Bartholomew's Notes

American Buddhist blogger Precious Metal  has received an unwelcome missive by email from UK libel specialist law-firm Carter-Ruck:

We act for the Buddhist monks William Van Gordon and Edo Shonin and write in connection with an article entitled “A Mother’s grief: ‘The cult guru who turned my son into a zombie'” that was published by the Daily Mail on 25 May 2007 and which is also published by you…

The article contains a number of false and highly defamatory allegations of both our clients and has caused considerable damage to their reputation. We write to give you formal notice that we have issued High Court proceedings for defamation on behalf of our clients against the publishers of the Daily Mail and ask you to remove the article from your website as a matter of real urgency. The article has been removed from the Daily Mail’s own website.

Articles critical of Edo Shonin (or “Edo Shonnin”, born Edward Penney) have also appeared on The Buddhist Channel.

Edo and Van Gordon run the “Tranquil Abiding Buddhist Retreat” in rural Wales, formerly known as the “Pine Forest Sangha”; according to a profile on its website

Br. Edo, originally from Scotland has dedicated the best part of his adult life towards spiritual development. He has received many transmissions and has been formally ordained in both the Hinay?na and Mahayana Buddhist schools. Br. Edo has followed the example set by his first teachers who in addition to being Buddhist monks also practiced the less familiar ways of the Yogi and have preferred as much as possible to remain unknown and unimportant…In a visit to Thailand earlier this year both of the Brothers received transmissions and further formal ordinations as Yogis under Master Draythep Chantawanno in Northern Thailand…The Brothers believe that whilst lineage and tradition are very important and special, sometimes people risk falling into the trap of following a particular group just because it can make impressive claims or has teachers with impressive titles for example.

Questions had been raised about Edo Shonin’s lineage in the past; an older website for the Pine Forest Sangha dealt with this in a rather less modest way:

At Pine Forest Sangha, we remember that the Buddha, Christ, Guru Nanak and Mohammad did not have any so called lineage or impressive title. They awoke to a universal realisation and they attempted to communicate to everyone that each and every sentient being is born with the capability of this realisation regardless of lineage or school of thought.

This older website also had more details in its profile of Edo Shonin:

Edo Shonin has been a monk in the Nygma and Shingon traditions for 43 years. Born to a devoted Buddhist family, his monastic education began at 5 years of age. From the beginning he has been devoted to the traditional Shingon ways as well as the Lam Rim and Zog Chen teachings of the Nygma. He has dedicated all of his life to learning and teaching Buddhism in various Asian countries…Having been Abbot of various monasteries in the East, he has now been invited to Great Britain.

Van Gordon, meanwhile, is his disciple, and it is his mother who made the allegations that were reported in the Mail. There is no other mention of “Master Draythep Chantawanno” that I could find on-line, although of course there may be Thai sources and alternative transliterations of his name.

Precious Metal has been given seven days to comply with Carter-Ruck’s demands or face “an injunction, damages and legal costs”. However, the blog is based in the USA and the owner has declined to comply; a couple of American court decisions support his position. Wired noted one in 2003:

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last Tuesday that Web loggers, website operators and e-mail list editors can’t be held responsible for libel for information they republish, extending crucial First Amendment protections to do-it-yourself online publishers.

Online free speech advocates praised the decision as a victory. The ruling effectively differentiates conventional news media, which can be sued relatively easily for libel, from certain forms of online communication such as moderated e-mail lists…The court based its decision on a section of the 1996 Communications Decency Act, or the CDA. That section states, “… no provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.”

And in 2006 California brought us this:

The court, in a unanimous decision, said those claiming defamation can only sue the original source of the allegedly offending comments, not publishers or distributors, even if the distributor is an individual. Internet users are protected by the same 1996 Communications Decency Act that grants immunity against defamation claims to publishers in most circumstances, the court said, overturning a San Francisco appeals court.

(Hat tip: Cult News Network)

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Yes, it’s the St Stephen the Great Trust again. Luckily, the author of the article has his own blog.

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Unity at Ministry of Truth has an absolutely masterful post on the British SPCK bookshops saga (I blogged this here), covering a number of questions about the American owners’ business practices, their legal threats against various bloggers (most recently a vicar in Essex), and – very usefully – providing a lot of information about libel law in the USA.

