The great Persian poet Nezami (1141-1209) was from the city of Ganja in northwestern Iran when it was ruled by the Seljuk Empire. That was the era of the Crusades and Richard Lionheart, though the Crusader kingdoms were far from Iran and Nezami only once left home, to see the king. In his Treasury of Mysteries, this Muslim poet refers to Christian themes several times.

The most famous reference is an anecdote clearly rooted in folk culture, though it captures something of Jesus’ love for the despised humble folk (courtesans and tax-collectors). Here is my hurried, loose rendering:

The feet of Christ, which traced the world,
passed by a small market one day.
A dog big as a wolf lay fallen.
Like Joseph, the coat of its beauty was bloodied.

A crowd of spectators gathered at the scene,
like vultures circling the carcass.
One said, “This gruesome sight poisons
the mind, the way a breath blows out a lamp.”

Another said, “It is a pure blight —
It is blindness for the eye, a plague on the heart.
All expressed their own opinion,
heaping scorn each in turn.

When came the turn of Jesus to speak,
he eschewed blame and went straight to the truth of the matter.
He said, “How fine was its bodily form,
and no white pearl can compare to its teeth.”

Unlike the others around him, Jesus is here depicted as finding something to admire even in the disgusting, putrid carcass of a dead dog, according to this mystical teaching story. Nezami goes on to advise people not to focus on the faults of others and preen about their own virtues. He warns against being too full of admiration for yourself when you look in a mirror. He says that decking yourself out in finery fresh as the spring is dangerous. Fate is out there, looking for prey to devour, and you don’t want to attract attention to yourself.

Here is an Iranian artist’s rendering of the scene from the Safavid period, early 1600s:

“Folio from a Makhzan al-asrar (Treasury of secrets) by Nizami (d.1209); verso: Jesus and the dead dog; recto: text: The tenth article.” National Museum of Asian Art . Creative Commons 0.

Nezami adds in Sufi fashion,

The entirety of this world, old or new,
is fleeting, and not worth two barley grains.
Do not grieve for this world, but rise, sir,
and if you do grieve, pour out some wine for Nezami.

Nezami’s story is an illustration of Matthew 7:3-5

3 Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye but do not notice the log in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your neighbor, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ while the log is in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye. (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition).

The Gospels also show Jesus as reminding people that they are in no position most of the time to judge others for their flaws, as when he defended the woman accused of adultery from being stoned in John 8:7

7 When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)

Muslim poets and story-tellers told lots of anecdotes about Jesus that are not in the Gospels. He was a figure of wisdom and self-denial, and the Persian mystics used him to symbolize the potential of the soul for spiritual growth.

The Pope continued, in a clear condemnation of the Israeli government, “With sorrow I think of Gaza, of so much cruelty; of the children machine-gunned, the bombing of schools and hospitals… So much cruelty!”

He said, “Let us pray for a ceasefire on all war fronts, in Ukraine, the Holy Land, in all the Middle East and the entire world, at Christmas.”

On Saturday, he had been equally forthright on Israel’s atrocities in Gaza, saying, “Yesterday they did not allow the Patriarch (of Jerusalem) into Gaza as promised.”

“Yesterday children were bombed. This is cruelty, this is not war.”

The Pontiff underlined, “I want to say it because it touches my heart.”

(Latin Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa did ultimately manage to visit Gaza City on Sunday to conduct mass for the Christian Palestinian refugees from Israeli bombardment there, in coordination with Israeli authorities. But apparently until the Pope spoke out, the Israeli military had denied him permission.)

Francis’s increasingly outspoken condemnation of Israel has caused several controversies this fall. In a new book first published in Italian in November, the pope called for a painstaking investigation of whether Israel is guilty of genocide in Gaza. (See below for an excerpt from my earlier analysis of these passages.)

On December 7, artisans from the Bethlehem Christian community presented a nativity scene at the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall. The installation was headed by Johny Andonia, 39. At the last moment, he decided to wrap the baby Jesus in a keffiyeh, the patterned scarf that is commonly worn by men in the Levant, Iraq and Arabia, but which has come to symbolize the Palestinians in particular. He said the scarf was a symbol to demonstrate the “existence” of Palestinians. After an outcry from Israel and its supporters ensued, the scarf was removed after three days.

Bethlehem in Palestine has a population of 29,000 about 3,000 of them Christians. Palestinian Christians have suffered from Israeli colonial brutality like all other Palestinians.

I wrote on November 21,

Pope Francis has a new book, Hope never disappoints. Pilgrims towards a better world. . . The Pope mentions Gaza on several occasions in the book. At one point he expresses concern about migration crises around the world, colored as they are by “violence and hardship,” in the Sahara, the Mexican-US border, and the Mediterranean, “which has become a large cemetery in the past decade.” He adds, “also in the Middle East,” because of the “humanitarian tragedy” in Gaza . . .

The Catholic leader laments that so many Ukrainians have been forced to flee, and praises countries that took them in, such as Poland. He then turns to the Middle East, where, he says, we have seen something similar . . .

Francis said he was thinking especially of those who leave Gaza in the midst of the famine that has hit the Strip. Experts estimate that about 100,000 Palestinians from Gaza managed to flee to Egypt before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu occupied the Rafah crossing with Israeli troops.

Then Pope Francis dropped his bombshell. According to some experts, he wrote, “What has been happening in Gaza has the characteristics of a genocide.”

He insisted that a painstaking investigation be carried out to determine whether the situation fits the technical definition formulated by jurists and international organizations. He is likely referring to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and the Genocide Convention of 1948, on the basis of which the International Court of Justice is deliberating on whether what the Israelis are doing in Gaza is a genocide . . .

“Pieta,” Digital, Dream / Dreamland v3 / Clip2Comic, 2024

His last mention of Gaza comes in a passage where he recalls a photograph of a Palestinian grandmother in Gaza, her face not visible, holding in her arms the lifeless body of her five-year-old granddaughter, who had just been killed in an Israeli bombing, along with other family members. He notes that the image has been called “The Pieta of Gaza.”

The Encyclopedia Britannica explains, “Pietà, as a theme in Christian art, depiction of the Virgin Mary supporting the body of the dead Christ. . . . the great majority show only Mary and her Son. The Pietà was widely represented in both painting and sculpture, being one of the most poignant visual expressions of popular concern with the emotional aspects of the lives of Christ and the Virgin.”

Michaelangelo, “Pietà,” Public Domain.

