Advocating the Lebanese Language Cause

Advocating the Lebanese Language Cause

A common opinion holds that Lebanese is a dialect and not a language. Among the Lebanese people themselves many consider Lebanese as a dialect and not a language, and therefore one should not be surprised that others who are not Lebanese think the same.

I hold that the Lebanese language deserves recognition among other languages. Through a series of simple arguments that is not exhaustive, common objections denying the existence of anything like a Lebanese language will be addressed and the underlying reasons will be exposed. My hope is that after having read my answers to the most common and typical objections, you come to make up your mind in favor of the Lebanese language and eventually you cherish it and practice it.

Please be aware that Lebanese words used in the text, or references to Semitic languages will follow the script of the Lebanese Latin Letters developed by the Lebanese Language Institute for writing the Lebanese language whenever needed. Sometimes the common writing in English of Lebanese names is presented first and between parentheses the version in the Lebanese Latin Letters is shown.


Why do people think that Lebanese is a dialect and not a language?

A range of answers might be provided by the people holding this opinion. Not all the answers have a rationale behind it. Some might simply say it is obvious that Lebanese is not a language, or simply laugh with a look of unbelief and an expression of disdain and mockery. Others might get angry to the idea that Lebanese could be a language or even that there is anything that could be called Lebanese: what an absurdity, according to them. Others might consider holding such views as a felony. In other words, the burden of the proof is thrown on anybody who would claim that Lebanese is a language.

However, taking the time to examine the reasons behind the denial of the existence of the Lebanese language when such reasons are provided is worthwhile for someone who believes that Lebanese is a language and as such, deserves recognition, or whoever is interested in understanding the matter before pronouncing the verdict. The issue becomes an issue of fairness. A number of advanced reasons that might prompt people to believe that the Lebanese is not a language, but at best a dialect, are examined. Each is summarized with its supporting arguments in italic format and then my position is formulated.


1) The Lebanese has never been recognized as a national language by the Lebanese Republic, that considers on the other hand that Arabic is the official Language of the country. Moreover Lebanon is a founding member of the Arab Countries League and the most recent constitution of the country states that Lebanon is an Arab country.

My position: The mentioned facts are true. However, by nature they are political and not linguistic. Many other countries have many languages though only one or few are recognized as official language(s) whether by a legal decree or by usage.

For instance, English is an official language in India. Yet hundreds of other languages are spoken among the Indian population. They are not necessary official languages of the Indian federal state or any particular state in the Indian federation.

The United States though using extensively English have no official language recognized as the language of the whole country. Does it imply that no language is used at all in the United States?

The official status of a language is not a proof of its existence or non-existence. Deliberating on the existence of a language from a linguistic point of view is part of the realm of science and not a political venture, though governments might have linguistic agendas included in their policies and goals.

Moreover, Arabic is not the only official language of Lebanon. French is an official language as well. Lebanon is also among the Francophone Countries and a founding member. Does it make then Lebanese a French dialect?


2) No other country than Lebanon has ever recognized the Lebanese as a language. Unlike English for instance, that is the language of England to start with but also a language recognized by other countries like France, Russia or China, Lebanese can not claim such peer recognition.

My position: Again, by nature the arguments are political, diplomatic, or legal but certainly not linguistic. Yet the mentioned facts about peer recognition of the Lebanese language are not true. Many countries recognize the rights of minorities, or foreign born children or children born to parents from foreign countries, to learn their heritage tongue or particular language, in addition to the official language of the country, if any language happened to be defined as such. This is the case of Scandinavian countries.

Moreover, recent development on the world scene, especially the War on Terror, prompted many citizens in western states to learn foreign languages and to realize that though many thought Arabic was the language of the Arab countries -and it is officially-practically it is not. It might even be irrelevant in some instances to believe so. More and more ads for jobs would explicit the desired “dialect” skills: Arabic with Iraqi dialect skills, or Arabic with Lebanese, Syrian, Jordanian and Palestinian dialects skills, and so forth.

Finally, many people though not representing states or working for governments wish to learn the Lebanese language –or for the moment let us accept to call it “dialect” - and know through experience that the Arabic they learnt did not make them speak fluently with their Lebanese friends and relatives, or speak at all their language. They often felt awkward because Lebanese people would laugh if you spoke classical Arabic with them unless in a very formal setting where you are expected to do so.

