*Sightings* 1/27/2011

Omid Safi

One of the lower points in the Park51 Center controversy was the comment by

New York Governor David Paterson:  ¢â‚¬Å“This group who has put this mosque
together, they are known as the Sufi Muslims. This is not like the
Shiites ¢â‚¬ ¦They ¢â‚¬â„¢re almost like a hybrid, almost westernized. They are not
really what I would classify in the sort of mainland Muslim practice. ¢â‚¬ 

In a few short sentences, the governor managed to offend Sufis, Shi ¢â‚¬â„¢i
Muslims, as well as westernized Muslims, non-westernized Muslims, and
 ¢â‚¬Å“mainland Muslims ¢â‚¬  (whoever they are). Paterson overlooked the fact that
some Shi ¢â‚¬â„¢i Muslims are mystically inclined, and that six million American
citizens are Muslims, thus there is no question of  ¢â‚¬Å“westernizing ¢â‚¬  or  ¢â‚¬Å“almost
westernizing ¢â‚¬  for them. There is a more disturbing implication hiding in his
assertion: the ongoing way in which the general demonization of Muslims, of
the kind now routine on Fox News, is accompanied by an equally pernicious
game of Good Muslim, Bad Muslims.

There are many versions of this game, but the basic contour stays the same:
The assertion that the general masses of Muslims are evil,
terrorist-supporters, anti-western, patriarchal, misogynist, undemocratic,
and anti-Semitic; and that these masses are set off and defined against
either the solitary, lone Muslim good woman or man. The  ¢â‚¬Å“Good Muslim ¢â‚¬  is
often an individual, or a small circle, because to admit that the larger
group of Muslims could be on the right side of the human-rights divide is to
have the house of cards of the Muslim demonization game collapse on itself.

There are endless scenarios of this fictitious bifurcation: *Reading Lolita
In Tehran* is  ¢â‚¬Å“Good Muslim, ¢â‚¬  unspoken, nameless, faceless masses of Muslims
are patriarchal, bad Muslims. Irshad Manji is an Israel-loving  ¢â‚¬Å“good Muslim ¢â‚¬ 
who suggests that Muslims could be blamed for the holocaust, while the
majority of Muslims are bad Muslims. Salman Rushdie and Orhan Pamuk are
 ¢â‚¬Å“good ¢â‚¬  secular or ex-Muslims, defined against the masses of Muslims. It is
worth noting how easily and how frequently the  ¢â‚¬Å“good Muslim ¢â‚¬  solitary figure
ends up being prominently featured on the op-ed pages of the *New York
Times. *

Sarah Palin famously addressed  ¢â‚¬Å“Peace-seeking Muslims ¢â‚¬  on Twitter:  ¢â‚¬Å“pls
understand, Ground Zero mosque is UNNECESSARY provocation; it stabs hearts.
Pls reject it in interest of healing. ¢â‚¬  In her inarticulate bifurcation,
supporters of Park51 were defined as being outside the  ¢â‚¬Å“peace-seeking ¢â‚¬ 
Muslim category.

The latest version of this bifurcation game of Good Muslim, Bad Muslims is
that of pitting Muslim mystics (Sufis) as the  ¢â‚¬Å“good Muslims ¢â‚¬  against the
majority of Muslims cast as villains. Sufi tradition offers incredible
reservoirs for mercy, love, and pluralism. Yet it is inaccurate, and
politically appropriative, to present Sufism as disconnected from politics
or wider social concerns at best, and as agents of the Empire at worst.

This type of a presentation was prominent in the discussion about Imam
Feisal Abdul Rauf, the visionary American Muslim leader behind Park51. Time
and again in the presentation of Imam Feisal and his wife Daisy Khan, we
were reminded by the *New York Times* that they represented Sufi Islam, a
gentle kind of Islam, nothing like the scary monster of political Islam:  ¢â‚¬Å“He
[Abdul Rauf] was asked to lead a Sufi mosque. ¢â‚¬  Daisy Khan is described as
 ¢â‚¬Å“looking for a gentler Islam than the politicized version she rejected after
Iran’s revolution. ¢â‚¬  Another *New York Times* article was even more explicit
in marking the couple as worthy  ¢â‚¬Å“good Muslims ¢â‚¬ :  ¢â‚¬Å“They founded a Sufi
organization advocating melding Islamic observance with women’s rights and
modernity. ¢â‚¬ 

The suggestion that Sufi teachings are somehow immune to politics, that
Sufis have been unconcerned with social issues and questions of justice and
politics are problematic. Historically speaking, Sufis have been fully
engaged in both challenging political powers and alternately legitimizing
political power throughout their history. Prominent Sufis like Abu Sa ¢â‚¬â„¢id Abi
 ¢â‚¬Ëœl-Khayr ¢â‚¬â„¢s legacy has been used in legitimizing political powers, and Sufis
such as  ¢â‚¬ËœAyn al-Qudat Hamadani and Abd al-Qadir al-Jaza ¢â‚¬â„¢iri have spoken
truth to power. In both cases, Sufis have not remained aloof from politics.

The Park51 controversy exposes many underlying assumptions about religion in
the public space and politics, particularly in the case of Muslims, who are
given two options in this superficial bifurcation game: to be politically
destructive in the manner of terrorists or  ¢â‚¬Å“Islamists ¢â‚¬ , or to be politically
quietist, acquiescing in the face of power. In this  ¢â‚¬Å“Good Sufi/Bad Muslims ¢â‚¬ 
dichotomy, Sufis are asked to line up in the politically quietist camp, so
that they can be validated.

