Why I Am Not A Muslim?

I have a confession that should come as no shock to those who know me. I am not a Muslim. – What are you then? I am often asked. Though I have shunned classifications, it is clear that I am a Eunuch.

I do have other identities besides this. On one level I am a Pakistani-American. On another level I [was] a Muslim. As I just stated, on a different level, I am a Eunuch. How can it be that I associate singularly and so fastidiously to the last of these identities over and above the other two?

Traditionally, the individual chosen to be made into a Eunuch would be tied spread-eagle upon a bed. A thin chord would be wrapped around his genitalia. With a sharp knife his organs would be amputated. Generally, both the testicles and the penis were removed, however, certain "honored" victims were allowed to keep their penis. The wound was then cauterized by a hot rod. The castrated male would then be forced to drink gallons upon gallons of water until the pressure in his urethra caused him to puncture a hole in the scarred tissue. That hole would be used for the rest of his life.

Being a Eunuch in today’s world does not require as severe a process of initiation as it used to in previous ages. However, the end result is the same. The knives have been replaced with heavy mortgages, the castration with unending student loans, and the emasculation is taken care of by one’s sharp-tongued girlfriend. Life is spent in the fastidious guarding of a few empty possessions that sit around like a congregation of useless whores. How swiftly I can be pointed at and told: "Your life is so miserable! You Eunuch are truly the abysmal entity of this world!" – Assuming this allegation carries some weight in the eyes of those who are "fully" male or "fully" female, how could it be that I so willingly want to be a Eunuch? Permit me a long winded explanation.

Where there are Eunuchs, where they are exalted; where they are stitched in the quilt of society only there does greatness arrive. On the backs of the castrated the weight of civilizations has been carried for a millenia. If one would go back in time and see what particular effect is shared by all great civilizations of the past, such as the Chinese, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Mamlukes, Ottomans, and Italians one would be led to find only one shared connection betwixt all of these civilizations: Eunuchs.

The word "Eunuch" is from the Greek and means "the keeper of the bedchamber" – an allusion to the Eunuch’s traditional role as guardian of the harem. In Greece, the Eunuchs were high-priests of the goddess of fertility, Cybele. It was these high priests who, by clanging their spears against their shields, hid the birth of Zeus from his cruel father and thus, aided in the coming of the deity that brought Greece its glory. Amongst the Romans, Eunuchs were referred to as Galli and castrated themselves to more closely identify with their goddess and lead the orgiastic Roman feasts. Amongst the Mamlukes and Ottomans, the Eunuch was employed to guard the promiscous treasure-chest of sensuality and culture – the harem – all the while serving as savvy advisers to the kings. Italians put these castrati to another use, to their most celebrated and cultivated structure in society – the opera. Whether it’s a beloved deity, the celebrated performance of orgies, the diamond beauties of a harem, or a life of service with one’s lungs, all in all it seems that the Eunuchs are the retainers of a civilization’s most important treasures.

After I had completed the aforementioned research and found how highly regarded Eunuchs actually were, I told my mother that I wanted to be a Eunuch.

"But you are a Muslim," she said. I was not aware that the two categories were mutually exclusive. "Besides," she added with classic Punjabi closed-mindedness to facts… "there are no Eunuchs in Pakistan, they all went to India." Bass! Khattam-Shud! Full-stop.

My adolescent mind was not quite so easily convinced. Having noted the presence of the castrati amidst the greatest epochs and greatest civilizations of human history, I asked myself a very simple question: in today’s world why should I want to be a Muslim over and above being a Eunuch? Why, indeed! The question led me to an exercise of comparison and contrast. I realized I needed an objective tool by which to gauge one over the other. Again, in my adolescent fancy, I found that barometer in the word with which all forteen year olds are obsessed: greatness.

It was a simple experiment. If Muslims were greater than Eunuchs, then, hell, I’d be Muslim. If not, then I should make a wholehearted embrace of all my castrated brethren in America.

Surely one cannot deny that since the advent of Islam in the 7th century A.D. in a small oasis in Arabia and its rapid expansion all the way across the world, that being a Muslim once allotted a tremendous feeling of greatness to a person. It is undeniable that without the Muslim contribution to science and philosophy the Europeans would have never come in touch with the works of Aristotle, Plato and the Hellenes and thus would have been deprived of their opportunity for intellectual growth and subsequent military superiority. In my research it was also undeniable that Muslims erected one of the most sophisticated legal systems – the Sharia – known to man. Their poetry, their art, their drama, their fastidious open-mindedness and tolerance were all beacons for humanity. All this was true. History had chronicled their greatness honestly. The difficulty posed to me, however, was that this tremendous output of greatness took a few hits and ground to a halt. It has not moved since. It no longer existed. It ossified under the baking sun of time and refused to move. It was 1994 and the tiger of Islamic greatness was nowhere found growling.

The causes of the Muslim demise are plentiful – an intellectual stagnance borne of excess codification of laws, the defeat at the hands of the Mongols, the decreasing piety of the masses (a favored argument of the Orthodox), etc. Nonetheless, in 1994 the causes of Muslim twilight meant very little to me. I was looking for a system of long-lasting greatness. I was looking for an identity that allotted positive feelings to me instead of leaving me languishing in imagining past glories.

As I followed the chronicle of Muslim past, I began to note an increasing amount of losses – defeats - in that romanticized Islam. There was, of course, the aforementioned destruction at the hands of the Mongols (1258), then the beating by the Castillians at Grenada (1492), then followed the watershed loss at Lepanto to the Spanish (1539), then the failed uprising of Panipat against the British (1857), and finally, the final destruction of the Ottomans at the hands of Europe (1924). Yes, my young mind, devoted to thoughts of eternity, immortality and greatness found no grandeur in a group of people who, for at least seven centuries, had only been excelling at losing.

It was at that time that I acceded to becoming a Eunuch. It may not be a flattering thought to think that participation in civilizational grandeur comes at the expense of one’s genitalia. However, if life is short and if only greatness makes it sweet then I rather be a Eunuch instead of being one of the defeated.