Religious freedom not a zero-sum game?

Christianity Today Review

There's a new book out on the worldwide persecution of Christians, which I'll need to read sometime, but until then, I rely upon reviews, like this on by Robert Joustra, "Religious Freedom Is Not a Zero-Sum Game" (Christianity Today, April 22, 2013), which looks at the approach taken by Paul Marshall, Nina Shea, and Lela Gilbert, of the Hudson Institute:

Paul Marshall, Lela Gilbert, and Nina Shea . . . . [in] Persecuted: The Global Assault on Christians . . . . focuses on Christians -- and rightly so, they argue, because Christians are, by some estimates, the target of as many as 75 percent of the acts of religious persecution worldwide. But this is not an isolated argument. Nor do the authors make the mistake of imagining Christians are the only victims. In fact, their deliberate appeal to American Christians on behalf of Christians is every bit a strategy for combating persecution in general. Religious freedom is not a zero-sum game . . . . [T]he authors address radical Islam and its manipulative use of blasphemy and apostasy laws. They call attention to the systematic suppression of religious freedom in lands where these laws are enforced, the attempt by some Islamic governments to have them enforced elsewhere, and the scandalous silence that persists around them . . . . The motivation for Marshall, Gilbert, and Shea is not about co-religious privilege . . . . The motivation is about religious freedom for all, regardless of religion.

But what if, for Islam -- and certainly for Islamists -- religious freedom means sharia? Wouldn't that imply a zero-sum game, i.e., more freedom for Islamists to practice their religion entails less freedom for other religions? If Islamists are not allowed to enforce apostasy laws -- the penalty for leaving Islam is death -- then Islamists' religious freedom is curtailed.

Speaking of apostasy, here are two stories of apostates in Iran: one about a man, the other about two women.

Iranian Refugees' Interest in Christianity

Iranian Converts

Photo by Kairospress

Christianity Today

An extremely interesting article by Matthias Pankau and Uwe Siemon-Netto, "The Other Iranian Revolution," appeared in Christianity Today (7/17/2012), reporting on Christian converts among Iranian refugees living in Germany:

[Apparently, there are] countless reports of Muslims having visions of Jesus. According to . . . [those] interviewed for this article, most of these appearances follow a pattern reported by converts throughout the Islamic world: Muslims see a figure of light, sometimes bearing the features of Christ, sometimes not. But they instantly know who he is. He always makes it clear that he is Jesus of the Bible, not Isa of the Qur'an, and he directs them to specific pastors, priests, congregations, or house churches, where they later hear the gospel.

How did these conversions get started?

Twelve years ago, Trinity Parish in Leipzig, a tiny congregation of the Independent Lutheran Church, began teaching German as a second language to asylum seekers awaiting government approval of their refugee status.

Trinity used Luther's Bible translation as a textbook. Linguists credit that translation with having created the modern German language. Intrigued by what they read, several exiles asked to be baptized. They brought along friends who also wished to learn the basics of the Christian faith. "Today, one third of our 150 members are Persians," says Markus Fischer, Trinity's pastor.

That's the story in Germany, anyway, but there's a broader answer, for Iranians have been converting to Christianity since the 1980s, repelled by Iran's Shi'ite Islamist government, with its system of enforced Islamic law, and attracted by Christianity, with its emphasis upon grace rather than law. Or as one German pastor explains:

"Islam is like a rope ladder on which people try to reach God . . . . They manage to climb a few rungs, but with each sin, fall off the ladder and must start all over again. Christians, by contrast, need no ladder because Jesus comes down to earth for them. Christians have salvation. Muslims don't."

Also, Iranian refugees tend to be well-educated, and among educated Iranians, Islam has lost a lot of moral legitimacy due to Iran's theocratic system, or so the article says. But I would add two more things. Shi'ite Islam in some forms speaks of a divine spark or divine light within the early caliph they honor, Ali, so the Christian concept of Jesus as both human and divine is not so foreign, and Ali's suffering at his death -- betrayed and dying of thirst -- can recall the death of Jesus. But religious concepts aside, Iranians are very proud of their pre-Islamic civilization and don't accept the Islamic view that everything pre-Islamic was mere ignorance, what Muslims call jahiliyya, a very negative expression. Iranians tend to see Islam as an Arab ideology and Islamization as Arabization, and I think there's merit to their opinion.

Whatever the motivation, these conversions are certainly a phenomenon to keep one's eyes on in the shifting kaleidoscope of contemporary European multiculturalism.

Neda Agha-Soltan: An Overdue Follow-Up

Ayatollah

Foreign Policy

An Iranian friend sent me a link to an article by Karim Sadjadpour, "The Ayatollah Under the Bed(sheets)" (Foreign Policy, May/June 2012), and in reading that for what it says about the Iranian Islamist regime's obsession with sex, I finally found an explanation for Neda Agha-Soltan's death. Some viewers of one photo of Ms. Agha-Soltan suggested that the pendant she wore was a cross. I looked at the image and also wondered if it were, but one anonymous commenter identified it as a faravahar, a national symbol of Iran. I suspect that's correct. She was thus not targeted for supposedly being a Christian, as some argued, but she was in fact targeted, according to information attributed to her mother:

[P]erhaps the seminal -- and most heartbreaking -- moment of the Green Revolution was the murder of a 26-year-old female protester, Neda Agha-Soltan, whose bloody death was caught on cell-phone camera and rendered one of the most viral videos in history. In an HBO documentary about her life, Neda's mother recalls a message that some sympathetic female Basij members relayed to Neda days before she was killed by a sniper: "Dear, please don't come out looking so beautiful . . . . Do us a favor and don't come out because the Basiji men target beautiful girls. And they will shoot you."

Assuming that this report is true, it means that Ms. Agha-Soltan was not accidentally, but rather intentionally shot . . . for being beautiful. Shot through her heart by sexually frustrated men who hated her, most likely because she signified for them something that they couldn't have.

The article has a lot of other informative details about the Islamist obsession with sex in Shi'ite Iran, but I imagine one could generalize to various Islamist factions in the Muslim world.

Anyway, read the article!

Kuwaiti Prince Abdullah al-Sabah Converts to Christianity?

Website Logo

File this one under the "Interesting If True" heading. In a recent issue of the Vatican Insider (January 16, 2012), Marco Tosatti reports on "Kuwait: The prince's mysterious conversion," informing us that "a Kuwaiti royal prince has become a follower of Jesus Christ" and has posted the affirmation in an audio file using his full name, Abdullah al-Sabah, on the Arabic Christian satellite TV channel al-Haqiqa, which transmits Christian religious programing:

In his audio file, Abdullah declared: "First of all, I fully agree with the distribution of this audio file and I now declare that if they kill me because of it, then I will appear before Jesus Christ and be with him for all eternity." In this statement, the prince demonstrates his awareness of the fate in store for a martyr of the faith, according to Christian doctrine. The television channel stated that Abdullah is a member of the royal family, and that he recently renounced his faith in Islam and became a Christian, without specifying which particular branch of Christianity he had chosen. After stating his full name, the prince declared: "I will accept whatever they do to me, because the truth in the Bible has guided me towards the right path."

