Source: TrueSpeak.org July 4, 2008 ....... FreeMuslims.org July 4, 2008

http://truespeak.org/content.php?id=judeochristianrightsofliberty

Foreword -- As readers consider the arguments comparing and roughly equating "Liberty" and "Justice" which are made by this essay, they should keep in mind the wording of the American Pledge of Allegiance: "I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands -- one Nation, under God, with LIBERTY and JUSTICE for all."

One of the well-intended but mistaken recommendations made by Muslim academics and others to the Department of Homeland Security -- which passed it on to the public as part of a "Words That Matter" advisory -- was the idea that in the War on al Qaeda-style Terrorism we should downplay the word "Liberty" (and presumably "Democracy," as well) and should favor the word "progress" in the Muslim World, instead.

The Department's apparent approval of this idea derives from the fact that in the Arabic words by which Islam defines itself, the terms "democracy" and "liberty" and "human rights" do not exist as such. All of these concepts do, indeed, exist among hundreds of millions of Muslims but not under the terms "progress" or "progressive" -- the latter term being the ideological Left's long-standing codeword for Socialist.

The far more appropriate term to have recommended is the powerful Islamic word "Justice" -- al Adl' in Arabic and in the Qur'an -- which happens to be an equally appealing, self-identifying and inspirational word in Judeo-Christian and Western contexts, as well.

This being the case, why not use the term as a de facto Muslim synonym for "Liberty?" Why not use both terms as a common frame of reference within which both Judeo-Christian notions of "Liberty" and what remains of peaceful Muslim notions of human "Justice" can be gradually drawn closer together in socio-religious terms -- rather than falling victim to other terms which tend to define the religions as inherently conflicting or antagonistic ones?

Even if these two terms are not and may never be absolutely identical, they might in time be molded into compatible parts of an interfaith and cross-cultural bridge upon which we can all meet and agree to treat each other with largely overlapping elements of Justice and, at least in the long run, with roughly equivalent prospects of Liberty.

Responses to Pseudo-religious Scams

To discover and to strengthen the common roots of such overlapping values, we should look back into the life and times of the late, great Pope John Paul who, among all recent pontiffs of the Roman Catholic Church, enjoyed a more positive interfaith relationship with Islam than any other.

How fortunate it would be, therefore, if the late Pope's human rights antidote to the pseudo-religious Marxist-Leninist scam of so-called "Liberation Theology" were to be embraced by authentic, spiritual, good-guy Islam -- and to become its own counter-narrative to Osama bin Laden's pseudo-religious scam of so-called "Jihadi Martyrdom" (a.k.a., Irhabi Murderdom or Terroristic Genocide).

As history reveals, the story centers strongly around the late Pope -- and also around the current Pope Benedict XVI, who was for many years John Paul's alter ego on virtually all matters of papal significance. And is it not a remarkable coincidence -- or perhaps a God of Abraham Intervention? -- that major interfaith negotiations have been scheduled in Rome this Fall between the Vatican and many senior clerics, jurists and theologians of Islam.

But getting back to Pope John Paul, in addition to the purely spiritual and moral qualities of this great man of God, the element most often cited as his lasting legacy is his unfailing devotion to what he called the "Rights of Liberty" of each and every human being -- whether Christian, Jew, Muslim or otherwise.

That was certainly the central theme of his historic Papal visit to his native Poland in 1979. And it was the equally powerful theme of his January 25, 1998 homily to hundreds of thousands of cheering Cubans in Havana's Plaza de la Revolucion -- in the uncomfortable presence of "Maximum Leader" Fidel Castro, who was then pretending a rapprochement with the Roman Catholic Church.

There, as he had proclaimed in Nicaragua several years earlier, John Paul spoke clearly and forcefully about "the inalienable rights of each individual" -- as opposed to the so-called "people's rights" always extolled by Fascist Fidel's "Socialism or Death" dictatorship.

Sprinkled through the Pontiff's carefully crafted messages in both of these venues and in many others all across the planet throughout his papacy were always such powerful words and frames of reference as liberty, solidarity, justice, freedom, reconciliation, human rights, human dignity, Christian love and Divine Guidance.

In Cuba in particular, some of his rhetoric tilted appropriately toward the broader societal conditions faced by the Cubans as a people and as a distinctive culture. But other parts of his message focused far more strongly on the singularly personal rights and duties of each individual Cuban citizen and each "child of Christ."

In the final analysis, all these images were woven into the Pope's basic framework of "the inalienable (i.e., the God-given) rights of each individual" -- the same frame of reference which is a cornerstone of the American Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

In this context, the Pope quietly but unequivocally rejected -- and condemned as a "Heresy" -- the Marxist-inspired and plainly pseudo-religious movement called "Liberation Theology." This was a perverse 1970's and 80's collaboration (still alive but waning) between far-Left Christian intellectuals and clergy on the one hand and militant Castroite and Sandinista ("Stalinista") revolutionaries on the other.

Most of its adherents seemed, and still are, far more intent on promoting socio-economic class warfare in the name of a group-think "preferential option for the poor" than about an expansion of civil liberties and economic opportunity for individuals.

When the aging but supremely confident Pontiff opted strongly for the latter -- as he did in Havana, with an aging and increasingly isolated Fidel Castro sitting front row -- he forcefully proclaimed: "There can be no true liberation if, from the beginning, the Rights of Liberty [los derechos de Libertad] are not respected."

"Liberation" May Not Be Liberty -- "Jihad" May Not Be Holy

Of course, the inherent difference between so-called "liberation" and liberty is that the latter is a specific and certifiable condition. Either you have it or you do not -- while "liberation" is all too often an endless "process" which leads toward tyranny, instead.

