By Ahmed el-Beheiri 27/ 4/ 2009
Zakzouk
Dr. Mahmoud Hamdi Zakzouk, Minister of Religious Endowments, said the number of foreigners who converted to Islam at Al-Azhar in 2008 amounted to 3,943 from 116 countries across the world.
In his speech yesterday at the 19th session of the meetings of the Islamic Fiqh Academy held in the Emirate of Sharjah (United Arab Emirates), Mr. Zakzouk said: "Islam does not compel anyone to convert, as religious freedom is a deep-rooted principle in the Islamic Law and has been applied for more than 14 centuries.
"Islam is a tolerant religion and covers the various aspects of life. This is why so many people have converted to it."
Zakzouk pointed out that forced conversions fed hypocrisy and destabilized the society.
He called on jurisprudential academies and religious institutions across the Islamic world to deal with thorny and controversial religious issues, such as «freedom of religion, struggling and accepting the others, closing the gap between Islamic schools, financial and economic issues and more modern issues".
Dr. Ali Juma, Mufti of Egypt, stressed in his speech the need to boost the principle of preserving the environment from an Islamic perspective in different parts of the Islamic world.
He emphasized that keeping the environment clean was one of human beings' responsibility.
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