Word: propheteer
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...long surahs, or chapters from the Koran, in a whisper. From time to time, he broke into sobs and moans, babbling incoherently, as if in a trance. Afterward, Bakr was asked to join al-Zarqawi and some of his closest aides in a discussion on the life of the Prophet Muhammad that went on until dawn. It wasn't until morning that al-Zarqawi gave Bakr a message to take back to his field commander. It was an order to launch a suicide-bombing operation...
...seen as a deeply spiritual Muslim whose actions are driven by a desire to save Islam from attacks from external and internal enemies, according to those sources. The most striking aspect of that transformation is al-Zarqawi's attempt to mimic the sirah, or lifestyle, of the Prophet. Those who have seen al-Zarqawi in the past year say he constantly uses the written histories of the Prophet's life, known collectively as the Hadith, to copy the way he spoke, sat, walked, ate and slept, even the way he brushed his teeth (the Prophet is recorded as having used...
...ZARQAWI IS NO RELIGIOUS SCHOLAR. A high school dropout, he memorized the Koran while in prison and acquired his religious ideas from extremist preachers and thinkers in Afghanistan and Jordan. To devout Muslims, emulation of the Prophet is considered desirable, and most believers concentrate on Muhammad's well-documented attributes, like frugality, modesty, charity and respect for elders. But al-Zarqawi, like others who subscribe to extremist schools of Islam, takes emulation literally. Among the examples Bakr cites is al-Zarqawi's tendency, modeled on the Prophet's, to "do everything from right to left: he puts on his right...
Like many other literalists, al-Zarqawi favors one of the Koran's more complex chapters, known as "The Cave." It includes some metaphysical stories whose meaning has been debated by theologians for centuries. The Prophet is said to have advised his followers to read the "The Cave" before Friday prayers, and "some people mistakenly take this to mean that this surah was the Prophet's favorite," says Khaled Abou al-Fadl, an Islamic jurist at UCLA. Bakr says al-Zarqawi frequently quotes extensively from "The Cave" and encourages discussion about its stories...
...many Muslims, emulating Muhammad's sirah is a deeply spiritual exercise, designed to make believers feel closer to God. In al-Zarqawi's case, baser instincts may be at work. "People like al-Zarqawi try to portray themselves as very close to the Prophet in order to legitimize their other actions," says al-Fadl. Those who have observed al-Zarqawi at close quarters suggest that this is the logical next step in his evolution as a jihadi. Once a street thug in his hometown of Zarqa, he turned himself into a mujahid, or holy warrior, in Afghanistan, and then...