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Congressman to be sworn in using Quran

By FREDERIC J. FROMMER, Associated Press Writer1 hour, 16 minutes ago

The first Muslim elected to Congress says he will take his oath of office using a Quran once owned by Thomas Jefferson to make the point that "religious
differences are nothing to be afraid of."

Rep.-elect Keith Ellison, D-Minn., decided to use the centuries-old Quran during his ceremonial swearing-in on Thursday after he learned that it is kept at the
Library of Congress. Jefferson, the nation's third president and a collector of books in all topics and languages, sold the book to Congress in 1815 as part of
a collection.

"It demonstrates that from the very beginning of our country, we had people who were visionary, who were religiously tolerant, who believed that knowledge
and wisdom could be gleaned from any number of sources, including the Quran," Ellison said in a telephone interview Wednesday.

"A visionary like Thomas Jefferson was not afraid of a different belief system," Ellison said. "This just shows that religious tolerance is the bedrock of our
country, and religious differences are nothing to be afraid of."

Some critics have argued that only a Bible should be used for the swearing-in. Last month, Rep. Virgil Goode (news, bio, voting record), R-Va., warned that
unless immigration is tightened, "many more Muslims" will be elected and follow Ellison's lead. Ellison was born in Detroit and converted to Islam in college.

Ellison said an anonymous person wrote to tell him about the Quran, and he arranged with the Library of Congress to use it. The chief of the Library of
Congress' rare book and special collections division, Mark Dimunation, will walk the Quran across the street to the Capitol and bring it back after the
ceremony.

Ellison's decision to use Jefferson's Quran was first reported by The Washington Post on Wednesday.

Jefferson was born in Albemarle County, in what is now Goode's congressional district in central Virginia. Goode's office did not return phone and e-mail
messages left Wednesday.

An English translation of the Arabic, Jefferson's Quran was published in 1764 in London, a later printing of one originally published in 1734.

"This is considered the text that shaped Europe's understanding of the Quran," Dimunation said.

It was acquired in 1815 as part of a more than 6,400-volume collection that Jefferson sold for $24,000 to replace the congressional library that had been
burned by British troops the year before, in the War of 1812.

"It was a real bargain," Dimunation said.

The Quran survived an 1851 fire in the Capitol. Dimunation described it as a two-volume work, bound in leather with marble boards.

"As a rare book librarian," he said, "there is something special about the idea that Thomas Jefferson's books are being walked across the street to the
Capitol building, to bring in yet another session of governmental structure that he helped create."

Copyright © 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or
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