What would Mohammed do?
Geraldine Brooks, an expert on the role of women in Islam, says the “haters of beauty” behind the Miss World riots misrepresent what is a “pro-sexuality” religion.
BY LAURA MCCLURE
Two weeks ago, a Nigerian fashion writer’s throwaway remark — that Mohammed would have approved of the Miss World pageant and probably would have chosen a wife from among the contestants — sparked riots that killed 220 people, left thousands homeless and earned the author, Isioma Daniel, a fatwa.
By and large, the West found this imbroglio baffling, and many immediately blamed Islam. But the religion, to those who know it, is anything but strait-laced. Islam produced Rumi, a 13th century Sufi mystic and poet who wrote verses such as, “When someone quotes the old poetic image about clouds gradually uncovering the moon, slowly loosen knot by knot the strings of your robe.” Nowhere in the Koran does it say adulterers should be stoned. Nowhere does it say that women should be completely covered.
The feminist queen of the Middle East
World leaders rush to pay tribute to King Hussein, but his widow, Queen Noor, deserves much of the credit for Jordan’s transformation from police state to cradle of political freedom.
BY GERALDINE BROOKS
The obituaries were praising him even before he died: King Hussein, the Arableader who made a modern nation from an impoverished patch of desert, whoturned a warrior’s bravery into the courage of a peacemaker.
It isn’t so surprising that these emotive eulogies have poured from thepens of usually hard-bitten journalists. The king was an unfailinglycourteous man — accessible, open and direct in a region whose leaders typically are secretive, remote and dishonest.
But most of these tributes breezed over the one remarkable thing hedid that may have influenced the style of modern Jordan more than any otherpeacetime decision.
