Osama bin Laden was a good Man

"God knows it did not cross our minds to attack the Towers, but after the situation became unbearable—and we witnessed the injustice and tyranny of the American-Israeli alliance against our people in Palestine and Lebanon—I thought about it. And the events that affected me directly were that of 1982 and the events that followed—when America allowed the Israelis to invade Lebanon, helped by the U.S. Sixth Fleet. As I watched the destroyed towers in Lebanon, it occurred to me punish the unjust the same way: to destroy towers in America so it could taste some of what we are tasting and to stop killing our children and women."

                                                                                                                — Osama bin Laden, 2004

"Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of war, to strike terror into (the hearts of) the enemies of Allah and your enemies, and others besides whom
you may not know but whom Allah doth know." – The Koran 

Are you insane? Come on! Be serious and realistic! Why on earth would you say Osama bin Laden was a good man? Perhaps you never heard he was He was the founder of al-Qaeda, the jihadist organization that claimed responsibility for the September 11 attacks on the United States, along with numerous other mass-casualty attacks against civilian and military targets.^[5][6][7] The attacks involved the hijacking of four commercial passenger aircraft^[129] and flying them into the World Trade Center in New York City, New York and The Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, destroying the former, and severely damaging the latter.^[130] It resulted in the deaths of 2,973 people(1)

I recalled vividly how the world reacted at the death of the adjudged top terrorist in the world. Everyone was happy that the man who had been perpertrating so many atrocities has been finally hunted down. Television broadcast were on high, he became the talk on peoples lips, radio programs were very elated because they had a subject matter to deliberate on. Calls went up! “have you heard? Osama is dead!” The death of Osama bin Laden was one of the most widespread news that ever occurred.

But why did I insist that this man, whose dominant zeal was to kill is good? Well the answer is not far fetched. You friends everything in this world begins with a small, minute, abstract force called IDEA! For the Christians we can concur to that fact. In the account of creation of the universe, we realized that the whole world was framed by God’s idea. He taught about what could be and then say ‘Let there be’ and as we saw ‘there was’. In the Greek book called Hebrews it was chronicled that ‘…..the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible’ (2)

Ideas are powerful! One idea can change humanity; one idea can change the world. Any idea when accepted by the masses can live till eternity even when the person, the source of it has gone into oblivion. Like the truism goes ‘Ideas always outlive men’. But the term ‘change’ is relative. Change can be good or bad. Some changes are transformational while some are overtly upheavals!

This was the case of our good friend Mr. Osama Bin Laden. Osama grew up as a normal child. He went to school just like any other child but something went wrong along the way. From my source in Wikipedia, it recorded that ‘Bin Laden was raised as a devout Wahhabi Muslim.^[24] From 1968 to 1976, he attended the élite secular Al-Thager Model School.^[20][25] He studied economics and business administration^[26] at King Abdulaziz University. Some reports suggest he earned a degree in civil engineering in 1979,^[27] or a degree in public administration in 1981.^[28] One source described him as "hard working";^[29] another said he left university during his third year without completing a college degree.^[30] At university, bin Laden's main interest was religion, where he was involved in both "interpreting the Quran and jihad" and charitable work.^[31] Other interests included writing poetry;^[32] reading, with the works of Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery and Charles de Gaulle said to be among his favorites; black stallions; and association football, in which he enjoyed playing at centre forward and followed English club Arsenal F.C.3

Did you see that? What actually struck me most when I first read this was that Osama Bin Laden was involved in ‘Charitable works’ he was a source of help to the helpless. He had a heart of love! But what actually went wrong? Did you want to know? The dark side of Osama Bin Laden originated when he conceived a wrong idea!  He suddenly along the way imbued himself with a false belief system, a faulty and questionable ideology. According to same Wikipedia, it shows that “the former CIA analyst Michael Scheuer, who led the CIA's hunt for Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaeda leader was motivated by a belief that U.S. foreign policy has oppressed, killed, or otherwise harmed Muslims in the Middle East,^[48] condensed in the phrase "They hate us for what we do, not who we are." Bin Laden also said only the restoration of Sharia law would "set things right" in the Muslim world, and that alternatives such as "pan-Arabism, socialism, communism, democracy" must be opposed.^[49Bin Laden's ideology included the idea that civilians, including women and children, are legitimate targets of jihad.^[54][55]

Bin Laden's overall strategy against much larger enemies such as the Soviet Union and United States was to lure them into a long war of attrition in Muslim countries, attracting large numbers of jihadists who would never surrender. He believed this would lead to economic collapse of the enemy nation.^[72] Al-Qaeda manuals clearly outline this strategy. In a 2004 tape broadcast by al-Jazeera, bin Laden spoke of "bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy".^[73](4)

This was the origin of Osama’s misbehavior. He allowed his mind to imbibe a false concept. He had a bad idea. Osama in himself was a good man, but he only had a bad idea. The problem with the US is that they had failed to recognize that:

*Ideas outlive men (even if they know what about the next one)

*Ideas cannot be destroyed by arms and ammunition

*You can shoot a man but you cannot shoot his idea

*The only way you can defeat a bad idea is to replace it with a good one

                                                                                                                           -Credit to Dr. Myles Monroe

The fact that a man had a bad idea does not make him utterly bad, he only had an idea that was bad. He is good but his idea, his belief, his ideology is bad. But the moment his faulty idea is replaced with a good one, the moment he is made to see that his idea is wrong he would drop such idea and embrace the one he has been convinced of. You can only fight or hold on to what you are convinced of. In the holy book, an account was given of a Jew in Tarsus named Saul.

Saul was an elite, a teacher of the Law. He was a man of letters and he schooled under the greatest teacher in the Jewish religion-under a man called Gamaliel. Despite his level of his education, Saul had a wrong idea, a wrong conception about the Law. He opposed the followers of the young rabbi called Jesus who has been pre destined to bring a new message to the people.

The message according to him was ‘the good new’. Because of his wrong base of his idea, he hunted these men. He arrested anyone who dares to preach in the name of Jesus Christ. He threw them in jail. He did all in his power to thwart the expansion of his church. He became so zealous that he requested for a permit to go to Damascus to destroy all the followers of this young rabbi. But on his way what happened? I believed you know the rest of the story. He had an encounter that  fine tuned his misconception. God himself made him understand that what he was fighting for was on a wrong base. He open his mind and replaced it with a good idea; that Jesus indeed the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

This same man who once persecuted the church later became one of the greatest masterminds of the Lord Jesus Christ. He fought for the truth with all the energy in the deep recess of his mind. He was the one who confessed:

“Woo is me if I preached not the good new”

“For I am not ashamed of the good news”

“All I ever want is to know Christ and to experience his power of his resurrection”

“Imitate me, just as I also imitate Christ”

                                                                             -Apostle Paul

Whoa! This is interesting! Saul who name later became Paul became one of the greatest followers of Jesus Christ, he single handedly wrote a dozen of the letters that was contained in the Holy book! Osama was a good man but he had a bad idea.

 (1)and(2) are from Wikipedia

(3) from Hebrews 11

Be INSPIRED!

Cyprian Henry

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