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Is there a future for Jewish, Christian, Muslim relations? The answer is simple: yes, there must be a future for interfaith relations or there is no future for humanity. The terrorist attacks of September 11 should awaken all Jews, Christians and Muslims to improve relations between the faiths; in my mind, nothing else is even second. The horrific events of the past few months remind us that no one has been promised tomorrow. Therefore, now is the time to get busy. There is no time for procrastination. This is the time for action! I pray we are not too late.
Here in the Detroit area we have been doing creative and pioneering work in interfaith relations for at least 30 years. I believe we have made some exciting progress. We hope that what we are doing here will show the way to the rest of the country and, eventually, the world.
In 1981, Judge George Bashara and I founded the American Arab and Jewish Friends and affiliated it with the Detroit chapter of the National Conference of Christians and Jews (NCCJ), one of 70 branches in the United States. We were quickly faced with a problem: many of our Arab friends were not eligible for an organization of Christians and Jews because they were Muslims. In response to this problem, my Muslim friend, Haj Charles Alawan, and I went to New York City to explain our predicament to the national meeting of the National Conference of Christians and Jews. As a result, the organization changed its name to The National Conference. It was a step forward. Today many Muslims are on the local Detroit board of the NCCJ, now known nationwide as the National Conference for Community and Justice (NCCJ). Annual chairmanships are rotated through all three faiths.
Shortly after the NCCJ formally included a Muslim component, another group was formed within the Detroit chapter—the Muslim-Jewish-Christian trialogue. Each year we host a symposium to which we invite a major speaker from each of the three faiths for an all-day experience of listening, learning, meeting and exchanging religious ideas and ideals. All participants profit from our trialogues. They help us break down stereotypes. We can meet real people and make real friends. Then, as conversations between friends develop and increase, understanding for those things that are of value to our friends, including their religion, develop naturally.
Communication is the key—talking and listening to each other. If we cannot talk together, we will never really know each other and discover in each other that God-given spark of the divine. Without communication, we remain locked up in our own self-imposed ghettos that only produce downward cycles of ignorance, resentment, hate and destructive acts toward those we do not know. September 11 taught us all just how cataclysmic those destructive acts can be. That is why I believe that improved Jewish, Christian, Muslim relations are so urgent today and why I say that there is nothing even second.
Keep Communications Open
In ignorance we are all apt to say hurtful things about others. A case in point is the videotape referred to in The Congregationalist (Oct/Nov 2001, page 9), in which Fawaz Damra, imam of the Islamic Center of Greater Cleveland, expressed a very crude and vile anti-Semitic message. Sure, it hurts to be called "the sons of monkeys and pigs." Because of that kind of hateful language, most Jews avoid all relations with the Muslim community, but I think that is a wrong response. No matter how disgusting and anti-Semitic the comment, we must keep communication open.
A serious problem we face today is that anti-Jewish words continue to be expressed and anti-Semitic actions continue against Jews all over the world. Most Muslims, I believe, realize that such statements and actions are wrong, but they go ahead and make excuses for the perpetrators as though they have a perfectly good reason for their anti-Semitism. This explains how some Arabs in the Middle East can plan and carry out terrorist attacks against innocent Israelis while, at the same time, claim that they are opposed to terrorism. They say what they are doing to Israelis is part of "national liberation." In other words, terrorism is not terrorism if the goal is to establish a Palestinian State. The end justifies the means, not matter how bloody and deadly the means.
Jews and Christians all over the world are speaking out against this justification of violence and calling Muslim leaders to be more responsible for what they teach, preach and write. I appreciate what they are doing; such hateful language and actions cannot go unchallenged. But, at the same time, Jews and Christians must be able to talk with Muslims and to Muslims, not about Muslims. There are those who think that this response will give stature to the other’s position. I believe that may be the price we pay in order to have authentic, constructive Jewish, Christian, Muslim dialogue. Without communication, progress is impossible.
| AGE OF INNOCENCE
O' Jerusalem, your walls built, crushed, Dreams hoped Screams of battle O' Jerusalem, you have redefined childhood and old age. The age of innocence: A time of unfettered dreams A time reaching, touching the future A time no longer O' Jerusalem your walls contain crushed dreams of the past –Jerusalem, 1994 Robert B. Coates |
Whose History Do You Believe?