He says that the photo, taken in a hospital morgue, conveys strength, sorrow and the unimaginable pain inflicted by war. He ends by again insisting that innocents must be protected even in the midst of warfare, a principle, he says, that is engraved on the hearts of all people.

The consequence of the Pope’s comments throughout is a humanization of the Palestinians — a humanization of which US and British media outlets have largely proved themselves incapable. The only way they can be all right with over 17,000 dead children in Israel’s campaign against Gaza is that they do not see them as truly human. Otherwise, even the death of one little granddaughter would have us all weeping uncontrollably.

Not only does the Pope humanize Palestinian suffering, refusing to lose his empathy in the face of the magnitude of the slaughter and the sheer number of children in burial shrouds, but in a sense he even divinizes Palestinian suffering. The dead little girl in her grandma’s arms is a Christ-like figure — Christ-like in her innocence, which did not prevent her from being brutally killed. And the heart-wrenching mourning of her grandmother is like the grief of the Mother Mary over her crucified son, himself the incarnation on earth of the divine.

The Pope mentions Gaza on several occasions in the book. At one point he expresses concern about migration crises around the world, colored as they are by “violence and hardship,” in the Sahara, the Mexican-US border, and the Mediterranean, “which has become a large cemetery in the past decade.” He adds, “also in the Middle East,” because of the “humanitarian tragedy” in Gaza.

Pope Francis says that Christians must feel the pain of migrants forced to leave their homes, noting that for many it is easier to empathize with the hopes of an entrepreneur who emigrates to found a business or a retiree who goes abroad to make their pension stretch further than with the hopes of refugees forced abroad by violence or famine, seeking a more peaceful existence.

He makes an interesting point here. I wonder if the difference is agency. We see ourselves in persons who take decisive steps to achieve a goal, but are alienated from those who are forced to do something against their will. Those with agency are admirable to us, are self, while those deprived of it are lesser and Other. I tell my students that they think of becoming a refugee as something that happens to others, but it can happen to anyone. I was trying to study in Beirut in my youth when war broke out and I had to flee to Jordan. My money was frozen in the bank because the banks all closed when war broke out. A kind man, at the American University of Beirut, Dean Robert Najemy, arranged for my parents to wire me airfare. He was later killed by a gunman. Of course, I wasn’t a refugee the way the Palestinians are — I still had my homeland and could ultimately return there. But I gained sympathy regarding those who suddenly have to abandon their domiciles. I don’t think of them as lacking agency or being Other, which I hope comes through in my new book on Gaza.

The Catholic leader laments that so many Ukrainians have been forced to flee, and praises countries that took them in, such as Poland. He then turns to the Middle East, where, he says, we have seen something similar. He praises the way Jordan and Lebanon welcomed refugees. He was obviously writing before mid-September, when Lebanon got caught up in the Israel-Hezbollah feud. Some 1.5 million Syrians had taken refuge in Lebanon from the Syrian civil war. Ironically, hundreds of thousands of Syrians and Lebanese have fled this fall to Syria. Jordan took in so many Palestinian families that a majority of Jordanians today have Palestinian ancestry. Jordan also took in hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Syrians.

Francis said he was thinking especially of those who leave Gaza in the midst of the famine that has hit the Strip. We think about 100,000 Palestinians from Gaza managed to flee to Egypt before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu occupied the Rafah crossing with Israeli troops.

Then Pope Francis dropped his bombshell. According to some experts, he wrote, “what has been happening in Gaza has the characteristics of a genocide.”

He insisted that a painstaking investigation be carried out to determine whether the situation fits the technical definition formulated by jurists and international organizations. He is likely referring to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and the Genocide Convention of 1948, on the basis of which the International Court of Justice is deliberating on whether what the Israelis are doing in Gaza is a genocide.

Although he appeals to international law in this passage, he is pessimistic that war is ever compatible with it. Elsewhere in the book he points out that no war avoids indiscriminately killing civilians. He recalls the images we have all seen coming out of Ukraine and Gaza. “We cannot,” he says, “allow the killing of defenseless civilians.” These are war crimes. Inflicting wounds on these innocents to the point where they have to have limbs amputated or their natural environment is destroyed cannot be dismissed, he says, as mere “collateral damage.” “They are,” he asserts, “victims whose innocent blood cries out to heaven and begs for an end to all war.”

“Pietà,” Digital, Midjourney / Clip2Comic, 2024

His last mention of Gaza comes in a passage where he recalls a photograph of a Palestinian grandmother in Gaza, her face not visible, holding in her arms the lifeless body of her five-year-old granddaughter, who had just been killed in an Israeli bombing, along with other family members. He notes that the image has been called “The Pieta of Gaza.”

The Encyclopedia Britannica explains, “Pietà, as a theme in Christian art, depiction of the Virgin Mary supporting the body of the dead Christ. . . . the great majority show only Mary and her Son. The Pietà was widely represented in both painting and sculpture, being one of the most poignant visual expressions of popular concern with the emotional aspects of the lives of Christ and the Virgin.”

Michaelangelo, “Pietà,” Public Domain.

He says that the photo, taken in a hospital morgue, conveys strength, sorrow and the unimaginable pain inflicted by war. He ends by again insisting that innocents must be protected even in the midst of warfare, a principle, he says, that is engraved on the hearts of all people.

The consequence of the Pope’s comments throughout is a humanization of the Palestinians — a humanization of which US and British media outlets have largely proved themselves incapable. The only way they can be all right with over 17,000 dead children in Israel’s campaign against Gaza is that they do not see them as truly human. Otherwise, even the death of one little granddaughter would have us all weeping uncontrollably.

Not only does the Pope humanize Palestinian suffering, refusing to lose his empathy in the face of the magnitude of the slaughter and the sheer number of children in burial shrouds, but in a sense he even divinizes Palestinian suffering. The dead little girl in her grandma’s arms is a Christ-like figure — Christ-like in her innocence, which did not prevent her from being brutally killed. And the heart-wrenching mourning of her grandmother is like the grief of the Mother Mary over her crucified son, himself the incarnation on earth of the divine.

The two guards were tasked with securing the area ahead of a scheduled visit by French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot. This move reflects Israel’s insistence on continuing its actions that violate the historical and legal status quo in occupied Jerusalem, stressing that Israel has no sovereignty over it.

The official spokesperson for the Jordanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Sufyan Qudah, stressed in a statement the Kingdom’s absolute rejection of all Israeli measures aimed at changing the identity and character of East Jerusalem, including the Old City, and changing the historical and legal status quo in Jerusalem and its Islamic and Christian holy sites.

