The Crescent and the Cross… the unitarian Islamic deity (Allah) and our trinitarian Christian deity (Yahweh). In my previous entry I mentioned that there are profound theological differences, and differences historically and in outworking, between the Islamic Allah and the God whom Christians worship. Yet Christianity and Islam are both called Abrahamic faiths. So what is it that they have in common if there is supposedly common ground that they share?

As the late Dr Francis Schaeffer pointed out (and other notable theologians too, of course) our knowledge of God is incomplete, but what we do know of Him can be true. We know Him truly, but not exhaustibly. We can know Him only inasmuch as He has chosen to reveal Himself to us. Christians believe His fullest revelation is in His Son, our lord Jesus Christ. However, all mankind has a certain knowledge of Him - internal knowledge (an instinctive awareness of divinity that we are born with, and a conscience) and external knowledge (evidence from His creation, and from history) - and this knowledge is of the only one God, the One who IS. This applies to all mankind, which includes Muslims.

So it would appear that Muslims, along with all others who acknowledge a Creator God and make claims to worship this God, do inasmuch as they have knowledge of Him. I have listened to a number of Muslims speak of God in certain ways that I know to be true of His character. We appear to be referring to the same God as we each know Him, and where there is agreement, there is a degree of commonality.

However, the Muslim knowledge of God is seriously altered from the Christian knowledge of Him by the information that Muhammad provided for them. Their knowledge of God took a turning and headed off down another path. Their knowledge, as provided by much of Muhammad’s elaborations in the Qu’ran, has taken them away from the Christian knowledge of God. In this departure they increasingly lose sight of the Christian triune God, and the one whom they worship (whom they call Allah) takes on more and more the appearance and essence of what is called in Biblical language, an idol.

But isn’t it just that we have different perceptions of the same Supreme Being? Well, here is an analogy for you to consider. Take the situation in which you and I believe that we might know someone in common. I describe this person according to my knowledge and experience of him, and you look somewhat surprised. Yes, many of those characteristic do fit, you say, but didn’t I know that he has a son as well? Nope, I didn’t know that. In fact I am quite sure that he doesn’t because he never married nor had any such relationship with anyone. Oh, and did I know that he also has written a book? Yes, I knew he had written a book and that it was about the warring tribes of the sixth century. You look at me strangely. No it wasn’t anything to do with warring tribes of the sixth century, but to do with his son and many other things as well. Then we begin to realize there are a great many other significant things that don’t quite stack up. You tell me that this person is very keen to befriend and help others, and I think that is most odd because I found him to be totally impersonal and very severe. We are both absolutely certain of our facts and so may start to wonder if we are actually talking about the same person… perhaps we had made a mistake about that, and it is two different people we are talking about. In fact, given two laws of logic, the Law of Non Contradiction and the Law of the Excluded Middle, the most logical and rational conclusion we can come to is that we are speaking of two entirely different persons.

There are so many major differences between the Islamic Allah and the Christian knowledge and experience of God, Yahweh.
~ Allah says he has no son, even in the figurative sense; Yahweh claims that He does.
~ Allah says that Jesus didn’t die, yet Jesus died;
~ Allah says that one of Noah’s sons died in the flood; Yahweh says that Noah’s three sons were saved in the flood;
~ Allah says that Jesus made clay birds that could fly when He was a child; this is not in the New Testament, but in later myth books;
~ Allah says that Jesus spoke as an infant; this is not in the New Testament, but in later myth books;
~ Allah does not seem to know what mainstream Christianity believed as far as the Trinity is concerned. The closest that the Qur’an comes to a Trinity is God, Jesus and Mary. Nowhere can you find the true concept of the Trinity in the Qur’an - Father, Son (Word) and Holy Spirit.
~ The Qur’an has no concept of the incarnation of the Word of God in Jesus’ human body; the Qur’an says in essence that Jesus could not have been God because He ate and slept. Well, Christians have always believed that Jesus was 100% human and needed sleep and food. Why didn’t Allah understand what Christians believed? Yahweh would have understood.
~ How do we reconcile the fact that Allah allowed Muhammad to have many, many wives when in the Old Testament, Yahweh said not to multiply wives?
~ How do we reconcile the fact that Allah allows divorce after Yahweh said He hates divorce, taking into consideration what Jesus said about divorce in the New Testament?

I could go on and on with this one.

However, many Muslims believe that they are worshipping God, that being the Only God, the Supreme Being, the Creator of all, whose name is Allah - and that it is the Christians who have the distorted view of Him. But would this be good enough for God? We could all probably make up a religion and make it similar to the teachings of the Bible and say that the revelations of this new religion came from God. Would that make it so? How similar to the Bible would I have to be in order to get some believers? How different in the teachings from the Bible would it take for me to be accused of being a fraud? It is very important to note that in the days of Muhammad the Jews accused him of being a fraud - and they knew their Scriptures.

It is noteworthy that Mohammed, when preaching to the Meccans, was not seen as introducing a new god to them, but merely proclaiming that one of their many gods, the one who was already called Allah, was the greatest and only god. The Meccans did not accuse Mohammed of preaching a different god from the one that they knew and so embraced “Allah” without difficulty. Muhammad was very cleverly backing for a win and a place. While reigning in the beliefs of his own pagan polytheistic Arab brothers who already worshipped the god called Allah (who incidentally had three daughters in pre-Islamic times), he was linking the name of Allah (Arabic for “God”, as we know) to the religious histories of Judaism and Christianity as a way to claim them also for Islam and seek the conversion of Jew and Christian as well. Thus he gave his Arab brothers their history by identifying them as the descendents of Ishmael whose father was Abraham, generating Islam as a religion based on corrupted, often Gnostic, versions of Scripture while claiming to have issued from Abraham. Interestingly, the Qur’an does not actually say that Ishmael was offered for sacrifice instead of Isaac, but this is taught to Muslims all the same. The Jews and Christians at the time saw through this deception and would have none of it, spurning Islam as false doctrine. Thus they mocked him, which angered him greatly. This appropriation is a cunning strategy of Islamic apologetics and one to which the naive and unsuspecting will fall victim in their thinking. For this reason there is a very real need not to allow any confusion of the Islamic unitarian Allah with the Christian trinitarian God.

My ultimate concern is that in agreeing that Muslims and Christians worship the same God (in the fullness of their respective and differing knowledge of God) and making allowances for Allah being just the Islamic view of the same God, we then subsequently deny our lord and saviour, Jesus Christ. Islam denies the deity of Jesus. There is no getting away from that single fact. On this point Allah and Yahweh irrevocably part company in terms of everything we know and subsequently experience of them. You may worship one or the other, but not both together as these two understandings of God are an eternity apart.

We all are blessed by His common grace, no matter what we believe, and show forth something of His image in which we are made. Muslims will also show good fruit, the outworking of His common grace which is there in all of us. They know Him in some measure, but not in the fullness of the revelation and relationship that we have of Him in Christ and through the grace of the Holy Spirit. I can see Muslims worshipping something of God, but in their deception (for Muhammad certainly deceived them with the teachings of the Qur’an) they have taken a false path, one that leads to a parody of God, that which is their Islamic Allah. I have talked with some very spiritual Muslimahs, ones who worship Allah as portrayed in the early Mecca surahs, and their knowledge is more like our God, Yahweh. But without Christ they have no experience of an intimate relationship, and their knowledge and worship is stifled as a result. Their worship is not of the One who can give them that relationship, who has revealed Himself in that fullness. They strenuously deny that as it would be utterly blasphemous and apostate to do otherwise. They cannot worship Christ, and yet Jesus said that He and the Father are one (John 10.30) The Apostle John had a very important warning for the followers of Christ. We must not ignore this Scripture.

