There is a problem in Islam with fatwas. First came the breast-feeding fatwa. It declared that the Islamic restriction on unmarried men and women being together could be lifted at work if the woman breast-fed her male colleagues five times, to establish family ties. Then came the urine fatwa. It said that drinking the urine of the Prophet Muhammad was deemed a blessing.
Technically, the fatwa is nonbinding and recipients are free to look elsewhere for a better ruling. In a faith with no central doctrinal authority, there has been an explosion of places offering fatwas, from Web sites that respond to written queries, to satellite television shows that take phone calls, to radical and terrorist organizations that set up their own fatwa committees.
Evidently some Muslims (as well as Muslim governments) are upset at some of the fatwas that have been issued and since there is no Pope to control what is issued, there is no centralized control.
However, while I thought that some of these things seem extremely unusual, what would someone in another culture think as they watched or listened to some of the preachers on American religious media?
2 comments:
In a faith with no central doctrinal authority, there has been an explosion of places offering fatwas
I really wish more Westerners understood this. When Norman Geisler came to campus and quoted Osama bin Laden's fatwas as an authority on Islamic theology, I wanted to yell something unkind at the stage. You can't just quote some deranged freelancer as the definitive source on a religion's theology. The word "fatwa" sounds really impressive, but it means very little except to followers of the particular person issuing it. We're not talking about Catholic canon law.
Granted, Islam seems to have a problem with a lot of deranged freelancers right now -- but none of them actually speaks for the religion as a whole.
Geisler also quoted suras from the Qur'an out of context. But I'd better stop talking about Geisler's presentation before I get upset. That was years ago.
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