Dr Muhammad Maroof Shah

Attempting to formulate what unites and grounds world religions and allow genuine inter-religious dialogue. Isn’t it sad and embarrassing to note that while political states, “though different in culture and competing with one another,” maintain diplomatic relations and strive for coexistence. Only religions are not on speaking terms.” The core problem that hurts their relationship is the blasphemy expressed thus: “I alone have all the truth and the grace, and all those who differ live in darkness, and are abandoned by the grace of God.”       Despite the enduring perception that religions “disagree profoundly and are in opposition to one another on matters of doctrine” it seems possible that we can express the common statement of all delegates to an imagined international conference in the idiom of every major religion. All we need is to take the best interpreters of world religions who understand language of all or at least some religions and seek to express...

Reading Abraham Joshua Heschel as a sage for our times. There are some people who are irreplaceable and indispensable for proper appreciation of  our collective heritage and flowering of world culture. For instance, Iqbal and Heschel. Today we read Heschel, “a Prophet’s Prophet,” one of the  greatest Jewish philosophers and theologians and revered religious leaders of the twentieth century. As a philosopher, a theologian, a mystic, an interpreter and advocate of the Biblical prophets and their activist mysticism and a passionate critic of secular modernity Heschel’s call for transcendence recalls key themes and arguments in Biblical/Judaic idiom, in Iqbal’s various works especially Asrar-i Khudi, Bal-i Jibril , Zarb-i Kaleem and The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam . The Muslim world especially needs to take note of him to help fight increasingly pervading skepticism and nihilism, clarify certain aspects of Islamic engagement with Israiliyat and Islam’s Juda...