Let me be clear: I’m a Christian, a Catholic. If I shut my eyes to the malicious violence being perpetrated in the video and just listen to the Arabic recital, I can conjure the pleasure of attending the Easter Vigil service (I was an altar boy once, when the mass was still said in Latin) while the priest sang the “Exultet” and lighted the Paschal candle.
Yes, I can conjure all this—until I translate the particular Quranic verses chosen for the video by Islamic State. These are from Chapter 21, and involve the figure of Abraham. The Quran depicts him as having been reared in a family of idol worshipers. He condemns his own father’s paganism—“What are these statues, to which you’re so devoted?”—and then smashes the family’s idols to bits.
Immediately after the recitation of these verses, a militant is shown reminding viewers that the Prophet Muhammad “removed and destroyed the idols with his own exalted and noble hands when he conquered Mecca.” Historic accounts say that a circle of idols once surrounded the Meccan shrine of the Kaaba. But with the prophet’s conquest in 630, the Kaaba was “purified” and the idolatrous traces of Mecca’s pre-Islamic past were expunged.
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