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Thursday, June 24, 1999
Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, Dignified Ulemas, Brothers and Sisters, On this day every year, hearts of Muslims, all over the world, converge on the cherished memorable occasion of Prophet Muhammad's birthday anniversary; peace be upon him, the ultimate of the prophets, sent by Allah Almighty as a mercy to the whole world, a harbinger advocating good, warning against wrong-doing and calling people to believe in God. Through his message, the world was changed, the march of history well-guided, a million of people delivered from dark pits of ignorance and tyranny to the open light of knowledge and justice and beneficial cooperation, cordiality and peace realized. As we celebrate this occasion, we muslims,fully recognize that Prophet Muhammad's birthday is not a mere occasion for exchanging congratulation, inattentive to meanings of loftiness and perfection of his manners and pure mode of life. Moreover, we should not ignore the core of this sublime message that we will continue, God willing, to uphold before God then the people; the message of the tolerant Islam. Since the very beginning, Islam has preached that in the judgment of Allah Almighty, the essence of humanity is far more sublime than all incidental features of colour, race, wealth and authority. In Islam, preference for individuals and nations is based on good doing, acts beneficial to people and generous giving. Within this noble meaning, Gabriel bore Gods words to our Prophet: Mankind! Lo! we have created you male and female, and have made you nations and tribes that ye may know one another. Lo! the noblest of you, in the sight of Allah is the best in conduct As we are observing this glorious anniverssary on the threshold of a passing century where the lights of science, construction and development were mixed with the darkness of war, violence and oppression, we announce anew to the whole world the great principle declared by the Prohet, peace be upon him, i.e.,difference of languages, colours, and races must not be a reason for conflict, clash, or aggression but it is rather a divine law of creation and a gift bestowed on His creatures. So, what is now called plurality, that is being advocated and respected by people, is a fact that was clarified and repeatedly elaborated by Divine Revelation more than four centuries ago. This plurality is seen as grounds for people to get closer and more friendly to each others. It should be also a motive to encourage competition and vieing for good doing. Allah Almighty says: Had Allah willed He could have made you one community. But that He may try you by that which He hath given you (He hath made you as ye are). So vie one with another in good works. Dear brothers, as we celebrate the birthday anniversary of our great Prophet, we once more extend our hands to the world with open hearts and minds to those living around, hoping that the beginning of the new century would be an auspicious sign for cooperation and exchange of knowledge and experiences rather than beginning of conflict, hostility and monopoly of prosperity. We hope people belonging to different civilizations co-existing on this planet will achieve consensus, as we are entrusted by God to inherit reconstruct and preserve this planet. The great scientific revolutions, achieved through flourishing of knowledge in the fields of transportation, communication and information have dismantled the barriers of time and space between nations and peoples. Hence, people of different cultures are in the same boat, confronting common dangers as well as sharing the same major interests. While directing our message to all of them today, we should follow the example the life story of our great Prophet who began his message by uniting the hearts of believers and improve relations between them. Under Allahs command, his message extended to the People of the Scripture who were with him as Allah says in the Holy Quran: People of the Scripture! come to an agreement between us and you: that we shall worship none but Allah. Then, the message reached its highest when he announced that all mankind of different races and origins are honoured, as Allah says in the Holy Quran: Verily we have honoured the children of Adam. We carry them on the land and the sea, and have made provision of good things for them, and have preferred them above many of those whom we created with a marked preferment. Thus, he put the building block in establishing effective protection of human rights and freedom, in addition to reinforcing the sanctity of his life, property and dignity. In his Farewell Pilgrimage Sermon, he declared that, Your lives and property are as sacred as this day of this month in this country until Dooms Day. Dignified Ulemas, Brothers and Sisters, In these words, I declare to the whole world in your name, that we Muslims are advocates of unity and concordance. At the dawn of the coming century, we are determined to be the first to call for justice, peace and respect of human rights. We derive these noble human orientations from the principles of our religion, the life story of our Prophet (peace be upon him) and from our deeply rooted cultural heritage. Hence, we declare that human tolerance is solely the true face of our great religion that has been misunderstood and misinterpreted by many people. It is time to refute such unjust accusation and ungrounded, unfair deformation of our Islamic culture. Brothers and Sisters, Here in Egypt, we have made up our minds and pledged to God to proceed forward on a path, flanked with difficulties and fraught with hard work. However, we understand that this is the only path to raise and improve the nations conditions and make it qualified to rise to the aspired position among peoples of the world at the dawn of the new century. It is the path of sustainable and comprehensive development and construction at home as well as reunion, patching up differences and achieving comprehensive reconciliation among the Arab and Muslim nations. It is also a path for participating strongly and meritoriously in building up a new world order based on justice in the political fields, equel opportunities in social and economic fields, as well as respecting specific indentity and idiosyncrasies in matters of thought, ethics and culture. On the home front, thanks to the help of Allah Almighty and unrelenting endeavours of our great people, we have made a good progress in construction and reform. Such construction and reform deserve to be looked up with satisfaction and assurance, while looking forward for more. We have restructed our national economy and turned it to a new direction where the state has no monopoly of economic activity but rather provides the widest opportunity for individuals, institutions and private capital to participate in this activity in the framework of freedom and fair competition, protected by a modern legislative system which encouragse, facilitates and stimulates investment. This generation of our people has witnessed the manifestation of a real qualitative leap in the standard of service performance and in the components of the infrastructure, on which the progress of production and services are based. We then proceeded forward to new vistas of construction