If you speak the Arabic language with Lebanese people in Lebanon on a daily basis, they would call you Mexican to make fun; in fact, popular Mexican series forecasted on Lebanese screens were translated into Arabic, prompting the association.


3) No systematic and standard teaching of the language has ever been introduced, with a standard script, grammar, dictionary or any reference literature and publications. Unlike the English language for instance that is written with the Latin script and has a well defined grammar, or the French language that is regulated by L’Académie Française -the French Academy- and the French government, the Lebanese can not claim such a standard for its own sake, though many would use practical scripts to write it. Even though the Lebanese could be written with the Arabic letters, or any other script, the language is not unified. Some writers and among them Said Akl (Saxiid Xaql or Saxiid Xa`l), a famous Lebanese poet with a society of fans, went up to codify the Lebanese as a language. Yet, all these enterprises remained tentative and did not make unanimity, and did not spread to include the common of the people among their allies.

My position: This is a very serious argument when it comes to standardization and widespread use of the standards. Though challenging and relating true facts, the existence of the Lebanese as a language should be considered as a people’s fact, a linguistic phenomenon, and not a governmental, political, legal measure or set of measures with the enforcement power backing them.

By the way, no language could claim to have only one standard that is followed by all. In fact, if the French is codified by the French Academy, the people kept speaking it their own way. Consider for instance the introduction of English words in it and the vivid and dramatic reactions of the government and the French Academy to that trend. However, when the French Culture Minister Jacques Toubon announced in the late eighties the legal measures to defend the French language and to prosecute those who would use English words instead of pure French words, he pointed to the challenge of the task ahead: he literally used the English word “challenge” instead of the French word “défi” in his address, then he rectified himself! Indeed it is a serious challenge especially in a world of global communication and connections, and in democratic societies that revel calling themselves open, to claim that one standard of speech exist and is binding to all!

Consider as well what the French call “l’argot” or “le patois”. These are like slang in English, reminiscent of local dialects or languages, or simply reflecting local influence. Consider “fashions” in language that vary like the seasons and the weather, in time and place: the words that are politically correct or defining a particular group change with the era. For instance, it is recommended nowadays in France to call any lady as “Madame” regardless of her marital status, though in the past “Madame” would be used to address a married woman or a widow, but “Mademoiselle” was used to address a single woman.

Besides English is not codified the way some people might think. The pronunciation, the colloquial, the slang, the regionalism, the Creole, the melting pot, the variations between countries like Great Britain, the United States and Australia, the social groups, the political movements, the artistic trends, the movies, literature, art productions and publications, the businesses and sciences, industry and technology and so on, all prove that the English language is a vibrant dynamic language, with a jungle of jargons, and myriads of expressions. This is certainly not the portrait of a static, rigidly defined language.

Therefore, the assumption of a static standard or set of standards defining a living language is not correct. A language precedes its codification and formulation in standards. A stark proof is that writing started in a point of time, signaling the beginning of what we call now History, but people spoke before that. Moreover, even when standards are formulated they can not stop people from using their own patterns playing with the standards in space and time. These very patterns would later lead to the formulation of new standards.

The process of standardization is dynamic itself. It serves to update the old by integrating the new. The advantage of standards is to keep the unity in diversity and set common references for understanding between people and for spreading the language for a significant period of time waiting for the new standardization. However the argument that a standard is definitive for a living language reveals a lack of pragmatism when examined closely. Notice that a word in a dictionary might have more than one meaning! Think that a writer has his own style and provides new meaning to existing words, and might invent a number of them. A poet would explore words and their inter-relations and bring about esthetic associations and creations. Look at ads and how they can play with the meaning of words. Consider your own speech and the ways you alter the meaning of the words for fun, or the misunderstandings that you might experience with other people. These are the common experiences that a language is not univocal and rigidly defined by structures. Speaking, reading and writing are indeed more than a simple repetition of words within a predefined frame of expressions. Each of us when practicing a language is called to responsibility. Responsibility requires our freedom. Freedom leads us to make choices. And through choices, we bring our voice, our imprint to language.

The best standards are those chosen by the people themselves. It is relevant to say that a widespread language, for instance English, though not rigidly codified might and could have some common references like the Oxford or the Webster-Merriam Dictionaries and others. It is beneficial and could serve for common grounds, striking a balance between the old and the new in the English language, and addressing the challenge of unity in diversity.