This sounds like evangelical Christianity to me . . . except that it sounds more like a hoax, particularly since a Kuwaiti prince by the name of Azbi al-Sabah insists: "There's no one by that name in the Kuwaiti royal family." He could be lying about that, of course, but getting caught in a lie so easily checked leads me to think he's telling the truth. This doesn't rule out the possibility that Abdullah al-Sabah is a pseudonym taken on by a real convert to hide his true identity, though such would seem to contradict the reported audio. Anyway, if the reported conversion is genuine, we may be hearing more about this in the near future.

To this Kuwaiti report, Tosatti adds a bonus point about neighboring Iran and the growth of Christianity there, a worrisome issue for Iran's theocratic Shi'ite state, leading the Iranian authorities to utter typically paranoid statements:

After Heidar Moslehi, the Iranian intelligence minister, asked Muslim seminaries to become proactive in stopping the spread of Christianity, a high-ranking cleric declared that Evangelical Christianity is the most horrifying intelligence and security organisation in the world. This statement seems to have appeared on press agencies close to the Revolutionary Guard.

In a conference on "New Age cults" held in Varamin, a district south of Teheran, Akhond Mohsen Alizadeh declared: "We should not allow these cults to question Islamic jurisprudence under the cover of mysticism." He went on to add: "They tell the youth that God is wrathful and horrible in Islam but is love in Christianity. Also, Christian preachers answer the questions and doubts of youth in their own interest and try to attract them." Nevertheless a whole series of signs seem to indicate that non-traditional Christianity -- there are Catholics and Orthodox Christians in Iran as well as a large Armenian community -- is spreading. The regime's press recently spoke of them with concern and the number of cases of repression and condemnation following conversions is growing.

By "non-traditional Christianity," Tosatti means evangelicalism, which includes pentacostalism, a variant on evangelical Christianity that seems to appeal to a lot of individuals outside of the West. If these folks make up "the most horrifying intelligence and security organisation in the world," then I can only conclude that the Holy Ghost must be involved in espionage, which rather fits the insider lingo that refers to spies as "spooks"!

Spooky indeed, but with God of their side, meaning that on the side of the Iranian theocratic state is . . .

Blood of the Martyrs . . . Seed of the Church?

Coptic Christians Protest Persecution

Ed Ou for The New York Times

(Image from New York Times)

The mainstream media might finally have begun to notice the widespread persecution of Christians throughout the world, particularly in Muslim-dominated areas, for I've noticed more articles recently in the New York Times on Christians suffering in Pakistan, Indonesia, and a number of other countries, particularly Iraq, from which Christians are fleeing and which threatens to be emptied of the last remnants of what was once its Christian majority. Now, we're also beginning to hear about Egypt.

David Kirkpatrick, writing for the New York Times, has recently noted that "Egypt's Christians Fear Violence as Changes Embolden Islamists" (May 30, 2011):

"Will Christians have equal rights and full citizenship or not?" asked Sarkis Naoum, a Christian commentator in Beirut, Lebanon. A surge of sectarian violence in Cairo -- 24 dead, more than 200 wounded and three churches in flames since President Hosni Mubarak's downfall -- has turned Christian-Muslim tensions into one of the gravest threats to the revolution's stability. But it is also a pivotal test of Egypt's tolerance, pluralism and the rule of law. The revolution has empowered the majority but also opened new questions about the protection of minority rights like freedom of religion or expression as Islamist groups step forward to lay out their agendas and test their political might.

Crawling out of the woodwork shaken by the revolution are even Islamists as radical as a certain Egyptian Salafi Shaykh Abu-Ishaq al-Huwayni who explains in this You Tube video translated by the site "Translating Jihad":

We are in the era of jihad. The era of jihad has come over us, and jihad in the path of Allah is a pleasure. It is a real pleasure. The companions (of the Prophet) used to compete to (perform jihad). The poverty that we’re in -- is it not due to our abandonment of jihad? But if we could conduct one, two, or three jihadist operations every year, many people throughout the earth would become Muslims. And whoever rejected this da'wa, or stood in our way, we would fight against him and take him prisoner, and confiscate his wealth, his children, and his women -- all of this means money. Every mujahid who returned from jihad, his pockets would be full. He would return with 3 or 4 slaves, 3 or 4 women, and 3 or 4 children. Multiply each head by 300 dirhams, or 300 dinar, and you have a good amount of profit. If he were to go to the West and work on a commercial deal, he would not make that much money. Whenever things became difficult (financially), he could take the head (i.e. the prisoner) and sell it, and ease his (financial) crisis. He would sell it like groceries.

The video of this man's insights into economics breaks off at this point, but I believe that we've heard enough to understand his mentality. Apparently, this statement was made over a decade ago, but in the 'freer' atmosphere of post-revolutionary Egypt, it has recently surfaced, and when the good sheik was questioned about it, he stood by his remarks. I don't know how much support he has in Egypt, but if Islamists of this sort were to take over that country and establish an Islamic state, they might not prove so popular. According to Trevor Persaud, writing "Public Enemy: Iran's Persecution Backfires" for Christianity Today (June 1, 2011), an Islamist state can inadvertently enhance the appeal of Christianity:

Islam is losing credibility after 30 years of theocracy [in Iran]. Resentment against the reigning regime is spreading and deepening -- especially since the disputed 2009 national elections.

"Before the [1979] revolution, the clerics were promising that once Iran becomes an Islamic state, it would be utopia, it would be brotherhood, and everything would be fine," . . . said [Issa Dibaj, an Iranian Christian]. But since then, Iranians "have seen nothing but war and fighting and international isolation and hatred, [and] they are thirsting for change."

"The Iranian public basically doesn't trust the government anymore," . . . said [Abe Ghaffari, executive director of Iranian Christians International], "and they don't trust the Muslim clergy anymore, because they have seen a lot of double standards and hypocrisy."

Converts in smaller communities still risk persecution from their own families, but tolerance is growing in urban areas and among the younger generation. "In fact," said Dibaj, "in places like Tehran and more educated communities, if you say, 'I have become a Christian,' they will respect you because of your courage and your independent thinking."

If anything, government persecution has made Christianity much more attractive, said . . . [Elam Ministries member David Yeghnazar]. "When government officials are on television telling people not to read the Scriptures, that generates more interest in the Scriptures."

I suppose that the Iranian government is worried, for as the article notes:

[M]ore and more Iranian Muslims are converting to Christianity. The house church movement is booming, with converts estimated in the hundreds of thousands. Evangelists are distributing large numbers of New Testaments, and satellite television continually beams Christian programs into the country.

Hundreds of thousands. Impressive, I guess, but out of a population of what, 80 million? That's still a rather minor percentage, so what is the Iranian government worried about?

Or might they have read chapter 50 of Tertullian's Apologeticus and learned of his theory on the growth of Christianity? But then, they wouldn't be persecuting Christians if they had, would they?

Or would they? Think of Iraq, which is being depopulated of Christians as they flee to escape the violence aimed at them by Islamists. Or of Pakistan, where up to 60 Christians each month convert to Islam to escape persecution.

