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Salman Rushdi's Satanic Verses At aboutislam.netfirms.comWe did not post the book in one part so that you don't download it since if you like what you are reading we think you should support the author of this book by buying it, it is a great book that took years to write, the author deserves the money |
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Mahound sits on the edge of the well and grins. “I’ve been offered a deal.” By Abu Simbel? Khalid shouts. Unthinkable. Refuse . Faithful Bilal admonishes him: Do not lecture the Messenger. Of course, he has refused. Salman the Persian asks: What sort of deal. Mahound smiles again. “At least one of you wants to know.”
“It’s a small matter,” he begins again. “A grain of sand. Abu Simbel asks Allah to grant him one little favour.” Hamza sees the exhaustion in him. As if he had been wrestling with a demon. The water—carrier is shouting: “Nothing! Not a jot!” Hamza shuts him up.
“If our great God could find it in his heart to concede—he used that word, concede -- that three, only three of the three hundred and sixty idols in the house are worthy of worship . . .”
“There is no god but God!” Bilal shouts. And his fellows join in: “Ya Allah!” Mahound looks angry. “Will the faithful hear the Messenger?” They fall silent, scuffing their feet in the dust.
“He asks for Allah’s approval of Lat, Uzza and Manat. In return, he gives his guarantee that we will be tolerated, even officially recognized; as a mark of which, I am to be elected to the council of Jahilia. That’s the offer.”
Salman the Persian says: “It’s a trap. If you go up Coney and come down with such a Message, he’ll ask, how could you make Gibreel provide just the right revelation? He’ll be able to call you a charlatan, a fake.” Mahound shakes his head. “You know, Salman, that I have learned how to listen. This listening is not of the ordinary kind; it’s also a kind of asking. Often, when Gibreel comes, it’s as if he knows what’s in my heart. It feels to me, most times, as if he comes from within my heart: from within my deepest places, from my soul.”
“Or it’s a different trap,” Salman persists. “How long have we been reciting the creed you brought us? There is no god but God. What are we if we abandon it now? This weakens us, renders us absurd. We cease to be dangerous. Nobody will ever take us seriously again.”
Mahound laughs, genuinely amused. “Maybe you haven’t been here long enough,” he says kindly. “Haven’t you noticed? The people do not take us seriously. Never more than fifty in the audience when I speak, and half of those are tourists. Don’t you read the lampoons that Baal pins up all over town?” He recites: