After facing a backlash for her use of Islamic hadith during her Savage X Fenty fashion show, Rihanna has apologized, saying the use of religious language was a huge oversight.
The 32-year-old lingerie mogul took to Instagram to say how she was “incredibly disheartened” to have used the “unintentionally offensive” music, which featured a remix of an Islamic prayer to a house beat.
Lingerie models danced to the song “Doom” by London-based producer Coucou Chloe during a portion of Rihanna’s show, which streamed on Amazon Prime on Friday. The song, released in 2017, includes a remix of a hadith narration about the end of times and judgment day.
“I’d like to thank the Muslim community for pointing out a huge oversight that was unintentionally offensive in our Savage X Fenty show,” Rihanna wrote on her Instagram stories;
“I would more importantly like to apologize for this honest, yet careless mistake. We understand that we have hurt many of our Muslim brothers and sisters, and I’m incredibly disheartened by this.
“I do not play with any kind of disrespect toward God or any religion and therefore the use of this song in our project was completely irresponsible! Moving forward, we will make sure nothing like this ever happens again.”
Rihanna had earlier on come in for harsh criticism on social media for her use of Islam as a pop culture prop.
“How is it okay for Rihanna to have a show of people dancing in underwear with an Islamic hadith about judgment day playing in the background?” TikTok user @nad asked his followers in a video about the show.
“If this was the Bible being used, the entire world would be enraged. How is it okay for the work of the most renowned Islamic scholar to be used as music for lingerie?”
