Whither Civilization Dialogue!

When the United Nations declared a decade of dialogue between civilizations the aim was to create understanding among different peoples and easing of tension and solving of conflicts. Of course there has been a kind of dialogue between civilizations as well as intra-civilization dialogues. Or rather between two cultures sharing common or different civilizations.

Dialogue is all the more relevant as there is a palpable heightening of the stakes in the common existence of people on the planet. On March 19, 2008 Osama bin Laden declared that Pope Benedict was playing a “large and lengthy role" in a "new Crusade" Unless peoples sort out problems across continents and among believers of all faiths there is likelihood of more disturbance than has been till now. Pope began his papacy on a controversial note rather than a reconciliatory one. His Regensburg address ofSeptember13, 2006 came as a shock. He was carried away by the weltanschauung post 9/11 His equating Islam with violence is not logos or reason. Moreover he is another custodian of Europe which will move on the axis of Hellenism, Judaism and Christianity and would have nothing to do with either other continents or their philosophy or belief.

The Pope as well as the Emperor of Byzantine or Manuel II Paleologus both have a preconceived view of Islam which according to them spread only through the sword and not the word. They have conveniently left out the example of Umar who was the deadliest enemy of Islam at the time of the prophet. It was the word that he heard and got converted to Islam. He would have slaughtered with his own hand even his sister if she dared to read the Quran. However, hear the word of the Quran he did and that mellowed him. He it was who also went berserk and would have killed Ali for declaring the prophet dead. But Abu Bakr read out the holy book on the mortality of even the messenger of god. That changed his heart. If you want logos, reason or word, it is there as it is in the Bible. A person informed of all these would not have pestered any Persian interlocutor with “Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached”

Muslims around the world protested against the pope in the remaining days of September 2006. But 138 learned among them reflected over the matter for more than a year and wrote an open letter titled: “A Common Word between Us and You,” emphasizing common ground between the two religions. That was October 13, 2007. On November 18, 2007, 300 Christian leaders welcomed the move albeit with apologia for the crusades as well as the excesses committed in the war on terror in the present time.

There appeared a consensus on submitting to one god and also respecting your neighbour as yourself. The Muslim Council of Britain showed great promising change. For the first time it joined the Jews and others in observing the Holocaust Memorial Day, January 27. They also took a lenient view of such matters as a Muslim’s right to convert, promoting a Muslim woman’s right to equal space inside the mosque, taking the initiative in creating guidelines for self-regulatory mechanisms to ensure mosques are not abused for promoting extremism, teaching imams to preach that forced marriages and domestic violence are "un-Islamic".

As the dialogue is still underway an unusual happenstance threatens to queer the pitch. Pope Benedict baptized the Egyptian born prominent Italian Muslim in what otherwise could not be but an ostentatious checkmate to the dialogue. He baptized 55 year old Magdi Allam and named him “Christian” during Easter vigil mass on March 22, 2008 at St. Peter’s Basilica. He was one of seven converted at the hands of the Pope. Why to single out him? It is self evident that he is a stormy petrel. As a deputy editor of the Corriere della Sera newspaper he has been vociferous in his denunciation of the Palestinians and his unbridled praise for the Israelis and his castigation of Muslims. Such a fanfare is not the way of the people of faith. This carries a message which neither the Pope and nor the neo convert need couch in words. But the implication is provoking.

What lacks as momentum in the dialogue between two people professing two different although Abrahamic religions is the opportune time. As compared to this impasse there is another dialogue going on that is intra civilization. The US is the core state of the Western civilization. The candidacy of Barack Obama is focus of the world. Having a Somali father and a white mother and family spread out on three continents he delivered a speech on racial theme that has been waiting for this suitable time. Obama calls slavery as his national’s original sin and cautions his fellow Americans that they might not take his candidacy as an exercise in affirmative action to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap.

The presidential hopeful knows that the coloured people are a part of him and they are a part of America, the country he loves. Hence he calls for an understanding of the problems caused by racism and a solution to the problems that beset them like degradation of schools and job opportunities and health care. He puts his finger on the raw nerve when he says: “we’ve heard my former pastor Reverent Jeremiah A Wright use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offended white and black alike.. .I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother..’

It is widely believed that this speech has opened a dialogue on the racial theme. It calls for all the sides to face the fact and live accordingly with moderation and understanding. Hate has no place here. Can it be allowed to have a place in the more comprehensive dialogue mentioned earlier? We can hope to begin in right earnest by listening to the word of the Bible. "First take the log out of your own eye and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbour’s eye".