President Gül Attends Holy Birth Week Inaugural Program

Delivering a speech at the opening program of the Holy Birth Week in Ankara the theme of which this year is “sincerity”, President Gül said: “I believe that these activities will help our people to understand better the august personality and illuminating guidance of our Prophet and will greatly contribute to the establishment of the atmosphere of peace and love for which He pioneered and which He always adviced us all to achieve. 

President Abdullah Gül and First Lady Hayrünnisa Gül attended the inaugural program of the Holy Birth Week held at the Ankara Arena Sports Hall. 

The Presidential Couple upon their arrival at the hall were welcomed by President Mehmet Görmez of the Presidency of Religious Affairs. 

The program was launched with Sala and Salavat (hymns praising the Prophet Muhammed); narration of Siyer (His life story); recital of the Quran and  promotional video of the theme of the Holy Birth Week, which is sincerity. 

IMPORTANCE OF SUCH ACTIVITIES 

Afterwards, President Gül took the floor and expressed his happiness at addressing his audience on such a meaningful night. “Tonight we have gathered here to commemorate our holy Prophet, who was sent by Allah to everyone and everything as a symbol of Allah’s mercy. 1143 years ago, Messenger of Allah, the Prophet Muhammed, was born. I would like to extend my thanks to the Presidency of Religious Affairs for organizing this event and to those who have contributed to such a meaningful activity. I believe that these activities will help our people to understand better the personality and illuminating guidance of our Prophet and will greatly contribute to the establishment of the atmosphere of peace and love for which He pioneered and which He always adviced us all to achieve.” 

“ALL PROPHETS CONVEYED THE SAME DIVINE MESSAGE” 

President Gül further stated that all prophets conveyed the same divine message and universal truth to peoples in different and diverse geographies and periods of time. “This faith is the most important fulcrum of the comprehensiveness and universiality of our religion. His 23 year-long Prophethood from the first day He conveyed the first message from Allah through Allah’s help and blessings was full of truths and facts that enlighten and guide us at all times. He will continue to illuminate the whole world not only with the messages He conveyed to the community He also belonged to and to us all but also with his quintessential and unique example and with his life that witnessed the thruth. The fact that He was mortal like everyone else in His community is emphasized in several verses of the Quran. Also, there are verses that remind some in His community, who were expecting supernatural miracles in order to believe what He said, of the fact that He was also a human being. Due to this very humanbeing identity of our Prophet, the divine messages appeal to humanbeings’ minds and thinking and reasoning abilities, moving the pure dispositions within their characters and natures. The fact that Allah says that He has sent His messages to a community that can ‘think’ and ‘contemplate’ proves the fundamental function which the mind and thinking have in the development of Islam and its civilization.” 

“OUR PROPHET WON THE CONFIDENCE OF ALL”

Prior to receiving the first message from Allah, our Prophet was also appreciated by everyone due to his modest, fair and pure honest personality, said the President, adding: “He, even in a community which was made up of diverse and mostly belligerent tribes, was able to win the confidence of all, which is why He was called Muhammedu’l-Emîn (Trustworthy Muhammed) by everyone. Thanks to this very significant quality and character He had, those who were not biased believed Him without expecting a miracle or something like that from Him when He brought the first message from Allah. As for those, who did not relinquish the bigotries and heresies of their community which are called ‘cahiliyye (ignorance)’, chose to ignore the facts, closed their eyes and ears to the truth and resorted to antagonistic acts. However, our magnanimous Prophet forgave the leaders of Mecca and their followers who displayed every enmity against Him and His friends even after our Prophet conquered Mecca and overcame the biggest hurdle in the way for the Islamic community to take roots. Showing a quintessential behavior to all humanity, He did not resort to wrath and revenge, thus establishing a spirit of living together side by side. 

UNIVERSIALITY OF MESSAGES OF PROPHET MUHAMMED 

Reiterating that the pieces of advice, suggestions and warnings the Prophet underscored during His Farewell Summon must be kept in mind all the time, President Gül continued as follows: “As the Islamic world and Muslim people, we all should examine our harmony with these warnings and advice. The Farewell Summon is full of strong warnings and recommendations regarding segregation, gender inequality and economic exploitation. That these warnings still apply to not only the Muslim countries but also the modern and developed countries demonstrates once again the universiality of our Prophet’s advice and warnings. I’m referring to them because I want us to understand better the reasons of both the situation the Islamic world has been in for a few centuries and its socio-economic and political picture which is not so bright at all.” 

DEVELOPMENT PROCESS OF ISLAMIC COMMUNITY

The small Islamic community whose foundations were laid by the Prophet Muhammed came to become one of the few most important political and economic powers in 20-30 years after His death, noted President Gül. “Despite the many sad events, struggles and internal divisions, it was able to implement many unprecedented scientific, social, intellectual and economic developments in a broad geography for centuries. The extraordinary spread of the Islamic communities to diverse cultures, beliefs, life styles and civilizations in this broad geography in this historical process disrupted the religious innocence and purity and the social unity they enjoyed at the very beginning of Islam, but they were able to reach fruitful syntheses thanks to interactions through these diversities.” 

