Religious conscience

Other Voices

ABy Ahmad Al-Sarraf

doctor friend of mine says that one of his acquaintances sends him a message every Friday morning praying to God to enlighten our hearts with intimacy and help us repent for our sins, etc. The message ends with a happy morning and a blessed Friday.

The doctor says he knows the sender. He has reportedly admitted to being an adulterer and earlier was involved in more than one case of administrative manipulation.

He is also known for lying and going on leave under the pretext of visiting his daughter in a neighboring country, but in fact did something else.

The doctor says he knows someone who claims to be holy and has always something urgent to attend to. He leaves office early under some false pretext but never feels guilty.

On YouTube, a well-known Syrian preacher Mohammad Ratib Al-Nabulsi says it is a well-known fact to Muslims of Europe that they present forged documents and certificates more than the others to obtain social assistance from the government.

He said when he worshipped at a mosque in Germany, he learned that a majority of the faithful were those who took large sums of money from the state as an unemployment allowance, but they worked in secret and the Germans knew they were cheats, but refrained from putting them behind bars because most of them have big families.

Nabulsi said when the government of an Arab government this year decided to allow its citizens to go on pilgrimage provided they had not performed the ritual

Al-Sarraf

earlier and asked to fill a form later discovered 90 percent of them had lied.

The commitment to religion prevails (although many of the faithful are not committed to religious teachings). This is not limited only to Muslims but is a phenomenon which includes everyone especially those who have little education.

The difference is that religious ignorance among non-Muslims is often not a tragedy or a cause for concern because they have learned to coexist.

Muslims who are ignorant of their religion, and perhaps they are in a majority, are controversial and claim to defend it, and prepared to die for the sake of their beliefs while at the same time kill others while defending their belief without really knowing that they die and kill others too.

Therefore, those who encourage jihad among the people who are naïve are usually more knowledgeable than others about religion and are clever in selling the idea of jihad for others, but neither they nor their children fight jihad but others fight on their behalf but they share the spoils.

This is contrary to what the doctor does, for example, when he prescribes medicine to his patient and advises rest. If the doctor suffers from the same disease he will not hesitate to take the same medication that he prescribed to others. This is not what the clerics do.

We don’t need religious dosages. What we need are dosages of love and respect for others, dedication to work, punctuality, hygiene and much more.

Note: I smiled sarcastically after reading the agreement of the Anti-Corruption Authority and the Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs to develop and strengthen religious conscience of the members of society to prevent them from practicing corruption and committing crimes. Of course this is meaningless.

e-mail: habibi.enta1@gmail.com