The Muslims’ letter to the Pope is not all it seems
At first sight the letter from 138 prominent Muslim scholars and imams to Pope Benedict XVI and other Christian leaders published last week, ‘A Common Word Between Us and You’, is a welcome statement of a number of obvious truths — that Christianity and Islam worship one God; that both religions enjoin truth, justice and love of neighbour; and that if these two great monotheistic religions fight one another, then there is little chance of peace in the world. The letter, issued by the Royal Aaal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought in Jordan, had among its signatories grand muftis with tens of millions of followers, and pointed out that Muslims and Christians make up more than half the world’s population.
A closer look, however, suggests that the appeal is misdirected, based on false assumptions and likely to feed precisely the paranoia among Muslims that leads to violence.
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