March 19, 2001
Despite its violent image in the West, the religion is a balm to
millions in an otherwise cruel and crowded world. Witness
Egypt
By Zachary Karabell
NEWSWEEK INTERNATIONAL
March 19 issue - Islam may be one of the world's
most important religions, but in the West, at
least, it has an image problem. Hizbullah in
Lebanon, Hamas in the West Bank,
fundamentalist violence in Indonesia, the
"mullocracy" of Iran, all are seen as
representative of the rage that is Islam. That, in
fact, was the main thrust of a Feb. 19 piece in
NEWSWEEK on Osama bin Laden and the new
wave of Islamic terrorist groups.
YET THESE GROUPS no more represent Islam than
the Branch Davidians of Waco, Texas, represented
Christianity or the Aum Shinrikyo represented Japanese
spirituality. Islam is a religion held dear by nearly a billion
people, and it shouldn't surprise us that there are more than
a handful of extremists. But on a recent trip to Egypt, I
found little evidence of them. Yes, a few marginal cells of
violent radicals still exist, despite the draconian efforts of
Hosni Mubarak's secret police. But for tens of millions of
Egyptians, Islam is an oasis of calm.
Egypt's population is fast approaching 70 million, and
with a growth rate just under 2 percent annually,
overpopulation is a very real problem. Cairo has one of the
highest population densities on the planet, and the rest of
Egypt's minimal amount of arable land is quickly becoming
saturated with people and unchecked growth. The
government subsidizes food and housing, which is a small
blessing, but jobs are scarce, early mortality looms and the
international economy seems to be passing Egypt by.
In this dreary context, Islam is a balm and a salve. The
hour-and-a-half drive from Cairo to the industrial port city
of Suez is dusty and ugly, festooned with debris and
billboards. But it is at least broken up by the names of God
lining the median. In Islam, God is said to have 99 names,
which include "The Compassionate" and "The Merciful,"
and they are posted, every 100 yards, all the way from
Cairo to Suez. My driver was quick to point this out, and
we spent the better part of the ride listing the names and
negotiating the fare. I had met him early that morning, and
he had been 10 minutes late because of prayer, which he
performed in the hotel's coat room with several of the
bellhops.
I took a bus from Suez to the canal city of Ismailia.
The bus was an old, creaky box stuffed full of people. But
for the first half hour, there was a preternatural calm as
everyone sat quietly and listened to a tape of a mellifluous
Quran reciter, as pure and simple as Gregorian chant. At
every juncture, Islam in Egypt defies our stereotypes. The
al-Azhar mosque and university in central Cairo is one of
the most conservative bastions of Islam in Egypt. Recently
the sheik of al-Azhar condemned the writings of a number
of authors, and the government has not stood in the way of
several of these being brought to trial. The sheik of
al-Azhar, like all clerics in Egypt, is a government employee
and receives a stipend from the state. But inside the mosque
itself, you would never guess that this is a center of Islamic
intolerance. The sheiks are friendly, and if you speak a little
Arabic, they will happily talk about the architecture,
renovations and history of the place. They are not interested
in proselytizing, and when I told them I was from America,
they smiled and said simply, "You are welcome."
For most Egyptians, Islam is intensely personal. Like
many American Protestants, Muslims tend to emphasize the
relationship between each individual and God, without
intermediaries. In a world of sprawling prefab concrete
housing projects, with high unemployment, an indifferent and
occasionally brutal government, Islam is part of the warp
and woof that maintains community and gives people some
sense that life has meaning.
There are those who would say that all this proves is that Islam
is an opiate for the masses, but who are we to say? Islam may not
solve the more intractable problems, and in soothing the
dislocations it may even make some things
worse. But then again, if you go to the Citadel in
Cairo on a Friday, as I did, you can stand, perched above
the city with the mosque of Muhammad Ali at your back,
and you can peek above the torrential smog that envelops
the city of 12 million people, and you can just make out the
Pyramids in the distance. You can listen, not to the sound of
cars or factories, but to the call to prayer, sounded
throughout the city, reminding all listeners of God's
compassion and mercy. It is a haunting symphony, and
juxtaposed with the devastation of overpopulation and
stagnant growth, it allows you to close your eyes and feel, at
least for a few moments, that all is well with the world.
Karabell is the author of "A Visionary Nation: Four
Centuries of American Dreams and What Lies Ahead,"
to be published by HarperCollins
(c) 2001 Newsweek, Inc.
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