Anyone who runs ahead and does not continue in the teaching of Christ does not have God; whoever continues in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not take him into your house or welcome him. Anyone who welcomes him shares in his wicked work.
(2 John 1: 9-11)

Check out this paper for more theology: Does Islam really serve the same God as Christians?

The Crescent and the Cross… the unitarian Islamic deity (Allah) and our trinitarian Christian deity (Yahweh). Some will have you believe that these deities are one-and-the-same, while others see the danger in referring to them both as though they are one. Are Muslims and Christians talking about the same Being, or do they each have someone different in mind?

I have already chatted about this subject here and here, but have tripped over more discussion on the subject elsewhere and this seems a good as time as any to highlight a concern that is coming to light.

Back in October 2007 a letter was written, signed by 138 representative Muslim leaders, calling on two “Abrahamic faiths” (Islam and Christianity) to love God and neighbours together. A similarly large number of Christian theologians, ministry leaders, and prominent pastors signed the response letter issued by the Yale Center for Faith and Culture.

The Christian signatories said that they “share the sentiments” of the Muslim leaders who pointed out that Muslims and Christians make up over half of the world’s population and therefore true peace cannot occur as long as conflict persists between the two religious communities. And the Christian signatories asked:
1. that Muslims forgive Christians for their past sins – such as the Crusades and excesses of the “war on terrors” – as taught by Jesus Christ who said to “First take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out your neighbor’s eye” (Matthew 7:5).
2. that an interfaith dialogue takes place that moves beyond “polite” ecumenical talks between selected leaders, and wrote that leaders of both faiths should hold dialogues to build relations that will “reshape” the two communities to “genuinely reflect our common love for God and for one another.”

However, some very important fundamental issues are being ignored. They were picked up by Dr R. Albert Mohler, Jr., president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, one Christian theologian who did not sign the response letter. Source. He was disturbed by the Christians’ request for forgiveness of sins committed against Muslims, including the Crusades and excesses in the war on terror.

“I am sure that all kinds of sin went on with the Crusades on both sides,” he said. “But I am not going to apologize for the Crusades because I am very thankful that the Muslim effort to reach a conquest of Europe was unsuccessful. Otherwise, we would be speaking Arabic on this program right now and we would be talking about the Muslim continent of Europe and potentially even of North America.”

The war on terror, he also noted, is the responsibility of the United States so he was “not sure” why Christians are apologizing for that as a sin against Muslims.
“I don’t think that is the right way to put it,” Mohler said. “I don’t think we associate the United States of America with the Christian church. For whom are we apologizing and for what are we apologizing?”

Dr Mohler explained that Muslims also believe in Jesus but only as a prophet, not as the son of God. Christians must distinguish what kind of God they believe in when responding to the Muslim letter, which emphasized love for a common God.

“We don’t believe that Jesus Christ is our hero. We don’t believe that Jesus Christ is merely our prophet. He is Prophet and Priest and King. He is the incarnate Son of God. He is the second person of the Trinity. He is the Lord over all. Any minimization of that is a huge problem.”

“This is the God who very clearly identifies Himself and says, ‘I am this and I am not anything else.’ If you disagree about the identity of Jesus Christ, then you disagree about the identity of God. The most important issues about the dialogue with Muslims is that Christians are very clear about the Gospel. It is not enough just to say, ‘we renounce violence.’ It is important, but it is not enough.”

“Now, I want to be very clear: we should have nothing against a conversation. But I don’t think this is the way to get into the conversation,” Mohler clarified. “My concern is that when Christians enter the conversation with Muslims we must enter the conversation as Christians,” he said. “I think when you address a letter to Muslims and refer to God in their terminology then there is a big problem…when Christians enter a conversation, we have to show up as Christians.”

I am in absolute agreement with Dr Mohler. This is certainly not being picky. The Muslim perception of God is that which is described in their Qur’an. The Islamic Allah does not love Christians. He loves only Muslims, and he instructs them to slaughter those who will not submit to him and become Muslims (Surah 9). There is no love there for any neighbour who is not Muslim. When Islamic clerics speak of God, it becomes very confusing when Christians suppose they are speaking of God of Judeo-Christian scriptures, Yahweh. We know that the word Allah is the Arabic word for God, meaning the Supreme being and Creator of all. When Arabic Christians speak of Yahweh, they use their word Allah. But when Muslims speak of Allah, they are referring to the one who is portrayed in the Qur’an… and he is nothing like Yahweh, the God whom Christians worship.

At the heart of the Muslim letter was the “common ground” that believers of both faiths share – love for God and love for neighbours. My concern are the unanswered questions… What common ground? How much common ground do we actually have? When speaking of God, who exactly do we actually mean - the unitarian Islamic Allah, or the trinitarian Christian Yahweh? They are most definitely not the same, there being profound differences theologically, historically, and in their outworking. Until this issue is made crystal clear, then both parties are talking past each other and no real dialogue, that to which each side is truly accountable, can ever properly take place.

The catchy pithy title of this post is the same as that of a book I am currently reading by Dr Douglas Groothuis, associate professor of philosophy at Denver Seminary. That I am doing so coincides rather remarkably with several recent events that have all served to remind me that we are living in an Age where “truth” is being allowed to have quite different meanings to different people.

It was brought home to me in my own family when my son told me that one is only guilty of having done something if one is found out. He went ahead and tried the same argument on a Judge and discovered His Honour was not particularly impressed, overruling the particular objection being thus defended. But where had he learnt such a thing? It was not from me, someone who sees truth as that which corresponds to objective reality, not a matter of subjective persuasion or angle of perception. Feelings of guilt may be present or not, but if one did something… then one did something, discovered or not. But my son has grown up in a postmodern culture pervaded by moral relativity, and thus his point of view is probably not too suprising. It is certainly the view espoused by an important American philosopher, Dr Richard Rorty, who takes the position of the pragmatist, asserting that truth is what one’s peers lets one get away with. Now I can get myself in a right tangle with the truth, asking the question of whether or not the Judge, peering over his spectacles, was a peer… and if that should matter at all.

Postmodernism raises challenges to those who argue that truth is absolute, objective and universal. Truth decay, Dr Groothuis explains, is a cultural condition in which such a view of truth is considered implausible, held in open contempt or not seriously considered. However, he does go on to reassure us that the truth itself does not decay, but just our human grasp of it has slipped.

One intellectual mentor of Dr Groothuis is the late Dr Francis Schaeffer (1912-1984) who pointed out that we need to distinguish the content of truth (what statements are true) from the concept of truth (what truth is) because our view of the latter shapes everything about us - or about our beliefs. And the problem with postmodernism, argues Dr Groothuis (and I wholeheartedly agree with him!) is that it accepts a “poisonous” and untrue view of the truth. It is one thing to believe something is true when it isn’t, but quite another to believe that whether or not it is depends entirely on personal choice. For example… whether or not I believe that gravity is true (that it exists and will have a predictable effect on me) is hardly a matter of choice such that I can jump off a cliff and choose whether or not to crash in a broken heap at the bottom.

But objective truth has little to do with spiritual reality if you listen to Ophra. Check out what she is saying here and prepare to be amazed. The truth is anything that you want to believe it to be. Postmodernism, broadly understood, has dispensed with Truth and has replaced it with truths… as many truths that everyone and anyone likes to manufacture and believe in order to suit themselves.

