Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Ib Warraq and Judeo Christian Origins of Islam
Ibn Warraq: The Judeo-Christian Origins of Islam (Part 9)
The Judeo-Christian Origins of Islam
by Ibn Warraq
Part 9
Part 1 here; part 2 here; part 3 here; part 4 here; part 5 here, part 6 here, part 7 here, part 8 here.
CC go on to argue that the town we now know as Mecca in central Arabia (Hijaz) could not have been the theater of the momentous events so beloved of Muslim tradition. Apart from the lack of any early non- Muslim references to Mecca, we do have the startling fact that the direction in which the early Muslims prayed (the qibla) was northwest Arabia. The evidence comes from the alignment of certain early mosques, and the literary evidence of Christian sources. In other words, Mecca, as the Muslim sanctuary, was only chosen much later, by the Muslims, in order to relocate their early history within Arabia, to complete their break with Judaism, and finally establish their separate religious identity.
There are many obscure passages in the Koran that can only be elucidated by reference to the Pentateuch or Psalms. Without going into the recondite philology of his arguments [for the details, see Michael Schub, The Secret Identity of Dhu l’Kifl, in ed Ibn Warraq, What the Koran Really Says, pp. 394-395], we can mention Michael Schub’s identification of the term “Dhu l’Kif”, which has puzzled commentators for centuries, with Melchizedeq mentioned in Genesis 14:16, Hebrews [NT] Chapters V and VII, Psalms CX. Melchizedeq is the one of who gets his share, who receives one-tenth of Abraham’s spoils, and who is to be ranked above the Levites, whose primary function under the Law was to collect the tithes, and that is precisely the sense of the Arabic Dhu l’Kifl.
Even more startling is the following example:
Surah III. 95-96; “Certainly the first house appointed for men is the one at Bakkah, blessed and a guidance for the nations. In it are clear signs: (it is) the Place of Abraham; and whoever enters it is safe; and pilgrimage to the House is a duty which men owe to Allah -- whoever can find a way to it. And whoever disbelieves, surely Allah is above the need of the worlds.”
Many translations simply add in brackets after Bakkah (Mecca), without a word of explanation. Modern Western commentators may add a footnote saying Bakkah was an alternative spelling of Mecca, as does the Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition. The classical Arabic commentary known as Tafsir al-Jalalayn completed approximately in 1467 C.E says, “The use of Bakkah rather than Mecca reflects a Meccan dialect; it is called that because it bears down (bakka) on the neck of tyrants. The angels built it before the creation of Adam whereas al-Aqsa in Jerusalem was built after that.” Here is one Muslim translator’s comments, “Bakkah is the same as Makkah [Mecca] [referrring the reader to Al-Isfahani’s Dictionary of the Qur’an] from tabakk meaning the crowding together of men [ Commentary of Fakhr al-Din Razi]. Others say it is from a root meaning the breaking of the neck, and the name is given to it because whenever a tyrant forced his way to it, his neck was broken [Razi]. Some think that Bakkah is the name of the mosque or the House itself that is in Makkah [Mecca]. The Jews and Christians are told that the Temple at Jerusalem was erected long after Abraham, while the Holy House at Makkah [Mecca] was there even before Abraham, and was in fact, the first House on earth for the worship of the Divine Being.” In other words, the Muslim commentators really do not have a clue as to its meaning.
OAFC Summer Training Was Encouraging
2011
OAFC Summer Training
Report
Standing Firm in Chirst July 2011
Dear Pr Hicham,
Thank you for your participation in the 2011 OAFC Summer Training. The complete Summer Training report is here. You can also check our Crier page on the OAFC web site for a single page document that could be used in newsletters and shared with others.
2011 Summer Training Report
Ongoing Ambassadors for Christ (OAFC), an outreach ministry serving congregations of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod held its 2011 National Summer Training July 7-14 which was based at Redeemer Lutheran Church in Springfield, MO. 124 Youth & Adult Ambassadors and guests took part in the event that was hosted by local LCMS churches in Springfield, Aurora, Bolivar, Branson, Forsyth, Lockwood, and Marshfield. These and other area congregations also provided support for meals and other events.
"Stand Firm in Christ" was selected as the Summer Training theme for 2011. This theme based on 2 Corinthians 1:21 was echoed through the week in team time, large group assemblies, Bible Studies and workshops.