Maybe Tertullian's blood-seed theory is not universally correct. Maybe some kinds of persecution are effective if the violence is brutal enough and if a substitute religion is offered.

I suppose we'll find out . . .

Maziar Bahari on the Clueless 'Mr. Rosewater'

Evin Prison

(Image from Inside Evin Prison)

The image above might or might not be from Evin Prison, for it isn't explicitly identified, nor is the photographer named, but it accompanies a report titled "Inside Evin Prison" on a certain man (called "Reza") who was arrested in Iran during the protests earlier this year, and its stark perspective appealed to me, for the isolation imposed on the prisoner depicted from above mirrors the intellectual isolation of his captors, as we learn from a different report, this one from Newsweek and written by that magazine's reporter Maziar Bahari, who was arrested and interrogated in Evin Prison for "118 Days, 12 Hours, 54 Minutes" (November 30, 2009).

The following exchange between Mr. Bahari and his interrogator -- whom he had mentally designated as "Mr Rosewater" because he smelled of the "rosewater perfume used by men who piously do their ablutions several times a day before prayers, but rarely shower" -- took place on June 22, 2009 at around 4 a.m., during which Mr. Rosewater wanted to be told about a dinner that Mr. Bahari had attended with eight other journalists and photographers the month before in Tehran, a meeting that Mr. Rosewater apparently believed had planned the recent mass protests in Iran:

"You are part of a very American network, Mr. Bahari," he said, as if summing up his case in a courtroom. "Let me correct myself: you are in charge of a secret American network, a group that includes those who came to that dinner party."

"It was just a dinner," I murmured.

"Yes. A very American dinner. It could have happened in . . . New Jersey, or someplace like that." He paused. "Your own New Jersey in Tehran."

The strangeness of the accusation was unsettling. New Jersey?

"You've been to New Jersey, haven't you, Mr. Bahari?" The thought seemed to infuriate him, and I was struck by the feeling that for some reason he might have wanted, secretly, to go to New Jersey himself. The worst thing that can happen in any encounter with Islamic Republic officials is for them to think that you're looking down on them.

"It's not a particularly nice place," I said, trying to sound conversational.

"I don't care. But it is as godless as what you wanted to create in this country."

"I'm sorry. I don't understand."

"You were planning to eradicate the pure religion of Muhammad in this country and replace it with 'American' Islam. A New Jersey Islam." He was building his case, and my responses were irrelevant. "Tell me," he said, "did any of the women at the dinner party have their veils on?"

"No."

"Then don't tell me that you didn't have a secret American network. A New Jersey network."

Mr. Rosewater's obsession with "New Jersey," as if it were the intellectual center of some sort of impure 'American' Islam, betrays the smallminded isolation of the Iranian regime. An important interrogator like Mr. Rosewater querying an important prisoner like Mr. Bahari over . . . "New Jersey," and pausing, as if he knew some dark secret about the place. He's sure that something is going on in New Jersey because the women go unveiled there . . . in New Jersey.

I'm somehow reminded of the childhood ditty that goes on about a "place in France where the women wear no pants" -- and we children probably knew as much about the real France as Mr. Rosewater knows about the real New Jersey.

We were clueless, but we were just children. Mr. Rosewater and his ilk are clueless men with power . . .

Did Ahmadinejad's Imam really say that?!

Mohammad Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi

Ayatollah and Consultant

to

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

(Image from Israel National News)

The following information will need to be double- and even triple-checked by somebody with better sources than I, but here's a report -- based on allegations by Iranian dissidents -- of statements said to have been made by a leading Shi'ite religious leader in Iran.

Writing for the Israel National News, the journalist Nissan Ratzlav-Katz informs us in his article "Ahmadinejad's Imam: Islam Allows Raping, Torturing Prisoners" that "[a]ccording to Iranian pro-democracy sources," Ayatollah Mohammad Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi gave his legal opinions on certain delicate questions concerning whether or not the use of "psychological, emotional and physical pressure" to obtain confessions was "valid and considered credible according to Islam." Concerning those queries, the ayatollah allegedly explained:

Getting a confession from any person who is against the Velayat-e Faqih ("Guardianship of the Islamic Jurists", or the regime of Iran's mullahs) is permissible under any condition.

The purported follow-up question to this opinion was likely prompted by the current rumors of rape having been perpetrated on many of the political prisoners arrested during and after the recent demonstrations in Iran over the disputed election:

Can an interrogator rape the prisoner in order to obtain a confession?

The ayatollah then reportedly made the following statement:

The necessary precaution is for the interrogator to perform a ritual washing first and say prayers while raping the prisoner.

This outrageous statement specifying the 'precaution' is then elaborated upon in a way that I'd prefer not to include on this family-safe blog, so go to the website if you really need to know the details. I'll just add this astounding judgement purportedly pronounced by the ayatollah concerning "the rape of virgin female prisoners":

If the judgment for the [female] prisoner is execution, then rape before execution brings the interrogator a spiritual reward equivalent to making the mandated Haj pilgrimage [to Mecca], but if there is no execution decreed, then the reward would be equivalent to making a pilgrimage to [the Shi'ite holy city of] Karbala.

I'd ordinarily dismiss as a false report anything so disgustingly depraved as to be literally incredible, but I've previously seen Islamic legal opinions written by the late Ayatollah Khomeini that rival this still-living ayatollah's legal decisions, so I'm not ruling out of court the possibility that Mohammad Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi really does hold that rape can be a sacred religious act.

Can anyone supply confirmation . . . and if accurate, the legal reasoning of this Shi'ite cleric?

UPDATE: Regular commenter Erdal informs us about this story:

[Mohammad Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi] didn't say it. This started as a dirty satire in some corner of the internet, sombody didn't get the joke, spread it as real, and you know the rest. The official party line is of course that rapes don't happen in Iran's prisons, which is as bizarre a statement as this story.

Thanks, Erdal. I've found a link to a site debunking the report.

Neda Agha-Soltan's death revisited . . .

Marzieh Amirizadeh

and

Maryam Rustampoor

Muslim-Background Christians

(Image from BosNewsLife)

Although I'm now about 90 percent convinced that Neda Agha-Soltan's death was a purely random killing by the Basij, who had no suspicion that she might have been Christian, the case of Muslim-background Christians such as Marzieh Amirizadeh and Maryam Rustampoor is what raised my suspicions:

Marzieh Amirizadeh, 30, and Maryam Rustampoor, 27, have been held for over four months in Tehran's notorious Evin prison apparently for converting to Christianity from Islam.

Iranian Christians and rights investigators said the two young women, who were arrested March 5, suffered sleep deprivation as part of police interrogations and were held in solitary confinement for three weeks in May and early June.

Later, they were put together in one small cell for about two weeks before being moved to a larger area to make place for other inmates, including many protesters who were detained following last month's disputed presidential elections, said Christians with close knowledge about the situation.

