While checking out another article on the the Arab news site Aljazeera.net, I stumbled across an interesting editorial on the history of relations between Islam and the West, as seen by a female Muslim scholar who works at the University of London:
"Why are negative images of Islam more prevalent than any others? Why is it still acceptable to say things about Muslims that would simply be deemed unacceptable of Jews, Christians, or Buddhists?
"That years of inter-faith dialogue have done little to advance a better understanding of the Islamic faith in the western world is an indication of how profoundly entrenched in the Western psyche crude misrepresentations and vulgar stereotypes of Islam are.
"Indeed, much of what is said of Islam today is in reality medieval in origin. The terms might have a modern ring to them, but the content remains very much medieval in essence. The roots stretch as far back as the 7th century, to Christianity’s earliest encounter with Islam.
[…]
"The medieval Christian view of Islam as a deviant, violent, licentious and heretical creed was secularised, stripped of its transcendental character and rearticulated within a modern essentialist philosophy that continues to define the terms of western discourse on Islam, in its mainstream at least.
"The correspondence between what is said and written today and the medieval texts we have inherited on the subject of Islam is so striking that I often have to remind myself that it is not the words of a medieval author I am reading, but those of a contemporary writer. True, the language is modern, but its content is largely medieval."
Reading carefully through these arguments, I was struck by how very similar they are in some respects to Catholic arguments againts Protestant polemicists, and even Christian arguments against agnostic and atheistic polemicists. The root of the argument on all fronts is that apologists for a particular religion often perceive that there is a good deal of misunderstanding of what that religion actually teaches or what its adherents actually believe.
Since this article does not offer much by way of example about how Islam is allegedly misinterpreted by its Christian critics, I cannot comment on the merits of this scholar’s complaint.
But it does demonstrate one point that I think we can take to heart: Before critiquing another religion, listen to its adherents and evaluate what they say they believe. Compare and contrast to the historical teachings of the religion as needed, of course, but take seriously the explanation offered by those who believe in the religion.
Hard as it may be to believe, it is likely that a believer in a particular religion, however incomplete that religion may be, really does understand better what it teaches than does an outsider. The outsider may or may not have a more complete religion to offer, but he won’t get a hearing for it until he takes seriously the concerns and religious commitments of the person he’s evangelizing.
In other words, just as there is nothing more frustrating for a Catholic than to be told "You worship Mary," or for a Christian, "The idea of a god is just a crutch religionists use to avoid reality," so it must equally be frustrating for a Muslim to be told "You worship a false god." With such frustrations clouding the air, there is little likelihood that anyone is going to listening — really listening — to each other and thus furthering the spread of the gospel.
UPDATE: Thanks to the reader who corrected my Latin grammar. I is grateful. 😉
Our Muslim brothers and sisters need to come to grips with the complete picture of Islam, both nationally and worldwide, before they write off all negative conceptions of the religion to mere “entrenched…misrepresentations and vulgar stereotypes.”
Perhaps this female Muslim scholar should reevaluate exactly why she is studying in the University of London, and not an historically Islamic school. Could it be that she is choosing to live within the refuge of a Judeo-Christian based and largely secular society and avoiding any truly Islamic based society?
I charge anyone to visit a number of Christian churches or Jewish synagogues within this country or around the world and record all of the negative comments made about Islam. I then charge that person to visit the same number of mosques in this country and a round the world, recording the same kind of remarks about Christians or Jews.
Yes, Christendom developed a negative view of Islam throughout the early middle ages. I offer five words in apologia.
Jerusalem
Alexandria
Ephesus
Hippo
Constantinople
Let’s make an analysis comparing medieval Islamic texts on Christianity to modern Islamic writings on the same topic. Who wants to attempt to make this study on the payroll of the University of Tehran?
In my humble opinion, this London-dwelling female Muslim scholar needs to take account of the dancing technicolor elephant herd in her own living room before she gives lectures on the irrational and hateful prejudices of the West. We’ve been hearing it for hundreds of years. I suggest that this scholar try bringing an Enlightenment to the Middle East before she purges the West of all its sin.
Why is it still acceptable to say things about Muslims that would simply be deemed unacceptable of Jews, Christians, or Buddhists?
I don’t know of any POSSIBLE things that she could be referring to. That is, things that are acceptable to say to Muslims but not acceptable to say to the others as members of such a religion PER SE. I think she proceeds from a false assumption that it is deemed ACCEPTABLE to say things about MUSLIMS that are not deemed ACCEPTABLE to say about Christians. People may disagree with Muslim beliefs, but it is entirely acceptable for people to disagree with Christian beliefs and say so. Many, in fact, do everyday.
