 So it's my great pleasure to be able to introduce Dr. Daniela Dumbrava to this round of seminars that we have in the center of World Christianity here at the School of Oriental and African Studies University of London. Dr. Dumbrava is no stranger to our college because she was here in order to carry out research which led her or which helped her complete her doctoral research into the travels of Nikolai Milescu who was producing maps for the tsars essentially. So it was a Eurasian enterprise and actually what I never told you is that your research actually... Early modern history. Re-enforced, yes, reinforced my interest in the populations of Siberia and that was one of the reasons why I decided to study Mantru so and Mantru's studies here are blossoming so it's a very, that made me very happy so anyway and then in the course of her studies she also covered the interrelation, you could say the interrelationship between the Orthodox Church and the Western Churches so it's an East-Western Orthodox Christian communication that you find in her work as well which I thought made her very suited for this circle that we have. I had been expecting before I reconnected with Dr. Dumbrava I had been expecting more communications in the same direction but actually I was very pleasantly surprised when I found out that you were studying the very complex relationship of communities in Lebanon which is of course today's topic and Lebanon I know very well myself I spent some time there at the American University but the Western part of the Middle East the Levant has its very own tradition where harmony more than conflict actually characterizes the overall picture but conflict of course does arise and often as the consequence of bad politics so that's perhaps something that we'll be returning to later but I don't want to say much more myself I would like to invite you to turn your attention to Dr. Dumbrava and recent experiences which feed directly into our current research so thank you very much and please go ahead and you should be able to share your PowerPoint from your screen yes I will try to do it one second so first of all thank you for having me to the seminar and I will start the PowerPoint I hope to manage to do many things in the very same time so first I have to share the the screen right one second yes okay it is already yes we can see it available okay good you can see so I I will know because the actually my paper is rather long and the discussion I think that there will be many questions I will prefer to to start and I'm pretty sure that people already wrote the the long abstract that I offered you and you and divided to send it to every person and so I before I start in my lecture since the subject is quite sensitive I would like to state two things out at the outset one this is a research in progress not definitive where the priorities to synthesize a fairly extensive volume of documents found from several archives especially payroll and book arrest these documents offer me the possibility of sketching out a history mainly ecclesiastical and university teaching that is very often seen from a political point of view obviously is more than more than ecclesiastical and university teaching history but however and second my exposition is based on based only on the documents before I can claim or state that I have outlined the general analytical framework leading to conclusions the only advantage I feel I have an analytical the constructing this topic in the coming months will be my multi-phase academic preparation through or not that of trans transnational justice well I mean I'm only historian and I will not make justice to anyone thanks to the detailed documentation that I had the opportunity to consult today I can speak of a laboratory of Islamic Christian education founded and developed in the same time frame as the civil war in Lebanon more precisely in Beirut consequently within the same framework there are massacres struggles between the various factions or either side of the green line and finally almost invisibly a mutual pacifying vision put in action by a group of professors at San Josef University in Beirut I think it is useful to briefly specify the fact that the ethnic and religious configuration in Lebanon is really different compared to it to its territorial dimension is very rich actually the dimension is small but the richness of religious and ethnic people is it's great it is a country that now has about seven seven million citizens if I'm not wrong of which more than a million are refugees only mainly Palestinian scourged Syrians these refugees arrived in Lebanon its territory in several ways but in any case after 1950 these refugees are whatever whether it is the foundation of the state of Israel in the case of Palestinians the flight from Turkey Kurds in the case of the Kurds or the recent recent war in Syria in the case of Syrians throughout the last century and at the beginning of the new millennium they reside in various parts of Lebanon as well as in Beirut now according to United Nation High Commissioner for People statistics on statistics 75.6 percent are Muslims Sunni, Shia, Alawite, Ismailis and 32.4 percent are Christians the wider group of Maronites the Greek Orthodox and the other smaller groups Latin Roman Catholics, Melchids Catholics, Romanian Orthodox, Syriac Orthodox and Iraqi Christians Assyrians, Chaldean Catholics, Copts Protestants, Presbyterians and Seventh Day Adventists and finally 4.62 percent are the Druze group concentrated in the rural areas in the mountain east of south of Beirut even there have monasteries actually in the Druze part of the mountains the Jewish community is almost nonexistent in Lebanon despite their presence in 911 as they came from the Mediterranean regions their community prospered during the French mandate by civil war force their relocation to Israel I have seen the Jewish cemetery in Beirut located no far from San Joseph University unfortunately in a sorry state Maghren Abraham Synagogue although restored in after 2008 where it was again damaged after 2020 explosion and there are also groups that are not recognized by the Lebanese state Baha'is Buddhists into the Neo Protestants so on The structure of current Lebanese parliament second-day type agreement 1989 should also specify this is banality but I repeated for someone who is not familiar with the history of Lebanon there is to be an equal number of Christians and Muslims the speaker of the parliament is a Shia Muslim the prime minister is a Sunni Muslim and the president of the state in a Marani is a Marani Christian for now I do not think it's necessary to go into the details of various factions of the civil