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Shan Ali Shah

18110023

SS: 100

Dr. Ammna Khalid

The Salman Rushdie case: An Islamic view by Dr. Khalid Zaheer

The article The Salman Rushdie case: An Islamic View is written in July 2007, by

Khalid Zaheer, a journalist by profession. He was the director of education in Al-Mawrid, an

Islamic institute in Lahore. Apart from this, he has been a Professor of Islamic studies in Lahore

University of Management Sciences (LUMS). He works as an Islamic scholar at Understanding

Islam UK (UIUK). UIUK is an organization since 2001 for spreading moderate messages of

Islam based on authentic sources; Quran and Sunnah. Zaheer has written this article on Salman

Rushdies blasphemy case. Salman Rushdie was a novelist and essayist. The controversy was

raised against him because of a novel the Satanic verses which was accused of having the

perception of blasphemy. A strong negative reaction was observed worldwide especially in

Muslim countries right after the novel was published. This resulted in evoking worldwide protest

from Muslim scholars and fatwa for death by Ayatollah Khomeini, the Supreme leader of Iran.

In this article, the writer claims that the Salman Rushdie has committed an offence but the death

penalty for this sin is unjust and provides arguments to support his claim. In Islamic history and

laws, there is no clear punishment for the blasphemer so it is unfair to call for the death sentence

of convict. The writer uses informal writing style and well-ordered structure to convince his

audience. However, the extensive use of Aristotelian appeal ethos and lack of pathos and logos,
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his lack of substantial arguments, use of logical fallacies and satirical tone fails him to convince

his audience about his claim.

In this text, author tries to scrutinize the arguments written in favor of accused for

blasphemy. He attempts to convince the Muslim nations that Salman Rushdie does not deserve

such critical reaction or death penalty on this act. The author has emphasized on two authentic

sources; Quran and Sunnah. Since Muslims cannot deny the fact that the readings of Quran are

reliable as they have blind faith in the Qurans verses; the writer has given references of Qurans

readings to prove his arguments correct. He then attempts to explain the definition of blasphemy

and explains why Salman deserves trials and different penalty for his crime since he resides in

Non-Muslim state.

Zaheer uses a casual writing style and a clear straightforward tone throughout his article.

The use of simple words makes his article easily understandable. This shows that Zaheer knows

that his audience consists of a variety of segments, mainly Muslims. As English is not very

widely spoken in Muslim countries, the use of patois in this article could have led to ambiguity

and misconception. Moreover there is no such use of traditional literary sentences that add to the

beauty of an argument but are hard enough to understand. The straight forwardness of the article

makes it an effective one and gives the author a platform to express his viewpoint clearly to the

target audience.

Zaheer follows a cohesive structure in his argument. He does not just give all his

supporting arguments in the beginning, in fact he follows a properly organized pattern. He starts

by giving the reason behind the writing of this article i.e. by acknowledging his audience about

the Salman Rushdie case. This ensures that his readers are not left unaware about the subject in
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the first place. He goes further by first giving his strong arguments in each paragraph and

supporting each of them by giving examples from the Muslim word. For example he gives three

narratives of the life of Holy Prophet (pbuh) where disbelievers have done blasphemous act. He

describes these incidents in three different paragraphs to clarify his content. Then he goes on

negating the counter arguments that are provided by the supporters of the capital punishment of

Salman Rushdie. He denies their points by giving evidences from the Holy Quran and the life of

the Holy Prophet (pbuh). Lastly he gives his conclusion by restating his thesis.

There has been an extensive use of Aristotelian appeal of ethos throughout the article to

maintain the credibility in front of the audience. This has been achieved by giving references

from Quranic verses. For instance, he has quoted Qur'an; 5:8, 5:54, 5:33, 5:32 etc. However, the

overwhelming use of Quranic references frequently breaks the tempo of the article and fails to

prove the credibility of the author himself in front of the audience.

The article lacks the use of the Aristotelian appeal of pathos. The author has nowhere

tried to sway the emotions of the audience. However, considering the controversy of the topic

and the enthusiasm of his audience, the writer could have easily made the audience wonder about

how evil it to kill an innocent man is. Although he has given perfect examples of the life of the

Holy Prophet (pbuh), he could have made his argument stronger by explaining how important is

for Muslims to follow the example of their beloved Prophet (pbuh). Moreover he could have

included rhetorical questions like Does Islam teach us to murder the innocent? , or Are we

really true Muslims? Inclusion of these could have forced the audience to rethink about their

stance on the subject.

