14 كانون الأول 2009
The Moussa Sadr Center for Research and Studies held a conference dubbed “Man in the Vision of Imam Sadr” on Saturday at the UNESCO Palace in Beirut to promote religious dialogue and honor the principles of disappeared Imam Musa Sadr. Speaker Nabih Berri was present at the gathering as well as Youth and Sports Minister Hussein Abdallah representing President Michel Sleiman, State Minister Mona Ofeish representing Prime Minister Saad Hariri and an array of political figures.
Head of the Sadr Foundation and sister of Imam Moussa Sadr gave a speech during the gathering in which she recalled the ideas of the imam. She referred to the imam’s definition of a “Man” as a being “of free will who forms part of the universe; a being active in its society and a being made by God.”
Rabab Sadr then explained that the imam believed caring for an individual meant caring for his society as well. “A society is made by men and nothing is imposed to it from the outside. What happens inside a society comes from the regimes men has made,” she said.
Imam Sadr was an Iranian-Lebanese cleric who disappeared in 1978 along with two of his colleagues during a visit to Libya.
Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi was suspected of holding the men hostage but the charges were never confirmed.
Representative of Maronite Patriarch Cardinal Nasrallah Butros Sfeir, Archbishop Shukrallah al-Hajj, read Sfeir’s address to the conference.
He said that religion served men and not the opposite and that religion was men’s revolution against oppression and injustice. He then talked about the role of all Lebanese in preserving their diversity and said Imam Sadr wanted Lebanon to be a model of diversity, freedom and democracy in the Arab world.
Sheikh Hisham Khalifeh, who represented Grand Mufti Sheikh Mohammad Rashid Qabbani, said that Sadr’s vision of “Man” was that of Islam and was based on three principles: the mortality of mankind, equality between all people and equal rights for everyone. “We should work on spreading these principles in our societies,” he added.
Vice President of the Higher Shiite Council Sheikh Abdel-Amir Qabalan said Sadr’s memory was still alive and the fight to reveal the truth about his disappearance was still strong. “If the case of Sadr should die then human values would die with it,” he said.
Qabalan added that all religions were one when they serve Man and God but that disagreements occur when each religion starts serving its own goals. He then presented a documentary about Sadr’s life and teachings.
Father Ibrahim Saad then read the speech of His Beatitude Ignatius IV Hazim the Greek Greek Orthodox Patriarc and said Sadr spoke in the name of justice and made everyone think of Man and God at the same time.
Sheikh Ghassan al-Halabi representing Druze spiritual leader Sheikh Naim Hassan said Sadr saw Lebanon as the land of gathering where the individual alone had little value. “Man is the purpose of being and the beginning of society,” he said.