war but maybe I will enter in the subject at the right time and I will try to speak however the interrelate and permeate according to the ethno-religious diversity then and now in in the territory that is all about so I I will try to explain who are the founders of the Institute of Islamic Christian Studies in Beirut who are the persons and I will start with Professor Yusuf Ibbish which was born in 1926 and passed away in 2003. Professor Ibbish was in the last years of his life the director of Al-Furqan Islamic Heritage Foundation and is remembered as a figure strongly focused on the promotion of Islamic culture as he was also appreciated outside Islamic work he was born in Damascus in 2026 as I said and had a Syrian Kurdish paternity he did his undergraduate degree at the American University in Beirut of Beirut after which he continued with the with his PhD at Harvard with the Scottish historian Orientalist Sir Hamilton Gepp then James Richard Stewart Professor of Arabic at Harvard. Incidentally the letter the letter has had his alma mater at the University of Edinburgh in School of Oriental and African Studies London. Yusuf Ibbish went on to become a professor then in American University of Beirut where he thought from 1960 till 1984. During his time he not only offered lecture to the Institute but also arranged for the student from the Institute to come to the American University in the offer of Beirut. As access was difficult in East Beirut where San Josef University in the Oriental Library was located. From 1985 he was invited as a lecturer at the American University in New Washington and was also a distinguished professor in 1985-1989 at Cambridge University. He published many studies and books and I will mention only two of them. The Political Doctrine of Al-Baqan Oriental Studies American University of Beirut and together with Ilana Markulescu, Rotko Chapel, Houston Texas Contemplation and Action in World Religions selected papers from the Rotko Chapel Collodon Traditional Modes of Contemplation and Action in 1978. He was brilliant actually and I was amazed actually reading about him. Unfortunately he passed away and there is only one professor that is living in Beirut from all these four and this is Professor Hisham Nashabbe born in 1931 in Tripoli, Sunni Muslim as well as I said Yusuf Abish. He was the secretary general of the UNESCO Nation Commission for Lebanon, trustee of the Institute for Palestinian Studies. Since 2011 he was the chairperson of the board of trustees of Makasset University of Beirut, director of Makasset Higher Institute for Islamic Education. I had the opportunity to visit and meet Hisham Nashabbe in person in Beirut in February 2020. He was very distinguished presence and we talk for over an hour. Although I had no serious documentation at that time I understood that the close relationship between Screma and Dr. Nashabbe was like that not only because of their collaboration in university classroom but also because of the civil rights of the Palestinian population in the Middle East, their state's stats of refugees. As far as I know at this stage of my research I was not it was not a matter of being part of the Palestinian political faction in the Lebanese territory but rather a vocation to moderate the tone of the Muslim religious Sunni elite and to have his informal contribution to the peace process in the Middle East. The archival documents for example the correspondence between Fadr Augustan de Prelatur and Fadr Screma never reveal any political details or preference for any groups fighting in a civil war of Palestinian origin. Professor Nashabbe left me with the impression of a person with an aristocratic and culture's nature. Always grateful for the relation with Fadr Screma in this critical time. His position as a secretary general of UNESCO National Commission of Lebanon remains a reformer as a reformer and is still a historiographical point to be clarified for myself and for other people. Then I will speak shortly about Augustan de Prelatur who was the director of the last jude, the jude islamic retinue. Here we you have a photo from historical photo from from the aula from the classroom and he he is rather young here. He passed away in 2011 and was born in France called Mar-Hodran in January 1921. He graduated in classical literature from the University of Grenoble in 1942 and in philosophy for the Faculty of Philosophy Societatis Jesus in Valpe-Lupuy-Fons in 1946. He completed his master degree in philosophy at the University of Lyon in 1950. He then went to study for his PhD at the Gregorian University in Rome which he completed in 1961. He speaks several languages in addition to his mother tongue namely Arabic, English, German and Italian and he has a preferred knowledge of ancient Greek and Latin. In 1965 he became professor of dogmatic theology at the Sanchez University in Beirut. He was head of department of continuing education in the Institute Superiore at the Institute Superiore to Science Religious and director of the Institute of Islamocratia. Father Augustine has published several studies on pathology and many volumes have been coordinated and edited by him. Augustin Duprelatur was also crucial in his vision regarding Islamic Christian relations through his time in Beirut. Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauron, president of the Pontifical Council of Interreligious Dialogue, remember him as one of the most influential people in Beirut University of Lyon and opposing fundamentalism of all kinds both Christian and Islamic. Considering his connection with Father Andres Crima, I believe he was most likely extremely close given his theological and philosophical training and background as well as his ethical and otherness rigor with Christian denomination and Islamic religion. In fact the two of them have achieved a great deal together first of all on original system of teaching which allowed people of different faith to reflect themselves in each other with the greatest respect while keeping their religious identity intact. Secondly, they have always combated the religious analysis of all kinds, putting in place a method of interreligious multidisciplinary study. And he was extremely close to Father Crima actually. They were very good friends actually and the correspondence is still unpublished. I published just one article many years ago and now I am going to publish a book and I will publish part of this correspondence. That part which I retain is very important. There are few letters which that are not relevant for the research and mainly with Bequinier details, salaries and so on. So I don't want to publish it but soon we will have a book. I mean I hope so. I