Two major changes were made in the summer training schedule with a Thursday start and adding one day to the schedule. After a team building activity and supper, Summer Training made its official beginning with a brief time of worship that included soon to be vicar Mark Triplett and soon to be ordained and installed pastor Matthew Tassey. Friday included preparing for the full OAFC Outreach Weekend which would start that evening at nine area churches. Teams canvassed on behalf of their assigned church on Saturday. On Sunday morning each team had a special part in sharing the Gospel of Christ during Sunday school and Sunday Worship at their host congregation. Teams also led a devotional program at a care home in the area.
Monday morning brought the entire group back to Springfield. A variety of workshops were offered the next three days including some led by Springfield area pastors. Area pastors also led the morning devotions each day. Rev. Hicham Chehab of the Chicagoland Lutheran Muslim Mission Association was our keynote speaker on both Tuesday and Wednesday mornings.
In addition to activities for the entire group, each person was also assigned to one of 9 smaller teams. Teams served area churches with OAFC Outreach Weekends and had Bible study each morning, personal devotion time, worked on and heard personal witnesses, and prepared for canvassing. On Monday evening the entire group conducted a canvass for a new mission start by Redeemer Lutheran Church in Ozark.
From our canvasses, we were privileged to visit 3245 homes. We talked with people at 1430 of these homes. No one was home at 1815 homes where we left Gospel literature. 75 persons were discovered who welcomed a follow up visit. Of the 889 persons who answered the question, 503 made a confession of being certain of going to heaven because Jesus Christ had paid for all of their sin. 11 area youth and 9 adults were trained in witnessing with OAFC.
OAFC is a partner in the Ablaze vision of the LCMS in reaching 100million people with the Good News of Jesus by 2017. During our calls we talked to 131 persons toward that goal. These are people who have no church or are not active in a church, and to whom we have been able to share the Good News of Jesus, and who have a chance to respond to that message.
During the annual OAFC meeting, Pastor Dan Smith was recognized for his time serving as Executive Director and Dan Barz was recognized for over 10 years serving as the Assistant to the Executive Director. Rev. David Dobbertien of Seward, Nebraska was installed as the new Intentional Interim Executive Director.
The Summer Training Happening was held Wednesday evening at Redeemer with Pastor Jeff Sippy giving the message. After the closing devotion the next morning, two travel teams set out with one traveling to Wisconsin, while the other toured Missouri and Iowa. Their rendezvous is July 24.
The place and dates for the 2012 Summer Training have not yet been set. When they become available they will be posted on the OAFC web site and will be published in the Crier. New Years Gathering information will also be announced when it becomes available.
Closing Notes
God blessed our canvassing this year. While the number at Summer Training was about the same and the weather was hot, we were able to reach many more people than in 2010.
If anyone would like to share Summer Training photos on our OAFC Photo Page of the website and maybe in future Criers. Please e-mail them to me. D. Barz
Standing Firm in Christ,
Daniel Barz, Crier Editor
Ibn Warraq: The Judeo-Christian Origins of Islam (Part 8)
Ibn Warraq: The Judeo-Christian Origins of Islam (Part 8)
The Judeo-Christian Origins of Islam
by Ibn Warraq
Part 5
Part 1 here; part 2 here; part 3 here; part 4 here; part 5 here, part 6 here, part 7 here.
B. OLD TESTAMENT.
The Koran has references to only the Pentateuch and the Pslams. Moses’ name appears 136 times in the Koran, allusions far exceeding “those relating to other figures of the Islamic history of salvation, including Abraham.”[Encyclopaedia of the Qur’an, Vol. 3, s.v. “Moses” p. 419]. Bearing in mind the importance of Moses in the Koran, Patricia Crone and Michael Cook in their important work, Hagarism, put forward the thesis that the influence of the Samaritans was perhaps the decisive factor in the creation of the Islamic identity. The origins of the Samaritans are rather obscure. They are Israelites of central Palestine, generally considered the descendants of those who were planted in Samaria by the Assyrian kings, in about 722 B.C.E. The faith of the Samaritans was Jewish monotheism, but they had shaken off the influence of Judaism by developing their own religious identity, rather in the way the Arabs were to do later on. The Samaritan canon included only the Pentateuch, which was considered the sole source and standard for faith and conduct. The formula “There is no God but the One” is an ever-recurring refrain in Samaritan liturgies. A constant theme in their literature is the unity of God and His absolute holiness and righteousness. We can immediately notice the similarity of the Muslim proclamation of faith: “There is no God but Allah.” And, of course, the unity of God is a fundamental principle in Islam. The Muslim formula “In the name of God” (bismillah) is found in Samaritan scripture as beshem. The opening chapter of the Koran is known as the Fatiha, opening or gate, often considered as a succinct confession of faith. A Samaritan prayer, which can also be considered a confession of faith, begins with the words: Amadti kamekha al fatah rahmeka, “I stand before Thee at the gate of Thy mercy.” Fatah is the Fatiha, opening or gate.