Another concerning thing about truth is that these days it may not be politically correct and thus should be strictly censored. For example… the Canadian government has ordered a Christian ministry that teaches doctrine and the differences between Christianity and pseudo-Christian cults be shut down because its reference materials were “critical” of the beliefs of those who are not Christian.

MacGregor Ministries has had to relocate its corporate structure into the United States because it points out that:
~ “Mormons won’t tell you that all their so-called scriptures such as the Book of Mormon, Pearl of Great Price, Doctrine and Covenants, and even their official ‘Mormon Doctrine’ statements contradict each other…”
~ “Mormons won’t tell you that the reason the Book of Mormon has no maps is because there is not one scrap of archaeological evidence to support it!”
~ “Mormons won’t tell you that their prophet Joseph Smith was heavily involved in the occult when he founded Mormonism.”
~ “Mormons won’t tell you that that they encourage visitations from dead relatives from the ’spirit world,’ a practice forbidden in the Bible. (Deuteronomy 18:10- 12.)”
~ “Neale Donald Walsch who wrote the bestseller Conversations with God says, ‘Hitler went to heaven’ (Neale Donald Walsch, Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue, Book 2, Hampton Roads Publishing Company, Inc., 1997; p. 35) And the reason according to Walsh ‘There is no hell, so there is no place else for him to go.’”
~ “The Bible states that the ONLY WAY to heaven is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. Universalism teaches that there is not just one way of salvation but many different ways. The Christian inclusivists state salvation is by grace through faith in Christ alone, but they change the meaning to be that His grace extends out to those who do not believe (not needing faith) because he died for them too.”

Now these teachings are objectively verifiable facts. But MacGregor Ministries were given an ultimatum that required them to say that all religions are equal, that Lorri MacGregor was to stop writing their magazine on the cults, that they were to remove their websites and stop selling any products to help teach about the cults, and any future DVDs that they do on the Bible must not be persuasive in favour of Christian truth.

This situation brings to mind the persecution of the Apostles in the first century of the Christian church. They were ordered to stop their preaching. However, as we are told in Acts 5: 29 Peter and the other apostles replied: “We must obey God rather than men!

Another example of truth being censored where it is not politically acceptable is that which is portrayed in Geert Wilder’s recently released film “Fitna”.

The film really does little more than highlight certain surah written in the Qur’an and show news clips to demonstrate how those surah have been played out in recent time. It does not provide “context” that would suit an Islamic apologist who might prefer to intellectualize away the bald facts, but there is an objectivity to it that simply cannot be denied. If you wish to view the film, it is available in many places on the internet, and one such place is Mark Alexander’s blog, “A New Dark Age is Dawning“, right here.

I rather like the comments on Cranmer’s blog where he writes the following:

There is one religio-political agenda which has no compatibility with British democracy; indeed, it is in the process of destroying it. It may be observed that one may attack Christianity and offend Christians by blaspheming the name of Christ with impunity; there is no sensitivity to the level of this offence, and therefore no censorship. But any such attack on Islam and its prophet not only meets with the full force of the law, there are draconian levels of pre-emptive censorship just in case the Queen’s Peace is disturbed.

The default ‘blasphemy law’ in the UK is now Shari’a, and it is under its absolutes that all religio-political discourse must now be conducted. The Qur’an is now treated with greater respect than the Bible; the name of Allah is more fearful than that of Jehovah; and the life and teachings of Mohammed are more sacred than those of Jesus.

Cranmer presumes the Archbishop of Canterbury is content with the incorporation of this aspect of Shari’a into UK law, albeit by the back door.

Note that reports do not mention ‘the Islamic Prophet’; just ‘the Prophet’. The ‘Son of God’ would undoubtedly be pre-fixed with ‘whom Christians believe to be’ in almost every media narrative.

and concerning Network Solutions’ withdrawal of the film from the internet…

This is an unacceptable pre-emptive censorship, and must be an infringement of constitutional right. Network Solutions has caved in to radical Islam and spat in the face of free speech. It should not be for Network Solutions to determine what is and is not acceptable any more than it should be for Google. If causing offence is deemed to be unacceptable, who knows who might get offended next and which sites will be pulled?

And it is noteworthy that Network Solutions is perfectly content to host radical Islamic websites, some of which belong to (or are closely affiliated with) terrorist groups like Hizbollah.

The postmodern philosophy of today is waging war on the view that truth is absolute, objective and universal by nature, that it is one and undivided, the same for all people everywhere at all times. And where it does appear in its objective and rational form, it must be put away as far too abhorrent and repugnant to consider.

Today is Good Friday. Why is it good? As a child I used to think it was good because we had hot cross buns for breakfast - lovely and spicey, warmed in the oven, butter melting and dripping down our chins. And it was a day off school. Perfect! But apart from that, I thought it was pretty bad that Jesus was crucified - that anyone could be crucified. How was that good? It should really be Bad Friday instead.

On the radio news this morning I heard that the Muslims in Auckland were complaining that all the shops had to stay closed today. It wasn’t fair on them since they were being penalized by having to observe a holy day from a religion which wasn’t their own. Well, tough! They knew before they came here that New Zealand is a country whose traditions are founded on Christianity, not Islam. If they don’t like it, they are free to leave and live in an Islamic country where Easter means nothing. I have no sympathy with such a complaint. Also, I am not asking them to attend Church. But if they can’t go shopping, they might like to pick up a Bible and spend that time reading the true story about the historical Jesus. As I have written about in a previous post, they are thinking He is someone else instead. Not so. The Biblical account of the historical Jesus predates their own version by a good 600 years, and is the actual eye-witness accounts of those who knew Him, lived with Him, listened to Him, and in many cases died for their belief in Him. To read about Him, it is to the Bible that one really must turn.

So on Good Friday our shops remain closed. I know that is an imposition on those who are not believers. They have to give up one day of shopping, a day of consumerism, a day of letting the moths fly their wallets. But to a child’s eyes, that is a small price to pay for those wonderful hot cross buns for breakfast!

It is Easter Sunday, the day we celebrate the real goodness of Easter, that makes sense of the Friday beforehand. Do you believe it was possible, that it could really have happened, that Jesus rose alive from His death? There is some incredibly strong evidence to support that it happened. If you don’t believe that it did, on what basis don’t you believe it? Have you actually investigated the evidence before making a judgement? Or are you simply prejudiced by your own uninformed scepticism? If you have not looked into the evidence, then do be honest about it. And think about this… that if Jesus did indeed rise alive from such a hideous and certain death, then that is something that needs to be taken pretty seriously indeed. There is far more to the story than just a plain simple response. If you have not already done so, then start checking out some of the evidence which can be found from here on. You could be in for surprises!

It needs to be said…

Jesus is not honoured by being called a great prophet.
He was and is the Messiah, the Christ. He is the Son of God.

To think that one honours Him by regarding Him as a great prophet, but not as the Christ, is to belittle and denigrate Him instead.

This is what Islam does to our Saviour.
Not just Islam, but any religion - and any individual - who does not recognize Him for who He is.

And yet I know they are not.

Actors in the Islamic movie, “Jesus, the Spirit of God”.