will try to speak a bit about Father Crima. He was born in 1925 and passed away in 2000. Orthodox Monk at the time member of Spirit of Father, at the time member and Spirit of Father of Saint George Orthodox Monastery, Derhal, belonging to the Archdiocese of the Orthodox of Mount Athos, Mount Lebanon, Orthodox Church of Antiochia. Patriarch of Constantinople, Athenagoras first, nominate him Archimandre of Constantinople and later he is observer at the Vatican Council from 11 October 1962 till 8 December 1965. His education is astonishing. He made a BA in mathematics and listening in philosophy and theology as well. His dissertation was published postmortem apophatic anthropology. He made a PhD under Thierry Murtin on the ultimate is methodological and epistemological connotation according to the Advaita Vedanta unpublished. He was good friend with Father Raimon Panikar. They met in India and I truly believe that Father Panikar introduced him to Erico Castelli which was a philosopher. He made epistemologies but he was busy with the philosophy of religions and then Screema was invited and Panikar as well to the famous Castelli's seminary in Rome and many of acts were published and they're a wonderful reference to understand that part of Formamentis of Andres Screema. And the president of India visited Bucharest in early 1950s and while in the Orthodox patriarchal palace he met Father Screema who impressed him with his knowledge of Sanskrit and his recitation from the Katha Upanishad. This is a sort of, I don't know if it's truly like that but it seems that it was like that. Many people conformed this anecdote. He was happy to offer him a scholarship in India shortly before leaving for India Screema went to Chateau de Bouzé, the inter-confessional ecumenical center near Geneva, set up by the World Council of Churches where he met Christophe Dumont, director of the Dominican Ecumenical Center Istina and editor for Journalistina in Paris and later Marie Dominique Chinou and Louis Bouillet, leading names of the Catholic intellectual elite. Andres Screema was one of the most influential Orthodox monks at the time on the Second Vatican Council, not only participating as a personal observer of the Ecumenical Patriarch but also as a person who created the direct link between the Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras I at the most important event of 20th century for the Catholic world. In addition to Screema introduced by Belgian Cardinal Leon-Joseph Suenens was one of the contributors to the commentaries of the council documents Lumen Gentium, Gaudium and Spez de Iverbo alongside theologians Sacha Saint-Reed de Lubac, Jean Danielou, Yves Congar, Gérard Philippe, Roger Schultz, Karana. Finally he was present at the meetings of Paul VI with the Patriarch Athenagoras in the Holy Land in Jerusalem on 6th to 6th January 1964 and Constantinople on 25 July 1967 and finally in Rome in October 1967. This position further enabled Screema to be highly respected as he was immediately welcomed as a thinker who united the two churches. Screema will reside in Lebanon between their half and Beirut from 1969 and beginning 1970 will become a lecturer at the San Josef University, Beirut and the Moronite University of the Holy Spirit Catholic. When he returned to Romania in 1991 he had to give up his academic duties and also had to leave the monastic community of the Antioch Orthodox and George's monastery. There amongst are the custodians of another part of Screema's archive as I mentioned before as well as the publisher of his various texts with a strong theological and monastic I have been to the monastery twice and have permanent contact with the community and the work of the Archaeodeges of Lebanon. In various articles I have also made an introduction to the more mystical side of the community which is strongly animated by the Jesus Prayer acquired through the careful supervision of Father Andres Screema. His biography like all the others is much richer in content but I will must I have to limit myself and I put here only what I consider useful here. Then I will, well these are the four professors but there is a pattern I mean the person who offered money to the institute from Dominique Domenique Schlumberger She was born in 1998 in the past way 1997. Her full name is Dominique Isaline Zelia Henriette Clarice Schlumberger and she was the daughter of very famous Alsatian Calvinist inventor Conrad Schlumberger. Together with his brother Marcel both educated at the School of Engineering in France. Conrad invented the system of electrical measurement of mineral exploration known as Schlumberger Array. Years later they founded the Schlumberger Well Surviving Corporation based in Houston Texas. Dominique Schlumberger studied physics and mathematics at the Sorbonne and had an interest in film and technology. Well even Screema was the one who graduated mathematics and he knows very well, knew very well physics and I think it was a part of theology, mathematics and physics and their minds, their formal mantras were very fit but they were synchronized in some some way. She converted to Catholicism in 1932 as soon as she married banker Jean Dominique. At the time of World War II she moved to New York then to Houston Texas Jean Dominique became the president of Schlumberger versus Middle East and Far East and Schlumberger, Surango, Latin America. Both linked with the multinational company Schlumberger Ltd. In anti-navigation they are to the NASDAQ and they are famous even today. Well Dominique becomes a widow in 1973 but together with Jean however they founded the Menil Foundation famous for a large number of paintings, sculptures, religious arts, sketches, photographs, rare books, etc. Mother of five children, the last of whom is the leader of Sophie Order in New York, Philippa de Menil. In 1971 the Menil family founded the Rothko Chapel where huge paintings by Marco Rothko are exhibited and where they mounted also the Byzantine frescoes that were later returned to Cyprus. In 1986 together with the former U.S. president Jimmy Carter Dominique founded the Carter Menil Human Rights Foundation, complementing two decades of human rights activists. They were very close, very, very close. I mean even the people we I mean Nasha, the professor Nasha by confirmed me this I mean and since the 1960s John and Dominique de Menil have focused on the civil rights movement and started a courageous research project, The Image of the Black in Western Art in Houston. Also in 1969 they try to assemble Baron Newman Broken Obelisk to celebrate the violent death of Martin Luther King Jr. but it was not accepted by Houston politically light and they mounted it in front of