The sacred book of the Samaritans was the Pentateuch, which embodied the supreme revelation of the divine will, and was accordingly highly venerated. Muhammad also seems to know the Pentateuch and Psalms only, and shows no knowledge of the prophetic or historical writings.
The Samaritans held Moses in high regard, Moses being the prophet through whom the Law was revealed. For the Samaritans, Mt. Gerizim was the rightful center for the worship of Yahweh; and it was further associated with Adam, Seth, and Noah, and Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac. The expectation of a coming Messiah was also an article of faith; the name given to their Messiah was the Restorer. Here we can also notice the similarity of the Muslim notion of the Mahdi. We can tabulate the close parallels between the doctrines of the SAMARITANS and the Muslims in this way:
MOSES, EXODUS, PENTATEUCH, MT. SINAI/MT. GERIZIM, SHECHEM
Muhammad, Hijra, Koran, Mt. Hira, Mecca
Under the influence of the Samaritans, the Arabs proceeded to cast Muhammad in the role of Moses as the leader of an exodus (hijra), as the bearer of a new revelation (Koran) received on an appropriate (Arabian) sacred mountain, Mt. Hira. It remained for them to compose a sacred book. Cook and Crone [CC] point to the tradition that the Koran had been many books but of which ‘Uthman (the third caliph after Muhammad) had left only one. We have the further testimony of a Christian monk who distinguishes between the Koran and the Surat al-baqara as sources of law. In other documents, we are told that Hajjaj (661–714), the governor of Iraq, had collected and destroyed all the writings of the early Muslims. Then, following Wansbrough, CC conclude that the Koran “is strikingly lacking in overall structure, frequently obscure and inconsequential in both language and content, perfunctory in its linking of disparate materials and given to the repetition of whole passages in variant versions. On this basis it can be plausibly argued that the book [Koran] is the product of the belated and imperfect editing of materials from a plurality of traditions.”
The Samaritans had rejected the sanctity of Jerusalem, and had replaced it by the older Israelite sanctuary of Shechem. When the early Muslims disengaged from Jerusalem, Shechem provided an appropriate model for the creation of a sanctuary of their own. The parallelism is striking. Each presents the same binary structure of a sacred city closely associated with a nearby holy mountain, and in each case the fundamental rite is a pilgrimage from the city to the mountain. In each case the sanctuary is an Abrahamic foundation, the pillar on which Abraham sacrificed in Shechem finding its equivalent in the rukn [the Yamai corner of the Ka‘ba] of the Meccan sanctuary. Finally, the urban sanctuary is in each case closely associated with the grave of the appropriate patriarch: Joseph (as opposed to Judah) in the Samaritan case, Ishmael (as opposed to Isaac) in the Meccan.
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Ex-Muslim Brotherhood member speaks to Grace Lutheran Church
centralkynews.com/winchestersun/news/ws-exmuslim-brotherhood-member-speaks-to-grace-lutheran-church-20110719,0,3230572.story
centralkynews.com
Ex-Muslim Brotherhood member speaks to Grace Lutheran Church
By Katie Kerpowski
The Winchester Sun
12:00 AM EDT, July 19, 2011
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Members of a local church gained a firsthand account into the system and beliefs of the Muslim Brotherhood from a former member and gained a better understanding of Muslim extremism and religious warfare.
The Rev. Hicham Chehab, born and reared in Beirut, Lebanon, has lived in the United States for about six years and is a preacher at Salam Arabic Fellowship, an Arabic worship service in the Chicago area. Chehab spoke at Grace Lutheran Church Sunday about his time in the Brotherhood and his long conversion journey, and said those he spoke to begin overcoming some of their fears toward the Muslim and Arab worlds.
