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University Daily Kansan
Friday, April 21, 1961
Winners All
Spring is irrefutably,irrevocably,undeniably absolutely and undoubtedly here. We hope.
The blossoms are out, tops are down, term papers are due, the grass is cut, the sun shines brightly, girls are in bermudas, and it's Relays weekend. Thousands swarm over Oread for the greatest track carnival in the land.
To all of you here for the first time, welcome. To those of you returning to the Mount, welcome. To the ones who contributed four years of your lives here, welcome. To the rest of you-stay in the library—it's getting close to finals.
The 36th annual Kansas Relays is upon us. Notwithstanding the weather bureau's promise of another wet Relays, the event will have its exciting and bright moments. The outstanding track and field figures in the nation have come to Lawrence to pit their talents against one another. But many more are involved in the spectacle than the track teams and individuals on the cinders today and tomorrow.
Weeks of preparation, work, and drudgery go into making the Relays a success each year, but only those who receive the medals get the acclaim. There are others who deserve medals as big as any of the winning performers, more notably, the Relays Committee.
Composed of students, some appointed, mostly volunteers, the committee begins in early December by sending out entry blanks to the various schools and individuals. Once the entries are in, the committee makes the drawings, assigns the heats, lanes, etc., and is responsible for arranging the whole meet. During the two-day affair, they act as coordinators, runners, messengers, and flunkies.
sengers, and teachers
It is obvious they, working with Coach Bill Easton, the ones who should receive a share of the kudos. They rarely do.
So, to them, we give our thanks and congratulations for making this spring affair a focal point for the nation and a source of pride for the University.
Frank Morgan
EDITOR:
...Letters ...
The newest edition of the "Kansas Engineer" is out, and without doubt it is the best thing the boys in Marvin have ever done in a journalistic line. Format, illustration, content, all are better than ever. It gives me great pleasure to see this sort of ambition and talent on our campus. But: I have a complaint.
The engineer at KU has a voice; he has a vocal organ by which he can air his views on the work he is doing and intends to do. However, the engineer's primary involvement is not with journalism or literature. He is the man who makes things work, not the man whose business is to talk about these things, or, for that matter about anything else. There are people whose work and interest is in writing and talking, about anything which to them seems important. These people too need a voice.
They had one once. It was called "Spectrum," and it did its job as well as the "Kansas Engineer" is now doing its. A little while ago, perhaps not long enough, "Spectrum" got into a bit of financial trouble. One of its faculty advisers was in Europe, on university business. No one seems to know where the other was. The business manager of the magazine seems to have made some sort of mistake.
On this mistake the fate of "Spectrum" hung, and either the mistake was too large for the University, or the University was too little to see this mistake for what it was, an isolated instance, not an administrative trend. Now we hear that "Spectrum" is officially and permanently dead.
Perhaps something could be done about this. Something ought to. We do not deny or deprecate the importance of the engineer; we do insist that the writer, the philosopher and the humanist are as important, at least. And we know that their need is to be heard. The engineer does not have that need, we think; his work is elsewhere, and his magazine, however good, is by no means essential to his work.
"Spectrum," or a magazine very like it, is not desirable, merely to the university society but necessary. It should be revived, or replaced. It can be done.
Walter M. Hunt
Eureka Springs, Ark., Sophomore
--aggression in Korea, unfortunately watered down later by the agreement to a stalemate. From that time on—nothing but an almost uninterrupted chain of shameful retreats, disasters, and betrayals, notably in Hungary.
Editor:
Angry at Rapoport
It was difficult not to be angry when reading your report on Professor Rapoport's lecture. I was not present myself. So I have to rely on your reporter. The anger blew over soon. What remained was the renewed sad insight into why the West has constantly been losing ground in the Cold War. The last glorious episodes for the West were the successful Berlin Airlift of 1949 and President Truman's decision to stop Communist
IF COUNSELS LIKE those advocated by Professor Rapoport prevail, and they undoubtedly have been influencing Western public opinion for years, it is no wonder that we are on the downgrade. I should like to take exception to the following points: 1.) Why must it always be we who concede and make an effort to "understand"? Why do we never expect our contravention to "understand" us? (I fear he understands us only too well... ) 2.) Why must it always be we who have to allay his fears and put salve on his tender ego? Don't we nourish justified fears? Don't we possess egos that deserve of an "understanding" treatment? 3.) Why should we always be on the defensive? We must attack and thus gain the initiative. For it is a battle in which we are engaged, not only as far as the arms race is concerned. Any manual in elementary tactics tells us that the attacker always enjoys the advantage of imposing his will on the enemy. But he must have a will, of course . . .
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS
"HE HAS TERRIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS—IM SUSPICIOUS THE COLLEGE WHERE HE NOW TEACHES MAY BE TRYING TO GET RID OF HIM."
