Pakistan Today: By Rabia Ahmad: It’s interesting how the blowback following recent terrorist incidents has forced people all over the world to re-examine their convictions. You wish we’d do the same, here in Pakistan. Dr Larycia Hawkins, who teaches political science at Wheaton College near Chicago, remarked on Facebook recently that Muslims, Christians and Jews worship the same God. Wheaton College, an Evangelical institution could not let such statements pass since according to Christian belief their God is not the Muslim God, and Dr Hawkins, a tenured professor, found herself placed on administrative leave. But that wasn’t all. Hawkins, who has written about race, religion and issues relating to American politics, spoke with the local chapter of the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) to find out if Muslims would be offended if a non-Muslim woman wore the head covering called ahijab, considered to be the preserve of Muslim womanhood. Obviously the Council replied they would not because then Dr Hawkins, a teacher who clearly believes in the practical side of education, decided to wear a hijab in solidarity with Muslim women who have been facing some bias of late.
Thinking logically, isn’t it odd that although decrepit Muslim sensibilities remain intact when a Christian woman wears the hijab, they fall apart when others who are called non-Muslim inscribe verses from the Quran on the graves of their dead? This is what happened in 1989 resulting in an FIR being registered by the Punjab police against the entire population of the city of Rabwah because its people inscribed Quranic verses on the graves of Ahmadiyya people in the graveyards of that city. Shall we think about this for a moment, all of us, including those who condemn the show of intolerance by Wheaton College? If the residents of Rabwah were wrong in doing what they did, Dr Hawkins was also wrong in wearing thehijab, but clearly if you check out the comments on that news report, most people think she did the right thing, and that it was the College that was at fault. Time to relate events to concepts and attitudes, and vice versa.
Thank you for sharing my column on your site. Although it does take the reader to the original article in Pakistan Today I would appreciate a clarification regarding its authorship on this page.