This is the second in a short series of articles looking at Islam from a more theological perspective.
In the last article I looked at what Yahweh and Allah are really like based on the structure of the Bible and the Qur’an. In other words, what is God’s character like?
This is what I noted:
• The Bible’s multi-generational, multi-genre structure revealed a God who is intentionally global in His purposes. The Qur’an’s single generational, monocultural, limited-genre structure evidenced its essentially parochial scope.
• The Bible’s many genealogies showed that Yahweh’s modus operandi is to engage actively and within the warp and woof of human history. In the Qur’an there are no intergenerational connections and Allah is portrayed as being disengaged from any active involvement with humanity.
• Lastly, the covenant framework of Biblical revelation reveals that Yahweh is both relational and personal, and that He seeks committed intimacy with His people. In the Qur’an, covenants entail duty on man’s part only; commitment and intimacy are no part of Allah’s nature.
Starting with this understanding of the character of God in the Bible and the Qur’an, I’m now looking a bit deeper by asking what it is about humanity that necessitates these communications from God. What is religion for? In other words: “What is God’s diagnosis of the human predicament?” To illustrate how this question came to be so important to me, I’d like to share something of my pre-Christian searching for an answer to this question.
The 'world problematique'
When I was studying for my MPhil degree in the late 1970s it was intellectually fashionable to assert that there was something intrinsically faulty about the way we human beings were managing our world. The Club of Rome, a group of concerned intellectuals, commenced a series of reports to address the situation. Starting with the physical dimension, their first report, “Limits to Growth” (1972), was a Malthusian call to control population growth to match limited physical resource availability. This was followed by “Mankind at the Turning Point” (1975), which called for more organic, interdependent social structures within society as the only way to save the world from the almost overwhelming “world problematique”. “Reshaping the International Order” (1976) was essentially a moral rebuke to international institutions to take responsibility for creating a more balanced global economy.
But their fourth report, “Goals for Mankind” (1977), moved on from the thus far largely secular analysis towards more philosophical and even religious perspectives on what was wrong with the world. Focusing deliberately on the human element, it noted that differing cultural attitudes, value theories and even religions affect the outcomes that the world experiences: “By understanding the influence of a specific religion, for example, we can better predict how a person or nation will respond to new economic and political policies. Before new goals are outlined, we need to know the cultural realities concerning their probable success or failure.”
In my thesis, grandly entitled “Unified Development – Towards a New Paradigm for Planning”, I pulled these and many other insights together to arrive at my own considered assessment that the root of the “world problematique” was humanity itself.
However, after successfully defending my thesis, it began to dawn on me that “mankind” also included “me” – and that if there really was a solution to the human predicament it would have to be one that could first address Andrew’s predicament! Ironically, I had included in my thesis an extraordinary quote from Karl Marx who once wrote: “To be radical means to get to the root of a problem; and the root of the problem is man.”
And so there I was, at the pinnacle of my intellectual achievement, having to say with G.K. Chesterton, in that shortest-ever letter to The Times newspaper: “Dear Sir, what is wrong with the world? I am. Yours sincerely.”
At the time of doing my thesis I was still, nominally, a religious person. I had no dispute with my Catholicism as far as it went. As I saw things then, religion offered only moral suasion. What caused my despair more than anything else was my discovery that, for all its perceptive radicalness, the Club of Rome’s diagnosis was futile in that it offered nothing beyond moral exhortation for better behaviour in this world. For, if all humanity were equally flawed, then the “world problematique” was not susceptible of any “man-made” solution. For how could others with the same problem effect a remedy?
More than this, my heart was screaming out for something more than just a horizontal morality. I was lonely, and to have only morality as my companion in an impersonal, cold universe was hell on earth!
At this point you may well be asking: “What has all this got to do with God’s diagnosis in the Bible and the Qur’an?” Much in every way; for, after more than 45 years of thinking very hard about what religion’s role really is, I have concluded that a religion that offers morality alone is offering not only hell on earth but hell beyond it as well!
So, what is God’s diagnosis of the human predicament as presented in the Bible and the Qur’an? To answer this, I put three questions to each of the Bible and the Qur’an, in turn: What was it like in the beginning? What happened next? Where does this leave us now?
What was it like in the beginning?
We have already seen that the God of the Bible is a being of committed, engaged, personal, intimacy. The world He created in the beginning was never intended as a home for humanity alone, but as a dwelling place for Himself alongside the humans created in His image.
The first glimpses of this homely purpose are seen in the Hebrew word “me’orah”, used to describe the lights to mark day and night (Gen. 1v14-16). This is the same root as the word “menorah”, which would be used for the light that signified God’s presence among His people in Moses’ tabernacle (Ex.25v31-35) and later, Solomon’s temple (1 Chron.28v15). Just as both the tabernacle and the temple were meeting places for man and God, so the original creation may be viewed as a “temple” – a place where God Himself could live in close communion with humans.
This original template, of a God who desires to dwell among His people, is common to the Old Testament, the New Testament, and the eternal world beyond the original creation: “I will dwell among the people of Israel and will be their God. And they shall know that I am the LORD their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them.” (Ex.29 v45-46).
