Plato and Muhammad Walked into a Cave...
“any human being who has lived a moral and god-fearing
life shall on his death depart for the Isles of the Blessed and shall dwell
there, and live a trouble-free life of perfect happiness; however, anyone who
has lived an immoral and godless life shall be imprisoned in the place of
retribution and justice, which is called Tartarus.” Plato, Gorgias 523b
Socrates' allegory of The Cave recounted by Plato in 'The
Republic', represents the importance of education and the benighted state of
those deprived of the experience of 'true reality'.
We are asked to imagine men confined within the depths of a
long cave, their heads fixed directly towards the wall in front of them: “There's
firelight burning a long way further up the cave behind them”, also a road
between this source of light and the prisoners with a small wall running
alongside it, behind this wall people are carrying various statuettes of animal
and human form which protrude above said wall, the fire light casting shadows
of these forms against the wall of the cave the prisoners are forced to look
at.
Socrates then asks us of the Prisoners: “do you think they'd
see anything of themselves and one another except the shadows cast by the fire
on to the cave wall directly opposite them....And what about the objects which
were being carried along? Won't they see only their shadows as well?...Now
suppose they were able to talk to one another: don't you think they'd assume
that their words applied to what they saw passing in front of them?...When any
of the passers by spoke, don't you think they'd be bound to assume that the
sound came from a passing shadow?”
The answer to these questions (though outlandish in the
extreme) is given repeatedly in the affirmative, we can hardly disagree, so at
this point Socrates begins to explain what would happen: “if they were set
free from their bonds and cured of their inanity”; if “someone tells him
that what he's been seeing all this time has no substance”. He describes
the severe discomfort as the prisoner's eyes encounter the firelight directly
for the first time, the confusion as the objects and people passing on the road
were shown to him and explained.
This sight he suggests would make the prisoner “turn away
and run back to the things he could make out, taking the truth of the matter to
be that these things are clearer than what he was being shown”, denying the
reality in front of him in favour of the shadow world he had become accustomed
to. Socrates continues: “Imagine him being dragged forcibly into the
sunlight, wouldn't this cause him pain and distress? And once he's reached the
sunlight, he wouldn't be able to see a single one of the things which are
currently taken to be real, would he, because his eyes would be overwhelmed by
the sun's beams?”[1]
With all forms of religious belief, is it not thus? We must
drag ourselves from the comfort and security of an illusory world to which we
are chained by circumstances, into the full light of day, into the reality of
direct, lived experience that we may feel the sun upon our faces and the wind
in our hair, casting aside the factitious representations we may have become
accustomed to in our slavery, to truly know this world as it is, the only world
in all it's breathtaking luminosity.
Even if it pains us to see it, even if this awareness is
marred by similar feelings of discomfort as our infant selves endured upon
leaving our Mother's womb, do we not owe it to ourselves in the short time we
have here to struggle to see it, to embrace it fully, to explore this world by
expressing our inherent curiosity in an unrestrained manner?
Needless to say the author of the Quran doesn't think so...
Chapter 17 (Bani Isra'il)
“Whoso desires the present life, We hasten for him therein
what We will- for such of them as we please; then have We appointed Hell for
him; he shall burn therein, condemned and rejected.
And whoso desires the Hereafter and strives for it as it
should be striven for, and he is a believer-these are the ones whose striving
shall find favour with God.” v.19
& 20
“And surely We have set forth for mankind in various ways
all kinds of similitudes in this Quran, but most men would reject everything
but disbelief.” v.90
“And nothing has prevented men from believing when the
guidance came to them save that they said, 'Has Allah sent a man as a
Messenger?'
Say 'Had there been in the earth angels walking about in
peace and quiet, We should have certainly sent down to them from heaven an
angel as a Messenger.'” v.95 & 96
Chapter 18, Al-Kahf (The Cave) signals a slight departure
from previous Chapters, assuming a more poetic style it's author makes use of
allegories and parables to answer a direct challenge from the Quraysh, during
the period when Islam was beginning to win converts in Mecca.
Ibn Ishaq's history conveys the displeasure experienced by
the tribal elders upon witnessing Muhammad's unusual religious practices and
public profession of his new mono-theistic faith, various plans were hatched that they might
put an end to his proselytizing, when diplomacy and more nefarious means were
employed with no success, the elders of the tribe sent Al Nadr and Uqba to the
Jewish Priests of Medina, “for they said, 'the Jews are the possessors of
the first book and have knowledge about the prophets which we have not'.”
