Reading and Interpreting Scripture

December 10, 2006

Consider this as one more installation in the recent spate of blogs on the topic of Islam and violence. I continue to be bothered by the idea that somehow a religion is doomed to fall into the extremism of its scripture. If anyone can locate exhortations to violence in the Qur'an, then that is exactly what will characterize followers of Islam 1400 years later.. if they are serious about their religion.

Right now my counter example is Mormonism and its allowance of polygamy back in the day of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. I could come up with pages of text demonstrating that these leaders justified and engaged in polygamy, so could I not draw the conclusion that Mormonism is anti-"family values"? That would be rubbish, we all know. Whatever the strength of that teaching in the past, it has been replaced by a veneration for marriage.

When I asked a class to explain this change, someone piped up that the American government forced the Mormon Church to give up polygamy.. which may be partially true.. but that is still a terribly concrete and unimaginative way to cast the issue. Staring us in the face is the fact that religions do have the ability to change and transform themselves. Problematic scriptures and doctrines have a way of being left behind.. or interpreted in new ways. Mormons today are obviously not resisting polygamy out of fear of the government, but because elements of their traditions have been selected and strengthened, while others elements were explained away by historical circumstances.

With respect to violence and religion, there is another example to think about.. Homer's Iliad and Odyssey functioned as the scripture for Greek civilization. Early on a form of inspiration was ascribed to Homer.. and throughout antiquity these two books remained a source for Greek writers of all stripes.. historical analogies and morals were drawn from these works.

Could there possibly be a more violent scripture lodged at the base of a civilization? Hard to imagine that. So obviously the Greeks were violent and terrible. Well, yes they were at times. But the literal reading of these texts gave way to readings that were much more amenable to philosophic ways of thinking. New thinkers rarely felt the need to trash Homer (Plato being the major exception), but found ways to make Homer work for their own purposes. This would be the pattern especially with the Stoics and then the Neo-Platonists.

I am hardly arguing that the modes of thought and system of values in Homer had nothing to do with Classical culture.. they helped to form that culture. But at the same time that culture could push back and re-shape its sacred texts. To understand classical culture one cannot simply cite pages of violent battles from Homer and claim to have some kind of clear window on the culture.. that would be a shortcut to the hard work of understanding a culture that is changing through time.

So now back to Islam. Yes, the Qur'an is a violent book, being revealed to Muhammad in the midst of a tribal setting that recognized the legitimacy of force and raids. Remember, this was well before Beowulf and the Icelandic sagas.. (one can imagine what it would have looked like if God sent a messenger to the Vikings!) It was a violent world, no doubt about that. At issue, though, is whether once we have recognized that fact we have cornered all future Muslims into a single view of violence and faith.

I believe the answer to that is no. Like all sacred books the Qur'an was impressed into issues that could never have been guessed at by Muhammad. In effect, the Qur'an was expanded to meet the needs of later generations. Various reading strategies are employed in expanding sacred texts.. and this is not the place for me to define those strategies.. I will just note that I am amazed at how literal-minded all sides are these days when it comes to scripture, both critics and adherents of religions.