By Jim Coggins @http://www.canadianchristianity.com
VISION TV has begun broadcasting an apology for previously broadcasting talks by a Pakistani Muslim who had talked about fighting for Allah on his show and had made offensive remarks about Jews in past speeches and writings.
The controversy raised questions not only about the balance between freedom of religion and laws against hate crimes but also about the connection between religion and violence.
Repeated apology
Israr Ahmed had appeared several times on the program Dil Dil Pakistan, one of about 75 programs that buys time on the multi-religious channel. However, it was remarks he made about the Muslim concept of jihad in a July 14 broadcast that caught people's attention.
After Ahmed appeared on the program again the following Saturday, Vision issued a public apology and announced that the Canadian producer of Dil Dil Pakistan had agreed not to put Ahmed on his program again.
Vision's on-air apology was broadcast twice on July 27 and was scheduled to continue to be broadcast twice a day for the next week or so.
Dil Dil Pakistan broadcast its own apology at the start of its regular weekly program July 28 and will broadcast the apology on August 4 as well.
Both apologies stated that neither the program's Canadian producer nor Vision had intended to suggest in any way that hatred or violence towards people of other faiths or cultures is acceptable under any circumstances.
Vision's apology stated that the station's goal "is to build bridges of understanding amongst Canadians of different faith and cultural backgrounds" and that programs such as Dil Dil Pakistan "provide windows into other cultures and religions."
The program's apology stated that its goal is "to share the beauty and lessons of the Holy Quran with Muslims and non-Muslim members of our audience."
It further stated that the program is not intended "to promote any individual, organization, sect or particular school of thought in Islam" but that "we will strive in future to ensure that individuals appearing on Dil Dil Pakistan have demonstrated, through their writings and public statements, that they share our peaceful interpretation of the message of the Quran."
Jihad
Part of the controversy concerns the varied meanings of the term 'jihad,' which means 'struggle.'
On the July 14 broadcast, Ahmed, while expounding the Koran, said: "Jihad in the way of Allah, for the cause of Allah, can be pursued either with your financial resources or your bodily strength when you go to fight the enemy in the battlefield. Jihad, the highest form, is fighting in the cause of Allah."
Sameer Zuberi, a spokesman for the Canadian branch of the Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-CAN), told CC.com 'jihad' is a broad concept that primarily means one's personal struggle against self and base desires, though it can also include the struggle to make society as well as individuals more Islamic. However, Zuberi insisted that the term does not cover terrorist acts and that it is an improper use of the term for terrorists to use it to support their actions. Zuberi further stated that Islam enjoins respect for Christians and Jews as people of the book.
Zuberi also stated that Ahmed represents only a small minority of Muslims in Canada and Pakistan and that if Ahmed has a larger following in Pakistan, it is for teachings other than his violent ones.
However, Gordon Nickel, an assistant professor of intercultural studies at Associated Canadian Theological Schools in Langley, BC told CC.com his years of living in Pakistan have convinced him that Ahmed is in the mainstream of Islamist Pakistan.
Islam, said Nickel, contains a variety of opinions from modernists, who have been influenced by Western values, to revivalists, who are determined to spread Islam by force. Ahmed's literal interpretation of verses in the Koran calling for violence has been the traditional Muslim interpretation for 1200 years, he said.
Nickel added that the way Muslims deal with their Scriptures is usually "not very sophisticated." They believe the "very letters" of the Qu'ran are kept perfected and protected on a tablet in heaven and therefore the only proper interpretation is a very literal one. This is reinforced by a commitment to the accepted interpretation fixed in Muslim tradition.
Nickel said Christians also believe in the authority of their Scriptures, but Christians work more at trying to understand Scripture in its original context.
Vision TV's first reaction to the controversy was a statement by Mark Prasuhn, vice-president of programming, who suggested Ahmed was offering an interpretation of the Koran in its historical context and that he had not applied it to advocating violence in the present day.
However, Nickel said "most Muslim preachers" view the Koran as "an eternal not an historical document." In other words, they take the Koran's statements, including those advocating violence, as commands that should be literally followed today.
Nickel added that when Christians such as himself who have been to Pakistan talk about this, people don't want to believe them. He said that especially since 9/11, North Americans have been repeatedly telling themselves that Islam is an inherently peaceful religion and violence is advocated by only a small handful of extremists; therefore, they are not prepared for it when they hear people such as Ahmed promoting violence.
