by Raymond Ibrahim<\/p>\n
National Review Online<\/i><\/p>\n
T<\/span>hough he is little known in the West, Coptic priest\u00a0Zakaria Botros<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 named Islam\u2019s \u201cPublic Enemy #1\u201d by the Arabic newspaper,\u00a0al-Insan al-Jadid<\/i>\u2014 has been making waves in the Islamic world. Along with fellow missionaries \u2014 mostly Muslim converts \u2014 he appears frequently on the Arabic channel\u00a0al-Hayat\u00a0<\/i>(i.e., \u201cLife TV\u201d). There, he addresses controversial topics of theological significance \u2014 free from the censorship imposed by Islamic authorities or self-imposed through fear of the zealous mobs who fulminated against the infamous cartoons of Mohammed. Botros\u2019s excurses on little-known but embarrassing aspects of Islamic law and tradition have become a thorn in the side of Islamic leaders throughout the Middle East.<\/p>\n Botros is an unusual figure on screen: robed, with a huge cross around his neck, he sits with both the Koran and the Bible in easy reach. Egypt\u2019s Copts \u2014 members of one of the oldest Christian communities in the Middle East \u2014 have in many respects come to personify the demeaning Islamic institution of \u201cdhimmitude\u201d (which demands submissiveness from non-Muslims, in accordance with Koran 9:29). But the fiery Botros does not submit, and minces no words. He has famously made of Islam \u201cten demands<\/a>,\u201d whose radical nature he uses to highlight Islam\u2019s own radical demands on non-Muslims.<\/p>\n The result? Mass conversions to Christianity \u2014 if clandestine ones. The very public conversion of high-profile Italian journalist Magdi Allam \u2014 who was baptized by Pope Benedict in Rome on Saturday \u2014 is only the tip of the iceberg. Indeed, Islamic cleric Ahmad al-Qatani stated on\u00a0al-Jazeera<\/i>\u00a0TV a while back that some six million Muslims convert to Christianity annually, many\u00a0<\/b>of them persuaded by Botros\u2019s public ministry. More recently,\u00a0al-Jazeera<\/i>noted Life TV\u2019s \u201cunprecedented evangelical raid\u201d on the Muslim world. Several factors account for the Botros phenomenon.<\/p>\n First, the new media \u2014 particularly satellite TV and the Internet (the main conduits for Life TV) \u2014 have made it possible for questions about Islam to be made public without fear of reprisal. It is unprecedented to hear Muslims from around the Islamic world \u2014 even from Saudi Arabia, where imported Bibles are confiscated and burned \u2014 call into the show to argue with Botros and his colleagues, and sometimes, to accept Christ.<\/p>\n Secondly, Botros\u2019s broadcasts are in Arabic \u2014 the language of some 200 million people, most of them Muslim. While several Western writers have published persuasive critiques of Islam, their arguments go largely unnoticed in the Islamic world. Botros\u2019s mastery of classical Arabic not only allows him to reach a broader audience, it enables him to delve deeply into the voluminous Arabic literature \u2014 much of it untapped by Western writers who rely on translations \u2014 and so report to the average Muslim on the discrepancies and affronts to moral common sense found within this vast corpus.<\/p>\n A<\/span>\u00a0third reason for Botros\u2019s success is that his polemical technique has proven\u00a0<\/b>irrefutable. Each of his episodes has a theme \u2014 from the pressing to the esoteric \u2014 often expressed as a question (e.g., \u201cIs jihad an obligation for all Muslims?\u201d; \u201cAre women inferior to men in Islam?\u201d; \u201cDid Mohammed say that adulterous female monkeys should be stoned?\u201d \u201cIs drinking the urine of prophets salutary according to sharia?\u201d). To answer the question, Botros meticulously quotes \u2014 always careful to give sources and reference numbers \u2014 from authoritative Islamic texts on the subject, starting from the Koran; then from the canonical sayings of the prophet \u2014 the\u00a0Hadith<\/i>; and finally from the words of prominent Muslim theologians past and present \u2014 the illustriousulema<\/i>.<\/p>\n Typically, Botros\u2019s presentation of the Islamic material is sufficiently detailed that the controversial topic is shown to be an airtight aspect of Islam. Yet, however convincing his proofs, Botros does not flatly conclude that, say, universal jihad or female inferiority are basic tenets of Islam. He treats the question as still open \u2014 and humbly invites the\u00a0ulema<\/i>, the revered articulators of sharia law, to respond and show the error in his methodology. He does demand, however, that their response be based on \u201cal-dalil we al-burhan<\/i>,\u201d \u2014 \u201cevidence and proof,\u201d one of his frequent refrains \u2014 not shout-downs or sophistry.<\/p>\n More often than not, the response from the\u00a0ulema<\/i>\u00a0is deafening silence \u2014 which has only made Botros and Life TV more enticing to Muslim viewers. The\u00a0ulema<\/i>\u00a0who\u00a0have<\/i>\u00a0publicly addressed Botros\u2019s conclusions often find themselves forced to agree with him \u2014 which has led to some amusing (and embarrassing) moments on live Arabic TV.<\/p>\n Botros spent three years bringing to broad public attention a scandalous \u2014 and authentic \u2014 hadith stating that women should \u201cbreastfeed\u201d strange men with whom they must spend any amount of time. A leading hadith scholar, Abd al-Muhdi, was confronted with this issue on the live talk show of popular Arabic host Hala Sirhan. Opting to be truthful, al-Muhdi confirmed that going through the motions of breastfeeding adult males is, according to sharia, a legitimate way of making married women \u201cforbidden\u201d to the men with whom they are forced into contact \u2014 the logic being that, by being \u201cbreastfed,\u201d the men become like \u201csons\u201d to the women and therefore can no longer have sexual designs on them.<\/p>\n To make matters worse, Ezzat Atiyya, head of the Hadith department at al-Azhar University \u2014 Sunni Islam\u2019s most authoritative institution \u2014 went so far as to issue a fatwa legitimatizing \u201cRida\u2019 al-Kibir<\/i>\u201d (sharia\u2019s term for \u201cbreastfeeding the adult\u201d), which prompted such outrage in the Islamic world that it was subsequently\u00a0recanted<\/a>.<\/p>\n Botros played the key role in exposing this obscure and embarrassing issue and forcing the\u00a0ulema<\/i>\u00a0to respond. Another guest on Hala Sirhan\u2019s show, Abd al-Fatah, slyly indicated that the entire controversy was instigated by Botros: \u201cI know you all [fellow panelists] watch\u00a0that<\/i>\u00a0channel and\u00a0that<\/i>\u00a0priest and that none of\u00a0you<\/i>\u00a0[pointing at Abd al-Muhdi] can ever respond to him, since he always documents his sources!\u201d<\/p>\n