Notice that even the English grammar is not codified. You might hear on TV series from New York somebody saying “No matter what she do!” Yet at school many of us were taught that we should say “she does!” instead. In a business setting you might read or hear or say “the company have a great new project” instead of “the company has a great new project”, and so on.


4) The people who speak Arabic understand Lebanese. Lebanese is simple Arabic for the common of the people in Lebanon. It is a dialect and as such cannot be a language.

My position: It depends who is making the statement. Indeed some people who speak Arabic at least understand Lebanese and might speak it fluently as well. The real issue is to know if they understand or speak Lebanese because of their knowledge of Arabic. Many would claim it. Can they prove it?

It is very difficult to make such an assessment because people could lie, or think to understand but without proof, or have a personal history, character and skills that are different from other people, that allow them to speak many languages including Lebanese. I do recall one time I have offered prunes to an Iraqi friend who asked for “ḱawḱ”. The word “ḱawḱ” means in Lebanese language prunes. My friend wanted peaches because in Iraq the same word means peaches and not prunes!

If people are good faith, they would recognize that they might have been exposed to the Lebanese art productions through theater plays, songs, movies, TV Channels, Internet Chat or might have been in contact with Lebanese people. They could also notice many similarities between the Lebanese and the Arabic whether in the words or the expressions. That is why many consider the Lebanese a corrupted form of the Arabic language, a version for the vulgar, meaning the common people. However, many other people who took courses of Arabic to be able to communicate with their Lebanese friends and families found it very difficult to speak the Lebanese language. The Arabic was burdensome and not effective in reaching their goal.

Even if we admit that the Lebanese is related to the Arabic, and more, a simplification of the Arabic, does it prove that there is no Lebanese language of its own? I do recall a friend of mine who is form Latin America counting a story from her family. Her father and her father-in-law used to speak each in his native tongue, one in Spanish and the other in Italian and communicated well with each other; does it prove that the Italian language is a corrupted form of Spanish and that Italian has no existence of its own? Or does it prove just the opposite? Such reasoning would prove everything and anything!

As a matter of fact many languages might stem from the same original one like the Latin family of languages form the Latin. In particular the romance languages among them, the French, Italian and Spanish have close bonds. The Portuguese and the Spanish might be like siblings. Many people, who speak one of the two, readily understand the other. Similarities and closeness come often from a shared history but do not imply that one language should be excluded or denied the label of language whereas the other recognized at its expense.

Regarding the distinction between dialect and language it is pretty artificial. Let us prove it through examples. If a dialect should not be considered a language, the current Arabic language that has its origin in a particular dialect, the dialect of the City of the Prophet Mohammed Qoreish around the seventh century A.D., in Saudi Arabia nowadays, should then be denied the status of a language. The present French language that is at its origin the dialect of the Ile-de-France, the region of France around Paris, should also be denied the status of language. The Latin languages that have their origins in the local variations of Latin should be denied their status of language as well, and so on! The distinction is purely conventional. A dialect is a language. Then some might ask: why do we have a word for a dialect and another for a language, and why we differentiate them?

Though there are many theories about the topic and the purpose here is not to launch ourselves through them and exhibit them all, we could at this point remind the practical characteristics of a language. A language is a system of meaningful words making its vocabulary called also lexic, that could be defined by reference to each other; has a syntax usually called grammar; and a common logic of expression. For instance the sequence of letters “bbrmqp” is not a meaningful word in English. The sentence “Weather good the is” though made of meaningful words is not grammatically correct. The English syntax requires it to be stated as “The weather is good”, in that order and shape. Finally, though words could be meaningful and shaped and ordered according to the syntax rules, a sentence to sound English needs to follow some way of expression that we propose to call the logic of the language in general. For instance, the sentence “I do not have the memory of the event” is made of meaningful words that are shaped and ordered according to the English syntax. However it is not the usual way of expression. One would rather say “I do not recall what happened” or “I don’t remember”. Finally a language is expected to fulfill its mission of communication on a social scale, whether narrow or broad, without boundaries on the size of the scale or the scope of the communication.

Let us then look at the Lebanese with these explicited criteria, as a system of meaningful words, with syntax and a logic of its own. The Lebanese accomplishes all the functions of communication expected from a language. The Lebanese is a complete language that could be characterized as any other language, learnt and taught and spoken. Hence, stated simply, the Lebanese is a language! In case you still have a doubt, ask yourself: What is that I can express in any given language that I cannot in Lebanese? If there is any such a thing, then let us add it to the Lebanese and therefore you will have no excuse to claim that the Lebanese is not a language anymore.


