Happy Eid! Happy Rosh Hashanah!

*munchmunchmunchmunch*

As a true liberal westerner I, of course, don't participate in any fast. Consuming must go on, especially with these highly interesting economic times - the Wallstreet crash on monday was the biggest in history, including 1929 -

Anyways, not fasting does not mean that I won't celebrate Eid! Especially not when an islamic colleague started bringing in all kinds of maroccan sweets :) Call me opportunist, call me unbeliever, I don't care as long as you feed me ...

We had a nice chat on the essence of Islam. He said that you should differentiate between pure Islam and cultural Islam. Islam has fused with local customs over the centuries. Customs that many people associate with being islamic while they in fact have much older maroccan or african tradition. He mentioned female circumcision, this is nowhere taught in Islam. The few Islamic countries practicing it are under a lot of pressure from deeply islamic countries to bannish it. Simply because it is *not* taught in Islam.

Now this sounds familiar, I mean look at christian aureoles or the dating of christmas! I wrote a whole thesis on the fusion between christian and pagan traditions and values in Norway in the 10th century. Anyways, he very much believes in this pure form of Islam. So I asked him how he would define "pure Islam". Not surprisingly he answered that this was limited to the teachings of Muhammad as written down in the Quran and the Hadith. Okay, I said, but these teachings are very much part of a fourteen centuries old middle-eastern culture. You are right, he answered, if you approach it from a scientific point-of-view. I confess, he got me there, and I could do little other than agreeing with him.

Still I stressed my point, how do you define what is 'pure' based on cultural ideas of the 7th century AD. He agreed that this was very difficult and that he was not qualified to interpret these texts. He did offer an example though, the Quran teaches polygamy and combines this with property rights for women. In his view this was an incredibly progressive idea in 7th century Araby - and I agree with that, polygamy was born from the idea that women are protected in marriage and as such hold legal rights - in his point of view this should now be put in a modern context. Had the prophet lived in the 21st century he would have taught full equal rights for men and women, because that's what the :idea: meant. So pure Islam is about the idea not about the literal text.

A very liberal thought indeed! And one that I can fully subscribe to. I mean, that is exactly how I read ancient texts, including the Bible. It also illustrates the real issue: any religion based on a fixed unchanging text, and no that's not limited to Islam, needs a constant interpretation based on current culture.

I enjoyed talking with him. As did he, because this was the first in a very long time that he was not attacked over his religion by the UIWAO (Uninformed-Idiot-With-An-Opinion).

So now, if anything we concluded that I am not a UIWAO :)
Yay.

With that, again, happy Eid.

Now this makes me think. Bear with me a little bit more... I mean we make a huge problem of making Eid a national holiday. We strictly observe the Christian days and be done with it. When, in the end, islamic observance of Eid is in general much more deeply religious than the consumerfest that Christmas has become. Isn't it a very liberal and progressive idea to just give everyone a limited number of flexible holidays for religious festivals? In that way, employees can observe whatever festival they personally enjoy/believe in. Everybody happy! No more idiotic discussions of cancelling Pentecost in favour of Eid. You believe, you choose.

Ah well. Who knows. Someday.

And yes in the title it also mentions Happy Rosh Hashanah. As everyone of course knows, today is Jewish new years as well. So welcome to the year 5769. And if I had had a jewish colleague I am sure I would be nicely chatting with him or her as well. Pity.