Islam and Peace
Religious Harmony
~ 136 ~
Despite these astonishing achievements other
religious groups enjoyed full religious autonomy
(9/912).
Now the complicating factor is that when any
religion having reached this stage of antiquity has
secured a sacred place in the hearts of its believers,
it becomes impossible to bring about any changes in
it. Efforts to bring about a change can produce a
new religion, but they can never succeed in
changing the old religion. There are many examples
of such failures in the past.
A very important point from the practical point of
view is that although the necessity to bring about
harmony among the different religions is not a
newly-felt imperative, endeavours towards that end
are still only in the formative stages. If progress
towards that goal has been slow of attainment, it is
because of the established positions which ancient
religions have secured in the hearts of their
followers, simply by virtue of their antiquity.
Trying to bring about changes in these religions per
se has never brought about harmony, because
instead of old religions being brought closer
