Swearing to God

For the first time in our history (that we know of) Americans have elected a practicing Muslim to the US House of Representatives. Rep. Elect, Keith Ellison, (D-Minnesota) plans to take the oath of office using a copy of the Koran instead of the Bible. As you might imagine, this has raised the ire of the religious right who are convinced that the Bible is the only acceptable publication upon which to place one's right hand while performing the pre-employment ritual designed to ensure that a newly hired public servant doesn't do anything corrupt, illegal, self-serving or in voliation of the Constitution. Perhaps if the current practice was even marginally effective, they'd have a coherent argument, but to them, it goes much deeper than that. We're talking about the Bible, the "Good Book", that venerable guide for the American race, inspired by God (R-Heaven), being supplanted by enemy's actual playbook. It's as if the gentle musings of a certain blue-eyed Nazarene are being replaced with bomb-making instructions.

Just after the election, CNN blowhard Glen Beck had Ellison on his show and asked him to prove he wasn't "working for the enemy", suggesting that if one is Muslim, one is suspect. The other day, a group of Muslim clerics from Arizona was booted off a US Air flight home because they prayed before getting on the plane.

On Wednesday, an article appeared on the American Family Association's web site [read it here] excoriating the very idea of using the Koran instead of the Bible. Dennis Prager, the article's author writes: "...imagine a racist elected to Congress. Would they allow him to choose Hitler's "Mein Kampf," the Nazis' bible, for his oath?" (FYI, Hitler was a Christian although he didn't act like one.) There are plenty of racists in Congress who'd swear on a stack of bibles that they weren't. He also makes the analogy of secular officials using a work of Voltaire as their preferred oath book. Prager doesn't get it.

Taking an oath of office is like making a promise with collateral. It's publicly putting your soul on the line as though the book would deliver a fatal electric shock if you didn't mean it. But that's not so farfetched. To a Christian, the Bible is the most powerful symbol of their faith. It's so powerful, in fact, that it overlaps onto Jews, Mormons and Agnostics alike, who are regularly sworn in using bibles. To a Muslim, the Koran is life blood. How many people do you know that actually memorize the Bible? It's really naive, and quite stupid, to cheapen the Koran by comparing it to Mein Kamph. It's also an apostasy to over a billion Muslims.

Nothing could be more symbolic of a true committment to his oath of office than for Ellison to use his Koran. It would also demonstrate to the world that America is diverse and tolerant of that diversity.