By  Dina Rabie, IOL Staff

An Israeli Jewish professor has authored a book and is planning a website that uses verses from the Noble Qur’an as a guide to address problems faced by educational counselors, a move met with suspicion from Muslim scholars.

“The Quranet project is a proposal for a website that will appear in different languages that are spoken throughout the Muslim world,” Professor Ofer Grosbard, clinical psychologist at the University of Haifa, told IslamOnline.net in an interview.

“Quranet reveals the beauty of the Qur’an and its respect for human dignity.

“It can serve any Muslim teacher or parent in the world.”  

Grosbard’s website, a demo of it has been published on the Israeli Foreign Ministry, will include verses of the Noble Qur’an to tackle problems faced by guidance counselors.

“The verse is followed by a story to demonstrate how it applies to everyday life, illustrating how the verse can be utilized to convey a message to the child,” he said.

The Israeli professor came up with the Quranet idea last year while tutoring a course to a group of Bedouin graduate students of educational counseling.

Grosbard was approached by one of his student saying that the Qur’an would have a much more powerful impact when it comes to counseling psychological problems.

“When I asked her to explain, she said that, in the appropriate context, quotation of a verse from the Qur’an has enormous impact on Muslims.”

Grosbard then brought a copy of the Qur’an to the next class and asked his students to identify verses that were related to the types of problems they expect to face.

The students returned with a list of 300 verses that focus on issues such as taking responsibility, respecting others, and telling the truth.

Grosbard then asked the students to make up stories based on these verses. He later added a short psychological-education explanation to each story.

The outcome was a 600-page Hebrew manuscript published in a book in May, addressing 330 questions on issues such as violence, mourning, incest, adolescence, etc.

“That was how Quranet came into being,” said Grosbard, who is now planning to translate the book into Arabic and English and upload the texts onto an interactive website.

Suspicion 

Grosbard’s project has already been met with suspicion in the Muslim world.

“Israel wants to lure Muslims into its trap by interpreting the Qur’an in a way that suits Israeli projects,” Sheikh Shawqi Abdel-Latif of the Egyptian Ministry of Awqaf (Religious Endowments) has told Al-Masri Al-Youm newspaper.

Dr. Manae Abdel-Halim Mahmoud, professor of Qur’anic sciences at Al-Azhar University, also blasted the Israeli project.

“Israel only harbors enmity to Islam and Muslims,” he said.

“This project aims to tarnish the image of Islam by giving wrong interpretation of the Noble Qur’an.”

The Palestinian Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs also rejected the project, saying there was no reason to re-interpret the Qur’an into Hebrew as the Holy Book has been interpreted correctly many times before.

Source: www.islamonline.net