Speaking to about 30, he emphasized the importance of sharing the gospel with the lost — how he described himself while a member of the Brotherhood, after losing his older brother to Christian militia and after first beginning the challenge of organizing an Arabic church in Chicago.
“Jesus is doing the work,” he said in his sermon. “I am not doing the work, I¿am only his humble assistant. And Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever. Every one of us has a calling … and our calling as Christians is to share the gospel with the lost.”
Chehab said at first during his sermon that people listening seemed overwhelmed with the information, because of the extensive historical background needed, but the overall reception was positive.
“Actually … it really kind of helped them overcome some of their fears towards Muslims and Arabs and helped them understand better the cultural and historical circumstances of the Middle East,” he said Monday.
In his sermon, Chehab compared America to what the Roman Empire was in Paul’s time, when he used the empire to spread the gospel because of its diversity.
“Now, America has all nations here, all ethnicities — Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists. They are in your Dunkin’ Donuts, in your gas stations, in your motels, in your colleges, in your businesses. God wants you to share the gospel with them the way the early Christians shared the gospel with those in the Roman Empire.”
Chehab said listeners seemed particularly intrigued with this point.
“People were interested in hearing this — that America could be a leader again in spreading the gospel,” he said.
Chehab also shared personal stories from growing up in the Muslim Brotherhood, the oldest and largest Islamist body and political opposition in many Middle Eastern states, most notably Egypt. He was recruited at 13 to his first military training camp and was taught how to shoot rifles.
“‘You put the rifle on your shoulder here, and if you want to shoot straight, you imagine a Christian in your sight,’” he recalled an instructor telling him at the camp.
Through email, Pastor Thomas Hoyt of Grace Lutheran said Chehab presented the Muslim religion as one that attempts to regulate the entire life of the adherent, and said those who heard him speak were enriched by the experience.
“An emphasis was also placed on the desire to control the government with the imposition of Muslim law (Sharia law) as its power grows among the people,” Hoyt said. Chehab discussed the importance of following Muhammad’s actions placed on him while in the Brotherhood.
Steve Allen has been attending Grace Lutheran for a long time and is a member of the church’s men’s group that worked to bring Chehab to Winchester. He said what he took away from his presentation was that people in the U.S. don’t realize what America is up against — a religious war — and that some Muslims are still in the conquering mindset.
“Muslims (are) proactive, and they go to church six times a day and a lot more on Fridays … and I¿think that was one of the shocking things he said was that you live it all day long,” Allen said Monday. “You live that whole life … and they are aggressive from the beginning … and they’re aggressive to get rid of people that don’t believe the way they do.
“It’s not like people hate us to hate us. It’s because people hate us for what we believe. And that’s the hardest thing.”
Allen said that from the beginning of Islam, the religion has been about taking over, but a lot of people — just as some have done in Christianity — have softened on that. He cited Westboro Baptist Church of Kansas City, which has used military funerals to protest gay rights, as one example of extremists on the Christian side.
“You’re not going to find the more mainstream Muslim people believing that they got to go out and kill Christians,” he said. “They’re not going to feel that way, and you can feel perfectly safe with them.”
Chehab, who will give a presentation to U.S. immigration officers at the end of July and has given an antiterrorism course to the Army Reserve, said most of those in attendance wanted to know how to reach out to Muslims. He expressed the importance of creating personal relationships, stressing that people don’t have to go far to meet a Muslim in the U.S.
Hoyt echoed Chehab’s statement about parishioners wanting to form friendships with Muslims.
“We need to make friends of them, respecting them as people,” he said. “It is only with personal relationships and developing trust will they be accepting of the Christian message of hope, love and forgiveness as taught by Christ.
“Our church family was pleased to offer this information to the community of Winchester. We hope to bring a message of peace and unity in Christ.”
Chehab’s sermon can be viewed through the Grace Lutheran website at http://tinyurl.com/3fqz8jx.
Contact Katie Perkowski at kperkowski@winchestersun.com or follow her Twitter, @TheSunKatie.
The Judeo- Christian Origins of Islam
Ibn Warraq: The Judeo-Christian Origins of Islam (Part 6)
The Judeo-Christian Origins of Islam
by Ibn Warraq
Part 5
Part 1 here; part 2 here; part 3 here; part 4 here; part 5 here.
