Those Who Forget the Past (62 page)

TOWARD EXACTING AND CONSTRUCTIVE DIALOGUE

The dialogue we engage in must be anything but complaisant. The lack of trust that permeates our Western societies and the situations of religious conflict throughout the world mean that our task must be far-reaching, exacting, and rigorous. First of all, dialogue must be based on mutual knowledge achieved by our seeking to make clear our shared convictions, values, and hopes, while clearly defining and circumscribing our specificities, our differences, and what may even be our disagreements. This is what is done in most interreligious groups, and I believe it is necessary to move in this direction. But this will not be enough: we have already said that the majority of women and men engaged in this kind of meetings are rather open and ready for the encounter. It is crucial that they describe and explain what they really represent in their religious families— what trend, the extent of it, their relations with the community as a whole, and so forth. It is important to know to whom one is speaking; it is no less essential to know to whom one is not speaking, and why. Interreligious dialogue should make it possible for each partner better to understand the various theories, the points shared, the differences and conflicts that are present in other traditions. It is a matter first of not deluding oneself that the other “represents,” for example, the
whole
of Hinduism, the
whole
of Buddhism, the
whole
of Judaism, the
whole
of Christianity, or the
whole
of Islam, and second of knowing what links and types of relations our partners have with their coreligionists.

To be involved in dialogue between religions while being completely cut off from the believers of one's own religion is problematic and can be illusory. Many “specialists” in interreligious dialogue, who go from conference to conference, are totally disconnected from their religious community, as well as from grass-roots realities. This might be conceivable if it were a matter of purely theological discussions, but in most cases, unfortunately, that is not the case.
³⁸
How is it possible to have a real understanding of religious traditions and the dynamics that permeate them on the ground if those who dialogue are not actively involved in their communities? Again, how can one hope to influence believers more widely if the specialists' circle is isolated in an ivory tower and does not report back on the nature of its work to each of the respective religious communities?

So, two fundamental conditions for dialogue with the other emerge: first, to commit oneself, as far as possible, to giving an account of the shared work to one's own faith community and second, in order to achieve that, to devote part of one's energy to opening up intracommunal dialogue, which will make possible the advancement of real pluralism. This dialogue is extremely difficult, sometimes much more difficult than interreligious dialogue itself, because discussion with one's nearest and dearest is so risky. This commitment is nevertheless essential if we want to break down internal ghettoes and sectarianism and try, within manageable limits, to respect one another more. It can never be said enough that intracommunal dialogue between Muslims is virtually nonexistent. Groups know one another, know how to identify one another and work out where they are in relation to one another, but then they immediately ignore one another, exclude one another, or insult one another, without any attempt at discussion. Within one religious understanding, one current of thought, divisions are maintained by intervening organizations. The culture of dialogue has practically abandoned Muslim communities and the respect for diversity, which always has been and should have continued to be their source of richness, has been replaced by dueling disagreements that contribute to maintaining the division, which causes their weakness. Some still tentative initiatives have taken off, but the movement must become more general and must naturally go alongside involvement in dialogue with other traditions.

Apart from getting to know one another, it is also necessary to establish relationships of trust and respect. Trust is lacking today: we meet often, listen sometimes, and distrust each other often. Trust needs time and support. The frequency and quality of meetings and the nature of the exchanges certainly help to create spaces for sincere encounter. However, it seems to me that four rules should be applied which may be quite demanding as preliminaries, but which are fundamentally constructive:

Recognition of the legitimacy of each other's convictions and respect for them;

Listening to what people say about their own scriptural sources and not what we understand (or want to understand) from them;

The right, in the name of trust and respect, to ask all possible questions, sometimes even the most embarrassing;

The practice of self-criticism, which consists in knowing how to discern the difference between what the texts say and what our coreligionists make of them, and deciding clearly what our personal position is.

