OT - Does anyone know anything about Professor Hmida Ennaifer? He has been invited to a interreligious dialogue conférence at a very sizable Paris church.

The meeting takes place on Thursday the 1st of December, will be followed up by a "Discover Islam" session on the 4th of January.

http://www.paroisse-st-leon.net/zannexes/dialogue-interreligieux.htm

I will be going along to both meetings hopefully have a chance to ask a question or two.

Should Daffersd or any other Paris based JWers be there, it would be a great chance to hook up.

Posted by: Sebastien at November 28, 2005 6:44 AM

But after his lawyer shipped him a Bible, along with two volumes of Shakespeare, prison officials confiscated the package.

But Shakespeare was a Muslim, wasn't he? Marlowe would be a different matter, of course.

UK readers will probably know of a radio programme called, rather quaintly, 'Desert Island Discs'. (Discs are what they used to have before iPods.) Guests are asked to select eight of their favourite pieces of music, which they would like to have with them on a desert island and one book. The Bible and Shakespeare are already on the island, on the assumption that too many guests would choose one of them. In a strange reversal of this, the Koran seems to be the default text at Guantanamo and any other books a dangerous luxury.

Surely Guntanamo inmates should be encouraged to read the Bible and Shakespeare rather than the Koran? Well anything other than the Koran. Even one of those tedious novels about snow or bones that were all the rage a few years ago. Better still, N F Stovold's 'Mornington Crescent - Rules and Origins', which would be of considerable help if they ever get out and want to make their way in the real world.

Posted by: Interested at November 28, 2005 6:45 AM

If someone, if anyone, wants two volumes of Shakespeare and the King James Version of the Bible, he should be accommodated. This inmate of Guantanamo is working, no doubt, on his English. It is natural then for him to demand for the 1611 edition, when the greatest committee that ever existed had finished its work on rendering the Bible, with plenty of help from Tyndale, into the latest English, which also turned out, since their own English had been formed in the late Elizabethan which is to say the age of Shakespeare, to be the best English prose, even plain dunstable prose, ever, English perfectly pitched. But even as he works on his English by reading the King James Version he will be insensibly affected by its beauty and then, possibly, by its contents. Who could not be?

And because one of the Muslim staples is that the sheer beauty of the Qur'an -- the most wonderful Arabic ever written and other assertions that many Arabic speakers flatly disagree with, and there have even been attempts to write far better examples of classical Arabic to disprove the argument from "unsurpassed beauty" (see what Carlyle wrote about that "unsurpassed beauty" of the Qur'an and its incondite state), familiarity with the incomparably greater -- as literary artifact and in all other ways -- King James Version, might turn, or at least disturb, the odd inmate. And only the odd inmate at Guantanamo would be asking for the Bible, and Shakespeare, in the first place.

Posted by: Hugh at November 28, 2005 10:25 AM

Christian fundamentalism is a scourge that should be wiped from the face of the Earth. No more aid for the needy, comfort for the sick and dying, and most of all no more of that loving thy enemy bit (makes me want to wretch in revulsion every time I hear that!). Such fundamentalist ideas must fall and be confined to the ash heap of history if we are ever to attain an idealistic Islamic utopia.

Posted by: Lisa at November 28, 2005 12:13 PM

I wonder if his fellow prisoners know about his request.

This could be a game of "gotcha" he is playing.
They give him the Bible, he shows it to his fellow inmates, and claims that the US is trying to convert him.

Posted by: Mr Ape Pig at November 28, 2005 12:55 PM

I would allow Shakespeare, I'm sure they would just love the Merchant of Venice.

Posted by: JadeDragoness at November 28, 2005 12:55 PM

We are probably getting some interesting little insights into "pure" Islam by indulging these verminous troglodytes at Gitmo and elsewhere... This must be like heaven to these minions of Islam -- Koran all day -- Koran all night -- nothing but Koran Koran Koran! I think it's a splendid form of treatment which Sharia must endorse -- torture of pious Muslims using nothing but the Koran and Islam and their fervent religiosity as the weapon of torture... How can any pious Muslim complain? How can any pious Muslim object? How can any pious Muslim deny the clear link between a fervent belief in Islam and the terrorist mindset?

