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What’s In A Name?
by American Phoenix | August 17, 2007
According to CWNews.com, Dutch bishop Martinus “Tiny” Muskens has suggested that Christians should refer to God as “Allah” to promote better relations with Muslims. (To place this in a bit more perspective, this is apparently the same bishop who advocated the use of condoms to prevent the spread of AIDS.)
“Allah” is the Arabic word for God so, on it’s face the suggestion does not’t sound unreasonable. Words, however, carry meaning, and meaning is given to words by culture. When a Christian says “God” does it mean the same thing as when an Muslim says “Allah”?
“Who is God?” This is the ultimate question that Pope Benedict asked during his speech delivered at Regensburg on September 12, 2006.
There was much commotion made over the Pope’s speech then. It was evident from the commotion that the vast majority of the press, conservative and liberal alike, either didn’t read his speech or just didn’t get it. Much of the press, indeed much of the blogosphere, focused on the commotion caused as a result of Muslim reaction to the speech rather than focusing on the speech itself, and the question it presented.
Although it is often claimed that Muslims and Christians believe in the same God, our understanding of the nature of God are vastly different. This subject bears some examination. The Muslim creed (shahadah) is: “There is no God but God and Mohammed is his prophet” (“La ilaha illa Allah, Mohammed rasul Allah”). To ask the question differently, if Mohammed was a prophet, for whom was he a prophet? The first part of the creed gives us merely an equivocation. God is God. There isn’t any information in that part of the creed which gives us any idea of the character or nature of God – in other words, who God is. We must therefore take a closer look at the Islamic notion of God.
I. Trinity
One of the primary Muslim objections to the Christian idea of the nature of God is the notion of a Triune God. A triune God, so it is claimed, is not monotheism. As the Koran says, “Say, ‘Allah is One, the Eternal God. He begot none, nor was He begotten. None is equal to Him.’” Koran, 112:1-4. This is a fine objection so long as Allah is thought of in finite, physical terms. Dividing something physical and finite results in something less than the whole. But if Allah is thought of as infinite, then it becomes clear that each of the three portions of an infinity are still equally infinite. Division is thus irrelevant.
II. Incarnation & Crucifixion
Another great distinction is that Muslims do not believe that Jesus is God, only that He was a great prophet. Surah 4:171 “Jesus. . . was only a messenger of Allah. . . Far is it removed from His transcendent majesty that He should have a son.” Thus, Muslims do not believe in an Incarnation with all of its consequences for [Christian] theology. It logically follows that Muslims do not believe that Jesus was crucified. The Koran states in Surah 4:157 states “they did not slay him, neither crucified him, only a likeness of that was shown to them.” Muslims therefore believe that someone else was crucified in Christ’s place. In Christianity, the Incarnation is important precisely because this was how God offered himself, in human form, as a sacrifice for our sins. The crucifixion is a Christian’s redemption. In Christian theology, both the Incarnation and the crucifixion is God reaching out to us. There is no parallel in Muslim theology. Allah does not reach out to human beings in a tangible manner. Allah is transcendent and ultimately unknowable.
III. Personal vs. Transcendent
The Koran portrays Allah as one who is “far”, who is transcendent. As a Muslim theologian has said, “Allah reveals only his will, not himself. He remains forever hidden”. Even though he is near as the jugular vein as the Koran states (Surah 50:16), this is not the same kind of nearness as in Christianity. Human beings don’t have a personal relationship with their jugular vein. This “nearness” conveys only that Allah is “everywhere” (far and near) like the air that is around us. In Christianity, God doesn’t want to be with us only on the basis of his omnipresence and omniscience because being God, He is “everywhere” anyway. God wants to be near to us like someone who loves us.
IV. Immutable or Mutable Nature?
What is even more striking about the Islamic notion of Allah is that it appears that Allah’s nature is not fixed and immutable. Allah is able to change His own nature. Allah can act with love or with hate. Allah can create and destroy. His Word can be abrogated. His commandments are subject to change and improvement. (Surahs 7:10-17; 38:20-24 and 47:20, 21; Surahs 2:225; 5:91).
Thus, there appears to be no intellect associated with or directing Allah’s will. Allah’s justice, therefore, depends on Allah’s purely arbitrary and capricious will. Allah is a most just Judge, but He appears to be a Judge without any standards, without any constant, eternal and unchangeable nature that can be depended on by man. This raises yet another interesting - and very dangerous - question: If Allah can change His nature, is He still Allah?
