Do the Quran and Sunnah’s Harsh Addresses Justify Insulting Others?

Do the Quran and Sunnah’s Harsh Addresses and Insulting Rebukes Justify Insulting Others?

Some time ago, it was reported from Mr. Ebrahimi Dinani: “Society is foolish. Today’s generation is foolish for two reasons: information overload and excessive comfort. Young people have become effete.” It is harsh language. But for now, I am not concerned with the content of this quotation, the accuracy of its transmission, or the validity of its attribution.

◾️ At that time, on the occasion of this statement being circulated, a well-regarded and respected preacher asked in a Telegram group: “The Quran, in some instances, has also used this kind of language. But does this become a justification for us to use it as well, or not?”

His remark, even if posed as a question, points to a reality: in a society with a religious majority, people tinge their worldly preferences with religious justifications, and, for instance, for insulting and using profanity—which is a form of violence in the broad sense of the word—they seek a pretext from the Book and the Sunnah, and, of course, they find it.

Although his question was raised on that specific occasion, it contains an allusion to a Quranic justification that some bring for insulting others: “The Quran, too, has likened deniers to cattle.”

◾️ I wrote to that respected and well-regarded preacher:

Perhaps one possible approach to examining this important question is that in a society with a religious majority, both the religious and the non-religious can, at least and in general, agree on this point: whatever they may be, they are not God, and from this perspective, they are equal and alike with one another. If they accept this principle, it is clear that they should not speak to one another or act toward one another as the Lord speaks to and acts toward His servants.

For example, likening some human beings to certain animals entails a judgment about where their existential rank lies in the hierarchy of being. Although such degrading analogies exist in the Quran and other revealed books, these analogies entail looking from the eye of the Lord upon the servants; that is, it is not befitting the station of servanthood for human beings to regard or address one another in such a manner, especially believers who acknowledge their own servitude and should, as a rule, not see themselves in a position to judge their fellow human beings from God’s perspective.

Among such judgments from God’s perspective is passing judgment on felicity and wretchedness, and deeming oneself or others to be destined for paradise or hell. These are all signs of harboring a desire for godhood and stepping into the shoes of the gods.

◾️ The response of that well-regarded and respected preacher contained other useful points: “You are certainly correct that the station of Lordship differs greatly from the position of servanthood, but the question is whether scholars and thinkers have the right to address those who do not benefit from reason and thought in any way, and who seemingly also persist and insist in this ignorance, with degrading language or not? And this is apart from the station of Lordship. Just as such addresses are found in abundance in the expressions of great figures like Rumi, Hafez, and Saadi as well…” and he then cited three verses from the poetry of Sanai, Attar, and Naser Khosrow as evidence. ◾️ In view of these remarks of his, following the short introduction below, I wrote three points for him:

What I presented in the previous short note was in response to your first question, where you asked, emphasizing the permissibility of citing the Quran to insult others: “The Quran, in some instances, has also used this kind of language. But does this become a justification for us to use it as well, or not?” My view, in brief, was that citing the Quran to justify such insulting rebukes and addresses could, in general, entail mistaking the station of the Lord for that of the servant.

Now you have raised another important question and fine point. Your recent question is: “Do scholars and thinkers have the right to address those who do not benefit from reason and thought in any way, and who seemingly also persist and insist in this ignorance, with degrading language or not?”

Regarding this question, I will offer three points: one concerning those “scholars and thinkers,” and two further points about those “people […] who do not benefit from reason and reflection in any way, and who seem, moreover, to be deliberate and emphatic in this ignorance.”

◽️ The first point is that those “scholars and thinkers,” even if they were the equals of Socrates in learning and thought, wisdom would dictate that they not consider themselves so learned and thoughtful as to be able to look down on others with contempt and, in Rumi’s words, “gaze from the hilltop of Damascus,” calling dissenters, for instance, fools or worse. Adopting such a stance toward others only arises from the self-righteous, and of course, whatever the self-righteous may be, they are not counted among “scholars and thinkers,” and therefore, they must presumably fall outside the scope of your discussion by definition.

“Scholars and thinkers” do not regard their dissenters as people who, in your words, “do not benefit from reason and reflection in any way.” As far as I know, no reliable method has yet been invented in scholarly and intellectual debates for identifying those who “do not benefit from reason and reflection in any way.” If what is meant by such people is the insane and the mad (with all the ambiguities that exist in defining these attributes scientifically), well, they too presumably fall outside the scope of your discussion by definition.