He also reiterated the Kingdom’s support for France and its position against the attacks of the Israeli occupation forces.

Via Middle East Monitor

This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Bonus Video added by Informed Comment:

WION: “French FM Refuses To Enter Holy Site In Jerusalem In Protest | World News | WION”

Previously, I argued for the impeachment of Justice Clarence Thomas based on his own ethical reckless and brazenly partisan behavior. Justice Alito wears his political sentiments on the flagpoles of his two homes. Trump-appointed Justices Brett Kavanagh, Amy Coney Barrett and Neil Gorsuch all lied during their confirmation hearings, about their devotion to preserving Roe v. Wade. So five of the six-person majority in this decision have demonstrated serious ethical lapses, and expressed contempt for Congress. Chief Justice Roberts, appointed by George W. Bush, has run interference for all of them. Senator Mitch McConnell broke Senate rules, and used legislative sleight-of-hand to stack ALL the US courts with Republican appointees, while sabotaging appointees of President Barack Obama.

Alito and Thomas should be legally compelled to recuse themselves from any cases involving Trump or the January 6 defendants. Reps. Adam Schiff and Mike Sherrill have already demanded that Alito recuse himself. Rep. Steve Cohen introduced a motion to censure Alito for what he called, “a knowing and shameless demonstration of his political bias.” Cohen added, “What’s more, he continues to participate in litigation directly related to the 2020 election and the Insurrection, in direct violation of the federal recusal statute and the Supreme Court’s own ethics rules.” The censure motion would be raised if Alito refuses to recuse himself, as demanded by Congressional Democrats.

The same pressure must be applied to Justice Thomas, who has been just as arrogant in expressing his similar partisan preferences. Rep. Jamie Raskin called for a Federal Ethics Panel for the Courts, which Republicans are fiercely resisting. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez demanded a Senate investigation into Alito saying, “Samuel Alito has identified himself with the same people who raided the Capitol on Jan. 6, and is now going to be presiding over court cases that have deep implications over the participants of that rally. And while this is the threat to our democracy, Democrats have a responsibility for defending our democracy. And in the Senate, we have gavels.”

The Young Turks Video: “You Won’t BELIEVE Justice Alito’s Latest Far-Right Flag ”

Alito’s behavior almost makes Thomas appear naïve and guileless. Both have the same “conflict” problem, having accepted lavish gifts and vacations from corporate titans with cases before the court. Now comes Mrs. Alito to argue that the inverted flag was a “distress signal,” because one of her neighbors had a yard sign that personally insulted her. No, that is for ships at sea in distress, or kidnapping victims. As The Guardian points out, “But these days it (inverted flag) is more often associated with activists making an extremist sign of protest, and at the time of the January 6 insurrection it had been adopted by some on the far right amid efforts, ultimately unsuccessful, to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory over Trump.”  She’ll say anything to deflect, divert, distract and obfuscate. That’s the Republican strategy when they’ve been called out and exposed for support to overthrow the US Government, and install Trump as President for Life. Just as Mrs. Thomas did.

The inverted flag was Alito’s first red flag. The “Appeal to Heaven” flag raised at his beach house is now the second. This illustrates an escalating trend of empowerment-entitlement, when coupled with Justice Thomas’ brazen vertical integration with Harlan Crow.  Republicans feel a misplaced sense of self-righteous justification, to dispense with ethical and legal boundaries that don’t help their agenda. It illustrates how elected and appointed Republican office holders and judges feel beholden to, and empowered by Trump, to dispense with the legal boundaries, as it suits their agenda.

Justice Alito holds enormous power to decide the fate of Trump and Democracy in the US. The expressions on his home flagpoles illustrate a clear “partisan” devotion to Trump over the Constitution. If he refuses to recuse himself, he should face impeachment. Same for Thomas. Not only can SCOTUS justices be impeached, but Alito and Thomas have made compelling cases that their abuses of standing and arrogance demands the process. Their ruling to allow a gerrymandered and racially motivated re-districting map to stand in South Carolina, illustrates the depth of the Republican “deep fix.” Their loyalties are no longer to the US Government and Constitution, but to Donald Trump and by extension, Vladimir Putin, Victor Orban and his other autocratic role models. Over 100 Republican Members of Congress voted to NOT certify the 2020 Election, out of fealty to Trump. Why shouldn’t they all be expelled according to House and Senate Rules, and the Constitution?

The Christian Nationalist movement fuels this dynamic, and piles on self-righteousness. Millions of Evangelicals have “anointed” Trump as their modern day King Cyrus, despite his deeply UN-Christian lifestyle. Why? Because he promised them to end legal access to abortion in the US, which is all they care about as a fast-track element toward Christian theocracy in the US. They want to believe he actually cares about that, though he paid at least one woman to have one. Six of the nine SCOTUS justices are devout, ideological Catholics, which comprise 20% of the US population. McConnell’s fear and devotion to Trump has given this minority outsized influence on our judicial system, with Alito and Thomas abusing their legal standing to make the US a Christian Theocracy, and Trump President-for-Life. Alito and Thomas must recuse or face impeachment; they drew the lines and raised the battle flags.

The Armenian quarter in Jerusalem’s Old City is facing its biggest crisis in a long time. A Jewish businessman with connections to the radical settler movement is poised to develop a quarter of the neighbourhood’s territory, with plans to build a luxury hotel. If this goes ahead, it will significantly change part of Jerusalem’s Old City and hasten the demographic shift towards the city’s Jewish population which has been happening for some years.

The Armenian quarter actually makes up one-sixth of the Old City (the other quarters being the Muslim, the Christian, and the Jewish) and the Armenian presence in Jerusalem dates back to the 4th century. Together with the neighbouring Christian quarter, it is a stronghold for the city’s small Christian minority. The threat of a takeover of parts of the quarter by Jewish settlers is widely seen as altering the demographic status quo to favour Israel’s interests.

Jerusalem: Armenian Christians fight controversial land deal | BBC News Video

In 2021, the Armenian patriarch of Jerusalem, Nourhan Manougian, agreed a 98-year lease over part of the Armenian quarter with the developers. The agreement covers a significant area that today includes a parking lot, buildings belonging to the office of the Armenian church leader – known as the patriarchate – and the homes of five Armenian families.

News of the deal prompted strong protests among the neighbourhood’s Armenians last year. Such was the depth of feeling that in October, the patriarch and the other church leaders felt compelled to cancel the agreement. This led to violent confrontations between settlers and local Armenians.

