Editorial

Hadrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad, Khalifatul Masih V, the Supreme Head of the worldwide Ahmadiyya Muslim com- m u n i t y, returned to London on 14 April 2004 after a month long visit encompassing Ghana, Burkina Faso, Benin and Nigeria. He opened more than twenty new mosques and visited a number of the community’s hospitals, clinics, schools and colleges. He met M r.John Ajyekum Kufuor, President of the Republic of Ghana, who remarked that he considered the Supreme Head to be a Ghanian. We shall be featuring H u z u r’s address to the Annual Convention in the June edition of T h e Review of Religions. Huzur also met Mr Mathieu Kerekou, President of the Republic of Benin, and Mr Blaise Compaore, President, and Hon. Mr Permanga Ernest Yonhi, Prime Minister of the Republic of Burkina Faso. In this edition, however, we are featuring the Supreme Head’s lecture on ‘Islam is a Religion of Peace’, delivered at the Université D’Abomey – Calavi, Cotonou, the capital of the Republic of Benin. We have supplemented this lecture by an address by the Amir and Missionary in C h a rge of Ghana, Mr Abdullah Wa h a b Adam on ‘Religious To l e r a n c e ’ , delivered a year earlier. These two articles need to be read in the backdrop of comments by the former Archbishop Lord Carey in Rome: ‘Sadly, apart from a few courageous examples, very few Muslim leaders condemn clearly and unconditionally the evil of suicide bombers who kill innocent people.’ Lord Carey would find these two articles, an eye-opener on how far Islam goes. There is no parallel teaching in any other scripture. Suicide bombers, like extremism, fundamentalism and ter- rorism, are totally alien to Islamic teachings. Then Lord Carey added, ‘Muhammad, acknowledged by all in spite of his religious greatness to be an illiterate man, is said to have received G o d ’s word direct, word by word from angels, and scribes recorded them later. Thus believers are told, because they have come direct from Allah, they are not to be questioned or revised… During the past 500 years, critical scholarship has declined, leading to strong resistance to m o d e r n i t y.’ Although the Holy Qur’an certainly promotes reflection upon its true meaning and further study, it is a complete Book. If it is not from God, Lord Carey should prove it first before he passes judgement on it. The Qur’an has never required any supplement. No one has ever been able to produce anything like its opening seven verses. On the other hand, a teaching as basic as the Lord’s prayer has been rewritten by the Church time and again. But what has its revision achieved? Has it made Christians better? Dwindling attendance tell a very different story. Perhaps that is where Lord Carey should c o n c e n t r a t e 2 The Review of Religions – May 2004 Editorial