About 600 women were reportedly brought to Evin prison during the protests. (Stefan J. Bos, "Concerns Over Detained Iranian Christians Amid Political Turmoil," BosNewLife, July 7, 2009)

As the report notes, apostasy from Islam is taken very seriously in Iran:

Apostasy along with murder, adultery, rape, armed robbery, and drug trafficking are all punishable by death in Iran, and last week Iranian media reported that at least six people were hanged for murder in the same prison where the two Christian women are held.

Iran's hardline on apostasy, combined with the seeming cross worn by Neda Agha-Soltan, left me wondering . . . but my former student Hajir, an Iranian, expressed skepticism that Neda had been specifically targeted:

Even though it might seem interesting that a girl whos name is Persian was wearing a cross in a picture, to me it is not surprising at all. First of all many of people who I know that live very secular if they find something stylish they might wear it for a period, therefore they are not necessarily Christian.

Or since many Persians these days are confused with their religious identity might identify themselves with any religion temporarily, but they cannot be considered real converts because [they] mostly do not have deep understanding and they just follow the trend for a short period.

But still there are many (unknown number) of Christian converts in Iran that she might also be one of them, Her religious belief is really uncertain to me, indeed it seems a cross to me in the photo.

. . .

I personally think her death was just like other deaths that unfortunately took place within the past few weeks and the only distinction is the video that has made the scene more significant than the others.

I believe she was shot down by Basij troops and the death was not plotted in advance. Because police were even unable to locate the protests, how could they possibly know somebody who has no high profile -- like her -- is somewhere among the protesters to plan to kill her?!

Hajir's final point is a very astute one. Following through on some plan to kill Neda Agha-Soltan in the chaotic crowds would have been very difficult. Still, let's not dismiss it entirely, for Iran's Islamist leaders are said to be worried about conversions away from Islam, especially conversions to Christianity, so much so that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has reportedly promised, "I will stop Christianity in this country" (Kenneth R. Timmerman, "Freedom to Believe," NRO, December 15, 2005). Consider this analysis from the news report above on Marzieh Amirizadeh and Maryam Rustampoor:

Elam Ministries linked the attacks [on Muslim-background Christians] to concern among Iran's leaders about the spread of Christianity in the Islamic nation. "Because Iran is a strategic gateway nation, the growing church in Iran will impact Muslim nations across the Islamic world."

The group said in 1979, there were less than 500 known Christians from a Muslim background in Iran. "Today the most conservative estimate is that there are at least 100,000 believers in the nation."

Church leaders have reportedly said that they believe "millions" can be added "to the church in the next few years-such is the spiritual hunger that exists and the disillusionment with the Islamic regime." (Stefan J. Bos, "Concerns Over Detained Iranian Christians Amid Political Turmoil," BosNewLife, July 7, 2009)

One need not accept the optimistic projections of Elam Ministries to recognize that the Islamic Republic of Iran might be paranoid about such conversions. Some supporters of the Iranian government even seem to revel in the brutal suppression, as with this "Anonymous" individual in a comment to one of my blog entries on the election in Iran:

Ahmadinejad was ahead before the election, and there is no reason to believe he did not win a landslide. He has been rubbing the West's nose in its own sh*t for over 4 years.

Four more years, like it or not. (Your own sh*t, that is.)

I found courtesy difficult to maintain in the face of such vulgar gloating by an individual who didn't even bother with asterisks (though I have since supplied these), but I did manage what I hope was a sufficiently irenic reply:

Anonymous, when I saw the "Anonymous" signature, I expected the sort of comment that you posted, so I wasn't surprised and therefore certainly not disappointed.

Congratulations on your victory. You sound happy with it.

We'll just have to see how this all plays out over the years and months, but "Anonymous" should recall that fateful warning to Sir Gawain: Þe forme to þe fynisment foldez ful selden ("first things to last things very seldom match," SGGK, Part 2, line 499).

Neda Agha-Soltan: A Christian?

Neda Agha-Soltan

Click Photo to Enlarge

(Image from Gabrielle Cusumano)

Readers probably recognize this photo of Neda Soltan, the 26-year-old Iranian woman who was struck by a bullet in the heart on June 20, 2009 during the recent demonstrations in Iran. If you missed the earlier reports, see the Wikipedia entry on the "Death of Neda Agha-Soltan" for information and links.

Truth is hard to come by in a case such as this, for the Iranian government has clamped down on reports and has claimed that foreigners killed her. I certainly don't accept this official Iranian claim. Initially, I assumed that Ms. Soltan had simply happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and had gotten struck by a stray bullet, for she was apparently not directly involved in a protest at the moment, nor was she especially close to where clashes were occurring. Many reports that I've seen, however, insist that she was deliberately targeted by the Basij, a paramilitary volunteer militia formed to protect the Islamist Iranian state and monitor the Islamic practices of Iranian citizens. But I couldn't understand why someone as innocuous as Ms. Soltan would be targeted.

Now, the buzz on the internet has been growing that Ms. Soltan was a Christian, based on the evidence of what appears to be a Christian cross on the necklace that she is wearing in the photograph above. Click on the photo to enlarge the image, and decide for yourself, but it does appear to be a cross to my eyes -- as well as to the eyes of my wife.

From the fact that Ms. Soltan had studied at Islamic Azad University, majoring in philosophy and religion, I had assumed that she was Muslim, but supposing that she were a convert from Islam to Christianity, then a motive for her execution would become more plausible, for Muslim-background Christian have previously been targeted by Iran's Islamist government (e.g., Hossein Soodmand in 1989, Mehdi Dibaj in 1994, and Ghorban Tourani in 2005), and the popular disorder during the demonstrations may have provided the Basij a perfect opportunity to strike.

So . . . was Ms. Soltan a Christian . . . and was she targeted? I suspect that we'll be hearing more about this soon enough, though definitive answers might be difficult to obtain.

Bernstein on Kolakowski's "Big Lie"

Richard Bernstein

(Master Media Speakers Bureau)

I guess that mainstream media ain't dead yet, or I wouldn't be learning so much from it. Yesterday was Ignatius applying Dostoyevsky to Putin; today is Bernstein applying Kolakowski to Iran.

I first read Leszek Kolakowski in Martin Jay's U.C. Berkeley seminar nearly 30 years ago, and except for excerpts since then, I've read little . . . though I keep promising myself to read more because every time that I read words that he wrote, I feel that I've learned something very important, such as what he said about "the big lie" -- which Richard Bernstein summarized a couple of days ago in his New York Times "Letter from America" column, "In Tehran, Shades of Tiananmen" (July 1, 2009):

Years ago, the Polish-born philosopher Leszek Kolakowski explained the remarkable adherence of totalitarian dictators to the big lie, which Mr. Kolakowski distinguished from the ordinary political mendacity -- an excellent recent example of which was the claim by Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina that he was enjoying a respite by hiking in the Appalachian Mountains when he was with his mistress in Argentina.

The ordinary political lie, in Mr. Kolakowski's view, didn't seek to erase "the distinction between truth and falsity," while the totalitarian big lie does. It defines truth as what the holders of power say it is, and, in this sense, as Mr. Kolakowski wrote in an 1983 article in Commentary Magazine, it is "the very core of a political system, the heart of a new civilization."