J Mark Brewer, who runs the organisation that owns the bookshops (and who is now seeking bankruptcy proceedings in Houston), believes he and his company should be immune from criticism because both are private: in fact, as Unity points out, Brewer is a subject of public controversy and so in US eyes is a “limited purpose public figure”. This is just one feature of US libel law that we could do with in the UK, where people who choose to involve themselves in public affairs can all too often suppress critical discussion and discourage investigation by waving lawyers around (and if you have a lawyer as a friend or ideological comrade, you don’t need to be rich to do it).

Meanwhile, the Chester Chronicle reports on some upcoming industrial tribunals:

SHOPWORKERS’ union Usdaw is taking four cases to an employment tribunal after staff were fired by e-mail from a Christian bookshop in Chester.

…Chester is just one of several branches affected after the trading arm of Christian charity St Stephen the Great (SSG) was “placed into reorganisation” in the United States Bankruptcy Court.

A new company, ENC Management Company, has been set up to run the bookshops run by Mark and Phil Brewer, the same two Texan brothers who head SSG.

…John Hannett, Usdaw general secretary, said: “It is clear that staff, many of whom have been long standing loyal workers, have been mistreated and many are understandably very upset and concerned.

“We are very concerned at a new company (ENC Management Company) being set up in these circumstances, while our members are losing their jobs.”

One website that Brewer objects to is a page on the UK Christian Bookshops Directory asking the public to make donations and offer assistance to affected booksellers.

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A bad week for Hamas, the Islamist movement which has proven disastrous both for Palestinian civil society and for those advocating Palestinian rights under Israeli occupation. A couple of days ago the Palestinian human rights organisation al-Haq issued a report accusing Hamas and Fatah of the artibrary detention and torture of Palestinian prisoners (and if this is how they treat their own people, the conditions endured by Hamas’ Israeli prisoner Gilad Shalit are difficult to imagine); now the son of Sheikh Hassan Yousef, who is Hamas’ leader in the West Bank, has announced his conversion to Christianity and given an interview to Haaretz. Masab Yousef, who is now based in California, has quite an indictment of Hamas:

“These people have no morals, they have no integrity. But they aren’t as stupid as Fatah, which steals in broad daylight in front of everyone and is immediately suspected of corruption. [Hamas people] receive money in dishonest ways, invest it in secret places, and outwardly maintain a simple lifestyle. Sooner or later they will use this money and screw the people.

“Nobody knows them and how they operate as well as I do…”

Yousef, or “Joseph” as he now prefers to be known as, also takes credit for his father’s relative moderation:

“He’s a nice, friendly man. But I discovered how evil his colleagues are…When I was with my father, I in effect pushed a moderate Hamas leader into making logical decisions, such as stopping the attacks and establishing two states alongside one another. I felt responsible. It was better for me to be there rather than a gang of fools who would poison his mind…”

Joseph explains that he became a Christian a while ago while still living in Ramallah, but that he kept quiet about it. He doesn’t explain to what kind of Christianity he has converted, and he gives few clues; although he has harsh words about Islam (“In the view of Hamas, peace with Israel contradicts sharia and the Koran”) and Palestinian society (“An entire society sanctifies death”), and says that he “respects” Israel, he doesn’t appear to have followed the path of Palestinian convert Walid Shoebat, whose entire religious identity is now grounded in a fundamentalist anti-Muslim and apocalyptic Christian Zionism.

The report has been received with predicable glee by pro-Israel websites; Joseph’s relatives meanwhile are denying that the story is true.

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Following on from yesterday, Israel Insider (described by Conwebwatch as “the Israeli World Net Daily“) has a lengthy conspiracy-rumination around Barack Obama’s (or “Barack H. Obama”, as the Insider reminds us) recent visit to the Western Wall and the subsequent publication of the prayer he left there. After more or less admitting that the Maariv “permission to publish” claim was rather dubious, the Insider presses on nevertheless:

…the suspicion that Barack Obama intended for his “private prayer” to become public knowledge is gaining currency here and abroad. James Taranto at the Wall Street Journal’s influential “Best of the Web” column [says]: “Obama’s so-called prayer was at best an open letter to God–a sentiment intended for public, not divine, consumption.”

