On reading the Koran | Lesley Hazleton | TEDxRainier
-
0:07 - 0:11You may have heard
about the Koran's idea of paradise -
0:11 - 0:13being 72 virgins,
-
0:13 - 0:16and I promise I will come back
to those virgins. -
0:16 - 0:19But in fact, here in the Northwest,
we're living very close -
0:19 - 0:22to the real Koranic idea of paradise,
-
0:22 - 0:27defined 36 times as "gardens
watered by running streams." -
0:28 - 0:32Since I live on a houseboat
on the running stream of Lake Union, -
0:32 - 0:34this makes perfect sense to me.
-
0:34 - 0:37But the thing is, how come
it's news to most people? -
0:37 - 0:40I know many well-intentioned non-Muslims
-
0:40 - 0:42who've begun reading
the Koran, but given up, -
0:42 - 0:45disconcerted by its "otherness."
-
0:46 - 0:48The historian Thomas Carlyle
considered Muhammad -
0:48 - 0:50one of the world's greatest heroes,
-
0:50 - 0:53yet even he called the Koran
-
0:53 - 0:58"as toilsome reading as I ever undertook;
a wearisome, confused jumble." -
0:58 - 1:00(Laughter)
-
1:00 - 1:03Part of the problem,
I think, is that we imagine -
1:04 - 1:07that the Koran can be read
as we usually read a book -- -
1:07 - 1:10as though we can curl up
with it on a rainy afternoon -
1:10 - 1:12with a bowl of popcorn within reach,
-
1:12 - 1:14as though God --
-
1:14 - 1:17and the Koran is entirely in the voice
of God speaking to Muhammad -- -
1:18 - 1:20were just another author
on the best-seller list. -
1:22 - 1:26Yet, the fact that so few people
do actually read the Koran -
1:26 - 1:32is precisely why it's so easy to quote --
that is, to misquote. -
1:32 - 1:33(Laughter)
-
1:33 - 1:35Phrases and snippets taken out of context
-
1:35 - 1:37in what I call the "highlighter version,"
-
1:37 - 1:40which is the one favored
by both Muslim fundamentalists -
1:40 - 1:43and anti-Muslim Islamophobes.
-
1:44 - 1:46So this past spring,
-
1:46 - 1:50as I was gearing up to begin writing
a biography of Muhammad, -
1:50 - 1:54I realized I needed to read
the Koran properly -- -
1:54 - 1:57as properly as I could, that is.
-
1:57 - 2:00My Arabic is reduced by now
to wielding a dictionary, -
2:00 - 2:02so I took four well-known translations
-
2:02 - 2:06and decided to read them
side by side, verse by verse, -
2:06 - 2:11along with a transliteration
and the original seventh-century Arabic. -
2:14 - 2:16Now, I did have an advantage.
-
2:17 - 2:22My last book was about the story
behind the Shi'a-Sunni split, -
2:22 - 2:25and for that, I'd worked closely
with the earliest Islamic histories, -
2:25 - 2:29so I knew the events
to which the Koran constantly refers, -
2:29 - 2:31its frame of reference.
-
2:31 - 2:36I knew enough, that is, to know
that I'd be a tourist in the Koran -- -
2:36 - 2:38an informed one,
-
2:38 - 2:40an experienced one, even,
-
2:40 - 2:42but still an outsider,
-
2:42 - 2:46an agnostic Jew reading
someone else's holy book. -
2:46 - 2:48(Laughter)
-
2:48 - 2:50So I read slowly.
-
2:50 - 2:54(Laughter)
-
2:54 - 2:57I'd set aside three weeks
for this project, -
2:57 - 3:00and that, I think,
is what is meant by "hubris" -- -
3:00 - 3:04(Laughter)
-
3:04 - 3:06because it turned out to be three months.
-
3:06 - 3:08(Laughter)
-
3:08 - 3:10I did resist the temptation
to skip to the back, -
3:10 - 3:14where the shorter and more
clearly mystical chapters are. -
3:14 - 3:17But every time I thought I was beginning
to get a handle on the Koran -- -
3:17 - 3:19that feeling of "I get it now" --
-
3:20 - 3:22it would slip away overnight,
-
3:22 - 3:23and I'd come back in the morning,
-
3:23 - 3:26wondering if I wasn't lost
in a strange land. -
3:27 - 3:29And yet, the terrain was very familiar.
-
3:30 - 3:33The Koran declares that it comes
to renew the message -
3:33 - 3:34of the Torah and the Gospels.
-
3:34 - 3:38So one-third of it reprises
the stories of Biblical figures -
3:38 - 3:42like Abraham, Moses, Joseph, Mary, Jesus.
-
3:43 - 3:46God himself was utterly familiar
-
3:46 - 3:49from his earlier manifestation as Yahweh,
-
3:49 - 3:52jealously insisting on no other gods.
-
3:53 - 3:58The presence of camels, mountains,
desert wells and springs -
3:58 - 4:02took me back to the year I spent
wandering the Sinai Desert. -
4:03 - 4:06And then there was the language,
the rhythmic cadence of it, -
4:06 - 4:09reminding me of evenings spent
listening to Bedouin elders -
4:09 - 4:12recite hours-long narrative poems
-
4:12 - 4:14entirely from memory.
-
4:16 - 4:20And I began to grasp why it's said
-
4:20 - 4:24that the Koran is really
the Koran only in Arabic. -
4:25 - 4:29Take the Fatihah,
the seven-verse opening chapter -
4:29 - 4:33that is the Lord's Prayer
and the Shema Yisrael of Islam combined. -
4:34 - 4:37It's just 29 words in Arabic,
-
4:37 - 4:41but anywhere from 65 to 72 in translation.
