December 1, 2008 | 2:55 pm

What the Koran says about unibrows

Posted by Brad A. Greenberg

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Here’s something light to start your Monday, assuming you start your week at 11 a.m. PST.

“Is it permissible for a man to remove hair from the chest, back, and between the eyebrows?”

IslamOnline.net offers this answer, via Holy Weblog!:

“There is no evidence from the Qur’an or the Sunnah that forbids cutting short the hair from the chest and back; but the removal of hair from these parts may be considered a form of imitating women, something forbidden according to the hadith: ‘May Allah’s curse be inflicted on women imitating men and vice versa.’ As for women, it is permissible for them to remove hair from these parts because it causes them harm.

“As for removing the hair from between the eyebrows, it is lawful, because it is not part of the eyebrows. But as for plucking the eyebrows, it is forbidden and not permissible in Islam, according to the Hadith: ‘May Allah’s curse be inflicted upon women who pluck their eyebrows, and women hired to do this.

Previously in interesting Islamic edicts:

A Saudi cleric says it’s cool to kill infidel operators of cable television;

Mickey Mouse makes another Saudi cleric’s hit-list;

Then there was the breast-feeding fatwa, not to mention to prophet’s pee blessing;

And before that a list of the “World’s Stupidest Fatwas.”

These instructions from clerics must do for Muslim moderates what the unwarranted condemnations of the James Dobsons and Pat Robertsons do for a moderate evangelical Christian like me: drive them bonkers. The more people who don’t represent our values dominate the conversation of what it means to hold our values, the less likely it is that the media will really understand and properly portray our values.

You’re probably wondering now how many times I’m going to say values. Three more: Values, values, values.

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