Divinity School At Yale Supports Gender Apartheid

by Herbert I. London
April 6, 2011 at 4:00 am

http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/2022/yale-divinity-school-gender-apartheid

Hucksterism is alive and well at university Divinity Schools across the country. These institutions, designed to provide instruction on religious practice, have now become centers for the promotion of Islam.

On March 23, Imam Feisal Rauf, founder and chairman of the Cordoba Initiative, also known as the Ground Zero Mosque at the World Trade Center, spoke at Yale on "religious tolerance and interfaith cooperation." The discussion, organized by Jews and Muslims at Yale, was moderated by Rabbi James Ponet, head of the Slifka Center for Jewish Life.

Imam Rauf has received international attention for the Cordoba Initiative. Rauf claims to foster strong ties and friendship among different religious faiths, but in all instances the understanding is a one-way street, with Jews presumably coming to appreciate the unique contributions of Islam.

Imam Rauf speaks in soft and mellifluous tones that conceal positions consistent with radical Islam. During deliberations about the mosque near the World Trade Center site, also known as the Ground Zero Mosque, for example, Rauf refused to criticize Hamas as a terrorist organization even though it is listed as a terrorist group by the US State Department. He refuses as well to recognize the incompatibility between Islamic religious Sharia Law – which he espouses – and Constitutional precedents in the United States

Rauf attempts to convince his audience of his benevolent intentions with reference to his enthusiasm for the New York Giants football team, his having grown up in New Jersey and his love of the United States. But what remains unclear -- and what is intentionally enigmatic -- is whether this love of America trumps his love for Islam and the totalistic demands of his religion.

There is also an inherent hypocrisy in his approach that many in the Divinity School embrace as well. While much is said about understanding and cooperation, the onus is put on Jewish students to appreciate Islam -- without any expectation that Muslims should learn to appreciate the Judeo-Christian tradition of the West as well.

While Islam relies on the Constitutional guarantee of the First Amendment to challenge the most basic and fundamental precepts of constitutionalism, it does not recognize the separation of church and state. Islam does not have any provision for the protection of individual rights. Islam systematically subjugates women and refuses to offer them the full protection of any law other than Shari'a, in which they are not only worth half a man, but deprived of all equality under the law. Are these conditions which should be embraced by the Jews at Yale's Divinity School?

Admittedly there are portions of the Koran which display a desire for cooperation in what is sometimes described as the Mecca period, when Mohammed was trying to woo the Jews to join his new religion. However, Islamic scholars have have abrogated those verses in favor of the later suras and and tales of Mohammed's life when he went to Medina, where he called for all Jews to be killed, presumably because they had declined to accept his gift. As a consequence, the Medina period in which violence is advocated and Verses of the Sword supercede those of the earlier peaceful period in Islam's evolution.

But did Imam Rauf mention this matter? Of course not. Will Yale students challenge him on this matter? Of course not. Will this event be heralded as a peaceful exchange designed to promote understanding? Of that I haven't the slightest doubt.

This trip of his should should more accurately be described as Rauf's Grand Sharia Tour Across America. It is a mission aimed at the useful dupes in the Academy who will accept his pronouncements. The dirty little secret that probably will not be revealed, is that many in America and Islam have very little in common, except for a deep-seated hatred -- often posing as "concern" -- for America's freedoms and its way of life.

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