A director has produced what he says is the first film giving an Islamic view of Jesus Christ, in a bid to show the “common ground” between Muslims and Christians. Nader Talebzadeh sees his movie, “Jesus, the Spirit of God,” as an Islamic answer to Western productions like Mel Gibson’s 2004 blockbuster “The Passion of the Christ,” which he praised as admirable but quite simply “wrong”. “Gibson’s film is a very good film. I mean that it is a well-crafted movie but the story is wrong — it was not like that,” he said, referring to two key differences: Islam sees Jesus as a prophet, not the son of God, and does not believe he was crucified.

These folk are convinced they are right. But wait, the Jesus of the Bible lived seven centuries before the Qur’an was written, and the New Testament gospels were already in existence. Did the Qur’an come up with new evidence about Jesus? No. There isn’t any that was not already known in Christendom. Nothing has been discovered since that favours the Islamic stories over and above the Biblical stories. Where did their version come from then? Islam tells us that the Qur’an was handed down to Mohammad, from Allah, via the Angel Gabriel. The Islamic stories of Jesus - or rather, of the Prophet ‘Isa, as they believe they know of him - come from their god, Allah. When I compare these stories with those of Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ of the New Testament, I seriously wonder if we are meaning the same person. In fact, I think this has to be a case of mistaken identity. The purported facts are so different in each case. Even Islam is saying exactly that, and that the purpose of this film is supposedly to give the truth. If that is the truth, then it has to be about somebody else - not Jesus of the Bible.

Talebzadeh says it aims to bridge differences between Christianity and Islam, despite the stark divergence from Christian doctrine about Christ’s final hours on earth.

“It is fascinating for Christians to know that Islam gives such devotion to and has so much knowledge about Jesus,” Talebzadeh said.

“By making this film I wanted to make a bridge between Christianity and Islam, to open the door for dialogue since there is much common ground between Islam and Christianity,” he said.

Source

But how does such a film “bridge the differences between Christianity and Islam” ?

I would say it points out the differences between Christianity and Islam, and just makes them so much more obvious. There is no bridge there at all.

There are two main sources for the stories of the Islamic prohet ‘Isa - the Qur’an, and the aHadith. The Qur'an gives a history of his life, whilst the Hadith collections, which are recollections of Muhammad's words and deeds, establish his place in the Muslim understanding of the future. The Qur’an declares that the true name of Jesus is ‘Isa, and his message was pure Islam - submission to Allah. ‘Isa was born to Mariam, daughter of ‘Imran, under a date palm tree and spoke while still a baby in the cradle. He breathed life into clay birds and foretold the coming of Muhammad. Apparently ‘Isa was given a book, namely the gospel, and the message revealed in that book is Islam. The book in its original form has since been lost, but his teachings are now incorporated in the Qur’an. ‘Isa was “supported” by the Holy Spirit and his disciples were all Muslims. ‘Isa was not crucified but he did ascend to Allah, and on the Day of Judgement he will be a witness against Jews and Christians for believing in his death. The prophet ‘Isa will have an important role in the end times, establishing Islam and making war until he destroys all religions save Islam.

However… The Qur'an, written in the 7th century AD, cannot be regarded as having any authority whatsoever to inform us about Jesus of Nazareth. It offers no evidence for its claims about biblical history. The Qur’an’s numerous historical errors reflect a garbled understanding of the Bible. ‘Isa is not an historical figure. His identity and role as a prophet of Islam is based solely on supposed revelations to Muhammad over half a millennium after the Jesus of history lived and died.

Jesus' mother tongue was Aramaic. In his own lifetime he was called Yeshua in Aramaic, and Jesu in Greek. It is interesting that Jesus’ name Yehoshua' contains within it the proper Hebrew name for God, the first syllable Yeh- being short for YHWH ‘the LORD'. Yeshua of Nazareth was never called ‘Isa, the name the Qur'an gives to him. Arab-speaking Christians refer to Jesus as Yasou' (from Yeshua) not ‘Isa.

Jesus did not receive a book. He spoke as He was given to speak from God, the Father.

The claim that Jesus was not executed by crucifixion is without any historical support. One of the things that all the early sources (and that includes historical texts ex-biblical) agree on is Jesus' crucifixion. Check that out here.

Mariam the mother of ‘Isa is called a sister of Aaron, and also the daughter of Aaron's father ‘Imran (Hebr. Amram). Clearly Muhammad has confused Mary (Hebr. Miriam) with Miriam of the Exodus. The two lived more than a thousand years apart! In the Bible Haman is the minister of Ahasuerus in Media and Persia (The Book of Esther 3:1-2). Yet the Qur'an places him over a thousand years earlier, as a minister of Pharoah in Egypt. The claim that Christians believe in three Gods — Father, son Jesus and mother Mary — is mistaken. The Qur'an is also mistaken to claim that Jews say Ezra was a son of God. (At-Taubah 9:30) The charge of polytheism against Christianity and Judaism is ill-informed and false. (Deuteronomy 6:4, James 2:19a)

Jesus' alleged foretelling of Muhammad's coming (As-Saff 61:6) appears to be based on a garbled reading of John 14:26, a passage which in fact refers to the Spirit.

Dr Mark Durie sums up as follows:

‘Isa (Jesus) of the Qur'an is a product of fable, imagination and ignorance. When Muslims venerate this ‘Isa, they have someone different in mind from the Yeshua or Jesus of the Bible and of history. The ‘Isa of the Qur'an is based on no recognized form of historical evidence, but on fables current in seventh century Arabia.

For most faithful Muslims ‘Isa is the only Jesus they know. But if one accepts this Muslim ‘Jesus', then one also accepts the Qur'an: one accepts Islam. Belief in this ‘Isa is won at the cost of the libel that Jews and Christians have corrupted their scriptures, a charge that is without historical support. Belief in this ‘Isa implies that much of Christian and Jewish history is in fact Islamic history.

The Jesus of the gospels is the base upon which Christianity developed. By Islamicizing him, and making of him a Muslim prophet who preached the Qur'an, Islam destroys Christianity and takes over all its history. It does the same to Judaism.

In the end times as described by Muhammad, ‘Isa becomes a warrior who will return with his sword and lance. He will destroy the Christian religion and make Islam the only religion in all the world. Finally at the last judgement he will condemn Christians to hell for believing in the crucifixion and the incarnation.

This final act of the Muslim ‘Isa reflects Islam's apologetic strategy in relation to Christianity, which is to deny the Yeshua of history, and replace him with a facsimile of Muhammad, so that nothing remains but Islam.

Source

And to cap it all off, our Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God. The prophet ‘Isa is not the Son of God, nor the son of Allah, since Allah is not a father and he has no son at all.

It beggars belief that anyone can think that Jesus of Nazareth, the historical Jesus of the Bible, is the same as the Prophet ‘Isa of Islam. Just who do they think they are kidding?

Photo credit: Malene Thyssen

Islamophobia is a seriously misused word these days. To quote the words of Mark Alexander who often comments here…

A phobia is a persistent, abnormal, irrational fear of something. People's fears of Islam are neither abnormal nor irrational. It is perfectly normal to fear someone or something which wants to destroy your way of life; and fearing such is not irrational either. Indeed, it would be irrational NOT to fear Islam, given that its stated aim is to take over the world. As for people being persisent in their fears, well that is because Islam is persistent in its objectives of wanting to Islamize the world.

Source

The term is seriously misused in that it is often wrongly defined as hatred towards Muslims. The correct term for that would be something more like Misomuslimism (Greek μίσος miso = hate) for hatred of Muslims, or Misoislamism for hatred of Islam.