Tisdall takes up the story, “In the book to which we have just referred, the event is connected with the Flight into Egypt. The tale records how the Holy Family started on the journey and for two days travelled on quietly. [The Pseudo-Matthew] then continues:—
"But on the third day after he had set out, it came to pass that Mary became exhausted in the desert through the excessive heat of the sun. When therefore she saw a tree, she said unto Joseph, ‘Let us rest a little while under the shadow of this tree.’ And Joseph hasted and brought her to that palm-tree, and took her down off her beast. When Mary sat down, she looked up to the top of the palm-tree, and seeing it full of fruit said to Joseph, ‘'I desire, if it be possible, to take of the fruit of this palm-tree.’ And Joseph said unto her, ‘I marvel that thou speakest thus, since thou seest how high the branches of this palm-tree are. But I am extremely anxious about water, for it has now been exhausted in our skin-bottles, and we have nowhere whence we can fill them and quench our thirst.’ Then the Child Jesus, who with joyful countenance lay in His mother the Virgin Mary's bosom, said to the palm-tree, ‘O tree, lower thy branches and refresh My mother with thy fruit.’ Instantly the palm-tree at this word bowed its head to the sole of Mary's feet: and they plucked the fruit which it bore, and were refreshed. And afterwards, when all its fruit had be plucked, the tree still remained bent, since it was waiting to rise up at the command of Him, whose command it had bowed down. Then Jesus said unto it, ‘O palm-tree, arise and be of good cheer, and be thou a companion of My trees that are in My Father's Paradise. But with thy roots open the spring that is hidden in the ground, and let water flow forth from that spring to quench our thirst.’ And the palm-tree instantly stood erect, and streams of very clear, cool, and very sweet water began to come forth from amid its roots. And when they beheld those streams of water, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy; and they with all their quadrupeds and attendants were satisfied and thanked God."
Tisdall continues, “Instead of connecting the palm-tree and the stream that flowed from beneath it with the account of the Flight into Egypt, the Qur'an, we have seen, connects them very closely with birth of Christ, representing Him as having been born at the foot of the tree, and at that moment (according to one explanation) directing the tree to let its fruit fall for Mary to eat, and telling her of the flowing streamlet. From its accordance with this apocryphal Gospel in this respect, it is evident that this explanation of the words of the Qur'an is more likely to be correct than the gloss which attributes the speech to Gabriel.
“But we have now to inquire from what source the Qur'an borrowed the idea that Christ was born at the foot of a tree: and also what is the origin of the legend that the tree bowed down to let the mother and Child eat of its fruit. It is hardly necessary to say that for neither the one statement nor the other is there the very slightest foundation in the Canonical Gospels.
The source of both incidents is found in the books of the Buddhist Pali Canon, which, as we are informed in the Maha-Vamso, was reduced to writing in the reign of King Vattagamani of Ceylon, probably about 80 B.C. at latest. But it is very possible that very considerable parts of these Pali books were composed several hundred years earlier. The legends contained in them were, in later but still very early times, widely spread, not only in India and Ceylon but also in Central Asia, China, Tibet, and other lands. Buddhist missionaries are mentioned in Yesht XIII., 16, as having appeared in Persia as early as the second century before Christ. The influence which Buddhism exercised on thought throughout Western, as well as Central, Eastern and Southern, Asia was immense. Manichaism, Gnosticism and other heresies were largely due to this, as was the rise of Monasticism. Several passages in the apocryphal Gospels show that ideas of Buddhist origin had gained access to the minds of the writers of these spurious works, though doubtless these men were quite unaware of the real source of their inspiration. It was easy for Muhammad therefore to be misled in the same way; and we can point to the very passages in the Pali books which represent the earliest known form of the legends about the tree.
One of these occurs in the Nidanakatha Jatakam (cap. i., pp. 50-3). There we are told that when Maya, who was to be the mother of Gotamo Buddha, was with child and knew that her time was at hand, she obtained her husband Suddhodano's permission to return to her father's house to be delivered, according to the custom of that country. On the journey she and her handmaidens entered a beautiful forest, and Princess Maya greatly admired the abundant flowers which she saw on some of the trees. In the words of the passage to which we refer, the account of what then took place runs thus:
"She, having gone to the foot of a well-omened Sal-tree, became desirous of grasping a branch of the Sal-tree. The Sal-tree branch, having bent down like the end of a stick well softened with steam, came within the reach of the princess's hand. She, having stretched out her hand, seized the branch. ... Childbirth came upon her just as she stood, grasping the branch of the Sal-tree."