In truth, hundreds of millions of poor souls (Russians, Chinese, Central Europeans, Cubans, Africans, Tibetans, Vietnamese, Cambodians and others) were brutally "liberated" not from oppression and slavery but from any prospect of true Liberty and, in most cases, from any prospect of national independence, as well.

Such so-called "wars of national liberation" and their attendant "Theology of Liberation" were nothing but a pseudo-religious scam -- very much in keeping with Vladimir Lenin's cynical observation (and deceitful tactic) almost a century ago that:

"We find our greatest success to the extent that we inculcate Marxism as a kind of religion. Religious men and women are easy to convert and win, and will easily accept our thinking if we wrap it up in a kind of religious terminology."

And so it is in the war against neo-Leninist "bin Ladenism" -- which has just as cynically labeled its own pseudo-religious conspiracy of hatred, murder and mayhem as one of "Jihad (Holy War) Against America and the West."

Its Lenin-like labeling of "Holy War by holy warriors and martyrs destined for Paradise" is just as deceitful as was (and remains) the Communists' perfidious rhetoric of "liberators" and "progressives" leading mankind to the promised "social justice" of a Paradise-on-Earth "people's democracy." Whether these two ungodly perversions -- bin Leninism and bin Ladenism -- are merely coincidental equivalents of a secular, temporal sort or should both be perceived as earthly manifestations of Satan himself remains to be determined.

Be that as it may, if Liberty is indeed a "specific and certifiable condition," as asserted above, it should be precisely defined by its many specific and certifiable component parts -- each of which should be in accord with the late great Pope's thinking and, presumably, on the approved human rights and civil liberties list of any true civil-libertarian, whether left- or right-of-center.

In fulfillment of this standard, displayed nearby are twenty-two very specific ingredients of this revolutionary "Theology of Liberty" -- forever "revolutionary" but hardly new -- with deep and everlasting roots in the Holy Bible, the Magna Carta, the American Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution and (if ever it were to be enforced) the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

In the ongoing War on al Qaeda-style Terrorism and in contrast to Osama bin Laden's cult of Irhabi (terrorist) Murderdom such a "Rights of Justice" movement among Muslims should also be seen as entirely compatible with the Qur'an's blessed "99 Names of Allah" -- which define both Allah Himself and his religion in such godly terms as Peaceful, Compassionate, Beneficent, Merciful and Just.

Hopefully, this will serve not only as the West's language of "Liberty" and "Democracy" but will also be seen as compatible with the Muslim World's new cross-cultural "Rights of Justice," as well -- featuring most if not all of the twenty-two specific items of personal dignity and eternal worth enumerated below.

JUDEO-CHRISTIAN "RIGHTS OF LIBERTY (& Islam's Similar "Rights of Justice" ??)

"There can be no true liberation if, from the beginning,
the Rights of Liberty [of Freedom] are not respected." ... Pope John Paul II

Freedom of ....Justice in ....the "no compulsion" practice of religion
Freedom of ... Justice in ....peaceful religious dissemination
Freedom of ....Justice in ....peaceful and compassionate religious education
Freedom of ....Justice in ....speech (personal, press, artistic, academic)
Freedom of ....Justice in ....voluntary unionism and right to strike
Freedom of ....Justice in ... the practice of peaceable assembly
Freedom of ....Justice in ....peaceable petition and protest
Freedom of ....Justice in ....access to an independent judiciary
Freedom of ....Justice in ....access to a speedy, fair and public trial
Freedom of ....Justice in ....habeas corpus (i.e., from illegal imprisonment)
Freedom of ....Justice in ....association, personal and cooperative
Freedom of ....Justice in ....ability to travel and to relocate, domestic and external
Freedom of ....Justice in ....no cruel or unusual punishment
Freedom of ....Justice in ... free, fair and regular multi-party elections
Freedom of ....Justice in ....no discrimination (class, race, age, religion, sex)
Freedom of ....Justice in ....no slavery and involuntary servitude
Freedom of ....Justice in ....information from Government about the Government
Freedom of ....Justice in ....privacy and in no unreasonable searches & seizures
Freedom of ....Justice in ....reas. access to credit, contract, property ownership
Freedom of ....Justice in ....reas. access to food, shelter, education, healthcare
Freedom of ....Justice in ....minimal abuse by "blind" or unregulated market forces
Freedom of ....Justice in ....being secure in one's own life and possessions

Finally, as a means of testing the acceptability of this list of human rights and civil liberties among individual faithful Muslims and in the Umma (the Muslim World) as a whole, we might pose the following question:

"For the rest of your life and the lives of your children, your grandchildren and your loved ones forever, would you regard the summary denial of ...[name the specific human right or civil liberty] ... a matter of Allah's eternal Justice or of Shaitan's eternal Injustice?"

To date, every single Muslim to whom I have posed this question has responded that it would be a terrible INJUSTICE to be forever deprived of any, much less all, of these self-evident and God-given "Rights of Justice."

The all-important question now is whether the Muslim World, the Umma, will actually fight for the Godly "Justice" which individual Muslims want and so desperately need -- or will it permit itself to be terrified, brainwashed, humiliated, perverted and subsumed by the fascist-Left and satanic likes of bin Laden, al-Zawahiri, al-Sadr, Nasrallah and Ahmadinejad?

JIM GUIRARD – TrueSpeak.org 703-768-0957 Justcauses@aol.com

A Washington DC-area writer, lecturer and anti-Terrorism strategist, Jim Guirard was longtime Chief of Staff to former US Senators Allen Ellender and Russell Long. His new TrueSpeak.org website is devoted to truth in language & truth in history in public discourse.