◽️ The second point concerns the second part of the premise of your question, where you added that those ignorant ones are so lacking in “reason and reflection” that “they seem, moreover, to be deliberate and emphatic in this ignorance.” My emphasis is precisely on this qualifier “deliberate.” When those “scholars and thinkers,” in addition to attributing ignorance to dissenters, also become suspicious of their intentions and consider their ignorance to be deliberate, they have in fact crossed another boundary, forgotten their own station of servitude, and implicitly and by extension claimed that, like gods, they have penetrated the innermost secrets of these dissenting and ignorant servants and have come to know that these ignorant ones are actually aware of their own ignorance, yet obstinately persist in and emphasize their denial. This claim of knowing the secrets of the heart is also among the exclusive attributes of the Divine. When “scholars and thinkers” claim, in a godlike manner, to know that those “ignorant ones” (which is really another name for dissenters) deliberately draw the veil of unbelief and denial over their own understanding and perception, they should come to their senses, lest they have claimed to read the intentions of God’s servants and, in so doing, have presumed to step into the shoes of the gods. How much more humane it would be if they learned from Hafez: If you see a head upon the tavern’s threshold, Do not kick it, for its intent is unknown!

◽️ The third point concerns the corroborative examples you have cited from the poetry of certain great figures of Persian mysticism and literature in disparaging dissenters. These examples can be multiplied, and one can even go further and cite certain sayings of the Imams and saints as evidence.

Unfortunately, the treasury of our literature, mysticism, and narrative tradition is not empty of such bitterness, harshness, roughness, coarseness, and even obscenities. The point here is that the mere existence of these references among the sayings of our predecessors in religion, knowledge, mysticism, and literature does not provide us with a license or justification to address opponents and dissenters (those whom we deem ignorant, and whose deliberateness in their ignorance we even read from the secrets of their hearts) with ugly rebuke and address.

Let me say in brief and pass on that the most important barrier that makes such emulation impossible is this clear principle in moral philosophy: from the statements of descriptive ethics, one cannot derive a conclusion or a reason for prescriptive ethics. Descriptive ethics is a descriptive, analytical, and explanatory discipline. It answers the question of what norms and values people in the past and present, in this or that culture and society, have taken as the basis for moral judgments, what actions they have considered good or bad, and so forth. But prescriptive ethics is a normative discipline. That is, it does not content itself with mere description. Rather, it asks what one actually ought to do to be moral, what the criterion for moral goodness and badness should actually be, and what the moral duty of human beings is in every situation and subject. Another matter in this same context is that prescriptive ethics, like descriptive forms of knowledge (which claim to report on reality), is itself an evolving matter. That is, our understanding of the nature, manner, and requirements of the moral life also grows and evolves over time.

Just as today, in the descriptive sciences such as chemistry and astronomy, no one cites the achievements of alchemists (the predecessors of today’s chemists) or astrologers, fortune-tellers, and astronomers (the predecessors of today’s astronomers), for morality as well, referring to the prescriptive ethics of the past is not sufficient, because prescriptive ethics is also a developing science.

Insult, humiliation, and profanity were not always classified and identified under unethical categories in past ages. The anthropology and norm-science of human beings have gradually undergone many changes, and in accordance with these transformations, our public moral conscience today no longer considers insult, humiliation, profanity, and the like to be ethical, especially if the humiliation, insult, and profanity directed at others is due to their intellectual content or way of life. In this day and age, the dignity of human beings can hardly be considered dependent on their mental content or the object of their faith, just as the dignity of human beings is now hardly considered dependent on their skin color, race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, and ways of life.

Unlike the era of our predecessors in religion, science, mysticism, and literature, in our time, ethically, one can no longer easily consider oneself the axis of truth and knowledge and humiliate others on the suspicion that they are ignorant, or even on the suspicion that they are "willfully" persisting in their ignorance, deeming them "fools and sissies," and considering it permissible to insult them.

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Do the Harsh Addresses and Insulting Rebukes in the Quran and Sunnah Justify Insulting Others?

Author: Mohammad Mehdi Mojahedi

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