Those of you who shop for produce may have noticed over the years that grapes never come from Arab or Muslim countries. The reason for this is fairly simple. The petroleum reserves in those countries are so great that they tend to rise to the surface, which proves infertile to the grape-growing industry. And so it is that among the Arabs, including the Muslim nations, grapes are highly prized. In the old days, grapes were often given as wedding gifts or, in other cases, were used to mark a wedding or a retirement. So the significant fact is that, while the Muslim countries admire the grape-growing countries such as Chile and Argentina, they are unable to grow their own grapes.
This situation has existed since the time of the Prophet Mohammed. When the Koran was written, it noted the absence of grapes from the Arab culture.
On the other hand, the Koran took notice of the fact that virgins existed in unbounded numbers. Some were young and some were middle-aged and some were elderly. But they all had notarized certificates attesting to their virginity.
These two facts about the absence of grapes and the plethora of virgins came into communion with the writing of the Koran. Specifically, the Koran promised that when a martyr approached the gates of Paradise, Allah would welcome him to those lofty heights and promise to reward him with a varying number of virgins. According to the Koran that one might read, there would be offered somewhere between twenty-five and nearly one hundred virgins to each martyr.
But the issue of virgins being allotted to martyrs again became quite sticky a few weeks back. It seems that learned scholars in the Arabic language had concluded that the reward to be offered to martyrs was not virgins but rather grapes. So if a martyr presented himself high in the clouds to Allah with a certificate of martyrdom, he, under this interpretation, would be rewarded with grapes, not with virgins. It seems to me that a person contemplating martyrdom through blowing himself up might be hesitant about doing so. In these days, grapes can be imported from this country or from South America, which makes them much less valuable. But when the Koran was written, they were inaccessible and highly prized to the point that each person was limited as to the number of grapes he could consume.
The author of this essay has a fertile and understanding mind when it comes to the issue of virgins and grapes. Let us suppose that a newly-minted martyr who had blown himself to smithereens in the market at Baghdad then approached Allah. After the welcoming ceremony, the new martyr would strongly hint to Allah that he was ready to get going with his virgins. My guess is that he would say to Allah, “Your Majesty, I am hot to trot.” Like most gods, Allah would be unfamiliar with this Americanism. He would tell the new martyr, “You came here to enjoy eternal life, which I hope we can do as soon as we put all of the millions of pieces of yourself back together.” And then Allah would be obliged to tell the martyr that he was going to spend this eternal life without the comfort of virgins. He would say to him, “Here are your 25 grapes. Congratulations. And be as happy as you can be in your eternal celibacy.”
If the martyr became belligerent with this “hot to trot” business, Allah would be obliged to remind him that the College of Cardinals has existed for 2,000 years, childless and in celibacy. But the martyr would say that he had not come to Paradise in quest of celibacy. He had come to Paradise with the thought that he was going to have a romp with 50 or 70 virgins.
When Allah would explain to the new martyr that this was a misreading of the Koranic verse, the new martyr would then say, “I came here hot to trot, but I wind up being screwed.”
What all of this boils down to is that from time immemorial, Allah must have known that the religious writings of his faith promised virgins to those who became martyrs and proceeded to Paradise on that assumption. From this it must be concluded that Allah might well be a bait-and-switch artist. It might well be that Allah will call to account those scholars who insist that grapes will be the reward of martyrdom. But I am not a Muslim and I do not believe this business about the virgins or Paradise.
On the other hand, the romantic interests in my soul tell me that the mistaken impression in the Koran that has existed for hundreds of years should continue. For all we know, it might be that potential martyrs may even fall in love with one of their imaginary virgins. Perhaps he would provide her with some imagined Chilean grapes.
E. E. CARR
April 29, 2009
Essay 380
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Kevin’s commentary: This is in my top 10 Essays of all time. It’s also the second official recipient of the “Outstanding Title” tag.
For more serious commentary on the subject at hand, you can look here: https://ezrasessays.com/?p=689
That said, this commentary is over; this essay easily stands by itself.