"By training people in this confusion," Mr. Kolakowski wrote, "and by inoculating them to believe that nothing is true in itself" it will "produce a new 'socialist man,' devoid of will and of moral resistance."

Kolakowski was speaking of Soviet-style socialism of the totalitarian sort, but Bernstein wonders if the concept can be extended further, a question stemming partly from his conversation with a Yale history professor:

"The Iranians are telling medium-sized lies," Timothy Snyder, a professor of East European history at Yale said in a conversation this week. The main thrust of the Iranian propaganda is to blame external enemies for internal problems, a practice, Mr. Snyder said, that was first used on a grand scale in mid-19th-century Europe, well before the era of total thought control.

Still, there seem to be more than faint echoes of the classic big lie in the case of Mr. Ahmadinejad and the actions of the security services.

"One reason the lie has to be big," Mr. Snyder said, "is that people will feel that if their leaders must have a lot of confidence to tell a lie that big, they are either crazy or they have a powerful security force behind them."

This doesn't mean that the lies Iran’s leaders are telling are going to work. Indeed there are plenty of signs that they won't. At the same time, events in Iran have proved that the leaders are eager to control information and they do have a powerful and ruthless security force behind them.

I wonder if the big lie can ever truly work anymore. Contemporary media is making the control of information significantly more difficult. Even something as 'silly' as "twittering" turned out to play a serious role in relaying information through short "tweets." Imagine how much more the young Chinese today would know about the killing of demonstrators at Tiananmen Square in Beijing 20 years ago if the new media that we have now had been available then. I don't think that any totalitarian system can erase "the distinction between truth and falsity" anymore because such a system requires "absolute control over every living soul" -- as Leonard Cohen puts it in "The Future" -- and that sort of system cannot be maintained without enormous expense of wealth, time, and energy against the tides of democracy.

As for those of us who belong to the more sophisticated West, we disdain the crude attempts at an erasure of "the distinction between truth and falsity" used in Soviet Russia, Communist China, or Islamist Iran, for we've developed a far subtler, much more efficient means: a quotidian relativism of everyday life.

Paradoxically, then, the West is best. Relatively speaking.

"Stoning . . . is the introduction, by contemporary Islamic leaders, of a Jewish custom"?

(Korea Herald)

The British scholar Chris Williams, who seems to be writing a regular column for the Korea Herald these days, had an article in yesterday's Herald that promised to apply lessons learned from the recent events in Iran to an analysis of North Korea: "Could 'Iran' happen in North Korea?"

Despite the headline, Williams actually had relatively little to say specifically about North Korea -- though he did make the following remark:

Hope for Iran, and North Korea, lies in two things. Despotic regimes inevitably score own goals, appear foolish and inept, and alienate their own supporters. But paradoxically, it is unfortunate that those who rule North Korea seem less inept than those who rule Iran.

I gather that North Korean 'eptness' means that the answer to the question posed in this article's headline as to the possibility of massive popular resistance in North Korea is: "Maybe not." I suspect, however, that if the North Korean leadership seems less inept than Iran's leadership, this is because the North Korean leaders do not flirt with democracy and therefore have no ballots to obviously and crudely miscount. Williams did have some otherwise interesting things to say about Iran, despotism, and democracy, but his article contains the following, confounding passage:

Stoning is not, as many believe, Iranian tradition. It did not happen during the Shah's era, and the practice is not Persian or proposed in the Koran. It is the introduction, by contemporary Islamic leaders, of a Jewish custom. The practice is closer to Zionism than Zoroastrianism.

That last line is perhaps indicative of an Anglo-Saxon love for alliteration, and thereby 'poetic', but the entire paragraph is a cognitive snarl that would appear to hold Jews in some way responsible for the un-Islamic application of stoning as punishment in Iran. Let us therefore look a bit closer at this issue.

Is stoning a Jewish custom? I don't currently see many Jews involved in stonings. To be frank, I don't see any. Jewish laws in Leviticus and Deuteronomy do indeed mandate stoning for some crimes, and these might be what Williams was thinking of, but the laws on stoning haven't been applied for perhaps 2000 years. There may have been some exceptions, for isolated cases can probably always be found, but one can hardly call stoning these days a Jewish custom.

Moreover, stoning surely has nothing to do with Zionism, which is a secular political philosophy. I can't imagine that Williams thinks that the state of Israel has laws to mandate stoning for capital offenses. As for the reference to Zoroastrianism . . . well, why is that thrown in? Except for alliteration, of course . . . and, I suppose, because the Iranians used to be Zoroastrians, who apparently didn't use stoning as a punishment. But Iranians haven't been Zoroastrians since the Islamic conquest nearly 1400 years ago.

And that is the crux, for stoning is both law and custom in Islam. Williams is correct that the Qur'an does not mandate stoning, but Islamic law, shariah, certainly does, for shariah is based on three sources: Qur'an (Allah's revelation), Sira (Muhammad's life), and Hadith (Muhammad's sayings). Muhammad practiced stoning, and he condoned it. Stoning is not a recent introduction to Islam by contemporary Muslim leaders. It is decidedly no innovation.

As for the history of stoning's application in Islamic Iran, I know little about that. Possibly, Williams is correct that it was not practiced in the past and was only introduced into Iran's Islamic Penal Code in 1983. Be that as it may, stoning has certainly always been part of Islamic law, and when one considers that Iran's Islamist revolution took place in 1979, then the fact that stoning was made law merely four years later looks less like innovation and more like an opportunity grasped.

In no way should one blame the Jews for stoning in Iran . . . or for stoning in Islam.

How 'Iranic': Koreans Protest at Iranian Embassy

South Koreans Protesting Against 'Iran'

Photo by Lee Jae-Won, Reuters

(Image from Yahoo)

I must admit to an error in judgement. On Tuesday the 23rd, I had lunch with my friend Dan Ernst, who teaches philosophy and international relations at Ewha Womans University, and we discussed the demonstrations that were even then going on in Iran. Dan asked me if South Koreans were protesting against the violent and even murderous repression being used by the Iranian government. I laughed and replied:

"Are you kidding? Koreans aren't interested in protesting against Iran. Protests against anything that America does, yes -- for that, Koreans would protest. But this? No, because it has nothing to do with America."

Well, I eat my words. Only two days later, on June 25, South Koreans protested, as the photo above and the passage below make clear:

Activists chant slogans at a rally denouncing what they say is the Iranian government's repression on the people in front of the Iranian embassy in Seoul June 25, 2009. Iranian police and militia have largely succeeded in regaining control of the streets after the biggest anti-government protests since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, touched off by the disputed June 12 presidential election. Some 20 people are reported to have been killed in the demonstrations.

I was touched at this display of Korean solidarity with oppressed Iranians yearning for democracy, and I nearly shed a tear . . . until I looked more closely at a protest sign in English:

The US and Western Governments, the Butchers of Iraqis and Afghans, You Don't Have a Right to Talk About Iran's Democracy

My daughter and wife then looked at a sign in Korean:

이라크 아프간의 학살자: 미국과 서방정부는 이란 민주주의 말할 자격 없다!