After a few quiet weeks, fighting broke out again at the end of December when more than 30 men armed with stones and clubs reportedly attacked the Armenians who had been guarding the area for several weeks.

The dispute has now gone to court. The question is whether the lease agreement is valid or whether the unilateral termination makes the agreement void. The patriarchate has engaged lawyers – local and from Armenia and the US – who will present its case that the agreement was not entered into properly because of irregularities in the contract.

Changing East Jerusalem’s demography

This is not a single incident. Since the 1967 six-day War, when the whole of Jerusalem came under Israeli control, there has been a concerted effort to change the demography in the traditionally Arab East Jerusalem.

In many places the authorities are evicting the Arab families who have lived there for decades with the explanation that they lack documents that they own the house. Then a Jewish family moves in.

This change of the demography of East Jerusalem happens through evictions, demolitions and buildings restrictions. This is also happening in Jerusalem’s iconic and touristic Old City.

Almost 20 years ago, there was a minor scandal when it emerged that the Greek Orthodox patriarchate, a large property owner, had entered into a long lease agreement with a Jewish settler organisation regarding two historic hotels.

Now we have a similar incident concerning the Armenian patriarchate. Selling or renting out property to Jewish settlers for a long time is viewed extremely negatively by the Palestinians, who have long fought against illegal Jewish settlements in Palestinian areas.

East Jerusalem is of vital importance to the Palestinians. In proposed plans for a two-state solution, it is the intended capital of a future Palestinian state. Decisively changing the demography there is therefore a priority goal for some in Israel – including the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who doesn’t want a two-state solution.

Hierarchical institutions

This conflict also underlines an old problem with the Jerusalem’s Christian churches – namely the gap between the leadership and the people. Old churches are by nature hierarchical and the leaders at the top rule supremely. In Jerusalem there is an additional problem in that the church leaders are not always drawn from the local population.

The largest Christian denomination in the Holy Land is the Greek Orthodox Church. Its members are largely Arabs, but the patriarch and the other leading prelates are Greeks.

Nourhan Manougian, the current and 97th Armenian patriarch of Jerusalem, was born in Syria to an Armenian family. The Armenian patriarchate has been accused of corruption and illegitimate sale of property in the past, long before the current crisis.

If the Armenians lose this battle and the settler movement is able to gain control of such a key site, it will harm a vulnerable small minority. And the settler campaign to colonise East Jerusalem under Jewish control will have achieved yet another victory.

Svante Lundgren, Researcher, Lund University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Pope Francis said at his evening Mass on Christmas Eve, “Tonight, our hearts are in Bethlehem, where the Prince of Peace is once more rejected by the futile logic of war, by the clash of arms that even today prevents him from finding room in the world.”

In Bethlehem itself, where Pastor Isaac preaches, the city elders canceled the Christmas parade and other festivities in commemoration of the shivering Palestinians a few miles away whose stomachs are being gnawed at by hunger and whose throats are raspy with thirst. Bethlehem is a town of some 25,000 in the Palestinian West Bank occupied militarily by Israeli troops. About 11,000 of its residents are Palestinian Christians, descendants of the Near Eastern pagans and Jews living under Roman rule who embraced the message of Jesus of Nazareth in his lifetime and after.

Bethlehem’s population is not being bombed from the sky the way the Palestinians of Gaza are, but they also suffer from Israeli occupation. According to a 2020 poll 80% of Palestinian Christians worry about being attacked by militant Israeli squatters, 83% worry that these colonizers will drive them from their homes, and 70% are concerned that the Israeli government will simply annex their land. Fully 62% of Palestinian Christians believe that the ultimate goal of the Israeli government is to expel Christians from their homeland. A good 14% have actually lost land to the Israelis, and 42% have to regularly go through Israeli security checkpoints, which have carved the West Bank up into cantons and make it difficult to get to hospital.

Aljazeera English: “‘No joy in our hearts’: Bethlehem’s Christians face heartbreak at Christmas ”

Although there are only about 800 Palestinian Christians in Gaza, they have suffered from Israeli bombardment, sniping attacks, and razing of civilian infrastructure. The Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem revealed in a letter last week that an Israeli army sniper “murdered two Christian women inside the Holy Family Parish in Gaza”. It said that besieged mother and daughter Nahida and Samar “were shot and killed as they walked to the Sister’s Convent. One was killed as she tried to carry the other to safety”.

They were among hundreds of Christians taking refuge in the Parish. The church had given the GPS coordinates of church properties in Gaza to the Israeli government in hopes they would be spared, but local Palestinians say that church building has been shelled by Israeli armor.

Pope Francis responded at that time, lamenting of the Israeli campaign against Gaza that “unarmed civilians are the targets of bombings and gunfire.” He condemned the assualt at the compound of the Catholic parish, “where there are no terrorists, but families, children, people who are sick and have disabilities, and nuns . . . A mother, Mrs. Nahida Khalil Anton, and her daughter, Samar Kamal Anton, were killed, and others were wounded by the shooters while they were going to the bathroom,” he announced.

The Pope continued, “Some say, ‘This is terrorism. This is war.’ Yes, it is war. It is terrorism . . . That is why the Scripture affirms that ‘God stops wars… breaks the bow, splinters the spear’ (Psalm 46:10). Let us pray to the Lord for peace.”

The Israeli army denied the charges and got in a snit about a “blood libel.” But when you are the 17th most powerful military in the world and you genocide 20,000 civilians in 11 weeks, there isn’t any libel involved. It is just blood.

Israelis with a conscience, such as activist Orly Noy, the chairman of the human rights organization, B’Tselem, in contrast called desperately for a ceasefire. This issue isn’t about Judaism or Islam or Christianity, since there are people from each of those traditions who are on opposite sides of it.

As for Lutheran Pastor Munther Isaac, on Friday he preached a sermon, “Christ in the Rubble.”

He cited the enormity of the death toll, including of thousands of children, and said that as in the case of South African Apartheid the theology of the state has been wielded against the helpless. Not even that some Palestinians are Christians has evoked sympathy in European and American Christians. “This war has confirmed to us that the world does not see us as equal. Maybe it is the color of our skin. Maybe it is because we are on the wrong side of the political equation. Even our kinship in Christ did not shield us. As they said, if it takes killing 100 Palestinians to get a single “Hamas militant” then so be it! We are not humans in their eyes. (But in God’s eyes… no one can tell us we are not!).”

He implicitly referred to US Evangelicals, many of whom have enthusiastically cheered on the Israeli army’s genocidal (my word) actions.