The ninety-nine attributes of God reinforce this point. Allah is both The Dominant (13:17), The One Who Leads Astray (4:90; 4:142; 17:99; 18:6), The Slayer (2:26), The Avenger (32:22; 43:40 and 44:15), and The Harmful (from tradition; not found in the Koran) at the same time that He is The Merciful, The Compassionate (or Merciful) (1:1, etc.), The Truth (22:62), The Life-giver (30:49 and 41:39), and The Forgiving (35:27).
It should be noted that the Christian idea of absolute Truth does not apply here:
According to orthodox Tradition, a lie is justifiable in three cases: “To reconcile those who quarrel, to satisfy one’s wife and in case of war.” (El Hidayah, Vol. IV., p. 81.) And Abu Hanifah alleges that if a man should swear “by the truth of God” this does not constitute an oath. Imam Mohammed agrees with him. (Oaths, Hughes’ Dict.,. p. 438.)
The Moslem Doctrine Of God: An Essay On The Character And Attributes Of Allah According To The Koran And Orthodox Tradition by Samuel M. Zwemer, F.R.G.S.
Islam itself appears to be aware of its contradictions, for as Andrew G. Bostom points out:
[E]ven if one accepts an apologetic interpretation of Koran 2:256 as prohibiting forced conversion to Islam…, this verse was abrogated by the verses of jihad, for example 9:5, and many others in sura 9, as well as sura 8. Indeed Koran 9:5 alone is held to have abrogated (here, pp. 67-75 ) as many as 100 pacific (or seemingly pacific verses).
The Pope, Jihad, and “Dialogue”, The American Thinker, September 17, 2006,
If these verses of the Koran were not’t so obviously contradictory, there would be no need for any abrogation.
V. Justice
It is significant that, of the ninety-nine attributes of Allah, “The Just” (“El ‘Adl”) is never found in the Koran, but only included in the list of God’s attributes by tradition. In other surahs, we find another of God’s attributes: “The Judge” (“El Hakim”). He is “The most just of judges (or rulers).” Surahs 95:8 and 7:85. Still, this does not tell us anything about the character of Allah’s justice. What standards of justice are intrinsic to Allah?
Mohammed-al-Burkawi, a well-known commentator on the Koran, gives us an insight:
Allah can annihilate the universe if it seems good to Him and recreate it in an instant. He receives neither profit nor loss from whatever happens. If all the infidels became believers and all the wicked pious He would gain nothing. And if all believers became infidels it would not cause Him loss. He can annihilate even heaven itself.”
The Moslem Doctrine Of God: An Essay On The Character And Attributes Of Allah According To The Koran And Orthodox Tradition by Samuel M. Zwemer, F.R.G.S.
In Islam, Allah’s law is apparently not the expression of His moral nature, as it is in Christianity, but of his arbitrary will. God, as viewed through Muslim eyes, is completely arbitrary. Al Ghazali, one of the most famous scholars of Islamic thought, reinforces this point:
Allah’s justice is not to be compared with the justice of men. For a man may be supposed to act unjustly by invading the possession of another, but no injustice can be conceived on the part of Allah. It is in His power to pour down upon men torments, and if He were to do it, His justice could not be arraigned. Yet He rewards those that worship Him for their obedience on account of His promise and beneficence, not of their merit or of necessity, since there is nothing which He can be tied to perform; nor can any injustice be supposed in Him nor can He be under any obligation to any person whatsoever.
Al Maksad-ul-Asna, quoted in Oakley’s History of the Saracens.
Allah is therefore exempt from the moral standards that would otherwise flow from a fixed and immutable nature. Once again, we discover that Allah has no moral nature from which his actions proceed – something completely unlike the God of Christianity.
It is also very interesting to note the profoundly influential role Al Ghazali played in shaping Muslim theology. In his book, the Incoherence of the Philosophers, Ghazali discusses the philosophical skepticism that would not be common in the West until the 18th century. Al Ghazali’s rejection of skepticism, and vehement denunciations of Plato, Aristotle and other Greek writers, led him to the belief that all causal events and interactions are not the product of material conjunctions but rather the immediate and present will of God. In short, Al Ghazali threw the baby out with the bath water. He rejected reason because it could lead to an extreme skepticism. The logical consequence of this rejection of reason, which has developed over subsequent centuries, is a movement towards fundamentalism in many Islamic societies.