With their help, that translates as:

Butchers of Iraqis and Afghans: America and Western Governments Don't Have the Right to Talk About Iran's Democracy!

The writing is far more clear in this JoongAng Daily copy of the photo if you click on it to enlarge:


This clearer copy of the photo (in an even more distinct black and white) appeared in the JoongAng's June 26th issue; otherwise, I might have missed the actual significance of this image showing Koreans demonstrating against the Iranian government, namely, that even this protest is really against the United States . . . well, and against 'Western Governments', too, but since "Western" includes the US, then why does America get such top billing as to be especially singled out? Oh, right, because anything wrong in the world must somehow be America's fault.

Perhaps I need not eat my words just yet . . .

Reuel Marc Gerecht: "The Koran and the Ballot Box"

Edward G. Shirley

aka

Reuel Marc Gerecht

(Image from FDD)

Reuel Marc Gerecht, whose columns I recall reading shortly after 9/11, is an intelligent and informed hardliner on Iran and the Middle East. Around that time, I believe, he was with the Neo-Conservative Project for the New American Century, working as director of its Middle East Initiative. Earlier, he had served in the CIA as a specialist on the Middle East, with a particular focus on Iran, it seems, for he wrote Know Thine Enemy: A Spy's Journey Into Revolutionary Iran (1997), which -- despite the title -- was an ex-spy's journey into Iran (albeit written under the pseudonym Edward G. Shirley). He now works for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies as a senior fellow. I think that I should note, perhaps not just in passing, that he has defended "physically coercive techniques" used to extract crucial information on imminent terrorist actions, a defense that you can read about in his exchange on this point with Andrew Sullivan.

Make of him what you will (and opinions will no doubt differ), Gerecht has written a very interesting article, "The Koran and the Ballot Box," for the New York Times (June 20, 2009). He argues that we are seeing " the unraveling of the religious idea that has shaped the growth of modern Islamic fundamentalism since the creation of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt in 1928," or more precisely, two incompatible ideas combined in Iran: "that God's law . . . would rule, and that the people of Iran had the right to elect representatives who would advance and protect their interests." As a new generation grew up and got educated, a systemic contradiction developed, for "God's will and the people's wants were no longer compatible."

Gerecht therefore believes that we are currently "witnessing not just the end of the first stage of the Iranian democratic experiment, but the collapse of the structural underpinnings of the entire Islamic approach to modern political self-rule," as "Islam's categorical imperative for both traditional and fundamentalist Muslims --'commanding right and forbidding wrong' -- is being transformed." Gerecht notes that this imperative was, historically, "understood as a check on the corrupting, restive and libidinous side of the human soul," but that "modern Islamic militants," also known as Islamists, have used it as "a war cry" and as "a justification of the morals police in Saudi Arabia and Iran, of the young men who harass 'improperly' attired Muslim women from Cairo to Copenhagen." The implications are thus far-reaching and wide-ranging, and therefore clarify why "Ayatollah Khamenei will try to stop a democratic triumph in his country, since real democracy would allow men, not God and his faithful guardians, the mullahs, to determine right and wrong." Even if the Ayatollah stops Iran's democratic movement, the world can see the significance, says Gerecht:

Westerners would do well to understand the magnitude of what is transpiring in the Islamic Republic. Iran's revolution shook the Islamic world. It was the first attempt by militant Muslims to prove that "Islam has all the answers" -- or at least enough of them to run a modern state and make its citizenry more moral children of God. But the experiment has failed.

Gerecht acknowledges that we cannot be certain what the opposition leader "Mr. Moussavi thinks about democracy," but he believes that Moussavi is "willing to entrust the people with more power than was [a previous opposition leader] Mr. Khatami," a reformer who "could neither really break with his ruling clerical brethren, nor free himself from the age-old Islamic belief that the faithful need clerical supervision."

Previously, the Islamic Republic of Iran has managed to depict itself "as a virtuous state with a workable level of democracy -- just enough to give the regime legitimacy and stability," but Gerecht holds that "the clerical regime can no longer make this argument," for "Iranians have come to know theocracy intimately," and "secularism has become increasingly attractive." Indeed, Gerecht states that "Iran now produces brilliant clerics who argue in favor of the separation of church and state as a means of saving the faith from corrupting power." In effect, the "Iranians are on the threshold of turning the Koran's ethical injunction into a democratic commandment: nothing good can be commanded without a vote of the people."

Moreover, though Iran is a Shi'ite Persian state, Gerecht thinks that Sunni Arab fundamentalists will "will surely see the awesome power of democracy" and "will probably conclude . . . that God cannot be the sole legislator of the laws and ethics that good Muslims want to live by."

Well, this all sounds enormously positive, and I hope that Gerecht is right, but we'll just have to see how this plays itself out in Iran. Repression might work for a long time. The Soviet Union lasted 70 years, long enough to destroy a great deal and thereby wreak enormous damage upon the peoples whom it ruled, and the great difficult labor of repair will continue for a long time. Even if the current demonstrations overturn the Shi'ite Islamist system in Iran, would the Sunni Islamists truly learn a lesson about the necessity for democracy? Why would the 'orthodox' learn from the deviations of the 'heretical'? We can hope that Gerecht is correct and that history will limp to the right . . . but only time will tell.

Meanwhile, here's a good site for updates on Iran: Radio Free Europe.

"Leaked Memo" on Iran's Election Revisited

Iran Behind the Mask?

Artist: Brian Stauffer

(Image from New York Times)

On June 18th, I expressed open skepticism about a memo supposedly written by the Iranian Minister of Interior, Sadegh Mahsouli, and sent to the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, providing the actual results on votes cast in the recent presidential election in Iran. My suspicions were based partly on a pre-election poll conducted for Terror Free Tomorrow by Ken Ballen and Patrick Doherty, who told us in their Washington Post article, "The Iranian People Speak" (Monday, June 15, 2009), that Ahmadinejad was far ahead, and because of that poll, I conceded that the vast majority of Iranians may actually have voted to return this current, hardline president to power.

However, I asked for clarification from experts and received a response from an Iranian, one of my former political science students at Yonsei's Underwood International College, who openly questioned the official election results (though he did not express a decided opinion on the memo's authenticity). Also, a regular reader offered a link that questioned whether or not the opinion poll by Ballen and Doherty offered accurate predictions. Moreover, a recent opinion piece, "A Different Iranian Revolution," published in the New York Times (June 18, 2009) by a certain "Shane M.," a student in Iran who has adopted this very 'Western' pseudonym, argued that even if the opinion poll were accurate when it was taken, the percentages could well have shifted radically by the time of the recent election:

Let's also forget the polls, carried out in May by Terror Free Tomorrow: The Center for Public Opinion, that have been making the rounds this past week, with numbers that showed Mr. Ahmadinejad well ahead in the election, even in Mr. Moussavi's hometown, Tabriz. Maybe last month Mr. Ahmadinejad was indeed on his way to victory. But then came the debates.