He also cities the witty column of Israel’s leading Hebrew-to-English translator Hillel Halkin, who writes in the New York Sun that the content of Obama’s note strikes a false note. “Frankly,” Halkin quips, “I’d feel a bit better about Mr. Obama if his prayer had simply said, “Lord, help me to be president.” It’s perhaps churlish of me, but the suspicion lurks that that’s what he would have written had he felt sure it would not have ended up in the newspapers.”

It’s always refreshing to see the religious poses of a presidential candidate being taken with a bit of scepticism, but what exactly were these people expecting? Obviously Obama was going to have a photo-op at the Wall, and obviously he was going to leave a prayer. And if you’re one of the most-scrutinized people on the planet obviously you’re going to be mindful about what you write on a bit of paper you’re going to leave at a public place. Of course he didn’t “feel sure” the note would never become public – why would he?

…The WSJ pundit adds: “If Obama is insincere about his religious faith, that does not speak well of his character. Then again, it is reassuring in a way, given that wacko church he belonged to for 20 years.”

Whereas McCain was totally sincere when he called Rod Parsley a “spiritual guide”…

The Insider then sets out on its own, drawing attention to the footage on Youtube I noted yesterday:

[David] Cohen’s testimony provides new evidence that suggests that the alleged pilferer, dressed in the garb of a seminary student, may in fact have been a member of Obama’s entourage. If so, there would not need to have been an official authorization by the campaign to publish the note. The actual “pilferer” may have been working for Obama.

Or maybe not:

It important to emphasize that the alleged pilferer has not been publicly identified, and any connection between him and the Obama campaign, or with Maariv, has not been proven…at this muddled stage who can really say?

That’s a bit deflating, given that the article was originally headlined “Video shows prayer note snatched by man IDed as ‘member of Obama entourage'” – changed to “Video source claims prayer note snatched by man in Obama’s ‘entourage'”, although misleading either way; Cohen’s “testimony” merely says that

seconds after Obama left the stones, some of his entourage stepped up to the wall (seen dressed in suits) while young men began gathering notes in their hands in what appeared to be the search for Obama’s freshly placed personal note. He is joined by others who unwrap notes and read them.

The Insider then directs us to an interpretation of the incident from Helen Cadogan, who tells us that this was a ploy by Obama to appeal to Muslim anti-Semitism:

Having gone to the Western Wall, and not to Al Aqsa mosque, having offered a Christian-type “prayer,” he has to regain some credibility in Muslim eyes, without seeming to do that. To distract his Muslim American audience from his genuflection at the Western Wall of the Jews, Obama made his fall guy a yeshiva student…So, Obama called a play straight out of the Farrakhan playbook. The note is stolen and the Jew did it! The Jews, they are always to be blamed for everything.

This is the rather desperate evidence provided by the Insider as to how “the ancient Western Wall was used by Obama as a prop for a public relations exercise that appears to have spun way out of control.”

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From the Jerusalem Post:

The yeshiva student who pried Barack Obama’s prayer note from the Western Wall has apologized.

…Identified only by the first initial of his name, Aleph, and with his face obscured, the student went on Channel 2 television Sunday to confess that he took the presidential contender’s note last week and passed it to the press.

“I’m sorry. It was a kind of prank,” Aleph said, his hands shaking as he fingered the tightly wadded-up sheet of King David Hotel letterhead. “I hope he wasn’t hurt. We all believe he will take the presidency.”

There have been calls for the Israeli newspaper that published the note to face a criminal investigation, while some right-wing US websites are suggesting that “Aleph” (or “Alef” in some reports) may have been working for the Obama campaign – the astonishing implication being that an American presidential candidate might be using religion to make himself look good.

