E Mullah الیکٹرونک مُلا: What's the Muslim Satan Like? .comment-link {margin-left:.6em;}

Sunday, January 08, 2006

What's the Muslim Satan Like?

1 comments

Very interesting and informative article by Mr. Engber.
What's the Muslim Satan Like? - Has he got a tail? By Daniel Engber: "What does he look like? Muslims don't have a clear iconography for Iblis, and there's no Shaitanic counterpart to the red-skinned, pitchfork-wielding demon of Christianity. During the hajj, Shaitan is represented by a featureless stone pillar or wall. Pilgrims 'stone Satan' by throwing rocks at the wall."


Update: By some divine intervention the link to this article was posted at the time when hundreds of people last their lives while stoning Satan this year in Saudi Arabia at the end of Haj. Hummm! They were their to kill Satan by stoning him to death (in the spiritual sense). I am not sure if Quran literally ask people to do this ritual as part of Haj. In fact there is a lot of talk going on about iconic blasphemy in the Muslim world in the wake of cartoons published by a Danish newspaper. The excuse Muslims have at the moment is that they don't use any icons in worship. So isn't stoning these pillars is iconic in the Muslim philosophy of purging sins and salvation?