We all grew up hearing words of haram and halal, or what is sinful and what is permissible, religiously speaking. We were asked to obey those edicts without questioning, even when these ran into the face of well-established manners and traditions. The contradictions were such that often something of a war was waged against the customs and practices of society. This is particularly true in Egypt, where many social occasions, such as Sham Al-Nessim, a variation on Easter, go back to Pharaonic times. Practices that have nothing to do with religion in the modern sense went back hundreds of centuries, recalling a culture that underlines and underpins ours. Yet, as youngsters, our minds were trained to accept the haram and halal edicts without thinking, even when these challenged collective acts, such as the way we celebrated our feasts, the way we ate, and the way we dressed. All it takes is for a preacher, however poorly educated that person may be, even in matters of religion, to climb on a pulpit and start haranguing the congregation about how haram their cultural practices are and how they should all repent and renounce their customary practices. Now, how sensible is this? The history of fatwas, or the offering of religious legal opinion, is far from flattering. So many edicts have been passed that are embarrassing, and quite a few were clearly wrong, such as the fatwa that prohibited precautionary quarantines in the early 19th century. Fatwas are a hazardous business, not only because they may conflict with reason, but also because they can give a bad name to religion, pushing it into areas from which it is safer to stay away. It would make more sense to use sheer reason instead of fatwas when it comes to matters of practical significance. Reason, after all, is the only way humanity can differentiate between good and bad. It is also the essence of any religion. The preponderance of fatwas makes people refrain from using their minds, a reaction that undermines their lives as well as those of others. Religions appeal to the sensibilities of the common people. As to the clergy, if they have a role it should be that of helping people understand their world in a better way. They should offer enlightenment, not mindless restrictions, let alone hate. As for fatwas that are clearly geared to political ends, these have to be spurned. In the past 30 months or so of revolutionary zeal in the Arab world, a lot of fatwas came out in Egypt and Tunisia, and the main thrust of these being political. Most were aimed at maligning others, demeaning them, and belittling their views. Often the maligned people were just as religious as the clerics who denounce him, if not more so. But they differed from them in political opinion, and that alone was reason enough for the clerics to lash out. One such fatwa was issued lately by Sheikh Youssef Al-Qaradawi to dissuade Egyptians from going to the streets to challenge the rule of the Muslim Brotherhood. When no one listened to him, Al-Qaradawi fired off another fatwa, in which he called on Muslims all over the world to start a jihad, or holy war, in Egypt. That was his answer: to turn Egypt into the Balkans or into Chechnya, and have Egyptian killed in the process. Why is this? The conflict in Egypt is a political one. It is a conflict triggered by the lack of vision by one political faction — a faction that could have risen high had it acted with any sense at all. But it has finally shown its true face, a face that it had hidden for decades. The Muslim Brotherhood is not a religious organisation of the kind that calls for good deeds and defends the dignity of man. It is a cancerous growth that uses religion to brainwash people, to incite them to violence, and to recruit them for terror. Egyptians, one is pleased to discover, have risen up twice against oppression. They staged a revolt once to oust political oppression, and then took to the streets yet again to overthrow their religious masters. What is happening now in Egypt is impressive. Egyptians have shaken off the yoke of fatwas and are using their minds instead. It has become common for worshippers to challenge mosque preachers when the latter go out of line and start making seditious sermons. Some may say this is the start of societal conflict and civil war. But it is not the case. What we see today is a state of awakening, when the people challenge the power of certain individuals who are dead set on keeping our nations backward.
The writer is managing editor of the quarterly journal Al-Demoqrateya published by Al-Ahram.