VI. Faith & Works
Al Ghazali brings up yet another important distinction. While Christians do not believe that they can merit heaven through good works, their good works are an outward manifestation of their faith. Faith without works is dead. (James 2:15) Faith, in turn, is an unmerited gift of God’s grace, an outpouring of God’s love for his creation.
Consider, however, the following surahs:
- To those who believe and do deeds of righteousness hath Allah promised forgiveness and a great reward (Surah 5:9)
- And He answers those who believe and do good deeds, and gives them more out of His grace; and (as for) the unbelievers, they shall have a severe punishment (Surah 42:26).
- O you who believe! If you are careful of (your duty to) Allah, He will grant you a distinction and do away with your evils and forgive you; and Allah is the Lord of mighty grace (Surah 8:29).
It appears from the above surahs that Allah’s forgiveness is tied to a Muslim’s works. But if grace is an unmerited gift, how can it be earned? Unlike Christianity where there is an assurance of salvation (1 John 5:13), there is no assurance in Islam because it rests in part on the obedience and good works of Muslims. In Christianity salvation is an unearned, free gift from God (Rom. 4:3; Eph. 2:89). In Islam, the Muslim must perform enough good works to outweigh his bad ones and hope that Allah wills to forgive him. Allah’s grace is completely dependent on Allah’s arbitrary will. This also raises the additional question how finite human works can ever be adequate satisfaction to an infinite God. In Christian theology, human works would never be sufficient – another reason why God’s son offered Himself as the perfect human sacrifice.
VII. Conclusion
So when Bishop Muskens asks Catholics to pray to Allah in order to “promote better relations with Muslims,” he is really asking Catholics to accept a completely different understanding of God which is very often at odds with the Christian understanding.
Is it possible then, to bridge this gap in understanding? Does a mere name change do the trick or is it merely indifferent to the sensibilities of both Christians and Muslims? This was the fundamental problem that Pope Benedict XVI addressed in his Regensburg speech:
The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God’s nature. The editor, Theodore Khoury, observes: For the emperor, as a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, this statement is self-evident. But for Muslim teaching, God is absolutely transcendent. His will is not bound up with any of our categories, even that of rationality. Here Khoury quotes a work of the noted French Islamist R. Arnaldez, who points out that Ibn Hazm went so far as to state that God is not bound even by his own word, and that nothing would oblige him to reveal the truth to us. Were it God’s will, we would even have to practise idolatry.
At this point, as far as understanding of God and thus the concrete practice of religion is concerned, we are faced with an unavoidable dilemma. Is the conviction that acting unreasonably contradicts God’s nature merely a Greek idea, or is it always and intrinsically true?
…
Thus, despite the bitter conflict with those Hellenistic rulers who sought to accommodate it forcibly to the customs and idolatrous cult of the Greeks, biblical faith, in the Hellenistic period, encountered the best of Greek thought at a deep level, resulting in a mutual enrichment evident especially in the later wisdom literature. Today we know that the Greek translation of the Old Testament produced at Alexandria - the Septuagint - is more than a simple (and in that sense really less than satisfactory) translation of the Hebrew text: it is an independent textual witness and a distinct and important step in the history of revelation, one which brought about this encounter in a way that was decisive for the birth and spread of Christianity. A profound encounter of faith and reason is taking place here, an encounter between genuine enlightenment and religion. From the very heart of Christian faith and, at the same time, the heart of Greek thought now joined to faith, Manuel II was able to say: Not to act “with logos” is contrary to God’s nature.
Faith, Reason and the University: Memories and Reflections, Pope Benedict XVI, September 12,2006
Few journalists or bloggers understood what Pope Benedict XVI said. One blogger who did was Amy Wellborn:
The Pope held up an interesting question for us to contemplate: Who is God? How can we talk about God? What does God’s existence and nature then imply about the way human beings are to live together on this planet? When true reason is abandoned as an attribute and expression of God, what hope is there for dialogue and peace?
Oh, please, Open Book, September 15, 2006
One journalist who also understood this is Maggie Gallagher. whose words I will leave you with:
What Pope Benedict was trying to say was the exact opposite thought: that in restricting reason to “science” (or that which can be empirically verified through the scientific method), the West risks reducing the “radius of reason” in ways that are dangerous. Why? Because (among other things) we risk relegating almost all the great important questions about human beings to the realm of unreason:
“If science as a whole is this and this alone, then it is man himself who ends up being reduced, for the specifically human questions about our origin and destiny, the questions raised by religion and ethics, then have no place within the purview of collective reason as defined by ’science,’ so understood, and must thus be relegated to the realm of the subjective.”
