Islamophile: Part 2

"All you young political pundit lovers out there, set your hearts to throb!"
--Jon Stewart


Fig.1 My favorite Iranian

Soon after the start of my religious awakening, Jon Stewart opened his show with that line. It is the most astute assessment of my cardiac activity whenever the mop-topped bespectacled religious scholar Reza Aslan appears on TV.

In religious scholar/Middle East expert commentator circles, Reza is “something of a Beatle” as Jon said, also joking that when people think religious scholar, “they think younger” than thirty-something Reza. I haven’t seen any other religious scholar hip enough as to appear on all the kids’ favorite news commentary shows and Facebook and MySpace and The Daily Beast and Bloggingheads and Twitter. Beatle comparison earned.

Once I was watching a documentary on the history of the Qur’an and the moment Reza unexpectedly popped up to offer his insight on the socio-political context in which the Medinians battled the Quraysh, I had tachycardia. I have since collected some of his greatest lecture hall hits on my iPod. You know, for those cold, dark, lonely nights studying the Qur’an. Reza can give me theological exegesis any day.

Fig.2 A revelation unto pop culture

Anyway, Reza sat across from Jon that day and I fell for him the moment he displayed a sense of humor about his religion. The book he was promoting, No god but God, is the first I ever read about Islam. No god but God has since been translated into a dozen languages and is frequently hailed as a great introduction to the faith. It came just in time, too.

Through Reza’s stories of fleeing Iran when he was just a boy and his vivid descriptions of what the Prophet Muhammad experienced during the infancy of Islamic history, the most misunderstood religion in my society was revealed to me with actual truth and deep understanding. What little fear I might have had regarding Muslims was forgotten. Finally, for my part, the Prophet had a face not colored by Arabian stereotypes or tainted by propaganda. It was a face not so different from Moses: the reluctant prophet wizened by God’s words, which eventually told him to lead a faithful people out of oppression and idol worship. Reza painted a vivid portrait of Mecca and Medina at the time of the Prophet and illuminated a history and a geography I had previously encountered only by watching Sir Alec Guinness pretend to be an Arab.


Fig.3 Reza doing what he does best: teaching while handsome

What blew my mind the most after reading Reza’s book was that too many people don’t even realize or accept that Islam is an Abrahamic religion, one that traces its ancestry to the Biblical Ishmael—Abraham’s first son born of his wife’s handmaid Hagar. Moses and Jesus are in the Qur’an, and are blessed just as much as Muhammad by Muslims. The story of Adam and Eve, Noah and Joseph are in there as well, along with many more stars and celebrities of both the Old and New Testaments.

After reading that, it occurred to me that Allah is the same God that gave Moses a reverse makeover on Mount Sanai and gave Jesus the powers of a water bug (among other powers, obviously). God has 99 beautiful names in the Islamic tradition, and Allah is only one of them. The Hebrew/Jewish names for God are Yahweh, Jehovah, He, Him, Almighty, Hashem, etc. and people generally don’t think it’s a different God from the one who sent us Jesus. But the Arabic word still tends to confuse people even though Christians utter that particular name of God all the time. “Hallelujah” this and “Hallelujah” that. How do we pronounce that? "Allah-LU-yah." Praise be to God. Pretty obvious if you ask me. They’d fit right in at a masjid.


Fig.4 The beauty of God is often expressed through exquisite calligraphy

My Rezannaisance set up the modus operandi for the rest of my Islamic explorations. Reza guided my internet research with his attitude of reverent humor and respect for religious history that cut through the hurtful propaganda and revealed the heart of Islamic world culture.

Can I get an Alhamdulillah! for Mr. Aslan?

Hollywood goes back to Arabia?

"The desert is an ocean in which no oar is dipped."
--Peter O'Toole as T.E. Lawrence in "Lawrence of Arabia" (1962)


Fig. 1 Peter O'Toole & Omar Sharif... be still my throbbing heart!

Just a few weeks ago, while seriously enjoying some frozen custard at Rita’s with my parents, we were discussing our favorite epic movies and biopics. We raved about how much we loved Kingdom of Heaven (the Director’s Cut, of course) and my all-time personal favorite, Lawrence of Arabia. We somehow landed on the absurd controversy of the Darwin biopic, Creation, which is currently having difficulty finding a distributor in the U.S., to the chagrin of intelligent Americans everywhere. Perhaps some people prefer the adventures of Alfred Wallace in Indonesia over Charles’ pedestrian Galapagos research? Perhaps I give some people too much credit.

 
Fig. 2 & 3 What do Americans have against Paul Bettany's career? Come on.

Intellectual embarrassment aside, immediately upon hitting this subject, I thought of other historical figures I’d love to see portrayed on the silver screen: Irving Thalberg, Einstein, Buster Keaton, Queen Hatshepsut, etc. But the first thing that came out of my mouth was: “Too bad we can’t portray the Prophet Muhammad because he had an absolutely riveting life story.”

My parents, being curious individuals, asked that I give them a summary. I tried my best to wrap it up in the fifteen minutes it took to drive home from the ice cream shop. I’ve read a dozen books on Islam and Middle East politics in the last three years, so fifteen minutes was easy to fill, but it did the subject little justice. It is a story better suited for books and, ideally, some cinema-oriented treatment.

This week, several of my usual Twitter news feeds lit up with commentary on the news that not one but two bona fide Hollywood biopics of the Prophet Muhammad are in the works. One is supposed to be a remake of The Message(1976), and the other will be backed by epic producer extraordinaire Barrie Osborne of Lord of the Rings/The Matrix fame. As a student of all religions, I am excited to hear such a development. As a student of Islam, I am cautiously optimistic.

Fig. 4 I can't wait to see who Andy Serkis will play. A CG camel, perhaps?

The restriction in Islamic culture of not portraying the Prophet is understandable, given the ancient Arab tendency to revere physical idols and imagery. This was the environment the Prophet was born into, and he had to find many ways to distinguish his revealed religion from the others surrounding him in Mecca at the time. He never claimed divinity, only prophecy, and didn’t want to be treated like a god. As a result, traditional Islamic art and architecture has favored expressing the beauty of God through intricate geometric designs and exquisite calligraphy often seen in mosques and textiles. The focus is on the written script of the Qur’an—the words of the Prophet—and grand physical expressions of the glory of God.

 
Fig. 6 Inside the Sheikh Lotf Allah mosque in Isfahan, Iran.


Fig. 7 Artisans decorating the kiswah covering for the holy Kaaba in Mecca

The filmmakers promise not to show the Prophet onscreen or even use his voice as a measure of respect toward the Islamic boundaries. I know from hours of Lord of the Rings Special Edition DVD extras that Barrie Osborne is a visionary guy, and a producer who respects the original material he uses to tell a story, so I’m inclined to trust his involvement in his biopic project. I’m also anticipating the novel tactics and plot devices they will have to conjure up in order to tackle this influential man’s story without ever actually affording themselves a single cameo appearance. Here’s hoping that a lot of research and respect goes into these film projects, and that the limitations provide the same creative inspiration to them as it has for Muslim artists throughout history.