{"id":1054,"date":"2016-03-02T20:01:04","date_gmt":"2016-03-03T01:01:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ubfriends.net\/?p=1054"},"modified":"2016-09-22T08:28:47","modified_gmt":"2016-09-22T13:28:47","slug":"do-christians-and-muslims-worship-the-same-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ubfriends.org\/ubfriends2015\/do-christians-and-muslims-worship-the-same-god\/","title":{"rendered":"Do Christians and Muslims worship the same God?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"mc1\"When I lived in Turkey, I was often ashamed of being an American because of the generalization that Americans are nonintellectual and self-conceited (which is often very true with tourists from the USA). Thus, when I was asked about my nationality I would reply, \u201cFilipino.\u201d This past week, however, I have felt that same shame creep up again, but this time because I am affiliated with the Evangelical Protestant Denomination. Last Wednesday, February 24, I attended an event entitled,\u00a0“The Same god? Dr. Larycia Hawkins and Ahmed Rehab at the Chicago Temple.”<\/a>\u00a0And I am heartbroken that Wheaton would lose such a Professor. I am also enraged that such a complex question would be boiled down to a simple yes or no answer. And that that answer would terminate someone’s career. I wish that Dr. Hawkins had been shown more grace. What happens at Wheaton has repercussions for the rest of the world; Wheaton is a representative of the evangelical community.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Context<\/strong><\/p>\n

First of all, in Dr. Hawkin’s facebook post she quoted the Pope. She\u00a0typed<\/a>, “I stand in religious solidarity with Muslims because they, like me, a Christian, are a people of the book and as Pope Francis stated last week, we worship the same God.” Back in 2013 during\u00a0an inaugural discourse to representatives of different faiths<\/a>\u00a0the Pope spoke these words,\u00a0“I greet and thank cordially all of you, dear friends belonging to other religious traditions; firstly the Muslims,\u00a0who worship the one living and merciful God<\/strong>, and call upon Him in prayer.” Here he was alluding to the\u00a0Lumen Gentium 16<\/a>\u00a0(Pope Paul VI, 1964). The dogmatic constitution of the church reads, “But the plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator…amongst these there are the Muslims, who, professing to hold the faith of Abraham,\u00a0along with us adore the one and merciful God,<\/strong>\u00a0who on the last day will judge mankind. Nor is God far distant from those who in shadows and images seek the unknown God, for it is He who gives to all men life and breath and all things (Acts 17:25-28).”<\/p>\n

I know that the Pope is not a person of authority in evangelical circles, but I would hope that evangelicals would have enough respect towards his words to at least take them into consideration. Surely, if a Christian leader (albeit Catholic) who reads the same Bible, shares this sentiment there must be some merit to his words (at least enough to acknowledge them and not jump to conclusions of heresy immediately). But I will share more about the Pope and the theological reasons behind his words later.<\/p>\n

At the talk on Wednesday, Dr. Hawkins clarified that she was not making a theological statement about soteriology (the doctrine of salvation). She was making a statement of embodied solidarity\/embodied piety with her Muslim brothers and sisters who also share the Imago Dei. She was also acting in reaction to the statement of\u00a0Jerry Falwell Jr.<\/a>, president of Liberty College,\u00a0who said,\u00a0\u201cI\u2019ve always thought that if more good people had concealed-carry permits, then we could\u00a0end those Muslims<\/strong>\u00a0before they walked in and killed them…I just wanted to take this opportunity to encourage all of you to get your permit. We offer a free course. Let\u2019s teach them a lesson if they ever show up here.\u201d His words embody a sentiment that is unacceptable in the global arena of civil discourse whether one is religious or not. It\u2019s ironic that when a the President of a Christian University endorses violence and hate during a school\u2019s convocation he passes through scotch free, while a Professor of Political Science at a Christian Liberal Arts School is terminated for posting a status on her personal facebook page quoting the Pope. Hate and love are treated differently; one is rewarded while the other is punished. This is the message this incident sends to the world.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, Dr. Hawkins also shared about a trip that the Pope made\u00a0to a beseiged mosque in the Central African Republic<\/a>. The Pope took off his shoes and entered the Koudoukou Mosque and told several hundred men, \u201cChristians and Muslims are brothers and sisters.\u201d Some people don\u2019t even know that CAR is a country. Yet the Pope went in and visited Muslims; he claimed his trip to Africa would not be complete without it. This was the first time the Pope had visited and active war zone and it was to visit Muslims and urge the country to work towards peace. This was the example of embodied solidarity that Dr. Hawkins was trying to portray by wearing a hijab during Advent. It also reminds me of the Nazarene who hung on a cross for those who did not adhere to his theological doctrine. This is what Dr. Hawkins was standing for, embodied solidarity in the midst of Islam-a-phobia in the US today. There is meaning behind her words and actions; they were a reaction to the fear and hatred of evangelicals, not an embrace of Muslim doctrine or rejection of Christianity. However, it seems that in today\u2019s society to identify oneself with Muslims in any shape or form is heresy. This flies in the face of the incarnation.<\/p>\n

