Dome of the rock on Temple Mount and neighboring Jerusalem. The Muslim Times has the best collection of articles on the theme of interfaith tolerance
Source: Muslim Sunrise Spring 2017
Written and collected by Zia H Shah MD, Chief Editor of the Muslim Times
In a recent interview President Trump said about his son in law, “Do you know what? Jared is such a good guy; he will conclude an Israel agreement that no one else can do.”[i]
Dennis Ross, a counselor at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy wrote an article for Washington Post in 2016 titled, How Trump could surprise the world on Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking. He started the article by saying, “Like many of his predecessors, Donald Trump aspires to Middle East peacemaking: ‘I would love to be able to be the one that made peace with Israel and the Palestinians,’ he said recently, adding, ‘I have reason to believe I can do it.’”[ii] [iii]
Ahmed I (1590–1617) was the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1603 until his death in 1617. Today no one would know about him except that almost everyone who travels to Turkey or Istanbul gets to visit the Blue Mosque, which was built by him and is also named after him as Ahmed Mosque, right next to Hagia Sophia in Istanbul and his name will continue to live forever.
The Blue Mosque in Istanbul, Turkey
It is hard to know if President Trump really means what he has said about the peace process in Israel or it would be like another of his statements to keep us busy and bamboozled. But, giving him the benefit of doubt, I want to contribute my two cents as to how, he could settle the dispute about the most precious real estate in the world, the thirty five acre Temple Mount in Jerusalem, which is called Haram ash-Sharif by the Muslims. For the rest of the article I will call it Temple Mount as that is how the Western readers know it.
Suggested reading: Joel Osteen: Enlarging the Circle of Love
First a little bit of the land survey for the real-estate-Mughal, President Trump. As we noted that Temple Mount is 35 acres platform, about 10 stories high from the neighboring land of the old city of Jerusalem, the site where the prophet Solomon, may peace be on him, had built the First Temple, in the ninth century BC. This site of 35 acres will be equal to 141,610 square meters and would be equal to about 20 football fields. The wall lengths are approximately 280 m (south wall), 460 m (east wall), 315 m (north wall) and 485 m (west wall).
Dome of the rock is a relatively small structure which stands in the center of this parcel of land. However in the north eastern part of the Mount there is a large empty area, which is not being used for anything and largely has trees. Reviewing a few of the pictures of the area easily available makes it easy to conceptualize what I am saying about the land survey. Obviously a far more detailed survey would need to be done before President Trump and his son in law embark on this ambitious mission.
The Temple Mount in Jerusalem with the Dome of the Rock in the middle
The picture above has labeling and you can see that the north-eastern portion that I am talking about is largely wooded.
The Empire State Building took just over a year to build. The construction started in March 1930 and finished in May 1931. In other words Trump has three years for negotiation and one year for building. The Empire State Building is 1454.16 feet high, 187 feet wide and 424 feet long. Certainly something bigger and better can be built as the Third Temple in the empty space available on the Temple Mount.
The Empire State Building in New York City
Trump being a successful real estate developer, can perhaps build the Third Temple, which he could nick name as Solomon-Jesus-Muhammad and Trump Plaza, in the north-eastern part of the empty land, which would be multiple synagogues, churches and mosques combined. May be we can throw in the name of Benjamin Netanyahu in there also if he plays nice.
Rest of my article is about how to bring all the different parties around, for a 50-100 story building, with all the allure and modern amenities, worthy of being called the Third Temple.
Every Jewish, Christian and Muslim denomination that has a sizeable presence in Israel gets a floor in the plaza free of charge, as their synagogue, church or mosque and in return they provide a public relations campaign to make the project a success. The state of Israel gets to choose the leaders of those denominations, giving the state and PM Benjamin Netanyahu some stake in the process.
All these denominations could serve as public relation media to promote the peacemaking efforts of President Trump.
The rest of the stories are offices of multinationals and residential condos. So, multinationals doing business in Israel and billionaires with surplus money with genuine zeal for peace, foot the bill.
Now we are left with the two toughest parties to this negotiation, the Orthodox Jews and the fundamentalist Muslims.
