The Roots of All Evil

Millions and millions of people have been victims of ‘holy wars’. Many have perished and many have been displaced and mourn the loss of their loves ones. Millions of women have become subalterns, without voice, as victims of some kind of ‘religious discipline’.The religions, who were supposed to allow peace and harmony in this world, have lost its purpose. For many, religion means suffering. If there is a God, what kind of a omniscient God would allow this to happen ?

It is this reality Salman Rushdie intends to satirize in his compilation of short stories ‘East West’ and specially in the story The Prophet's Hair where Rushdie tells the story of a familyliving in the disputed state of Kashmir valley in India who’s somewhat peaceful family life was destroyed by the supernatural effects of a much revered religious icon which was a strand of the prophet Muhammad's hair encased in a glass vial. The story is a mix of realistic and non-realistic coincidences that may seem excessive, parodic, flippant, and at sometimes horrifying and exhilarating but Rushdie has done a fine job in intelligently directing the reader’s attention to current social issues as religious intolerance, sexual stereotyping, domestic violence, crime, poverty, class disparity, and the erosion of traditional culture. Among those two significant issues stand out. These I like to call the roots of evil in the modern society, money and religion.

In this story, Rushdie indirectly brings our attention to the destruction caused by radical religious fundamentalism. Hashim, a wealthy, self satisfied hypocritical money lender accidently finds the famous relic of Prophet Muhammed which was apparently stolen from its shrine at Hazratbal mosque and “had created an unprecedented hue and cry in the valley”. Hashim, a collector decides to keep it for himself ‘just as an American millionaire would keep stolen art masterpieces’. Under the influence of the relic, he accepts Islam as his faith and begins backpedaling so hard in an attempt to right the wrongs he has committed in his life thus far that he seems to go insane. He becomes an intolerant and violent religious fanatic and starts to look "swollen, distended," as if "he had filled up with some spectral fluid which might at any moment ooze uncontrollably for his every bodily opening". This massive shift ultimately causes his own death as well as that of both his children, and results in his wife being committed to an asylum. In this way, Rushdie exemplifies the corrupting nature of fundamentalist religion.

In my personal opinion, Rushdie not only satirizes the individuals like Hashim who creates destruction around him by embracing fundamentalism but uses it as an analogy for the whole world, where Hashim represents some nations in the history who assumed religious superiority using symbols, books with words of God and authority from a higher religious institutions and enforced their beliefs to native ‘uncivilized barbarians’ and stripped those nations off their wealth and culture. Not only has that he satirized the negative effect of religion on the society itself. The seemingly peaceful family was totally destroyed by introducing extreme religious beliefs. Likewise, the peace in the world, between nations, was destroyed mainly as a result of religious division and one religion trying to prove its superiority over the other. I believe this is much evident by the metaphor Rushdie uses in this last sentence when he mentions about the thief’s wife, who is ‘gazing once more upon the beauties of the valley of Kashmir’. Even though Kashmir is a beautiful valley is has been tormented by a religious war between fundamental Muslims and Hindus for more than two decades.

The next root of evil, as we all know, is Money. Hashim himself is first introduced into the story as a content money-lender who charges a ridiculous 70% interest to his customers, though he justifies himself by saying he’s ‘teaching these people the value of money’ even though his religion did not permit usury. But he does not stay that way, and it is the switch of his allegiance from money to religion that provides the conflict in the story and begins the rising action. His family also is under the spell of money. Hashim and his wife “had successfully sought to inculcate the virtues of thrift, plain dealing, and a healthy independence of spirit" on their two children. But this is main cause that they all perished at the end. Atta, who thought money could do anything gets beaten up by the thieves who he tried to hire to steal the prophet’s hair. Huma was successful hiring the thief Sheikh Sin, who saw "his opportunity of amassing enough wealth at a stroke to leave the valley forever” but they both were killed in the process and Hashim also kills himself for accidentally butchering his own daughter.

By intelligently using all these characters as metaphores, Rushdie has created, what i like to call, a satirical masterpiece that

confronts prevalent issues in our society that many do not wish to confront.