On first Friday of new gov't sermon policy, preachers go off script
Sat, 23/07/2016 - 13:16 Al-Masry Al-Youm
http://www.egyptindependent.com//news/first-friday-new-gov-t-sermon-policy-preachers-go-script

Preachers at Al-Azhar shunned the government decision that identical,
government-approved sermons should be delivered in all mosques during Friday
prayers, with President of Al-Azhar University Ibrahim al-Hodhod speaking
yesterday on his own chosen topic.

The Religious Endowments Ministry's new policy for Friday sermons was
enforced as of yesterday after being announced just under two weeks ago. The
ministry handed out copies of the standardized sermon — about abstinence and
generosity — to mosques across the country, calling on preachers not to
violate the new rule.

During Zuhur prayers on Friday, Hodhod delivered a sermon on justice in
Islam. Speaking to Al-Masry Al-Youm, he defended his move by saying that
policies issued by the Religious Endowments Ministry do not apply to the
ancient center of Islamic scholarship, Al-Azhar, and its preachers fall
under the rulings of Al-Azhar only.

Deputy President of Al-Azhar University Abbas Shouman reiterated this,
saying that the ministry’s decision on prescribed sermons is non-binding for
Al-Azhar scholars, who have sufficient expertise to make their own
judgements on suitable material.

The former president of the university, Ahmad Omar Hashim, now on Al-Azhar's
Council of Senior Scholars, said he refuses to read a scripted Friday
sermon.

Other members of the council threatened to give up preaching if the ministry
sticks by its decision.

It was reported that preachers across the country — from Sohag to Kafr
al-Shaikh to the governorate of Alexandria — also overrode the policy and
chose their own topics on Friday.

The dispute between the Religious Endowments Ministry and preachers has not
died down since the announcement of the decision earlier this month, with
scholars from Al-Azhar being particularly vocal in raising objections to the
policy.

The ministry has been providing imams with topics for their sermons at
Friday prayers since 2014, but the latest move confines all preachers to
reading from the same script.

Several preachers have expressed fears that the new system will make
preachers lazy and cause them to loose their knowledge of Islam, forced to
read mindlessly from a piece of paper where they used to prepare their own
material on a weekly basis. Others have labeled the move as the death of
creativity, and still others fear it will destroy the relationship between
the preacher and the listeners, eventually causing people to lose interest
in Friday prayers.

Combating security threats linked to extremist Islam has been at the top of
President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi's agenda since he took power from the ousted
Muslim Brotherhood in 2013, and it is believed that the sermon policy is the
government's latest move to stamp out hotbeds of extremism.