"Christian presence in the Middle East is a "necessity" and keeping Christians there is "an Islamic duty", the secretary of the Lebanese national committee for Muslim-Christian dialogue said Thursday."
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"The Christian presence in the (Middle) East, working and living alongside <span><span>Muslims</span></span>, is as much a Christian as an Islamic necessity," Mohammad Sammak said at a Vatican synod conference on Christianity in the region.
ReplyDeleteHe needs to say those words in the Middle East, not at the Vatican!
What do you mean, in Saudi Arabia or Yemen? This may be true but in Lebanon or Syria, it's common.
ReplyDeleteWhy do you bother with this vza TGIA? She either does not know what she is talking about or is a propagandist.
ReplyDeleteThis country (USA) is a breeding ground for gross ignorance
ReplyDeleteOf course Syria and Lebanon are the exceptions. That still leaves quite a few places where the message is necessary.
ReplyDeleteMy goodness, a voice from the wilderness! How good it is to "hear" your dulcet tones again!
ReplyDeletePropagandizing is just no good without you around, v.
Hey, we have a foursome! There is more to Christianity in the Middle East than can be covered in a few short notes here. Suffice to say that Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria were Christian countries before the arrival of Islam 1400 years ago and for those interested in the deeper side of thgings, it was the Christians that formalized the Arabic grammar that is used today so no one can attack the Arabness of Christians. The dwindling presence of the Christians in all the countries of the ME is a big problem and the purpose behind the current synod. ^0 years back, Christians constituted over 55% of Lebanon's population and today, they are less than 20% and a loss to Lebanon. The elimination of Christians from there would make it just another Arab country. It should be noted that in spite of saddam's horror stories, there were over 2 million Christians in Iraq living relatively easy and thanks to the bringing of democracy to Iraq, there are now less than half a million left living there in terror and it's only a matter of time that these too will have left thanks to the breaking up of Iraq.
ReplyDelete<span>Hey, we have a foursome! </span>
ReplyDeleteWalid..This place used to have hundredsomes (if I may) at one stage but ever since I cracked down on some demented folk who were generating most reactions, it slowed downed dramatically..People love to put up a little fight but that was a choice I had to make..I could not sit back and read some of the nastiest, filthiest racist comment spewed on a daily basis..
Walid
ReplyDeleteI'd be very much interested in your becoming a contributer to this blog..If you're interested, could you post an email where I can send you an invitation to contribute?
Hi TGIA; thanks for the invitation and when I'll have something worthwhile, I'll send up some smoke signals. I knew about the past problems from having read about them somewhere and it's a shame it had to be done. You have a nice blog and it would be great if more participants of the kind you want jumped in.
ReplyDeleteWalid..You can clearly see that a voice from Lebanon is lacking on this blog..I've been away so long that I can hardly talk from a meaningful perspective about it apart from the occasional article that I glan here and there. In this sense, among many on other topics as well, your contributions should be valuable here..What you conside worthwhile does not have to be formal editorials, few have time and capacity to that, but a daily reflection on one issue or another is good enough. It should spice up the content and broaden it significantly..In any case, you know now that whenever you feel like it, let me know..
ReplyDelete<span>Walid..You can clearly see that a voice from Lebanon is lacking on this blog..I've been away so long that I can hardly talk from a meaningful perspective about it apart from the occasional article that I glan here and there. In this sense, among many on other topics as well, your contributions should be valuable here..What you consider worthwhile does not have to besomething to agonise over. , Daily reflection big or small, an article you find of interest on one issue or another are good enough. It should spice up the content and broaden it significantly..In any case, you know now that whenever you feel like it,you're welcome..
ReplyDelete</span>
Walid
ReplyDeleteAs you can clearly see, a voice from Lebanon (and its neighbourhood) is lacking on this blog. I've been away far too long to be able to have a meaningful perspective in that respect..What you consider worthwile doesn't have to be somthing you'll have to agonise over writing but reflections big or small on all matters you consider of interest are good enough. You know now that you're welcome any time..Just let me know and I can send you an invitation to a (bogus) email (gmail, Yahoo and the likes)..
The Prophet Muhammad (whose coming was prophesied in the Holy Books of the Jews and Christians) enjoined the faithful to protect the Jews, Christians and Sabaeans from persecution, though not from discrimination. His followers were to guard synagogues, churches, monasteries,etc., from attack, as they were places where the one God was worshipped.
ReplyDeleteThat is one reason why Wahhabis are heretics, they go against the teachings of Prophet of Islam.
