“What the…?” Jon asked himself; then the phone rang.
“This is Captain Rhinehart at Harvard Security, Professor Weber,” the voice on the line said. “I should warn you that the Muslim Student Association on campus was granted a demonstration permit, and we just learned that you may be the subject.”
“They’re already here. Any idea why they’re after me?”
“Haven’t the foggiest. We’re sending our men over now. I suggest you lock your office door immediately.”
“Right! Thanks.”
Outside the window, the mighty mantra continued, as each leaf fluttering on the ivy-covered walls seemed to waft the message in Jon’s direction. Now he saw some of the placards sprouting above the crowd: PROF. WEBER WILL PAY 9/11 IS ON ITS WAY! WEBER IS THE CANCER ISLAM IS THE ANSWER! WEBER’S A PROFESSOR? WE NEED HIS SUCCESSOR!
Again the phone rang.
“Dr. Weber? It’s George Gabriel of the Boston Globe.”
“Hey, George. I’ve been meaning to call and thank you for doing that nice piece on our ICO conference. But just now we’ve got a big demonstration over here-”
“I’ll bet! We just got an AP dispatch from Tehran that the grand ayatollah of Iran is convening a council of Shiite clergy to determine if charges of blasphemy should be lodged against you.”
“What?”
“It’s the new Arabic translation of your Jesus of Nazareth bestseller. It seems they’re going to urge the faithful to buy up copies at all the bookstores and burn them. Hey, at least that should help sales!”
“But in Iran they speak Farsi, not Arabic,” Jon replied, ignoring the levity. “So why would-?”
“Apparently the offending passages were translated into Farsi, and they pounced on them.”
“But what offending passages, for goodness’ sake?”
“Don’t know. The only item mentioned in the dispatch was… let’s see, here it is. ‘The Iranian clergy feel that the author treated the Prophet Muhammad with great disrespect, if not outright sacrilege.’”
“Impossible!” Jon almost shouted into the phone. “Most of my book covers the first century, not the seventh! I mention Muhammad only in the final chapter, which does a quick summary of Christianity since Christ.”
“Yeah, but you know how sensitive Muslims are. Remember the Danish cartoon business or the pope’s comments in Germany?”
“But I can’t think of anything in the book that would be offensive. Anyway, I gotta go; someone’s at the door. I’ll get back to you.”
The knocking persisted as a voice resonated through the wood of the door. “Harvard Security-Captain Rhinehart here, Professor Weber. I have the president of the Muslim Student Association with me, and he’d like to speak with you.”
Jon opened the door to find Captain Rhinehart standing with a tall, bronzed figure dressed in a galabia and a maroon fez. A small crowd of campus police and curious students filled the hallway behind them. The student introduced himself-in excellent English-as Abdoul Housani, an Egyptian graduate student in international studies. Jon invited him into his office, and Rhinehart followed without waiting for an invitation.
“Have a seat, gentlemen,” Jon offered.
“I prefer to stand, Professor Weber,” Housani said.
“As you wish. Perhaps you’d be kind enough to explain why this demonstration is taking place?”
“Yes, of course. You are on record as insulting the Prophet Muhammad-may his name be blessed.”
“Why in the world would you ever think that?”
Housani opened the book he was carrying- Isa al-Nazrani, the Arabic edition of Jon’s book-and turned to a bookmark he had inserted at page 490. Pointing to the last line of the text, he said, “Here, sir, you have grievously offended all of Islam by what you wrote about the Prophet-may his name be blessed. I shall read your own words back to you as I translate.”
“Please do.”
“On this page, you deal with the great expansion of Islam, and the last line reads, ‘Undoubtedly, Muhammad introduced the greatest evil Christianity ever faced.’ Now that is an outrageous-”
“I never wrote that!” Jon exclaimed as he rose, stood next to Housani, and peered at the page. His Arabic wasn’t exactly conversational, but he had a reading knowledge of the language. Slowly, he read the offending line aloud: “La yujad shakk, qaddama nabi Muhammad al-radi al-’athim allathi wajahat al-masihiyah.”
Jon stopped reading and returned to his desk, fighting the impulse to clench his fists. “Unbelievable!” he almost whispered. “That’s exactly what it says!” Then he looked up and said, “You translate well, Mr. Housani.”
The swarthy face of his guest warped into a grim smile of triumph. Captain Rhinehart’s brow corrugated into a facial question mark as he looked on rather helplessly.
“But that’s not what I wrote!” Jon fairly bellowed. “It should be tahaddi, not radi – challenge, not evil.” He went to one of the bookcases insulating the four walls of his office and pulled off a copy of the American edition of Jesus of Nazareth. Quickly thumbing his way to the last chapter, he swooped down to the final line and held the book out for the student. “Now, Mr. Housani, please read what I actually wrote.”
Glowering with suspicion, the student read aloud, “‘Undoubtedly, Muhammad introduced the greatest… challenge… Christianity ever faced.’”
“ Challenge, Mr. Housani. Challenge, not evil!”
The Arab student seemed perplexed and was mute for several seconds. Finally he stammered, “I… I don’t understand…”
“It’s really quite simple. Either this was a wretched typographical error, or it’s a translation error. Believe me, I’m going to find out which.”
Slowly, Housani nodded, while Captain Rhinehart stopped wringing his hands and smiled.
Jon didn’t want to overdo the injured innocence bit, but he did have a few questions he wanted answered before this student left his office. “Might I ask, Mr. Housani, why you and the Muslim Student Association didn’t check the original English version of my book first before staging this demonstration? I can’t imagine it would have been difficult to find a copy. I think the Harvard Coop keeps about fifteen in stock at all times.”
“I… we… find Arabic easier reading than English.”
Jon nodded. “Okay, understandable. But something strange seems to be going on here. How in the world did you and your demonstrators even learn about all this? The publication date for the Arabic edition isn’t until a week from now.”
Housani was silent for some moments. Then he answered, “We have a contact in Cairo who mailed us a copy air express in order to help us… stay on top of things as much as we can.”
“As well you should,” Jon replied, now smiling. “I trust you’ll explain all this to the Muslim Student Association?”
“Yes. I’ll do that, Professor Weber. But please let us know how that terrible error got into the Arabic translation.”
“Of course. In fact, the moment you leave this office, I’ll be phoning my publisher in Cairo to stop the presses-literally-and make that correction. Then I’ll instruct him to recall as many of the faulty first editions as possible.”
“Thank you, Professor Weber. And… I apologize if any of our people went overboard during the demonstration.”
“Accepted. Thank you. By the way, how come you have such a perfect command of English-even our colloquial expressions-and hardly any accent?”
Housani smiled. “Well, as a boy growing up in Bahrain, I listened to Voice of America as much as I could, and I tried to imitate American English.”
“VOA? Well done, sir. Your association certainly seems to have picked a worthy leader.”
They shook hands. The moment Housani and Rhinehart left, Jon reached for the phone. Never mind that it was nearing midnight Cairo time. If his publisher didn’t roust himself out of bed and act quickly, much of the Islamic world might erupt into rioting that could make the demonstration in Harvard Yard look like a party in the park.