If she is really thinking about saying acceptable things about “radical jihadist terrorist muslims” (a small but lound percentage) then those same types of things can be acceptably made about militant Christians such as who bomb abortion clinics, etc.
It would have been nice if she backed up such a claim, because I don’t think that it really withstands scrutiny on its own.
Here’s something I don’t understand.
We as Christians are very well familiar with Christian/Catholic scholars, and with the Christian/Catholic spokesman that show up on the news every few days. We know how they like to go and speak about the fact that Christianity really teaches this (e.g., to be accepting of homosexuality itsef) or really teaches that, when we know full well that Christianity doesn’t really teach that or teaches the opposite.
So why is it that everytime some Muslim scholar comes out or some Muslim spokesman comes out and says that Islam really teaches this or that, we believe them? We know that religious scholars and spokesman like to push the more liberal, or just plain wrong, ideas, and to go put the politically correct spin on things on the evening news. Why don’t we realize that Muslim scholars and spokesmen do the same things? We just assume that what they are saying must be quoted straight from the Koran.
The truth is, we know (especially as Catholics) that most members of a particular religion don’t know what their religion teaches. If I asked 100 Catholics what the Immaculate Conception is, 70 of them would get it wrong. Gosh, how many Catholics don’t even know something so simple as that they ought not to receive Christ while in a state of sin? I knew a woman who thought she was destined for Hell with no hope of escape because her godchildren became Lutheran or something. There’s a huge disconnect between what people think their religion teaches and what it actually does. With Catholicism, the truth is usually much better than the misconception.
With Islam, I’m not so sure. I try very hard to believe those folks that say it’s a religion of peace, but I’ve also done a lot of research and it’s just very hard to keep believing they’re correct. Their Islam may be a religion of peace, but to so many people their Catholicism teaches that contraception is fine. That doesn’t make it true. I’m not trying to rag on Islam, but I think this is a very important topic for us to be discussing at this point in history.
When we look at where Protestants miss the mark, it’s often in changing from some of Christ’s original teachings. The truth of any religion is that which was taught by it’s founder(s). The reason Catholicism has a fullness to it is because we believe 100% everything that the founder, Christ, believed, and we follow His life’s example as best we can. When we look at the founder of Islam, we see a man teaching and practicing profound violence. He did a lot of wonderful things, too, but there was always that really nasty side. That really nasty side is there in Islam. A lot of the wonderful things are too, but so is that nasty stuff, and it’s pretty strongly in there and we mustn’t ignore that, both for the safety of our whole world, and for the safety of the soul’s of our Muslim friends.
My belief is that most Muslims in this world are doing very much the will of God, but not because their religion is teaching them to. In some cases, it does teach them to. In some cases however, they are doing His will by NOT doing something it teaches them to do. They are doing His will by speaking AGAINST violence. In other words, they are great people doing God’s work, but a lot of times they are doing God’s work by unconciously rejecting key tenents of Islam.
True. I’ve heard flatly contradictory statements from many Muslims about what exactly Islam teaches. It makes it a bit harder to do what this columnist suggests. The problem — and this is a problem in Protestantism as well — is that there is not any one authority which defines the true religion. Thank God for the Magisterium!
I agree with Jimmy on this. Being antagonistic does no good. I’ve never seen it work (well, I’ve seen it work, but negatively.)
If someone were to go up to a Catholic and start attacking the sacrament of confession, nearly any Catholic would defend confession before listening to the actual reasons for the attack on their own.
A difference my wife always notices between true Christians and people from other religions (as well as not so good Christians), is that a Christian not only knows what the other side believes, they tend to try and understand it as well.
You’re right, DJ, being antagonistic does no good, but I don’t think anyone here is advocating being antagonistic. We’re just pointing out that what Islam is varies from Muslim to Muslim.
This post also points out the fact, in all apologetics, that you have to “argue” against whatever it is that the individual person you are talking to believes, not necessarily what the group they claim to belong to believes. And that necessitates, of course, listening respectfully while they explain to you what they personally believe.
(And BTW it was Michelle who posted, not Jimmy.)
hee hee..woops.
I’ll just leave the < grin style=”sheepish” > tags on for a while.
Contra mundum! Contra mundum!!!
Arg. Latin misuse makes baby classicists cry.
When talking with a Muslim always remember, their doctrine of al Taqiyya.
News note: 14 Christian homes burned over the weekend in a Christian village in the Palestinian controlled West Bank. Their crime? Dishonoring a muslim woman.
“Contra mundum! Contra mundum!!! Arg. Latin misuse makes baby classicists cry.”
