Sura 32: the Prostate

Let's recap. We're blogging the Koran, recording our impressions as we go, which mostly are: Borrrrrinnnnng!!!1!1 Considering all the other things going on in my life, it's hard to keep dragging myself back to this dreck. But I'll keep going, and finish this project, because of some mysterious genetic defect.

We're in past the middle of the Late Mecca period. Mohammed's been preaching for about 8 years, and still hardly has any followers. It's easy to see why. He hasn't said anything noteworthy, he's just another raving street preacher giving the same lame sermon over and over. And over. Chapter 32 is just another version of it:

...this is a true book, bla bla god made everything, knows everything, bla, bla judgment-day's a-comin', bla. Verses 14-16 tell us good people fall down in adoration, (the name of the chapter, 'The Prostration', comes from this, not male bladder dysfunction), they forsake sleep in order to pray, they give money (Betcha never saw that comin, hmmm?). And about that god, alias 'We' and 'Me', here's what he's like:

¹³ If We had so willed, We could certainly have brought every soul its true guidance: but the Word from Me will come true, "I will fill Hell with Jinns and men all together."

The fuck? At least he's upfront about it. What's missing is any reason to a) worship such an asshole, and b) believe anything Mohammed says. Oh, and c) read this book.

WHOA, WHOA, HOLD IT, What's this shit?

²¹ And indeed We will make them taste of the Penalty of this (life) prior to the supreme Penalty, in order that they may (repent and) return.

The “them” we-me-god is talking about is me, and probly you reading this, all of us who don't swallow his judgment day threats. God wants us to suffer. He's not content with torturing us after we die, he wants us to suffer in this world. Says so right here. Am I paranoid to think some of his followers might interpret this to mean:

Allah wants infidels to taste of the Penalty of this (life)
Allah will like it if I make infidels taste of the Penalty of this (life)
For the sake of Allah, I should make infidels taste of the Penalty
I should go shoot some infidels, for the sake of Allah.

Naw, that'd never happen.