the seed and its sower

Submitted by manju kak (India), Aug 17, 2002 at 09:13

First. The American public is outraged in turn by the keepers of Islam. But it is important for them to differentiate between the keepers of Islam and Islam itself. It is because the individual is flawed, "human" that his responses to the tenets of islam and so it has been with the interpretations of Islam or for that reason any religion. Interpretation is rested in the needs of that community in that historical span of times as it was in teh crusades, as it will be in any idealogical warfare down the centuries.
So if those needs had been given serious thought to, assessed, debated upon when they were prime manifest a much greater understanding would have unfolded.

Second. Today it is Saddam measured by the western tenets of democracy consensus etc. The other day a British broadcasting service showed an american spokesperson commenting on Saddam and comparing him to Hitler. Such comparisons show a surprising simplistic view of the world and its cultures. When the debate was taken to a higher plane it was the peoples' right to democracy. Democracy as the americans see it? Do they not perceive it as hegemonistic to annouce that all peoples need their version of democracy. Those ingrained or brought up in other traditions do not see it so.....many assaults have been made on ancient tribal cultures with just such rhetoric...today reversed.....so political philosophies liberal ones too when they assert themselves as paramount, possess the same dangers as dictatorships.
manju kak

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