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Opening Session - Speech of the Professor Ady Steg

Published on 2007-12-27 17:35:15

For the first time in history, more than 100 Imams and Rabbis, surrounded by 70 personalities from all over the world, met, from January 3 to 6, 2005, under the high patronage of His Majesty Albert II and His Majesty Mohammed VI in order to de-legitimise all forms of violence committed in the name of God or of any religious principle. Furthermore the representatives of Jewish and Muslim communities from 34 countries, in Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East and America affirmed their determination to develop dialogues and co-operation between Islam and Judaism.

Here in its entirety the opening speech of Professor Ady Steg. The Pr Steg, is for several years the president of the Universal Israelite Alliance. He is also a member of the Benjamin and Ariane Rothschild foundation that he represented at the congress.

 

It is for me, neither an imam nor a rabbi, an exceptional honor to be able to address such an assembly. Without doubt I owe this invitation to two things. First of all to the Foundation Baron and Baroness Benjamin and Ariane de Rothschild, a foundation that has a long tradition of cultural, social and scientific patronage, but which has also a fundamental vocation of bringing together, meeting and better understanding men of different traditions. The decisive investment of this foundation in the organization of this meeting witnesses an act of faith of Benjamin and Ariane de Rothschild in the good future relations between Jews and Muslims.

But it is also in a second capacity that of president of the Alliance Israélite Universelle, an institution founded more than 140 years ago, in 1860, to create schools around the Mediterranean Basin. These schools are dedicated to education but also to the propagation of French culture to assist young people to enter the modern world. It was thus in a few years schools were created from Ispahan, Shiraz and Kamanchar in the east and across the Mediterranean to the Atlantic coast of Morocco at Essaouria, Safi and Marrakech. I mention the names of some of the large towns and cities. I could also say Baghdad, Aleppo, Damascus, Jerusalem, Alexandria, Cairo and so on. But what seems to me important is that the Alliance had created schools even in small villages; and because I am very familiar with Morocco, that the Alliance had also created schools in the Mountains of the Riff and of the Atlas, and in addition on the very edge of the desert.

Though as can be imagined, the Alliance is a Judeo-Muslim story, consecrated to the communities that have woven their destinies together and who have lived in harmony. Of course, with the new configuration of the Mediterranean after the Second World War things have changed. The schools have been closed. But the Judeo-Muslim context is not a simply an element of our history it is still a powerful reality today, as is witnessed by our schools in Casablanca, Morocco.

These schools have the particularity of having a large proportion of Muslim children. And it is necessary to see them, these Muslim pupils! I would like to share the surprise, amazement, emotion that one feels in seeing these boys and girls, Jews and Muslims, sitting side by side on the same benches, studying together the same curriculum, learning Hebrew together and reading the Torah in its original version. This happy and friendly companionship is so extraordinary that I would like to underline its importance. Because it is not a mere accidental or circumstantial companionship that repeats itself day after, year after year, for decades, and that constitutes 30% to 40% Muslim pupils in our schools. These children are Muslims from all classes of the population, their parents have different political leanings and in spite of that the harmony in our schools has not been affected by exposure to events and the repercussions of the conflict in the Near East.

I would like to recall an event, that of May 2003 in Casablanca. After the attack in Casablanca, it could have been feared that the Muslim parents would hesitate to send their children to the schools. And yet, not one pupil, I emphasize not one, was missing at the role call. I know, and underline, that the influence of the formidable reaction of His Majesty King Mohammed VI has united and soothed the spirits of the Moroccan people. These events nevertheless enabled us to verify the formidable confidence of the Muslim parents in our schools.

This testimony could be considered as a mere anecdote, limited, some may even judge it as unsuitable for a meeting of such importance, and I must say that after listening to speeches of great spirituality on another plain. Nevertheless, I believe that this testimony is important because it shows an example, a model and perhaps what is essential. Because whatever the issue, the importance of the debates at their ideological or theological levels, there is one essential thing, it is meeting, and this meeting, we can see it in our schools. This meeting should be a real meeting, face to face, in Hebrew we say: paniyel panah, face against face, eye to eye, and thus this how this meeting will color all of our debates.

Well, it is precisely from this tribune I can see an incredible scene, really incredible; rabbis, imams, just as in our schools, seated side by side on the same benches, I could almost say beard to beard, prepared to study extremely difficult questions, each qualified in his science, each with his own convictions. But it is precisely thanks to this meeting we can be sure that the debates will be in the greatest respect, with the concern, without doubt, for certain to convince, with certainly the concern that all will understand the other.

Then, I can say, I see in this congress a formidable source of hope. It was incredible, even unthinkable just a short time ago. This extraordinary accomplishment was still improbable not long ago, and perhaps the success of this meeting is more in what it proclaims. Because one could think, and I think, that here commences, is set in motion, a spiritual dynamic of hope colored by a light, a new light, and who knows, perhaps this light will take form and the colors of a rainbow.

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