the Rothko Chapel. This is to make you understand the insane courage of activists in times of extreme hostility to African-Americans. I mean even if you think you know I I became trembling even in the Middle East they have continued to support the rights of Palestinian refugees and have founded the Institutes of Islamic Christian Studies for over two decades. Returning to the Carter Menil Foundation it should be pointed out that they founded the Carter Menil Human Rights Prize also sponsored by the Rothko Chapel as well as Oscar Romero Award after the assassination of Catholic Bishop Oscar Arnold for Romero he got damaged by a hitman commissioned by the government of San Salvador. Dominique visited Lebanon several times and the entire in both in the 1970s and 1980s being very close to the academic projects of Scrima and the entire academic staff of the Institutes of Islamic Christian. I had the opportunity to read the epistolary between Dominique de Menil and Andres Scrima and the Scrima archive at New York College in Bucharest and I must say that although it is still restricted from publication and sometimes even for consultation it is a correspondence with many reflections on the situation and conflict in Middle East and as well as theological ones between Scrima and Dominique Dominique this theological exchange ideas was truly powerful and very to the very high level. I hope that I will get the chance to take something from this correspondence and to communicate to the scientific groups and to the center who knows. Well now I think it's better to, this is a wonderful picture with Dominique de Menil and Scrima to their heart in the monastery and I think it was made in the 1980s and she was familiar even with the monastic community in their heart. She was very commanding, very open-minded and an extraordinary personality even she was speaking very little. There is someone to offer a biography actually, a monographic to the Menil Foundation, a journalist in New York and I have I mean yeah I think to go to the Menil Foundation and to get the chance to study our archive mainly for his relationship with Carter and to see exactly if there is a direct link between her activity in the Middle East and the Camp David Accords. This is a very interesting point. I know that many people are not agreeing with the Camp David Accords and I must say that many documents in the archive in Bucharest of which belonging to the Andres Scrima collection are related with the situation in Palestine in Palestine and about Jerusalem and all this and all the situation critical situation in the Middle East and I think it's still a lot of work to do and first of all to be able to trigger all this documentation and then to complete it and to have a general picture seeing the archive in Houston that would be maybe another complementary project to that one that I am working on and it is rather interesting to reconstruct the history of these accords from another point of view from another kind of primary sources which are not quite are not at all political but all these documents are belonging to the private collection or there are also those from the ecclesiastical work mainly the Catholic work so this history should I mean it might be viewed from another point of view when well now I will continue after this parenthesis when faith animates science the purpose and method of teaching at the Yeik there are many documents some of them edited that explain the purpose and structure of teaching at the institute an article by Duprelatur and Hisham Nashabet but part of this information I found it under the thumb of Andres Scrima and Duprelatur specified in in his papers travel paper travel journal travel that Scrima offered him 80 percent of his materials in justifying the existence of the institute and not only so he's a real thinker but I think he is modest because he has also a philosophical performance and he was also able to reconfigure the epistemology of of this kind of new discipline so they they published in 1989 in solidarité orient it's not so it's almost inaccessible today the last two days to this democracy under Beirut and both professors point to the fact that in Lebanon there is a long existence of institution and various bodies dedicated to Islamic studies and oriental studies even in the American University of Beirut and San Josef University there are institutes that carry available research in the field but their methodological approach is one often one-sided online Islamic studies enjoy Islamologists who treat Islam as an object in the perfect rationalist scientific line on the other hand Islam is treated in a fideistic even fundamentalistic fundamentalist tone even the same for the studies of Christianity between religion, religion, Swiss and confessionalist the institute project promotes a change in the relationship between science and faith focusing on the fact that religions cannot be started by emphasizing only those disciplines that aim to understand the religious phenomenon it is driving force behind the study of religions and without faith not even religion science will exist therefore teaching should favor and I quote en esprit de recherche suivant une méthode déjà éprouvée selon un mode pluridisciplinaire il pouvait faciliter chez les professeurs déjà formé à cette méthode par la formation universitaire le dépensement du temps fanatisme partisan et la sécurité de l'objectivité devant un auditoire d'étudiant un clan déjà à la critique et appartenant aux deux confessions I continue to summarize in English their explanation in the in this institute the very faith of the professor is part of his activity the essence of this teaching is there for the reflection of believers Christians and Muslims in line with their own religious tradition and based on a deep scientific knowledge and intern internally assimilated with a personal commitment for example for the past two years for research have been applying they explain in the article the method of rhetorical analysis to text from the rhetoric analysis to the old and testaments for the Christian tradition and have this from the Muslim tradition another project to gather basic text relating to Christian Muslim exchanges with particular emphasis on official statements by religious authorities and declaration from conferences or symposia it was a sort of a new trigger and analyze of theological language both Christian and Muslim well the aim of this project is to clarify the essential attitude of different Muslim and Christian community towards these exchanges and to analyze their components and motivations finally it appeared important to organizations or on medical ethics where Muslim and Christian