He didn't have to choose -- he should have opened up two fronts.
Posted by: Hip Gnosis | 19 Sep 2006 14:34:05
Why open two fronts? Hitchens is free to say or write what he thinks. I don't think that is a privilege he'd enjoy, say,in Iran or Saudi Arabia. He criticised the messenger as much as the message though the quotation that caused the trouble is an opinion that he would probably endorse if it came from, say, John Lloyd who wrote something similar in the Guardian some weeks ago (take a look if you can drag yourself away from the Times). Kamran Nazeer in the latest edition of Prospect also writes that in Pakistan there is "broad support...for those fighting in Kashmir, as there was for those pursuing the Islamist cause in Afghanistan...They are struggles for freedom and for the spread of Islam". Hitchens just saw a ridiculously easy opportunity to snipe at another man with a big mouth in a frock. Now that Hitchens'libertarian credentials are reconfirmed we may all rest easy in our beds, safe in the knowledge that Tom Paine's principles are safe with him. Maybe it would have been more honest of Hitchens to have given us the benefit of his opinion about the offending quotation and the reaction to it.
Posted by: Michael | 19 Sep 2006 14:57:34
When he says
"Ratzinger accepts as true the equally preposterous legend that St. Paul was commanded to evangelise for Christ during the night"
I suspect Mr Hitchens is refering to Acts 16.9
"And a vision was shewed to Paul in the night, which was a man of Macedonia standing and beseeching him, and saying: Pass over into Macedonia, and help us".
The whole of the Acts (and the Pauline letters) should be read before entering into judgement on the Pope or indeed Mr Hitchens or even St Paul.
The dream is reported (true or not) but there is nothing intrinsically preposterous about what is reported.
The truth is more complicated, and a bit more glorious than Mr Hitchens implies.
Posted by: Chris Gillibrand | 27 Nov 2006 20:22:07