Al-Azhar preparing to sue author over "blasphemous" play

Sharia Alert. "Egyptian feminist faces lawsuit over 'blasphemous' play," from AFP:

CAIRO (AFP) - Sunni Islam's highest institute of learning Al-Azhar said Thursday it was preparing to sue Egyptian feminist Nawal al-Saadawi for a play she wrote it describes as blasphemous.

Al-Azhar's Islamic Research Council, chaired by the head of the institution, Sheikh Mohammed Sayyed Tantawi, agreed to file a suit against the play, "God Resigns in the Summit Meeting," spokesman Maher Haddad confirmed.

A final decision on the suit must await a ruling by a council of the institution's legal experts before it is officially referred to court, added Haddad.

Saadawi, 75, who is currently in Brussels for her "peace of mind," reacted strongly to the news. She condemned it as the "revenge of al-Azhar," with whom she has long had issues.

"Since when do men of religion pass judgement on plays? That is something for theatre critics to do, not them," she said. "It is a piece of fiction and fiction has no limits."

Not according to the officials at al-Azhar.

The play, which was published at the end of 2006, and the latest edition of her autobiography, were pulled by her publisher from the Cairo International Book Fair at the end of January and the copies destroyed.

Saadawi declined to explain the contents of the play, saying it was too complex to be summarised in a telephone conversation, except that it was an allegory dealing with contemporary problems in Egypt.

A doctor by profession, Saadawi has written dozens of taboo-breaking books on women in the Middle East which have often brought her into conflict with religious authorities.

Together with hundreds of other opposition intellectuals, she was jailed by President Anwar Sadat in 1981.

During the 1990s, Saadawi's name was on the death lists of a number of militant Islamist organisations and in 2001 she successfuly fought off an attempt by Islamist lawyers to divorce her form her husband on the grounds that she was an apostate.

Al-Azhar, which maintains that she consistently insults religion with her works, has previously recommended the banning of two of her novels.

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20 Comments

exsgtbrown | March 2, 2007 7:32 AM

Islam ,.... what a paranoid religion.....

exsgtbrown | March 2, 2007 9:12 AM

Of course, if the law suit fails, there are always bullets and bombs....the Usual Islamic mainstays.....

UK Infidel Lover | March 2, 2007 9:39 AM

This is similar to the treatment of the late
Naguib Mahfouz - one of the greatest of Egypts authors

See

Obituary: Naguib Mahfouz
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/5297592.stm

and

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naguib_Mahfouz

Here are some pertinent extracts:

============
Naguib Mahfouz was arguably the greatest Arab novelist of the 20th Century.

He had something of the status of a national treasure in Egypt, where many of his characters became household names.

He was well known too throughout the Arab world, partly because so many of his works were turned into films or television dramas.

His novel known in English as Children of Gebelawi was banned in Egypt, and he was accused of blasphemy.

In 1994, Mahfouz was attacked outside his home by Muslim extremists said to have been incensed by his treatment of religious themes in the book.

He was stabbed in the neck but survived.
============

Isn't it appalling that writers of fiction have been attacked by Islamic extremists?
It shows that freedom is precious.

exsgtbrown | March 2, 2007 10:13 AM

some notable assassinations of late:

1991..Rajiv Ghandi, former Prime Minister of India

1992..Mohammed Boudiaff, President of Algeria

1995..Yitzak Rabin, Prime Minister of Israel

1996 Andrei Lukanov, Prime MInister of BUlgaria

1999..Vazgen Sarkissian, Armenian Prime Minister

2001..Rahahm Zeevi, Israeli Minister of Tourism

2001.. Ahmed SAhah Massod, anti Taliban leader

2002..Pim FOrtuyn, Dutch politician

2002.. Haji Abdul Qadir, Afghan Vice President

2003..Zoran Djindjic, Serbian Prime MInister

2003..Addul Majid Al Khoei, Shi Ite cleric

2003..Sergei Yushekov, Russian Legislator

2003..Bakir Aghakim, Shi ite Cleric

2003.. Anna Lindh, Swedish foreign mininster

2004..Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, Chechen President

2004..Akhmad Kadyrn, Chechnian president

2004..Ezzedine Salim, Iraqi Council president

2004..Bassam Salih Kubba, Iraqi Foreign Minister

.and the beat goes on and on.....you do not want Muslims in your neighborhood...The US and Britain have be fortunate that a major dignitary has not been assassinated yet, although the Muslims are trying....

Ban Muslim Immigration now....

radishthegreat | March 2, 2007 10:21 AM

"Egyptian feminist" seems like an oxymoron. Good on Saadawi. Let's give her asylum in the U.S.

kelisw | March 2, 2007 11:23 AM

When I see words like 'Islamic Lawyers' I just wanna laugh. As if regular lawyers weren't bad enough, Islamic Lawyers! *shudder*

sheik yer'mami | March 2, 2007 11:34 AM

'Catch the Fire'- all over again: Hate-crime laws are being used to stifle debate:

http://www.canada.com/windsorstar/news/story.html?id=465428a2-657b-4732-b12f-e07548dda592

exsgtbrown | March 2, 2007 12:10 PM

Islamic Lawyers....Religious Police....

