On Desecrating a Holy Text

02/27/2012

On February 22nd, 2012, Afghanistan saw the first of a series of riots and protests against the burning of Qurans just a day earlier. All of the attention had been on the actual burning of the holy texts. What has gone largely unnoticed: the desecration of the Qurans by Afghan prisoners prior to the unfortunate disposal by US military at Bagram Airfield.

A plausible scenario (forgive the passive tense):

The Qurans in question were used to conceal messages for prison inmates seeking to communicate under the Bagram radar. A member of the US military working a prison shift found these messages and confiscated the Qurans, putting them somewhere safe until further notice.

The Qurans, along with other books to be disposed, were later found and identified as burn material. This task was relegated to a low ranking soldier, who was told not to ask questions. The soldier took all the books, including the Qurans, to the on-base incinerator. An Afghan worker found the burned books and requested them as a fire starter for the evening so that he could keep his family warm. The request was granted, and the Afghan took the books off base. He later noticed that some of the books were actually burnt Qurans, and the word was out.

The Qurans in question, housed in the library of Bagram Air Fields prison, were likely used by prisoners in much the same way a Bible would be used in an American prison: to reconnect with a higher morality as part of one's personal rehabilitation; to pass the time with legendary tales of mysticism from an age none of us really know for certain existed as written; to find faith in something greater as a way of rationalizing the "reality on the ground."

Those same holy books have now been confirmed as vehicles for prisoners who wanted to exchange messages in secret. This is a direct desecration of Allah's word. So before the Qurans were burned, they had already been defiled by the very same people who purportedly held those books to be sacred.

Were the messages, highlighted as the reason for confiscating the Qurans, violent? Irrelevant. The use of the Quran as a notepad was a highly grave error in judgment. The second, and much more damning error in judgment, came from the US military, who had a choice to deal with this silently - as may have been dictated by higher authorities - or submit the Qurans as evidence that Muslims had violated the sanctity of Allah's word. In my humble view, the actions actually taken reflect a sincere insecurity of internationals in-country with respect to the Quran, and a lack of leadership with respect to the sensitivity and understanding necessary to deal with this situation properly.

I wonder if a Muslim in America found a Bible scrawled with violent, anti-Muslim language, and he then burned the Bible in order to destroy the messages (and the medium), would that reasonably compare to this circumstance? Would Christians become unnerved and resort to protests in order to bring visibility to the desecration of their holy text?

That the Quran was mistreated by non-Afghans, non-Muslims, is certain. That this action has been used to call Muslims together in protest is within reason. That people lost their lives for expressing anger and resentment at such action is unfortunate. And that those in the media and military failed to provide appropriate context and inspection for the use of the Quran as a medium for illicit communication is wholly irresponsible.