Iconoclast or Jackass

Last updated on: March 13, 2015 at 8:07 pm by Robert Hunt

Iconoclast or Jackass 2015-03-13T20:07:49-06:00 Robert Hunt

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One of my favorite characters in fiction, Commissioner Brunetti in Donna Leon’s novels, is an ardent humanist. Faced with claims that sacred symbols and institutions trump human need Burnetti says, “nothing is sacred but humans.” I resonate with this belief. As do many other Christians.

And the reason is obvious. The claim that people, institutions, and icons of all sorts are intrinsically sacred has, down through history, led to the demeaning of individuals and societies, often with fatal consequences.

At the advent of the Enlightenment in Europe and North America a movement grew – perhaps most strongly in France – to break the hold of these sacred institutions, particularly the Roman Catholic church, over human minds. Freedom was to be achieved by demonstrating through parody and increasingly virulent criticism that icons and priests and churches had no hold on the truly free person. Satirists essentially dared God to strike them down.

And God demurred.

However, this iconoclasticism only worked in a particular set of social circumstances in which the claims to temporal power by the church were already diminished to the point that it could not enforce its version of God’s will. Circumstances in which large numbers of people had already begun to question whether these sacred persons, institutions, and icons really had any power to help or hinder, save or damn.

Thus iconoclasts had far less influence in countries like Germany, England, and the United State where Protestant Christians had already reinterpreted their religious institutions as human rather than divine, their pastors as representatives of the congregation rather than God, and their symbols as reminders and memorials rather than incarnations of divine presence. Christians already had the freedom to choose in religion. Breaking the power of the Church and its symbols didn’t give them anything they hadn’t already given themselves.

In societies where the power of icons is already broken, the iconoclasts are nothing more than insulting. They have the power to make people angry, but not to change the balance of power between God, the human, and the society and its norms.

And this is the problem with an upcoming “Art Exhibition” in Garland Texas, sponsored by Pamela Gellner and others in the Islamophobia industry. They have called for art that represents the prophet Muhammad, offering a monetary prize for the best work. They say their intention is to assert the right of free expression. And they have chosen a venue where Muslims gathered last month in a major fund raiser at which they launched a protest. They are looking for a confrontation.

The Council of American Islamic Relations says that they won’t get one. As do local mosques. And it is easy to see why. There are, of course, Muslims who will be insulted (as is intended) by this so-called art exhibition. But, as it was with the cartoons that eventually created violent reactions in Europe, these Muslims will not be influenced in their relation to their religion and its symbols by depictions of Muhammad.

Muslims do not regard Muhammad as sacred, or his image (positive or negative) as having sacred power. He is not and never was an icon. So iconoclasticism is a waste of time. The classical Muslim resistance to depictions of Muhammad was based on the fear that among the ignorant they might be worshiped. Obviously negative images of Muhammad pose no danger in this direction. The second objection was that iconic representations blasphemed a God who forbade such images. But in Islam blaspheme as a religious act is punishable by God alone. The real problem was that blaspheme is a political act as well. It threatens the state whose power is based in claims to represent God’s authority. As an act of treason it did draw punishment. But lacking a state dependent on God for its power there is no political impulse to punish. And there is no state in the West whose power depends even remotely on an appeal to God.

The third (and modern) objection is that some images intentionally insult Islam, Muslims and God. They do, and such insults are mere jackassery.

So Gellner and her crowd, by acting like jackasses will, as jackasses often do, make some Muslims angry. Which of course they are free to do. If you weren’t free to be a jackass in America we would hardly have politicians, TV preachers, and cable news pundits. Jackassery is a central American cultural institution.

But we shouldn’t confuse insulting people and getting a laugh with a movement to break the enslaving power of icons. In the French context Charlie Hebdo was a magazine that, when it attacked religion, was kicking a corpse. Which may be useful if you have a latent belief in the resurrection of the dead. When it attacked Muhammad it was just being insulting. It was never going to loosen the grip of Islam on its followers. It would only make them long for the judgement day when God would deal with God’s enemies.

The irony is that those who worked at Charlie Hebdo were made martyrs not by their mission, but by their death. If there is a God they are no doubt in Paradise, while those who killed them will have attained only, courtesy intervention by the French police, the hell they so richly deserve.

Neither will Gellner’s art exhibit change Muslim minds or hearts. It will assert free speech in the same manner as an adolescent potty mouth shouting the F word to people on a street corner. And will attract as fans the same people who are always attracted to such braying. The mating call of geldings.

Those who really care about the future of America, and the real and serious threat of Islamic terror, won’t be bothered to participate. And Muslims, by avoiding the show, will simply demonstrate that as a community they are stronger and more mature than those who hate them.

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