Starting on June 1, the country was treated to an experience without precedent in the 30 years of the Islamic Republic of Iran: six back-to-back live and unscripted debates among the four presidential candidates. Iranians everywhere were riveted, and the poll numbers began to move.

By the Wednesday before the election, Mr. Moussavi was backed by about 44 percent of respondents, while Mr. Ahmadinejad was favored by around 38 percent. So let's not cloud the results with numbers that were, like bagels, stale a week later. (And let's ignore the claim that polling by Iranians in Iran is "notoriously untrustworthy." A consortium of pollsters and social scientists working for a diverse range of political and social organizations systematically measured public opinion for months before the election.)

Such a major shift has happened before. A month before the 1997 elections, the establishment candidate, Ali Akbar Nategh-Nouri, was trouncing his opponents in surveys. Then, a week before the vote, the tide changed, bringing to power a reformer, Mohammad Khatami.

The reason for this fluidity in voter preference is simple. Iran has no real political parties that can command a fixed number of predictable votes. With elections driven primarily by personality politics, Iranians are always swing voters. So Mr. Moussavi, hampered by a lack of access to state-run news media and allowed only two months to campaign, began to make inroads into Mr. Ahmadinejad's lead only during the final days leading into the election, his poll numbers rising with his visits to provincial cities and the debate appearances.

These details -- offered by one who sounds as though he knows what he's writing about -- put the memo in a very different light. It may indeed be fake (as the usually politically astute JK insists), but it might also nevertheless offer analytical results calculated by some Iranian willing to put forward projections at to the 'real' details and deciding to publicize them in a way guaranteed to get attention.

Or the memo may really be authentic.

I await more comments -- on the memo, the election, and the direction that events are taking us -- but I note in passing that if voter preference is so fluid and personality-based as "Shane" maintains, then perhaps nobody, not even the Iranians, can tell us where they are going (though this direction would be welcome).

Leaked Memo on Iranian Election?

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

Supreme Leader of Iran

(Image from Wikipedia)

Over at The Marmot's Hole Blog, a commentor going by the handle "Nix" left a very interesting comment (#70) on June 17, 2009 at 5:04 a.m. From an Iranian friend, he obtained a rough, unedited translation of a supposedly "leaked memo" of June 13th that had originally been intended for Ayatollah Ali Khameni and supposedly gave the real results of the recent Iranian election. Here's the original memo, provided online at a site titled "Iran Election was Rigged":


Here's the rough, unedited English translation:

To: The Supreme Leader, Hazrat (similar to sir) Ayatollah Khameni

Salam Alaikon

due to your express of concern to the results of the tenth election and (your) very own discretion to retain Mr. Ahmadinejad as the President at this sesetive times, the plans are set so that the results that will be published would be expedient to the regime and the revolution, and all the necessary measures have taken for the likely events following the election, the head of the parties and candidates are under heavy suvaliance.

so, only for your information, we present you with the real results of the election.

the sum of the ballots: 42,026,078

Mir Hossein Musavi Khamene: 19,075,623

Mehdi Karrubi: 13,387,104

Mahmud Ahmadinejad: 5,698,417

Mohsen Rezai Mirqaed: 3,754,218

Invalid (Blank, Unreadable, etc.): 38,716

Minister of Interior
Sadegh Mahsouli

Is this memo authentic? Are these numbers genuine? If so, they put Ahmadinejad a distant third in the vote. But there could be much reason to doubt, for Ken Ballen and Patrick Doherty tell us in their Washington Post article, "The Iranian People Speak" (Monday, June 15, 2009), that a poll conducted by them prior to the election supports the official vote tally in Iran:

The election results in Iran may reflect the will of the Iranian people. Many experts are claiming that the margin of victory of incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was the result of fraud or manipulation, but our nationwide public opinion survey of Iranians three weeks before the vote showed Ahmadinejad leading by a more than 2 to 1 margin -- greater than his actual apparent margin of victory in Friday's election.

Moreover, they strongly insist that their poll produced valid statistics:

While Western news reports from Tehran in the days leading up to the voting portrayed an Iranian public enthusiastic about Ahmadinejad's principal opponent, Mir Hossein Mousavi, our scientific sampling from across all 30 of Iran's provinces showed Ahmadinejad well ahead.

What, then, are the correct results? We do know that Ayatollah Ali Khameni -- under pressure from the enormous demonstrations -- has agreed to a recount. But why? Because of his certainty? Or his uncertainty? I would tend toward skepticism on this memo, for I doubt that Ahmadinejad could have done so poorly. The memo shows the two candidates considered reformist far in the lead, which looks suspect to me. But what do I know?

Perhaps one or two of this blog's Iranian readers could offer comments, for I know that some Iranians do occasionally read Gypsy Scholar.

An Iranian 'Shin Jeong-ah'?

Ali Kordan

Need to hire "two lawyers and three detectives"?

(Image from The Telegraph)

In a piece of news that also could easily have come from Korea in the past year, Nazila Fathi reports for the International Herald Tribune that a high-ranking "Iranian official admits [that his] Oxford doctorate is [a] fake" (October 1, 2008):

Iran's interior minister[, Ali Kordan,] admitted that a doctorate he said he had earned from Oxford was a fake, and said he was pressing charges against an intermediary who had forged it without his knowledge . . . . Kordan said he had been victimized by a man who introduced himself eight years ago as a representative of Oxford and gave him the fake degree in return for a thesis he had written previously.

"My degree was issued, based on my management and executive experience and in return for a thesis, by a man who had opened an English language school in Tehran," Kordan wrote.

I sympathize with Mr. Kordan. Every day, I receive countless emails promising to award me a doctorate for my "life experience," for which I -- like Mr. Kordan -- surely deserve honored recognition from some preeminent institution of higher education. So far, however, I've been put off by the price and haven't taken up any of the offers. Why should I shell out hard cash for recognition that I so legitimately deserve? I've already paid my dues in the school of hard knocks, so why the extra tuition? The money thing is enough to make one skeptical, but some of us have to learn the hard way:

Kordan said that he reacted with "utter disbelief" when he discovered that his doctorate was a fake. He said he had filed a complaint against the man, but had not been able to trace him. He did not give the man's name.

Mr. Kordan is to be commended on his new-found incredulity. He has learned a valuable lesson from his experience and would likely now truly qualify for a doctorate in Pyrrhonian skepticism -- undoubtedly a Pyrrhic victory for him (though as a Pyrrhonian, he would be entititled to continue doubting).

In my initial remark that this news about Mr. Kordan "could easily have come from Korea in the past year," I was thinking of the Shin Jeong-ah case. The talented Ms. Shin -- formerly a Dongguk University assistant professor and also originally slated as a director for the 2008 Gwangju Biennale -- claimed to have a doctorate from Yale University, but like Mr. Kordan, she was 'deceived':

According to the JoongAng Ilbo, she recently told a reporter that she had not faked the diplomas and was actually the one being deceived, saying she had hired two lawyers and three detectives to search for a tutor who had helped her write her Ph.D. thesis. (Kim Rahn, "Shin Jeong-ah's Life Full of Mystery," Korea Times, September 12, 2007)

Ms. Shin's "two lawyers and three detectives" were apparently unsuccessful, but all is for the best because Ms. Shin is currently enrolled in an institution of learning where she will certainly earn the highest of degrees in hard knocks.

