What is your opinion of the proposed Islamic Community Center near the site of the 9/11 attacks (Ground Zero) in New York? Should the imam behind the center move the center to a new location or not? Why?
USA say usually it is the country of liberty i want to see where is the freedom i agree with strong if the proposed Islamic Community Center near the site of the 9/11 attacks (Ground Zero) in New York because every world know the qada cant make 11-9-2001 and i want to the world know islam can not do any Explosion Explosion in any country in the world, is a religion of mercy, justice and peace and security
I think that it is great idea to propose building Islamic center near the site of the 9/11 attacks because it sending message for all people that these attacks not belong to Islam at all. So the idea is great but about building it or not is totally belong to Americans them-self, but I think it will be very disappointed (and destroying for the idea of liberty of religion) if this proposal refused just because it for Islam.
Thanks Ben for this explanation and I totally agree with you to stop to be under the mercy of a news media and start to understand each other. And let me explain what I think about comparing ELRC with Ground Zero, they work in the same direction but in different ways, Ground Zero touch very critical point related to Islam in America and it face 9/11 problem with very clear message and this message not directed to limited layer or specific people, actually it is very hard to speak with all kinds of minds and try to deliver a message to persuade sad hearts. In contrast ELRC build good communications but with non-core functions, as ELRC is English learning center. Also ELRC work with who can easy (not always, but almost) accept the others according to his knowledge, from both sides, and I think that the most important thing that ELRC offer that it can create good opportunity to AL-Azhar Muslims to can express them self with west language. One more thing Ben, about “But just because Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf (who visited the ELRC in February) has a right to build a mosque at that location, does not mean he should” totally agree with you about that. But about “Just as Americans have the right to burn the Quran but that does not mean they should”, let me ask why “Americans have the right to burn the Quran”? And I know you mean that they should not do that. I think that all have full rights to express their opinion about Islam and discuss it with appropriate men. But Quran is belong to Muslims, it is look like you told me you have rights to burn my house, you can ask any Islamic scientist to discuss anything in Quran and told him you do not agree with some things in Quran or with it all. As we believe that our eyes, hands and all of our body’s is like credit given by Allah (God) also same as our all property. We should keep them save and use them with good way. In the same way we believe that Quran is one of most things that Allah gives it for us, so the idea having rights to burn the Quran exactly like having rights to kill us and burn our property. I hope that I can explain it well and I know that liberty doesn’t mean hurting others, and I believe that freedom without limits is not good place for humans. May be it allowed in law of US to express what you think with whatever way, but I don’t think it includes hurting the other.
Thanks a lot Ben for your interesting comment and post, I really enjoyed to read it and thinking about your opinions. And let me divide me comment to four main points (I had to submit it in parts because comment system accept only 4,096 characters): 1) Scopes of freedom and relation to burning Quran a) About Freedom of speech: I think the main point here is boundaries of freedom (and I’m not speak about if government support freedom of speech or not, but how we think about freedom limitation) and maybe we have different ways to mange this according to differentiation in culture, but to categorize your mind and to know our limits about each category is very important regardless level of freedom applied by government. For example, if we discuss some business issues and you have full rights to criticize one of famous companies but without destroying any of property of this company, right? So now you have limit to express you freedom. Ok, now what about rights to criticize your government and compare this with your rights to criticize government of foreign country, it cannot be the same, now scope of freedom is changing according to category. And this scoop of freedom change according to the scoop of effect. So when we speak about secret and holly issues that effect on people distributed around the world (include your and my countries) like issues of burning Quran or Bible or Torah, it cannot be the same as you speak about any other books or flags. b) Second point about that, there are clear different between government work and what people think, like politic live and public live. Let me explain by example, when America started Afghanistan war and also Iraq war, some very angry people burn America flag. However it illegal in my country but there is no one tried to burn any holly books, although there were some religious violent terms like “Crusade” heard in this period. There are moral limits stop people to think to do anything like that. On the other hand, the issue of cross burning in Virginia and the debit that happened about it at this time. So “as I believe” there are always moral limits that should stop us to think about doing things like that, regardless our government allowed it or not. And about if should government participate on it or just government let everything allowed, I think it belongs to freedom levels and scoops that I mention before. Actually this leads to ask about what west people think about limitation of freedom especially when it related to religions. 2) Abuse the power and respect constitution a) I totally agree with you about "absolute power absolutely corrupts". And I don’t think our point about the issue if we can trust any politicians or not, or how far freedom in Egypt!!. But let me ask you why you let people that you cannot trust have rights to manage your country process. Anyway this maybe another point has different perspective. b) And about [“Many American Christian policemen would say "I do not support you burning the bible but I will sacrifice my life to defend your freedom to burn it." Can you understand this?”] actually we apply this not just understand it and it happened in Egypt that Muslim policeman protect Non Muslims and sacrifice his life for that. So we agree about that we should respect and protect what our constitution protects. As I convinced that constitution is humans work and can be changed by other humans. What you think about that?
