The city of Oxford, England is currently embroiled in a controversy. The question: should the muezzin (sort of Muslim equivalent of a Christian sexton) of a local mosque be permitted to broadcast the Adhan (Islamic call to prayer) three times daily over a loudspeaker? The debate has heated up in the United Kingdom itself and abroad. In the minds of some individuals, the public call to prayer is part of Muslims’ freedom of worship. Others – including one Jewish columnist – claim instead that it amounts to an unacceptable imposition on Britain’s majority Christian culture. The matter is now before Oxford’s City Council.
I would probably oppose the Adhan on purely aesthetic grounds. Loud, overpowering human voices bother me. This has nothing to do with Islam per se: as a practising Christian I find street corner evangelists shouting “Repent and be saved†at the top of their lungs equally irritating. The difference is that beyond some one hundred metres the sound of street preachers tends to fade into nothingness, whereas the voice of a muezzin on an amplifier would be heard over a much wider radius, including areas like residential neighbourhoods where Christian preachers generally do not operate.
People on both sides of the issue have compared the muezzin’s call to the chiming of Christian church bells. Though this may be a matter of personal taste, I don’t find church bells particularly intrusive. In fact, in downtown Toronto the bells from the nearby cathedrals often play some rather pretty tunes, in my opinion. Of course over my nearly forty years in Canada I’ve become attuned to the sound of such chimes; perhaps I might regard them as mere noise pollution if I were moving here from a non-Christian majority country.
The argument that the Adhan should not be allowed because Britain is a “Christian†country strikes me as less convincing. True, the UK is a Christian nation in that the bulk of its inhabitants identify at least nominally with Christianity, albeit with different denominations. Britain has a state religion, the Church of England (Anglican). However, freedom of worship is guaranteed by British law, and in this respect Anglicans and Christians in general enjoy no advantage over followers of other faiths. It also seems somewhat ironic that some commentators speak of Muslims “imposing†themselves on Britain when as a former colonial power that nation did not hesitate to foist its customs on the peoples it conquered. (Here I’m not singling out Britain; most other Western European countries, such as my father’s native Italy, have a history of colonialism as well.)
On the other hand, freedom of religion has its limits; it cannot infringe on the rights of others. Courts in the United States, for instance, have on occasion stepped in when Christian Scientists have attempted to deny their children medical care on religious grounds. The situation in Oxford is not quite as dramatic, but it might be argued that if the muezzin’s call is overly loud and disturbs residents’ right to peace and quiet, it should not be permitted. Hopefully the City Council of Oxford, in consultation with the citizens, will make a good decision.
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It’s always tough balancing the rights of one group against another. Since there are alternative ways to notify the faithful which don’t disturb everyone else, I hope Oxford decides to maintain the peace and quiet.
Yes, don’t get me wrong: I have nothing against Islam itself or people’s right to practise it. I just think that it shouldn’t disturb others. I would say the same thing if a Christian preacher decided to spread his message at full blast so that half the town could hear him over a loudspeaker.
I got your meaning, Emilia Liz. I was thinking of how the atheists and secularists of Oxford must feel about this one…
Dear Mac,
I guess regarding secularists and atheists, some of them may not like the message of the adhan, but in a free society we all may read/hear/see things with a message (be it religious, political, etc.) that might bother us. I suppose my main opposition to the adhan was the fact that it will basically be a form of noise pollution, and even people who agree with the message of the adhan might find it too loud.
Like I said, there are alternative ways to summon the faithful… whether it’s pager, cellphone, whatever… There’s no reason for the noise.