Reply #28: Actually, I do know about this fatwa....

[punpirate]

"I inform the proud Muslim people of the world that the author of the Satanic Verses book which is against Islam, the Prophet and the Koran, and all involved in its publication who were aware of its content, are sentenced to death."

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini
FATWA issued February, 1989

I don't see that as any different than the crazed dominionists in this country saying that adulterous women or homosexuals should be stoned to death.

It may be an affront to Allah in Khomeini's view as a blasphemy, but it's extremism and contrary to free expression, which is something we value in this society (most Muslim societies value it, too).

Religions can only order people killed if they are also the state--that's why in Islamic societies, a properly-issued fatwa is a legal opinion or a legal order.

In this country, the First Amendment protects us from that eventuality, even though there are many people trying to undo that separation at present. That First Amendment was put there to prevent precisely the sort of abuses for which many religions are justifiably infamous.

When people get this serious about defending their religion, they've lost touch with reality. It's fundamentally the same as burning witches at the stake, imposing torture on another to extract a confession of faith (an inquisition), things I am quite happy to say our Constitution prevents. That may not be in accordance with Khomeini's Islam, but it is an enlightened view, even if you choose to define it as "Western humanism."

As for Yusuf Islam, I believe the flap started because he was asked what that fatwa meant, and he described it from a Muslim's point of view. I don't believe he was inciting people to actually carry it out. There's a difference, legally.

When we start tolerating the killing of people for things like blasphemy, we descend toward our lesser nature, rather than rise to our best--it doesn't matter in what God we believe.

Cheers.