O people, We created you all from a single man and a single woman, and made you into races and tribes so that you should get to know one another. In God’s eyes, the most honoured of you are the ones most mindful of Him: God is all knowing, all aware.
(al-Hujurat, 49:13)
(al-Hujurat, 49:13)
Human values such as culture, religion and beliefs along with our physical attributes such as race, ethnicity and language has been always the basis of cooperation or conflict among people coming from different or similar backgrounds. As we are sharing the same earth we are bound to engage with each other and ultimately have to learn to coexist in the same space if we wish to sustain our existence. In this respect interfaith and inter-cultural dialogue is a significant effort on the part of civil society. Gulen movement has always been an active group promoting this agenda in Turkey and in parts of the rest of the world wherever they can find ground for such activities.
It is important to distinguish dialogue from debate or discussion to better understand what dialogue can achieve for humanity. Purpose of the dialogue is to honestly engage the other side to understand them better while purpose of the debate is to win an argument and the goal from taking part in discussion is to reach a general agreement or to produce solution to issues at hand. Furthermore dialogue is not just being in conversation but it also entails all sorts of meaningful exchange in social, political and cultural areas.
Although dialogue can be a productive tool facilitating conflict resolution and peace building, it is valuable by itself as it is necessitated by our natural tendencies. In the Qur'an Allah says, “People, We created you all from a single man and a single woman, and made you into races and tribes so that you should get to know one another[1]” while in another verse He says “I created jinn and mankind only to worship Me. [2]” In the first verse we see that people are created differently and hence this is a basis for interacting with each other peacefully. The second outlines the purpose of the creation indicating that the main mission of the humankind is to know and worship God. Naturally one has to explore and interact with the outer world to seek God within limitations of the capacity endowed by the God. Undeniably this effort of inquiry involves dialogue with others. In addition, through dialogue one understands one’s self better by placing their selves in a framework with others whose beliefs and backgrounds different than ours. In much as the same way as colors will stand out when put in a background different than their selves, we will comprehend distinctiveness of our own identity much more clearly when compared to characters from other groups.
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| Fethullah Gulen and Pope John Paul, II |
The existence of social groups that differ on the basis of race, tribe, nationality or religion carries the potential of competition and conflict between them. There exist many different communities of believers with their distinctive religions, prophets and sacred scriptures. This plurality is both a reason for and an outcome of the human freedom to choose faith and religion, the basis of moral responsibility and final judgement. In this respect religious plurality is one of the means to test and develop human capacities. People are required to overcome inter-group tensions and their potential negative outcomes through good will and the commitment to live together in peace and justice with their fellow human beings, whatever the odds. In other words, the response to diversity through positive engagement or dialogue is one of the major goals that the divine will has set for humankind.
[1] al-Hujurat, 49:13
[2] al-Dhariyat, 51:56
Published on fethullah-gulen.net, 15 November 2012, Thursday