Saturday, July 16, 2011
Former Muslim Brotherhood member brings message of peace to Winchester
By Katie Perkowski
The Winchester Sun
12:00 a.m. EDT, July 16, 2011
A¿converted Christian and a former member of the Muslim Brotherhood is bringing his story of conversion and a message — to not fear Muslims — to Winchester.
The Rev. Hicham Chehab, who was born and lived most of his life in Beirut, Lebanon, has lived in the U.S. for about six years and is a pastor at Salam Arabic Fellowship, an Arabic worship service in the Chicago area. It’s associated with the Lutheran Church for Missouri Synod, and its first Arabic language service was in March 2008.
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Chehab, who will speak at Grace Lutheran Church Sunday, described how Beirut, the largest city of Lebanon and its capital, in the days before the Lebanese Civil War was known as the “Paris of the Middle East.” The city lies along the Mediterranean seaside, or “corniche” in Arabic, with palm trees, fishermen and joggers lining the sidewalk along the way. It was deemed the “Paris of the Middle East” because of its thriving tourism, five-star hotels and energetic nightlife that rivaled some of the best tourist destinations in Europe.
Chehab described the city in the 1960s, before the war, as a cosmopolitan town with tourists from all over the world and as a fashion town. The American University of Beirut, where he later attended school, also brought in professors and professionals from all over the world to work.
“The neighborhoods were mixed, and we used to see a lot of Europeans and Americans,” he said.
When thousands of Palestinians were expelled from Jordan in a bloody mass exodus, Black September, many fled to nearby Lebanon. The new arrival of thousands of Palestinians and the Palestinian Liberation Organization caused friction in the country, and, although this wasn’t the sole cause, in 1975, the Civil War broke out.
“Everything became chaotic,” Chehab said, adding that hotels and businesses were looted, shops downtown were looted and burned, and Christian militias began facing off against Muslim militias. “Downtown was a battlefield.”
Tourism halted, traffic laws were not obeyed, gunmen appeared on the streets daily, kidnappings happened and there was a lot of arbitrary shelling between Christian and Muslim neighborhoods, he said.
“So it was like a chaos, however … because Beirut was such a beautiful place, every month, people would say ‘Next year it will be better, next year there will be a solution.’ People had hope in the beginning,” he said.
By 13, he was recruited by the Muslim Brotherhood, and he said the focus was on discipleship and training children to know exactly the Muslim theology and know the Koran partially by heart. Smoking and drinking were taboos.
“However, something very important was we had to kind of dispense ourselves from everything that looked Western, especially the media. They were against watching TV¿or going to the movie houses, and they believed that the media was a tool for Westernizing the Arab and Muslim world,” he said.
When the war began, he fought against Christians, and while he was on his way to becoming a Muslim preacher, he got in a car accident that set him back for a year. After this, he decided to go to AUB to study medicine, and in 1980 during his first semester, a Christian militia killed his brother.
Chehab said when his brother was killed, he couldn’t really hold the course load he had, so he dropped all classes except one — one that included discussion of the Bible. His reasoning for this was to make friends with some Christian militia members so he could know where they moved at night and where they lived.
But then one day he heard the Sermon on the Mount in class, and it began his slow change of heart and long journey to Christianity.
“I¿thought this was really ridiculous, but I can say I used to memorize parts of the Koran by heart, and I never heard something so peaceful like calling for peace and invocation that calls for peace like this,” he said of his first time hearing the sermon. “Peace for the enemy, peace for the human kind, and I¿was kind of distorted … I¿was very kind of leading an unpeaceful life, and I¿needed peace, and I¿thought ‘Maybe this is the answer.’”
He recalls sneaking into churches to hear priests speak about Jesus, and he felt he wanted to be a peacemaker, “the peacemaker that Jesus described in his Sermon on the Mount.”
When the Civil War ended around 1991, Chehab found a nongovernmental Christian-Islamic dialogue association to bring the two religious sects together in hopes of healing the wounds of the war. He said it took a long time for him to completely go to Christianity because he was unsure if it was a step he should take, and he lived like a “secret believer” for a long time.
Chehab earned a master’s in the history of Arabs and a Ph.D. in the history of Islam, and he was baptized in 2000. He then worked with a Lutheran church missionary in Beirut. He tried to do missions for Palestinian-Muslims for six months, but he couldn’t raise enough funds to continue.
