In my most recent link farm post, I posted a link to a story about Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani calling a fatwah against homosexuals. The blogger Zeyad apparently translated this from an page in Arabic on Sistani’s website:
Q: What is the judgement on sodomy and lesbianism?
A: “Forbidden. Those involved in the act should be punished. In fact, sodomites should be killed in the worst manner possible.”
Juan Cole also believes the story is true. However, Ginmar, who has significant expertise in this area, is arguing that the story is false. From an email Ginmar sent me (reprinted with permission):
Here’s the evidence. Sistani has a long history of taking fatwas extremely seriously and always issuing them in the service of non-violence. The other part of the fatwa incited Shi’ites to violence against Sunnis. While homophobia may be old news, this not and all the major news organs would have reported that. It directly contradicted Sistani’s earlier fatwas, ordering Shia to stand down from acts of retaliation. After the bombing of the Al Askari mosque this year he ordered Shia not to protest violently.
The original tip reported he was the leader of the BADR Corps and SCIRI. This is manifestly not true. The tips have come from one source, the guy cited in the 365 gay article. I’ve never heard of him before. Amongst other things, the guy got just about everything wrong and appears to have no real knowledge of conditions in Iraq. Chat room murders? People don’t go out at night for fear of bombings and kidnappings. Furthermore, homoerotic friendships are common in Iraq to the point where you see men walking hand in hand down the street. Homosexuality is commonly but not openly practiced.
Finally, it appears that Sistani’s website has been hacked. It’s not like he has 24/7 internet access in An Najaf.
I spent a year studying the guy’s actions in Iraq. This fatwa contradicts a long-established pattern of behavior and public statements, not to mention earlier fatwas issued when the stakes were far lower. Sistani’s primary concern has always been the safety of the people of Iraq. He’s what’s known as a Quietist: he believes that religion should be an influence on people’s lives, and their lives will then influence their politics.
I’m not entirely sure what’s going on with his website, but this is the guy’s character: he’s the last person to incite violence when it’s this dangerous, so something’s going on. I was going to print out his website and have my NCO read it. That’s the only thing I’m not certain of.
You should know this, too: Sistani issued a fatwa early in the war that instructed Iraqis not to resist the invasion. That’s how concerned he is with loss of life. My biggest fear is Zarqawi’s oft-expressed urge for a religious war. Iraqis don’t fear each other nearly as much as they do the Iranians, and assassination of Sistani is the one thing that would guarantee a civil war. That country is like an abyss covered by tightropes supported by razor blades.
I don’t know what the truth is; hopefully things will be clarified soon. But I wanted “Alas” readers to be aware that the story has been called into doubt.
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Sistani, not Sistini. [Thanks! Correction made. –Amp]
Ginmar’s analysis is persuasive. There is a nugget of doubt, however; bashing gays is an easy ticket to some popular support. Perhaps Sistani needed to boost his cred with a conservative demographic, and decided that gays could be safely thrown over the side. It wouldn’t be the first time an otherwise decent political figure decided that he’d be better off being agin’ the homos.
You underestimate Sistani. He’s not a public figure in the sense that American public figures are; he’s a moral leader, and as such he has no need to appeal to the public. Iraq was a largely secular society with nightclubs and so forth before the fall of Saddam; Sistani is a moderate conservative who’s devoted to stemming the tide of radical conservatives.
Amp, thanks for this very important post.
[Thanks! Correction made. ““Amp]
Maybe there was more than one? It’s in your headline.
Robert, Amp can’t change the headline without changing the URL; then he’d lose the links to this post (including the one on my blog).
Ha ha, Amp uses lame blogging software!
No, Robert’s right, there was more than one. Yeesh.
Amp, kudos for posting this. And thnks to Ginmar for a thoughtful, realistic analysis.
Please forward this to Ginmar, the expert on Sistani:
>Here’s the evidence. Sistani has a long history of taking fatwas
>extremely seriously and always issuing them in the service of
>non-violence. The other part of the fatwa incited Shi’ites to violence
>against Sunnis. While homophobia may be old news, this not and all the
>major news organs would have reported that. It directly contradicted
>Sistani’s earlier fatwas, ordering Shia to stand down from acts of
>retaliation. After the bombing of the Al Askari mosque this year he
>ordered Shia not to protest violently.
Perhaps I should have clearly pointed out in my post that this is NOT a fatwa in the sense that Westerners understand it. Westerners seem to believe that Islamic clerics suddenly wake up in the morning with something on their mind and immediately issue a fatwa about it. It doesn’t work that way; there has to be an Istifta’ (usually in written form), to which the cleric in question responds to with an answer that is called a Fatwa, or a religious edict that is binding to the person who submitted the Istifta’, and to all followers of mentioned cleric.
In this case, one follower of Sistani asked him what was his judgement on gays (sodomy) and lesbians. Sistani responded with the edict that I translated on my blog. That’s that. It was not during a press conference (Sistani has never given a press conference in his life) or any other setting, and there was nothing mentioned about killing Sunnis either.
>The original tip reported he was the leader of the BADR Corps and SCIRI.
>This is manifestly not true. The tips have come from one source, the guy
>cited in the 365 gay article. I’ve never heard of him before. Amongst
>other things, the guy got just about everything wrong and appears to
>have no real knowledge of conditions in Iraq.
Just because a story contains bits of rumours and false conclusions, doesn’t mean the whole claim is false. There are bits of truth in almost everything.