What are the consequences? Ethics and religion become “a completely personal matter,” losing “their power to create a community” and ending the very possibility of dialogue between different cultures: “A reason which is deaf to the divine and which relegates religion into the realm of subcultures is incapable of entering into the dialogue of cultures.” (Postmodernism suffers from the same deficit: If truth is impossible because reality is entirely subjective, what is the point in speaking to one another at all?)
What Did the Pope Think He Was Doing? by Maggie Gallagher, RealClearPolitics.com, September 20, 2006
Additional Reading:
-
Bishop Tiny Muskens and the BBC Documentary, The Curt Jester, August 20, 2007
-
Bishop Says Call God Allah, A Deo et Rege, August 16th, 2007
- Another for the “Smoke of Satan” Files…, †Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam†, August 14, 2007
- Okay. But shouldn’t they have to call Allah “God”?, The Deacon’s Bench, August 15, 2007
- What is the Dutch word for “God”?, Insight Scoop, August 14, 2007
- AmP’s “Huh?!” of the Day, American Papist, August 14, 2007
- Comfortable With the Size of My Muskens, An Examined Life, August 16, 2007
- An Interesting Juxtaposition of Stories …, Pro Ecclesia * Pro Familia * Pro Civitate, August 16, 2007
- The Enemy Within, RomanCatholicBlog.com, August 15, 2007
- The Name of God, ProfessorBainbridge.com, August 15, 2007
Topics: Catechetics, Catholic, Christianity, Religion |
August 18th, 2007 at 6:41 am
The problem “Tiny” ignores is that the rational Muslims don’t have a problem with Christians’ using a different name for Allah. The radical Muslims have a problem with even which type of Muslim you consider yourself to be. The problem in Iraq for example, is not a Muslim/Christian war, it’s Muslim/Muslim. So, thinking that simply referring to God as Allah will solve some problems in my opinion is horribly naive. If anything, those radical elements will perceive this as a victory for their terrorist ways and use that to ramp up their war on civilization.
August 18th, 2007 at 6:47 am
Tiny Muskens and the pronunciation of God
Tiny Muskens, a Dutch Bishop, really thinks if Christians refer to God as Allah, it will solve a lot of problems.
I think hes a blithering idiot. Are the Sunni, Shiites, and Kurds fighting only against Christians in Iraq?
Radical Islam is so r…
August 18th, 2007 at 8:37 am
At the very least, moderate Muslims won’t kill Christians who do use the name Allah. It is used by Christians in Indonesia, the Middle East, and other places where derivatives of Arabic are spoken or where there is a culture which has largely been influenced by Islam. However, many Christians in those communities actually try to avoid using the word “Allah” because of its strong association with Islam, and because of the very real possibility of bringing on retribution from Islamists.
I’ll agree with you that the biggest problem in Iraq is Muslim vs. Muslim. However, you should not ignore the fact that the Christian minority in Iraq is being horribly persecuted, sometimes by Muslims on both sides. Priests have been murdered, such as Father Boulos Iskander and Father Ragheed Ganni in Mosul, Christian churches have been bombed, and Christians murdered or imprisoned, their homes and property stolen or vandalized. It’s such a serious problem that the Christian minority, which has existed there since Biblical times, is in danger of vanishing.
September 24th, 2007 at 12:11 pm
Hi. I just came across your site and enjoyed it - I share some of your opinions strongly, and others, not. However, your tribute to 9/11 grabbed me. I just wanted to drop you a quick note to say that my first son was born at 5pm on 9/11/01. My family was all working in NYC and nobody knew he was born until the day after. When my sister arrived at the hospital (she worked across the street from the World Trade Center) she asked what his name was - we were still in shock and hadn’t decided. She came up with a name that bucked our Catholic tradition of naming after Saints. His name is Phoenix and he truly is the all-American boy. He marches with my bagpipe band at all of our Fireman’s parades and St. Patrick’s Day celebrations. He has a wonderful mind and endless heart. If I knew how to attach a picture here, I would. God has also blessed us with two other beautiful children. But I felt it was most appropriate to share a little about him. Keep up the good work. God Bless America!