World politics, alas, is not a debating society, nor are we dealing, in the persons of Comrades Khrushchev, Mao, et alli, with patients in a psychiatric ward. What we are caught in is a life and death struggle in which much more is at stake than our survival as a big power, a high standard of living, and an order of society based on liberty and self-government.
WE ARE FIGHTING, or, at least, should be fighting for the preservation of our moral, cultural, and religious identity with ourselves. Any new surrender will bring us one step closer to the state of morally emasculated servants of hard-headed, shrewd, and totally unsentimental masters who cannot be convinced or dissuaded anyway because they know all the answers. They can be induced, however, to yield, if only for tactical reasons, and tone down their aggressiveness, by a well-calculated, intelligent show of strength military, scientific, and, above all, moral.
A POINT OF VIEW that, at a time when men died in Korea, Berlin, Poznan, and Budapest, and are still dying in Laos, Viet Nam, Cuba and other places on this globe in battling Leviathan, blandly assumes the Cold War to be a "debate", seems to me devoid of seriousness and responsibility. It is this concoction of weakness, flippancy, and naivete ("basically they are like us") that will lead to the downfall of what once was a great civilization.
Heinrich A. Stammler
Associate Professor of Russian
International Jayhawker
By Raja Mohammed Naib Pakistan Graduate Student
The first UPI dispatch by Louis Cassels in UDK dated Feb. 17 dealing with the efforts of Christianity and Islam to win over the religious allegiance of some parts of the emergent Africa, and the second dispatch of Feb. 24 entitled: "Muslims, Communists Can Cooperate," do represent a healthy tendency to present a comparative approach on the ideological front.
Yet, through the courtesy of your columns, I would like to comment on four major doctrinal positions of Islam, which would seem to have been misrepresented in the said dispatches. The success of Islam has been explained, along with other factors, with major emphasis on:
1. That Islam allows the natives of Africa to have four wives.
2. That Islam is prepared to condone the continuation of the worship of tribal gods and magic, etc.
3. That Islam confronts people with the choice of proclaiming their faith in Allah or having their throats cut.
4. That the Quran does not say anything about turning the other cheek.
IT IS INSTRUCTIVE to note that the clause in the Quran which contains the permission to contract four contemporaneous marriages, is immediately followed by a sentence which cuts down the significance of the preceding passage to its normal and legitimate dimensions. The passage runs thus, "You may marry two, three or four wives, but not more." The subsequent lines declare, "but if you cannot deal equitably and justly with all, you SHALL marry only one."
The extreme importance of this proviso, bearing especially in mind the meaning which is attached to the word "equity" (adl), in the Quranic teachings, has not been lost sight of by the thinkers of the Muslim world. "Adl" signifies not merely equality of treatment in the matter of lodging, clothing and other domestic requisites, but also complete equity in love, affection and esteem. As absolute justice in matters of feeling is impossible, the Quranic prescription amounts in reality to a prohibition. Further the elasticity of laws is the greatest test of their beneficence and usefulness. The present day nations in the world of Islam have standing legislation to stop any kind of polygamy, for the conditions which brought that cautious provision exist no more.
ONENESS OF GOD IS THE most fundamental principle of Islam. Mohammed, the apostle of the unity of God, stands forth in history in noble conflict with the retrogressive tendency of man to associate other things with the creator of mankind. Ever and anon in the Quran occur passages, fervid and burning, like the following:
"Your God is one God; there is no God but He the Most Merciful in the creation of the heaven and earth, and the alternation of night and day, and in the ship which saileth on the sea, laden with what is profitable to mankind; and the rain-water which God sendeth from heaven, quickening again the dead earth, and in the change of winds, and the clouds balanced between heaven and earth—are signs to people of understanding; yet some men take idols beside God, and love them as with the love due to God."
Quran, Surah 11.158-160.
Compromise on such a fundamental principle would be tantamount to the negation of the very spirit of Islam.
It is a matter of historical fact that in most of the new territories which came under the supremacy of Islam at the early stages of its development, a tax was levied on the Jews and the Christians in lieu of the protection of state extended to them. Islam always refers to them as the "people of the book." Islam is basically a missionary religion, relying on persuasion and not coercion.
The Quran does not say anything about turning the other cheek, but it does emphasize forgiveness. "He who challenges you, challenge him in the same way, and he who forgives, will be granted forgiveness from God." Now unless it be the rationalization of failure by attributing such accusations to Islam, may it be enquired about the practical manifestation of the philosophy of turning the other cheek. Two of the most devastating wars, 1914-18 and 1939-45, were let loose by the meek adherents of this philosophy. Is it consistency?
THE PURPOSE OF THIS ARTICLE is to bring in proper perspective the urgent necessity to face the historical facts realistically. That the fundamental concepts of Islam have been distorted and misrepresented by a number of Western scholars during the past two centuries cannot be denied. But the continuation of this error in this scientific age is extremely astonishing. Surely, this attitude, if not modified, will hinder international understanding, a prerequisite to universal harmony and world peace.
Daily Hansan
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