Orthodox Jews want to build the Third Temple exactly where the Dome of the Rock sits these days in the center of the Temple Mount.
A picture is worth a thousand words and here is a picture from Pew Research Center from last year that at a glance gives us the demographics of different sects or groups of Judaism in Israel and in USA:
Writing for Pew Research, Michael Lipka, who is a senior editor focusing on religion at Pew Research Center, suggests about the demographics of Jews, “Israeli Jews are much more neatly grouped into four informal categories of Jewish religious identity – Haredi (ultra-Orthodox), Dati (religious), Masorti (traditional) and Hiloni (secular). Virtually all Jews in Israel say one of these terms describes their religious category.”[iv]
The Orthodox Jews are most likely to insist that the Third Temple should be exactly where the Dome of the Rock exists today the third holiest place to the 1.6 billion Muslims. Trump could perhaps convince them with the help of 90% of Jews of USA, who are non-Orthodox and 78% of Jews of Israel, who are in that category.
The Orthodox Jews can be reminded about Hillel, when asked to give a commentary on the Torah, he said, “That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn.” They could also be reminded about some of the teachings they hold near and dear to their heart, True Fasting: A Message of Compassion and Love from the Old Testament[v] and Jewish Perspective on the Rights of Neighbors.[vi]
According to a recent Pew Research Center survey of the American Jews, many of the Orthodox Jews who call themselves Modern Orthodox skip key rituals. Ten percent of Modern Orthodox Jews in the survey said they did not fast on Yom Kippur, 22 percent don’t always or usually light Shabbat candles and 17 percent don’t regularly keep kosher.[vii] [viii] The Orthodox do make compromises for their personal convenience, can they make some compromises for the sake of coexistence, for democracy and world peace.
After all the Wailing Wall, which is not even on the Temple Mount is sacred; can we not safely assume that each and every niche and corner of the 35 acres of the Temple Mount is sacred? Additionally, I propose that we should take several buckets full of dirt from around the Dome of the Rock and sprinkle it in the foundation of the Third Temple.
If the negotiations fail, the Third Temple can still be built with the blessing of a very large majority of the Jews and the Orthodox can continue to pursue their dream that they have had since 70 CE, when the Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans.
Now I come to how to deal with the hardliners among the Muslims.
In light of the dual claims of both Judaism and Islam, the Temple Mount is of course one of the most contested religious sites in the world. Since the Crusades, the Muslim community of Jerusalem has managed the site as a Waqf, without interruption. As the site is part of the Old City, controlled by Israel since 1967, both Israel and the Palestinian Authority claim sovereignty over it, and it remains a major focal point of the Arab–Israeli conflict. In an attempt to keep the status quo, the Israeli government enforces a controversial ban on prayer by non-Muslims.
But the big struggle is about the area where there is Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa mosque, which is in the south of the Temple Mount. I am proposing north-eastern corner for the Third Temple.
The land that is not being used by the Muslim community of Jerusalem or Waqf could be leased from them and it would be a constant source of funds for them for humanitarian causes. Perhaps Trump could use King Abdullah of Jordan, who is an ally of the West and President Mahmood Abbas for this negotiation. Trump could perhaps choose all the three previous Democratic Party Presidents, President Jimmy Carter, President Bill Clinton and President Barack Obama to use their influence. Perhaps each one of them would want a story in the plaza of the Third Temple named after them.
If the Muslims are opposed to a multistoried building next to their existing holy places, they need to be only reminded of the clock tower in Mecca, right next to Kaaba.
Clock Tower in Mecca with crescent on top of it; in the foreground you see Kaaba
I have shown a winning hand for all parties in the building of the Third Temple.
Now, the only possible bottle neck would be those who pretend that they want to coexist and make peace, but in fact don’t. Here, I would hope that President Trump is smart enough and strong enough to strong arm such parties.
