Seyyed Ahmed Al-Safi
Dear brothers and sisters,
I would like to deliver to you the following:
First Matter:
The country is going through many and big challenges. The most important ones of them are the security challenges whether they are internal or external. At the time our sons in the army, the policemen, the volunteers, and the tribesmen are defending our country, some security breaches happen inside the cities in the form of bomb attacks here and there that kill tens of innocent people and leave large numbers of wounded. This requires more vigilance and alertness from the security authorities’ side, as dealing with terrorism and the terrorists must be with great accuracy and professionalism. Intelligence agencies must always be careful, especially that this war’s situation requires exerting more efforts to monitor the enemy’s movements and to promote and develop the personal capacities of those agencies’ agents.
Second Matter:
Our sons the students in the colleges, institutes, and high schools have to make use of the holidays, as time is a blessing that we have to exploit the best and the most correct way. In addition to achieving excellence during school days, so should it be during holidays. Maybe one of the things that should be done in holidays is striving to enroll in development courses in the intellectual, cultural, scientific, and ethical fields in order to gain more of such useful knowledge. In addition to conducting lectures for educating people on good citizenship, taking care of the country, participating in preserving it, weapons training and being ready to defend it whenever needed, good reading of the events that are happening around us, raising awareness, and increasing perception. Today you are students with limited responsibility, but tomorrow you will have larger responsibilities when you will be in advanced positions to serve your people God willing.
Third Matter:
Our country holds a great cultural heritage (praise be to God). Many and several things have helped build this heritage, and they must have left a reflection on all of our society. We cherish the social composition in our countries of all its components, and perhaps the tribes form a large part of this composition. Those generous tribes have helped preserve the sincere Arabian complexions, like bravery, magnanimity, generosity, respecting the elderly, good hospitality, and the likes of those good morals that are endorsed by both the religion and the customs. But some frictions and scrimmages sometimes happen between tribesmen for a reason or another, and some may try to resolve such conflicts and to reconcile people, and that is a good thing to do. So, out of our keen on preserving the advanced virtues of the precious tribes, we would like to clarify the following matters:
- The expedition of containing any conflict or an issue by the tribal elders, and preventing the situations from developing into larger ones, as expanding problems can generates side problems that are hard to control.
- Reactions should not be greater than an action itself, because in that there will be an egression from righteousness towards blasphemy, and in many cases, injustice occurs to some people who have nothing to do with the issue. An example on this, is what happens in some areas to resolve a conflict by forcing some women to get married under what is known as “Tribal Compensation” which is a deprecated thing morally and religiously, because a woman cannot be forced to get married from someone she does not want under any circumstances, and neither her father nor anyone else have the right to force her to marry against her will. So, fear God and avoid such practices that are far from the religion and the morals.
- The generous tribes have to benefit from the scholars, the religious sciences students, and others within the tribes in conflict resolutions, as some of the current resolutions have negative repercussions. It is a good thing to confer in such matters, and righteous intolerance is a must. A known quote of Imam Ali’s (PBUH) is “Let your intolerance be in the interest of precious qualities, benign actions, and the good things”. And if one no one could bring reconciliation, then referring to courts is a must to reach a satisfactory solution for everyone according to the religious and moral criteria.
May God preserve our country from any bad, and help the righteous do what is good for them, and let praise be to God first and foremost.
