Terry Jones’ insatiable hunger for the media’s spotlight was briefly fed last week when news of his arrest broke.
He got busted with thousands of kerosene-soaked Qurans at a Mulberry park.
As a Muslim columnist, here’s the response — rooted in the Islamic tradition — to Jones’ antics.
For us, all religious scriptures are revered. The Hebrew Bible and Gospels are sacred texts. No sane Muslim could ever disrespect the Torah, the Psalms or the New Testament.
The Quran is similar — with only one exception.
All the famous prophets of the Biblical tradition came with miracles. Without Jesus’ healing hands or Moses’ sea-parting staff, how could their communities know if the men were legit? In Islam, Muhammad is the final prophet sent to humanity. God couldn’t give him a gimmick that would last only a few years, so, according to tradition, Muhammad received the divine Quran, piecemeal, over a period of twenty-three years.
Neither prose nor poetry, the Quran claims itself to be “a Book whose verses are perfected and expounded from the One.” The unique elegance and universal relevance of the text has led to readers, like the “Life of Pi” author, Yann Martel, saying, “When you read the Quran there’s a certain voice there where you feel the hot breath of God in your ear, a great intensity.”
Thomas Jefferson used to study the book, Mahatma Gandhi used to recite its verses and Edgar Allan Poe’s longest poem is entirely based on the Quran.
Whether it’s the spiritual force or the personal touch, some elements of the Quran have always resonated with open-minded folks. For 1.6 billion people today, the words of the Quran are words directly from God.
As a curious atheist probing the translation, author Jeffrey Lang recalls, “You cannot simply read the Quran, not if you take it seriously. You either have surrendered to it already or you fight it. It attacks tenaciously, directly, personally; it debates, criticizes, shames, and challenges. From the outset it draws the line of battle, and I was on the other side. I was at a severe disadvantage, for it became clear that the Author knew me better than I knew myself.”
With the Quranic reminder — let there be no compulsion in religion — echoing in my head, don’t mistake my message for a thinly veiled proselytizing attempt.
My request is actually very simple.
Most of us are familiar with Ray Bradbury’s “Fahrenheit 451,” the classic American novel about a totalitarian society where “firemen” suppress ideas by burning books. Terry Jones is widely ridiculed when he takes the role of a present-day “fireman.”
But here’s the problem: “There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them,” Bradbury said.
My request to you is the same as the first word revealed in the Quran: “Read,” in this case, an English translation of the Quran.
Once you’ve gently broken this scriptural virginity, the Muslim pain over Terry Jones’ behavior will make some sense.
By drowning ignorance with a quest for knowledge, the curious reader will realize why the Quran continues to be so dear to the hearts of so many.
As Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said centuries ago: “Can the Quran from Eternity be? ‘Tis worth not a thought! I believe, as a Muslim ought, that wine from Eternity must be.”
Zulkar Khan is a UF microbiology senior. His column runs on Wednesdays. A version of this column ran on page 6 on 9/18/2013 under the headline "‘Fahrenheit 451’ lesson: Read the Quran"