Thomas Jefferson gave us our Declaration of Independence and our Separation of Church and State, which has ensured the prosperity of millions of Americans for more than 240 years now. Inside his memorial that was built in Washington DC during the time of President Bill Clinton there are four of Jefferson’s quotes, prominently displayed on the inside walls. One of these highlights the paramount importance of justice in our civic life, in which he used slavery as the example that existed in his time, states:
God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that His justice cannot sleep forever. Commerce between master and slave is despotism. Nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than that these people are to be free. Establish the law for educating the common people. This it is the business of the state to effect and on a general plan.[ix]
Such a Third Temple would also serve as a foundation to achieve broader peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
If such a Third Temple or Solomon-Jesus-Muhammad and Trump Plaza is successfully built, by President Trump or his son-in-law, it would become a beacon for interfaith coexistence for the whole world and President Trump will go in history, as the greatest real estate developer of all times, for centuries to come.
I, the humble author of this article, will reminisce in my old days in a nursing home, a quote from President Truman, “It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.”
The Jewish people, who gave us a lot of our science and technology and economics, would also have given us interfaith tolerance, not only in Israel but many other parts of the world.
Failing which the Jews, the Muslims and the Christians are showing to China, India and Japan, how petty we can all be. Patriarch Abraham, with whom we all associate, was certainly far better than that.
How can we build the Third Temple together? @JustinTrudeau @realDonaldTrump @POTUS44 @billclinton @CarterCenter https://t.co/NgGipQBAxp pic.twitter.com/CgFf227HyD
— The Muslim Times (@The_MuslimTimes) April 20, 2017
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References
[i] http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/16/politics/donald-trump-times-bild-interview-takeaways/index.html
[ii] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/23/us/politics/your-guide-to-most-important-quotes-times-trump-interview.html?_r=1
[iii] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/how-trump-could-surprise-the-world-on-israeli-palestinian-peace-making/2016/11/30/6e1f9c76-b5bc-11e6-959c-172c82123976_story.html?utm_campaign=331223d486-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2016_12_01&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Pew%20Research%20Center&utm_term=.6acbdcac1003
[iv] http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/03/15/unlike-u-s-few-jews-in-israel-identify-as-reform-or-conservative/
[v] https://themuslimtimes.info/2015/04/02/true-fasting-a-message-of-compassion-and-love-from-the-old-testament/
[vi] https://themuslimtimes.info/2016/09/10/jewish-perspective-on-the-rights-of-neighbors/
[vii] http://www.pewforum.org/2013/10/01/jewish-american-beliefs-attitudes-culture-survey/
[viii] http://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/nearly-1-in-5-modern-orthodox-jews-dont-keep-kosher/
[ix] https://themuslimtimes.info/2017/01/17/thomas-jefferson-memorial-inscriptions/
Categories: Interfaith, Interfaith Leader, Interfaith tolerance, The Muslim Times
In peaceful circumstances, yes, it would be possible to share the property. However, experience showed that if you give an Israeli a little finger he will claim the full arm. Therefore the reluctance of the Palestinians to share or give up anything now is completely understandable.
Thank you for a cool article. I feel that Mr Trump will successed to reach peace in Middle East— and eliminate all the extremist groups such as Hamas, Hesbulah or Iran who do not recognize the existency of Israel whereas Egypt and Jordan did.
We are waiting Saudi Arabia to recognize Israel soon. The world be better off if Saudi recognize Israel and all Islamic countries will follow Saudi Arsbia
The extremist Sunni and Syah will be eliminated and then defeated indy Allah
With ❤️
Somi is dreaming, if he thinks that Israel will ‘give in’ to anything in return to recognition. Israel is insisting that it should be recognized as a ‘Jewish’ state, meaning an Apartheid State. It did not work for long in South Africa and it will not work for long in Israel. The ones distroying Israel are in fact Israel’s own politicians.
Allah Loves People Who Love Others
Rabbi Allen S. Maller
Two brothers who had inherited land from their father, divided the land in half so each one could farm his own section. One brother’s land was mostly on a hillside; the other brother’s land was mostly in a valley on the other side of the hill.
Over time, the older brother married and had four children, while the younger brother was still not married. One year there was very little rain, and the crop was very meager.
This was at the beginning of a long term draught that would turn the whole valley into an arid, treeless, desert where grain did not grow and all the springs dried up.