The Jews of Medina kindly obliged, giving them three
questions with which to test the knowledge and authenticity of the self
appointed 'Apostle of Allah': “...'if he answers them obey him, for he is a
prophet; but if not, then he is a pretender, and you may deal with him as you
think proper'.
Al Nadr and Uqba returned to Mecca and told the people
what the priests had said, and they said to the apostle: (1)'inform us
about the young men who passed away in ancient times, because their case is
wonderful; (2)tell us also about the traveller who went from the east to
the west of the earth; (3) and tell us about the soul and what it is!'
The apostle of Allah replied: 'I shall tell you tomorrow.'”[2]
This was a pretty serious miscalculation by Muhammad, whether
he brashly believed he would be able to dream up the answers overnight; ask
whoever was instructing him and receive an immediate response; hurriedly
extract the answers from some fragments of scripture he may have held; or
fabricate an accurate, poetic sounding response which would retain his air of
authority on such short notice, remains inconclusive.
What is known however is that it took two weeks for an answer
to be forthcoming, in which time the Quraysh had already decided 'the apostle
of Allah' was an imposter.[3]
This series of events gave us chapter 18 of the Quran: 'Sura
Al Kahf', wherein the author sets about providing the answers to these
questions while attempting to justify his vagueness, as well as alleviate any
doubt likely to spring from those answers, by recourse to the trusty threats of
'divine' punishment for the unconvinced, and rewards for the faithful that
anyone reading this far will be familiar with, yet more evidence of the
manipulative methodology of the author.
The customary prefatory warnings are here of some subtle
interest however, v2 states: “All praise belongs to Allah who has sent down
the Book to His servant and has not put therein any crookedness”, the
translator's notes state the Arabic term here rendered as “therein”, more
accurately translates as “In It”, but as he says himself this would imply one
or the other has “no crookedness”, how unsurprising that the translator is
unwilling to entertain the idea this may be so?
Whether or not Muhammad was the actual author, following his
prior miscalculation and the two week delay we should expect this transference
of his self assumed authority to the book, in a sense saying “ok I may have
been wrong but the book's what matters”, attempting to save face by affirming
the accuracy, therefore importance of 'the Book' above that of himself, this
suggests that even to the author, being a mere man; Muhammad may not be
entirely, infallibly straight, at least not all the time,[4] which should come
as no surprise to the objective reader of our relatively enlightened epoch, who
studies these instructions on how to form a totalitarian, religious state.
Following the customary warnings, the 'apostle of Allah'
begins by addressing the story of those 'young men who passed away in ancient
times who's case is wonderful', which he takes as referring to the story of the
7 Sleepers of Ephesus, a story remembered in the Christian liturgy with a feast
day towards the end of June, when soldiers taking shelter from the persecution
of Christians under the Roman Emperor “Trajan Decius” (circa 250ce), were found
and excavated after about 230 years during the reign of Theodosius (circa
480ce).
Though this obscure version recounted by the author of the
Quran lacks direct reference to the pre-existing, Assyrian and Christian myth,
nor either of the Roman Emperors fundamental to accurately identifying the
story, it does contain enough similarities to suggest this was what the author
was describing, v.10,11,12: “Dost thou think that the People of the Cave and
the Inscription were a wonder among Our Signs?
When the young men betook themselves for refuge to the
Cave and said, 'Our Lord, bestow on us mercy from Thyself, and provide for us
right guidance in our affair.'
So We prevented them from hearing the news of the outside
world for a few years”
It would seem the author at the time of writing had not heard
of one of Socrates' and Plato's most famous analogies, if 'They' had, perhaps
they wouldn't have taken the diametrically opposed course for bestowing correct
education and right guidance to that outlined by Socrates in “The Cave”, or
perhaps 'They' had, and actually intended to accustom the “young men” to a
mystical world of shadowy reflections?
v.13: “Then We raised them up that We might know which of
the two parties would better reckon the time that they had tarried.”
This is one of the first confused points in the story,
(ignoring the use of “We” by this professed Monoto-theist) where has the 2nd
party alluded to come from; formerly we had one party of young men who “betook
themselves for refuge to the Cave”, now apparently there are “two
parties”, we could assume here the verse refers to those who found the
young men, but surely the whole point of a divinely ordained and directed holy
scripture is to alleviate the need for human assumption, after all isn't Allah
apparently “The all-seeing, all-knowing”?