In 2004, he came to the U.S. and began attending the Concordia Seminary in Fort Wayne, Ind., and by 2009 completed his seminary studies. Now, he is a pastor for Middle Eastern communities in the Chicago area, and he travels the country spreading his message of peace.
Pastor Thomas Hoyt of Grace Lutheran, said he saw Chehab’s name in some of the church’s district newsletters, and he said the church’s men’s fellowship “had been reviewing some information about Islam and wanted to share some of the information to other churches.” He said he hopes a big crowd comes.
On Wednesday, Chehab said he had done four lectures in 24 hours and was traveling from Missouri by car. He said he only flies when it’s absolutely necessary, because of the changes after 9/11.
“I used to breathe freedom here, especially coming from the Middle East,” he said. “I used to feel everybody is relaxed, everybody is not worried about anything. Maybe this isn’t good, but boarding a plane was like boarding a bus. We didn’t feel we needed to go ahead of time and go through security, but one of those times I¿was traveling from Canada to the U.S. or vice versa … on the Canadian-American border, they discovered my Lebanese passport, and everybody was given a blue basket to put their things.
“I was given a red basket and given an escort like somebody who would hold me if I¿were to attack somebody … and I¿felt like the Scarlet Letter … I¿felt like I¿had a scarlett letter on my coat.”
He recalled that even though he showed he was a “peacemaker,” his word didn’t count at all, and that the word “profiled” is not enough to describe the experience.
Chehab said many Christian converts from Islam and people who work in his field contribute to “fear mongering,” and go around saying all terrorists are Muslim, which he said he agrees with partially.
“But I’m saying those are human beings like us, and they have their own dreams and their own human weaknesses,” he said. “And they are people like us, and I¿believe they need love and forgiveness like we do.”
Chehab spoke to about 200 high schoolers and college students Wednesday, and he said one of his messages was that while some say they should lead people to Christ, “I tell them we should love people to Christ.”
“We should let Christ shine through us and be a light to the people.”
Chehab will teach the Sunday Bible class at Grace Lutheran, 108 Hemlock Road, at 9:15 a.m. and be the guest preacher at the 10:30 a.m. worship service. He’ll also present his testimony through a video presentation, “The Road to 9-11,” at 1:30 p.m.
Contact Katie Perkowski at kperkowski@winchestersun.com or follow her Twitter @TheSunKatie.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Iranian Pastor Tried for Apostasy
Citing President’s Christian & Muslim Heritage, Rutherford Institute Calls on Obama to Intervene in Execution of Christian Pastor in Iran
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, has called on President Obama to intervene in the impending execution of Youcef Nadarkhani, a Christian pastor in Iran who was convicted of apostasy. In a letter to President Obama, which was copied to the Iranian ambassador, members of Congress and other key dignitaries, Whitehead urged the president to demand that Iran abide by its obligations under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and its own Constitution, which provides that “no one may be molested or taken to task simply for holding a certain belief.”
The Rutherford Institute’s letter on behalf of Youcef Nadarkhani is available at www.rutherford.org.
“If citizens in Iran cannot depend upon the protections of the most basic human rights provided in their own Constitution, then we must offer them the solace of a watching world that is willing to intervene politically,” stated John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute. “Surely we cannot stand silently by as this man of faith is martyred. Youcef’s imminent execution presents the United States with an opportunity, and, I submit, a duty, as a beacon of liberty, to interpose its influence and authority on behalf of such inalienable human rights as are inherently beyond legitimate government sanction.”
According to reports by the Assyrian International News Agency, Christian pastor Youcef Nadarkhani was convicted of apostasy after protesting the government’s decision to teach Christian schoolchildren--including Youcef’s own 8- and 6-year-old sons--about Islam. Over the course of the past two years Youcef has spent in prison, he has allegedly suffered various forms of inhumane and irregular punishment, including a denial of access to his attorney, the arrest of his wife, threats to place his two sons in the custody of Muslim families, and the administration of drugs in an attempt to force him to recant his religious faith. Youcef’s sentence to be executed by hanging was recently upheld by the Iranian Supreme Court. It is reported that the death sentence may be carried out at any given time without advance notice. Youcef will likely be ordered once again to recant his faith, and if he refuses, he will be executed immediately.
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