What Comprises Blasphemy in Islam?

I think it's difficult for Western audiences to comprehend what constitutes blasphemy in Islam. I say that fully aware that I am not completely sure. At the conference I was at on Islam and the Media, I saw several discussions of Islam in the media which caused a massive reaction. Everyone remembers the Danish cartoons, but a recent one that got less coverage (because there were no death threats), was the outrage against the Playstation 3 Game "Little Big Planet."

The controversy about the game is over the game's soundtrack. A Grammy-award winning Islamic musician included Quranic verses in one of the songs. There was such outrage in Britain that they had to recall the game, take the song out and re-release it.

Millions of copies of Little Big Planet have been withdrawn from warehouses after lines from the Koran were found to be included in the accompanying music.

The game, which was due out on Friday, will now be re-programmed without the offending song – a track by Mali-born singer Toumani Diabate that contains two lines from the Islamic holy book.

So what constitutes blasphemy in Islam and why aren't we sensitive to it? What is it about Western society that makes us numb?

Perhaps we're desensitized by the re-re-re-crucifixion of Christ and Christianity in our press, our movies and our television shows. Jesus is essentially a punchline in American society. The seriousness with which Christians regard Christ pales next to the seriousness Muslims hold of Muhammad and the Quran.



Christians have, in this century, responded in a number of ways to Christ-bashing. Usually falling in, or close to two camps.

(1) The "Blow It Off" Camp- where Christians just let it go. Take it as par for the course. Some close to this camp would even say that the depiction of Christ in anyway allows for some public discourse in the situation.

(2) The "Boycott You" Camp- this was seen most obviously during the Last Temptation of Christ (where we saw Jesus copulate with Mary Magdalene). But there were also some boycotts against Disney and Harry Potter as well.