Letter to a young muslim
Task 3. Uppsala, 2023-09-17
Religion in Peace and Conflict Masters Program
5RA702 RA702
Alexander Buhnevici
Letter to a young muslim regarding the Danish man Paludan and his ilk trying to provoke the أمة المؤمنين ummat al-muʼminīn into violence by burning the holy Qur’an in Sweden.
My dear brother or sister,
Peace be upon you.
I’m an average Swedish sinner and I am sick with shame.
This man that burns your holy book and uses the law of the land against you and I. He uses constitutional laws that, due to separation of religion and state, can NOT easily be changed by any king or political party, and…bear with me, should not. Laws that allow for me and my muslim friends to think and say what we want. Laws no populist may change to their will or interest.
This embarrassment to mankind uses a lighter and some fluid. To bait you into violence and create distrust and disgust between non-muslim and muslim.
Would your prophet Muhammed, a military genius, let his army be lured into an obvious ambush by one honourless man? Would Aisha or Khalid Ibn Al-Walid? Would your prophet Jesus?
Brother, would even Yuha?
When Saladin reconquered Al-Quds from the crusader king Richard “The Lionheart”, who had every man, woman and child slaughtered, he spared the Christians and even called back the Jewish refugees. Why?
I work in care. Wiping the behinds of the old, feeding and supporting and caring. Most of my colleagues are muslim. My Syrian colleagues know The Wagner group well. They sleep badly and work too hard in a strange land. We all know what Russian and Western arm and oil interests have done to your beautiful lands. Afghan kids play outside only when it's cloudy. We all know.
My colleagues are the backbone of Swedish society and a true pride to your faith.
Do you know what that man wants? I think you do.
This little Danish man openly hopes for some muslim kids, completely justified in their hurt, to lynch a Swedish cop on life tv. Or to be martyred for his ‘cause’. To make non-muslims look at my colleagues and their kids with distrust and disgust.
For Sweden to become (likely) the next target for a bomb or worse.
Why? You know.
We all know.
To vilify you and my beautiful colleagues and everything deeply respectful about your faith. And it is working. The far right parties here are growing dangerously powerful.
Now you could put a small blue-eyed child in a cage in front of the cold eye of a live streaming camera. Use that same lighter and fluid.
Baby, light my fire. -Jim Morrison
It would hardly cost you anything and you could do it every Tuesday between Dhur and Asr, with time to spare for a game of Tawla.
Or..
Represent the wisdom of your faith! Do not be baited like a hungry donkey but follow your own teachings! Read Quran 16:125 or 42:36-37 or 2:195 or 16:90. Remember the Hadith by Sahih Bukhari where the prophet Muhammed said, "The strong is not the one who overcomes the people by his strength, but the strong is the one who controls himself while in anger." or Sahih Muslimor so many other wise men and women.
Learn there is a greater community of man; a"أمة العادلين" or community of the just! The mature and rational majority among us, that, like any farmer anywhere on earth, does not wish evil upon themselves or their fellow man. Use your intelligence like God, The Prophet Mohammed and the Hadiths teach, command and hold high.
I’m but a fool, but am trying to get Paludan committed to 72 hours psychiatric care.
Or we could take away police protection and let the social monopoly on violence take its course. It is not like the cops love to be put in that situation, let alone by a man not even from Sweden!
Or, we could (it is the internet age) declare a gps localized municipal fire-ban on these book burners so that every member of the Ummah al-Adilin may use their fire-extinguishers to quench that horrible fire.
If a silly pagan can come up with these suggestions, what can the Muslim community of believers come up with?
What can you, my young muslim brother or sister, come up with that is both wise and just?
Preferably something that does not involve burning little children.
Please have faith! We need you!
With love and respect,
Alexander Buhnevici
Stationsgatan 44
75340, Uppsala
PS: Views and opinions expressed are completely my own and in no manner that of Uppsala University.
PPS: Whataboutism is not an argument I accept, kid. What about the Palestinian refugees or the thousands of muslim babies in Yemen starving to death as the princes drive their supercars? The community of the just is in every culture. Assholes are everywhere.
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Footnotes.
Hedges, Paul. Religious Hatred: Prejudice, Islamophobia, and Antisemitism in Global Context. Online version via Uppsala University. ISBN 978-1-3501-6290-7 (online). First edition, Bloomsbury Academic, London.
E.P.Evans The Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals . Copyright 1906 by William Heinemann. Available via ‘project Gutenberg’ online at https://www.gutenberg.org/files/43286/43286-h/43286-h.htm (2023-09-17, 19:05pm)
