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UMT hosts National Conference on Creating Space for Tolerance in an age of Extremism
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March 28, 2013
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Develop solutions and strategies to address extremism: Dr Hasan Sohaib Murad
In the interest of interfaith harmony and stepping towards a tolerant society, Center for Global Dialogue, in association with Institute of Islamic Culture, Lahore, and Institute of Communication and Cultural Studies, University of Management and Technology, Lahore, held a national conference: Creating Space for Tolerance in an Age of Extremism, today at the UMT campus. The conference was attended by intellectuals, dignitaries, enlightened members of the general public and students of the University.
In his keynote address, Dr Hasan Sohaib Murad, Rector UMT, said that extremism is a known menace that is threatening society and weakening our institutions. The way forward is to address it boldly, develop solutions and strategies and figure a way out of the problem.
Dr Hasan said that extremism has different meanings for different people. Generally speaking, people at difference sides of the fence or at opposing ends of the arena have different takes on various issues. Extremism begins when reasoning is compromised, when our ability to rationalize is affected. This leads to various shades of extremism and affects our ability to live with people of diverse views and faith. Sometimes, extremism is a function of power play and extremist tendencies are manifested as a reaction to display of power.
Elaborating the conflict of ideas, Dr Hasan said that the world is a battleground of ideas. Perhaps there is nothing wrong with this contest of ideas. The world’s history is replete with examples of execution of power which has been adopted as the preferred methods to enforce the preferred point of view. However, there are also two features of human society that help to deal with this. One is that people want to live in peace. And the other is the law of moderation which says that a moderate view is always good. It is this aspect of human society that enables it to reach out to diverse segments of society for cross-fertilization of ideas.
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Dr Rafia Hasan, Member Board of Governors, Institute of Islamic Culture, said that it is imperative that the spirit of the message of a liberal progressive interpretation of Islam be promoted through positive steps that stop retrogressive forces. She added that this was indeed in keeping with the vision of the Quaid-e-Azam and also of people like Dr Khalifa Abdul Hakim whose progressive interpretation of Islam needs to be propagated more widely. She said that she was looking forward to the Dr Khalifa Abdul Hakim Memorial Lecture today which is being delivered by a scholar of international repute and standing.
Delivering the Dr Khalifa Abdul Hakim Memorial Lecture for the current year, Dr Munawar Anees, Director, Center for Global Dialogue, UMT, spoke on the topic “The Muslim Predicament: between Tolerance and Tyranny”. The debate he said, is profuse with an incipient terminology that includes phrases like permissive relativism and rationalist fundamentalism. This discourse has pitted religion against everything else. Dr Anees said that irrespective of cultural and political manifestation of religious sentiment, religion per se has never been uprooted even by the use of force. Religion remains an integral part of the mass consciousness in the South as well as in the North in spite of the onslaught it has faced from communism and secularism.
On an important note, Dr Anees pointed out that fundamentalism is a Christian term that has Christian connotations and dates back to the 19th century Princeton theologians. There are no sociological or historical parallels between the fundamentalists and the Muslims. He said that history bears witness to Muslim tolerance. Compare the massacre of 40,000 Muslims in Jerusalem at the hands of the first crusaders with the recapture of Jeruslaem by Sultan Salahuddin Ayyubi who shed not a single drop of non-Muslim blood. Even in contemporary times, the citizens of the only Muslim majority country in the heart of Albania write of the rescue of Jews on their territory by Albanians (both Muslims and Christians) during World War II.
He said that the Muslim world today is facing tremendous pressure on account of the post-colonial geo-politics and the Ummah is paying a heavy price for this. Pakistan, the first ever geopolitical entity carved in the name of Islam was torn into two pieces in less than 25 years of its existence. Palestine continues to suffer to this day. Afghanistan lies in ruins. The Islamic world is torn with strife and conflict. And yet people like Bernard Lewis, Danile Pipes and Judith Miller convey that the Islamic world is an enemy of the West. This seems to be a deliberate effort to alienate the Muslim world.
On an important note Dr Anees said that Islam will remain the defining paradigm in the Muslim world. However, the Muslim predicament, no matter, how deep, is not a burden of the West. It is upto the Muslim world to realize that their future lies in their resolve to put their own house in order. Dr Anees reminded the audience that historical evidence favors the view of Muslim fidelity to their religious doctrines. However, the rising intra-Muslim strife, violence against women, sectarian murders, violation of rights of other faith communities, and violence as a political instrument under the guise of Islam are highly disturbing trends that need to be arrested. The universal ideological matrix for compassion, mercy, kindness, forgiveness, harmony and tolerance as enunciated by the Holy Quran and the Prophetic tradition, which depict true Islamic values, must be projected to the outside word.
The event also hosted a multi-faith display, Gifts of Faith, where people from different faiths displayed their prayer books for free distribution or offered event-related items.
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