The younger brother lay awake one night praying and thought. “My brother has a wife and four children to feed and I have no children. He needs more grain than I do; especially now when grain is scarce.”
So that night the younger brother went to his silo, gathered a large bundle of wheat, and climbed the hill that separated the two farms and over to his brother’s farm. He left his wheat in his brother’s silo, and returned home, feeling pleased with himself.
Earlier that very same night, the older brother was also lying awake praying for rain when he thought. “In my old age my wife and I will have our grown children to take care of us, as well as grandchildren to enjoy, while my brother will probably have no children. He should at least sell more grain from the fields now, so he can provide for himself in his old age.”
So that night, the older brother also gathered a large bundle of wheat, climbed the hill, left it in his brother’s silo, and returned home, feeling pleased with himself.
The next morning, the younger brother was surprised to see the amount of grain in his barn seemed unchanged. “I must not have taken as much wheat as I thought,” he said. “Tonight I’ll be sure to take more.”
That same morning, the older brother standing in his barn, was thinking the same thoughts. After night fell, each brother gathered a greater amount of wheat from his barn and in the dark, secretly delivered it to his brother’s barn.
The next morning, the brothers were again puzzled and perplexed. “How can I be mistaken?” each one thought. “There’s the same amount of grain here as there was before. This is impossible! Tonight I’ll make no mistake – I’ll take two large sacks.”
The third night, more determined than ever, each brother gathered two large sacks of wheat from his barn, loaded them onto a cart, and slowly pulled his cart through the fields and up the hill to his brother’s barn.
At the top of the hill, with only a little light from a new moon, each brother noticed a figure in the distance. When the two brothers recognized the form of the other brother and the load he was pulling behind, they both realized what had happened.
Without a word, they dropped the ropes of their carts, ran to each other and embraced.
Christians and Jews believe the hill is Jerusalem. Muslims believe the valley is Mecca.
I believe they are both right and God willing, someday everyone may see both cities and their sanctuaries as a pair of lungs; that are central to humanity’s spiritual inspiration by, and connection to, the One God of Abraham, Ishmael and Isaac.
Only God can make a geographical place into a holy space. Thus God’s prophets later knew that brotherly love and concern for each other had made this space into two holy places, as a pair of spiritual lungs for two holy sanctuaries on which the descendants of these two brothers will each build and rebuild a holy House for this world’s spiritual revival.
As the Qur’an states: “’Believers, be steadfast in the cause of God and bear witness with justice. Do not let your enmity for others turn you away from justice. Deal justly; that is nearer to being God-fearing.” (5:8)
When all those, both near and far, who revere their house as a standard for the world, and share it in love with everyone else who reveres it, then God will help them do, as Abraham will request: “Make this a land of Peace, and provide its people with the produce of of the land”. (Qur’an 2:126).
May the inspiration of this ancient tale, transmitted orally for so many centuries in both Arabic and Hebrew, help Christians, Jews and Muslims overcome the many hate filled actions occurring in today’s world. As the Qur’an states: Good and evil deeds are not equal. Repel evil with what is better; then you will see that one who was once your enemy has become your dearest friend…” (41:34)
May the one pair of lungs provide the spiritual energy all humans need to live according to God’s peace: ”Say: the Holy Spirit has brought the Revelation from your Lord in Truth, in order to strengthen those who believe, and as guidance and glad tidings to Muslims.” (Qur’an 16:102)
And as the Hebrew Prophet Joel (2:28-9) states: “in Messianic times the Holy Spirit will be poured out upon all the People of Israel”; and according to a statement in the seventh century rabbinic Midrash Tanna debe Eliyahu, (Friedman edition): the Holy Spirit will be poured out equally upon Jews and non-Jews, men and women, freemen and slaves.
Rabbi Maller’s web site is: http://www.rabbimaller.com Rabbi Maller’s book ‘Judaism and Islam as Synergistic Monotheisms: One Rabbi’s Reflections on the Profound Connectedness between Islam and Judaism’ (31 articles by Rabbi Maller first published by Islamic web sites) is for sale ($15) on Amazon and Morebooks.
Thank you Rabbi for these nice words.