‘The cheese and worms:The cosmos of a sixteenth century miller’ is a good book providing excellent reading experience, authored by noted historian with profound knowledge on Italian vernacular records,Carlo Ginzburg.The book was translated into English by John and Anne Tedeschi in 1976. The English version is published by Routledge and Kegan (London and Henley).The book depicts and analyses the court trial of a sixteenth century miller from Friuli, who was sentenced to death by Christian inquisitors of the time for allegedly being a heretic.This victim of the notorious religious policing which was well established through inquisition courts in Europe then, Domenico Scandella, who was called Menocchio by his fellow men, was a carrier of ideas which were strange to catholic church.The author explores in the light of inquisition records, various chances by which Menocchio, who was not a learned scholar well versed with philosophical disputes, might have framed his theology.

The cosmogony attributed to Menocchio in the inquisition court records possess no dearth of contradictions and diversity and therefore it is very difficult for one to connect his ideas exclusively to any particular scripture or religious sect. The author is well aware of this fact and is trying to solve the puzzle of the complex mixture of unorganised ideas that came out of Menocchio. Neverthless, some of the arguments formulated by the accused miller explicitly echoes numerous verses of the Qur­an and it is obvious for a reader who is acquinted to the principles of Islam that the scope of parallelism between the two is much larger than the author himself had supposed. Apart from the similarities occuring in context of the issues of Christ’s divinity and crucifixion(which was a cruci­-fiction according to Qur­an), which are the two Ginzburg has rightly pointed out, there are more occassions which could be traced out as instances at which Menocchio sounded very much “Islamic”.Look at some examples:

1) Menocchio’s statements recording strong contempt for the priesthood in christianity are abundant and are portayed in various parts of the book. “What popes!What prelates!What priests!He didn’t believe in these people”(page 14). “According to him blaspheme against the saints was not sinful, but to blaspheme against God was”(page 14). “He did not believe that the Holy spirit governed the church”(page 2). “As for him,he knew God better than they did” and “priests want us under their thumb just to keep us quiet, while they have a good time”(page 2). Now, see from Qur­an: “They(jews and christians) took their rabbis and monks to be their lords besides the true God,and (they also took as thier lord) Messiah, son of Maryam, while they were commanded to worship none but God” (9:Tauba:34). Also,
“Verily,there are many of the rabbis and monks who devour the wealth of mankind in falsehood and hinder(them) from the way of God”(9:Tauba:34).

2) Regarding the holiness of the holy scripture,Menocchio opined: “I believe that sacred scripture was given by God,but was after ward added to by man”, “As for the things in the Gospels,I believe that parts of them are true and parts were made up by the Evangelists out of thier heads, as we see in the passeges that one tells in one way and one in another way” and “Holy scripture has been invented to decieve man”(all from page 11).Here also, coincidence with Qur­an is evident:
“O people of the Scripture(jews and christians), why do you mix truth with falsehood and conceal the truth while you know?”(3: Aal­ Imran:71). “Had it (the book) been from other than God,they would surely have found there in much contradictions”(4:Nisa:82). “Then woe to those who write the Book with thier own hands and then say , “This is from God”, to purchase with it a little price! Woe to them for what their hands have written and woe to them for that they earn thereby”(2:Baqarah:79).

3) Menocchio denied original sin and opposed the notion of christ being crucified for others’ sins. He said: “If a person had sinned, it is he who must do penence”(page 112).Qur’an strongly upholds these ideas: “No person earns any (sin) except against himself only.and no bearer of burdens shall bear the burden of another.” (6:An­’aam:164). “No burdened person (with sins) shall bear the birden (sins) of another,And man can have nothing but what he does (good or bad).” (53:Najm:38,39). Also, it is reported in Sahih Bukhari that prophet Muhammed said that each and every child is sinless and innocent at the time of birth.

In fact, Muslim scholars have always argued that a careful reading of the Bible would show how Christianity is far removed from the teachings of the semitic prophets it claims to inherit. Curiously enough, Menocchio had stated before the tribunal during his second trial that “fantasies that had come into my head because I had read the Bible and because I have a keen head”(page 103), even though the author has not paid much attention to the possibility of a research around this point. For getting started,have a glance at some extracts from the Bible which undoubtedly throw light on Menocchhio’s understanding that the ‘son of God’ metaphor in the New Testament did not imply any unique divinity of Jesus as the same metaphor has been used for numerous persons in the Bible:
“Adam was the son of God”(Luke 3:38).
“Israel is my son” (Exodus 4:22).
“Thou (David) art my son, this day have I begotten thee”(Psalms 2:7).
“But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God” (John 1:12).
“Blessed are the peace makers:for they shall be called the children of God” (Mathew 5:9):

And as far as Menacchio’s refusal to place Christ at par with God is concerned,Christ himself has declared that “my father is greater than I”(John 14:28).

What about Menocchio’s confusions with original sin and the concept of passion of Christ as a remedy?Had Bible any way tempted him to think that way?See what the scripture says:
“The father shall not be put to death for the Children,neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers. Every man shall be put to death for his own sin”(Dueteronomy 24:16).
“In those days,they shall say no more,fathers have eaten sore grape and the children’s teeth are set on edge.But every one shall die for his own iniquity…..Every man that eateth the sore grape;his teeth shall be set on edge”(Jeramiah 31:29,30).

Again come back to Menocchio’s cosmos: “Neither relics nor images should be venerated …we should not adore or rever the relics,we should not adore their images,but God alonen who created heaven and earth”(page 12). Also, “Don’t you see that Abraham cast down all idols and images and adored only one God?” (in the same page).Are thes ideas alien to Bible?The answer certainly is “not at all” and it is explicit that Menacchio himself had cited the biblical character of Abraham in defense.Further more,old testament declares in plain words, “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in the heaaven above or that is in the Earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth”( Exodus 20:4).

The book thus provides hints for a research on the influence Islam might have had on some Christian minds of medieval Europe. It allows Christian readers to cross-check the tenets of their faith with the real teachings of the Bible, as well as to read the noble Qur’an to find out whether the holy book of Muslims can help them to clarify some of their doubts on the metamorphosis of Christianity.

Abdul Kahhaar