-
4:41 - 4:44And yet the more you add,
the more seems to go missing. -
4:46 - 4:50The Arabic has an incantatory,
almost hypnotic quality -
4:50 - 4:53that begs to be heard rather than read,
-
4:53 - 4:55felt more than analyzed.
-
4:56 - 4:58It wants to be chanted out loud,
-
4:58 - 5:01to sound its music in the ear
and on the tongue. -
5:01 - 5:06So the Koran in English
is a kind of shadow of itself, -
5:06 - 5:09or as Arthur Arberry called his version,
-
5:09 - 5:10"an interpretation."
-
5:12 - 5:15But all is not lost in translation.
-
5:16 - 5:18As the Koran promises,
patience is rewarded, -
5:18 - 5:20and there are many surprises --
-
5:20 - 5:23a degree of environmental
awareness, for instance, -
5:23 - 5:27and of humans as mere stewards
of God's creation, -
5:27 - 5:28unmatched in the Bible.
-
5:29 - 5:32And where the Bible is addressed
exclusively to men, -
5:32 - 5:35using the second-
and third-person masculine, -
5:35 - 5:37the Koran includes women --
-
5:37 - 5:39talking, for instance,
-
5:39 - 5:41of believing men and believing women,
-
5:41 - 5:44honorable men and honorable women.
-
5:46 - 5:50Or take the infamous verse
about killing the unbelievers. -
5:51 - 5:52Yes, it does say that,
-
5:52 - 5:55but in a very specific context:
-
5:55 - 5:59the anticipated conquest
of the sanctuary city of Mecca, -
5:59 - 6:02where fighting was usually forbidden.
-
6:02 - 6:05And the permission comes
hedged about with qualifiers. -
6:05 - 6:08Not "You must kill unbelievers in Mecca,"
-
6:08 - 6:10but you can, you are allowed to,
-
6:10 - 6:15but only after a grace period is over,
-
6:15 - 6:18and only if there's no other
pact in place, -
6:18 - 6:21and only if they try to stop
you getting to the Kaaba, -
6:21 - 6:24and only if they attack you first.
-
6:24 - 6:28And even then -- God is merciful;
-
6:28 - 6:30forgiveness is supreme --
-
6:30 - 6:32and so, essentially,
-
6:32 - 6:34better if you don't.
-
6:34 - 6:37(Laughter)
-
6:37 - 6:40This was perhaps the biggest surprise --
-
6:40 - 6:42how flexible the Koran is,
-
6:42 - 6:46at least in minds that are not
fundamentally inflexible. -
6:47 - 6:51"Some of these verses
are definite in meaning," it says, -
6:51 - 6:53"and others are ambiguous."
-
6:54 - 6:57The perverse at heart
will seek out the ambiguities, -
6:57 - 7:02trying to create discord
by pinning down meanings of their own. -
7:02 - 7:04Only God knows the true meaning.
-
7:06 - 7:10The phrase "God is subtle"
appears again and again, -
7:10 - 7:12and indeed, the whole
of the Koran is far more subtle -
7:12 - 7:15than most of us have been led to believe.
-
7:15 - 7:20As in, for instance, that little matter
of virgins and paradise. -
7:21 - 7:24Old-fashioned orientalism
comes into play here. -
7:25 - 7:30The word used four times is "houris,"
-
7:30 - 7:35rendered as dark-eyed maidens
with swelling breasts, -
7:35 - 7:38or as fair, high-bosomed virgins.
-
7:39 - 7:43Yet all there is in the original Arabic
is that one word: houris. -
7:44 - 7:47Not a swelling breast
or high bosom in sight. -
7:47 - 7:49(Laughter)
-
7:49 - 7:54Now this may be a way of saying
"pure beings," like in angels, -
7:54 - 7:57or it may be like
the Greek "kouros" or "kore," -
7:57 - 7:58an eternal youth.
-
7:58 - 8:01But the truth is, nobody really knows.
-
8:01 - 8:02And that's the point.
-
8:03 - 8:06Because the Koran is quite clear
-
8:06 - 8:10when it says that you'll be
"a new creation in paradise," -
8:10 - 8:16and that you will be "recreated
in a form unknown to you," -
8:16 - 8:18which seems to me
a far more appealing prospect -
8:18 - 8:20than a virgin.
-
8:20 - 8:27(Laughter)
-
8:28 - 8:31And that number 72 never appears.
-
8:31 - 8:35There are no 72 virgins in the Koran.
-
8:35 - 8:38That idea only came
into being 300 years later, -
8:38 - 8:41and most Islamic scholars
see it as the equivalent -
8:41 - 8:45of people with wings sitting on clouds
and strumming harps. -
8:46 - 8:49Paradise is quite the opposite.
-
8:50 - 8:52It's not virginity;
-
8:52 - 8:53it's fecundity;
-
8:54 - 8:55it's plenty.
-
8:56 - 9:01It's gardens watered by running streams.
-
9:03 - 9:04Thank you.
-
9:04 - 9:11(Applause)
- Title:
- On reading the Koran | Lesley Hazleton | TEDxRainier
- Description:
-
Lesley Hazleton sat down one day to read the Koran. And what she found -- as a non-Muslim, a self-identified "tourist" in the Islamic holy book -- wasn't what she expected. With serious scholarship and warm humor, Hazleton shares the grace, flexibility and mystery she found, in this myth-debunking talk.
This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDxTalks
- Duration:
- 09:16
Maggie S (Amara staff) approved English subtitles for Lesley Hazleton at TEDxRainier | ||
TED Translators admin edited English subtitles for Lesley Hazleton at TEDxRainier | ||
TED Translators admin edited English subtitles for Lesley Hazleton at TEDxRainier |