This dichotomy ignores a third group of Muslims: Those who, whether
mystically inclined or not, want to neither destroy the world nor acquiesce
to the wishes of the Empire, but rather seek to redeem the world by speaking
truth to power. This group speaks out of the love of God and cries out for
the suffering of humanity, defiantly and prophetically standing up for
justice and liberation,

And here is where the canard of  ¢â‚¬Å“Moderate Muslims ¢â‚¬  comes to play: Ever since
9/11, we have been asked time and again where the  ¢â‚¬Å“moderate Muslims ¢â‚¬  are,
and why they are silent. No matter how often, and how loudly, Muslim
organizations and individuals condemn terrorism, the likes of Thomas
Friedman can still famously, and inaccurately, state:  ¢â‚¬Å“The Muslim village
has been derelict in condemning the madness of jihadist attacks ¢â‚¬ ¦ To this
day–to this day–no major Muslim cleric or religious body has ever issued a
fatwa condemning Osama bin Laden. ¢â‚¬  No presentation of factual data seems to
persuade these critics that Muslims did, do, and will continue to speak out
loudly and officially against terrorism. The reason their critics do not
hear the moderate Muslims is because they are not listening.

Moving beyond the question of Muslims condemning terrorism, there is the
larger question of what exactly makes someone a  ¢â‚¬Å“moderate ¢â‚¬  Muslim? In its
current usage, the term  ¢â‚¬Å“moderate Muslim ¢â‚¬  is as meaningful as a purple polka
dot unicorn. If the term moderate implies a balancing point between two
extremes, it is a hopelessly vague term in the post-9/11 landscape. If one
of the two extremes away from the  ¢â‚¬Å“moderate Muslims ¢â‚¬  is easy to imagine
(terrorism, Bin Laden, etc.), the other extreme is ill-defined. What are
moderate Muslims moderating? If one extreme is terrorism, then what is the
other extreme?

 ¢â‚¬Å“Moderate Muslims ¢â‚¬  are often defined, and confined, to be supporters of US
foreign policy, vis- ƒ  -vis some important issues, such as supporting US
global military presence, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the
Palestinian-Israeli issue. To dare suggest that the United States is today
the world ¢â‚¬â„¢s only military Empire with hundreds of military bases in other
countries, or that we have in fact become the Military-Industrial Complex
that Eisenhower warned us about, or heaven forbid, that the Palestinians
suffer from decades-long, unbearable occupation and violations of human
rights, is to define one outside the safe (and lucrative) safe-zone of
 ¢â‚¬Å“moderate Muslim. ¢â‚¬  Sadly, even the safe-zone is not so safe. Imam Feisal has
been sent on political missions abroad by the State Department, yet even he
was not safe from being branded by Fox News as a terrorist sympathizer.

If our public discourse about religion and politics is to evolve to a more
subtle, and accurate, space, it must get to the point where religious voices
that speak from the depths and heights of all spiritual traditions can do
more than simply acquiesce in the face of the Empire. They can, and should,
speak for the weak, and give voice to the voiceless.

*References*

**

Fatemeh Keshavarz, *Jasmine and Stars: Reading More than Lolita in
Tehran*(North Carolina: The University of North Carolina Press, 2008).

Mahmood Mamdani, *Good Muslim, Bad Muslim*: *America, the Cold War, and the
Roots of Terror* (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2005).

Omid Safi, *The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam* (North Carolina:
The University of North Carolina Press, 2006).

CBS New York,  ¢â‚¬Å“Paterson:  ¢â‚¬ËœMosque Developers Hybrid, Almost Westernized ¢â‚¬â„¢
Muslims<http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2010/08/26/paterson-mosque-developers-hybrid-almost-westernized-muslims/?utm_source=Islamic+Information+Center&utm_campaign=d894d68df0-Interfaith&utm_medium=email>, ¢â‚¬ 
August 26, 2010.

Sarah Palin,  ¢â‚¬Å“Peace-seeking Muslims, pls understand, Ground Zero mosque is
UNNECESSARY provocation; it stabs hearts. Pls reject it in interest of
healing <http://twitter.com/sarahpalinusa/status/18858128918>, ¢â‚¬  Twitter,
July 18, 2010.

Michael M. Grynbaum,  ¢â‚¬Å“Daisy Khan, An Eloquent Face of
Islam<http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/14/fashion/14khan.html?_r=1&ref=feisalabdulalrauf>
, ¢â‚¬ * The New York Times*, November 12, 2010.

Thomas L. Freedman,  ¢â‚¬Å“If It ¢â‚¬â„¢s a Muslim Problem, It Needs a Muslim
Solution<http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/08/opinion/08friedman.html>, ¢â‚¬ 
*The New York Times*, July 8, 2005.

Dwight D. Eisenhower,  ¢â‚¬Å“Military-Industrial
Complex<http://www.h-net.org/~hst306/documents/indust.html>, ¢â‚¬ 
1961 speech.

Islamic Statements Against Terrorism<http://www.unc.edu/~kurzman/terror.htm>,
compiled by Charles Kurzman, University of North Carolina.

*Omid Safi* is a Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North
Carolina. He served as the Chair of the Study of Islam Section at the
American Academy of Religion from 2002-2009. He is the author of *Memories
of Muhammad: Why the Prophet Matters* (HarperOne, 2009).

———-

*Sightings* comes from the Martin Marty
Center<http://divinity.uchicago.edu/martycenter/>at the University of
Chicago Divinity School.

Attribution

Columns may be quoted or republished in full, with attribution to the author
of the column, *Sightings*, and the Martin Marty Center at the University of
Chicago Divinity School.