An Atheist Explores the Qur'an Part 110: Islam: The Platform Game, Chaplin In Hell, and “Mumadadda” (The Scandal-Monger (al-Humazah))
The Scandal-Monger (al-Humazah)
Islam: The Platform Game, Chaplin In Hell, and “Mumadadda”.
Welcome to the next instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Qur’an version).
In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the Qur’an, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.
For more detail, see the introductory post https://bit.ly/2ApLDy0
For the online Qur’an that I use, see here http://al-quran.info and http://quran.com
The Scandal-Monger (al-Humazah) 1-9
“Woe to every scandal-monger and slanderer, who amasses wealth and counts it over.”
Although this surah is only nine verses, I’m not going to quote the whole thing here, since some of it is easily summarised. It’s an attack on “scandal-mongerers” and “slanderers”, but seems to equate this with also being a miser or hoarder of wealth, since it is the wealth that is directly attacked and not the slander - “He supposes his wealth will make him immortal!”
Recall that the Prophet has attacked gossips before, so possibly this again is based on trying to stamp out a whispering campaign against him, or that there is somebody specific in mind for whom this is intended as a very personal message. Since not everyone that engages in slander also counts their wealth, nor everyone that counts their wealth is a slanderer, it’s a strange confluence to assert. Either or both of those things I can easily see as being condemned, but here we see good evidence of the kind of black and white thinking religion can lead to. Slander and gossip can be harmful, yes, which is why there are laws against deliberately spreading false information about a person to their detriment. On the other hand, they are also useful tools for a social species to unseat and undermine unsuitable leaders. Is, for example, Chaplin’s portrayal of “Adenoid Hinkel” in The Great Dictator an action worthy of landing him in Hell (more of that anon)? Or is it a useful tool to prick the pomposity and undermine the authority of a cruel dictator? And is the accrual of wealth in and of itself an immoral act? An argument can certainly be made that excessive inequality of wealth causes many social problems, but this is not quite the same as making money in and of itself. Really, this is another of those spiritual=yay/physical=boo artificial dichotomies that religions seem to like to make.
Oh yes, the rest of the surah. I mentioned punishment in Hell for “al-humazah”, where we are told later in the surah that “He will surely be cast into the Crusher”. The next verse we get something familiar from the last few surahs - “And what will show you what is the Crusher?” I think this formulation is really meant to mean “Shall I tell you about the Crusher? (or whatever)”, since “what will show you” is just an assertion made in the next few lines rather than any kind of actual demonstration. Read in that light, the phrasing makes a lot more sense.
So what is The Crusher? It’s an everlasting fire powered by Allah that “will close in upon them in outstretched columns.” Which sounds like something out of a platform game – pillars of flame that go up and down and you have to time it so that you can jump between them. This is obviously what you face once you’ve got past the Dividing Heights level and into the Hell levels of Islam: The Platform Game. You know the one that’s never going to get made. That also features a level where you ride a buraq to the moon.
The poetic construction of this surah isn’t as interesting as some of the more recent surahs. The second and third verses use a pseudo-rhyme with “ʿaddadahū” (“and counts it”) with “ʾakhladahū” (“will make him immortal”), also the final word “extended” (applied to the columns of fire) is the rather wonderful word “mumaddada”.
Islam: The Platform Game, Chaplin In Hell, and “Mumadadda”.
Welcome to the next instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Qur’an version).
In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the Qur’an, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.
For more detail, see the introductory post https://bit.ly/2ApLDy0
For the online Qur’an that I use, see here http://al-quran.info and http://quran.com
The Scandal-Monger (al-Humazah) 1-9
“Woe to every scandal-monger and slanderer, who amasses wealth and counts it over.”
Although this surah is only nine verses, I’m not going to quote the whole thing here, since some of it is easily summarised. It’s an attack on “scandal-mongerers” and “slanderers”, but seems to equate this with also being a miser or hoarder of wealth, since it is the wealth that is directly attacked and not the slander - “He supposes his wealth will make him immortal!”
Recall that the Prophet has attacked gossips before, so possibly this again is based on trying to stamp out a whispering campaign against him, or that there is somebody specific in mind for whom this is intended as a very personal message. Since not everyone that engages in slander also counts their wealth, nor everyone that counts their wealth is a slanderer, it’s a strange confluence to assert. Either or both of those things I can easily see as being condemned, but here we see good evidence of the kind of black and white thinking religion can lead to. Slander and gossip can be harmful, yes, which is why there are laws against deliberately spreading false information about a person to their detriment. On the other hand, they are also useful tools for a social species to unseat and undermine unsuitable leaders. Is, for example, Chaplin’s portrayal of “Adenoid Hinkel” in The Great Dictator an action worthy of landing him in Hell (more of that anon)? Or is it a useful tool to prick the pomposity and undermine the authority of a cruel dictator? And is the accrual of wealth in and of itself an immoral act? An argument can certainly be made that excessive inequality of wealth causes many social problems, but this is not quite the same as making money in and of itself. Really, this is another of those spiritual=yay/physical=boo artificial dichotomies that religions seem to like to make.
Oh yes, the rest of the surah. I mentioned punishment in Hell for “al-humazah”, where we are told later in the surah that “He will surely be cast into the Crusher”. The next verse we get something familiar from the last few surahs - “And what will show you what is the Crusher?” I think this formulation is really meant to mean “Shall I tell you about the Crusher? (or whatever)”, since “what will show you” is just an assertion made in the next few lines rather than any kind of actual demonstration. Read in that light, the phrasing makes a lot more sense.
So what is The Crusher? It’s an everlasting fire powered by Allah that “will close in upon them in outstretched columns.” Which sounds like something out of a platform game – pillars of flame that go up and down and you have to time it so that you can jump between them. This is obviously what you face once you’ve got past the Dividing Heights level and into the Hell levels of Islam: The Platform Game. You know the one that’s never going to get made. That also features a level where you ride a buraq to the moon.
The poetic construction of this surah isn’t as interesting as some of the more recent surahs. The second and third verses use a pseudo-rhyme with “ʿaddadahū” (“and counts it”) with “ʾakhladahū” (“will make him immortal”), also the final word “extended” (applied to the columns of fire) is the rather wonderful word “mumaddada”.
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