“You shall not defile the land in which you live, in the midst of which I dwell, for I the LORD dwell in the midst of the people of Israel.” (Num.35v34).
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” (John 1v14).
“In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit” (Eph.2v22).
“Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.” (Rev.21v3).
In the Bible, therefore, creation is a place where God wants to live intimately with His people. This is the way it was in the beginning, and it is the way it will be eternally.
In the Qur’an, creation is a theme in at least 30 of its 114 chapters. Many of its traditional chapter titles reference aspects of creation: Light (Q24), Moon (Q54), Constellations (Q85), Dawn (Q89), Night (Q92), Daylight (Q93), and Daybreak (Q113).
Creation is viewed as a sign intended to convince not only believers but all thinking, reasoning beings that God exists: “It is He Who made the sun to be a shining glory and the moon to be a light (of beauty) and measured out stages for her; that ye might know the number of years and the count (of time). Nowise did Allah create this but in truth and righteousness. (Thus) doth He explain His Signs in detail, for those who understand” (Q10:5).
The creation is also an expression of Allah’s beneficence to all his creatures, and a reminder to all humanity of their duty to bow to his will: “It is Allah Who made out of the things He created, some things to give you shade; of the hills He made some for your shelter; He made you garments to protect you from heat, and coats of mail to protect you from your (mutual) violence. Thus does He complete His favours on you, that ye may bow to His Will (in Islam)” (Q16:81).
While creation is intended to be enjoyed, there is never any suggestion of a mutual, creator and creature, enjoyment of creation. Any notion of the creation as the realm in which God and humans would somehow live together in intimate relationship, is excluded as being totally inconsistent with Allah’s eternal nature. To share creation with humanity would imply that personal attributes were intrinsic to the divine nature itself. Consequently, nothing about the created realm may be construed in a way that might involve Allah in any form of mutuality. For mutuality implies personality, and personality intimacy. All these characteristics are impossible for a God who has no partners.
In the Qur’an, therefore, the creation is a place for created beings only. This is the way things were in the beginning and what they will be like eternally.
What happened next?
However, in neither the Bible nor in the Qur’an does the original situation at creation go unchallenged. And, more than anything else at all about Christianity and Islam, it is the nature of the challenge to humanity’s original circumstances that distinguishes the Bible’s religion from that of the Qur’an. It is here where we discover God’s diagnosis of the human predicament – and hence what the task of religion is!
Because it is less complex, I will start with the Qur’an’s diagnosis. What happened to change things after the creation is described most fully in the Qur’an’s second chapter, “the Cow” (Al-Baqarah). Adam is created as Allah’s vice-regent on earth (Q2:30). His position is higher even than that of the angels – a status that one angel would covet. This is revealed in the following way: after first teaching Adam the names of all things, Allah places this information before the angels saying: “Tell me the names of these if ye are right” (Q2:31). The angels are forced to acknowledge that they have no way of knowing because such knowledge can come from none but Allah, who is perfect in wisdom and knowledge. Adam is then told to brief the angels on this knowledge that he alone among the creatures has received from Allah. Based on this privileged status accorded to Adam, Allah says to the angels: “‘Bow down to Adam’ and they bowed down. Not so Iblis [Satan]: he refused and was haughty: He was of those who reject Faith” (Q2:34).
Elsewhere, Satan explains his reluctance to accept Adam’s superiority to angels as follows: “Shall I bow down to one whom Thou didst create from clay?” (Q17:61).
What happens next needs very careful attention because it contains the Qur’an’s only analysis about what is wrong with humanity and hence with the world. In other words, here is Allah’s diagnosis of the human predicament – and hence the terms of reference of Islam as a religion.
“We said: ‘O Adam! dwell thou and thy wife in the Garden; and eat of the bountiful things therein as (where and when) ye will; but approach not this tree, or ye run into harm and transgression.’ Then did Satan make them slip from the (garden), and get them out of the state (of felicity) in which they had been. We said: ‘Get ye down, all (ye people), with enmity between yourselves. On earth will be your dwelling-place and your means of livelihood – for a time.’
“Then learnt Adam from his Lord words of inspiration, and his Lord turned towards him; for He is Oft-Returning, Most Merciful. We said: ‘Get ye down all from here; and if, as is sure, there comes to you Guidance from me, whosoever follows My guidance, on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve.’” (Q2:35-38).
The following points should be noted: (i) following Satan’s challenge, Allah still wants Adam and Eve to enjoy creation. (ii) a “tree” is mentioned but not its significance. (iii) Satan causes humanity to “slip” from their original state of happiness and perfect knowledge in creation’s original garden into a world in which there would be conflict among human beings on earth. (iv) The cause of changed circumstances appears to be the loss of the originally perfect knowledge that Allah had given to Adam. (v) To help Adam, Allah offers fresh inspiration and guidance.
