The Canadian Islamic Congress Discusses the Old Testament

Mohamed Elmasry of the Canadian Islamic Congress.

I have previously documented MPAC's excursus into Qur'anic exegesis and James Zogby's opinions on the Torah. Now, here comes Mohamed Elmasry of the Canadian Islamic Congress with a discussion of the Old Testament. If possible, he makes an even greater fool of himself than do the other two. Arguing that "Israel's campaign of death, destruction and misery against the Palestinians under its occupation is true to its Holy Book; the Old Testament," he draws on a 1953 book by French pacifist Jean Lasserre, La Guerre et L'Evangile, to make his case. Drawing on Lasserre's view that by and large, "the Old Testament ignores that respect for human life, that unconditional love, that non- violence, which [is] the general climate of the New Testament," Elmasry portrays Israel as fulfilling its blood-thirsty attitudes.

Comment: This is drivel, of course, and for several reasons: The Old Testament is not the caricature drawn by Lasserre, the Jewish religion has evolved greatly over the past 2,500 years, and the socialists, humanitarians, and assorted post-moderns who dominate Israeli life are hardly under the sway of the Tanakh. That said, Elmasry's simplistic interpretation should warn non-Muslims about reading the Koran and thinking they understand twenty-first-century radical Islamic movements. For this reason, I discourage reading the Koran for political insights. (July 7, 2006)

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