nursing students from the different nursing schools in Beirut their understanding of the position of their different religious communities on the fundamental problems of human life illness and death and on the problems posed in the different fields of medical practice if not it is a sort of avant la letre the question of euthanasia or another kind of bioethics you know they in the late 80s early 80s started to to trigger this kind of this kind of subject which are belonging now to a very specific discipline which is bioethics and actually I am going to publish recently an edition a critical diplomatic edition of the Lamor Passageau Limit it is a course that I find in Beirut in the archive of the Jesuits Residence de Jésus and I'm I I've already delivered an article in introducing the matters of this course and it is amazing because we find actually Screema explained the death from the historical religious historical point of view then bioethics and finally phenomenological point not rather Christian but anyway phenomenological point of view and often in this manuscript I found manuscripts manuscript I found the questions which are belonging to bioethics richer research topics in 1979-1980 a first line of research addressed the question does the conscience of faith exercise the critical function on the word order a second line of research deal with the question of that modernity possess to Christianity and Islam subsequently a topic emerged that was important for highlight the deep destructor structure of the respective tradition another theme was another issue was a much scripted and form research into the foundation and meaning of spiritual language and Christian and Islamic art so it is a sort of this course is amazing it's a sort of semi-seological treaty so it's a sort of dictionary of semantic analysis theological language and terms so it's amazing they had really a brilliant mind in concrete terms to profess one Christian and one other Muslim both academics agreed to compose their course according to a similar structure and in front of the same students they take turns on one listening to another's lecture and intervening when necessary in this way the research is done in common and is enriched by the reciprocal contribution of each religious tradition for each of the two traditions is supported by the testimony of true believers through scientific contents and high academic standards there is also the testimony of a living faith that is important as well in this line each of the professor is invited to present his own or her own religion tradition in the language of that tradition in order to oblige the listener of the other faith to a necessary change of scenery which will then help them to penetrate the religious universe presented to them from within that's interesting in the comparative history of religions the danger of correspondence between religious elements or externally similar rights is often noted acclaimed screema such comparison may be useful on one level but they cannot be starting point for understanding a certain religion they can only provide a superficial synthesis they claim screema mainly in order to grasp the original meaning of a religion one needs to get a glimpse of a religion it is necessary to grasp the nucleus the cord very hard which gives its constituents elements their articulation and their deep hierarchy now this core this principle of both unification and creativity is that emerging truth where the revelation stands and which guarantees and criticizes the external form formulation although a convergence may appear between the views and conceptions of God and in the world corresponding to the two religions at the base it is the difference which is more particularly perceived and underlined this difference cannot be reduced otherwise we will end up with the syncretives that will deny the originality and specificity of cheer religion on the contrary it must it might it must be maintained for the sake of truth and the preservation of authenticity and it is from this difference that a real and authentic collaboration can be built what actually actually present over the origin of the institute at the time of the constituent meetings i have taken the liberty of leaving the voice of the founders who have been very careful to specify their purpose with the institute their methodological approach and their epistemological choices of course this open up the question of historical comparative approach in historical religion or religious studies we know that the great historian of religions mainly rafaeli but that's on you know as reflected with great care the epistemic area of the discipline however religions are considered as objects of study completely devoid of their substance namely the faith the religious texts the artifact or any historical element that connects and is related to religions or the religious phenomenon are completely considered by a bit of their historical and historiographical context understanding these religious phenomenon could be something more think the professor who reject the confessional approach in the study of true religion as well as fiddles that is the blind attitude in trials of trusting in the truth of religious doctrine explaining an understanding religion automatically involves reason but faith is the essence the core of internal epistemic elaboration which cannot be denied to the believer either that's the crucial point actually i don't know if the historian of historians of religions and actually part of my word because i'm doing history of religion as well it's ready to accept it but how you can uh teach uh the monotheistic religions or the two religion and comparative ways without in libanon or in uh in the middle east context without considering the faith and i think it's very i mean it's very useful to reflect on this kind of interrogation i have another point i don't know if i have another time to uh yes maybe five more minutes so oh five okay so i have some testimonial what do we find outside the classroom i said and i have some testimonials and uh well i tried to to have some uh some voices i mean i i took from the from the correspondents some uh temo anyash uh explaining actually what what they the perception uh their perception considering the work and uh i tried to translate from french into english and for example in 40 24 uh june 1978 and another one which is rather powerful i guess um uh we have this last time in aprim and day and night it's really unthinkable in the state a little of things to be concerned with the life of the university in our country because we are concerned with the islamo-christian institute and we will have to think about the local abbey road west and the last one i you have actually the the english translation is not i mean it's not needed to repeat it and uh i will pass to the one interesting frame and more can you show the the picture because for the translation for those who. Yes, of course. Yes, sorry. It is now. It's okay. So that people can read. Yes, thank you. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it actually is much easier to read it. Yeah. Well, I believe that the testimonies are convincing enough to give us an idea of the hostile atmosphere in the members, the instrumental members to their permanent traveling status for more than two decades. Instead, I would like to talk about other documents I have found in the archive, especially the screma's found screma collection at the New York College that concerned Jerusalem. I have little time for that, but I will do it. Screma had collected these documents for which he had also prepared response and then his turn. One of these documents is entitled Christian Support Unified Jerusalem Prepared by Interreligious Affairs, Department of the American Jewish Community with an introduction by Rabbi Mark Tanenbaum, a Rabbi, American Rabbi from Belmore, an activist for human rights and social justice. He too was involved in the drafting of various council documents in Vatican, including Nostra and Tate. Returning to the four months mentioned document, it is Michelini from the 1970s in which various prestigious Christian theologians for all the denomination, evangelical Roman Catholic Protestants, ecumenical and interreligious groups. Reflection from Catholic leaders in the international and local press command on the issue of the internationalization of the holy city Jerusalem, which actually is very active even today. The background to the whole issue was the so-called Druidization of Jerusalem, Druidization of Jerusalem, which obviously it was very offensive. And the reunification of Jerusalem under a single jurisdiction that of Israelis recognizes the legitimacy of the rights of the Arab population. On the other hand, the Muslim position was to return in East Jerusalem to Muslim control, which was established in 1948 in the wake of Jordanian military occupation of the holy city in violation of the 1970, 47-year partition plan, day point view. Rabbi Tanenbaum was disturbed and I called the recent UN Security Council debate and undoubtedly has reinforced that impression, especially since the Jordanian representative seated, called a whole range of Christian spokesmen from Pope Paul VI to the National Council of Churches as being uniformly identified with the Muslim position. So that what is to say is that at that time the question of the status of Jerusalem was under the observation of the entire world and the Christian people, most of them were belonging to the Muslim position and the Muslim position to the Christian one. And only the evangelical Protestants were actually prepared to recognize the new status of Jerusalem under the Israeli control. On the one hand, there are the evangelical Christians, as I said, which are in perfect agreement with the Israeli daily position. And on the other hand, the rest of the Christian world, the Vatican, World Council, or the Muslim elite, but who are the Christians that Tanenbaum refers to as being aligned with the Israeli position. Well, he said that evangelical Christians have understood that. In the past, the restoration of the Jewish people to Jerusalem represented the fulfillment of biblical prophecies. Likewise, theologians such as Caraner, at that time, one of the most authoritative voices in the Catholic world states, I cannot see the return of Jerusalem to Israel constitutes a real theological problem for a Christian such that reason of faith will compel him to oppose the return. Of course, I cannot recall all the voices in the document, but hundreds of pages confirm the fact that the question of the status of Jerusalem, it is at the heart of the entire Christian world in the Middle East and beyond, generating a kind of solidarity with the Muslim position, especially the modern Sunni ones. I limit myself only to the documents I consulted and no further. My decision to propose as a hypothesis to be contemplated, the link between the four professors of the Institute and their activities beyond the university classrooms. These activities relating to the major problems in the Middle East, such as the status of Palestinian refugees, the status of Jerusalem, the efforts for peace, which then ended up with the Camp David, of course, seems to be, seems to me realistic. As I wrote into my absurd, there is not a direct causal link between these political entities, but rather a think tank of Islamic Christian theological relation where peace in the Middle East and the stability of the Palestinian community in the Lebanese context and beyond enuclates a basis for a light discussion of both communities. The main purpose of the Institute's activity was primarily to build theoretical biases for motorist faith between the two religious communities, given the massacres of infamous fight between the various Lebanese factions. Secondly, it was a question of forming an intellectual ally that at least in Islamic Christian relation, we'll be able to explain the theological basis of two of the two religious identities without slipping into the apologetic approach of any religion. Thank you very much. I think I will stop here. Yes, if you could just unshare, just get us back into the pictures. If you click on the top, or maybe I can give it up. No, it's better if we see each other. Yeah, that one. I could do it. Yes. I forgot. Yes. So thank you very much. Before I open the floor to the discussion, this is what I would describe to my students as an example of micro history, because it describes the close-knit community that existed between thinkers and religious practitioners who operate in a very difficult situation, namely not just of actual warfare, but of a situation which did not allow different sides to communicate with each other for reasons of security, such as the snipers who you mentioned. It was very unsafe to go into the Muslim part, for example, or vice versa. And importantly, it is also a world which still continues to exist because of the tensions that the unresolved Palestinian question has brought along, and the unresolved Lebanese situation, because we don't have the space to include the current situation in Lebanon, but I know from friends that this creates difficulties at various levels, which in one way or another go back to the time of the civil war. That's a very simplified version. I found it very interesting, that's the last thing that I'll