“I feel sorry for you. We will be ok. Despite the immense blow we have endured, we will recover. We will rise and stand up again from the midst of destruction, as we have always done as Palestinians, although this is by far the biggest blow we have received in a long time.

But again, for those who are complicit, I feel sorry for you. Will you ever recover from this?”

No, I don’t think this campaign’s supporters ever will regain their souls, which they have sold for the thirty silver coins of conformism, militarism, cowardice and Islamophobia.

Pastor Isaac went on:

“In our pain, anguish, and lament, we have searched for God, and found him under the rubble in Gaza. Jesus became the victim of the very same violence of the Empire. He was tortured. Crucified. He bled out as others watched. He was killed and cried out in pain – My God, where are you?

In Gaza today, God is under the rubble.

And in this Christmas season, as we search for Jesus, he is to be found not on the side of Rome, but our side of the wall. In a cave, with a simple family. Vulnerable. Barely, and miraculously surviving a massacre. Among a refugee family. This is where Jesus is found.”

So he inspired me to a digital painting. I’ll leave you with it.

“Gaza Guernica 19: Nativity,” by Juan Cole, Digital, Dream/ Dreamland v.3, PS Express, IbisPaint, 2023.

Verses 19:17-35:

And once remote from them, she hid behind a screen. Then we sent to her our spirit, who took the shape of a well-formed man.
She said, “I take refuge in the All-Merciful from you, if you are pious.”
He said, “I am but an angel of your lord, come to bestow on you a son without blemish.”
She said, “Will I have a son, when no mortal has touched me, and I was not rebellious?”
He said, “So it is.” He said, “Your Lord says, it is easy for me. We will make him a sign for the people and a mercy from us. The matter has already been decreed.”
So she bore him, and withdrew with him to a remote place.
And the pangs of childbirth drove her to the trunk of a palm tree. She said, “I wish I had died before now, and had been forgotten in oblivion.”
But he called to her from beneath her, saying, “Do not be sad. For your Lord has made a stream run beneath you.”
So shake the trunk of the palm tree toward you, and ripe, fresh dates will fall to you. So eat and drink and be comforted. If you see any human being, say, “I have taken a vow to the All-Merciful to fast, and will speak to no one today.”

Many of these details are from material circulating in the late antique Christian community that also reached the Prophet Muhammad. In the Qur’an Jesus is depicted as in a line of God’s prophets, including Moses, Solomon, David, and others, a line that went on to include the Prophet Muhammad as of the early 600s CE.

The tradition of Persian and Mughal miniature painting — of painting leaves intended to go into manuscript books for the libraries of kings or very wealthy notables — flowered in the 1200s and after, in Iran, Central Asia, India and what is now Turkey. It was influenced by Chinese techniques that came in through the Mongol conquests and the Silk Road and sometimes the people depicted look a little Chinese.

In 1519-1687, the Qutb-Shahi dynasty ruled the Kingdom of Golconda, named after their initial capital, a city near Hyderabad in South India. From 1591 Hyderabad itself became the capital. That city today is the capital of Telengana State and is the fourth-most-populous city in the Indian Republic. The dynasty was founded by an adventurer from Hamadan in Iran, who was a Shiite, and so the kingdom had Shiism for its state religion, even though most of its subjects were Hindus and most of its Muslim subjects were Sunnis. In its later decades it became a vassal of the Mughals based up north, and ultimately was absorbed into the Mughal Empire.

During the 1600s in particular there was a lot of contact with European maritime empires and merchants, who brought books and paintings from Europe, and so the Renaissance tradition of depicting the Nativity had an impact on court artists. But these paintings were commissioned by Muslim rulers for Muslim court purposes, as their own celebration of Jesus, whom they considered, as did all Muslims, one of their prophets.

The National Museum of Asian Art at the Smithsonian has a spectacular miniature painting from Golconda, dated to about 1630, of the adoration of the baby Jesus.



Jesus and Mary are both shown with golden halos. Joseph is also there but without a halo.

One of the adorers is, (extremely) anachronistically, a 17th-century European merchant in boots, almost certainly Dutch. He also seems to have brought gold vessels, and he has in his hand what looks to me like fine cloth, dyed purple. Indigo dye was one of India’s trading major commodities. More on all that later.

There are three winged angels, two hovering above and one on the ground in front of the manger. One of the angels above is holding what looks to me like a crown. Since the Muslim tradition doesn’t know about the Gospel language regarding the messiah being the king of the Jews, my guess is that this motif was borrowed from a European artist. Also, gold was one of the gifts traditionally thought by Christians to be brought to the Christ child by one of the 3 magi.

The other angel has a bow. In South India, the crown and the bow were royal symbols. So I think the angels are depicted as exalting Jesus in the way royalty was exalted. These symbols raise the possibility that the royal treatment given here to baby Jesus is not Christian in origin but Hindu Indian. After all, the beloved god Ram was a king. For these Indian artists, who did not know the Bible, the symbols may not be an assertion that he was royalty, only that he deserved the sort of glorification that kings received.

Although in the West of the Muslim world Arab artists were reluctant to depict holy figures, this Indian artist has no problem with it. Most did not, and they painted Muhammad, as well. Mary is shown wearing hijab but with her face visible, and Joseph and Jesus also have their faces depicted.

Shiite Islam puts special emphasis on piety centering on the family of the Prophet, including Muhammad’s son-in-law and first cousin, Ali, Muhammad’s daughter Fatimah, and the two sons of Ali and Fatimah, Hasan and Husayn. Although Sunni courts also produced nativity paintings, it could be that this form of Christian piety especially appealed to the Shiite rulers of Golconda.



As for the Dutch merchant or factor, Sanu Kainikara explains,

“In 1627, the Dutch had a disagreement with the Governor of Golconda, under whose jurisdiction the region fell, regarding the grant of a ‘farming’ permit for Masulipatam (Macchilipatanam). They withdrew to Pulicat and blockaded Masulipatam from the sea. The Qutb Shah dismissed his governor and invited the Dutch to return to Masulipatam. The reason for the Qutb Shahi sultan’s action was that the Dutch possessed a preponderance of naval strength that was able to threaten an adversary from the sea without exposing themselves to any significant danger—a capability that no other European power in India could lay claim to at that time.”

“The Dutch trade from Masulipatam amounted to Rupees 600,000 per year throughout most of the 17th century. In 1660, the Dutch opened a factory in Golconda, whose chief merchant also doubled as the ambassador to the Qutb Shahi king.”

