Qur’an.mp3

We’ve been told that the iPod’s earphones may damage our hearing and distract us from traffic, but now a scholar from the al-Azhar mosque in Cairo has warned that listening to recordings of the Qur’an is dangerous for the soul.

Sheik Gamal Qutb has warned that if someone listens to the Qur’an in public (presumably meaning on headphones while out in public, as I’d imagine public broadcasts of the Qur’an were something different) they are inevitably distracted, and so disrepect it. A theologian from al-Azhar, however, Ahmed as-Sayeh, countered that

“Listening to Quran in public places does not imply any carelessness,” he told al-Arabiya. “On the contrary, those who do that honor the Quran to the extent that they need to listen to it everywhere.”

This comes two years after the Saudi government banned imams from reading the Qur’an over the phone for night prayers during Ramadan.

There’s an interesting piece on the matter at ReligionDispatches, that interprets Qutb’s issue in light of Marxist theory and “passive listening”.

Hussein Rashid ‘Marxism Meets Al-Azhar: Can You Listen to the Qur’an on Tape?‘, ReligionDispatches (2/9/09)