say, that you're making a difference between religion and faith, and that is perhaps a key to unlocking the stalemate that we have, because faith itself does not create communities, it's religion that creates communities, and once these communities are in conflict with each other, then it is very difficult to resolve it. But at this point, I would like to invite the others in the room to come up with questions. Who would like to ask? Yeah, maybe I can tell to the people that when I was in Beirut the last time, I mean, I felt I ended up in Beirut after two days when the Shia community started to protest against the judge, I mean the person who was judging the case of deflagration in 2020. And when I arrived at the airport, I was, I mean, people stopped me, I mean, you know, the Hezbollah controlled the airport, that is the reality. And they were amazed that someone is coming to see Lebanon, and I mean in Beirut, and to make research in a way, and I was a woman. I mean, I don't felt afraid and threatened at all, but they put me in the office for more than 20 minutes until they get the time to verify everything. And then I was obviously free to go, and when I took the car, and when I arrived to the residence de Jésus, there are many rumors. It was a sort of talk of the Iranian spiritual leader, and people were shooting in on the air. And I was rather shocked because I, nobody told me that this is a custom. And then, yeah, of course, it was a bit like that, with some emotions. It's always like that, an adventure. But then I started to speak to the people in the university, with the Christians, and in the San Josep University, many Muslims are coming, and I was participating into a Sufi concert, which was amazing. They are in a wonderful relationship. I mean, they cultivate actually this relationship until today. And the young people are so natural in that Catholic environment. They don't, they're simply natural. So I don't know. The conflict, it's maybe the reason of the conflict, it's staying in another part, not quite in the religious part, but what it's what it is important is that this education system, by the way, I make a parenthesis in Lebanon and Beirut, there are all the 50 universities, obviously confessional, non-confession, scientific, and many denominations are their own university, and so on. So that means that people are instructed. Many people are speaking five of eight languages, very normal. A normal, isn't it, for them is natural. So in the university, in San Josep University, where is actually a famous department of religious studies as well, where belonging first as a department of this institute, actually, because it was the first of the department of this democracy, and after it became an institute, they are, they have a huge library with Arabic fundamental texts, sacred texts, and a lot of hundreds of books and the documents and so on, so on. And they are very rigorous. I mean, the students, by the way, both Christians and Muslims are accepted, and it is a wonderful place to be. Only, well, in this period, the professors are a bit scared, because they are not paid by the state, and they have to accept a situation that they can't take from the bank, rather than a certain 10% of their own normal salaries. And I think that spirit of revolution, which I felt it in February 2020, rather disappeared in 2020, in 2022. And people are not so, I mean, not so optimistic. Well, Alison, Alison. Yes, Alison has her hand up, yes. She's the one to have courage to put me a question. Thank you so much. I've kind of read a little bit of the writings of Andres Grima, but you're talking about him as setting much more into context. I kind of read him as this kind of, I don't know, almost like eccentric, who did all these amazing things, you know. But it's fascinating to hear more, and particularly about his archive and everything. I'm particularly interested also in Metropolitan Georges Hauder in the lesson. And I'm wondering, was he part of this initiative at all? Or was he friends with these people? I mean, were there links between them? Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. He was, I mean, I visited, I mean, I visited him to the Metropolitan place. And he was rather old, and maybe a little bit annoyed by the people. But when I was speaking about Grima, he clearly, I mean, briefly said to me, he was a saint and a genius. Well, it was, I called, I called him. Well, he was very active, actually. And he was very critical. I mean, if you see, his language is terrible in respect of many situations, considering the Israeli part of the, of these negotiations in the civil war. And he was the founder of the Le Mouvement de Jean Orthodox. And I've met a lot of people who were belonging to this movement. Of course, I've met plenty of, yes. Yes, yes, sorry. Sorry, I was wondering, I mean, did members of this movement study at the Institute that you've discussed, the Islamic Christian Institute? This is a very good question. I think they prefer to have Father Grima rather as a sort of spiritual leader. And they expect it from Father Grima to teach them the Jesus Prayer. And to, they were mainly directed by this, the mystical part of the orthodoxy. And because Father Grima was ordained priest in that archaeotheosis, actually, in their heart, he became a priest in their heart. And then he received the role of his spiritual father. And then, and he, he was member of a famous group in Bucharest in the 40s, Le Mouvement de Blisson Arden, the Burning Bush movement. And he was a person who has the assistant Jesus Prayer. He was, I mean, he, they accepted him to teach this prayer because he, he, he gained it in a permanent way. I mean, he was truly spiritual. So, and there is another father who also was invited by the Le Mouvement de Jean Orthodox, Father Gilles. I'm not, I'm not remembering. Lev Gilles. Lev Gilles. And also, he also was a peeler of the movement. And for example, I was amazed that one of the members which spoke with me for hours in Beirut, she said that we didn't have not even the liturgical books in Arabic. So, the community started to translate, first of all, the homilies of Father Grima and then and to try to, the tipicon and so on and so on and try to, this lady started to translate something connected to the iconography and so on and so on. So, they were very poor in, in, in Arabic language, liturgical texts and so on and so on. And they expected from, from Grima and from the fathers a sort of living tradition, living God, not, not a theoretical God, but a living God. And that, that was manifested through the Jesus prayer. And they were very happy to, and by the way, many Catholics started to ask Father Grima as