Everybody and their mother knows that this situation is about religion... Each side believes that their faith promises them the same plot of land to worship their god, that's fine. I personally do not hold any of the faiths involved in this situation so (from my point of view) my opinion is as good of an outside perspective as there will ever be (there could always be smarter people who weigh in on the situation who also do not hold any of the beliefs in question, but my point is that they would be as detached as me). It's a very interesting situation to be in, given the nature of the religious motivations on all sides and trying to find a solution to the problem as well as analysis of other solutions or efforts proposed... The "left wing" perspective has basically been to try to convince, religiously motivated efforts to strengthen Israel, to basically give up on their efforts to fulfill the narrative of their doctrines, "Free Palestine". The "right wing" perspective which has been dominated by Christian values has basically been to support Israel militarily and financially. I believe that my perspective is a third way in between these two patterns.
The great thing about this situation is that one set of beliefs is falsifiable. Christians believe that once the Jewish temple is rebuilt, Jesus will return, while Jews themselves believe that once the temple is rebuilt, the true Messiah will reveal himself and Muslims obviously do not think anything will happen otherwise they would have allowed the temple to be rebuilt a while ago. Also, (If I am not mistaken) there are a few Muslim buildings that would need to be removed before the temple is rebuilt due to the location for the prophecy to be true.
Here's the idea.
Since one set of beliefs is falsifiable (as in it could be shown to be wrong if it was wrong) it could be tested and if it's wrong (which Muslims would be sure of, according to their faith) you tear down the temple and rebuild whatever Muslim holy structure was there before and we can all finally put this behind us. Since it would be such a huge thing to cope with for any religious organization, to just remove some of your most important iconic structures just so that this group of delusional fanatics (from the perspective of a Muslim who has rejected Christianity or Judaism as the correct way to interpret the world) can test their theories, I would suggest the global Jewish and Christian communities work together to figure out what it would be worth in dollars to test and see if their prophecy would come true. 500 billion dollars? A trillion dollars? Figure out what you would be willing to sell and what you would be willing to donate to the effort of compensating the Muslim world, organized probably through the Catholic Church since they are suppose to be the largest religious institution, and make a contractual offer to Palestine. Something along the lines of taking as much care as possible to remove whatever Muslim artifacts and structures with the best that modern technology has to offer (which would make the whole removal process near perfection) so that if the test proves to be false you could rebuild with the exact same materials and artifacts that were there. Having a definite amount of time for the experiment to be over, maybe after a month of the temple being rebuilt and no Messiah shows up it could be said that the prophecy was false, just to be sure that it wouldn't be this open ended affair where Muslims loose their land. There would need to be a formal process on the part of the Catholic church as well to provide all of the specific parameters (before the test begins) that would need to be filled for the prophecy to be true so that there couldn't be any back tracking of the sort that the experiment was insufficient.
I can anticipate that there might be people who are going to claim that even if there was an offer of an incredible amount like 5 trillion dollars, (half before removing Muslim artifacts, the other half after the temple was built) that Muslims are just so irrational or evil that they couldn't be reasoned with. Even though my own knowledge on this insanely complex topic of the middle east and these three religions is limited compared to scholars who have dedicated their whole professional lives to the subject, its still easy to spot when certain sides demonize their enemies instead of looking at them as human beings. I do know that there are Muslim teachings that promote peace and empathy for their fellow man, and surely there are some Muslims who would agree that helping over 2 billion people get over their obsession with this temple being built and the return (or the arrival) of the Messiah would be one of the all time acts of love for the human species as a whole and would seriously consider taking the financial compensation for their temporary sacrifice as well as the prospects of living in a world with more peace.
Its certainly a long shot (not as far off as I think some people may think it is), however I feel the two positions that I generalized in the beginning "the left" vs "the right" are both failing strategies for reasons that I haven't fully elaborated on here, and hope people consider my suggestion for a peaceful way to a resolution.
No comments:
Post a Comment