In the year 786, Harun al-RashidA ruler who is widely credited with kicking off the so-called Islamic Golden Age of learning and cultural advancement in the Islamic World. His surname, "al-Rashid", means "rightly-guided". became caliph of the Abbasid EmpireThe third caliphate to rule the empire created by the Prophet Muhammad. It lasted from 750 until 1258 and presided over the Islamic Golden Age.. This made him one of the most powerful rulers in the world, and the figurehead of the Islamic world.

Harun was a great scholar. He built the House of Wisdom, one of the greatest libraries in history, and attracted intellectuals from all over the world to BaghdadA city in Iraq built by the Abbasids. It remains the capital of Iraq today..

His court was a riotous place, full of poetry, music - and drinking. But it was also home to many of the empire's most powerful clericsA religious leader. Collectively, clerics are known as the clergy. A form of clergy exists in all Abrahamic religions., who sought to dampen the fun with strict religious rules. Harun spent much of his reign protecting his effervescentEnthusiastic and spirited. court intellectuals from priests who wanted to silence them.

Salman RushdieBritish-Indian novelist who had to go into hiding when his book The Satanic Verses was condemned as offensive to Islam by Muslim leaders. is an admirer of Harun al-Rashid. He even named two characters after the caliph in his book Haroun and the Sea of Stories, a tale of censorship and repression.

Born into a Muslim family (although he has since lost his faith), it is little wonder he should feel such an affinity for a Muslim ruler who fought so hard to preserve freedom of speech and learning. When he wrote The Satanic Verses in 1988, he saw himself as working in this same long tradition in the Islamic world of dissent against clerical domination.

The book is about many things. It is a biting satire of Britain in the 1980s. It is an incredibly moving exploration of the experience of migration, and the compromises forced on those who find themselves torn between two cultures.

But it also depicts the Quran as the work of the Prophet Muhammad, and not of God; and it lampoonsPublicly makes fun of, mocks or ridicules. the Ayatollah KhomeiniAn Iranian cleric and revolutionary who led the Iranian Revolution in 1979 and became the country's Supreme Leader., Supreme LeaderThe Head of State and highest religious authority in Iran. of Iran, the man who was to issue a worldwide fatwaA word used in Islam to describe any legal opinion. The fatwa issued by Ayatollah Khomeini calling for all Muslims to kill author Salman Rushdie in 1989 created a misconception in the West that a fatwa is a kind of death warrant. calling for Rushdie's death in response to The Satanic Verses.

On Friday, 33 years later, a US citizen tried to carry out this warrant by stabbing Rushdie multiple times. The author remains in a critical condition since the attack.

In 1988, the response to The Satanic Verses In the West was mixed. Although some defended him, many of Rushdie's fellow writers thought he had brought it upon himself by offending Muslims.

That is why some think the attack on Rushdie is the death knell of free speech. They argue that far too many people now believe that there must be limits on speech to protect people from offence. Many, they argue, have adopted self-censorship to ensure that they never say anything controversial or offensive.

But others are not so sure. They point out that Rushdie has now received an outpouring of support from all over the political spectrum. Today, everyone from left to right agrees that the attack on him was unconscionable.

Some think the attack really has nothing to do with westerners and their values at all. It is part of a much longer struggle within Islam itself. Although millions of Muslims protested against the book, many Muslim intellectuals regarded Rushdie as a martyr for Islamic free speech.

Rushdie, they say, is simply carrying on the same battle for tolerance and freedom as Harun al-Rashid all those centuries ago.

Yes: No-one would publish The Satanic Verses today. We are all so terrified of offending others that we end up self-censoring. That is bad for freedom of expression and bad for literature.

No: It has never been possible to write without risks. Even if almost everyone believes in free speech, one individual might still decide to kill you for their beliefs. The attack on Rushdie does not indicate any deeper free speech crisis.

Or... There have always been certain things you cannot write. We would not defend someone who wrote a book denying a genocide. As times change, so do taboos.

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