Muslims ‘explain’ the tsunami
From worlds away — maybe another planet — “explanations” for the tsunami begin.
On Palestinian Authority TV, according to MEMRI (the Middle East Media Research Institute), Sheik Ibrahim Mudeiris asked Allah in a Friday sermon to have mercy on “all the Muslims who died” in the tsunami. Which means everyone else is on his own. Next, the sheik railed against the disaster’s cause, which was neither earth, skies nor anything in between. It seems it all had to do with “the oppression and corruption caused by America and the Jews” – naturally.
Saudi cleric Muhammad Al-Munajjid’s take, as broadcast on state-controlled Saudi television, was somewhat more religious. Or rather more anti-religious. Make that anti-Christian.
“The problem is that the Christian holidays are accompanied by forbidden things: by immorality, abomination, adultery, alcohol, drunken dancing and … and revelry,” he said, displaying a less-than-Dickensian expansiveness of spirit. “At the height of immorality, Allah took vengeance on these criminals … Allah struck them with an earthquake. He finished off the Richter scale,” he added. “All nine levels gone.”
No mention of the tens of thousands of non-Christians “gone” alongside said “criminals” — and, of course, no mention of the vast amounts of “criminal” (and even Jewish) aid pouring into the region, most expeditiously via the U.S. military, in amounts that dwarf the contributions of the Muslim world.
Then there’s the Web site Jihad Unspun. In a feat of contorted thinking not even The New York Times editorial page would attempt, it connects the killer from the sea to Thailand’s support for United States foreign policy – that is, for “the Christian Crusaders” at “the altar of capitalism.” No word on why Allah kept other U.S. allies tsunami-free, not to mention Washington, D.C., and Tel Aviv.
None of the above explanations leave an opening for a scientific explanation of December’s disaster – not even Sheik Al-Munajjid’s somewhat hilarious invocation of the Richter scale. This would seem to be in keeping with Islamic tradition. In a fascinating book called “For the Glory of God” (Princeton University Press, 2003), comparative religion professor Rodney Stark reveals why science developed in the Christian West, not the Muslim East.
Historically, according to Mr. Stark, it came down to completely different visions of an Almighty. “Allah is not presented as a lawful creator but has been conceived of as an extremely active God who intrudes on the world as he deems it appropriate,” Mr. Stark writes. As a result, human efforts to understand natural law have always been considered blasphemous because “they denied Allah’s freedom to act.”
By direct contrast, Mr. Stark writes, Christianity did indeed fully embrace the notion the universe ran on fundamental principles laid down by God at the Creation. “Christianity depicted God as a rational, dependable, and omnipotent being and the universe as his personal creation, thus having a rational, lawful stable structure awaiting human comprehension.” Intellectually inquisitive European scientists saw themselves “as in pursuit of the secrets of Creation.”
Most of these secrets remain — including many secrets of December’s tsunami. To this day, the cultures of the West and East regard them in a completely different light. This is something elemental to consider. For just as Islam hides its face from the facts of modernity, we must not hide our face from Islam.
Diana West is a columnist for The Washington Times. She can be contacted via [email protected].