One of the key commodities traded from Golconda to the Netherlands and later to Britain was diamonds.


Map of Hyderabad state, c. 1730, H/t Wikipedia, UM Clement Library .

So that Dutch merchant was almost certainly in Hyderabad seeking diamonds. But maybe also indigo dye and textiles, which he is shown in turn offering to baby Jesus.

And the court painter, having been commissioned by the king to do a nativity scene, obligingly incorporated the trader into the painting, a common practice. It is unlikely that the painting was commissioned by the foreigner– it stayed in India until a British officer purchased it. It just shows that the Prophet Jesus (`Isa in Arabic) had acquired another connotation in the Renaissance period, being associated with the expanding maritime trade empires of the Christian Europeans. The Dutch had just displaced the Portuguese, who can be seen in earlier miniatures.

The painting is a reminder that Christmas is not parochial — not northern European, as it is often conceived in the US, but a global commemoration of a global event. Not only do Muslims celebrate Jesus as a holy figure, but many Hindus also respect him (and more used to before the rise of Hindutva, Hindu nationalism). And Jews who live alongside Christians often have Christmas trees, even if they can’t go along with Christian beliefs about Jesus, who after all was born and bred a Jew. Christmas should be for celebrating rebirth and renewal and hope, in a world that desperately needs all three, for Christians and for everyone.

Exploring the Qur’an and the Bible with Gabriel Said Reynolds: “Juan Cole: Infidel or Pagan? Understanding Kufr (كفر) in the Qur’an | Muhammad the Prophet of Peace ”

Juan Cole, here. This is what I wrote on the subject at IC when my article first appeared:

My new article is out in The Journal of the American Oriental Society about the meaning of the root k-f-r in the Qur’an, the Muslim scripture. We’ve all grown up hearing about the Qur’an’s condemnation of “infidels” or “unbelievers,” but I think that this is for the most part a mistranslation. I argue that the root does not mean “infidel” but “pagan” or “polytheist” (and I think with the connotation of hostile, impious and morally corrupt pagan). In fact, I think the Arabic may be a translation of the Latin paganus. The latter had connotations of “hick” or “rustic” but also of “polytheist” and the same is true in Qur’anic Arabic.

Juan Cole, “Infidel or Paganus? The Polysemy of kafara in the Quran,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, 140, 3:(2020): 615-635:

I also find that the noun kāfir is never applied in the Qur’an to Jews and Christians in an unmodified way. The noun implies “pagan” or “scoundrel” or “ingrate.”

The Qur’an considers Jews and Christians to be monotheists or submitters to the one God (muslimun). This is the antonym of “pagan.” In The Cow 2:62, the Qur’an promises paradise to righteous Jews, Christians and other monotheists alongside the followers of Muhammad.

I write in the article, “A key attribute of the [pagan] kāfir, as we have seen, is that such a person is damned to hell. Dominion 67:6 reads: “And for those who denied (kafarū bi-) their Lord, there awaits the torment of hell, and a wretched destination!” In contrast, in speaking of Jews and Christians we find in The Spider 29: “Debate the scriptural communities only in the best of ways, except for those who do wrong. Say ‘We believe in the revelation sent down to us, and the revelation sent down to you; our God and your God is one, and to him we have submitted’.””

It is common in the contemporary Muslim world to refer to all non-Muslims as kuffār or unbelievers, but I believe this is contrary to the usage of the Qur’an itself.

I think virtually all Qur’an translations err in consistently translating kafir as “infidel” or “unbeliever” or “disbeliever,” since this rendering implies a larger group than just pagans.

I made some of these arguments very briefly in my book on the Prophet Muhammad, but since it is a rip-roaring historical narrative I could not stop and do word philosophy at length:

In the article, I also explore how the verb kafara can be used of anybody. It means to commit impiety, blasphemy, immorality, etc. It is like the verb “to sin.” Monotheists can commit impiety as a one-off or occasional act, but that does not cause them to be characterized as among the group of pagans or kafirun. Even Muhammad’s own followers can commit this sin, as I explain:

“The verb kafara, however, is more fluid and is sometime applied to monotheists. The Family of Imran 3:167 complains about those of Muḥammad’s believers who declined to go out to defend the city (later commentators say the verse concerned the battle of Uḥud in 625): “They were told, ‘Come, fight in the path of God, or at least take a defensive position’. They replied, ‘If we knew how to fight, we would have followed you’. That day, they were closer to kufr than to faith, inasmuch as they said with their lips what was not in their hearts. God knows best what they are concealing.” The deverbal noun kufr here clearly means hypocrisy or dishonesty rather than disbelief.

Here are a few excerpts from the article, which I have modified slightly in an attempt to make them a bit more readable. The original is technical and written for specialists, but I think the findings are accessible and very important. Obviously, scholars should consult the full text for footnotes and for the larger argument about how the noun and verb could diverge from one another (and there really are two distinct verbs, only one of which means “to disbelieve” in a straightforward and consistent way).

—–
From Juan Cole, “Infidel or Paganus? The Polysemy of kafara in the Quran,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, 140, 3:(2020): 615-635:

The active participle kāfir . . . cannot be assumed necessarily to mean “rejecter of something” or “infidel.” Rather, it has a wide range of meanings that can be discerned contextually. In Iron 57:20 the broken plural refers to rustic farmers: “Know that the life of this nether world is a game, a sport, a trinket, a mutual boast among yourselves and a multiplication of your wealth and children. It resembles rain whose resultant vegetation pleases the peasants (kuffār), but then it withers and you see it yellowing into chaff.” As al-Khalīl mentioned [in his early dictionary], kafr means village, reinforcing the rural connotation of the root. It may be that a secondary meaning of polytheist or adherent of traditional religion emerged because the population in the countryside was more likely than its urban counterpart to have clung to the old gods and resisted accepting monotheism.

The root is also clearly associated in the Quran with polytheism. Al-Kāfirūn 109:1–6 opens with: “Say: kāfirūna! I do not worship what you worship. Nor are you worshipping what I worship. Nor am I worshipping what you have worshipped. Nor are you worshipping what I worship. To you your religion and to me my religion.” There is an admission that the pagans have a religion, but it is simply castigated as a false one, which makes translating kāfir as “infidel” seem odd. That the dispute was over Muḥammad’s monotheism versus Arabian polytheism is demonstrated by Ṣād 38:4–5, which says . . . “They marvel that a warner came to them from among them, and the [pagans] kāfirūna said, ‘This is a lying sorcerer. Has he made the gods into only one God? That is an astonishing thing’.” This and many other verses demonstrate that the Quran came out at least in part of a milieu where there were adherents of traditional religion . . .

