By Micah Halpern
I've Been Thinking:
What do you call a terror attack when it takes place in suburban Dallas? Well, you certainly do not call it a terror attack.
Gunmen perpetrated an attack against a conference on freedom of speech that sponsored a competition for cartoon depictions of the prophet Mohammed. And that attack has yet to be labeled a terror attack.
We can assume that the terrorists were upset by the depictions and by the competition. We assume that they were offended by the subject of the competition and decided to defend the honor of the Prophet. And they chose, as did the terrorists in Paris who attacked Charlie Hebdo, to use guns as their defense tool.
What so irks Muslims about the portrayal of their Prophet in art?
One might think that it is disrespect - and that indeed might be the basis of the anger played out in Dallas. But that is not the reason for the Islamic prohibition against depictions of Mohammed the Prophet. In fact, during the Middle Ages, Muslim art was replete with images of Mohammed. In most of those depictions, however, the faces were blurred.
The reason for the prohibition is a direct reaction against paganism. In that way it is not dissimilar to the Biblical commandment against graven images.
A bit of background: Islam emerged out of a pagan society and believers feared that any depiction of the Prophet would be worshiped. Islam rejects that outright. In Islam, Mohammed was both a man and a prophet and he cannot be worshiped.
Out of fear that followers would create icons and images and figures and then worship them --- Islam forbade the creation of an image or the portrayal of Mohammed.
Today it is an entirely different story. Portrayals and cartoons and caricatures are not icons and could never be seen as anything other than a lampooning of their subject matter.
At issue is freedom of speech versus respect for Islamic sensibilities. Given the choice there is no doubt that, in the West, freedom of speech trumps the sensibilities of any religion, not only Islam, and trumps, as well, almost every other value out there.
Micah@MicahHalpern.com
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