bigotry. When all he did was raise a legitimate issue to discuss.
Even Mozart, who’s been dead 250 years, isn’t immune when it comes to questioning Islamic theology. The German Opera in Berlin just cancelled Mozart’s “Idomeneo” for fear of offending Muslim extremists. (The opera includes a scene that shows the king of Crete lifting the severed heads of Poseidon, Jesus, Buddha and Mohammad.) Now, that doesn’t appeal to me much but the point is why didn’t they mind offending pagan Greeks or Christians or Buddhists – why only Moslems?
Maybe, it’s just they’re afraid of being blown up. But if that’s the answer why is that fear so real when it relates to criticizing Islamic theology – but isn’t real when it comes to criticizing the teachings of Buddha?
Of course, no one is saying all Muslims are fundamentalist or radical or violent. But the attacks on the World Trade Center, the British subway and the Spanish train in Madrid were not carried out by Buddhists or Hindus or Episcopalians. So isn’t debating the role of violence in their Islamic theology or culture or political heritage a legitimate question? Instead of a form of intolerable religious bigotry?
When the Pope made his speech in Regensburg I thought at last, someone was addressing what may be one of the crucial issues in the war on terrorism. But the debate ended before it hardly began. If we feel free to have raucous debates over everything from gay marriage to banning the Ten Commandments why can’t we also have a little debate on violence and Islamic theology?
An Odd Thing
People will say just about anything about a politician they disagree with, say, on the war in Iraq. Anyone from the head of the Moral Majority to the Pope is fair game too. But when the Pope, ever so gently, raised the question of the role of violence in Islamic theology all of our free-wheeling freedom of speech screeched to a standstill. You would have thought the Pope was guilty of blasphemy. Or intolerance. Or bigotry. When all he did was raise a legitimate issue to discuss.
Even Mozart, who’s been dead 250 years, isn’t immune when it comes to questioning Islamic theology. The German Opera in Berlin just cancelled Mozart’s “Idomeneo” for fear of offending Muslim extremists. (The opera includes a scene that shows the king of Crete lifting the severed heads of Poseidon, Jesus, Buddha and Mohammad.) Now, that doesn’t appeal to me much but the point is why didn’t they mind offending pagan Greeks or Christians or Buddhists – why only Moslems?
Maybe, it’s just they’re afraid of being blown up. But if that’s the answer why is that fear so real when it relates to criticizing Islamic theology – but isn’t real when it comes to criticizing the teachings of Buddha?
Of course, no one is saying all Muslims are fundamentalist or radical or violent. But the attacks on the World Trade Center, the British subway and the Spanish train in Madrid were not carried out by Buddhists or Hindus or Episcopalians. So isn’t debating the role of violence in their Islamic theology or culture or political heritage a legitimate question? Instead of a form of intolerable religious bigotry?
When the Pope made his speech in Regensburg I thought at last, someone was addressing what may be one of the crucial issues in the war on terrorism. But the debate ended before it hardly began. If we feel free to have raucous debates over everything from gay marriage to banning the Ten Commandments why can’t we also have a little debate on violence and Islamic theology?