I finally got around to reading The Satanic Verses, by Salman Rushdie; that notoriously controversial novel which might actually be banned where I read it. It is pretty clear from the text how Rushdie would incur the wrath of fundamentalist Muslims, culminating in Khomeini’s fatwa. Still, the novel was such a bizarre and fantastical journey across centuries-apart yet-interwoven stories, that most of the time I couldn’t make heads or tails out of what was actually happening, let alone take offence at Rushdie’s supposed effrontery. Although I should also note that my sense of the sacred has been worn to shreds over the last five years, and I think generally we Western-types have grown rather accustomed to the endless and bitter (and trendy?) abuse heaped upon our religious heritage, by our own compatriots. I doubt there’d be much of a reaction if Rushdie had lampooned the life and times of Jesus instead of Mohammed (that is, until Ron Howard got his hands on the movie rights; then it’d all be over.) Rushdie also flooded the story with allusions which flew right over my head, and which, when coupled with the general strangeness of it all, made me feel like such an impotent reader that I’ll probably have to look up the Wikipedia article to see what the book was actually about. I still need to do that for The Machinist (I watched it over a month ago and still find myself vexed... although come to think of it, the two could probably be compared as they both deal with the grotesqueness of human nature and the personal hells we create). Ultimately I do recommend this book, if not for Rushdie’s clarity then for his sweeping scope, his satirical asides, and the psychological portraits of his neurotic lead characters.

In some ways I wonder that my parents allowed me to even read it at such a tender and impressionable age. With all of its stark descriptions and cynicisms, the book must have planted a dark seed in my uncultivated mind all those years ago. I have reaped the reward: awestruck, and wide-eyed doubt.

The Poisonwood Bible, and other books have slowly nudged me toward a sort of open-ended agnosticism, which has in turn served to reinvigorate honest theological curiosity. For me, this mindset has opened whole realms of thought which just weren’t accessible when I was strictly adhering to a rigid system of prescribed beliefs. Doubt undoes religion, but I think it strengthens faith. I’ve found it to be the most potent motivating factor in the search for Truth.

Or maybe I’ve gone off the deep end. God only knows.