What is truth, really?  How do we separate what we’ve been told in childhood from truth?  And how do we find the truth as adults?  For some of us, finding it is imperative, because somewhere, buried deep in our bone marrow is the feeling that some things are true, some are false.  The difficult question is: is it just a feeling or is it truth?

I’ve just finished my first book on Muhammad, written in his favorite wife’s voice–Aisha, the one he married when she was nine-years-old.  She was literate, as he was not, and she is said to have written down over 1000 revelations of Muhammad for his followers.  Mother of the Believers is a fictional account; however, Pasha, the author and a devout Muslim himself, researched extensively, so I’ll assume much of it is based in fact (other than her inner thoughtful life, which no one can know).

I’m going to start at the beginning, guessing that you are like me–that you might not know much about Muhammad.  I’ll take my first impressions and offer them up to you.  Then I’ll lead you through my slow and surprising revelations as I was reading the book.  So, in order to benefit from this post, you’ll have to read the whole thing.  Even as long as it is.

The book begins with Aisha’s birth, and as she is telling about the almost-death of her mother, she flashes back to tell about Muhammad’s life before his vision and what brought him to be God’s Messenger–all of it very reasonable and interesting.

A snippet:

“Muhammad had never been interested in the religion of their people.  The crude idols that the Arabs worshiped had repelled him, and he was drawn instinctively to the People of the Book, Jews and Christians, and their remarkable stories of the One God who stood for justice and compassion.  And the People of the Book would remind him that this God had once also been worshiped by the ancestors of the Arabs, who had been descended from the prophet Abraham through his firstborn son, Ishmael.  This God, whom the Jews called Elohim, was still known to the Arabs as Allah, the Creator God.  But the Arabs now worshiped hundreds of other deities that were seen as intermediaries of Allah, who was too powerful and remote to care about the daily lives of men.  Every tribe in the desert had its own god, and each held its god out to be better than the others, leading to division and warfare among the clans.  These competing deities, like the untamed elements of nature they symbolized, were capricious and lacked any sense of morality or justice.  Seeing the chaos engendered by these warring and cruel gods, Muhammad longed for his people to return to the old ways of Abraham and his simple, pure vision of Allah.”

Nothing jarring there.  I’m thinking, “Wow.  I never knew this….”

Then Muhammad, a young man of exceptional reputation–good, kindly, and giving–had a vision on Mount Hira.  He worried and fretted, “convinced that he was mad or possessed by a djinn.”  But his first wife (who died long before Aisha married Muhammad) had comforted him.  She “told him that a man of his character would not be misled or abandoned by Allah, and that his experience must be true.  Over the next several months, the visions intensified, and the angel told Muhammad that he had been chosen to follow in his ancestor Abraham’s path–to abolish idolatry and establish the worship of the One God among the Arabs, who would then spread the faith of their forefather to all mankind.”

As I read this, I got to thinking about Paul’s being struck down on his way to Damascus, supposedly “blinded” by God, asking why Paul was persecuting Him (God).  I got to thinking about Peter and his vision of clean  and unclean animals jumbled up in a white sheet dropped from heaven…and God saying that what He has cleansed should not be called common or unclean.

These are no different, in my opinion, than what Muhammad may have been experiencing.  Is that offensive to say?  I don’t think so.  If you look at it logically, who says that one person (whom we might revere) can get visions and messages from God, but another cannot?  No one.

Okay, moving along…

Aisha’s father, Abu Bakr, too, trusted Muhammad’s wisdom.  “Allah, the God who had spoken to Moses and Jesus, had not forgotten the Arabs, the children of Abraham.  Abu Bakr had know Muhammad for over thirty years and had never had reason to doubt one word spoken by Al-Amin.  If God would choose anyone to prophesy to the Arab nation, it would be this man.  It had to be this man.”

The way for Muhammad was not easy.  He was touting the One True God.  He was breaking all rules of Arab culture–the pride, greed, and power struggles that had existed for centuries.  Many people wanted him killed and discarded.

Muhammad went through some difficult times (I imagine this is true, considering that you’re claiming something that is foreign to everyone else!).  Aisha explains: “If these visions were real, if what he saw was truly an angel and not some mischievous desert sprite mocking him, then why had his God abandoned him and left him without any light of hope?

“But as we all learned, the Divine is a teacher who sometimes shows men what they are made of by taking away everything they have, so that the truth of their character is finally revealed.”

Such insight, I think.  Such wisdom.

Let’s continue…

As in the birth and life of all religions, there are problems with communication and understanding–also, logistical questions.  Aisha again: “I shook my head in frustration as I remembered the gentle wisdom of my husband, who had always preached a religion of moderation.  The stubborn resistance of some Muslims to common sense and their obsession with the letter of the law while ignoring its spirit has always been the bane of our community.  With the Messenger no longer alive to restrain such foolishness, I fear that dogmatism and extremism may only worsen with time.”

Sound familiar?

“My husband claimed to be a prophet in the line of Moses and the Jewish messengers.  He had ordered us to pray toward Jerusalem and even fasted on the Jewish Day of Atonement, which they called Yom Kippur and we knew as Ashura.  And yet the Jews had made it clear that he could not possibly be a prophet of their God, since they alone were the Chosen People.  The Arabs, even though they were descended from Abraham through his first son, Ishmael, were not included in God’s covenant.  The Messenger had been shocked and saddened by their rejection.  To him, God’s message was for all mankind.  How could it be that only one tribe would be privy to His Word?  And yet the Jews held steadfast to their ancient beliefs and did not shy away from branding Muhammad as an impostor.”