The term is further misused in its frequent form of an ad hominem attack on those who, without any hatred towards Muslims, seek to share the truth and reality of Islam - the facts as they are revealed in Islam’s holy book, the Qur’an.
See Islam 101.

This past weekend in New Zealand saw this term frequently misused (together with its related one, Islamophobe, used as a denigrator) through the combined efforts of the “Residents Action Movement” and “Voices of Peace” organizations who brought British MP, George Galloway, here for a public meeting in Auckland. My previous Journal entry introduces and discusses their reactionary agenda.

Reactionary? Yes - absolutely.

Baptist Pastor, Dr Stuart Robinson, the Australian author of the book Mosques and Miracles, drew about 200 people to a conference in Auckland this past weekend aimed at revealing what he says are the true dangers of Islam, and to inform, educate and equip Christians about Islam and how to reach out to Muslims. The two-day conference was organised by the missionary groups Open Doors, Middle East Christian Outreach, Asian Outreach and Interserve, with support from the Vision Network of evangelical churches. Glyn Carpenter of “Vision Network of New Zealand”, who helped promote the conference, said that “the conference is essentially a reminder to Christians of the basic teaching to love others. Certainly the speakers are sharing from their considerable experience of Islam, which includes living in Islamic countries, about the diversity within Islam, and issues to be considered”. (Source)

Dr Robinson believes there is a fundamental difference between Christians and Muslims trying to convert others to their religion, and we need to recognize this difference. He explains that most Westerners do not understand that Islam teaches that peace would prevail in the world only when the Muslim religion predominated. This is what Muslims mean when they describe Islam as a peaceful religion - that peace will reign when there exists universal submission to Allah. Dr Robinson also points out…

Their books teach that they [Muslims] are the best of all people, that they want to rule over the whole world.
One can’t object to that. Christians also are on a mission from God to make disciples, but we make disciples of Jesus, who was quite a different entity from the example of Muhammad.
Muslim theology teaches that war has to be prosecuted against the infidel until the day of judgment when Jesus Christ returns.
Unlike Christianity, which offered salvation simply through faith, Islam teaches that the only sure way to paradise was to die as a martyr for the faith. That becomes an enormous recruitment device for a lot of the suicide bombing that we see.

Source

It is these statements that are considered to be the “rantings” of islamophobia. But what if they are the truth? What if these statements are absolutely factual? In fact, there is irrefutable evidence to support that being the case. The Qur’an reveals these irrefutable facts. The aHadith, and the Sunnah, all reveal these irrefutable facts.

But there is tremendous pressure being brought to bear to have us all believe otherwise. One surely has to question the motives of people who promote such an aggressive denial of these facts. Grant Morgan, the co-editor of a Marxist journal for all grassroots activists, wearing his “Voices of Peace” organization hat, uses the emotionally coloured terms “anti-Muslim extremism, racist bigotry” in his reaction to the planned conference, having already swallowed the politically correct version of Islam rather than listen to the truth spoken by Dr Robinson and others like him. Grant Morgan again, this time wearing his “Residents Action Movement” organization hat, in yet another press release here continues the ridicule and ad hominem assault on “the Aussie Islamophobes” (Dr Robinson, Dr Durie, Dr Shayesteh) whose credentials more than likely far outweigh those of his own and George Galloway combined.

“All good people must unite to defend our Muslim sisters and brothers from the race hate lies of the Aussie Islamophobes and their New Zealand cronies,” writes Grant Morgan.

A few more points to note:

1. Muslims do not regard non-Muslims as their brothers and sisters.

2. There is no evidence at all of any racial hatred. Islam is not even a racial grouping.

3. There is no evidence at all of any hatred towards Muslims. No-one is supporting hatred towards Muslims. The conference aims were specifically related to love, and to reaching out in love to Muslims.

4. Teaching the facts of Islam as per the Qur’an is not hatred. It is simply the teaching of facts. Grant Morgan and George Galloway are the ones providing the emotional ingredients.

5. Teaching what is in the Qur’an is teaching the truth of what is there. No lies are being taught. There is substantial evidence from many other sources to verify this as truth.

6. Islamophobes, cronies - name-calling, the use of ad hominem, is well recognized as the cover-up for a weak argument.

7. Grant Morgan’s red herrings and straw man arguments do not constitute a scholarly rebuttal of the truth espoused by Dr Robinson and his colleagues. Same can be said for George Galloway’s rhetoric. In fact, theirs is just an emotional reaction with no knowledge substance to it at all.

8. Glyn Carpenter of “Vision Network of New Zealand” adds an interesting comment here.
“Contrary to statements made by organisers of the “Voices of Peace” conference, the Mosques and Miracles conference speakers and attendees are anything but Islamophobes. It is ironic and concerning that organisers of a conference called “Voices of Peace” would use terms like “NZ Islamophobes“, “Aussie extremists“, and “far-right Islamophobic idealogues” about this conference.”

9. The website of the Federation of Islamic Associations of NZ supposedly promotes knowledge of Islam but in its account of the life of the Prophet, portrays him as a man of peace, and provides no account sowhatever of his (anything but peaceful) activities of the Medina period. Of course, we can resort to the history books for all that, but this is a glaring omission that must reasonably caution the reader to the likelihood of other omissions of equal magnitude.

10. The use of the word “Islamophobia” should ring loud alarm bells and have us looking critically at what exactly is being said, and being ready to remove the emotional content to look strictly at facts, at reality, and for substantiated truth. Teaching what is truthfully revealed in the Qur’an is not “hatred for Muslims” - but having a fear of something with a clearly stated intent of destroying one’s lifestyle, and enforcing a religious belief against one’s will, is most certainly rational and sane, not phobic at all.

And a passing note on the “hatred” of Christians for Muslims…

On the other side of town, ten young men all under 20 years old put into place final arrangements for their ultimate act of faith, living out their love for Allah and hatred of infidels who they felt undermined Islam.

The young men got guns, breadknives, ropes and towels ready for their final act of service to Allah. They knew there would be a lot of blood. They arrived in time for the Bible Study, around 10 o'clock.

They arrived, and apparently the Bible Study began. Reportedly, after Necati read a chapter from the Bible the assault began. The boys tied Ugur, Necati, and Tilman's hands and feet to chairs and as they videoed their work on their cellphones, they tortured our brothers for almost three hours*

[Details of the torture:
* Tilman was stabbed 156 times, Necati 99 times and Ugur's stabs were too numerous to count. They were disemboweled, and their intestines sliced up in front of their eyes. They were emasculated and watched as those body parts were destroyed. Fingers were chopped off, their noses and mouths and anuses were sliced open. Possibly the worst part was watching as their brothers were likewise tortured. Finally, their throats were sliced from ear to ear, heads practically decapitated.]

In an act that hit front pages in the largest newspapers in Turkey, Susanne Tilman in a television interview expressed her forgiveness. She did not want revenge, she told reporters. “Oh God, forgive them for they know not what they do,” she said, wholeheartedly agreeing with the words of Christ on Calvary (Luke 23:34).

In a country where blood-for-blood revenge is as normal as breathing, many many reports have come to the attention of the church of how this comment of Susanne Tilman has changed lives. One columnist wrote of her comment, “She said in one sentence what 1000 missionaries in 1000 years could never do.”

Source

For George Galloway and Grant Morgan and a great many others who want to believe that Christians (whom they vilify) are haters of Muslims, Susanne Tilman’s message has yet to reach their ears. She is only one of a great many whose sincere love of Christ means there is no room in her heart to carry hatred for even the torturer and murderer of her husband.
What hatred? Christ teaches us to love our neighbours, love our enemies, and to forgive those who persecute us. What hatred for Muslims? Calling Morgan and Galloway… what planet are you on?