The Irony<\/strong><\/p>\n

The most memorable part of the talk for me was when Dr. Hawkin\u2019s shared her personal faith. Both Dr. Hawkin\u2019s and Ahmed Rehab are highly educated people. They know that Christianity and Islam are different entities. Dr. Hawkin\u2019s shared the doctrine of the divinity of Christ, the trinity and the resurrection. These are all concepts that Muslims do not accept. Dr. Hawkin\u2019s was not spitting in the face of Jesus. You can read her\u00a0own words<\/a>\u00a0describing herself as, \u201cA woman on a spiritual journey is who I am\u2014a journey that for me, has always pointed to Jesus. Throughout my years of service at Wheaton College, I have never wavered from my commitment to the Christian doctrines elucidated in the\u00a0Statement of Faith<\/a>.\u201d You can find Wheaton\u2019s statement regarding the review and resolution process\u00a0here<\/a>. I personally do not see how her facebook post stands against the statement of faith. Honestly, I had come to the event with my mind already made up. I thought the answer was an irrevocable \u201cNo, Muslims and Christians do not serve the same God.\u201d But after hearing Dr. Hawkins speak, I realized this is not a simple yes or no answer.<\/p>\n

The Implications<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are two responses to Wheaton\u2019s decision. One is that this further proves the notion that the US\u2019s evangelicalism is \u201cnarrow-minded, culturally and racially-myopic\u2026 sliding into irrelevancy (Howell, 5*).\u201d This is the stance that I am trying not to hold, but it is very difficult. I don\u2019t understand why dialogue is not able to be had. Why does one facebook post blow up into everyone\u2019s face? Why do Catholic teachings and the Pope make evangelicals cringe? Why is finding commonalities with Muslims considered so repulsive?<\/p>\n

And yet on the other side there are those who see this as a victory \u201cof an institution standing up to the forces of liberalism and pluralism that would devalue the truth-claims of the gospel and Christian theological distinctive in the name of tolerance (Howell, 5*).\u201d To some, there is no need for any dialogue. But, do those who answer “no” point-blank deal with Muslims? Are they missionaries or missiologists? Have they ever made any attempts towards interfaith dialogue?<\/p>\n

There is a fear that if we answer \u201cyes\u201d to the question there will be no need to evangelize. There is a fear that if we build bridges with the Muslim community we are compromising and diluting the gospel. And yet can we not transcend the divide? Can we let go of our religious concepts? What if Dr. Hawkin\u2019s intention was, \u201cto build bridges in service of a positive Christian presence and witness, while still affirming that salvation comes only in and through the work of Christ (Cashin, 8*)?\u201d However, such a notion is impossible in a binary mindset.<\/p>\n