Perhaps Mr. Kordan can look forward to the same opportunity.

Return to "The Mission Field..."

House Church in Iran?
The data is a bit fuzzy . . .
(Image from Christian World News)

A few weeks ago, I posted a blog entry titled "The Mission Field" and asked about the statistics that one sometimes hears concerning Muslim-background converts to Christianity. A couple of interesting articles published last week in Christianity Today provide a bit of information on this issue, though not much hard data.

Christopher Lewis, "It's Primetime in Iran," Christianity Today (September 24, 2008), describes the scene in a television studio that beams a Christian message from Pastor Hormoz Shariat to Iranian believers in Christ:

The TV studio hums just a few feet from his church office in northern California, but pastor Hormoz Shariat is still a last-minute arrival to his own show. Behind the scenes are teams of phone counselors and hip young producers.

Waiting behind an Islamic veil 7,000 miles away is an exploding house-church movement in Iran, whose compatriots eavesdrop on the illegal satellite programs produced daily by Pastor Shariat's Iranian Christian Church (ICC).

Lewis doesn't explain here why he refers to the "house-church movement in Iran" as "exploding," but in a separate article, "Looking for Home," Christianity Today (September 24, 2008), he cites information from Abe Ghaffari of Iranian Christians International, so I can see what he meant by the remark:

Missiologists say Persians have never identified as strongly with Islam as their Arab Muslim conquerors. While some studies estimate 500,000 to 1 million Iranian Muslim-background believers worldwide, Ghaffari counts fewer than 300,000 -- most of them isolated "secret believers." But even Ghaffari is stunned by how Iran's house-church movement of 50,000 has doubled in the last five years. "This is historic," he says.

Ghaffari sounds somewhat trustworthy since he downplays the total numbers of Iranian converts from Islam to Christianity, but I nevertheless wonder how one 'counts' "secret believers." Presumably, one would need to count these, or a representative sample, to back up claims of a "doubling of the Iranian house-church movement in 5 years" -- which sounds impressive but is ambiguous between meaning from 25,000 to 50,000 and meaning from 50,000 to 100,000. Initially, I took the claim to mean the latter, but I now think that it must mean the former.

However, I am not sure, for in my "Mission Field" post, I noted that Golnaz Esfandiari, "A Look At Iran's Christian Minority" (Payvand's Iran News . . . 2004), quotes the Iranian Protestant Issa Dibaj on the number of Muslim-background Christians in Iran:

"There is another Christian minority that people know little about, these are Iranians who are born as Muslims and then later become Christians," Dibaj said. "Their number is growing day by day. [There] may be around 100,000 [of them], but no one really knows the exact number."

The number 100,000 might sound as if it would support Ghaffari as meaning that the house-church movement has exploded from 50,000 to 100,000, but Dibaj's estimate was four years ago would therefore not support Ghaffari's round number if 100,000 is meant. Unclear, however, is whether or not Dibaj was referring to a house-church movement at all. And what does Ghaffari mean by his numbers anyway -- individual believers or house churches?

Whatever the figures, they pale beside Iran's mostly Muslim population of about 70 million. The house-church movement might be 'exploding,' but to my ears, it still sounds more like a firecracker than a bundle of dynamite.

The Mission Field...

Iranian Christians

An Official Church

(Photo by Mehdi Ghasemi, ISNA)

Sunday morning has come, so what better time than now to look briefly at some intriguing but also imprecise reports on the 'growth' of Christianity in Iran (and elsewhere) -- since I happened just this morning to come across an article that got me to searching for more:

Farsi-language Christian broadcasts and websites are blanketing Iran with the gospel message 24/7 . . . . This kind of hearts-and-minds campaign is having significant results, notably among Iran's huge population of young adults unhappy with the current regime. According to Compass Direct News, house churches are growing rapidly. (Editorial, "Talk to Iran," Christianity Today, July 2008)

The expression "house churches," as you probably know, refers to the homes where Christians hold worship services in countries where religion, or often specifically Christianity, is suppressed. The spread of such churches in China is well known and accounts for the wildly differing 'statistics' on the number of Chinese Christians -- ranging from 30 million to 130 million, if I recall -- for nobody is keeping precise records. The lack of accurate official records in China had its obvious reasons in the past, but China is becoming more tolerant toward religious beliefs, so we might be seeing more accurate numbers there in the near future.

Iran, however, as with the Muslim world more generally, is a different story. One continues to hear of the 'growth' of house churches in Muslim countries, e.g., among the Berber people in Algeria's Kabylie region, who have reacted against the extreme Islamists and their jihadist violence, which has convinced them that "Christianity is life, Islam is death." But this Berber report dates from about 2000, and I've heard little since then other than imprecise reports about continued 'growth' and more recent reports in mainstream media about former Muslims being arrested for having converted to Christianity.

Something is going on in these areas, but I have no idea how to evaluate the reports. Muslim governments have an interest in suppressing not only house churches but also any reports of significant growth, and local Christians have an interest in keeping a low profile, so one might expect the true rates of growth to be higher than reported . . . except that mission reports back in the 'Christian' lands have an interest in citing higher rates to justify continued support for missions.

In one of my classes recently, I had an Iranian student. This person was a secular Muslim, so I asked about Iranian Muslims converting to Christianity. The student knew about this but like me also had no idea of the numbers.

I did find this article by Golnaz Esfandiari, "A Look At Iran's Christian Minority" (Payvand's Iran News . . .), dating from late 2004, and Esfandiari quotes an Iranian Protestant, Issa Dibaj on the number of Muslims in Iran who have become Christians:

Issa Dibaj is the son of reverend Hassan Dibaj, a Christian convert who was jailed and later found murdered in 1994. Issa Dibaj left Iran five years ago and now lives in the U.K.

"There is another Christian minority that people know little about, these are Iranians who are born as Muslims and then later become Christians," Dibaj said. "Their number is growing day by day. [There] may be around 100,000 [of them], but no one really knows the exact number."

The number 100,000 sounds impressive and would signify rather impressive growth . . . until one recalls that Iran has a population of about 70 million. But that was in 2004. What about today? Serendipitously, I found an article in Friday's edition of the San Francisco Chronicle on the topic of secret Iranian Christians:

Although there are no statistics on how many Iranians have converted to Christianity in recent years, officials at such Christian television stations as SAT-7-PARS say that in the past two years they have received a flood of e-mails and thousands of telephone calls from Iranians. With the advent of satellite television, they say, Christianity is on the rise, with some Iranians even undergoing clandestine conversions at Assyrian churches, said David Harder, communications manager at SAT-7-PARS' Cyprus headquarters. (Anuj Chopra, "Iranian Christians forced to worship in secret," San Francisco Chronicle, June 27, 2008)

Intriguing details, but "no statistics" . . . so where does one find dependable numbers on such things?

Anybody know?