Let this pig and every other wallow in their Islam. Let their hearts and minds utterly starve on the monotony and meaninglessness of Islam. Let them become horrified, no terrified at the complete impotency of their religion to change the monotony of their squalid existence. They wanted to violently impose "pure" Islam on the rest of us? Shove it down their throats! Give them nothing but "pure" Islam -- NOTHING ELSE!

Some must begin to wonder "Where is all powerful and vengeful Allah now? What vengeance is he wreaking on my captors? I see no evidence that he is doing anything for me, his most fervent believer..." Not all, but some must be asking themselves this question.

We've probably incarcerated some pretty demoralized fanatics who possibly can be turned into deep undercover agents. When confronted with an utterly impotent and inconsequential Allah I think there may be some who will turn and turn completely into something else... our tool. Exactly what that is I cannot say -- but as long as it somehow serves our purposes -- even if it takes 100,000 prisoners to turn out a dozen or so -- it's well worth the trouble...

No bibles. No Shakespeare. Nothing but Koran Koran Koran. It should be sufficient for most "pure" hearted thralls of Islam. For the rest -- let's just wait and see...

There are great pros and cons to fighting a network of Jihadis. On the one hand, it is a very difficult thing to destroy a network, but its very nature it is resilient -- on the other every node in a network is somehow connected to nearly every other node -- you just have to be sufficiently upstream, and sufficiently deeply embedded to get the proper perspective, to become "situationally aware."

Posted by: jsla at November 28, 2005 2:42 PM

To the US Government and the so-called "mainstream" secular Progressives (i.e., radical left neo-Communists), 'Christian Fundementalists' are a greater threat than anything else.

Being 'Christian' alone is suspect. Go to church? More so. Actually read and study the New Testament? Dangerous fanatic. Attempt to live a life by Christ's teachings? Subversive enemy of the state.

The neo-Commies have set the agenda and defined the words. Today's "mainstream" is what we used to call the far-left Socialist / Anarchist / Communist fringe. A believing Christian is now a "right-wing Christian extremist".

Posted by: ODA 564 at November 28, 2005 2:53 PM

there is an attempt in many parts of the courts/ with its left media to muzzle Christians... guess they are concerned about Christians preaching turn the other cheek, etc.

Posted by: Lulu at November 28, 2005 7:57 PM

I suspect the man is engaged in the same activity, that we are, but from the other side.

He wants to Study the Bible so he can milk the quotes, and possibly prepare or help prepare his defense.

All scriptures can, and have been culled, to rationalize and justify the most horrendous of acts (ex: Slavery - Leviticus), but Judaism and Christianity, unlike Islam, have (for the most part, save for the radicals) have left behind the unsavory and inhuman exhortations, laws and justifications, whereas with Islam, the only abroggation has been when Mo got caught with his pants down (Satanic Verses) or when "no compulsion in religion" was abrogatted in favor of the verse of the sword.

Otherwise Islam is pretty much as it was, when it was hashed together during the Caliphates circa the 8th and 9th Century.

Posted by: Nariz at November 28, 2005 8:42 PM

Give the guy a bible and some Shakespeare.
Locking someone up with only moo slime excrement is turdture, even to moo slimers.

Posted by: dby at November 29, 2005 3:06 AM

I can't take this stupidity anymore!

It's bad enough knowing that these crimes against civilization are being ignored, but then to have my own government be so stupid!

How do I stay aware, without having a stroke?

I saw a bumper sticker today:

"If your not outraged, you're not paying attention."

Posted by: Libertas at November 29, 2005 3:06 AM

Why in the world would a muslim terrorist want to read Shakespeare? This is highly suspicious.
The whole thing could be a subversive operation. Where are these Shakespeare books comming from? Iran? I hope the authorities there at the prison are checking these books for hidden messages written in disappearing ink on the margins.

Posted by: duh_swami at November 29, 2005 2:30 PM

So the US government on gitmo is promting the establishment of religion. Why is the ACLU not screaming about this? Oh that's right, they want to ban the Bible everywhere.

The Quran is freely available but the Bible and classical English literature are forbidden. I didn't know that Gitmo was a public high school.

Posted by: Provoslavni at November 30, 2005 3:18 PM