3) Does hurt Islam hurt Islam? a) Yes you have copy of Quran and you buy it with your money so you have rights to keep it, and what I mean that equality in rights not in effect, sure if you burn copy of Quran this not effect at Islam at all and also it isn’t mean killing someone. I speak about rights to do, not effect of actions. And when someone burn Quran he actually just burn papers, totally agree about that, but I try to express how Muslims pain from burning Quran in comparing to killing or burning houses. You know, when you buy a copy of Quran you just pay the cost of paper, printing, delivering and so on, and no cost at all for words them-self, actually it not allowed in Islam to trade with words in this book, because we believe that there is no money can pay to these words. b) And about “I also understand that in the Quran it says that the Bible and the Torah were corrupted by men but that Allah will protect the Quran. Do you trust in this or feel that you must personally work to protect the Quran?” I don’t think you got the point from Muslim objection to burning Quran, if we try to do that to save Quran we will just printing a lot of copies and keep doing this, but this not what Muslim meant. And as we believe that when someone hurt Islam that mean he hurt us not Islam, it’s obvious. That is why I try to explain it to you by comparison it with killing or burning houses. 4) Different societies and deferent cultures a) And about “limits on freedom in the USA” I understand that there are freedom limitations in USA, but it may be not clear for us, for example, how burning the Quran is not one of things that it does not threaten public safety? It hurt American Muslims badly, and hurt about 1.5 billion Muslim around the world. And as you mention in your example “If a group of American Muslims announces they will burn the Bible because they feel Christians are at war with Muslims, should this burning be illegal? If this really happened in America, it would be legal. And if a group of Christians threatened to attack the Muslims when they burn the bible, …” that what can expect from hurting people badly, violation will start, even in same country under the same law. b) I totally respect your preferred society and if there are only two types I’ll prefer it too. But in absolute view, let me say “speak freely even if it means that I must sometimes accept that people will say things that hurt my feelings” this not my preferred type, I believe that if we put government outside of the equation and between public start to say what we want to say honestly and without hurt the others (and it possible, in Islam bad Tongue is leading to bad end) then it will be good freedom. So the key in hand of public not government c) And about Egypt, it obvious that we don’t have USA freedom levels but also it not a prison indeed.
USA say usually it is the country of liberty i want to see where is the freedom i agree with strong if the proposed Islamic Community Center near the site of the 9/11 attacks (Ground Zero) in New York because every world know the qada cant make 11-9-2001
ReplyDeleteand i want to the world know islam can not do any Explosion
Explosion in any country in the world, is a religion of mercy, justice and peace and security
I think that it is great idea to propose building Islamic center near the site of the 9/11 attacks because it sending message for all people that these attacks not belong to Islam at all. So the idea is great but about building it or not is totally belong to Americans them-self, but I think it will be very disappointed (and destroying for the idea of liberty of religion) if this proposal refused just because it for Islam.
ReplyDeleteRead my blog post comparing "Ground Zero Mosque" to the Azhar ELRC here
ReplyDeleteThanks Ben for this explanation and I totally agree with you to stop to be under the mercy of a news media and start to understand each other. And let me explain what I think about comparing ELRC with Ground Zero, they work in the same direction but in different ways, Ground Zero touch very critical point related to Islam in America and it face 9/11 problem with very clear message and this message not directed to limited layer or specific people, actually it is very hard to speak with all kinds of minds and try to deliver a message to persuade sad hearts. In contrast ELRC build good communications but with non-core functions, as ELRC is English learning center. Also ELRC work with who can easy (not always, but almost) accept the others according to his knowledge, from both sides, and I think that the most important thing that ELRC offer that it can create good opportunity to AL-Azhar Muslims to can express them self with west language.
ReplyDeleteOne more thing Ben, about “But just because Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf (who visited the ELRC in February) has a right to build a mosque at that location, does not mean he should” totally agree with you about that. But about “Just as Americans have the right to burn the Quran but that does not mean they should”, let me ask why “Americans have the right to burn the Quran”? And I know you mean that they should not do that. I think that all have full rights to express their opinion about Islam and discuss it with appropriate men. But Quran is belong to Muslims, it is look like you told me you have rights to burn my house, you can ask any Islamic scientist to discuss anything in Quran and told him you do not agree with some things in Quran or with it all. As we believe that our eyes, hands and all of our body’s is like credit given by Allah (God) also same as our all property. We should keep them save and use them with good way. In the same way we believe that Quran is one of most things that Allah gives it for us, so the idea having rights to burn the Quran exactly like having rights to kill us and burn our property.
I hope that I can explain it well and I know that liberty doesn’t mean hurting others, and I believe that freedom without limits is not good place for humans. May be it allowed in law of US to express what you think with whatever way, but I don’t think it includes hurting the other.
