Something new is afoot at Union Square in New York City. Union Square is the home of East End Temple (EET), a Reform synagogue that has begun hosting Cordoba House Jumu’ah prayer every Friday. EET has already been renting space to the Cordoba House Sunday School, but the relation between the two communities—one Muslim, the other Jewish—is evolving into much more than a landlord/tenant agreement. We have embarked on a journey of mutual discovery, towards a future together that is still to emerge. Part of that journey has been a combined course in Judaism and Islam, taught together by Imam Feisal and the spiritual leader of the East End Temple, Rabbi Josh Stanton.
The two-session class met on Thursday, February 8 and February 15, 2018. About twenty participants drawn from both communities gathered for the evening classes at EET. Rabbi Stanton observed about Thursday that, of itself, it carries no special significance for either faith tradition, but the Jews and Muslims gathered together on those two Thursdays sanctified the day by their intention to welcome each other into their hearts. And, so they did!
The two spiritual leaders wove together a tapestry of friendship between Islam and Judaism. Judaism would never have survived, commented the Rabbi, had the medieval Muslim Abbasids not hosted centers of Jewish learning in Baghdad; to which the Imam rejoined, Muslims would never have had their workable regimen of prayer had not Moses advised Muhammad, during the Prophet’s Night Journey, to recommend to God five-times daily prayer, over the 50 God had at first commanded. The teachers commented on ways Judaism and Islam reflect each other and affirm the validity of other faiths.
Students and teachers together plumbed deep questions about the afterlife, why we suffer in this life, and the one God of all religions overseeing this life and the next. In the warmth of the exchange, the classes foretold a new and evolving community of God-believers of all faiths.
