Funny take on 72 virgins

Obviously, I do not read Arabic so I cannot speculate on the validity of her exegesis.  Still, this is funny from Muslim who converted to Atheism.

Misconception #5: They’re actually white raisins, not virgins.

This one is has been widely popularized by the less-harsh critics of Islam, notably Irshad Manji. While I respect the work that she does from the inside (reforming Islam is a tough goal), the scholarship that suggests that “virgins” is a mistranslation of “raisins” is shaky at best. Beyond the well-recognizedlinguistic issues with the raisins idea, there is plenty in both the Quran and Hadith to point to the reward in heaven being women, not dried fruit.

Misconception #4: Having to teach all of those virgins would be tedious.

The virgins in Jannah are supposed to be everything that men desire. Furthermore, the ancient Arabs’ conception of the highest in sexual pleasure is penile-vaginal intercourse with a woman who has never had sex, so the idea was the utmost in sexual pleasure, not tedium.

Misconception #3: They wouldn’t be virgins for very long.

The houris’ virginity is described as eternally renewable, similar to that of Aphrodite in ancient mythology.

Misconception #2: Seventy-two is an arbitrary number.

Seventy-two, in classical Arabic, is a number used for exaggeration. It is similar to saying “If I told you once, I told you a thousand times” in English. No one literally means a thousand times; what is intended is countless times. Taking into account the Arab conception of virgins, seventy-two virgins, then, means more sexual pleasure than could be imagined.

Misconception #1: The virgins are from Earth.

This is, by and large, the most common misconception. Random people on the Internet did it. Family Guy did it. Even The New Yorker did it.The joke is, of course, that the “virgins” are not nubile women, but the types of people on Earth who tend to, at least stereotypically, stay virgins their whole lives, such as World of Warcraft players (that assumption is a fallacy itself, of course). Where the joke falls flat for those in the know, like me (and, soon, you), is that the houris are not human beings from Earth who died without having had sex, but are supposed to be heavenly maidens especially created to sate the lusts of men as understood by Muhammad...

...Oh, and why did the concept of houris make me doubt my faith? Not only did the idea of heavenly sex-bots awaiting my future Muslim husband trigger my insecurities, I was pissed off that I, as a woman, would not get my own sex-bots. [1]