ISLAMIC COMMUNITIES AND MODERNISM

President Gül further maintained that reading history correctly is a must for evaluating today well and for laying the robust foundations of the future, continuing: “It is evident that orientalism, which has established an intellectual hegemony in the West in the last centuries, has been under the influence of the negative image created about Muslim communities and the Islamic culture and civilization and it is the product of a dogmatism, a dire fallacy and an understanding that puts the blame on religion for all the social, political and economic problems the Islamic world is going through. This chaotic situation of most of the Islamic countries, which have radically cut their bonds with their own histories, cultures and civilizations and conflicted with their own peoples and values by being influenced by these understandings, demonstrates that they bring nothing but deadlock and chaos. Moreoever, this kind of denialism does not erase the Muslim identity of these communities; on the contrary, it creates additional social and political problems. Culminating in frustrations in many Muslim countries, these tendencies are the products of a wrong and deficient understanding of modernization that emerged in the early 20th century and has continued to this day. Rather than considering modernization to be a model for raising social, economic and political standards, taking it as an ideology and imposition of a life style has led to failure on the path toward modernization, thus creating extreme reactions that instabilize communities.” 

DISTANCE BETWEEN THE WEST AND THE ISLAMIC WORLD 

The question “why did we lag behind?” which was often asked during the second half of the 19th century among the Ottoman intellectuals is still heard in many Islamic countries, emphasized the President. “The validity of this question even today demonstrates that even though more than a century has passed since this discussion was made and despite the many political and economic changes seen in the Islamic geography in this process, the correct answers have not been given to this question nor have the right answers been transfered to right policies. In spite of the strong traumas that the two world wars and the collapsed empires created in the West, the distance between the Islamic world and the West seen in terms of social, economic and political areas at the time is still to be covered. The great advancements the western communities have achieved by learning from these traumas of the past in such areas as institutional restructuring, human rights and freedoms, welfare increase, income distribution, technological development and human-state relationships, have not only made the existing distance between the two worlds something more than only a quantity gap in terms of prosperity and economic development but also unfortunately transformed it into a qualitative difference in progress in terms of human and social development.” 

The President further noted that one cannot ignore the the tangible outcomes of this difference such as the authoritarian regimes, lack of individual rights and freedoms, institutional retrogression, deficiencies in education, inequality in income distribution, poverty and staying at a far distance to transparency and accountability in public administration. “As a consequence of the accumulation of these fallacies and wrongdoings that are no longer possible to continue in this era, the inevitable uprisings have been seen and peoples have taken to the streets with righteous demands in the Islamic world in recent years. Leaders that can perceive tha era have paved the way for these transformations with less costs in their countries, whereas others who favor the status quo  have ruined their countries, made their citizens suffer from agoines through bloodshed and tears or taken their countries tens of years backward with the unsustainable policies they have pursued. We as Muslim people should show these countries how to come out of this sad situation while sharing these agonies and demonstrating the necessary solidarity.” 

“ISLAM ATTACHES UTMOST IMPORTANCE TO THINKING, DOING  RESEARCH AND EXERTING THE MIND AND KNOWLEDGE” 

President Gül noted that if the administrations in the Islamic world can make greater efforts toward the implementation of the Prophet Muhammed’s participatory, negotiation-oriented and pluralist values as well as administrative principles based on justice and law, they will make great contributions to their countries in particular and to the whole of the Islamic world in general. “I believe that Muslim people who are today making efforts for more democracy, more transparent public administration, broader individual rights and freedoms, a well functioning rule of law and justice will display a stance more suitable to the spirit of Islam and its basic principles, contributing to the happiness and prosperity of their countries and peoples as well. After all, such values as rights, laws, transparency, accountability and equality, which are attributed to the western societies in different terminologies today and which are characteristics of “good governance”, are our own values indeed. When we realize these values in our personal and social lives, we can achieve  a material and spiritual richness. It is a responsibility upon our intellectuals, state officials and educators to prepare the necessary conditions so that we can see once again the rise of Islam as during the times when it attached utmost importance to thinking, doing research and exerting the mind and knowledge.” 

THEME OF HOLY BIRTH WEEK THIS YEAR: SINCERITY 

Referring to the the theme of the Holy Birth Week this year, which is sincerity, President Gül suggested that everyone look sincerely at themselves first and then at their environment and that they review their lives, adding that they should guarantee the peace and survival of all beliefs and ethnicities in this land. “We should feel morally and conscientiously responsible for that. I believe that it takes a deep sincerity to love and obey the Prophet Muhammed. The common feature of our more than one thousand-year-old history of our Islamic history is sincerity in belief and religion. People must carry out their relationship with others just like they do so with Allah. We must admit that we are being tested for sincerity. The essence of our relationship with Allah and our prophet is built on sincerity. If this is the case, how about the religious and moral foundation of our relationship with others, ourselves, nature and all living things? I hereby would like to urge you all to ponder on this issue.” 

President Gül ended his speech with the following words: “I would like to accentuate before ending my speech that the fundamental condition for a healthy society is that we should be earnest and sincere to each other and that we should be open-hearted to in every way. I hope that the Holy Birth Week will enable us all to understand and grasp better our prophet’s messages and that it will open new doors for us in terms of internalizing these messages.” 

After his speech, President Gül was presented a rose on the stage. At the end of the program, the Presidential Couple gave roses to citizens before leaving the Ankara Arena Sports Hall.

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