The sense of “to worship the gods” for k-f-r is underlined in The Cow 2:257: “God is the patron of those who believe, bringing them out of darkness into the light. And those who kafarū, their patrons are Ṭāghūt, who bring them out of the light into darkness.” Ṭāghūt is a loan from [Ethiopian] Geʿez that means “new or alien god” or “idol,” and, interestingly, is treated as a plural in this quranic verse, corresponding to numerous patrons. Belief in polytheistic religion is not, properly speaking, disbelief but the wrong sort of belief, from the point of view of the Quran. It is not a charge of atheism. Not only are such believers committed polytheists but they are also militant: “Those who believed fight in the path of God, and the pagans (al-ladhīna kafarū) fight in the path of Ṭāghūt, so fight the associates of Satan, for the guile of Satan is feeble” (al-Nisāʾ 4:76) . . .

Elsewhere, it is admitted that they [the pagans] are believers in their own tradition; when they question the eschatological opening or grand success, the verse reads: “Say: On the Day of the Opening, the faith (īmānuhum) of those who kafarū will not benefit them, nor will they be granted a respite” (al-Sajda 32:29). Since it is allowed that they have faith, they are not unbelievers strictly speaking and translating this phrase as “the faith of the infidels will not benefit them” would be self-contradictory. While they are not accused of disbelieving, they are, however, liars and wrongdoers, dishonest and workers of evil (cf. The Women 4:167–68). As well as labeling them “wrongdoers” (sing. ẓālim), they are “morally dissolute” (fāsiqūna) for responding incorrectly to God’s proverbs (The Cow 2:26). Along the same lines, it is said of Muḥammad’s monotheistic followers: “God has caused you to love faith, rendering it beautiful in your hearts, and he has caused you to abhor impiety (kufr) and ungodly behavior (fusūq) and rebellion” (al-Ḥujurāt 49:7).

“Rebel” is one meaning of the root k-f-r. In the story of how Lucifer fell (The Cow 2:34) it is reported: “And when we said to the angels, ‘Bow down to Adam’, they prostrated them- selves, save the Devil; he refused, and grew haughty, and so he became one of the rebellious (kāfirīna).” The active participle here does not involve disbelief but disobedience. The Devil (Iblīs, Gk diabolos) is not accused of rejecting the existence or oneness of God but of refusing the divine order to bow down to the first human being. Indeed, in 2:30 the angels are depicted as arguing with God that creating Adam would lead to turmoil, and the implication is that Satan parted ways with God not because he disbelieved but because he had a positive if misguided motive -— he differed with him on the wisdom of opening Pandora’s box . . .

kufr is equated with impiety, which Grecophone Christians in their polemics against the pagans called asebeia. Likewise, in Prohibition 66:10 God had made the wives of Noah and Lot an object lesson for those who kafarū because of these women’s preference for pagan society over their husbands. The reason given in 2 Pet 2:6 for the calamity that befell the people of Sodom and Gomorrah is that they lived impious lives (asebesin), which seems roughly the meaning of kufr in Q 66:10.

BLASPHEMY

A controversial passage in The Cow 2:102 provides a further sense of the verb. The Quran condemns those in the era of Solomon who followed demons… that taught magic. It goes out of its way to underline that Solomon himself did not commit kufr, even though in late antique folk tradition he was held to be able to control sprites and demons. The demons were guilty of putting otherwise inoffensive teachings to evil purposes, turning them into black magic, so that they kafarū (A. J. Arberry translates this as “disbelieved”). Of what, however, did this act consist? It does not appear to have been a denial of anything, but rather was a blasphemous activity. The humans were eager to have the teaching of the two angels of Babylon, Hārūt and Mārūt, which they then desecrated by turning it into dark arts so as to separate spouses from one another. The demons’ instruction harmed people rather than benefited them, and turning to the occult deprived these individuals of any portion of heaven.

Hārūt and Mārūt are two of the Zoroastrian celestial spirits, Haurvatāt and Ameretāt. These emanations of the supreme deity, Ahura Mazda, symbolize wholeness and immortality. For instance, in the Younger Avesta, Yasht 19.95–96, the last days during which the world will be renovated are described thus: “Evil thought will be overcome, good thought will overcome it . . . The celestial spirits Integrity (Haurvatāt) and Immortality (Ameretāt) will defeat the demons of Hunger (Shud) and Thirst (Tarshna).” The two celestial spirits associated with nemeses among the demons symbolizing bodily human cravings like hunger and thirst may have inspired the Quran’s motif that devils misused their teachings to satisfy lust. Moreover, Ameretāt is associated with plants, fertility, and the tree of life. The Quran could be projecting into the time of Solomon a contemporary set of Zoroastrian ideas. The retrofitting of this motif to the time of the Hebrew monarch may in turn have come about because of the association in late antiquity of Solomon with mastery of the sprites or demons, which is reflected in quranic passages.

In late antique Greek Christian authors, black magic was associated with blasphemy (which originally meant slandering [God]). In his “Homily 10 on 2 Timothy,” John Chrysostom (ca. 349–407 CE) wrote, “Let us then so live that the name of God be not blasphemed (blasphēmíesthai).” Among the many examples he gave of Christians blaspheming in failing to live up to their ideals were “your auguries, your omens, your superstitious observances . . . your incantations, your magic (mageías) arts.”

What if we translated The Cow 2:101 this way?

“They followed what the demons recited over the realm of Solomon. Solomon himself was not a blasphemer, but the demons were blasphemers, teaching the people magic and what was revealed to the two archangels of Babylon, Haurvatāt and Ameretāt. But these two had been careful not to teach anyone without warning them, ‘We are a potential disturbance of faith (fitna), so do not fall into blasphemy.’ From them they learned how they might divide a man and his wife [. . .].”

Here is a condemnation of warlocks and witches who engage in what is seen as necromancy, which apparently enables those who covet married persons to cast spells to separate them from their spouses. They are instructed by demons who pervert and misuse the teachings of divinely inspired Zoroastrian angels.
Later Muslim commentators on this text are divided over its meaning. Some saw the anecdote as concerning fallen angels. Others defended the angels as having been sinless, and held that while they performed licit miracles, the demons turned their teachings to the purposes of thaumaturgy. As I read the text, the teaching of the angels itself is not being condemned here. Solomon, the verse says, bore no blame for his mastery of the spirits. The Zoroastrian celestial spirits are spoken of with reverence, called angels rather than demons, and are depicted as having been given inspiration (unzila) by God. The angels act responsibly inasmuch as they give disciples an explicit warning that learning their esoteric teachings could tempt humans, if they are not careful, to the dark side. (Zoroastrianism is listed in Pilgrimage 22:17 with the monotheistic religions and distinguished from paganism.)

