A Tariq Ramadan Interview

by Zakiah Koya, not me.

Zakiah asked me to read her work, and like her biggest fan, I did. Good job, Zak.

Malaysia has been through a lot lately. And if you guys don't want to listen to each other, go ahead an listen to an "outsider," which in irony, is also a way of saying: listen to the viewpoints of others. It's getting the lame the way we are fighting. So lame that it's reaching the point of raising red flags.

Here is Zakiah's full interview with Tariq Ramadan. This is a blurb on what he has to say about interfaith dialogues, and how - contrary to popular belief - is not detrimental to the religion.

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We have a perfect religion, yes, but we are not perfect. Dealing with other religions means that we are challenging the very meaning of ours. When we have a dialogue, sometimes when we meet Jews, Christians, Buddhists, agnostics or atheists, the way they are helps you to better your religion as they may make you see something which you have neglected to see.

For example, when I was in South America, the priests there were talking of love. So, I learnt to also talk of the spiritual dimension of love in Islam and its importance in life. So the experience of others is helping you to have other viewpoints of your religion.

When we talk about values, when we speak about dignity and solidarity and when we talk about racism, dialogue can be very important because at the end of the day when dealing with Christians and Buddhists – why do they have to listen to me? – because together we want to change the world for the better. We want to make our world a better place.