Freedom of Speech: A Core Islamic Value!

Those of us, who have seen the Message movie, about the life of the Holy Prophet Muhammad and most of the Muslims have, would recall a scene, when the companions of the Prophet are saying the creed of Islam, in the courtyard of Kaaba, “There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is the prophet of God,” and the non-Muslim Meccans start throwing stones at them and start beating them.

This physical struggle is going on as the main character of the movie, who is uncle of the prophet Muhammad, Hamza, who is not a Muslim yet, enters the courtyard of Kaaba and says tauntingly to Abu Jahal, one of the main leaders of the Meccans, “He is the bravest man in the desert, when he meets unarmed men!”  Abu Jahal retorts, “Muhammad is a liar,” to which Hamza responds, “Where is the lie and where is the truth, when it has not been spoken yet.  You do not let him speak.”

We find in the early history of Islam and all of the Holy Prophet Muhammad’s life that he was a great champion of free speech.  How else would he propagate his religion, in Arabia?

The religion started with one man and everyone else was on the other side of the river, in a manner of speaking.

The famous British apologist for the Holy Prophet Muhammad, Thomas Carlyle wrote in his book, On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and The Heroic in History:

Much has been said of Mahomet’s propagating his Religion by the sword. It is no doubt far nobler what we have to boast of the Christian Religion, that it propagated itself peaceably in the way of preaching and conviction.  Yet withal, if we take this for an argument of the truth or falsehood of a religion, there is a radical mistake in it. The sword indeed: but where will you get your sword! Every new opinion, at its starting, is precisely in a minority of one. In one man’s head alone, there it dwells as yet.  One man alone of the whole world believes it; there is one man against all men. That  he take a sword, and try to propagate with that, will do little for him. You must first get your sword! On the whole, a thing will propagate itself as it can.

There are at least five places, where the Holy Quran claims its uniqueness and puts out a challenge to non-believers to produce its equal:

And if you are in doubt as to what We have sent down to Our servant, then produce a Chapter like it, and call upon your helpers beside Allah, if you are truthful.  (Al Quran 2:24)

Do they say, ‘He has forged it?’ Say, ‘Bring then a Surah like unto it, and call for help on all you can besides Allah, if you are truthful.’  (Al Quran 10:39)

Do they say, ‘He has forged it?’ Say, ‘Then bring ten Chapters like it, forged, and call on whom you can beside Allah, if you are truthful.’  (Al Quran 11:14)

Say, ‘If mankind and the Jinn gathered together to produce the like of this Qur’an, they could not produce the like thereof, even though they should help one another.’  (Al Quran 17:89)

Do they say, ‘He has fabricated it?’ Nay, but they would not believe.  Let them, then, bring forth an announcement like this, if they speak the truth!  (Al Quran 52:34-35)

This challenge has never been met in fourteen hundred years, but, there is another aspect to this challenge.  This enshrines the freedom of speech of every non-believer in the eyes of everyone who believes in the Holy Quran to be the literal word of God.

If this is not freedom of speech, I do not know what is!  Any man has a God given right to produce the equal of ‘word of God,’ even though Allah says that no one can succeed at this.