These rules are essential. One cannot enter into dialogue if one does not recognize the legitimacy of other people's convictions. Not to share them is one thing, but not to recognize, deep in one's heart, their right to be is another. Nor is it fitting to try to become an exegete of one's partner's scriptures. This is not our role or our area of expertise. It is for our partners to tell us what they understand or what their coreligionists understand, from such and such a text. Reading the Torah or the Bible for a Muslim, the Qur'an for a Jew or a Christian, or the Bhagavad Gita for all three is certainly useful and necessary in order to try to understand others' convictions, but these readings should inspire meditation and questions, not a simplistic accusation. We must also give ourselves the right to dare to ask all the questions that occur to us. The answers may or may not be satisfying, they may or may not suit us, but they will have been clearly stated. Trust can be born only from this frankness and clarity: in the meantime, without the latter, courtesy is but artificial or even a masquerade. At a deeper level, these are all questions that help people to go further in understanding their own traditions. Looking for a way to give a deep explanation means making the effort to understand better. The relevance of the question to my partner in dialogue is a gift, an intellectual and spiritual tonic, because I learn to express better what I believe and so to understand more deeply the meaning of what I am. Finally, dialogue involves clarity and courage: our scriptural sources have sometimes been used, or have legitimized (and still legitimize) discourses, behavior, and actions toward others about which we need to make clear statements. This is not always easy, but it is nevertheless vital, and all the religious traditions should be involved in this self-criticism. Some see it as a kind of disloyalty toward their own community; it should instead be a matter of self-respect and dignity before God and each person's conscience.

SHARED INVOLVEMENT

Dialogue is not enough. Even if it is rigorous, even if it is necessary to give time to knowing, trusting, and respecting each other, even if we should take on ourselves the widest possible responsibility to report back, it is only one stage or one aspect of the encounter among the various religious traditions. In Western societies, it is urgent that we commit ourselves to joint action.

In dialogue, we soon realize that we hold a great number of convictions and values in common. We understand very quickly that we are facing the same difficulties and challenges. But we very rarely move outside these circles of reflection. Together we say “God,” awareness, spirituality, responsibility, ethics, solidarity, but we live and experience, each one on one's own, the problems of education, transmission of spirituality, individualism, consumerism, and moral bankruptcy. In philosophical terms, we could say that we know one another in words but not
in action
. Our experience of fifteen years of joint action in South America, Africa, and Asia has convinced us not only that this path is necessary but that it is the only way to eventually change minds and build mutual respect and trust.

In the West, there are many shared challenges, first among them being education. How can we pass on to our children the sense of the divine, for the monotheistic faiths, or of spiritual practice for Buddhism, for example? In a society that pushes people to own, how are we to form individuals whose awareness of being illumines and guides their mastery of possession? Again, how are we to explain morality and boundaries, to pass on principles of life that do not confuse liberty with carelessness and that consider neither fashion nor quantity of possessions as the measure of goodness? All the religious and spiritual traditions are experiencing these difficulties, but we still see few examples of shared commitment to proposing alternatives. And there is so much to do—working together, as parents and as citizens, so that schools will provide more and more courses on the religions; suggesting ways of providing educational modules outside the school structures to teach the general population about the religions—their fundamental beliefs, particular topics, and social realities. Such modules need to be thought out together, not only by inviting a partner from the other religion to come to give a course as part of a program we have put together for and by ourselves. By way of example, the Interreligious Platform in Geneva has launched an interesting “school of religions,” and there is the Center for Muslim-Christian Studies, in Copenhagen, which, under the leadership of Lissi Rasmussen, is scored a first in Europe in establishing a real partnership within an institution promoting and practicing dialogue.

Acts of solidarity take place from within each religious family, but the examples of shared initiatives are rare. People sometimes invite others, but do not act in collaboration. One of the best testimonies that a religious or spiritual tradition can give of itself lies in acts of solidarity between its adherents and others. To defend the dignity of the latter, to fight so that our societies do not produce indignity, to work together to support marginalized and neglected people, will certainly help us know one another better but it will, above all, make known the essential message that shines at the heart of our traditions: never neglect your brother in humanity and learn to love him, or at least to serve him.