The funny thing is, though, that an obscure outfit called “CoVisionsProductions” has posted to Youtube a low-quality video apparently showing three ultra-orthodox figures (looks like two students and an older man), swiping the prayer in full view of journalists and other worshippers.  According to the blurb, by a certain David Cohen:

…Seconds after Obama left the stones, some of his entourage stepped up to the wall (dressed in suits) and I recorded a young man gathering notes in his hands in what appeared to be the search for Obama’s freshly placed personal note. He is joined by others who unwrap notes and read them. [Footage includes] one person walking away from the wall with a note that he unwraps as he tries to aggressively block the camera lens.

Strangely, though, the prayer-pilferers don’t appear to mind a camera looming at them. There’s also a shot of an arm in a modern black jacket (at 19 seconds) reaching forward to extract one prayer request, and it’s not one of the three men we see clearly.

John McCain visited the Western Wall back in March, for what was obviously a purely private act of piety and mark of respect, with no political calculations at all.

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No, not me – Bartholomew I, Patriarch of Constaninople, who is in Kiev to celebrate 1020 years since the Christianization of Kievan Russ, the old Russian state in Ukraine. In 988 Duke Vladimir, ruler of Kiev, accepted Greek Christianity after weighing up the alternatives, and his people were “encouraged” to present themselves for baptism in the river Dnieper. The Russian Primary Chronicle explains:

…Vladimir sent heralds throughout the whole city to proclaim that if any inhabitant, rich or poor, did not betake himself to the river, he would risk the prince’s displeasure. When the people heard these words, they wept for joy, and exclaimed in their enthusiasm, “If this were not good, the prince and his boyars would not have accepted it.”

Alas for Vladimir’s successor, some of Kiev’s citizens of today are rather less keen to “exclaim in their enthusiasm”, if this Interfax report is accurate:

 The management of Kiev’s hospitals and clinics forced the staff to join festive events in the center of Kiev, conducted by Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople, the Interfax-Religion correspondent reported…Asked what the staff’s reaction was like, [a medical attendant] said, “Negative, of course,”

However, it should be remembered that Interfax is based in Russia, and it shares the Moscow Patriarchate’s antipathy to Ukraine President Yushchenko and Bartholomew, who are seen as supporting a “schismatic” Ukrainian Orthodox Church. In turn, Bartholomew is doubtless wary of Russian domination over Orthodoxy, and given the Russian Orthodox Church’s links with the Russian government Yushchenko would prefer a national church closer to Constantinople than to Moscow. Moscow Patriarch Alexei II has also been present at the anniversary celebrations, but Interfax complains that

Large posters showing Patriarch Bartholomew – alone or with Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko – can be seen everywhere in Kiev. Pictures of the Russian Patriarch are a much rarer occurrence.

I blogged some of the long-standing tensions here.

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The former Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, writes in UK tabloid the News of the World concerning Max Mosley’s recent court victory after the newspaper revealed details of his sado-masochistic orgies:

A DANGEROUS precedent has been set this week in the victory of Max Mosley over the press. The first major victim is Free Speech itself. Without public debate or democratic scrutiny the courts have created a wholly new privacy law. In itself that’s bad enough.

…In the past a public figure has known that scandalous and immoral behaviour carries serious consequences for his or her public profile, reputation and job. Today it is possible to both have your cake AND to eat it.

But a case can be clearly made for a direct link between private behaviour and public conduct. If a politician, a judge, a bishop or any public figure cannot keep their promises to wife, husband, etc, how can they be trusted to honour pledges to their constituencies and people they serve?

…The new High Court ruling prevents press investigations into matters of clear public interest. It needlessly shackles the press and removes the right of the public to make informed moral judgements.

We can take issue with a couple of points here: the idea that the News of the World can help the public to make “informed moral judgements” is a laughable one, and most people would hopefully take the sensible view that a private sexual failing does not mean that a person generally untrustworthy: in Mosley’s case, his character will probably be judged in relation to the exploitative and cruel nature of his activities, rather than for their extra-marital status (of course, simple affairs might raise the issue of hypocrisy – as in the case of clergy or “family values” politicians – and usually there is ridicule: see Paddy “Pantsdown” Ashdown and Paul “Spanker” Johnson).

