Christian leaders are furious that Bibles seized from The Bible Society of Malaysia (BSM) bookshop in Petaling Jaya earlier this year have been desecrated with a warning that they were not to be published or used anywhere in Selangor, before they were released to Sarawak Christians last month.
The stamping of the Bahasa Malaysia and Iban Bibles was only discovered after the Selangor Islamic Religious Department (Jais) handed over the holy books to the Association of Churches of Sarawak (ACS) in a ceremony witnessed by the Sultan of Selangor on November 14.
Sources who knew of the matter confirmed to The Malaysian Insider that BSM would be issuing a statement to protest against the stamping of the Bibles, and that it was highly upset over what it considered a repeat incident.
In March 2011, 5,000 copies of the Alkitab were stamped and serialised by the Home Ministry, which held the consignment worth RM70,000 for two years after seizing them at the Kuching Port on March 20, 2009.
In expressing dismay at the Home Ministry's stamping of serial numbers on the 5,000 copies of the Alkitab, the BSM had then issued a statement saying that the Bibles could no longer be sold but would instead be preserved "as a heritage" for Malaysian Christians.
The sources did not want to be named ahead of the official statement from the BSM which handles the importation and distribution of Malay Bibles throughout Malaysia.
A photograph circulated on Facebook of what is said to be the warning stamp in the Bibles. – December 7, 2014.
One of them confirmed that a photograph being shared on Facebook was indeed of the stamp which stated the warning in red letters.
In English, it reads: "Strictly for non-Muslims usage only and shall not be published or used in any part of the state of Selangor pursuant to section 9 (1) Non-Islamic Religions (Control of Propagation Amongst Muslims) Enactment 1988".
Christians in the dark over new stamp
One of the sources said that the national-level Christian bodies did not know of the stamping until after the Bibles were handed over.
BSM president Bishop Datuk Ng Moon Hing, when contacted, said to wait for the official statement.
The November 14 ceremony where Jais handed the 351 Bibles seized from BSM in January to the ACS was witnessed by Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah and by Menteri Besar Mohamed Azmin Ali at the Istana Alam Shah.
The Bibles were received by ACS chairman Rev Archbishop Datuk Bolly Lapok.
The arrangement to have the holy books handed over to ACS rather than BSM was later explained in a press statement by the Selangor Islamic Religious Council (Mais).
Mais had said that it had been instructed by the Sultan to "dispose of these Bibles containing the word 'Allah' by returning them to the ACS" and on strict conditions that they were not to be distributed in Selangor, especially among Muslims, and were only for Christians in Sarawak to use.
It appears that the peninsula-based BSM did not know of the stamping immediately for it had issued a press statement on November 20, thanking the Sultan of Selangor for his involvement in securing the release of the Bibles, and expressing "content" over the release to Sarawak churches, where the Bibles "had been designated for, in the first place".
But according to one of the sources who confirmed the stamping with The Malaysian Insider, BSM only came to know of the defacement sometime at the end of November, which indicates that it had issued its statement thanking the Sultan before discovering the stamp in the Bibles.
The release of the 351 copies of Malay and Iban Bibles finally came about after much defiance by the state Islamic authorities against the Attorney-General's decision that there were no grounds to charge BSM as the Bibles were not a threat to national security.
The Islamic authorities had also defied orders by the Pakatan Rakyat-led state government under former menteri besar Tan Sri Abdul Khalid Ibrahim to return the Bibles, saying the state administration should not interfere in the management of Islamic affairs. - TMI
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