An Appeal to Muslim Clerics and Rulers: Save Our Christian Heritage!
Greek Orthodox Archbishop Theodosius( Atallah Hanna) and Sheikh Taissir Dayut Tamimi of Jerusalem.
by Tarif Khalidi
An appeal to Muslim clerics and rulers, women and men:
What is happening today in Maloula and other Christian cities and areas in Syria, Egypt, and other Arab countries transcends any political opinions about what is going on in this or that tormented country, whether the opinions oppose or support the political regime in those countries. The repeated assaults on Christian holy sites that are happening today and the forced expulsion of Christians is a flagrant assault on our Islamic heritage itself and on the precedent of our venerable Prophet, his noble hadith, his life, and the lives of those followed him in doing good. The destruction of churches and Christian holy sites that we are witnessing is a barbaric, pagan assault on our Islamic civilization which, over the ages, has given a central place to Jesus son of Mary and his virgin mother (peace be upon them) at the heart of our teaching, rooted in the long and glorious history of coexistance and love between Islam and Christianity, this coexistance that is one of our greatest point of pride when we express our pride among civilizations.
Any attack on these holy places is part of a campaign against Islam, aiming to disfigure this love and coexistence. This campaign is now being waged by those who have been overcome first of all by ignorance, then by blind prejudice, then by rejection of the other, even when this other is “the closest in affection to those who believed.” In light of all the above and before it is too late, we call upon Muslim clerics and rulers, women and men, to join their voices with this cry, that perhaps someone may heed it in the lands of Arabity and Islam… “O mankind! Be careful of your duty to your Lord Who created you from a single soul.”
This article was orginally publishes at Notes on Arab Orthodoxy
http://araborthodoxy.blogspot.mx/
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Arabic original in al-Akhbar
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نداء الى علماء المسلمين وحكمائهم | أنقذوا معلولا وتراثنا المسيحي!
طريف الخالدي *
نداء الى علماء المسلمين وحكمائهم، من النساء والرجال،
إن ما يحدث اليوم في معلولا وغيرها من المدن والأحياء المسيحية في سوريا ومصر، وغيرها من الأقطار العربية يتخطى كافة الارآء والاعتبارات السياسية حول ما يجري في هذا البلد المعذب او ذاك، أكانت تلك الآراء معارضة للنظام السياسي في تلك الاقطار أم موالية له.
إن ما يجري اليوم من اعتداءات متكررة على المقدسات المسيحية، ومن تهجير للمسيحيين، هو اعتداء صارخ على تراثنا الاسلامي بالذات، وعلى سنة نبينا الكريم، وعلى حديثه الشريف وعلى سيرته وسيرة من تبعه بإحسان.
إن ما نشهده من تدمير للكنائس والمقامات المسيحية المقدسة، هو هجمة بربرية جاهلية على حضارتنا الاسلامية التي، وعلى مرّ العصور، أوسعت لعيسى بن مريم ولأمه البتول (عليهما السلام) حيّزاً مركزياً في صلب عقيدتنا، رسّخه تاريخ طويل مجيد من التعايش والمحبة بين الاسلام والمسيحية، هذا التعايش الذي قد يكون اليوم من أكبر دواعي فخرنا حين تتفاخر الحضارات.
إن أي اعتداء على تلك المقدسات، لا يمكن وصفه إلا بأنه جزء من حملة تناهض الاسلام، وترمي الى تشويه هذا التعايش وتلك المحبة. وهذه الحملة تتم الآن على أيدي أناس غلب عليهم الجهل المطبق أولاً، ثم التعصب الأعمى، ثم رفض الآخر حتى ولو كان هذا الآخر {أقربهم مودة للذين آمنوا}. لكل ما تقدّم، وقبل فوات الأوان، نهيب بعلماء المسلمين وحكمائهم من النساء والرجال، أن يضمّوا صوتهم إلى هذه الصرخة، لعلها تجد من يصغي إليها في ديار العروبة والاسلام… {يا أيها الناس اتقوا ربَّكم الذي خلقكم من نفس واحدة}.
* أكاديمي فلسطيني
أستاذ في الجامعة الأميركيّة في بيروت
سوريا
العدد ٢١٠٠ الثلاثاء ١٠ أيلول ٢٠١٣
سوريا تكسر أحادية أميركا
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About the author
Tarif Khalidi was born in Jerusalem in 1938. He received degrees from University College, Oxford, and the University of Chicago, before teaching at the American University of Beirut as a professor in the Department of History from 1970 to 1996. In 1985 he accepted a one-year position as senior research associate at St Anthony’s College, Oxford, and from 1991 to 1992 was a visiting overseas scholar at St John’s College, Cambridge.
In 1996, he left Beirut to become the Sir Thomas Adams’ Professor of Arabic at Cambridge University, the oldest chair of Arabic in the English-speaking world. He was also Director of the Centre for Middle East and Islamic Studies and a Fellow of King’s College, Cambridge. After six years, Professor Khalidi returned to the American University of Beirut, taking on the Sheikh Zayed Chair in Islamic and Arabic Studies, the first chair to be filled at the University since the civil war.
He has published several books, including Images of Muhammad (Random House, 2009), The Muslim Jesus (Harvard University Press, 2001), Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period (Cambridge University Press, 1995), and Classical Arab Islam (Darwin Press, 1996). He has also published a recent translation of the Qur’an (Penguin, 2008) and edited a collection of essays, Land Tenure and Social Transformation in the Middle East (Syracuse University Press, 1985).
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