If 'He' is, why does he frequently come across as
monotonously repetitive, not to mention ignorant and often incoherent?
v.14,15,16,17: “We will relate to thee their story with
truth: They were young men who believed in their Lord and We increased them in
guidance.
And We strengthened their hearts, when they stood up and
said, 'Our Lord is the Lord of the heavens and the earth. Never shall we call
upon any God beside Him; if we did, we should indeed have uttered an enormity.
'These our people have taken for worship other gods beside
Him. Wherefore do they not bring a clear authority for them? And who is more
unjust than he who invents a lie concerning Allah?'
'And now when you have withdrawn from them and from that
which they worship beside Allah, then seek refuge in the Cave; your Lord will
unfold for you His mercy and will provide for you comfort in this affair of
yours.'”
This strikes me as the 2nd obscure point, the
wording seems to suggest that actually this refers to the people composing the
book, those adherents of Allah hunting the answers to these three questions,
the vagueness of the narrative seeming to refer to the contemporary situation
in Mecca not events of the past, perhaps owing to the authors' reluctance to
mention the Roman Empire directly, or perhaps their inability to actually give
a definitive answer or accurate historical account?
Again it is difficult to be convinced either way, it may well
just refer to the story of the young men in a cave, while trying as much as
possible to parallel the situation new Muslim converts were experiencing in
Mecca, thus helping them relate more easily to the affirmation of mono-theism
and alleged primacy of Allah, using the opportunity to accentuate certain
aspects of the story such as the 'Lord' sending them to live in a cave as
Muhammad had done, while portraying the practice of idolatry the Meccan
establishment were engaged in, as being on the 'wrong' side at all points in
history.
After v.18 tells how the sun was seen to rise and set from
the cave and v.19 introduces a dog peculiar to the story in the Islamic
tradition, verse 20,21 and 22 seem to continue in this convoluted fashion: “And
so We raised them up that they might question one another. One of them said,
'How long have you tarried?' They said, 'We have tarried a day or part of a
day.' Others said, 'Your Lord knows best the time you have tarried. Now send
one of you with these silver coins of yours to the city; and let him see which
of it's inhabitants has the purest food, and let him bring you provisions thereof.
And let him be courteous and let him not inform anyone about you.'
'For, if they should come to know of you, they would stone
you or make you return to their religion and then will you never prosper.'
And thus did We disclose them to the people that they
might know that the promise of Allah was true, and that, as to the Hour, there
was no doubt about it. And remember the time when people disputed among
themselves concerning them, and said, 'Build over them a building.' Their Lord
knew them best. Those who won their point said, 'We will surely build a place
of worship over them.'”
The Lord knows best who these townsfolk were who had power superior to that of Allah, able to turn 'His' faithful away from 'His' religion towards their own.
“The Lord knows best” is an evasive tactic employed
frequently in this chapter, it wouldn't wash in any academic setting, imagine
answering any question: “your Lord knows best”, it's merely a device allowing
the answerer to avoid making an incorrect guess, because as the next verse (23)
shows Muhammad was only guessing, he had no definitive answer, no proof, he
couldn't go to the Library as I have and look in a Catholic encyclopaedia of
saints to find “The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus”, which his story very loosely
alludes to: “Some say, 'They were three, the fourth was their dog,' and
others say 'They were five, the sixth was their do,' guessing at random. And
yet others say, 'They were seven, the eighth was their dog.' Say, 'My Lord
knows best their number. None knows them except a few.' So argue not concerning
them except for a casual discussion, nor seek information about them from any
one of them.”
v.24,25: “And say not of anything, 'I am going to do it
tomorrow,'
Unless Allah should will. And remember thy Lord when thou
forgettest and say, 'I hope my Lord will guide me to what is even nearer than
this to the right path.'”
We can see Muhammad has at least learned from his earlier
error, however that doesn't stop him from immediately proceeding to make
another mistake, perhaps even more destructive to the image of 'divine
messenger' he is attempting to convey, v.26: “And they stayed in their Cave
three hundred years, and added nine more.”
The addition of 9 years relates
to the Lunar Calendar, though why the author thought fit to provide the solar
and lunar calculation remains unclear, perhaps to create the illusion of
specificity, perhaps to add an interesting fact that might distract from the
wrong answer he gives.
This man is supposedly the 'Messenger of Allah', the emissary
of the 'Lord of Creation', one of 'His' prophets on Earth, but he couldn't even
accurately portray what was relatively recent History to him at the time of
writing?