5) The Lebanese is not standard in Lebanon but varies regionally and locally. For instance, the people of the south do not speak like the people of the north of the country. Beirut has its own dialect that is different from the one of Tripoli (Ṫrablos), Sidon (Ṡayda), Zahle (Zaḣle), Baalbek (Bxalbak) or Zgharta (Zġarta).

My position: The Lebanese indeed might vary from a region to another, even from a village to another. A natural question comes then: who could claim to speak the Lebanese? What variation is the real Lebanese and why? Again, this type of questions applies to any language. For instance, what language is American? Is it the variation from Massachusetts or Texas? from Alaska or Puerto Rico? from Chicago or New York City? from Manhattan or the Bronx? Is American the same as English? Historians of the English language make the point that English had and still has many local variations in England. Since it has spread all over the world it has many variations still today.

And by the same way, what is French? Is it the Metropolitan French or the variation of Québec? the “Parisien” (from Paris) or “Marseillais” (from Marseilles)? The break down could keep on and on as needed to express all the wide local varieties of any language starting at an international level, then moving to national, state, county, city, neighborhood levels and so on. For those who travel, they might as well notice that these comments apply to the Italian and the German, each with its many variations that the citizens of these countries themselves do acknowledge. The variations could be so different that it seems like two different languages are spoken by the citizens of the same country.

Yet we need to explain the choice of what Lebanese variation would be adopted and the reasons behind the choice. The civil war –that is still ongoing to some extent- divided people in Lebanon even within families. It has caused intense interactions between people especially at the language level. People needed to adapt in order to survive. Refugees from all over the country blended together in areas that are not their natural habitat. The Lebanese experienced the melting pot with a Lebanese version, tailored by the necessities of the war. Ironically, the war was meant to divide and hurt people and yet for the information and the psychological warfare people needed a common language!

The war also prompted many to seek building bridges with the other side and hence outreaching to others for the common good. As a result a smoothing of all the accents and variations took place, especially in the very dense area of Beirut were demographic estimations report about half of the Lebanese people live (in Lebanon without counting those in the diaspora). A witness of this phenomenon are the many jokes people will enjoy counting with at least one character in the story still holding the local variation of the language that is like a hallmark of identification.

Lebanese art productions with charismatic figures like the brothers Rahbani (Rriḣbeene) and the Rahbani family (Rraḣeebne), the famous Lebanese singer and icon Fayrouz (Fayruz) who galvanized the country as a symbol of unity and still do so, caused a leveling of the Lebanese all over the second half of the twentieth century and made it known to all Arab speakers and available to the world and the generations to come.

Symbolic figures like the poet and writer Said Akl (Saxiid Xaql or Saxiid Xa`l) gave the Lebanese language impetus and momentum through a prolific production of poems, stories and myths, and through the eccentric and attaching figure of the poet himself. The media broadcast contributed as well to standardizing more and less the language. Lebanon is a small country whose size is larger than Rhode Island but smaller than Connecticut. The development of the means of communication led everybody to exchange with everybody else, removing many barriers.

Popular figures of the Lebanese traditional art of singing called Zzajal also contributed to the widespread sharing of common songs and heritage. There is a muwweel -that is a chanted poem- for any circumstance. In addition to these traditional popular Lebanese genre the miijana, and the ataaba (xataaba or xateeba), the abu zzuluf and the raddeet (rradeet or rradee) should be included as well.

In these conditions, the natural choice for the Lebanese falls on the already common to all Lebanese version, the blended version used by all or nearly all. It is noteworthy that the differences between variations are not necessary huge in that sense that often the accent and the way the vowels are pronounced make the difference between them. In the south the trend is to pronounce towards the “ii” sound. Moving to the north it is the “o” that becomes dominant. The reason for the first is its historical relationship with the Phoenician and Old Hebrew. The reason for the second is its origins in the Syriac, called also the Occidental Aramaic, by reference to the West of Mesopotamia (Mesopotamia is located mostly in Iraq and Syria today).

Let us take one example: the first person pronoun “I”. In the south of Lebanon, one would hear in local accent “Anii” still like the Hebrew exactly. Within Mount Lebanon, one might hear “Eena”. In Beirut, the word becomes “Ana” closer to the Arabic. To the north of Mount Lebanon, one might hear “Anee” and more to the north towards the Akkar (Xakkar), one could hear “Ono” or “One” (not “one” like in English but o-n-e pronounced according to the Latin Lebanese Letters system).

