Book: Interpreting
Islam
Editor: Hastings
Donnan
Publisher: Vistaar
Publications, New Dehli
Year: 2002
The book Interpreting
Islam is a collection of essays by as many as ten different
authors compiled into one book, edited by Hastings Donnan. It
is a collection of essays by western academics that represent
a variety of approaches. The book also focuses on how the
perpetuation of myths and stereotyping in the West has caused
misunderstandings about Islam. The various authors of these
essays reflect their assessments on political, social,
cultural and disciplinary contexts of how the study of Islam
in the West has shaped and developed. The editor, Hastings
Donnan, is a professor of Social Anthropology and head of the
Anthropological department in Queen’s University Belfast.
Chapter 1: Interpreting
Interpretations of Islam
The first chapter of
the book is co-authored by Hastings Donnan himself along with
Martin Strokes. The chapter argues that it should always be
understood that the different exegesis by different academics
always take into consideration the following three critical
points namely, i) who is doing the interpretation, ii) for
what audience and iii) for what purpose? The motives and
demands for Islamic work are very diverse. They range from
demands for publications by university administrators to
vanity and fantasies to sincere commitments to public
education. The chapter terms Edward Said’s study of
Orientalism very important because it has been so prominent in
the Anglo-Saxon world considering the western origin of Said.
Chapter 2: Orienatalism
or the Politics of the Text
In this chapter, its
author discusses Orientalism in the light of Edward Said’s
book Orientalism.
According to Turner, the main criticism of Said’s thesis is
that the so called “Orient” is constructed in western ideology
as an enduring object of knowledge in opposition to the
“Occident” as its negative. The author then underpins major
criticism of Said that he exaggerates the amount of coherence
in the western academic discourse, and neglects the range of
heterogeneous views within oriental sciences. Turner also
points out that since Said’s analysis was driven by his
commitment to the Palestinian movement and his attention was
oriented towards imperialism and neo-colonialism, as a
consequent, he neglected “Occidentalism”. It is also stated
that since Said concentrated primarily on French orientalism,
as a consequence, he missed important variations in English
and German branches of orinetalism.
Chapter 3: Researching
the Radical
The third chapter of
the book deals with radical publications about Islam in the
west. Edwards discusses the reasons why generally Islamic
politics is associated with violence, and Muslims presented as
engaged in jihād against the west. Bernard Lewis, the
patriarch of conservative orientalism, champions the idea that
the Muslim world is seized by the resentment of the west.
The view that Islam was established through the sword has sunk
deep into the consciousness of the west and the author asserts
that Islam has itself invented the western threat. The
revolution in Iran, war in Afghanistan, beheadings in Saudi
Arabia, training camps in Sudan, suicide bombers on the buses
of Tel Aviv, attacks on the World Trade Centre and bombs on
Paris highways have not helped Islam’s image in the west.
Edwards also agrees that the research on Islamic
fundamentalism has in the past been much represented in view
of Ayatollah Khomeini’s theocratic republic which
characterized political Islam as a wholly radical and violent
phenomenon.
A portion of this
chapter also includes feminist theorist Beverly Thiele’s
argument on writing on radical Islam where the majority of the
writers in this sphere are male. She says that she understands
the fact that women in this field are a minority voice and
tells us about her experience of work in Hebron where she went
to take interviews of some Muslim leaders accompanied by a
male researcher who later took all the credit from her. Thiele
also deplores the fact that there is a lot of macho image
associated with this subject of writing on radical Islam
resulting in the topic being reflected by a male-stream.
Chapter 4: Islam in the
Media
The author of this
very interesting chapter tells us about the imbalance in news
coverage between Islam and the “other”. Ruthven in his essay
cities numerous cases of biased coverage especially by the
British print media. One example the author gives of negative
headlines is of newspapers splashing extreme viewpoints of
radical militants while ignoring the viewpoints of the silent
majority. Another example is given with respect to capital
punishment in Saudi Arabia. The argument presented is that
several hundreds of criminals are subject to execution in the
Kingdom, but when two British nurses convicted of a crime in
Saudi Arabia were given death penalty, huge media attention
was given to it and the western media harshly described the
kingdom’s criminal justice system by using words such as
“medieval tyranny”.
