Weekly Message from Rabbi Alexandra Wright Dear Members and Friends, An eventful day yesterday which began with a sad funeral at our cemetery. What was a cloudy, unpromising day cleared as we stepped out into the grounds. I notice how, as we approach an open grave - each time - flocks of birds take off noisily and land on the roofs of nearby houses. The sun was almost warm on our skins. I always know its going to rain, said James at the cemetery as we waited for the congregation to cover the grave. The birds take cover in the trees. Later on, I caught a train to the Royal Holloway University in Egham to give a talk on behalf of the Joseph Interfaith Foundation (the UKs only organisation promoting Jewish-Muslim relations) to the universitys Islamic Society. Mufti Barkatulla, the Muslim speaker, a judge on the Sharia court (the equivalent of our Beit Din) spoke about the passage in the Quran that parallels our Akedah - the Binding of Isaac. Except in the Quran, there are some marked differences. Ibrahim, in the Quran, is shown in a vision that his son will be offered as a sacrifice and urged on by the son, they both submit their will to God as he had him laid prostrate on his forehead for sacrifice. Which son is sacrificed in the Muslim tradition, for neither Ismail nor Ishaq is named? The Mufti explained that many commentators and more popular interpretations, especially from the pulpit, understand that the son must be Ismail. But it is not a foregone conclusion and he accepted that the sacrificial victim might well have been Ishaq (Isaac). We looked at the differences and close similarities between the two stories - this account in the Quran and the Akedah in Genesis 22. And hearing Mufti Barkatulla speak about the text - its ambiguity, and about the later commentators and the way they interpreted the Quranic texts, made me realise yet again that there is so much that we share as Jews and Muslims. The Islamic faith advisor, a young man whom I had met before through the Joseph Interfaith Foundation was nervous about my presence. The leadership of the Islamic society, he said, was conservative. But the students listened attentively and respectfully and I felt that even if just one or two could see a Muslim and Jew, representatives of their communities, together in conversation and dialogue, speaking about reconciliation and understanding and those things that bring us together, then some good may result from this encounter on a dark Wednesday evening in Surrey. Shabbat Shalom, Alexandra Wright
Posted on: Thu, 23 Jan 2014 21:35:23 +0000
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015