A history of violence
Muslim apologists often overlook the historical fact that Islam has largely been spread by conquest, said Nickel. He cited the argument of Lamin Sanneh, a professor of history at Yale Divinity School, that the Crusades waged by medieval Christians can be seen as a response to Islamic jihad. Nickel noted that "many Christians are repentant for the Crusades" but it is very hard to find a Muslim who has any remorse for the Islamic conquests.
Gerry Bowler, a history professor at the University of Manitoba, told CC.com Islam has always had "bloody borders," and the current conflicts in places such as Chechnya and Sudan are just the most recent examples of the wars that have been fought on the borders of Islam throughout its history. "We forget that Damascus and Alexandria and Carthage were once Christian cities," he said.
Bowler said Muslims still tend to divide the world into "the land of Islam and the land of war." He said the separation of church and state is a foreign concept to Muslims, who generally believe that Islamic law should apply in Muslim lands and in any lands that were ever Muslim, such as Spain, and that Islamic law will eventually dominate the whole world.
"Christianity and Islam have been opponents for over a thousand years," said Bowler, and to some extent "Islam and Christianity have defined each other."
Nickel said he would not necessarily advocate banning Israr Ahmed from Vision TV, but Ahmed's teaching is certainly "inappropriate for a broadcaster that wants to create good relationships between people of different faiths."
Nickel said he was also "uncomfortable" with Christian broadcasters who tie Christianity to US foreign policy and "advocate fighting Muslims."
Bowler said it is one thing for an American to advocate war as an element of foreign policy and quite another for a televangelist to advocate killing Muslims as a Christian.
A diverse history
Bowler said Christians have a diverse history in terms of the use of violence. For the first three centuries, Christians were "a persecuted minority" who submitted to the state unless the state demanded they disobey God. In that case, rather than resort to violence, Christians continued to follow God and simply accepted being thrown to the lions as a result.
It was only later that Christians developed 'just war' theory and the idea of a right to resist tyranny.
Bowler said the first instance of Christians using violence to spread their religion was in the Middle Ages, when Charlemagne invaded and converted by force the Saxons who were continually raiding his largely Christian empire.
There are also examples of Christians not resorting to violence. When the Irish were constantly raiding Great Britain, Christians converted them peacefully, and the Irish then became very successful missionaries throughout the rest of Europe. On the other hand, when the Vikings and Normans invaded Europe and were peacefully converted to Christianity, they remained violent and became leaders in the Crusades against Islam.
Under the modern liberal state, Bowler said, Christians generally limit themselves to passive resistance, such as civil rights marches, when faced with injustice.
However, Bowler said questions about the use of violence remain. Should we be like those Christians who want to impose the Mosaic law on our society? Should North Americans intervene to rescue the Karen people of Burma who are in danger being exterminated largely because of their Christian faith?
"As Christians, we can live under liberal democracy or tyranny, but the state should never have our ultimate loyalty," said Bowler.
A genuine dialogue
North Americans, and Christians especially, should "by all means go and meet with the Taliban," said Nickel, but they should do so without any illusions about the nature of human sinfulness or about all Muslims believing in peace.
Radical Muslims would be "more impressed by a firm Christianity" than by a weak faith that accepts all beliefs as equally valid and assumes that all people are committed to peace, he said.
Rather than banning Ahmed and listening only to modernist Muslim voices, Nickel said the current controversy may provide an opportunity for "a real discourse in which Muslims speak openly about Islam and dialogue with others. Where are people talking about this in an open and honest way?"
Related stories:
I'm not an anti-Semite, TV preacher insists
A fundamentalist Pakistani preacher, taken off the air by VisionTV this week in response to complaints, defended his beliefs about Jews yesterday but denied he was a hatemonger. Asked to respond to VisionTV's decision to ban him from the multi-faith religious channel, Israr Ahmad "strongly refuted the impression that he hated the Jews or he held anti-Semitic views." But the written statement, issued by his personal secretary in Lahore, went on to explain Mr. Ahmad's belief that the Holocaust was "Divine punishment" and that Jews would one day be "exterminated."
National Post, July 27
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