well to join Dominican communities, for example, male and female, to, to teach them the Jesus prayer. And he, he was very happy to, to share it. It was a very discreet work. Even his writings, sometimes he published in Istina without his name. He simply affirmed as an one orthodox because he was the security from the Romanian security was trying to follow him through various, various personages. I don't want to enter into this this subject because it's very complex and we have more time, we need more time to explain. But in the 60s, he was terribly, I mean, the, the secretary claimed that he was the most important and influential monk to, to be followed and to, to try to convince him to become a metropolis for the diaspora in order to, to have it in, in their own hands. And he was afraid to speak with the Romanian priests. I mean, you know, and but I think he, that's why he, he tried to do his work in a very discreet way, not secret, but discreet. It's a huge difference. By the way, Christian is acting like that, a mystic is acting like that in silence, doing things, not commenting on things. I mean, he was delivering a lot of papers, a lot of, when he was asked for, but in a discreet way. Yeah. So what is the attitude today in Romania towards Grima and are his views on Islamic Christian relations? Are they part of kind of, I don't know, what the average Romanian Orthodox today would? Hopefully his domain to kind of view Muslims in a more positive way? That's a very, very, very good question. You know why? Because in one hand, they tried to recover the monastic face of Grima. I mean, the monastic activity and marriage and what you want. But from, they didn't, I mean, they are, it's difficult for them to understand Christianity belonging to the Muslims. I mean, the community, you know, the existence between these two communities, the reality of Christianity. There is another culture of Orthodox faith in Europe. That's why I'm afraid many conservators today are against and mainly they are religious people. I mean, and they are against the Muslim communities. And they didn't want to be very open to this kind of approach of others Grima. And I think in a very humble way, I try to explain why it's so important if someone wants to understand it. It's needed just to go once in Beirut. They will understand immediately. I mean, it's a sort of immediate perception. You can't stay in the Middle East without this this connection with the Muslim community and with Muslim allies. And by the way, he tried to wrote a lot and even giving the theological reason not to reject people and to pay respect for them and for their own identity. And well, actually, I have this, it is a sort of miracle that I was accepted with this research issue in, you know, in the Romanian institutions we are giving by competition given to me this grant. And we try to communicate all the time. I mean, in the last year, I didn't do so much communication. I refuse actually to deliver talks or to deliver many things because I still want to write and to try to put online the writings and the courses from Lebanon in original, in French. A part of this work was done, actually was translated in Romanian without an critical addition, but still there is something. But the language, the theological language of al-Skrim and this kind of semi theology where the repository of semantic connotation of various concepts, Christian concepts is still very, very difficult to accept because simply people prefer to stay in the wood language of Christianity. There is a wood language and I don't want to criticize, obviously, but Father Skrim has his own approach speaking often about the hermeneutical, put the hermeneutical interpretation of Christian texts in acts. So that means leaving tradition, not only quoting tradition. And I think he was rather clear, but it's difficult to be at that level existentially and even with our mind maybe because not, I mean, if you are not open with your heart, you are not open, you will not be open with your mind either. But this is the point. This is my duty to try not only me, but my team was a research team. And by the way, brilliant people Bogdanta Taruk Azavan, for example, which he was an ambassador to the Holy See, and he published also a journal dedicated to his days in Skrimas activity in the Second Council, Vatican II. And then slightly because of this project, it is a sort of provocative because they said, what means resilience in Lebanon and what do you mean about that? And I said, look, even being a Christian, a practical Christian and being with a good preparation and with a spiritual language prepared to accept the other, that it's enough to manifest a sort of resilience and to continue to exist in that space. That's the point. Thank you. I'm aware that we should not really go beyond the half-path mark. So are there any other questions? I would like to continue this conversation. Yes, but time is rushing. Much further, yes. But that's the reason to have another talk maybe. Yes, there will be. I mean, it reminded me, for example, also of the situation in Alexandria, in Alexandria, in Egypt, where you have a very strong Sufi tradition and of course, a Coptic Christian and all Islamic traditions as well, a Jewish community. So it's, you need these, it's not just a social glue, it's a kind of freedom of thinking, which communities, small communities who encourage inter-communal contacts create. And this is important in a city like Behud. I would, I could have asked you more about the historical background of the civil war period, but for that, we don't have time right now. That would have been very interesting because the contacts on both sides of the green line, for example, they were difficult, but they did exist. And that was a challenge which many of the religious leaders also took on them. Well, anyway. Yes, actually, I'll be more than willing to receive another questions even by email. I was going to say, if there are any further questions, I can circulate your email address and then we can continue this. And of course, there will be more sessions. The next one will be around table, so you will get an invitation for this. Thank you. If you're in London, any one of you is in London, then it will be also in person, but we will put it on the screen and then you will recognize some of the members here who are present today. I will be more than honored to come to London to know in person the people there, amazing people, an amazing initiative, I guess. I mean, that's true and unique, if I'm saying. It should be more. Yes, anyway, if there are no urgent questions, then I think I would like to stop the recording yet and. Yes, thank you. Thank you, Lars.