>Chat room murders? People
>don’t go out at night for fear of bombings and kidnappings. Furthermore,
>homoerotic friendships are common in Iraq to the point where you see men
>walking hand in hand down the street. Homosexuality is commonly but not
>openly practiced.
I don’t know if there were any murders related to chat room dates. But chat room dating (whether homosexual or heterosexual) is quite real in Iraq, and the Arab/Muslim world in general. We don’t have mixed gender high schools, and boys and girls rarely meet or mingle in public. The Internet is a useful tool to meet members of the other sex (or same sex, in this case). I have a homosexual neighbour and he spends most of the day on Iraqi chat rooms chatting with gay Iraqis, Arabs and even Westerners. He is now considering meeting with some of them. Oh, and by the way, Sistani also forbids internet chatting.
You don’t see men kissing or holding hands in public, but homosexuality is even more common in Iraq than you believe, even in clerical circles. I knew a mosque Imam who used to seduce young boys who came to learn Quran reciting. Homosexuality has historical origins in the Abbasid and Ottoman period. Up to the early 20th century, it was very acceptable for wealthy and powerful men to have boy slaves. Bars used to have young boy dancers and singers. Arab poets and writers have extensively discussed the subject. There are tons of Arab literature on this. It is still very common to this day for Iraqi singers and poets to use the male pronoun “he”, “his”, “you” when referring to a lover, even if the lover is female. Sistani has forbidded all forms of singing and dancing. Even listening to singing is forbidden.
>Finally, it appears that Sistani’s website has been hacked. It’s not
>like he has 24/7 internet access in An Najaf.
Maybe I should tell you that Sistani has offices all over the world, and endless financial and manpower resources. He does not need to maintain his own personal site from Najaf. The website is translated into 5 languages. Sistani does not have much free time to act as webmaster for his own site. He has plenty of people to do that for him.
>I’m not entirely sure what’s going on with his website, but this is the
>guy’s character: he’s the last person to incite violence when it’s this
>dangerous, so something’s going on. I was going to print out his website
>and have my NCO read it.
If you have no knowledge of the Arab language, then you are really the last person to argue with Iraqi Arabs over whether this story is true or false. I suggest you ask Juan Cole, or any other Western scholar with a knowledge of Arabic. Not everything on Sistani’s website is necessarily available in Arabic.
>You should know this, too: Sistani issued a fatwa early in the war that
>instructed Iraqis not to resist the invasion.
Again, this is a false rumour. No one has proved that such a fatwa exists. There are repeated statements on Sistani’s Arabic website denying such a fatwa or edict was ever issued. You accuse others of making up fatwas, yet you are doing it yourself.
>Iraqis don’t fear each other nearly as much as they do
>the Iranians, and assassination of Sistani is the one thing that would
>guarantee a civil war.
Sistani is octogenarian and has suffered from medical problems. He will not live forever. Eventually he will die and will be replaced by another high ranking cleric in Najaf, most likely Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Ishaq Al-Fayyadh. It is up to Iraqis to prevent the fall in civil war, not Sistani.
As someone who does have expertise in middle eastern affairs and a good working knowledge of Arabic, I must agree with Zeyad.
First, what qualifies this Ginmar as an “expert on Sistani”? As we can see from what he wrote, his expertise could well be limited to reading what the (mainstream and online) media has written on Sistani and nothing more.
What’s more baffling about Ginmar’s line of thought is that he claims that the story “must” be false just because it does not “befit” the Sistani he think he knows… That is, he presents no evidence, no transcript of any of the ayatollah’s pronouncements, nothing at all to support his theory (filled with factual flaws, as Zeyad pointed out).
Isn’t it obvious that Zeyad and the likes of him are in a much better position – both geographically and linguistically – to say what one of his countrymen actually said than one self-proclaimed expert?
This is where I believe ginmar is wrong. I bet if you asked the said men who are walking hand in hand whether they consider it to be homoerotic, they would look at you with puzzled faces (or get angry).
Point being that many western societies view men touching men as inherently “homoerotic”, which arguably makes men wary of touching each other. While men probably shouldn’t be as worried about appearing gay as many are, I fail to see point in trying to push the homoerotic -meme.
Also, the fact that Sistani is a moderate does not logically mean that his beliefs on homosexuality (= practitioners must be killed) must be false. The moderatism is too specific to the bigger picture (where the extremes lie in Iraq), and this may be a mainstream view in the Islamic world, that, let’s face it, isn’t as evolved and tolerant as Western societies are (not that the West is perfect…) It ought to be remembered what Thomas Jefferson had to say about “sodomites”, for example. Widespread acceptance of homosexuality is a relatively new phenomena, and does not simply exist in many less evolved societies.
Still, I don’t know what the truth is here. I wish I could read arabic.
It’s worth noting that Juan Cole has stated that he believes that Sistani is referring to the greek model; an adult male and a young boy. I can’t do justice to his insightful comments, so I’ll just link to them here.
http://www.juancole.com/2006/03/sistani-on-homosexuality-andrew.html
Just a point: in my reply above I cited the original source, whom you bend over backward to defend, then take me to task for taking seriously. Um, what?
Crap, where’d my other comment go? I pointed out to Zayed that he needs to adhere to one standard for the use of the word fatwa—if he’s going to criticize me for using the word his source uses, then he should accept that that’s a hit on his source as well.
I notice no one is touching the notion that Sistani would call for retaliation against Sunnis. Isn’t that interesting?