The Qur’an’s diagnosis of the human predicament is therefore that Adam and, by extension all humanity, suffer from a deficit of knowledge. There is no mention of death in connection with the “slip” from the garden. For in the Qur’an, life and death are part of the original, and continuing, created order (Q2:258, 3:156, 7:158, 23:80, 40:68, 50:43, and 57:2). Moreover, because only Adam and Satan, not God himself, are parties to the disruption, the situation between God and humanity remains as it was in the beginning.
Turning to the Bible’s account of “what happened next”, it is important to recollect the original template, that of a world created as a shared dwelling place for God and His people. Within this template Adam’s privileged status is not limited to his perfect knowledge, but to the perfect relationship he enjoys with his God. Reading back from Genesis 3, we understand that God was in the habit of “walking with Adam” in the cool of the evening. God had also created a special day for their mutual contemplation and enjoyment.
So, if, in the Qur’an’s account, it was Adam’s God-given knowledge that Satan targets, in the Bible’s it is Adam and Eve’s beautiful relationship with their God that he has in his sights. With this context in mind (and noting that in his craftiness Satan approaches Eve in the first instance, rather than Adam) here is the Bible’s account of “the fall”: “Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, ‘Did God actually say, “You shall not eat of any tree in the garden”?’ And the woman said to the serpent, ‘We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, “You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.”’ But the serpent said to the woman, ‘You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.’” (Gen. 3v1-5).
Satan’s “offer” to Eve, following the opening exchanges about what God did or did not say, is (i) death is not something to be too concerned about and, (ii) knowing good and evil like God does can’t possibly be a bad thing.
Both parts of the offer contain partial truths. Adam and Eve would not, and did not, die in the sense of physically expiring. And knowing good and evil is not wrong in and of itself; it is of the essence of all religion and of secular morality too. But what Satan achieves is to separate true life and true morality from their original purpose, that humanity’s real life is knowing God such that the only true morality is that which gives expression to that life.
Eve, and then Adam, succumb to this very subtle temptation to step outside the sphere of their original privilege, with the result that the relationship of committed intimacy between them and their God is severed. In place of what they had in the beginning they now have a “life” evacuated of all that makes it worth living, and a morality / religion that leads nowhere.
But there is worse, for unlike in the Qur’an’s account, God Himself is deeply involved. The perfect home that He was preparing has been spoiled by the very people who were the objects of His intimacy. They are not just down on knowledge. They are guilty of a terrible betrayal. But even their personal guilt is not the worst of their problem. For they were not Satan’s ultimate target; humanity’s status of close relationship with God meant that Satan’s attack on humanity was an attack on God Himself. Mankind was now, with Satan, in the hands of an angry God.
Here, therefore, lies the heart of the Bible’s diagnosis of the human predicament: the “fall” has disrupted the foundations of the intimate relationship between God and man in a way that cannot be remedied by any amount of moral initiative by humanity. For both man and God are involved in the diagnosis; man is guilty, and God is slighted.
Where does this leave us now?
My “rules of engagement” in this comparison of the religion of the Qur’an with that of the Bible have been to accept at face value their respective claims to be God’s sole, sufficient, verbally inspired communication to all humanity of all ages. In this article I have sought to clarify what each book says is wrong with the world and with humanity. In the context of my youthful search for meaning in the world I wanted to know whether religion has anything better to offer than that which I learned of the Club of Rome. My intellectual conclusion then was that their diagnosis was futile because it offered nothing beyond moral exhortation for better behaviour in this world. But my existential perception then was that moral exhortation alone could not change the world – because it couldn’t change me! It is really for this reason alone that I have studied the books of the two greatest religions in the world. If they are what they claim to be they should indeed have a better answer than that of the secular experts.
But what I have discovered and sought to present in this article, is that the Qur’an and the Bible are literally poles apart in their diagnoses of the human predicament.
The Qur’an teaches that the removal of humanity from an original state had no moral dimension, let alone any relational, supernatural implications. Consequently, human beings are born morally neutral and are capable of pleasing God if properly informed.
The Bible teaches that the fall from humanity’s original state had moral, existential and supernatural implications. In turning their backs on God, Adam and Eve turned against the defining aspect of their own human nature – the capacity for relating to God Himself. Death, in the sense of punitive separation of humanity from their intimacy with God, was introduced. All humanity is born sinful by nature, alienated from God, and intrinsically unable to please Him.
It is just as I discovered to my horror all those years ago: the “world problematique” is not susceptible of any man-made solution. Something far more radical than moral exhortation is needed – but that is the subject of my next article – “God’s Remedy”.
Implications for evangelism
Many readers may view what I have written as simply a restatement of the first element of our Biblical gospel, that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”. But herein lies a potential stumbling block to evangelism. For Islam is a religion in which humanity is not intrinsically guilty; God is not perforce offended; and death is not an intentionally punitive phenomenon. In stark contrast, Christianity is a religion “from another planet”, in which ordinary people have been supernaturally transformed. The key to witnessing to Muslims is to re-engage with the New Testament’s emphasis on witness that is supernaturally enabled. Our evangelism must rediscover its roots in the Sermon on the Mount’s insistence on being “impossible people” ; people who are lights in the dark world; salt within a corrupt world; hope within a hopeless world. Speaking out of this reality will give authority to our words.