I often resist being called a this or a that, given some label and dumped in with a lot of characteristics that do not define me. Some labels are necessary and unavoidable, but there are others that are very important to resist because they brand their wearers with flawed generalizations and associations that create identity error.

It has been reported in our news that a visiting left-wing British MP, George Galloway, is in the country to speak to the issue of Islamophobia. It is written that Mr Galloway said he flew half way round the world for the weekend to counter talks by “crazed fundamentalists from Australia who are here to whip up hatred against the 45,000 Muslims resident in New Zealand”. One can read this story here. The report lists a number of one and two line statements that sound quite alarming, such that I wonder who is whipping up hatred against whom.

Mr Galloway comes from a country where there is a growing problem from a process of Islamisation, where there are serious threats and acts of Muslim terrorism, and yet he recommends that we follow that country’s political policies to stop “Islamophobia” (which he defines as racism against Muslims) developing here in NZ. I find that something akin to inviting a non-swimmer to teach swimming lessons. It also stands out as a rather bizarre message in the light of another report published today in Germany…

POPE Benedict XVI's private secretary has warned of the ‘Islamisation’ of Europe and demanded that the Continent's Christian roots not to be ignored.

“Attempts to Islamise the west cannot be denied,” Monsignor Georg Gaenswein was quoted as saying in a copy of the weekly Sueddeutsche Magazine published today.


”The danger for the identity of Europe that is connected with it should not be ignored out of a wrongly understood respectfulness,” the magazine quoted him as saying.

Gaenswein also defended a speech Pope Benedict gave in Regensburg, Germany, last year linking Islam and violence, saying it was an attempt by the Pontiff to “act against a certain naivety.”


In the interview with the respected German weekly, Gaenswein confirmed that the Pope wrote his own speeches and that the remarks had not been edited.

He said: “I believe that the speech from Regensburg, as it was held, is prophetic.”

Asked if the idea of a serious dialogue with Islam that exists in the real world was naive, given that it was a religion where human rights were trampled under foot, he said: “Attempts to Islamize the West cannot be denied.

“The danger for the identity of Europe that is connected with it should not be ignored out of a wrongly understood respectfulness.

Source

Mr Galloway creates a link between Christian fundamentalists and those who promote this supposed Islamophobia, but where in the equation would he dare to place Pope Benedict? After all, that lecture at Regensburg considerably upped the antagonism from the Muslim clerics who objected to Allah being seen as promoting violence. But Pope Benedict, far from preaching Galloway’s “wrongly understood respectfulness” of Islam, was warning against “a certain naivety” that recognizes the reality. Maybe, just maybe, Mr Galloway is denying the facts and stirring up hatred against those (usually Christians) who actually recognize them for what they are - stark reality.

1. Islam is both a political ideology and a religion - some would say a marriage of both, and more correctly the former simply cloaked in the latter. It is not a race, therefore talking in terms of racism only demonstrates a confusion in terms and meanings.

2. Islamophobia is a fear of Islam. However, the term is being used to describe a hatred towards Muslims, this creating further confusion due to imprecise meanings.

3. Teaching the truth about Islam is not “Islamophobia” anymore than teaching the truth about Christianity is Christophobia. If that was so, then we should be asking serious questions about Church Sunday School classes as well.

4. The common sense asking and answering of questions, dealing with facts and reality, is not fear-inducing unless there is very good reason that fear arises from such facts. It is not whipping up fear where none needs to exist. Neither is it whipping up hatred towards a race of people or adherents of a particular religion. Those who equate the teaching of facts with such an emotion-laden term are the ones employing psychological means to push an agenda.

5. It is fashionable and trendy to label sane level-headed Christians as “Christian fundamentalists” whether they are or not, vilify them, mock their religious beliefs, and accuse them of deluded and distorted thinking. Apart from this being an ad hominem attack that does not deal with the facts of the issues, it also involves creating straw man arguments into the bargain.

6. In connection with the previous point, it would be more sensible to separate the message from the messenger. It may be that Christians, being those in the firing line for persecution by Islam, have a sharper view of what Islam is about, but the facts need to be considered objectively. The connection with, and vilification of, Christian fundamentalism has prevented an objective appraisal of reality. The baby is being thrown out with the bath water.

The supposed “crazed fundamentalists from Australia who are here to whip up hatred against the 45,000 Muslims resident in New Zealand” include names I recognize as very well-balanced and educated authors who do not hide the truth of Islam.

One is Dr Mark Durie who is vicar of St Mary’s Anglican Church in Caulfield, Melbourne. He is also a senior associate of the Department of Linguistics and Applied Linguistics at the University of Melbourne, with the honorary title of Associate Professor, and was formerly head of the Department of Linguistics and Language Studies. He has written several books on the language and culture of the Acehnese, an Islamic people of Indonesia, and was elected to the Australian Academy of Humanities in 1992 for this research work. He served as a member of the Council of the Academy for a term during the 1990's.

Another is Dr. Daniel Shayesteh who was deeply involved in the Iranian Fundamentalist Revolution (1979) as a leading Muslim political leader and teacher of Islam. In addition to English, he speaks three middle-eastern languages (Farsi, Turkish and Azerbaijani) and is an accomplished poet and classical middle-eastern musician. He is an author and studied in one of the universities in Tehran and later in Turkey and Australia. His doctorate is in international business. He is now a Christian, Director of the Exodus from Darkness ministry, and a National Evangelist for the Christian and Missionary Alliance of Australia.

And another is Australian Baptist pastor, Stuart Robinson, author of “Mosques and Miracles”. Dr Stuart Robinson has been the Senior Pastor of Crossway in Melbourne since 1983. Together with his wife Margaret, they worked for fourteen years in South Asia, where Stuart pioneered church planting among Muslims and thus gained the knowledge and experience which enabled him to author his best selling book.

These people have had considerable experience of Islam and know all of its facets. They are concerned for the future of Western civilization, knowing the Islamic mission of bringing about universal submission to Allah. There is nothing “crazed” about their writing and teaching, but it seems that “whipping up hatred” is the term Mr Galloway and his associates prefer for the teaching of facts that we all need to know. As Christians, they are also committed to the teachings of Christ who would have us all love our neighbour as ourselves. There is no teaching that we must hate Muslims.

Now I have a question to ask. Why is it so important to Mr Galloway to come all the way around the world to tell us this message, or to his associates who have brought him out here? Why must we not hear the truth about Islam? Why must the facts be messed up with a lot of ad hominem attacks on Christians and straw man arguments? No one is hating the peace-loving Muslims living in NZ, those getting on with their lives and not causing anyone any upset. But should we not be aware of the dangers that some may bring to our shores, and if numbers increase as they have done so in Britain and Europe, then that we may be subject to similar concerns for ourselves?

A friend of mine recently returned from a quick trip to London and told me how, as she was waiting in the queue at Heathrow to board her flight back home, there were about a dozen young Muslim men lining up as well. Being a friendly person, she spoke to them but got back some awkward looks. One of their number came up to her and, in halting English, explained that none of the group spoke any English except for himself. During the flight they spent most of their time reading from their Qur’ans, and later in the flight the young men were having a problem filling out their immigration cards. The one who could speak a little English approached my friend for assistance. It transpired that the whole group were coming for 3 years. They were all going to attend NZ universities - 3 to Otago, 3 to Canterbury, 3 to Victoria, and 3 to Auckland. But wait… how could they study at a NZ university if they could not speak, read or write the language? Oh my! It really does make one wonder for what exactly 12 young Muslim men are coming all this way here to New Zealand.