The Quran shows positive attitudes throughout to Christians and The Cow 2:62 admits Christians to heaven (“Those who believed, and the Jews, and the Christians, and the Sabians, and whoever has believed in God and the Last Day and performed good works, they shall have their reward with their Lord”). To underline the difference, the Quran shows God pledging to Jesus regarding future Christians in The Family of Imran 3:55: “God said, ‘Jesus, I will take you to me and will raise you to me and I will purify you of those who kafarū and will render those who follow you superior to those who kafarū until the judgment day’.” Likely it is distinguishing between the old pagan Romans, who had persecuted Jesus and his faithful, and the Christians themselves. There will always be, the Quran vows, a difference between followers of Jesus and the kāfirūn. This and other passages suggest to me that the deverbal noun kāfir is never used tout court for Jews and Christians.

[Takeaway: kafir as a noun is never used in the Qur’an to refer to Christians and Jews, only to pagans or rebels or blasphemers or the morally dissolute.]

In the Medinan period, the Quran uses the verb kafara when it begins speaking of an antagonistic group from among the other monotheists: “Neither those who kafarū from among the people of the Book, nor the polytheists (mushrikūna) themselves, desire that good from your lord descend upon you” (The Cow 2:105). Some groups from among the biblical communities had allied politically with the militant pagans. A hypernym — for instance, “tree”—is lexically superordinate to hyponyms, another set of nouns or phrases under its rubric (e.g., “juniper” and “acacia”). Here the phrase “people of the Book” functions as a phrasal hypernym, which is lexically superordinate to the hyponym “Those who kafarū from among the people of the Book.” Logically speaking, the need to identify this subset of believers in the Bible as those who kafarū proves that kāfir does not ordinarily refer to Jews and Christians. That is, if all Jews and Christians were always kāfirūn, it would be redundant to identify this group “from among the people of the Book” as “those who kafarū.” Moreover, if all Jews and Christians were always kāfirūn, it would make nonsense of God’s pledge to Jesus (Āl ʿImrām 3:55) that he “will render those who follow you superior to those who kafarū until the judgment day.” Christians are not kāfirūn under ordinary circumstances, just as they are not doomed to hell under ordinary circumstances. Still, just as they can commit mortal sins and so depart from righteousness into perdition, so they can throw in with bellicose polytheists against Muḥammad and his cause, and likewise join the damned . . .

PAGANUS

It is suggestive that kāfir maps so closely onto the Latin paganus as it was used in late antiquity. Remus points to an imperial decree of 416 CE (16.10.21) that excludes from government service “those who are polluted by the profane error or crime of pagan rites, that is, gentiles (qui profano pagani ritus errore seu crimine polluntur, hoc est gentiles).” This principle was reaffirmed by Justinian (r. 527–565) in his Code (1.5.19), which body of law applied to Arabic speakers in the empire in Muḥammad’s own era. The Table 5:103 likewise denounces the pagan rites of sacrifice to idols practiced by those who kafarū and al-Jumʿa 62:2 speaks of “purifying” gentiles (ummiyūna) implying that paganism had polluted them.

The two words share a number of other meanings and connotations -— rural, polytheist, opponent, persecutor, enemy, blasphemer, potential convert, and interlocutor. K-f-r may at least in some instances be a loanshift from the Latin paganus. Whatever the etymology of the term paganus, by the late fourth century it had come to mean both “rustic” and “adherent of the old Roman religion.” It was often used satirically, to class the remaining pagan aristocracy with unlettered peasants.

Centuries of Roman rule had made Arabic speakers familiar with Latin vocabulary. The word for “path” in the phrase “straight path” of piety in the Quran, ṣirāṭ, is a loan from the Latin via strata or paved avenue.72 One route for Latin influence was the Arab mounted foederati who served as an auxiliary to the Roman army in Bostra and elsewhere, since Latin remained the language of the military. Another way Latin may have proved influential was through law, inasmuch as fourth- and fifth-century imperial decrees and even some of the sixth-century Code of Justinian were still issued in Latin as well as Greek in the sixth century.

I have argued that kāfir in the Quran for the most part does not mean “unbeliever” or “infidel.” In most of our examples, a lack of belief is not at stake. Rather, kāfir is a polysemous term that has a wide range of meanings, including “peasant,” “pagan,” “libertine,” “rebel,” and “blasphemer.” These are discernible if we look at the parallelisms, synonyms, and antonyms with which quranic verses surround this noun. I understand the impulse of translators to use “unbeliever” for kāfir, and, of course, the term sometimes does mean just that. Moreover, the condemnations of pagan belief and practice, while often made with other terms, could be seen to imply unbelief at some meta level. I argue, however, that limiting the meaning of the root so severely causes us to miss a rich set of other connotations that give us a rounder idea of the Quran’s intent…

I have suggested that the bilingual lives of many Arabic speakers in and on the fringes of the Roman empire over hundreds of years (Arabic-Aramaic and Arabic-Greek) contributed to this polysemy, through the phenomenon of the loanshift. The Latin paganus, which came to have the connotation both of “rustic” and “polytheist” in the fifth and sixth centuries, may well lie behind Iran 57:20, which refers to kuffār as peasants happy to see rain and greenery. At the same time, the quranic term is clearly also used to refer to polytheists. Ṣād 38:5 reports of the kāfirūn that they rejected the notion that the many gods could merge into only one, while The Cow 2:257 says that those who kafarū had taken the deity or idol Ṭāghūt for their patron instead of God. The Family of Imran 3:151 menaces these pagans with hellfire for having made God part of a pantheon (ashrakū). While it is not impossible that Arabic independently invented a connection between farmers and polytheists, Occam’s razor would suggest that we instead posit that Arabic was influenced by late antique Roman Christian usage, which was embedded in imperial laws applying to Arabophone citizens of the empire. In any case, far from being deniers or nihilists, the pagans are admitted to believe in their own religion (dīn) and to have faith (īmānuhum) in it. It is simply a false religion. Kafara thus has a positive valence that “to disbelieve” does not capture, even if the latter is not ultimately an incorrect characterization of the quranic view of the pagans.