The same claim about the Prophet can serve opposite moral purposes

Evidence

For any outsider, and surely for most Muslims, this would be regarded as defaming the Prophet in the worst possible way; in Iran this was done for the exact opposite purpose. Claiming that the Prophet instigated murder had as its purpose not to defame the Prophet but to justify murder by showing that the Prophet himself had encouraged it. It is an argument with far-reaching impli­ cations and devastating consequences. — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 586

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The passage captures how interpretive communities invert the moral valence of the same textual claim — defamation becomes legitimation depending on who asserts it and to what end. Dense and paradigm-shifting about the plasticity of religious precedent.
• XREF: connects to: Identical source material can yield opposite religious impressions; Enlightenment thought held contradictory views of Muhammad