and reform. Cognizant of the magnitude of challenges, we began to establish mega projects beyond the limits of partial development in the traditional sense of the word, to make a radical change in the peoples living standard, allowing large numbers of this people to get out of thebounds of the narrow Nile valley to new areas.To go to, let alone settle in such areas, was thought of in the past as risky and unimaginable.Thus, urbanization is extended, population re-distributed all over the land and wealth redoubled to cover all this great people. Egypt considers that the reunion, mending differences and the endeavour to achieve a comprehensive reconciliation among the people of the Arab Islamic Nation as one of the main principles of its policy with its neighbours , brotherly and Arab countries. Never has Egypt spared any efforts in this respect, nor has secluded its efforts from those of the Arab League and the Organization of the Islamic Conference nor the good offices by some of the presidents and kings. In so doing, Egypt is prompted by its belief that the unity of the nation, achieving the integration between its sources of power is the only and exclusive way to effectively defend its rights and interests. In an age where people unite rather than stay a part, peoples get closer; seeking more strength, reinforcing competitiveness and increasing opportunities for contributing to establish a new world order. Nevertheless, we should not disregard the fact that there are pending issues and small or big problems that still awaits solution. We are aware of the roots of these problems and the obstacles hindering their resolution over years. We remind ourselves and our brothers that we have no other choice but to rise above reasons of differences, reconsider our order of priorities. We should be aware of the volume of political and economic interests which are served and supported by unity, coordination and bridging gaps between stances and policies, as much as harmed and hindered by extremism, fanaticism and rumination of reasons for dispute. On the international arena, we closely and carefully follow up the profound changes that have taken place in the international community and the duties these change impose on us. The old world order has collapsed and no new clear one has risen yet. The world is still passing through a restless transitional stage which is not void of disorder and chaos. Economic interests intermingled among countries and peoples. Most of the countries have formed economic groups that protect the interests of their members and compete with other groups sometimes in a friendly and other times in a severe aggressive way. Our nation will not be able to share in such competition unless we change some of our old orientation and behaviour in dealing with ourselves and others. This change, in my opinion, includes two major issues: First: Dismantle the barriers of isolation which have for long years separated some of our countries from the world surrounding us. Isolationism is no longer possible nor beneficial since continued communication with others only will grant us the opportunity to get closer and participate in building the new international order as well as tackling the existing problems besides removing the misunderstanding resulting in loss of mutual confidence between peoples and the various cultures. Second: Put an end to mental and psychological confinment to the past; our new generations should be aware that the platform of our real battles is the present and the future. While the essence of our religion and culture is deeply-rooted in the past, yet we should not rely complacently on our past glories which no longer serve as a suitable ground for our present communication with others nor will they result in any awakening nor open the doors of future before us. In order to achieve the above-mentioned results, our new generations should possess two weapons that exclusively enable us to open the doors of future: the first is science and innovation which even surpass the importance of military power and population density. Science is now the path for nations competing for supremacy and leadership. The second weapon is persistene, unrelenting work and perfect performance by all citizens. We should all be aware that there is no room in the new coming century for sluggish performers, preoccupied with slogans and big talks rather than hard work. Besides any industrial, agricultural, or service productions are valueless unless they rise up, in terms of quality and efficiency, to the level of their competitors in world markets which are now open, without any limits, to all, where commodities and services are promoted exclusively on the basis of high quality. Reverend Ulemas, Brothers and Sisters, This is my address to you on this glorious day. We talked about the eternal message of Islam and the consequences that our nation confronts on the threshold of the new century. However, we cannot finish our talk before we dwell in endless reverence and love on the birthday anniversary of the gracious prophet by whom Allah guided us towards this great message. Through his immaculate course of life, his records of traditions, verses and gracious deeds that still enlighten our life with guidance and justice, we can identify several features, that we cannot enumerate in this brief talk. Suffice it, on the birthday anniversary of prophet Muhammed, to recall that the prophet who declared the message of pure, exclusive monotheisn, only of God Eternally-Besought-of All, has also laid down the principle of the oneness of humanity, regardles of barriers of sex, race and colour. We are all brethren in hummanity as we all descend from Adam. Suffice it that the Prophet presented to mankind a tolerant Sharia as Allah says in the holy Quran He will make lawful for them all good things and prohibit for them only the foul; and he will relieve them of their burden and the fetters they used to wear. This Sharia is based on facilitation and releasing embarssment as Allah says in the Holy Quran Now hath Allah lightened your burden, for the knoweth that there is weakness in you. Suffice it that he called upon us to seek endless useful knowledge and, when reading, to do so in the name of Allah who createth and who teacheth by pen .Teacheth man that which he knew not. He also called us to work incessantly and warned us that on Dooms Day, our acts would be presented before God Almighty and seen by His Messenger and believers. He elevated the value of the good word, resembling it to a goodly tree, set firm in the ground, its branches reaching into heaven. We will be talking endlessly, if we are to track his virtues and seek good exampleout of his fine qualities. Suffice it that we have loved him, believed in him and followed his enlighting message. Today, as we celebrate his birthday anniversary, honouring the prophet and his message,we ask God Almighty to grant us power and determination in order to live up to the message we are entrusted with. We are confident that He Almighty will question us about it, as Allah Almighty, addressing His Gracious Messenger and ourselves: And Lo! it is in truth a Reminder for thee and for thy folk; and ye will be questioned. May Allahs peace and mercy be upon you. |
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