The story of Snow White, the 5 Dwarves and their Dog would
never be treated so haphazardly, and it doesn't even claim to contain a
miracle, do Muslims honestly believe this story about people sleeping in a Cave
for 300 years, before being “raised up” by God and going to Town to buy some
food with one of their, -I assume- extremely valuable antique “Silver Coins”?
If so do they also believe the story of Snow White is an
accurate account of real historical events?
v.27: “Say, 'Allah knows best how long they tarried.' To
Him belong the secrets of the heavens and the earth. How Seeing is He! And how
Hearing” They have no helper beside Him, and He does not let anyone share in
His government.”
At this point the incorrect retelling of the story of the
Seven Sleepers ceases, Muhammad knowing he's made a grotesque error begins to
recount the most disgusting threats for those who disbelieve his version of
events, all the while attempting to assert the power of this half blind, deaf
and forgetful monotheistic totalitarian deity he claims to represent, conveying
the rewards this disabled demiurge has laid on for the credulous believers,
namely gold bracelets; reclining sofas and fine green dresses of silk[5].
v.30: “And say, 'It is the truth from your Lord; wherefore
let him who will, believe, and let him who will, disbelieve.' -(how
uncharacteristically liberal)- Verily, We have prepared for the wrong doers
a fire whose flaming canopy shall enclose them. And if they cry for help, they
will be helped with water like molten lead -(oh, ok maybe not that
liberal)- which will burn the faces. How dreadful the drink, and how evil is
the Fire as a resting place!”
Having failed in his attempt to answer question one, 'the
messenger of Allah' sets forth a simple parable of a man rich in worldly
possessions and another who coveted his neighbours wealth, Muhammad telling his
faithful preachers, or being told himself by the actual source of the Quran to:
“...set forth to them the parable of two men: one of them We provided with
two gardens of grapes, and surrounded them with date-palms, and between the two
We placed corn-fields.
Each of the gardens yielded its fruit in abundance, and
failed not the least therein. An in between the two We caused a stream to flow.
And he had fruit in abundance. And he said to his
companion, arguing boastfully with him, 'I am richer than thou in wealth and
stronger in respect of men.'” v.33,34,35
v.38,39,40,41,42: “His companion said to him, while he was
arguing with him, “Dost thou disbelieve in Him Who created thee from dust, then
from a sperm-drop, then fashioned thee into a perfect man?
But as for me, I believe that Allah alone is my Lord, and
I will not associate anyone with my Lord.
And why didst thou not say when thou didst enter thy
garden: 'Only that which Allah wills comes to pass. There is no power save in
Allah?' if thou seest me as less than thee in riches and offspring.
Perhaps my Lord will give me something better than thy
garden, and will send on thy garden a thunderbolt from heaven so that it will
become a bare slippery ground.
Or it's water will become sunk in the earth so that thou
wilt not be able to find it.””
And what reward proceedeth from Allah regarding this
resentful and jealous believer, how did his Lord redress the balance between
this faithful servant and his wealthy, boastful neighbour?
v.43: “And his fruit was actually destroyed...”
So it seems Allah is 'the great leveller', for whosoever
covets his neighbours goods and worships Allah; his Lord will wreak disaster
and catastrophe on those His servant resents.
v.44,45: “And he had no party to help him against Allah,
nor was he able to defend himself.
In such a case protection comes only from Allah, the True.
He is the Best in respect of reward, and the Best in respect of consequence.”
As if any clarification were needed as to the nature of this
demiurge, spawned of the mind of a megalomaniacal merchant afforded the luxury
through marriage, of sitting around watching the business practices of the
inhabitants of Mecca he came to resent, seeking to separate himself from them
by dwelling in a cave while formulating a totalitarian system which he believed
would destroy them and their idols.
Having thus bestowed upon the faithful a far from complex
parable, in the following verses Muhammad is instructed -or instructs his
followers- to: “...set forth to them the similitude of the life of this
world: it is like the water which We send down from the sky, and the vegetation
of the earth is mingled with it, and then it becomes dry grass broken into
pieces which the winds scatter. And Allah has power over everything.” v.46
Perhaps it shouldn't surprise us that Muhammad, the
inhabitant of a drought stricken, arid, infertile region of the world, not to
mention an ignorant age, would fail to adequately describe the hydrologic cycle of the earth, for there would be no water to 'precipitate' from the sky were it not for the evaporation of surface water.
Besides this understandable oversight by the
author, the allegory is extremely bad and subsequently discarded forthwith.