....Islam is some religion,it requires lawyers and its own police....both ready to pounce on its own members with a leathality normally reserved only for extreme criminals in western countries.......

Islam is in a constant state of paranoia....maybe mad mullah disease is rampant....

A_Plague_on_Both_Houses | March 2, 2007 1:58 PM

NO~Body expects the Spanish Inquisition....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZQI0Xm29To

Church Police... Church Police!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dd3ootIAog

kelisw | March 2, 2007 2:03 PM

it can certainly be argued that Islam is the most paranoid religion of all time. Women must be controlled at all times, you can't make fun of Islam, you can't speak badly of the prophet(peanut butter upon him), you certainly can't leave the religion. And then theres the whole fear of pigs, dogs, alcohol, cartoons and Britney Spears thing. It must be so stressful to be a muslim! Maybe if we just paid for each and every one of them to have intense psychotherapy we could all live together peacefully

MBR | March 2, 2007 4:01 PM

Before we get too excited about Nawal El Saadawi, consider what she wrote in the Preface to her "The Hidden Face of Eve" (1980):

"Influential circles, particularly in the Western imperialist world, depict the problems of Arab women as stemming from the substance and values of Islam, and simultaneously depict the retarded development of Arab countries in many important areas as largely the result of religious and cultural factors, or even inherent characteristics in the mental and psychic constitution of the Arab peoples. For them underdevelopment is not related to economic and political factors, at the root of which lies foreign exploitation of resources, and the plunder to which national riches are exposed..." (p.i)

What evidence do we have that she has moved away from these views?

My enemy's enemy is not necessarily my friend.

John Sobieski | March 2, 2007 4:21 PM

Excellent point MBR. Does she still believe that 'blame the colonialists' crap or not? The West must not be too awful since she evidently finds safety and comfort in its bosom.

UK Infidel Lover | March 2, 2007 5:00 PM

MBR Wrote:
>> What evidence do we have that she has moved away from these views?

My enemy's enemy is not necessarily my friend.

MBR | March 2, 2007 6:35 PM

"So I would like to hear more of what she is saying before rushing to judgement."

UK Infidel Lover (above)

My rushed short quote perhaps asks more questions than it answers, but her book was handy and I believe the quote shows both her willingness to blame Western imperialism for the woes of Arab countries, and to absolve Islam for the position of Arab women.

Further and more recent views are quite easily found at her website. From among the statements she has made or hosted on the site:

"It is now clear that the government of the United States of America under the leadership of George W. Bush seeks to impose a total domination of the world, and of the oil resources in the Gulf Region by war. The war on Iraq is an economic, political and military imperialist invasion which attempts to hide its blatant neo-colonial nature behind slogans of democracy and freeing the Iraqi people from the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein....

"In the Arab region he has continued to support the dictator Ariel Sharon whose hands were stained with the blood of thousands of men, women and children in Lebanon and who continues to perpetrate a racist massacre against the tortured and defenseless people of Palestine."

For the members of the Arab Women's Solidarity Association
Nawal El Saadawi (President)
9 April 2003

at http://www.nawalsaadawi.net/articles/2003/wariraq.htm

"The US-backed Israeli assault on Lebanon has left the country numb, smoldering and angry. The massacre in Qana and the loss of life is not simply “disproportionate.” It is, according to existing international laws, a war crime.

The deliberate and systematic destruction of Lebanon's social infrastructure by the Israeli air force was also a war crime, designed to reduce that country to the status of an Israeli-US protectorate..."

7 August 2006
[signed by, inter alia, Pilger, Pinter and Chomsky]

at
http://www.nawalsaadawi.net/statements06/lebanon-israelEN.htm

One can imagine that with views like this she fits in very comfortably with the (anti-)Western feminist Left.

Pelayo | March 2, 2007 8:44 PM

Sheikh Mohammed Sayyed Tantawi must be a one of those moderates we've been looking for. A true believer would have issued a death fatwa.

MeanieMo | March 3, 2007 1:38 AM

Gesellschaftsverkehr ohne islam ist vie Geschlechtsverkehr ohne HIV.

MeanieMo | March 3, 2007 1:39 AM

Sorry that should have been in English:

Society without islam is like Sex without AIDS

MeanieMo | March 3, 2007 1:48 AM

..Listening to Dovrak's Ode to the New World... Name ONE moslem who has ever written anything like it!

And yet they profess to despise us!

Whoever doesn't know about this fabulous symphony and its subtext please investigate.

Mr. Dvorak was one European full of admiration for the New World.. And he let the world know!

Just listen... mmmm/....

MeanieMo | March 3, 2007 1:58 AM

For the members of the Arab Women's Solidarity Association
Nawal El Saadawi (President)
9 April 2003

Since when is ISRAEL an Arab region?! Is this how they consider real people before their "reversion" to pigslam?

ISRAEL will NOT be an Arab region, buddy-girl!!!

Stay the frick in Egypt with your theatre critics and your muftis, babe!!

MeanieMo | March 3, 2007 1:59 AM

Ariel's hands are NOT nearly stained enough!

Eretz ISRAEL>all of arab lands

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