One characteristic of the historical Shuf (Cuf) district, South of Beirut, below the Baruk Mount, is that people pronounce the guttural “q”. They do so in the Hasbayya (Ḣaaṡbayya) in the south of the Bekaa Valley (B`eex or Bqeex) in the Anti-Lebanon Mounts, in the Weede Ttaym. It is a characteristic sound that could even identify the Druze sect. However, Christians in those areas might speak like the Druze as well. After all it is a letter found in the Syriac like in the “Qadisha” Valley (Weede Qadiica), the Saint Valley, and in the Arabic like in Al Qods that is Jerusalem, and literally “the Saint of Saints” in the old Temple, first built by Salomon including in its structure the Cedar of Lebanon.

Moreover, many Lebanese speak both their own village or area variation and the common version used by all. They can switch any time by convenience. It is a way to show an urban and civilized stand yet still in touch with one’s roots. The imprint of these variations is still visible in the common Lebanese language in many ways, for instance through more than one way of conjugating a verb and the many meanings of a word. They enriched the common version and do not contradict it or question its existence.


6) Other dialects in the regions resemble the Lebanese if not identical, so how to claim that there is such a thing as an original Lebanese language? Why not talking about the Syrian language or the Palestinian language or the Jordanian language or the Iraqi language as well?

My position: The Lebanese indeed resembles many of other regional dialect/languages: the Syrian, the Palestinian, the Jordanian, the Iraqi and others. The same patterns of analysis applied to the Lebanese apply to them and to any dialect/language. They have themselves variations within each country. They have differences and similarities with the Lebanese regarding for instance the vowels pronunciations, the general expressions, the colloquial, the logic, the grammar and so on.

All these dialects/languages share a common history, common influences and background. However, claiming they are the same is very problematic in this case for many reasons, the same developed previously to address the other objections.

In the case of the Latin languages, who can decide they are the same or they are different? From a linguistic point of view the question is very difficult for it supposes that somebody has the criteria to decide when and a priori, two dialects/languages are the same or are different. Though not impossible the task is tedious and controversial. If the Lebanese was to be compared to the Chinese, China being a remote country from Lebanon with little direct interactions at the linguistic level, the issue would not be controversial to settle. No Lebanese people, so far as we know, are claiming the Lebanese to be Mandarin, or vice versa. But for reasons of proximity, the issue is different in stand when it comes to comparing Lebanese with other regional Languages in the Middle East.

The inherent issue is that each language has many variations itself. If two or more supposedly different languages stem from the same roots each with its own variations, it becomes clear that ambiguity might be raised from a theoretical point of view to determine the significance of the differences. What criteria should be used to decide that the differences between them are not greater than within each of them? In the science of numbers, and precisely in statistics this would be called an ANOVA test. But words are not numbers and there is no unanimous test for languages. Indeed, one could develop a theory to address the linguistic issue; even then would the issue be settled? There is a simpler answer in this case than developing a theory: let the people decide!

One could object here that I refused all political and legal arguments be used by my opponents but allow myself to use them to my benefit. Is not that true when calling for the people to decide? Yet, what I mean is that some distinctions between languages might have meaning for some and not for others, might be dramatic for some and negligible for others; they are arbitrary to some extent. For instance, who can say or prove that Portuguese and Spanish are completely different languages? If the people of Spain say that Spanish is their own language and the people of Portugal say Portuguese is ours, and everybody recognizes their choices then we should by convention call them two languages, regardless of any other theoretical consideration, by consensus. The difficulty in the examples of languages from the same family is that the language is continuous in its variations from one country to another and though there are political frontiers, the language does not need a passport to cross the border, like the wind itself.

Therefore, if Syrian people would like to develop their Syrian language we should respect them in their choice but we cannot do it in their place or impose it on them; and similarly with the Palestinian, Jordanian, Iraqi or others. By the way, I am not claiming that I am the Lebanese people or Lebanon, but somebody from Lebanon. There are other Lebanese who might disagree with my enterprise, or more in my adventure. I do respect their positions. What I do, I intend it to be a gift for Lebanon and those who are thrilled to discover Lebanon. We can invite but the guests are free. This is what our hospitality tradition is about.

