The Qur'an; Book of War
only. This is jarri ng to moder n sensi bilit ies, to be sure, but it does not
amount to the same thing. That's one reaso n why Jews and Chris tians
haven 't formed terr or groups aroun d the world that quote these Scrip-
tures to justi fy killi ng civil ian non-combat ants.
By contr ast, Osama bin Laden , who is only the most visib le expon ent
of a terror networ k that exten ds from Indone sia to Niger ia and into
Western Europe and the Ameri cas, quote s the Qur'an copio usly in his
commun iqués. In his 1996 "Decl arati on of War again st the Americ ans
Occup ying the Land of the Two Holy Place s," he quote ssuras 3:145 ;
47:4-6: 2:154 : 9:14; 47:19 : 8:72; and of cours e the notor ious "Vers e of
the Sword ," sura 9:5." In 2003, on the first day of the Muslim holy
celeb ration Eid al-Adha, the Feast of Sacrif ice, he began a sermon:
Allah who revealed the verse of the Sword to
his servant and messenger [the Prophet
Muhammad], in order to establish truth and
abolish falsehood.""
Of course, the devil can quote Scripture for
his own purpose, but Osama's use of these
and other passages in his messages is
consistent (as we shall see) with traditional
Islamic understanding of the Qur'an. When
modern-day Jews and Christians read their
Bibles, they simply don't interpret the pas-
sages cited as exhorting them to violent
actions against unbelievers. This is dueto the
influence of centuries of interpretative
traditions that have moved away from liter-
alism regarding these passages. But in Islam,
there is no comparable interpretative tradition.
The jihad passages in the Qur'an are anything
hut a dead letter. In Saudi Arabia,A Book You're Not
Supposed to ReadDon't believe what I am sayi ng about the
Qur' an? Read it for your self. The cle arest
and most accu rate English tran sla tion is
that of N. J. Dawo od, The Kora n
(Pen guin), but Musl ims tend to dis like it
bec ause Dawo od was not a Musl im. The
two mos t accu rate Engl ish tran sla tion s
by Musl ims are those by Abdu llah Yusu f
Ali and Moha mme d Marmadu ke Pick thal l,
both of whic h are avai lable in mul tipl e
editions unde r vari ous titl es. Both are
marred by a pseu do-King James Bibl e
Englis h, whic h make s them irritating to
read.