Martin Jacques put the view supporting Mosley’s right to privacy in the Guardian’s Comment is Free in June:

The idea that it is somehow in the public interest that newspapers have the right to invade an individual’s private life in this way and effectively seek to destroy them is unacceptable. There is no public interest whatsoever, but it is certainly in the interests of a tabloid newspaper, giving it the power to break and humiliate individuals by appealing to the public’s worst voyeuristic instincts, all in the cause of sales. What one does in private should remain private, providing it does not contravene the law.

One recalls Adorno’s views on “the attitude of snooping”, which he saw as “closely akin to fascism”.

However, it seems to me, in agreement with Carey, that whether something is “in the public interest” is not the business of judges, and if we find a newspaper to be repellently intrusive we can simply opt to ignore it; free speech should be denied just because some public “instincts” are unattractive. I wrote more about the subject of privacy and free speech here, noting some interesting hypothetical examples raised by (cough) Sean Gabb.

The judge who awarded Mosley £60,000 is Mr Justice Eady, who has also found for Saudi billionaires in UK libel actions. According to Private Eye (1194) magazine, Eady “has found against reporters so often that the law lord Lord Hoffman slapped him down for being ‘hostile’ to responsible journalism in the public interest”. George Carey, in contrast, has been supportive of free speech: despite being an evangelical he apparently “loved” the Life of Brian and in 2005 he called for the repealing of blasphemy laws.

Mosley is now planning a raft of libel actions in the UK and Europe over the claim that his orgies had “Nazi” overtones, rather than simply “German prison” themes. How much exactly will that difference in damage to reputation be worth?

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From the Wardman Wire (link added):

We have another blogosphere Libel Action…

Dave Walker [back-up site here – RB], the official Lambeth Conference Cartoonist in Residence, has taken 75 posts down on his blog after being threatened with Libel Action by the new owner of SPCK – the oldest chain of Anglican Bookshops. He has been reporting the story of alleged mismanagement for two years.

I blogged on the take-over back in 2006. I used to live in a town with an SPCK (“Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge”) bookshop, and it was an incredible resource for intelligent books about religion, including serious Biblical scholarship. In 2006 the shops were sold off by the SPCK to an Orthodox American organisation called the St Stephen the Great Charitable Trust. The new owner, Mark Brewer, had religious objections to the range of materials available in SPCK bookshops – in particular, the Koran. The Church Times noted

…Concerns over Islam are apparent on the SSG’s website, where the charity reports: “England has not only become extremely secularised in recent years, but has witnessed the explosion of Islam. . . In an effort to stem the growth of non-Christian faiths and re-establish Christianity in areas where it has been driven out, the Trust has acquired a beautiful building [the redundant St Mary Magdalene’s] in Bradford. (This city has one of the highest percentages of resident Muslims in the UK.)”

Text on the website has been amended since the Church Times published the report announcing the partnership. References to the “misguided beliefs” of those who turned to the Roman Catholic Church, and other references to the Orthodox Church as “the only Church true to the Word of God, and therefore the only one that offers true salvation and eternal life”, have been removed.

Brewer claims that ongoing criticism in the Church Times has been motivated by the fact that the Times‘ owner (SCM-Canterbury) controls some rival bookshops. However, allegations of mismanagement proliferated, and in June the Worcestor local branch manager Steve Jeynes committed suicide after being made redundant. Around the same time, SSG filed for liquidation in the US. The Bookseller reported:

Three weeks ago brothers Phil and Mark Brewer, who run the charity, told staff and publishers that SSG LLC, the trading company that operates the former SPCK chain, had filed for protection from its creditors under Chapter 11 of the US Bankruptcy Code—a form of bankruptcy that allows a business to continue trading.

However, Verlie Rios, a court clerk in Houston, told The Bookseller that this had been converted to Chapter 7 bankruptcy in court. “It basically means the business is in liquidation,” she said. “There will be a meeting for creditors on 22nd July.”

However, not all has gone to plan, as the Church Times now reports:

THE OWNERS of the former SPCK bookshops chain have been halted by inconsistencies in their petition from declaring themselves bankrupt in a United States court. They are said to owe thousands of dollars to hundreds of creditors.

The Bankruptcy Court in Houston, Texas, has issued a notice that says it intends to dismiss the motion for bankruptcy unless it hears from the owners by Monday 4 August.