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The writer has failed to provide logos in some of his statements. Firstly, he declares the

only people who were liable to be killed other than for committing the two above-mentioned

crimes were the ones who were killed by the Almighty Himself through His messengers and his

companions. This infers that the Muslims should ignore and overlook all these condemnable

devilish acts of dis-believers and wait for Gods reaction. No doubt that God takes dis-believers

into account but this does not mean that Muslim community should not take serious steps against

such loathsome and wicked acts of nonbelievers. Apart from this, ignoring this action may imply

to the world that these actions are tolerable in this religion as this will encourage transgressors to

commit such sinful act again and again. Thus, here the writer fails to provide logical argument

which weakens the effectiveness of the text and hence lessens the interest of audience. Secondly,

he states There are many other authors who were guilty of the same offence, some of who have

committed it. This implies that Salman should not be punished as earlier authors who

committed the similar crime have not been penalized. Here, he fails to provide logical argument

since the castigation has to start from somewhere. Apart from this, the writer has not stated the

names of authors who have also committed the blasphemy; this absence of names minimizes the

credibility of author and reduces the efficiency of the article.

Some of Zaheers arguments speak of, if not anything else, an ill informed source. An

example is when he says that Rushdie should be given leeway since he is a resident of a state

which does not practice Islamic law. Now this is an ill informed and weak argument since it

lacks insight in terms of the scope of Islamic jurisprudence for Muslims irrespective of where

they reside. Muslims can be and are tried in accordance with Islamic laws in non-Muslim states

for their actions, may it be issues regarding marriage, divorce or other more trivial ones. So why

exempt him in cases of blasphemy. Another example in the similar context is when Zaheer
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argues that Rushdie is not an apostate by saying, he found by accident of birth that he was a

Muslim and later decided that he did not want to be one anymore. Zaheer is here either in the

dark in terms of his facts about Rushdie or hes deliberately pretending to be in order to sound

more convincing because Rushdie in 1990 issued a statement about how he renewed his faith,

repudiated the attacks on Islam in his novel and was committed to working for better

understanding of the religion across the world (the statement was issued to seek refuge from the

anguished Muslim attacks) but later he went on to say that he was merely pretending. Now this is

clearly a case of apostasy, it is a wonder how Zaheer missed it. Now at another instance Zaheer

defends Rushdie by saying that his work is borrowed and so he tries to exempt him from the

accusations. Apart from the fact that this piece of information, about his work being not his own,

puts a question mark on his credibility as an author but its also not a reasonable argument in his

defense. Borrowed or not, nothing can relieve him of the possible crime he might have

committed because at the end of the day Rushdie is the one who compiled the work, got it

published and holds claim to the novels ownership so of course he is aware of context of the

book and its implications, hence he should be held liable to all that follows.

Zaheer uses some logical fallacies in his argument which makes his claim look irrational.

For instance he uses the straw man fallacy by saying that Rushdie should not be sentenced to

death as he has neither murdered someone, nor he has caused mischief in this world. Whereas,

the main argument here is that whether he has committed blasphemy and should this be punished

by a death sentence. At another point he is wrongly assuming that Rushdies act has not caused

mischief on earth. Muslims around the world cannot bear anything against their Holy Prophet

(pbuh) and Rushdies book directly challenges the beliefs of the whole Muslim community

regarding their Prophet (pbuh). Majority of the Muslims regarded this act as a blasphemy and
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hence this created chaos in Muslim countries creating a demand to hang Rushdie. If all this does

not mean to create a mischief in the world then the author really needs to define what he exactly

means by the word mischief.

The author has employed satirical tone at some incidences. For instance, he states: We

Muslims then must arrange for millions of people to operate all over the globe in the form of

death squads to take care of the requirements of Islamic law that stipulates immediate killing

for all blasphemers. Here he is mocking at the faith of typical Muslims and criticizing those

who believe that death penalty for blasphemers is the only solution. The use of sarcasm is very

effective in increasing the efficiency of the article. However taunting the Muslims for lack of

knowledge by presenting his view will be considered sensible by very few from his audience.

It is heartbreaking to see that people are ready to protest over books, paintings and

movies but not for the tragic killings of thousands of innocent men, women and children who die

every day by so called jihadists of Islam. The lack of knowledge in Muslims about Islam is very

clear as the punishment for blasphemy that many believe is to murder, is nowhere mentioned in

Quran. Even though the occurrence of blasphemy is mentioned in the Holy Book, the permit to

kill is not. The correct way is to ignore the blasphemous acts the same way as Holy Prophet did

in his lifetime.

Overall, the article makes sense and was a need of the time. Muslims around the world

need to realize that the Islamic Jurisprudence does not allow them to punish anyone until and

unless they are proven guilty of their crime. Islamic scholars like Dr. Khalid Zaheer need to

increase awareness in Muslims in this regard. The writer has used a proper structure and easily

understandable vocabulary to portray his argument, however, some false claims, improper use of
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Aristotelian appeals and the use of logical fallacies fails the author to convince his audience that

Rushdie should not be held guilty of blasphemy.

Word Count: 1953

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Work cited page

<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/8686504/Sharia-a-law-unto -

itself.html>.

Zaheer, Khalid. "The Salman Rushdie Case: An Islamic View." Khalid Zaheer. July 2007. Web.

22 Apr. 2015.

<http://www.khalidzaheer.com/essays/kzaheer/criticism/the_salman_rushdie_case.html>.