The author believes that “Islamophobia” continues to dominate
the struggle over representation of Islam in an increasingly
globalized media.
Chapter 5: Interpreting
Islam in American Schools
This chapter by Susan
Douglass and Ross Dunn explores the reasons why American
schools have not provided meticulous investigation regarding
Islam in schools and universities in the past; one of the
major reasons is to avoid conflict by ignoring religion in
schools especially after the Second World War. Most
universities would give more weight to history programs on US
only or modern Europe rather than introductory courses on
Islam and Muslim history. The author also states that the 1988
guidelines of United States of America have considerably
improved the part of Islam in American text books.
However, many textbooks often used words like “new” for Islam
and “nomadic wanderers” for Arabs. Some books also link the
word “founded” to Islam which is rather synonymous to
something being invented.
The writers believe
that over the years, Muslim organizations have attempted
fruitfully to improve textbooks in terms of accuracy of
content and in 1989 a Council of Islamic Education (OIE) was
created to build relationships with major publishers with a
view to assisting them in providing unbiased information on
Islamic history and culture.
Chapter 6: Ideological
Dimensions of Islam
Ilyās Ba Yunus, in
this chapter, firstly explores dimensions of Islamic economy
and explains that it encourages ownership of private property,
free exchange of goods and services and also aims to minimize
the differential between the rich and the poor through poor
tax of zakāh and distribution of the property of the deceased.
On the other hand, Islam rejects the notions of gambling,
hoarding and dealing in ribā i.e. interest. Next, Ilyās
explores the dimensions of Islamic family in which he wittily
explains that love should grow out of marriage rather than
precede it. The chapter also gives details on the concept of
mahr (which is not to be confused with dowry as it is the
exclusive right of the wife alone and is not shared by anyone)
and the concepts of polygamy and monogamy. After that, the
author moves on to Islamic politics in which he identifies a
major difference between the Sunni and Shiite sects as Sunnis
believe in the concept of shūrā (meaning that the believer
should elect leaders through mutual consultation and obey them
as long as they adhere to the teachings of the Qur’ān and
Prophet Muhammad (sws)) while the Shiite point of view is that
the authority rests with the descendants of the Holy Prophet (sws)
through his cousin, the fourth caliph ‘Alī (rta).
Chapter 7: Kissing
Cousins
Charles states that
instead of a theology that gives a symbolic picture of the
cosmos, Islam offers the faithful a simple set of performances
and prohibitions commanded by Allah and enacted by the
Prophet. The author in detail talks about his experience and
interaction with Islam when he undertook some research work in
the valley of Swāt in Pakistan. He recalls his days in the
tribal areas and lauds the generous hospitality of the locals.
Charles is mystified at how much has Islam deeply penetrated
into the lives of the tribesmen he was interacting with during
his fieldwork. He also says that for Orientalists, books not
people contained the essential truths about Islam as they take
for granted that textual arguments about Islam would reveal
the core of an Islamic society which was not true in the case
of anthropologists. He says that anthropologists now dare to
use the knowledge of contemporary tribal social structure and
behaviour to re-examine and reanalyze the Muslim texts that
detail the life of Muhammad.
Chapter 8: Islam and
the Sea
This chapter by Xavier
basically discusses the Muslim and Christian maritime control.
The author links the failure of Muslim sea warfare with the
disintegration of Ottoman fleets in 1827. Xavier says that the
impression of Muslims at sea is best of mediocrity. He says
that Muslims were so ignorant of the sea that the Turks even
lacked a specific word to designate the sea and today still
use a term which was initially applied to lakes. And almost
all of the seafaring vocabularies spoken in Turkish are words
borrowed from Italian, and words concerning fishing are
borrowed from the Greeks. Bizarrely, the chapter quotes the
Prophet Muhammad (sws) to have said: “The sea is Hell and
Satan reigns over the waters.” The writer also gives another
example in shape of the second Caliph ‘Umar (rta) declining a
proposal from the then governor of Syria, Mu‘awiyya, to attack
Cyprus by building a fleet. The author concludes by saying
that had Muslims been resolute and ventured to the sea, the
fate of the world could well have been different.