I think we should ask common sense questions, and we should be given truthful answers that match all the facts. It is only common sense after all.

I am almost at a loss for words. Of all the saddest things to come out of the Anglican Communion of late, the following story is more than enough to make one weep. When the truth claims of Christianity are disregarded to the extent that sound doctrine is swept right away by whatever silly notion and whim takes the fancy, then I guess anything can be believed. And so the Rev. Dr. Ann Holmes Redding, a scholar in New Testament, can tell us that she is both a practising Muslim and an Episcopal priest. The content of Judah’s Journal is copyright. If you are NOT reading this on Judah’s Journal, then it has been copied from there and is re-published illegally - in other words, stolen. Those who would do that are common thieves and lack moral integrity. Judah’s Journal The June 2007 issue of the Episcopal Voice carries the story on page 9, and it is now appearing on numerous other Christian blogs such as this one here.

To quote the Rev. Dr. Ann Holmes Redding:

“We Christians, in struggling to express the beauty and dignity of Jesus and the pattern of life he offers, describe him as the ‘only begotten son of God.' That's how wonderful he is to us. But that is not literal,” she [Redding] continues. “When we say Jesus is the only begotten one, we are saying he's unique in some way. Islam says the same thing. He's the only human aside from Adam who is directly created by God, and he's different from Adam because he has a human mother. So there's agreement—this person is unique in his relationship to God.” Christianity also says that we are all part of the household of God and in essence brothers and sisters of Jesus. Muslims take the figurative language of “only begotten,” make it concrete and contradict it: God “neither begets nor is begotten.” “I agree with both because I do want to say that Jesus is unique, and for me, Jesus is my spiritual master,” Redding says. “Muslims say Mohammed is the most perfect. Well, it depends on who you fall in love with. I fell in love with Jesus a long time ago and I'm still in love with Jesus but I'd like to think my relationship with Jesus has matured.”

When we say that Jesus is the only begotten son of God, we are saying He is unique but not simply just “in some way”. We actually know in what way. It is in the way that He is of the same substance as the Father, our Creator God. And being of the same substance He is indeed God - God, the Son; second Person of our three-in-one Godhead. (John 10:30 “I and the Father are one.”) Not to acknowledge this uniqueness in this way is not to believe the truth claims of Christ.

What is more, it is not we who “struggling to express the beauty and dignity of Jesus” have coined the term “only begotten son of God” in our supposed struggle, but He is called that in Scripture which is God’s holy written word, the revelation of God Himself, because He is indeed that - as God has revealed! (Matthew 16:15-17 “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?” Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven.”)

Christianity does not say that we are all in essence brothers and sisters of Jesus, but only those who believe in Jesus as the Son of God are the children of God. (John 1:12,13 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God - children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God. )

The Qu’ranic description of Allah is something quite different from the Biblical revelation of Yahweh. Pope Benedict found himself in hot water last year as a result of his lecture at Regensburg when he described how Christianity’s view is that God is intrinsically linked to reason (the Greek concept of logos) whereas Islam’s view is that “God is absolutely transcendent.” He appeared to be saying that either the Islamic interpretation of God must be in error when used to justify patently irrational violence as divine, or else the god the Muslims worship is not God. The submission of man's rationality to irrational violent commands, Pope Benedict dared to suggest, is incompatible with who God must be. The Muslims, who insist that their Allah is the God of Abraham, were incensed and turned up the heat in their attempt to cook the Pope like a live lobster in a pot.

Furthermore, Muslims deny the deity of Jesus. To them He is just a prophet, the one they call ‘Isa. And the Qu’ranic accounts of their ‘Isa have significant contradictory differences (such as His crucifixion and resurrection which they deny, that He was begotten and not created - that is, being the Word through whom all Creation came into being) from the Gospel accounts of Christ. Unlike Yahweh, the Islamic Allah is not a father - he has no son.

Dr Redding believes that Jesus led her to Islam. Quoting from the interview with her…

She added that what Islam does is take Jesus out of the way of her relationship with God, “but it doesn't drop Jesus. I was following Jesus and he led me into Islam, and he didn't drop me off at the door. He's there, too.”

Yes, Islam does take Jesus out of the way of her relationship with God, and it does even more besides. Without Jesus and His redemption that restores our relationship to God, we are lost and no longer the children of God. (1 John 2:23 No one who denies the Son has the Father; whoever acknowledges the Son has the Father also.) This is about the Sonship of Jesus, His unique relationship to the Father (”…of one Being with the Father through whom all things were made…” Nicene Creed) and our acknowledgement of His deity as part of the Godhead.

Jesus made an exclusive claim (John 14:6 “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”) and to suggest that He leads anyone to worship a false god, one that denies His deity and all that He did on the cross for our redemption, is quite staggering to me. I can only surmise that Dr Redding has been well and truly deceived by the Father of Lies, and in losing sight of the real Jesus, has followed Satan, the evil one, instead.

One simply cannot be both a Muslim and a Christian. Each requires incompatible allegiances. Their truth claims are contradictory and mutually exclusive. Both cannot be right together, and to claim to believe in both requires a dissociative mental state. Dr Redding has sought synergy rather than salvation, and in attempting to be a believer of both, she has become a true believer of neither.

The questions to be asked next: What is this woman doing being allowed to remain a priest in the Episcopal Church? Where is her bishop, and what is he saying about her outright heresy? If there was any reason to be defrocked, this is surely a big one. Oh, wait, the Episcopal Church has veered right off course, creating it’s own liberal revisionist religion. It really is the saddest thing about the Anglican Communion.

Yesterday in New Zealand an international inter-faith forum was opened, attended by 165 religious and cultural leaders from 15 countries. The forum was sponsored by the New Zealand, Australian, Indonesian and Philippines governments as a response to the 2002 Bali bombings, the aim being to prevent religious-inspired terrorism by building links between various faiths in what is potentially the world’s most volatile region. In a sign of the importance they are afforded by member states, the opening was attended by NZ Prime Minister Helen Clark, the NZ Foreign Affairs Minister, Philippines President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, and the Australian Foreign Minister. New Zealand has a Statement on Religious Diversity, prepared by the Victoria University Religious Studies Programme, and is the subject of a national process of public consultation coordinated by the Human Rights Commission. It was endorsed by the National Interfaith Forum in Hamilton in February 2007 as a basis for ongoing public discussion. The statement reads as follows:

1. The State and Religion
The State seeks to treat all faith communities and those who profess no religion equally before the law. New Zealand has no official or established religion.

2. The Right to Religion
New Zealand upholds the right to freedom of religion and belief and the right to freedom from discrimination on the grounds of religious or other belief.

3. The Right to Safety
Faith communities and their members have a right to safety and security.

4. The Right of Freedom of Expression
The right to freedom of expression and freedom of the media are vital for democracy but should be exercised with responsibility.

5. Recognition and Accommodation
Reasonable steps should be taken in educational and work environments and in the delivery of public services to recognise and accommodate diverse religious beliefs and practices.

6. Education
Schools should teach an understanding of different religious and spiritual traditions in a manner that reflects the diversity of their national and local community.

7. Religious Differences
Debate and disagreement about religious beliefs will occur but must be exercised within the rule of law and without resort to violence.