On the other hand, Christians in Arab nations were used as agents of interfering European nations, so creating a hostile climate for themselves. A minority maybe, but enough to make life difficult for their co-religionists. I believe it was the French who encouraged the Maronites to rise up against their Druze overlords in the 19th C. in an attempt to become the dominant confessional group in Lebanon. Today their descendants act as agents of Israel.
Muslim hostility to Christians and Jews, where it exists, is political rather than religious in its origin.
<p><span><span>Jeremy, the 19th century fighting was part of the ongoing world conflict between the English and the French. France had been the protector of the Maronites in Lebanon since 1700 or 1703 under a formal treaty. This is why there has always been a close bond between France and the Maronites of Lebanon.<span> </span>While the French backed and armed the Maronite Christians, the English backed and armed <span> </span>the Druze and the game was to have the 2 groups fight each other to get the weak Turkish rulers caught in between. There was the first civil war between the Maronites and the Druze in 1840 and second and more deadly one in 1861 that resulted in the French, the English and the Russians (with the 3 navies at the ready in the port of Beirut) imposing conditions on the Turks that gave limited autonomy (the Mutasarafieh) to the Maronites and Druze in parts of Lebanon which remained in effect until Turkey suspended them when the war of 1914 broke out. It's thanks to the French and its loyalty to the Maronites that Lebanon is in its current configuration. In 1920 during the Sykes-Picot cutting up of the pie, Weizmann had the British convinced to relinquish the part of Lebanon that was south of the Litani to Palestine because it was in the Jewish master plan back then that the whole of Palestine would eventually belong to the Jews and Weizmann wanted the Litani River to be included in the future Jewish Palestine. The British tried but the French refused to go along because of the promise they had made to the Maronites. More than that, the French took a good chunk out of Syria and gave it to Lebanon that tripled its size. The purpose of that was to transfer a large Christian population from Syria to Lebanon to enlarge and strengthen the Christian community but the French goofed and ended up transferring mostly Muslim villages.</span></span>
ReplyDelete</p><p><span> </span>
</p><p><span>As to your comment generalizing that the Christians are collaborators of Israel, this is not accurate. While there were Christian working for Israel such as in the Israeli invasion of 1982 and the Sabra-Shatilla massacres, over the years it was seen that the majority of collaborators in the South Lebanon army that worked with Israel were Shia Muslims and of the 100 or so spies for Israel arrested in the last year, most are Muslim. Christians were among the first resistance fighters against Israel long before Hizbullah was founded and Christians are the ones that have kept Lebanon distinct from the other Arab countries while at the same time ensuring and solidifying its “Arabness”.</span>
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<span>The Prophet Muhammad (whose coming was prophesied in the Holy Books of the Jews and Christians)</span>
ReplyDeleteI know that Muslims claim this, but besides them, who else?
I have often wondered why if Muslims claim the Old and New Testaments are corrupted, how is it that the scriptures they cite in the "corrupted" books prove the foretelling of Mohammed and why on earth would they need proof from something they discount as corrupted?
ReplyDelete<span>I have often wondered why, if Muslims claim the Old and New Testaments are corrupted, how is it that the scriptures they cite in the "corrupted" books prove the foretelling of Mohammed and why on earth would they need proof from something they discount as corrupted?</span>
ReplyDeleteMoslems, like Christians and Jews pick and chose what they want to believe about their own religion and that of others. They refer to Jews and Christians as People of the Book to mean as believers in the one God, yet they are not averse to criticizing these books and this is done within the Koran itself that discredits "it has been written elsewhere " material. And Muslims like Christians and Jews have their own myths about their holy book such s the one that there is only one vesion of the Koran that Muslims are all told whereas there are 7 versions containing minor changes in circulation. To get a better understanding of all 3 books, what must be analysed are not the contents of the books or even their meaning but the history of how these 3 books were compiled. With this knowledge, it all becomes clear how the 3 books are so much alike in certain aspects and that there is not one more or less authentic than the other.
ReplyDeleteWhat I was thinking but couldn't have put so clearly.
ReplyDeleteThanks for this informative reply, Walid. That Christians were "the first resistance fighters against Israel" is news to me. Their political leaders don't appear to have shown any enthusiasm for taking on the Israelis; quite the contrary in the case of Chamoun and the Gemayyels. And the SLA, whatever its make-up, was led by Christians - Haddad, Shidyaq.
ReplyDelete<span><span>if Muslims claim the Old and New Testaments are corrupted</span></span>
ReplyDeleteNever heard of that claim as Muslims, as far as I know, hold the belief that they're holy. 'Kutub munzala' or books of divine nature/dictated.