Linguistics<\/strong><\/p>\n

In Arabic speaking countries there is no difference linguistically between the Allah of the Muslims and Allah of the Christians. Actually the word\u00a0Allah<\/em>\u00a0pre-dates Islam. The translation of the word God is always difficult to translate in target cultures. Even in Acts 17, when Paul spoke to the Athenians about God, he used their common Greek word\u00a0Theos,\u00a0<\/em>not Yahweh or Elohim (Priest, 3*). Many have come to God through this missiological approach of using common ground to present the gospel. \u201cCountless millions have embraced the Christian gospel and come to what evangelicals understand as a saving relationship to the God of the Bible, a God they continue to refer to as Hananim, if they are Korean, as Apajui, if they are Agurana, and as Allah, if they are Arab (Priest, 3*).\u201d Once an Arabic speakers was told to translate the statement “we don’t believe in Allah; we believe in God.” To say that in Arabic it would come out as, “we don’t believe in God; we believe in God (Greenlee, 14*).” Many of our views of “objective\u00a0reality” are based on our language and culture. And yet we are so foolishly quick to judge.<\/p>\n

Theology<\/strong><\/p>\n

I find in Christ’s interactions with the Samaritans that He did not shut them down. In John 4:22 he says to the Samaritan woman, “You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews.” He does not discredit their worship. She is reaching out to the one true God.<\/p>\n

Todd Aglialoro<\/a>\u00a0writing in response to the Pope’s claim that Muslims and Christians worship the same God wrote, \u00a0“I think we can say with confidence that any monotheist who calls out to the Lord is heard by the Lord, whether it\u2019s a Muslim, a pagan philosopher seeking the God of reason, or a Native American petitioning the Great Spirit. As\u00a0Lumen Gentium\u00a016 continues, God is not \u201cfar distant from those who in shadows and images seek [him].\u201d<\/p>\n

From an Eastern Orthodox Perspective, (Rommen, 27*) there are three reasons why we could answer yes to the aforementioned question.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. There is only one true God.<\/li>\n
  2. Every human being has the image of God no matter how sinful or distorted and thus every human desires a relationship with God.<\/li>\n
  3. “Every human being has been included in at least one of the divine covenants. while the earlier covenants may not contain the fullnesss of the knowledge of God afforded by the covenant in Christ, if the individual is acting in faith in what they do know, then they must be responding to the one true God (Rommen, 27*).”<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    My view<\/strong><\/p>\n

    The answer to this question for me personally is both yes and no. There are undeniable similarities between the God of Islam and the God of Christians: eternal, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, Creator, Judge, etc. Of course, Islam does not have the full revelation of God. There are differences between Christianity and Islam, i.e. Trinity, divinity, resurrection, but I still believe in embodied solidarity. I believe that we do have common ground to work on. I believe in the incarnation. I believe in the necessity to take on the likeness of those to whom we preach the gospel too.<\/p>\n

    In the case of Dr. Hawkins, I also believe in forgiveness and mercy. American society is so polarized. Not only that, but we evangelicals are so quick to throw each other under a bus. I am sick and tired of seeing this narrow mindedness. (Theologians are scattered on both sides of this issue. The answer is not black and white). I am saddened by the loss of the first African American woman tenured professor at Wheaton. (The only other time a Wheaton tenured professor was placed on academic leave in the past 20 years was for a case of possessing and trading child pornography*. I am angered at the inability for two parties to hold differing views on an issue and interact cordially.<\/p>\n

    My hope is that we would get comfortable with tension. That we would be able to embrace diversity within unity, that we would hold our essentials tight, but not the non-essentials. I don’t feel as though Dr. Hawkins was rejecting an essential of the Christian faith. It is from the Trinity that I learned diversity in unity. It is from the incarnation that I learned embodied solidarity. It is in the words of Jesus Christ that I learned to love my enemies. But I don’t see that lived out in the case of Dr. Hawkins.<\/p>\n

    What about you? How would you answer this question? Do you agree or disagree? What do you think of interfaith dialogue?<\/em><\/p>\n

    __________________________<\/p>\n

    * signifies articles from here: Wheaton and the Controversy Over Whether Muslims and Christians Worship the Same God<\/a><\/p>\n

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