This was written by the great Persian poet and atheist, Omar Khayyam (translated by Edward FitzGerald):

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.

We recall those lines in connection with a controversy that has been raging – not too strong a word ! – on our pages.

A number of commenters have complained, some very aggressively, that the caption to the picture in our posts Acts of religion, and Acts of religion (repeat) is inaccurate; that the burnt bodies are those of people killed by a truck accident in the Congo, not – as the caption says – Christians burnt by Muslims. They want the picture and caption removed.

We did not know that it was a picture of a truck accident at the time we first posted it nearly a year ago on November 6, 2010, nor when we repeated it on August 7, 2011. The information we received was that the dead were the victims of an attack by Muslims. We did not intend to mislead.

A mistake can be a useful thing. This one has brought thousands of people, as nothing else seems to have done, to think about how Christians are treated in the Muslim world.

And it is true that Muslims burnt Christians in Nigeria. See our post Acts of religion in Nigeria revisited, October 16, 2011. We urge all those who have complained to take note of that fact.

The picture of the many burnt bodies was posted, the caption was written, the mistake was pointed out, we responded. All that has happened and cannot be erased or cancelled.

Those who are furiously exercised about it should put their passion and energy to work against the cruelties perpetrated daily in the name of Islam.