Word: clerical
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Khomeini, the world has two master plotters, celebrated controversialists both, with unusually lively imaginations, each of them now in his own embattled hideout while the War of the Words rages on. Yet even Jorge Luis Borges -- or Rushdie -- could scarcely have dreamed up a scene in which a Muhammadan cleric vows to kill Salman Rushdie for a book in which the Prophet condemns an apostate called Salman for "polluting the word of God." Who is the prophet here -- Rushdie, for predicting the confrontation in the first place, or the Ayatullah, for taking it upon himself to be the living embodiment...
...insulting Islam, the Prophet and the holy Koran, and for good measure exonerates any Muslim who manages to perpetrate this deed and promises him the rewards of martyrdom. And not only the author, but anyone else involved in the publication of the book. A day later, another Iranian cleric announces that a bounty has been placed on the author's head: $2.6 million if the avenger is an Iranian, $1 million if he is not. The following day, thanks to the generosity of still another Iranian philanthropist, the reward is doubled. Governments are angered, publishers intimidated, airlines subjected to bomb...
...furor over the Archbishop of Canterbury' s leadership results in a cleric' s shocking suicide. -- U. S. Catholics, condoms and AIDS...
...protecting him and, having made his escape, reduced to the status of a fugitive in rags who fears for his life and does not know where he will be safe. As he descends into the underworld, haunted by undercover agents and herded from truck to shadowy truck, the highest cleric in the land finds himself in touch for the first time with the masses he claims to represent. He also finds himself increasingly, and in every way, in the dark...
Khomeini's relations with Saudi Arabia seem almost beyond repair. Ironically, the break follows a period in which Iran seemed to moderate its religious rivalry with the House of Saud. In a conciliatory move two years ago Khomeini replaced his religious representative in Mecca, a hard-line cleric whom the Saudis loathed. Before the start of this year's hajj, however, Khomeini's hatred had revived. Not only were the Saudis still bankrolling Iraq, they openly supported Kuwait's assistance to Baghdad. Many observers expect Iran to avenge the Mecca deaths by launching terrorist acts on Saudi Arabian soil...