Tag : Pales­tin­ian Territories

In the 12th cen­tu­ry, Peter the Ven­er­a­ble, Abbot of Cluny, ini­ti­at­ed a dia­logue with the Islam­ic world. ​“I approach you not with arms, but…

There are those who say that lying and deceiv­ing is at the soul of all crime and that Chris­tian­i­ty epit­o­mizes these traits more than any oth­er faith. As proof of their asser­tion they often quote Paul of Tar­sus, arguably the true founder of Chris­tian­i­ty, who is record­ed to have said, ​“But if through my false­hood God’s truth­ful­ness abounds to his glo­ry, why am I still being con­demned as a sin­ner ? Any why not do evil that good may come ? – as some peo­ple slan­der­ous­ly charge us with say­ing. Their con­dem­na­tion is just.” (Romans 3:7 – 8)

The Inter­faith Coali­tion of Nashville orga­nized this year’s inter­faith con­fer­ence in the Van­der­bilt Uni­ver­si­ty, Nashville, USA. Judaism was rep­re­sent­ed by Dr. Don­na Whit­ney, Chris­tian­i­ty by Dr. Tom Davis, Hin­duism by Dr. Howard J. Resnick (HD Goswa­mi), and Bud­dhism by Pro­fes­sor Win Myint. Dr. Habib Sid­diqui rep­re­sent­ed Islam. This is the tran­script of his speech on Islam. The con­fer­ence was opened by Dr. Jawaid Ahsan. Dr. Charles Hem­brick, Pro­fes­sor Emer­i­tus of Reli­gion at Van­der­bilt Uni­ver­si­ty, mod­er­at­ed the conference.

The most uni­ver­sal­ly rec­og­nized sym­bol of Jerusalem is not a Jew­ish or Chris­t­ian holy place but a Mus­lim one : the Dome of the Rock, or Qub­bat as-Sakhra as it is known in Ara­bic. When peo­ple see its gold­en dome ris­ing above the open expanse of Haram as-Sha­reef, they think of only one place in the world. The Dome of the Rock is undoubt­ed­ly one of the most cel­e­brat­ed and most remark­able mon­u­ments of ear­ly Islam, vis­it­ed every year by thou­sands of pil­grims and tourists. It is Jerusalem’s answer to Paris’ Eif­fel Tow­er, Rome’s St. Peter’s Square, Lon­don’s Big Ben and Kuala Lumpur’s Petronas twin tow­ers ; daz­zling the minds of Mus­lims and non-Mus­lims alike. The Dome of the Rock is Jerusalem.

Dur­ing the Mi’raj, the Prophet(P) is report­ed to have received from God the com­mand of five dai­ly prayers (salah) that all Mus­lims must per­form. Upon his return to Mec­ca, the Prophet insti­tut­ed these prayers. It is sig­nif­i­cant to note that he made Jerusalem the direc­tion (al-Qiblah) which Mus­lims must face while doing their prayers (nar­rat­ed by al-Bukhari, 41 and by Mus­lim, 525). Jerusalem is thus called Ula al-Qiblatain (the first qiblah). The Prophet (P) and the ear­ly com­mu­ni­ty of Islam wor­shipped towards the direc­tion of Jerusalem dur­ing their stay in Mec­ca. After the Hijra’ (migra­tion), Mus­lims in Med­i­na also con­tin­ued to pray fac­ing Jerusalem for almost sev­en­teen months until God com­mand­ed the Mus­lims to change their direc­tion of prayer from Jerusalem to Mec­ca (Qur’an 2:142 – 150). These estab­lished facts clear­ly sig­ni­fies the impor­tance of Jerusalem in Islam.

It is well known that the Gospel of Mark con­tains numer­ous geo­graph­i­cal errors. This is summed up in Küm­mel’s clas­sic, Intro­duc­tion to the New…