It seems to suggest life is sent down from the sky to nourish
the vegetation of the earth, rather than making this vegetation healthy and
vibrant however, the author suggests it makes it become dry, brittle, breaking
into pieces to be scattered by the wind, rather than decomposing and
fertilizing the soil.
But is it actually a “similutude” at all, a likeness or
allegory of “the life of this world” because it appears to be merely an
inaccurate description of it?
“Wealth and children are an ornament of the life of this
world. But enduring good works are better in the sight of thy Lord in respect
of immediate reward, and better in respect of future hope.” v.47
We know from Ibn Ishaq's history of the Prophet, that these
events were prior to the various battles which would come to define the shape
and ensure the prosperity of Islam, at that later stage it could be fairly said
that war and especially looting were the “good works” required of the faithful;
but what could be more enduring than the legacy secured by having children who
will be well fed and supported, then as now wealth offers far more “immediate
rewards” than religion, also can it be denied that child rearing (so i've
heard) offers far more by way of satisfaction than wealth, let alone religion
and certainly more in terms of (realistic at least) “future hope”?
The point he makes more strenuously than needs be is this,
“the life of this world” is transient “which the winds scatter”; “wealth and
children are an ornament of the life of this world”, so also must be considered
transient, when in actuality these are two of only few things which will leave
a lasting legacy in the world.
One can only conclude this is a not so subtle imperative to
focus on the afterlife, but also to dedicate oneself entirely, as slavishly as
a drone in a bee colony to the manufacture of the emerging religion.
“And bethink of the day when We shall remove the
mountains, and thou wilt see the nations of the earth march forth against one
another and We shall gather them together and shall not leave any one of them
behind.
And they will be presented to thy Lord, standing in rows:
'Now have you come to Us as We created you at first. But you thought that We
would fix no time for the fulfilment of Our promise to you.'” v.48,49
This may refer to a grandiose delusion on the part of the
author, or, and perhaps this is a little generous, a specific example of
mountain dwelling tribes whom it was believed would be 'brought round' to belief
in Islam, if so it would have symbolic relevance to the intellectuals of the
day, who would have perhaps known of the failure of numerous large empires, to
subdue the unruly, diverse tribes north of Mt. Ararat around the Black Sea
towards the Caucasian Mountains, and unify them with those empires East of the
Zagros Mountains.
What better way to seduce the power crazed into adopting this
new imperialist ideology than suggesting the ways it may improve on the ancient
Persian, Macedonian and Roman attempts at Empire building in the region?
And the book will be placed before them, and thou wilt see
the guilty fearful of that which is therein; and they will say, 'O woe to us!
What kind of book is this! It leaves out nothing small or great but has
recorded it.' And they will find all that they did confronting them, and thy
Lord does not wrong anyone.” v.50
Unfortunately we can't be sure, as indeed a centuries long
tradition of Islamic theological disagreement demonstrates, to 'put forth a similitude'; we are here dealing with shadows
upon the wall of a cave, the reality behind these shadowy images, which is to
say the veiled, perhaps even unconscious intentions of their creator or
creators, are barely perceptible, can only be vaguely discerned, being as they
are indirectly alluded to in the manipulative, coercive methodology, the means
the founders of Islam employed to obtain an end which with hindsight we can at
least be slightly more certain about.
__________
[1] abridged excerpts from Plato's 'The Republic', 514-516b.
Circa 400bce
[2] Ibn Ishaq's 'The Life of Muhammad', 44-45
[3] This precipitated the persecution of his Muslim converts
in Mecca by the Quraysh, leading to them being sent away to live under the
protection of the Negus of Abyssinia (Modern Ethiopia), which had been
cultivated by Christian scholars from Egypt since around 300ce. Muhammad
remained in Mecca in relative security, being beyond reproach -besides the
occasional 'mocking'- owing to the protection granted him through his filial
bonds with the Quraysh elder Abu-Talib.
[4]If the botched and bungled band of followers Muhammad had
amassed by the time of his death, accepted this primacy of the book, it's
object of idolization: Allah's importance above that of Muhammad whom they
idolized instead, then maybe they wouldn't have descended into almost immediate
conflict regarding who would fill the latter's boots, becoming numerous
antagonistic sects at war from then till now?
But then perhaps if it hadn't divided into two predominant
sects vying to out do the other, the movement would have simply attained a
stultifying 'peace of mind', withered and atrophied in the deserts of Arabia,
and would never have dispersed upon the known Earth and beyond, spreading their
religion by the sword, and seeking out knowledge which might grant them
supremacy over the other along with all
those they encountered.
[5] Verse 32
