By Maryam Vahedi Source: GroundReport

After centuries, if not millennia, filled with dark histories of religious tensions between Muslims and Jews one may be considered delusional for suggesting that Muslims and Jews can live together peacefully in the Middle East. Many statesmen and community leaders have tried in vain to mend the differences of the followers of these two great religions. The paradoxical nature of Muslim-Jewish relations has been the focal point of Sharam Kohan a Jewish Iranian mathematical logician, philosopher and jurist. He seems to have cracked the dividing line between Jews and Muslims.

Kohan, a two times gold medalist at Iranian’s National Mathematics Olympiad, was not permitted to represent Iran in the International Mathematics Olympiad as a competitor. The Iranian officials advised him that having a Jew represent the Islamic Republic in an international event would be inconsistent with the Islamic values. In western countries such an action would have outraged masses, but not in Iran. Kohan went on to study mathematics, philosophy and law and graduated with highest distinction from college, but remained committed to alleviating the mistrust between Jews and Muslims. He recognized the most powerful tool to combat religious discrimination and hatred was Quran, which is considered by Muslims to contain words chosen by God. Muslims believe that meaningful recital of Quran frees a true Muslim of hatred. With this notion, Kohan spent years on learning about Quran and reciting it in Arabic just like a Muslim cleric would. He used his knowledge of logic to draw and gain friendship with senior logician Muslim clerics and as a result he gained access to Muslim seminaries where he learned advanced Islamic Jurisprudence as non-matriculated student. Upon graduation from law school, Kohan served as a law clerk for the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Iran, and then served as an assistant counsel to the President of Iran. Subsequently, he became a tenured professor of law at the University of Judicial Sciences, a first time for a Jewish Iranian since the 1979 revolution.

According to Kohan, Quran should be a center piece of any interaction between non-Muslims with Muslims. He theorizes that peace in Middle East depends on proper application of Quran by Jews and Muslims