INTERVENTION OF SPECIAL GUEST, MR MUHAMMAD AL-SAMMAK, POLITICAL COUNCILOR FOR THE
MUFTI OF LEBANON
At 6:30 p.m. the President Delegate, H.B. Ignace Youssef III YOUNAN, gave the floor
to Special Guest, Mr. Muhammad AL-SAMMAK, Political councilor for the Mufti of the
Republic (LEBANON) and then to Special Guest, Ayatollah Seyed Mostafa MOHAGHEGH AHMADABADI,
Professor at the Faculty of Law at "Shahid Beheshti" University, Member of the Iranian
Academy of Sciences (IRAN). We publish here the full intervention of Mr. AL-SAMMAK:
When
I was honored with the invitation to the Special Synod for the Middle East, I asked
myself two questions. The first is the following: why is this Synod consecrated to
the Christians of the East? And the second: what does it mean to invite a Muslim to
this Synod, what role can I play there now and in the future? As for the first
question, to try to answer it brings up many more questions. First of all, had
the situation of Eastern Christians been a good one, would we have needed to call
for this Synod? And then, can this Synod ensure the serenity and confirm their roots
in the land of their fathers and ancestors, in this land where the light of Christian
faith arose to embrace the whole world? Personally, as a Muslim, I truly believe
it is very important for the Vatican to focus its attention on the problems of Christians
in general and the Eastern Christians in particular, this East source and cradle of
Christianity. At the same time, I hope that the initiative of the Saudi Arabian king
Abdallah Ben Abdel Aziz in favor of interreligious and intercultural dialogue can
move the Arab and Islamic attention to this cause, under all its national, religious
and human dimensions, so that these two initiatives, the Vatican and the Saudi Arabian
one, can complete each other towards the resolution of the problems of Christians
in the East, knowing that this is one and the same Islamic-Christian issue. As
for the second question, I don’t think I was invited to this Synod to learn about
the difficulties of Christians in certain Eastern states. Our suffering as Easterners
is only one. We share our suffering. We live them in our social and political delays,
in our economic and developmental regression, in our religious and confessional tension.
However, this fact of making the Christian the target because of one’s religion, even
if this is a new and accidental phenomenon for our societies, can be very dangerous;
the greatest danger is that it poses the problem of reciprocity. This, in fact, is
a phenomenon foreign to the East and which is, more so, in contradiction with our
religious cultures and our national constitutions. Because this indicates two very
serious facts: First, an attempt to tear away at the fabric of our national societies,
to break them apart and to take away the ties of their complex tissue built up and
recognized over the past centuries. Then the attempt to show Islam in a different
light than the one it truly reflects and in opposing what it professes and in contradiction
on what it is fundamentally based upon, the knowledge of the differences between peoples
as one of the signs of God in creation and as the living expression of God’s Will,
as well as the acceptance of the rule of pluralism and the respect for the differences
and faith in all Divine messages and in what God revealed. The Holy Koran says: “Of
the People of the Book are a portion that stand (for the right): They rehearse the
Signs of Allah all night long, and they prostrate themselves in adoration. They believe
in Allah and the Last Day; they enjoin what is right, and forbid what is wrong; and
they hasten (in emulation) in (all) good works: They are in the ranks of the righteous.”
(3:113-114). Two negative points demonstrate the problem faced by Eastern Christians: The
first point concerns the lack of respect for the rights of fully equal citizenship
when faced with the law in certain countries. The second concerns the misunderstanding
of the spirit of the Islamic teachings, especially the part relative with Christians
which the Holy Koran qualifies as “nearest among them in love to the believers ” and
justifying this love by saying “this is because there are priests and monks among
them and because they do not behave proudly”. These two negative points, with all
they entail as to negative intellectual and political content, and in all they imply
as attitudes relative to the agreements and their applications and cause as worrisome
and harmful actions, are bad for us all - Christians and Muslims - and offend all
of us in our lives and in our common destinies. For this, we are called upon, as Christians
and Muslims, to work together to transform these two negative elements into positive
elements: in the first place, through the respect for the bases and rules of citizenship
which accomplishes equality first in rights and then in duties. In second place, in
denouncing the culture of exaggeration and extremism in its refusal of others and
in its wish to have the exclusive monopoly on an ultimate truth, and in working towards
the promotion and spreading a culture of moderation, of charity and of forgiveness
as the respect of the differences of religion and beliefs, of language, of culture,
of color and of race, and as we are taught by the Holy Koran, we put ourselves at
the judgment of God about our differences. Yes, the Christians in the Middle East
are being tested, but they are not the only ones. Yes, the Christians in the Middle
East in fact do need support and help, but this should not ease their emigration or
turning within themselves, nor through the abandonment of national and moral duties
towards them by their Muslim partners. To ease emigration, this is forcing them to
emigrate. To turn in on oneself, is to slowly suffocate. To Abandon the right to defend
the rights of others for a free and dignified life, is to diminish the other’s humanity
and abandon the constants of faith. The Eastern Christian presence, which works
and acts with Muslims, is a Christian as well as an Islamic need. This is a need not
only for the East, but also for the entire world. The danger represented by the erosion
of this presence on the qualitative and quantitative levels is a Christian as well
as an Islamic concern, not only for Eastern Muslims, but for all Muslims all over
the world. Furthermore, I can live my Islam with all other Muslims from all states
and from all ethnicities, but as a Middle Eastern Arab, I cannot live my being Arabic
without the Middle Eastern Christian Arab. The emigration of Christians is an impoverishment
of the Arabic identity, of its culture and of its authenticity. For this reason,
I underline once again here, before the stands of the Vatican, what I have already
said before the stands of the venerable Mecca: I am concerned with the future of Eastern
Muslims because of the emigration of Eastern Christians. To maintain the presence
of Christians is a common Islamic duty as well as a common Christian duty. The
Christians of the East are not a minority by accident. They are at the origins of
the presence of the East before Islam. They are an integral part of the cultural,
literary and scientific formation of Islamic civilization. They are also the pioneers
of modern Arabic renaissance and have safe-guarded its language, the language of the
Holy Koran. Since they were at the forefront in the liberation and return of sovereignty,
today they are also at the forefront to confront and resist occupation, to defend
the violated national rights, especially in Jerusalem, and in occupied Palestine in
general. Any attempt in approaching their cause without considering these true
facts, rooted in our national societies, ends up in the wrong conclusions, based on
the wrong judgment and lead in consequence to the wrong solutions. Therefore, it
is very important that this Synod be something more than the cry of Christian suffering
which echoes in this valley of pain which is our suffering East. Hope rests upon the
practical and scientific foundations the Synod may give in favor of an initiative
of common Islamic-Christian cooperation that can protect Christians and watch over
Islamic-Christian relations, so that the East, the place of Divine revelation, remains
worthy of raising the banner of faith, charity and peace for itself and for the entire
world.