Home

Filing into the prayer room at the Masjidut Taqwa Mosque in Trenton, about 60 men and women separated into two lines, stowed their shoes on waiting shelves, and settled down in separate areas to hear Imam Abdul Malik Ali talk about peace in Islam. This was the first stop on the May 31 Mercer County Tri-Faith Walk, organized by local clergy and peace groups at the suggestion of Rep. Rush Holt (D-N.J.), whose purpose was to share and learn about peace within the three Abrahamic traditions.

As the group walked together between the mosque, the New Jersey State Museum for a Jewish perspective, and Trinity Cathedral for a Christian approach, cars honked in support and participants talked and developed an easy camaraderie. For Imam Ali, who has been active in interfaith efforts for years and was one of three imams in New Jersey invited to meet with Pope John Paul II, the walk represented "three faiths coming together and breaking down artificial barriers."

Ali outlined the basics of Islam and also addressed aspects of the religion that he felt have been misinterpreted. When Rabbi Donna Kirshbaum of the String of Pearls congregation in Princeton asked Ali, "What do you see as the biggest challenge for your congregation or the larger American Muslim community?" he responded, "Letting people know who we are as opposed to what people say we are."

From Ali's perspective, many people misinterpret the history of Islam, claiming that it is spread by the sword. He suggests, however, that it "grew by Scripture, the spiritual word."

The root of the words Islam and Muslim is s-l-m, which means literally "he rested," with the connotation of resting and hence being at peace. A Muslim, then, is one who submits peacefully and willingly to what God wants, and Islam is the peace that God has established in the world. "It is not a religion," Ali said. "It is a way of being."

Ali opened by reviewing the five principles of Islam: faith; prayer, which is the action that reflects faith; charity; fasting during daylight hours in the month of Ramadan; and haj, or pilgrimage to the religions holy sites. Then he emphasized how any religion is subject to interpretation, especially when the central document, in this case the Quran, is translated into many different languages. Religious interpretation, he suggested, depends on who the interpreters are personally and culturally.

The walk's second stop was at the New Jersey State Museum, which served as the Jewish venue because Trenton no longer has a Jewish congregation. Kirshbaum interpreted the role of peace in Judaism through prayer, song, and words, and Rabbi Adam Feldman of the Jewish Center in Princeton answered questions afterward about the Jewish religion.

To make the space sacred, Kirshbaum brought along a sacred object, a Torah, and had people look at the week's Torah portion as they walked into the building. She opened her presentation with the song "Od Yavo Shalom Aleinu," "Peace Will Come Upon," which ends in the words, "Salaam, salaam," or "peace" in Arabic. She then sang bits of Jewish liturgy, including the Friday night hymn, "Shalom Aleichem," about the ministering angels that accompany people home from synagogue on Friday night; "Shalom Rav," "May their be abundant peace over Israel"; and "Sim Shalom," "May God grant us peace."

She also talked about the root of the word "shalom," sh-l-m, meaning to complete a transaction and hence to make something whole. Then she shared an interpretation of Exodus 32:15 about the Ten Commandments, "two tablets of the Pact, tablets inscribed on both their surfaces: they were inscribed on the one side and on the other."

One interpretation is that the tablets were written on two sides, so that they were visible from both the divine and the human side. But, noted Kirshbaum, the word "side" is not there in the Hebrew, mee-zeh oo-mee-zeh, which could be translated more literally as "from this and from that," and she offered another possible interpretation. "This Torah of ours is a matter of bringing two different points of view, sometimes contradictory, in one place, and that brings about completeness."

The final stop was the Trinity Cathedral, where Deacon Chris Cox talked about peace in Christianity and led an ecumenical service. Cox offered a short PowerPoint presentation with several quotes about how Christianity views peace: "All people of God speak the same language -- the language of God, love, and peace," "God planted a longing for peace in our hearts," and "True peace is not just the absence of war, but a vision of all human beings living together as siblings, at peace with one another and with God." In the late afternoon the group shared a potluck dairy dinner.

The walkers were a colorful crew including clergy, congregants of churches, synagogues, and mosques, and longtime participants in the peace movement.

Rev. Charles Stephens of the Unitarian Universalist Church at Washington Crossing wore a stole that expressed his commitment to interfaith dialogue, sporting symbols of Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, Unitarians, and Native Americans as well as a dove representing peace. Stephens came to an interfaith vision at a young age, when the only clergy in the 350-person Wisconsin community where he grew up was the rabbi who ran a Jewish boy's camp; the rabbi was called upon for prayers at community celebrations and graduations. Stephens himself started as a Lutheran minister and eventually evolved to Unitarianism.

Stephens is active in the Interfaith Community for Middle East Peace (ICMEP), which encourages relationships between the three Abrahamic religions by providing information about the beauty in each one and their common goal of peace. In a recent event in Philadelphia, the organization cosponsored a joint appearance of interfaith activists Rabbi Menachem Froman, from Tekoa, Israel, and Sheikh Ghassan Manasra, from Nazareth, Israel.

ICMEP is an offshoot of a national group, Compassionate Listening, whose goal, Stephens explained, is: "As humanity we all have wounds, and around them is scar tissue; the heart is at the center. We try to get people to communicate from the heart."

Larry Snyder, a member of Kehilat HaNahar in New Hope, Pa., is the coordinator of ICMEP, which sponsored a trip to Israel last year to bring together Israelis and Palestinians. "What we learned is that there is truth on all sides. We need to listen compassionately to people we don't agree with as well as those who are easy to build bridges with," he said. "It is a lot of work trying to build bridges with populations not used to working together."

When Larry Cohen, a member of String of Pearls, heard about the walk, he remembered thinking, "This is exactly the type of activity that can build a community that can withstand anything that occurs." He added that it is important to establish such a community before any crisis.

As for his experience the day of the event, Cohen, who attended with his 13-year-old daughter, said, "I think it is safe to say that at some time during the day, most of us felt just a little uncomfortable, at least once. But by pushing ourselves to go a little outside our comfort zone, we all learned something."