Thought of the Week: 4 June 2015
Written by Writings & Sermons by others — 4 June 2015
Last night at Alyth, Jeremy Smilg, historian of British Jewry and Alyth member read an extract from Voltaire’s London diary from the late 1720’s. He was at the London Stock Exchange where he noted appreciatively that “here Jew, Mohammedan and Christian deal with each other as though they were of the same faith and only apply the word infidel to people who go bankrupt.” As Jeremy told us, at the time there were fewer than 8000 Jews in Britain and unlikely to have been more than a few hundred Muslims and as it seems they lived well with each other. Now according to the 2011 census Britain is home to 263,000 Jews and, 2.7 million Muslims.
A Jewish community that is serious about contributing to the society around us and which lives up to its Hebrew name shaaeri tzedek (the gates of righteousness or justice – Alyth’s Hebrew name since 1933) must make great efforts to understand the issues facing the very substantial Muslim community. We need to build relationships within it in order to ensure that at times of amity we can help build Britain together and at times of crisis we can speak with each other to prevent discord. These are the aims of a series of events over the coming months which our Clergy are organising called “Am to Umma – A Jewish community understanding the Muslim Community”. The Hebrew word am means people – as in Am Yisrael Chai! The Arabic word Umma means the same, referring to the Muslim people around the world in all their different denominations.
Over the past six months I have been privileged to spend nine intense days at Winsdor Castle together with Reform and Orthodox Rabbis and lay leaders, Muslim Imams and community leaders and Christian ministers. We have been training together to be better leaders under the auspices of Cambridge University Department of Divinity. We also resolved to bring our new found understanding of each other back to our communities to share.
The first Am to Umma event will be an open Iftar, the fast breaking meal during the month at Ramadan here at Alyth on the evening of June 25th. Rabbi Maurice pioneered this event last year at Alyth and since his ground-breaking action it has spread to other Synagogues and Churches throughout the country. We are inviting our local Muslim community to join us and the event will be co-hosted by Muslim community leader Julie Siddiqi. Please ask any Muslim friends or colleagues to come and join us and come yourself from 20:30-22:00. it is so late as the fast does not break until 9:20pm! The evening will include learning together and sharing food and conversation.
In the months to come we will host lectures, shiurim and even a sermon from some fascinating people who are deeply respected in their own communities. Our guests will include the Imam who is the official adviser on Muslim affairs to the British Armed Forces, the Imam of the Leeds Makka Mosque, a community which has had to repair itself after knowing that the 7/7 bombers of a decade ago came from the West Yorkshire Muslim community and which continues to face challenges of the radicalisation of young people, an Imam who works with the British Council to use drama and performance art to influence Muslim communities abroad to understand the British way of life, and a Muslim woman scholar from Cambridge who adeptly teaches the common values of three religions from Koran, Torah and the Christian Bible.
This should be a fascinating journey and will create lasting understanding and rich relationships for the good of the Jewish community. If you would like to be sure to receive early notification of each of these events and classes as the dates are fixed then please send your e-mail address to mark@alyth.org.uk otherwise you will find details of all in our weekly e-mails and Around Alyth.
Rabbi Mark Goldsmith