The Middle Eastern countries have among their citizens multiple ethnicities that have their own languages in addition to the official language/languages. For instance, the Kurds speak also Kurdish, the Armenians Armenian, and the Turkmen the Turk. The Syriacs, Assyrians and Chaldeans speak varieties of Aramaic. Some minorities kept in their liturgy –that is to say in their public worship services as long as the government and circumstances allow the public worship- ancestral languages like the Maronites still use the Syriac, the Greek Catholics and Orthodox the Greek, the Latin Christians the Latin, the Jewish the Aramaic and the Hebrew, etc. Some communities have religious attaches that prompt them to practice foreign languages on a more or less regular basis. The Catholics are attached to Rome, the Orthodox to the Orthodox World with Greece, Russia and East European countries, Egypt and Ethiopia with their Coptic communities and other countries as well; the Shiites to their brethren in Persia, the Sunnites to other Sunnites communities in the Arab World and outside, and so on. Finally immigration contributed to the mixing and blending of people in the area and therefore their languages mixed as well.

The concurrence of Arab supremacist ideologies on one hand and the disdain of the West on the other led to call all the people in the Middle East Arabs or Muslims, with a pejorative connotation, regardless of their real ethnicities, beliefs and rights to integrity. The Middle East is still the land of diversity and complexity, and none of the communities there deserved disregard or disdain, including Arabs, Muslims, Christians and Jews, whether by their own governments or the West or the International Community in general. Ignoring the facts, or worse abusing the others pain and worry is not excusable, especially coming from those who claim to excel in the sciences and the art of observation on one hand, and believe in the fundamental and alienable rights of all people, persons and communities on the other hand.

The Lebanese as I am developing it is a gift for all of them that they will have in addition to all what is their own and is not meant to replace or challenge any choice or right that is theirs whether individual, communities or states.


7) All languages, or most of them, are affiliated to a family of languages. What family is the basket where to put the Lebanese? Is it a Semitic language? Should it be under the Arabic or the Aramaic families? Or else?

My position: The question is among the most interesting one and falls more under the human sciences shield than the political arena. There are hints and sparse studies, and many intuitions about the language origins. Lebanon is a land where many civilizations encountered each other sometimes embracing each other and other times conflicting with each other. The Lebanese came from that struggle and that very conviviality. We could cite: the Canaanites also called the Phoenicians (the same people as called by the Greeks), the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Chaldeans, the Persians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Arameans, the Byzantine, the Arabs, the Europeans through the Crusades, the Arabs and Muslims through the Anti-Crusades, the Mamaliik called also Mamlouk in some books or Mamluk, the Turks, also minorities like the Armenians, the Kurds, the Sharkas (Carkas) from the Caucase and Russia, the Italian traders, missionaries from all over the world, including American and European, and finally the Lebanese diaspora from all over the world.

However, establishing in a scientific way the roots of the Lebanese and its connections to other languages is currently a topic of research, exploration and discovery. Our new approach to analyze the Lebanese as a linguistic phenomenon first, led us to recognize especially in the grammar and logic of the language patterns that could not be reduced to the Semitic languages influences alone, or obtained by simple derivation from any of them to the best of our knowledge. They match patterns in the Indo-Arian languages like French, English and Spanish. Though the subject of the research would be dealt with in another article, the conclusion of the discovery prompt us to think that the Lebanese is somehow unclassifiable in one tree or one basket, and as such it is a reflection of the Lebanese character itself, that is by essence diverse and cosmopolitan even from very old times back to antiquity.

The openness of the Lebanese people, their quest for consensus, their syncretism and natural orientation towards connections and synthesis, their drive to synergy and effectiveness, all these qualities in such a small nation, make them awkward and vulnerable in the midst of a world of intolerance and resolute narrow ideological views. How can the jealous, the envious, the dogmatic, the angry, the hateful and the arrogant tolerate such a place and such a people? Lebanon could be thought of as a miracle. Lebanon is a huge cemetery of great civilizations with their ruins standing like majestic skeletons and vestige of the past. Yet, the Lebanese still stand after all have passed. Strong of the knowledge that all that appear great now will pass one day, they discovered more than the civilization. They strive to sanctity and absolute since antiquity. Clinging to their mountains, hills and valleys, through the sea coast and interior plains, they stand as a people of faith, one people under God that is Infinite Mercy for all, the Lebanese and all humanity equally.


Copyright Hicham Khalil Bourjaili, October 2007, August 2009, Connecticut, USA