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Soundtrack: famous broadcast by
Gordon Sinclair "The Americans" June 5, 1973
What Would Jesus Do About Bin Laden?
Not to mention, Buddha, Moses and Machiavelli
NEWSWEEK WEB EXCLUSIVE
Dec. 22, 2001 — I’m not a religious man, but with Christmas upon us and
the capture of Osama bin Laden increasingly imminent, I started hearing
that old phrase “What would Jesus do?” rattling around in my head.
Indeed, President Bush often talks about how, when confronted with
difficult decisions, he asks himself, “What would Jesus do?” So it struck
me: What would Jesus do if American troops catch Osama bin Laden?
And the answer is: Forgive him. No, seriously. I checked with priests,
ministers, deacons and other assorted leaders of the Roman Catholic
Church. As long as Osama repents what he has done, he gets a free pass to
Heaven.
“If he has true repentance, Jesus will forgive him,” said Dana Corsello of
St. James’s Episcopal Church in Richmond, Va.
Of course, if bin Laden does not repent—and given his performance in that
videotape last week, repentance does not appear to be at the top of his
agenda—Jesus would have no problem casting him into “everlasting fire,”
according to Matthew 25:41.
“But he can still save himself by repenting—and he can do it at any time,”
Corsello added.
Now, I don’t know about you, but there was something unsettling about this
particular “What would Jesus do?” scenario. After all, a person shouldn’t
be allowed to massacre 3,000 people in a single day of terror and then get
a pass to Heaven if he says “I’m sorry about that.”
So, I started wondering how other deities would handle the Osama question:
WHAT WOULD MOSES DO?
Of course, I am speaking of the principle lawgiver of the Jewish faith,
not Robert Moses, who once wielded dictatorial power over New York City’s
infrastructure (besides, we all know what that Moses would do: he’d route
a highway through Kabul’s minority neighborhoods).
But the real Moses—if he were president—would push for the death penalty,
said Rabbi Marc Schneier of The Hampton Synagogue in Westhampton Beach,
N.Y. “He might ask Osama to confess or atone, but the act of repentance in
no way exonerates him from human punishment,” Schneier said. “Judaism is
clear on this: if he is guilty, he must be killed.”
WHAT WOULD MOHAMMED DO?
As in the Jewish tradition, murderers are condemned to death under Islamic
law.
“If it is deliberate murder and the victims’ families do not forgive the
murderer, then the murderer must be killed,” said Imam Omar Abu-Namous of
the Islamic Center of New York. “The traditional method, going back to the
days of the prophet, is to be beheaded with a sword.”
I considered that a nice touch. But then Abu-Namous told me about a
loophole. If the families forgive the murderer, he will be off the hook as
long as he pays what is called diya, or blood money, to the victims’
families.
The amount, Abu-Nambos said, “depends on the circumstances.” When pressed,
he refused to speculate on how much diya bin Laden would have to come up
with. “It is more than it would have been many years ago,” he said,
suggesting that inflation is a factor in determining how easy it will be
for bin Laden to buy repentance.
WHAT WOULD BUDDHA DO?
If Siddhartha Gautama—a.k.a. the Buddha—were our president, Osama would be
sent to the nearest library for re-education, said Franz Metcalf, a
Buddhist scholar and author of “What Would Buddha Do: 101 Answers to
Life’s Daily Dilemmas.”
“The Amitayur Dhyana Sutra, a Buddhist scripture, says that compassion
must be the guiding force in the Buddhist mind,” Metcalf said. “So capital
punishment is definitely out. Buddha would lock up this guy and give him a
chance to read some good books, like the Dhammapada, which is a short
overview of how we should live.”
Those of us who want to open a can of whoop-ass all over Osama bin Laden
will find the Buddhist solution less than satisfying. After all, Buddhism
doesn’t even believe that we are individuals.
“There are, in essence, no people, only action,” Metcalf said. “So there
is no Osama bin Laden, only the actions of Osama bin Laden. And you can’t
punish actions; they’re already done. We are all redeemable if we develop
our Buddha mind. We all have it. You just have to live compassionately and
wisely.”
I suggested to Metcalf that a life of compassion and wisdom is tough,
especially for a guy like bin Laden.
“You’re right,” he said. “But we all have many lifetimes to work it out.”
WHAT WOULD MACHIAVELLI DO?
It’s an absurd question because Niccolo Machiavelli, the great
15th-century political theorist, would never be president, preferring his
behind-the-scenes, Karl Rove-type role. But if Machiavelli were pulling
President Bush’s strings, he’d advise a swift execution, said Stanley
Bing, author of “What Would Machiavelli Do,” a primer on how to get
through life through cunning and duplicity.
“It would be done efficiently, without emotion and without sentiment,”
Bing said. “He was interested only in maintaining the power of the
state—and bin Laden represents a danger to that power. Machiavelli’s work
is filled with rationales for killing enemies.”
Of course, in these days of suicide bombers, that could create even more
enemies. Naturally, Machiavelli offers advice on that, too, Bing said.
“Think about the Marshall Plan,” Bing said. “That was essentially
Machiavellian. We were trying to buy the affection of people in countries
that we had conquered. Being ‘Machiavellian’ doesn’t necessarily mean
being negative. It’s Machiavellian to buy someone you don’t like a
Christmas present if you think it will get that person to like you.”
WHAT WOULD A GENIUS DO?
Unsatisfied with Jesus, I called a genius instead, someone with an IQ in
the 140s, but was just as unimpressed. “We have to give Osama bin Laden a
fair trial,” said Cookie Bakke, an actual genius and member of Mensa.
“We must avoid the quick emotional response and remember that we have a
historical responsibility to absolute fairness,” she said. “There are
those who want to chain him to a pole at Ground Zero and let people cut
him up for souvenirs, but we really have to avoid that. The whole world is
watching.”
That’s fine, but what’s with that last name, Cookie?
“OK, so that’s the one stupid thing I did in my life, marry a man named
Bakke when my name is Cookie. Everyone mispronounces it so they think I’m
named ‘Cookie Bake’.”
WHAT WOULD THE FRENCH DO?
I called the French Embassy in Washington and was told that a Mr. Delattre
would get back to me, but he never did. But the French silence speaks, how
you say, volumes. We know what they’d do: Refuse to extradite bin Laden to
stand trial in the United States and name him an honorary citizen of Lyon.
WHAT WOULD A RADICAL LAWYER DO?
I called radical lawyer Ron Kuby—former partner of the late William
Kunstler—and expected him to say that he’d want to defend bin Laden, just
as he has defended other unpopular criminals.
“No, that’s not for me,” Kuby said. “See, I’m also a Communist, so I have
hated these right-wing religious homophobic fundamentalist patriarchs well
before it became fashionable here. I’m glad to see the rest of the country
is appalled by such faith-based initiatives as September 11.”
So, having heard all the rhetoric from religious leaders, geniuses,
lawyers and even the French, I still wasn’t sure what should be done if we
ever capture bin Laden. So I went back to Jesus.
“What should we do with bin Laden?” asked Jesus Ayala of Brooklyn when I
approached him the other day. “We should kill him and cut his b—ls off.
Not necessarily in that order.”
Now that’s a Jesus most of us can live with.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gersh Kuntzman is also a columnist for The New York Post.
His website is at http://www.gersh.tv
