Rushdie Haunted by his unholy Ghosts — Page 7
Rushdie: Haunted By His Unholy Ghosts 7 done well to heed the advice of Hadhrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad(as), the Promised Messiah and Mahdi, who wrote in one of his poems: Incline not, O brother ! to the wealth of this wretched world. Deadly poison is every drop that seems like honey to you. It was in fact the pen of Salman Rushdie that turned out to be the one with the deadliest poison of all when he wrote The Satanic Verses. How did this all come about ? What made him do the impossible and think the unthinkable? Was there more to it than just the monetary guerdon ? Was it apolitical or was it to do with religion ? Or was it a conspiratory association of all these put together by the enemies of Islam ? Was it then presented to Salman Rushdie as a full package, with advance royalties and with strings attached, and was he then told to go ahead and ‘do your damndest’ ? He must have felt like a child given the opportunity to run riot in a chocolate factory. He could have hardly believed his greedy eyes. But what the facts bear out is that he came out of it like an animal, totally covered in filth and reeking of greed, hypocrisy, heresy, blasphemy and apostasy ! T H E SH ADOWS BE H I N D RUSH DI E Rushdie must have known the consequences. Surely, he could not have been that naive - or were the powers and forces behind him too great to resist and too powerful to desist. Or, to coin a dra- matic phrase in true Mafiosi style, was he made an offer he could not refuse ?