“The Prophet warned that some of the Jews–although, he stressed, not all–had come to see themselves as deserving of God’s blessings as a birthright, without any corresponding moral obligations on their own end, and this had led to their downfall throughout history.  Islam had come to erase that sense of tribal entitlement and replace it with individual moral responsibility.”

This makes sense to me, for some reason.  I would like to know if God chose the Jewish people, or if they gave that designation to themselves.  After all, hasn’t every civilization and religious sect done this?  We’re-special-and-you’re-not sort of thing?  Think of slavery, warfare, genocide…the list is too long for this post.  I would think that if God existed–and I believe He does–He would welcome everyone into the “fold”–which, in reality, is the message of Jesus…and Buddha…and Muhammad.

Are you still with me?  Or are you shifting in your chair?

When Muhammad’s Muslim army conquers their former Jewish allies (who betrayed them), the Prophet tells them they will be punished according to their Torah.  Aloud, the rabbi reads their punishment written in Deuteronomy: “…And if it [the city] will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it.  And when the Lord thy God hath delivered it into thine hand, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword.  But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the Lord thy God hath given thee.”

But I have to go into more detail here, because I think it exposes what could be wrong with many religious commandments.  A couple of pages later, Aisha is troubled by the severe punishment, and Muhammad has to explain his reasoning behind having them read their punishment.

“‘The rabbi read the wrong section of the Book, as I had asked him to.’

“My eyes went wide.

“‘I don’t understand.’

“The Messenger squeezed my fingers and I could feel the depth of emotion that he was suppressing.

“‘The law of Moses he read was a punishment only for distant tribes who fought the Children of Israel from other lands.  It was not the punishment for a neighboring tribe.’

“I looked up at my husband, unsure of what he was holding back.

“‘What would have been the punishment in the Torah for a neighboring tribe?’

“The Prophet looked at me and I saw lines of great sadness in his eyes.

“‘The rabbi read to me the verses that followed,’ he said.  ‘The Book says that in the cities that are near, the judgment is to kill everything that breathes.’

“I was stunned and shuddered at the horror.  Could the God of Moses, the God of love and justice that we worshipped as Allah, be so cruel that He would call upon the Children of Israel even to slay women and children?”

My question is this: was it God who came up with these rules, or was it mankind who was greedy for more land, more wealth, more power?  The suspicious fact here is that there’s a different punishment for a city, based on if it was close or distant.  The punishment for the next door neighbor is harsher.  How convenient!  I’m sure the rivalry is much stronger with a neighboring city…

Knowing how civilizations are built and destroyed, I would wager a guess that many religious commandments stem from whatever benefit the “commandment maker.”  My hypothesis, of course.

In all my research for Eve, I was astounded to see that the Sumerians had rules similar to those listed in Leviticus.  As a child (and as an adult), I’ve always thought the litany of such decrees was ridiculous and a little silly.  Well, news flash: the Sumerians had the same types of laws, and they did NOT believe in One True God.  So what gives?  Might the Israelites have used the rules of other nations to make their religion and God seem more legit?  It’s a possibility.

And this is where Muhammad’s best efforts (and all black-and-white religious decrees) start to unravel, in my opinion.

Imagine a new religion, that’s just starting out.  A man steals from another man.  What’s the consequence?  They trudge to the originator of the truth–the one hearing the voice of God.  “What is the penalty?” they ask.  Well, obviously a commandment or law needs to be laid down, not only for this time, but for all the times this will happen in the future.  A law is made.  The people either memorize it, or set it down in stone (Moses).  This goes on and on, until years later, the number of detailed laws cover everything from how to clean yourself after menstruation to how to offer up sacrifices to please the Lord.

Well, Muhammad had the same problem.  When confronted with such a question, he would go into a seizure-like trance, when he would experience a revelation.  Suspiciously (in my opinion), the revelations were convenient…for Muhammad.  When Muhammad fell in love with his adopted son’s wife, he announced that “Allah had nullified the oldest of Arab taboos that had made the sons of the flesh and the sons of oath equal in the eyes of men.”  In other words, Zayd (his adopted son) would no longer be his son, and he would no longer have a wife and family.  Thus, this would free up Muhammad to marry Zayd’s wife…which he promptly did.

Hmmm…

When Aisha is angered that Muhammad is wedding another beautiful wife and proceeds to do a little flirting at the wedding celebration, Muhammad has another revelation.  Clever little man…

“O wives of the Prophet, you are not like any other women.
If you fear God, do not speak softly
In case the sick at heart should lust after you
But speak in a firm manner.
Stay at home and do not flaunt your finery
As they did in the Days of Innocence.”

But that’s not enough–to sequester his wives away in their compartments, for no one to see.

“When you ask his wives something, do so from behind a curtain.
This is purer for your hearts and theirs.
It is not right for you to offend God’s Messenger
Just as you should never marry his wives after him.
That would be an enormous sin in the sight of God.”

Really?  His wives are bundled away behind yards of fabric…now they can’t even marry anyone else, after he dies?

Hey…something’s fishy there…don’t you agree?

Laws and edicts like this shine a bright light on all past, present, and future “religious” rules.  Why were they made?  Who made them?  What was the political climate at the time they were made?

What about Paul’s rules for women in the New Testament?  Do they apply to us today, or where they intended for the culture they were written for?  I lean toward the latter.

Do any of us churchgoing people even contemplate any of this stuff?  I think we should.

This is what I’ve meant in the past by: what does God look like, stripped down of all manmade rules and regulations?

I can promise you: not like we see Him today.  Not even the teensiest bit.

Next question: how do we discover Him, all over again?  Fresh and anew?