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    My Friend the Raven: The Unqualified Right to Hate
    My Friend the Raven: The Unqualified Right to Hate
    My Friend the Raven: The Unqualified Right to Hate
    Ebook38 pages27 minutes

    My Friend the Raven: The Unqualified Right to Hate

    By Mohamed Hasan Alharbi

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    I have always been haunted by the notion of hatred which not only looks unjustifiable in my view, but also encourages people to commit murder, a crime which has mostly been preceded by hatred and incitement.

    I have never believed in the saying without hatred, humanity would not have known love or passion. This saying proved to be futile in reality. To prove this, all monotheistic religions came to promote tolerance and spread love among human beings. Personally I still tend to believe that man is born to love, however, over time people have been taught to hate. Up to this moment my belief has never changed that love is the core of humanity, while hatred is an acquired value.

    In some cases, though, hatred might be justified; the fear instinct, for instance, may drive one to hate the source of that fear. You may like a lion when it is inside the cage. However, once that cage is open the lion becomes a threat to your life.

    But for a human being to hate another human being or even an animal for no reason other than what has been said in some old books is, from my point of view, a misfortune. Some hatred is based on unfounded narrations which could be no more than witchcraft.

    However, the world still lives with the results of that terrifying growing hatred; Entire peoples hate each other without even examining the real reasons behind that hatred.

    In our Arab region where nations of many origins co-exist, we tend to get rid of what we hate forever, be it human being or animal which could cause civilization disruption and psychological shock.

    I found out that the raven could be used to symbolize this idea. Not only is this bird so peaceful but also friend to peasants and environment. It has good social behaviors and embraces collaboration and team spirit. It learns from its own mistakes through error & trail, and has high IQ. Furthermore, it was mentioned in monotheist books as the bird which taught human beings how to bury their dead (the story of Abel and Cain).

    Despite all this, the raven is hated more than any other bird by Arabs and Muslims and some peoples of the East. It is, for many, the source of evil omen.

    The ravens voice is considered one of the roughest sounds on earth. What is even more catastrophic is that some consider the raven as an epidemic that must be eradicated by killing.

    This book does not literally defend the raven as a bird; it goes deep in hatred, a notion which increasingly controls people's stances and behaviors regardless of their origin, color or tongues.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherXlibris AU
    Release dateAug 6, 2013
    ISBN9781483674148
    My Friend the Raven: The Unqualified Right to Hate
    Author

    Mohamed Hasan Alharbi

    Author Mohamed Hasan Alharby, M.A. Media Studies, is a renowned columnist and author whose books cover various fields ranging from media studies to education, novels, short stories and literary criticism, in addition to script writing for TV talkshows. He is now a columnist writing for daily newspapers in the Gulf and Arab region and foreign magazines. He has been interviewed by various TV and radio stations. Mohamed Hasan Alharby has also been involved in training in the fields of printed journalism and self- development. Among his main interests are the environment, human rights, media studies and sustainable development. His latest work "My Friend the Raven" is number eleven in a series of books, some of which have been translated from Arabic into different European languages.

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      Book preview

      My Friend the Raven - Mohamed Hasan Alharbi

      Copyright © 2013 by Mohamed Hasan Alharbi.

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

      This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

      Rev. date: 07/22/2013

      To order additional copies of this book, contact:

      Xlibris LLC

      1-800-455-039

      www.xlibris.com.au

      Orders@xlibris.com.au

      504063

      Contents

      A Few Words That Need To Be Said

      Preface

      The Philosophy Of Hate

      Introduction

      The Raven In Pre-Islamic Times

      Early Islamic Times And Later

      The Crow: They Hated His Looks And Became Pessimistic Because Of His Voice

      Crows Are Tribes Like Us

      The Colored Crow Is An Element Of Love

      The Head Full Of Secrets

      Piercing Intelligence And Tough Luck

      The Crow Judiciary… . Reap What One Sow

      Criminal And Penal Code

      Environment And Balance Map

      Dedication

      For her, and her alone. I wrote this book as a token of my apology and deep regret for all the troubles I have caused her, and also in gratitude for her strength and tolerance.

      A FEW WORDS

      THAT NEED TO BE SAID

      I would like to thank each and every person who shared this obsession of an idea, and helped push me towards publishing it in the form of a book. I am grateful to them all, especially to Mohammed bin Massoud, a brother and friend who provided me with advice and encouragement; to Dr. Basem Shaheen, a brother and friend who provided me with advice and encouragement; to Mrs. Nawal Hussein, the artist who designed the cover for an Arabic version of this book; to my sons Dr. Azzam and Nasser Alharbi, for their insightful interventions. I would also like to express my appreciation of the support extended to me by the people in charge of Jawaher magazine in Dubai, for publishing excerpts from this book.

      PREFACE

      This book is all about ravens. I decided it would be most appropriate to start with a general survey of universally acknowledged literary works that dealt

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