*Sightings* 2/24/2011

*Secular Revolutions, Religious Landscapes*

— Shatha Almutawa

While the Middle East uprisings have not revolved around religion, faith has
not been absent from Arab scenes of protest in the last two months. God and
scripture are invoked by revolutionaries and those who oppose them for the
simple reason that Arab dialects and ways of life are infused with religion.

To an outside observer the revolts of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen and
Bahrain might appear to be entirely secular, but Arabic Twitter and Facebook
feeds are brimming with prayers, some formulaic and some informal, asking
God to aid protesters and remove oppressors. Qur ¢â‚¬â„¢anic verses and sayings of
the Prophet Muhammad are shared on Facebook walls. One blogger titled his
post:  ¢â‚¬Å“A saying of the prophet about President Qaddafi. ¢â‚¬  In the quoted
hadith Prophet Muhammed warns of a time when trivial men will speak for the
people.

After Libyan president Moammar Al-Qaddafi ordered brutal attacks on
demonstrators, leaving thousands dead and even more wounded, Yusuf
Al-Qaradawi urged the Libyan army to kill Qaddafi.  ¢â‚¬Å“I say to my brothers and
sons who are soldiers and officers in the Libyan Army to disobey when (the
government) gives orders to kill the people using warplanes, ¢â‚¬  the prominent
Sunni scholar said, according to UPI. Soldiers have already defected in
large numbers, and the pro-democracy army has taken hold of many Libyan
cities.

In every part of the Arab world religious spaces such as mosques and
churches have been stages for demonstrators as well as opposition. In the
United Arab Emirates an activist was arrested after giving a speech at a
mosque in solidarity with the Egyptian revolution. In his speech he invited
worshippers to join him in performing a prayer for the Egyptian protesters.

In Egypt marches began at mosques after Friday prayers, and inside them
imams gave speeches in favor of or opposition to the uprising. Egyptians are
donating blood at mosques near the Libyan border. In Bahrain pro-democracy
and pro-government protesters demonstrated outside Manama ¢â‚¬â„¢s Al-Fateh Mosque
as well as at Pearl Roundabout.

Even though religion is not the driving force behind the revolutions,
religious leaders continue to defend protest in speeches that are
disseminated via YouTube. Dr. Tareq Al-Suwaidan, a leader of the Muslim
Brotherhood in Kuwait, gave a speech in which he urged Arabs to continue
demanding freedom, human rights and an end to corruption. He challenged the
governments ¢â‚¬â„¢ claim that revolutions will lead to instability and insecurity,
and that new freedoms would lead to chaos.  ¢â‚¬Å“The west is living with these
rights in stability and security, and they are making progress, ¢â‚¬  he said.
 ¢â‚¬Å“Our religion calls for these rights. Our religion guaranteed them to us. ¢â‚¬ 

Al-Suwaidan ¢â‚¬â„¢s tone is one of disbelief at dictators ¢â‚¬â„¢ illogical statements
and the contradictions in their claims. But his ridicule of government
leaders is tame in comparison to the jokes made by Arabs all over the world
following Al-Qaddafi ¢â‚¬â„¢s speech. The jokes, too, involve religion.
 ¢â‚¬Å“Al-Qaddafi ¢â‚¬â„¢s demands are simple ¢â‚¬”only that the people should say: There is
no God but Al-Qaddafi, ¢â‚¬  Nael Shahwan tweeted in Arabic. Mohammad Awaad
wrote,  ¢â‚¬Å“Qaddafi  ¢â‚¬Ëœthe god ¢â‚¬â„¢ is a natural result of a media that has become
accustomed to not saying no to a president, as if he is never wrong. ¢â‚¬  He
continued,  ¢â‚¬Å“I believe we have 22 gods ¢â‚¬  ¢â‚¬”one for each Arab country.

The opposition, too, is armed with religious rhetoric, but mosque, Qur ¢â‚¬â„¢an,
and hadith have been central in the Arab world ¢â‚¬â„¢s struggle for freedom and
democracy. Religious leaders as well as lay people have found that the
language of religion is also the language of revolution. After all religion
is very often the spirit of Arab life, and the inspiration for most of its
endeavors ¢â‚¬”jokes and revolutions included.

*Shatha Almutawa* is the editor of *Sightings* and a PhD candidate at the
University of Chicago Divinity School.

———-

In this month’s Religion and Culture Web Forum, Jessica DeCou offers a comic
interpretation of the theology of Karl Barth, bringing his work into a
surprising and fruitful dialogue with the comedy of Craig Ferguson. Both
men, she contends,  ¢â‚¬Å“employ similar forms of humor in their efforts to unmask
the absurdity and irrationality of our submission to arbitrary human
powers. ¢â‚¬  The humor of Barth and Ferguson alike stresses human limitation
against illusory deification. DeCou argues for understanding both the humor
and the famous combativeness of Barth’s theology as part of this single
project, carried out against modern Neo-Protestant theology. The Religion
and Culture Web Forum is at:
http://divinity.uchicago.edu/martycenter/publications/webforum/

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

———-

Submissions policy

*Sightings* welcomes submissions of 500 to 750 words in length that seek to
illuminate and interpret the intersections of religion and politics, art,
science, business and education. Previous
columns<http://divinity.uchicago.edu/martycenter/publications/sightings/>give
a good indication of the topical range and tone for acceptable essays.
The editor also encourages new approaches to current issues and events.

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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.