More broadly, we have to act together so that the body of values that forms the basis of our ethics is not relegated to such a private and secluded sphere that it becomes inoperative and socially dead. Our philosophies of life must continue to inspire our civil commitment, with all due respect to the supporters of a postmodernism whose aim seems to be to deny any legitimacy to all reference to a universal ethic. We need to find together a civil role, inspired by our convictions, in which we will work to demand that the rights of all be respected, that discriminations be outlawed, that dignity be protected, and that economic efficiency cease to be the measure of what is right. Differentiating between public and private space does not mean that women and men of faith, or women and men of conscience, have to shrink to the point of disappearance and fear to express themselves publicly in the name of what they believe. When a society has gone so far as to disqualify, in public debate, faith and what it inspires, the odds are that its system is founded only on materialism and ruled only by materialist logic—the self-centered accumulation of goods and profit.

We must dare to express our faith, its demands, and its ethics, to involve ourselves as citizens in order to make known our human concerns, our care for justice and dignity, our moral standards, our fears as consumers and televiewers, our hopes as mothers and fathers—to commit ourselves to do the best possible, together, to reform what might be. All our religious traditions have a social message that invites us to work together on a practical level. We are still far from this. In spite of thousands of dialogue circles and meetings, we still seem to know one another very little and to be very lacking in trust. Perhaps we must reconsider our methods and formulate a mutual demand: to behave in such a way that our actions, as much as possible, mirror our words, and then to act together.

NOTES

Although it must be pointed out that more and more dialogue initiatives are aimed at the local level and in the United States and Europe unite believers from various religions.

Qur'an 2:38.

Qur'an 6:35.

Qur'an 10:99.

Qur'an 5:48.

The Qur'an confirms this in a clear general rule: “No compulsion in religion” (2:256).

Qur'an 2:251.

Qur'an 22:40.

Qur'an 49:13.

Read and understood globally, these Qur'anic references bring together all the dimensions of “difference” among human beings: tribe, nation, race, religion.

Qur'an 29:46.

It does not mean that it would be impossible to dialog with pantheistic spirituality or Buddhism, but its ground and its focus would naturally be more essentially directed toward common moral values, ethical commitment.

Qur'an 3:64.

In the mind of Muslims, the Qur'an confirms, completes, and corrects the messages that came before it, and in this Muslims hold the same position that Christians hold toward the Jews. It is a position that is in itself perfectly coherent: to believe in a Book that comes later necessarily assumes that one considers that there is a deficiency or distortion in the former.

Qur'an 3:2–3.

Qur'an 16:125.

Qur'an 29:46.

Qur'an 5:82.

Qur'an 60:8.

Whether one translates this as “they are miscreants who . . .” or “they are infidels who . . .” depends on the sense one gives to
kafara
. We shall return to this.

Qur'an 5:17.

Qur'an 98:1. We find the same senses here: “who have done wickedly” or “who are infidels.”

Qur'an 3:19.

Qur'an 3:85.

Qur'an 2:120.

Qur'an 3:28.

See part I [of the whole book].

Qur'an 2:34.

Qur'an 2:131.

Qur'an 2:62.

On the strength of an opinion attributed to Ibn Abbas reported in al-Tabari's commentary (tafsir). It was said to be abrogated by 3:85, already referred to.

After the revelation of the last message, those who had knowledge beforehand would be judged according to their sincerity in the search for truth. Only God is the judge of this, and no human being can declare another's destiny, or his own.

The concept of “milla” used in this verse to express the idea of religion conveys the idea of “people's community of faith,” a sense of belonging, much more than the word “din,” which is “religion” or “concept and way of life” per se. 34 In Qur'anic usage, the word
mumin
(bearer of faith) usually means
Muslim
.

Qur'an 60:9.

Qur'an 16:125.

Qur'an 2:143.

As I see it, interreligious debate cannot take place by way of a debate on theological questions. We often witness a choice between extremes; either the discussion is completely theological, or the theological aspect is totally ignored and people behave as if the cause of the problem were understood. Both approaches are, in my view, defective and illusory.