PGHIMC - Pittsburgh Independent Media Center

Muslim Scholar Delivers Message of Peace Between Religions
by Corey Ballantyne Thursday, Mar. 27, 2003 at 8:27 PM
cjbst57@pitt.edu (email address validated) 412 687 3996

Muslim scholar Dr. Bekir Aksoy delivers brief lecture, long Q & A, on Islam; encourages peaceful & accepting "dialogue" between religions.

Muslim scholar Dr. Bekir Aksoy of the Islamic Studies Group (ISG) at Univ. Pittsburgh delivered a peaceful lecture/discussion this evening emphasizing the importance that �dialogue� be held in a �civilized� manner between especially Jews, Christians, and Muslims about their faiths. After a short lecture, Dr. Aksoy devoted approximately 1 � hours to audience questions, giving generous attention to every question.

Islam in a general sense is �the religion of God,� he said, and encompasses the three religions which can be traced back to Abraham: Judaism, Christianity, and what we usually refer to as Islam.

In addition to people sharing their own specific beliefs, Muslims respect �people of the book,� a designation which historically meant Jews and Christians but has come to encompass most of the world�s religions.

Dr. Aksoy calmly expressed disagreement with the fundamentalisms of all three �Abrahamic� religions. He equated fundamentalism with �exclusivity� (belief that truth exists only in one�s own belief system) and called this tendency �ignorance.�

Asked about politics, his comments included the following. He considers himself both American and Turkish. He was forgiving of various countries which have not acted ideally, including the U.S. in invading Iraq at present. He said that �Muslims around the world should support the U.S.� as a superpower because of all countries which have (or have recently had) potential for world domination, it is the best; he would not like to live in a world dominated by China or by Russia under Stalin.

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Islam
by Theo Friday, Mar. 28, 2003 at 3:07 PM
TheoK444@aol.com

Wow, somebody actually understands that the problem is with fundamentalism, and not with Islam. Amazing. Does anybody remember that Fallwell, Robertson, and others spent the first weeks after 9-11 blaming gays, feminists, etc. for the tragedy? What a stunning display of patriotism and 'standing together'. Their vision of America looks a lot more like Iran's regime than the one the Founding Fathers strove to create.

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Naiive comment...
by pjd Saturday, Mar. 29, 2003 at 3:05 PM

He said that �Muslims around the world should support the U.S.� as a superpower because of all countries which have (or have recently had) potential for world domination, it is the best; he would not like to live in a world dominated by China or by Russia under Stalin.

This is a incredibly naiive comment. Has he not ever heard the very-true statement: "power corrupts - and absolute power corrupts absolutely". With the USSR gone and China serving as our one-stop sweatshop, the US is now in a position of absolute power. The democratic checks to it's power, aleways limited, are gone; it's population has been media-brainwashes to pssivity. The US should not be expected to be nice to anybody anymore.

Also, it is very arguable whether the US was ever so nice anyway. While the USA certainly provided civil liberties at home, and was "nice" toward the cooperative business people abroad (especially Arab kings, dictators and oil executives), and similarly-complected Europeans, it rained bombs, bullets and proxy death squads and secret police on any nation that dared take an independent (and many cases quite democratic) course. Since the early 1960's. the death toll in Vietenam, Indonessia, E. Timor, Central America, Africa, and South America (and now Iraq) is in the millions and counting!

I am NOT defending China or the old USSR, but the USA now has a lot bigger a body count than anything that post-Stalin USSR or post-Mao China has done.

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