8. Cooperation and understanding
Government and faith communities have a responsibility to build and maintain positive relationships with each other, and to promote mutual respect and understanding.

Background to this statement is the understanding that New Zealand is a country of many faiths with a significant minority who profess no religion. Increasing religious diversity is a significant feature of public life. At the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, Governor Hobson affirmed, in response to a question from Catholic Bishop Pompallier, “the several faiths (beliefs) of England, of the Wesleyans, of Rome, and also Maori custom shall alike be protected”. Christianity has played and continues to play a formative role in the development of New Zealand in terms of the nation’s identity, culture, beliefs, institutions and values.

On the face of it, these eight points that comprise the statement do look fair and reasonable. In our secular society every person receives equal protection under the law - protection from each other when the “right” to freedom of expression and practice of religious beliefs are under threat. The virtue of equality in law is upheld, but with it the less virtuous levelling of our national identity to whatever ingredients just happen to be in the mixing pot.

Less virtuous? The addition of a very small amount of salt may be excessive in flavouring the soup, and so too may the original ingredients forming our nation’s identity, culture, beliefs, institutions and values be overwhelmed by the influence of a small but forceful component without certain protections for those original ingredients. Just as has happened in the United Kingdom with the over-reaching impact of Islam from a population percentage still in single digits (about 3%) and in Europe from a greater percentage range, so may our Judeo-Christian heritage also require extra protection if we are not to lose it’s influence in several decades from now. Muslim youth in Sweden are wearing T-shirts emblazoned with the words based on socio-demographical predictions: “2030 and we take over”.

The content of Judah’s Journal is copyright. If you are NOT reading this on Judah’s Journal, then it has been copied from there and is re-published illegally - in other words, stolen. Those who would do that are common thieves and lack moral integrity. Judah’s Journal

At the opening of this inter-faith forum yesterday were 2,000 protesters led by “Bishop” Brian Tamaki of the Destiny Church, a traditionally Bible-based evangelical Christian church that many would describe as fundamentalist. The protest was against the statement of religious diversity which says the country has no “established or official religion”. Bishop Tamaki branded it “treason” for failing to properly recognise New Zealand’s Christian past, and delivered his own statement which demanded the Government formally recognise New Zealand as a Christian nation.

“Our government intends on presenting to primarily what are Muslim and Hindu and Buddhist countries that New Zealand has no established religion. I contend and say that we do have an established religion, it’s Christianity and I think … every New Zealander should be involved in making that officially recognised.” ~ Bishop Brian Tamaki, Destiny Church.

In response, our Prime Minister defended the Statement on Religious Diversity by saying that NZ has never had a state religion. Some further debate on this issue has been reported here. In the 2006 Census, those professing a Christian faith dropped from 60.8% of the population in 2001 to 51.2%, but were still 10 times as numerous as all other religions combined (5.1%). Those professing no religion rose from 29.6% to 32.2%, and 13.3% refused to answer the question.

How does one protect our Judeo-Christian heritage while receiving immigrants from different cultures and religions? I personally would like to see formal recognition of our Christian heritage, and an amendment of that first point which so upsets Brian Tamaki and others. After all, we do indeed have an established religion, that being Christianity - historically and currently. Our national anthem is God Defend New Zealand. It is not Allah, Buddha, or Krishna (etc) Defend New Zealand. In teaching about different faiths, I would like Christianity favoured over the teaching of other religions in schools - and taught realistically, such as within a Biblical Christian world view that explores some of the essential apologia for its tenets of faith, not just a random assortment of Bible stories for children. And the cessation of the current politically correct effort to eradicate Christian influence and practice where that is taking place, such as the over-sensitivity to the meaningful (as opposed to commercial) celebration of Christian festivals in case a practitioner of a different faith might possibly feel offended. The practice of other religions needs be kept reasonable in regard to the existing culture, which doesn’t mean hiding one’s face inside a burqua when that engenders suspicion and fosters segregation rather than assimilation.

Puritan Lad, in his Covenant Theology blog, has posted an entry entitled “Christianity and Immigration” in which he writes that, whereas “the Bible commands us to love the immigrant, it also commands the immigrant to assimilate into a Christian society that welcomes him.” He references the following Scripture:

“You shall not wrong a sojourner or oppress him, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt. You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child. If you do mistreat them, and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry, and my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless.” (Exodus 22:21-24)

“You shall have the same rule for the sojourner and for the native, for I am the LORD your God.”
(Leviticus 24:22)

“And if a stranger sojourns among you and would keep the Passover to the LORD, according to the statute of the Passover and according to its rule, so shall he do. You shall have one statute, both for the sojourner and for the native.”
(Numbers 9:14)

This is about assimilation, and assimilation into a country with a Judeo-Christian heritage upon which our culture and national identity is based. Our society may be largely secular due to the separation of state from religion, but we are not religion-free and there should be no covert invitation for any other to make the soup too salty to the taste. Yes, of course I am biased towards Christianity. The first of the Ten Commandments just happens to be: “You shall have no other gods before me.”

But now for a somewhat closer look at that parable of the Elephant. Is it such a good analogy after all? I am not so certain.

What each of the blind men describe is only part of the Elephant, and they all are mistaken when they claim their part to be the whole. Their opinions are not equally true. They are equally, and actually, false. If such an analogy of religious pluralism was meant to show that all religions are true and all paths lead to the one God, that is not the case at all. Their opinions are false, not true.

But what is even more important, should a seventh man arrive on the scene of the Elephant and happen to be able to see, then he has a distinct advantage with regards to knowing the truth about the Elephant. This knowledge could provide a revelation to the blind. But humans are frequently stubborn and arrogant, with those who are truly blind more than ready to disregard the revelation of one who can see. Not believing his credentials of sight, they will accuse the seeing man of all manner of things - heresy, madness, an overactive imagination, lies and deceit. Only some will accept his word, that which is Truth and Reality.

Just for the record, Article 841 of the Catholic Catechism states: “The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day.”

Islam acknowledges that it serves the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. However, in so doing it claims that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, were Muslims! A banner recently waved by Muslim protestors to the Pope’s recent visit to Turkey even claimed that “Jesus is not the Son of God. He is a prophet of Islam.” Islam retrospectively makes such claims that preceed it’s own existence and where, unlike the person of Christ, there is no prophetic mention of anything Islam in the Old Testament writings. Islam has appropriated Judaism and Christianity to itself, distorting them for it’s own purposes. Contrary to Article 841 of the Catholic Catechism, Abdullah Al Araby gives many reasons in his paper, God of Christianity vs. Allah of Islam, that clearly show how Yahweh and Allah are not the same as each other. Dallas M. Roark writes in his paper, Is there a true religion?, the following summation:

We cannot conclude that the god of Islam is the same as Yahweh of the Old Testament who becomes Incarnate in Jesus of Nazareth to redeem mankind. This finality in Christ eliminates any other coming prophet such as Muhammad. The epistle of Hebrews speaks with finality about God's last word, his highest word, coming in his Son. Islam cannot therefore be regarded as an extension, culmination, or completion of the Judeo-Christian tradition. While there are prophets mentioned in the New Testament they were in agreement with the Christian Gospel and did not seek to supersede the New Testament revelation or claim a different revelation.
(Mt. 23:34; Acts 11:27-29; 13:2-3; 15:32;21:9-11; 1 Cor. 12:28-29; Eph. 2:20; 3:5;4:11, for example)

The followers of Islam are like those blind men who will not believe the revelation of the one who sees. Their Qur&#