MALAYSIA THREATENS TO SHUT DOWN CATHOLIC NEWSPAPER IF IT REFERS TO GOD AS ALLAH
December 27th 2007 11:39
The government of Muslim-majority Malaysia will not renew a Catholic newspaper's license to publish unless it stops using the word ‘Allah’ to denote god.
Father Lawrence Andrew, the editor of the Herald has come up against an issue that has affected inter-religious relations before in the Southeast Asian country, which is often cited as an example of pluralistic democracy in the Muslim world, according to CNSNews which followed up a story that originally appeared on Asia Sentinel on Christmas eve.
Shortly before Christmas, the Malaysian Internal Security Ministry sent a directive ordering the weekly to drop the use of the word ‘Allah,’ when referring to the god who Christians worship. Instead, the newspaper should use the word ‘Tuhan,’ which is a general term for god in the language spoken by the majority of Malaysians, Bahasa Malaysia.
The instruction to the Herald, which publishes sections in Bahasa Malaysia, English, Tamil and Mandarin, has stirred controversy, especially because of its timing..
The newspaper, like others in Malaysia, is required to have an official permit that must be renewed annually, and that expires on December 31.
The Herald editor said the ministry was trying to suppress the Bahasa Malaysia section of the newspaper, and pointed out that the word for god in the Bible in the Malay language is Allah, and said it was thus natural that that word be used.
This isn't the first time the use of the word Allah by non-Muslims has caused contention in Malaysia.
In 2003, the issue prompted a government decision to ban a Bible published in the tongue of a small indigenous ethnic group. The ban was later reversed after protests.
“According to Deputy Internal Security Minister Johari Baharum, ‘Only Muslims can use Allah. It’s a Muslim word, you see. It’s from the Arabic language. We cannot let other religions use it because it will confuse people,’ he was reported as saying. ‘We cannot allow this use of Allah in non-Muslim publications, nobody except Muslims. The word Allah is published by the Catholics. It’s not right.’”
“But what Johari revealed was his ignorance of his own professed religion, of the Arabic language in which the Koran is written, and of the history and culture of Muslims throughout most of the world. God and Allah mean the same in different languages.”
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Comment by Damo
Catholics and Muslims have agree that they pray to the same god. So what is with all this My God vs Your God crap?
Comment by Ahmed
Video Gamer Kids
Little Green Foosballs
PolyKicks
On the other hand I'm curious why they want to call god 'Allah'. So if they really have ill intent, which I'm suspecting they do, then the threats may be justified.
Comment by JJ McRoach
Watching the Media
I'm sure if I had have gone to church on Xmas day and loudly said Preise Be to Allah there would be a whole lot of cheesed off churchgoers.
And on it goes.