Randy W. Williams, the trustee of the bankruptcy courts, had filed the motion to dismiss the bankruptcy motion because, he said, the company that petitioned for bankruptcy, “St Stephens the Great LLC”, did not exist. What did exist was “St Stephens the Great”, which bore the same name and same tax code as the charity in the UK that took over SPCK shops’ staff and assets. It is with that charity that many creditors were in dispute….Mr Williams said that it was not in the best interest of the “extensive” creditors that the proceedings should be so far from the UK, where almost all the “tangible business” took place.

Meanwhile, Unity at Ministry of Truth has done some further digging, finding gems such as:

SPCK’s remaining bookshops, including those in Durham and Chichester Cathedrals have been transferred to companies called ENC Shop Management Co, Durham Shop Management Co, and Chichester Shop Management Co. all of which are listed on Companies House as foreign companies (Houston registered, again) and all having the same secretary and directors…

SECRETARY: BREWER, SANDRA K
DIRECTOR: BREWER, J MARK
DIRECTOR: BREWER, PHILIP W

(Hat tip: Dave Cole)

UPDATE: Talk Islam draws attention this blog on the subject.

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Yes, it’s that man yet again: just a couple of weeks after my blog post on Walid Shoebat’s past links with the UK-based Simon Altaf, Shoebat’s associate Joel Richardson presents “A Public Rebuke and Warning From The Walid Shoebat Foundation” concerning Altaf. As I noted in my blog post, Shoebat fell out with Altaf when Altaf became involved with a certain Rabbi Moshe Yoseph Koniuchowsky, who is based in Florida and heads a Messianic Jewish offshoot called “Messianic Nazarene Yisrael” or “YATI”. However, not much was in the public domain: Shoebat’s handler Keith Davies simply explained that the split occured “because we didn’t agree with the stuff [Altaf] was putting on his website”.

That seems to have been an understatement, judging from Shoebat’s new pronouncement against Altaf:

You need to beware of this false Rabbi Moshe Koniuchowsky alongside Simon Altaf who turned polygamist and cultist of the first order…When confronted with the facts of this cultic behavior Simon Altaf went to Moshe Koniuchowsky and Moshe told him to cut off communication with me since we the Christians are now evil and only they are the true Nazarene believers.

Shoebat then provides us with letters from Koniuchowsky, as well as from Altaf and Altaf’s  estranged wife. Here’s an extract from Altaf’s letter, in which he explains why God wants him to take a second wife:

The woman’s name is Salmah, not married, single, 25, ex-Muslim, she had explicit dreams of seeing me in her bedroom holding her hands, then she saw me in her room as I am inside her body…There were other dreams but don’t challenge me because I walk closely to YHWH and He has shown His will. I know you are Mr Skeptic but I am Mr Yes Sir to YHWH.

Altaf’s legally-recognised first wife tells Shoebat that Altaf has

…been acting very strangely ever since he got involved with these lunatics from Florida. He corrected the teaching of a self professing Rabbi who has written the vilest book imaginable and has rubbed HaShem’s holy name in dirt. It’s called “sex and the believer” and it’s disgusting.. You can get it from the YATI website, it’s disgusting and totally carnal. Aside from being proponents of polygamy they are obsessed with having as many women and children as possible and creating “seed for HaShem”. The book mentions lewd things like if you have too many wives, you can have a male concubine, make your wife satisfied so that she does not feel “neglected”.

Koniuchowsky has a number of “synagogues” under his leadership, including in Columbia, Cuba, India, Pakistan, Panama and the UK.

Altaf’s wife also mentions a “Brother Tehseen”, who tried to reason with him. This would be Pastor Tehseen Gul Khan of Yesu Masih Ministries, who, like Altaf, is based in Southall in West London. Khan is apparently “1st Asian Pastor/teacher who teaches the word of Yahweh with full Hebraic & two house Understanding”, and his website includes the notice that

Mr. Simon Altaf is no more part of Yesu Masih Ministries, radio and website. He is 100% responsible for all his actions, statements and newly emerging teachings.  We will not take any responsibilities if you agree or disagree with any of his teachings, actions and statements… We are also not affiliated with Mr. Moshe Yoseph Koniuchowsky.

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