Chapter 9: Organized
Charity in the Arab-Islamic World
The author writes this
chapter from the perspective of an NGO worker investigating
Islamic doctrine and the history of Islamic charitable trusts.
In Islam, waqf is seen as the withdrawal of a property by the
owner and spending the proceeds for charitable purposes.
For example in Oman, waqf exists for the purposes for funerals
of poor people; in Makkah, the Ministry of Awqāf owns a
building for the accommodation of pilgrims while in Jerusalem
there exists a waqf soup-kitchen which provides meals to over
a thousand people a day in Ramadān. The author says one of the
most favoured objects for Muslim charitable works is the care
of orphans. Perhaps the most important reason being that the
Prophet Muhammad (sws) himself was an orphan. The writer
claims that there is a devout passion especially in the Middle
East to donate, and cites an example of Oman where so many
citizens wish to fund the building of mosques that the
ministry is trying to pass a law that there should be a
distance of at least one kilometre between two mosques.
However, at the end, he concludes that there also have been
some cases of funds collected being directed towards political
violence as there is lack of accountability. Therefore western
NGOs have a part to play in injecting technical skill and
disseminating the important principle of public
accountability.
Chapter 10: Silver
Sounds in the Inner Citadel
The major schools of
jurisprudence have no firm means of categorizing music either
as obligatory or as canonically forbidden (harām) although
debating the later Hadīth literature provides more evidence of
explicit nature notably concerning the Prophet’s disapproval
of the musical slave girls, and attendance at weddings at
which music was played.
However many groups in the Middle East have put ecstatic music
and dance deeply in their communal lives refuting critics with
arguments based on lack of firm Qur’ānic evidence and the
ambiguity of Hadīth literature. The chapter also discusses the
fact that qawwāli musicians respond to complex cues provided
by spiritual leaders and devotees who gather at religious
shrines especially in Pakistan and northern India. However,
the chapter contains very limited information on the author’s
findings and Martin Strokes merely takes a neutral stance to
musicology in Islam.
Conclusion
This book helps
readers to make sense of Islam by examining a range of
disciplinary approaches. For many, Islam has meant mobs in
streets or terrorists trying to blow up public buildings or
the exploitation of women. This image came to be associated
largely in the western imagination stimulated to a large
extent by media coverage. Islam has suffered from severe
cultural and political biases. This book gives a gist of
opinions of various western orientalists, anthropologists and
professors of social and political sciences.
Chapters of this book
such as Researching the Radical by Beverly Milton Edwards,
Islam in the Media by Malise Ruthven and Interpreting Islam in
American Schools by Susan Douglas and Ross Dunn discuss why
there is such bias against Islam in writing, media and
academic curriculum respectively. Beverly Milton in particular
agrees on the fact that the world attention is such that the
images of Muslim violence pictured of the covers of a book
sell, while passive images of Muslims in state of prayer
don’t. Given the nature of the medium, it is perhaps
inevitable that producers will seek to emphasize the
sensational aspects of any subject.
The over-reaction is
partly an artefact of history as the Muslim Ottoman Empire
came very close to conquering Europe and the Muslim Middle
East was the most feared opponent of the West. Many westerners
continue to fear these aspirations and misleadingly call the
connection between Islam and terrorism, Islamic
fundamentalism. Such a pervasive fear of Muslims is ironic
given the real political weakness of the Middle Eastern states
which have been subject to long periods of colonialism and
western influence.
The fact that this
book is authored only by western academics should not be taken
as a limitation of this book because the purpose of this book
is not to discuss Islamic issues in the light of Qur’ān and
Sunnah but rather to recognize how the western orientalists
and anthropologists understand Islam. Chapter three
Researching the Radical, four Islam in the Media and seven
Kissing Cousins of this book are in particular a delight to
read. Overall, the book is highly recommended as it addresses
a number of issues.
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