Thanks Osama for your comments please read my response: Should the right to burn the Quran be protected as freedom of speech?
ReplyDeleteThanks a lot Ben for your interesting comment and post, I really enjoyed to read it and thinking about your opinions. And let me divide me comment to four main points (I had to submit it in parts because comment system accept only 4,096 characters):
ReplyDelete1) Scopes of freedom and relation to burning Quran
a) About Freedom of speech: I think the main point here is boundaries of freedom (and I’m not speak about if government support freedom of speech or not, but how we think about freedom limitation) and maybe we have different ways to mange this according to differentiation in culture, but to categorize your mind and to know our limits about each category is very important regardless level of freedom applied by government. For example, if we discuss some business issues and you have full rights to criticize one of famous companies but without destroying any of property of this company, right? So now you have limit to express you freedom. Ok, now what about rights to criticize your government and compare this with your rights to criticize government of foreign country, it cannot be the same, now scope of freedom is changing according to category. And this scoop of freedom change according to the scoop of effect. So when we speak about secret and holly issues that effect on people distributed around the world (include your and my countries) like issues of burning Quran or Bible or Torah, it cannot be the same as you speak about any other books or flags.
b) Second point about that, there are clear different between government work and what people think, like politic live and public live. Let me explain by example, when America started Afghanistan war and also Iraq war, some very angry people burn America flag. However it illegal in my country but there is no one tried to burn any holly books, although there were some religious violent terms like “Crusade” heard in this period. There are moral limits stop people to think to do anything like that. On the other hand, the issue of cross burning in Virginia and the debit that happened about it at this time. So “as I believe” there are always moral limits that should stop us to think about doing things like that, regardless our government allowed it or not. And about if should government participate on it or just government let everything allowed, I think it belongs to freedom levels and scoops that I mention before. Actually this leads to ask about what west people think about limitation of freedom especially when it related to religions.
2) Abuse the power and respect constitution
a) I totally agree with you about "absolute power absolutely corrupts". And I don’t think our point about the issue if we can trust any politicians or not, or how far freedom in Egypt!!. But let me ask you why you let people that you cannot trust have rights to manage your country process. Anyway this maybe another point has different perspective.
b) And about [“Many American Christian policemen would say "I do not support you burning the bible but I will sacrifice my life to defend your freedom to burn it." Can you understand this?”] actually we apply this not just understand it and it happened in Egypt that Muslim policeman protect Non Muslims and sacrifice his life for that. So we agree about that we should respect and protect what our constitution protects. As I convinced that constitution is humans work and can be changed by other humans. What you think about that?
3) Does hurt Islam hurt Islam?
ReplyDeletea) Yes you have copy of Quran and you buy it with your money so you have rights to keep it, and what I mean that equality in rights not in effect, sure if you burn copy of Quran this not effect at Islam at all and also it isn’t mean killing someone. I speak about rights to do, not effect of actions. And when someone burn Quran he actually just burn papers, totally agree about that, but I try to express how Muslims pain from burning Quran in comparing to killing or burning houses. You know, when you buy a copy of Quran you just pay the cost of paper, printing, delivering and so on, and no cost at all for words them-self, actually it not allowed in Islam to trade with words in this book, because we believe that there is no money can pay to these words.
b) And about “I also understand that in the Quran it says that the Bible and the Torah were corrupted by men but that Allah will protect the Quran. Do you trust in this or feel that you must personally work to protect the Quran?” I don’t think you got the point from Muslim objection to burning Quran, if we try to do that to save Quran we will just printing a lot of copies and keep doing this, but this not what Muslim meant. And as we believe that when someone hurt Islam that mean he hurt us not Islam, it’s obvious. That is why I try to explain it to you by comparison it with killing or burning houses.
4) Different societies and deferent cultures
a) And about “limits on freedom in the USA” I understand that there are freedom limitations in USA, but it may be not clear for us, for example, how burning the Quran is not one of things that it does not threaten public safety? It hurt American Muslims badly, and hurt about 1.5 billion Muslim around the world. And as you mention in your example “If a group of American Muslims announces they will burn the Bible because they feel Christians are at war with Muslims, should this burning be illegal? If this really happened in America, it would be legal. And if a group of Christians threatened to attack the Muslims when they burn the bible, …” that what can expect from hurting people badly, violation will start, even in same country under the same law.
b) I totally respect your preferred society and if there are only two types I’ll prefer it too. But in absolute view, let me say “speak freely even if it means that I must sometimes accept that people will say things that hurt my feelings” this not my preferred type, I believe that if we put government outside of the equation and between public start to say what we want to say honestly and without hurt the others (and it possible, in Islam bad Tongue is leading to bad end) then it will be good freedom. So the key in hand of public not government
c) And about Egypt, it obvious that we don’t have USA freedom levels but also it not a prison indeed.