Another serious problem we face today is our understanding of history. In answer to the question, "What division of Palestine would satisfy the Palestinians?" Imam Fawaz Damra answered, "Possession of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem as their capital, as it has been for hundreds of years" (The Congregationalist, page 11). That statement is factually untrue. At no time in history have Palestinians had possession of the West Bank and Gaza for "hundreds of years." In its 3,000-year history, Jerusalem has been a capital city only twice: first, when King David established his capital there, a monarchy that lasted until it was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE, and now again, Jerusalem is the capital of the modern state of Israel. There never has been a Palestinian State and Jerusalem, including the neighborhood of "East Jerusalem," has never been a capital for anyone but Jews.
It is too bad that much of Jewish, Christian, Muslim relations gets caught up in the politics of the Middle East because that is a dead end. We quickly hit a barrier that no one seems to be able to overcome. The futility of interfaith relations based on Middle East politics causes most people to give up and say there can be no Jewish, Christian, Muslim relations. There can only be separation. I strongly disagree.
Jews, Christians and Muslims each understand history and accept it as authoritative. The problem lies in the fact that we all study our own history from our own perspectives, I know of no completely neutral history. Issues of homeland, statehood and security are so basically fundamental to a minority people that has suffered through a history of persecution by the majority people (true of both Jews and Palestinian Arabs) that compromise on fundamental issues seems impossible. We need to find an impartial, universally respected, impeccable source that is acceptable to both sides. If we cannot agree on basic facts we will not be able to agree on anything.
Here in Detroit, the American Arab and Jewish Friends has made it a policy not to discuss political issues in public, This policy alone has made it possible for us to continue meeting together uninterrupted for 20 years. We all know that politics is one of the hottest issues, especially when it involves the Arab-Israel conflict. We avoid it completely, except in private. In all our conversations we replace stereotypes with reality and continue to gain more understanding and respect for each other.
Tough Issues for Private Conversation
Having said that, I should also say that for those of us who have been meeting together since we began some 20 years ago, there is rarely an issue that we can not discuss in private. As in all good relationships, potentially divisive issues can be discussed only when friends are committed to each other and their friendship. That kind of a relationship takes time and trust to develop. In public discussions we agree to avoid certain issues, but in private conversations between committed friends, we discuss the tough issues and develop a deeper understand for our friend’s values. I should add that we have yet to change anyone’s mind. But we are able to continue the discussion without ruining the friendships, and that is the critical issue.
Is there a future for Jewish, Christian, Muslim relations? There has to be; but no one said it would ever be easy. As a Jew, I shudder every time I hear Christians speak about us as if we were no longer part of God’s family or say Jesus was not a devout Jew who was committed to the Torah and to Jerusalem, the place of Temple sacrifices. I also shudder when I hear Muslims speak of us as something less than human and when I hear hateful language meant only to demean Jews, Judaism and Israel. At the same time I imagine that there are still things that Jews say or think about Christians and Muslims that are not accurate and cause pain or discomfort to them. The hurtful language reminds us where each other is coming from, and should motivate us to begin developing conversations and friendships that will lead to mutual understanding and respect. I know of no other way to overcome the significant differences that divide us.
The mission of Jews and Judaism is tikkun olam—to repair the world. Jews believe that God has put us here to complete the work of creation, to bring together a splintered and fragmented world, a process that prepares the way for the Messiah. We work towards the Messianic Age when all strife, disease, hatred and division will be abolished. We are continually called to this task by our teachers:
"It is not up to you to complete the work, nor are you at liberty to give it up" (Pfrke Avoth, The Teachings of the Fathers, 11:18).
Christians seem to have a similar mission, another way to repair the world—to follow the example of Jesus and love others as he did: "We love because He first loved us. If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this commandment: Whoever loves God must also love his brother" (I John 4:19-21).
Completing the work of creation is not easy. It is often very painful. What else could we expect from a broken world? The evil that we confront every day reminds us of work that remains to be done by all of God’s people. We cannot give up, we must press on. Our children, our grandchildren and our great-grandchildren demand it of us; indeed, the future of mankind demands it. I believe that Jews, Christians and Muslims must begin to come together before the human race destroys the world. There is no other choice for those of us who claim to follow the teachings of the one God as given to us in the Torah, the Bible and the Qu’ran.
Arnold
Michlin is by vocation, a chemist and by avocation, an ecumenist. He is a member
of Congregation Shaarey Zedek in Southfield, Michigan, and was the co-founder of
the American Arab and Jewish Friends (1981) and the Muslim-Christian-Jewish
Trialogue (1986). His many involvements have included service on the national
and local boards of the NCCJ, interfaith chairman of the Detroit chapter of the
American Jewish Committee and local board member of the Anti-Defamation League.
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