Series On Islam: "Three Faces East Part 50" - By HJS

Modi (Moderate): Radi, I hear you and your imam had a falling out.

Radi (Radical): Yes, that is right. I think he is becoming addle-headed.

Mani (Mainstream): I thought you liked him; he was really a puritan Salafist. I went to his sermon only once, and he scared me something fierce.

Radi: But now he is getting very soft. Old Ayman was drunk again last week. He already had been to see the magistrate four times. On the fourth time, they gave him eighty lashes.[1] This is the second time he has been drunk since then, but the imam does not take it seriously. The last time they took pity on him because of his age.

Modi: Radi, Ayman is pretty old, and his latest wife is an old sourpuss. She is always complaining, and I was told she could not cook worth a hoot.

Mani: The poor chap has so many grandchildren, he doesn’t know all their names anymore. If anyone deserves to be drunk, he does.

Radi: Our Most Beloved had said that if someone is drunk the fourth time, kill him[2].

Modi: Radi, have a heart! Do you remember that wedding feast we attended last year? That evening, you were three-sheets-to-the-wind with a fair breeze.

Mani: Yeah, I remember that too, Radi. And the next morning you were on a rolling deck all day. (Modi laughs)

Radi: (Embarrassed) I was not drunk, just festive.

Modi: Radi, you had a good reason for being drunk. You needed some time away from your head lopping and hate speeches.

Mani: Take it easy on Ayman. He needs some time away from reality.

Modi: You are not an imam or anything, Radi. Why are you always so concerned about punishing people?

Radi: If the imams or the magistrates do not do their jobs, or if the sin happens elsewhere, it is the task of the family or the tribe to take action.

Mani: Of course, it is tradition; however, we are now a nation of laws. We must leave everything to the authorities.

Modi: Radi, perhaps we need to tell you, no one gets retirement pay for being a vigilante. (Mani laughs)

Radi: You two are heaping verbal abuse upon me today. Calumny is a sin and Allah warned about that in the Book[3]. If I remember correctly, that should be worth about eighty stripes apiece[4].

Modi: You certainly are a real buddy, Radi old pal. I feel obligated to tell you, though, that you would have a hard time providing evidence of calumny.

Mani: Yes, Radi. We are your friends, and we are trying to bring you back to the straight and narrow. However, you refuse to listen to the voices of moderation and adhere only to the bellowing of the fanatics.

Radi: My ears listen only to the teachings of the Qur’an, and I obey only the Sharia. Modi: Your ears only listen to the voices who narrow the meanings of the ayats (verses). Surely, they ascribe hatred meant for the polytheists who denied you access to the Masjid al-Haram (Grand Mosque) by unfair extension to the People of the Book, who deny you nothing that is rightfully yours.

Radi: Another lie. What about Palestine?

Mani: What about claiming ownership of an area that nobody wanted until the Jews returned to reoccupy it? A land whose name, I might add, we cannot even pronounce.”

Modi: Don’t get me started on Palestine, Radi. I have had enough, and the entire Middle East has had enough of the lies, the destruction, and the killing, all because the Jews were returned a very small portion of the land that had been their homeland since antiquity and had been nothing but a garbage dump ever since. Just do not bring it up!

Mani: As a matter of fact, Radi, if you really want to make an ownership claim to Palestine, take it up with the King of Jordan. As soon as the land was offered to the Jews, King Abdullah seized most of it and left only 25% to be divided up between the Jews and some Arabs who wanted to live there.

Modi: Or you could sue the Brits. They are the ones who did not have the guts to say no to Abdullah.

Radi: All of these things are lies. We have always had Palestine as a homeland.

Mani: Radi, remember, you get eighty lashes for lying. If you don’t get them here, Allah will have someone waiting.

Radi: You are the ones telling the lies.

Modi: Would you want to make a wager on that?

Radi: What kind of wager?

Modi: At Judgment Day, we will go before Allah. If my lies are more numerous than yours, I will take on the punishment for both of us. However, if yours are more numerous than mine, you take on my punishment as well as yours. With Allah as judge, it has to be fair.

Radi: I am not going to make such a wager. After all, I am allowed to lie any time it advances the interest of my religion.

Mani: Only when you cannot advance it any other way, Radi. You are not going to get a pass on lying when you would be better off telling the truth.

Modi: I think some of Radi’s friends, the politicians, seem to lie even when it is not in their best interest.

Mani: I noticed that. I guess they have to keep in practice.

Modi: I don’t think politicians need the practice. But getting back to Ayman, Radi, I thought I read in the newspapers that Ayman did get another eighty stripes recently.

Radi: I know. I saw that, but it wasn’t fair. A few others and I complained that he should have gotten whipped. But they gave him only ten lashes.

Mani: Yeah, Radi, but they used eight twigs to do it. Eight times ten is eighty!

(Mani and Modi laugh; Radi shakes his head)

Radi: I hear the adhan. It is time for the noon prayer.

Mani: Yes. It is nice to pray among friends.

HJS




[1] Dawud, Book 38, 4473: “Abu Bakr gave forty lashes for drinking wine, and then Umar in the beginning of his caliphate inflicted forty stripes, and at the end of his caliphate he inflicted eighty stripes. Uthman inflicted punishments, eighty and forty stripes, and finally Mu’awiyah established eighty stripes.”

[2] Ibid, 4469: Narrated Abu Hurayrah: “The Prophet [pbuh] said: ‘If he is intoxicated, flog him: again if he is intoxicated, flog him; again if he is intoxicated, flog him. If he does it a fourth time, kill him.’” See also 4466, 4467, 4470.

[3] Qur’an 33:58 “And as for those who malign believing men and believing women without their having done any wrong – they surely burden themselves with the guilt of calumny, and [thus] with a flagrant sin.”

[4] Dawud: Book 38, 4452: Narrated Abdullah ibn Abbas: “A man of Bakr ibn Layth came to the Prophet [pbuh] and made confession four times that he had committed fornication with a woman, so he had a hundred lashes administered to him. The man had not been married. He then asked him to produce proof against the woman, and she said: I swear by Allah, Apostle of Allah, that he has lied. Then he was given the punishment of eighty lashes of falsehood.”