Thanks for the correction, Kevin. 🙂
Sept. 5 was the anniversary of the Istanbul Pogrom. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Istanbul_Pogrom
Al Taqiyya, I believe, is only in reference to Shi’ites pretending they are Sunni to escape oppression. I don’t think it has anything to do with deception about Islam to non-Muslims or whether they are Muslim period.
The hard thing for some Muslism to accept is that any negative comments people make about Islam is not because Westerners are ignorant about it, but because other Muslims are trying to kill those people and that this terrorism is not isolated, but pervasive in its criminality.
It is unfair to accuse all Muslims of holding such views, but the minority is significant enough to be noticed by the world in general, and even glorified in some Islamic communities. Westerners are probably equally ignorant about Buddhism, but do not hold a negative view because Buddhists don’t seem to engage in terrorism.
Many Muslims do not hold such terrorist views and would never perform terrorism. Being wrongly associated with terrorism must shame them terribly, and it is easy to understand their anger. However, any negativity towards Islam is based on actual actions. It is not persuasive to accuse the West that any bad reputation Islam has is based on prejudice at the very same time Islamic terrorists are killing innocents.
I think we have to remember that we don’t need to be going against or being critical of individual Muslims. It is absolutely correct to say that the vast majority of Muslims don’t want to go around killing people, or doing anything else bad. They also do go around trying to do good things. What we have to do is determine what the actual religion itself teaches, and then be critical of that if it is warranted. I suggest that it is, but I am only one person.
What does it mean to say Islam “teaches” something? The inquiry seems to me meaningless. Are you asking what did Mohammad teach? Or what most people who are called “Muslim” believe? There’s no central authority in Islam, so to talk as if Islam were a unified magisterium appears to me misleading. The best you can do is either point to a source, like the Koran, or to authoritative representatives of some part of the tradition. But to think of Islam in Catholic terms, as if there’s a pure orthodoxy which is the divinely revealed truth, seems to me a fruitless enterprise.
What does it mean to say Islam “teaches” something? The inquiry seems to me meaningless. Are you asking what did Mohammad teach? Or what most people who are called “Muslim” believe? There’s no central authority in Islam, so to talk as if Islam were a unified magisterium appears to me misleading. The best you can do is either point to a source, like the Koran, or to authoritative representatives of some part of the tradition. But to think of Islam in Catholic terms, as if there’s a pure orthodoxy which is the divinely revealed truth, seems to me a fruitless enterprise.
On another note,
To find out what Islam is like in practice, as a “religion of peace,” we should take to Christians who live in Islamic countries, or struggle with Islam on a daily basis. Their perspective is enlightening, and often considerably more frightening that the white-wash we get from American politics.
Michelle’s original point was very good, though. I absolutely HATE it when someone TELLS me what I believe because the explanation I gave them about veneration of the saints, the eucharist, Mary, etc is actually palatable and acceptable to their Protestant views.
A coupla’ notes:
1) There are indeed Buddhist terrorists, although the news does not call them that. There are also Catholic terrorists too (Shin Finn or something like that).
2) The difficulty with understanding Islam not only lies in the absence of an authoritative Majesterium, but also in the lack of any widely-held idea of authority. Your average evangelical Protestant believes in Sola Scriptura. What does your average Muslim believe in? It really seems to vary according to geographical region of origin and ethno-cultural traits of the people there.
I think that all un-poped religions (only two faiths that I can think of right now can be considered “poped”) continually oscillate between total apostasy and radical fundamentalism, and because Islam predates Protestantism by a good couple of centuries, it stands to reason that today’s picture of Islam may serve as an indicator of Protestant development in the future.
“Islamic terrorists” are not terrorists who are Islamic. They are terrorists whose reasons for terrorism are Islamic.
I would agree with the post, except you won’t find two Muslims (or body of Muslims) saying the same thing, and you won’t have a central religius authority to verify. What you have in the end is a religion whose basic outline is written in a book filled with massive contradictions that can be interpreted any which way. One can say that Christianity suffers from the same thing, however, I believe that is why Jesus did not leave without establishing an institutional Church and teaching authority. Mohammed probably forgot to ask God or something, but he never left anything of comparison. While it took a full millenia before Christianity’s first major division, it took Islam only a couple of generations to split into the Shia and the Sunni, with both sides splitting further after that. (The famous Assassins were a splinter Shia sect, for example)
The scholar’s complaint strikes me as whiny. (I especially don’t buy the line about how it’s acceptable to ridicule Islam and not Christianity in secular society…hah!) If she finds stereotypes, she should see why they remain for so long in a society that is decidedly allergic to stereotypes. Plus, if she believes her religion to be peaceful, then peace be upon her. However, with the nature of Islam, she shouldn’t expect us to believe that her view holds sway over the rest of the religious body.