Recent Changes in Christian Approaches to Islam:

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This paper is published to promote discussion of a vital issue in the contemporary Church. It is not intended in any way to impugn the Christian integrity of any of the people or organisations whose views are considered or critiqued.

Introduction

Christians and Muslims have been engaged in dialogue for several decades. The interfaith dialogue movement began during the 1950s when the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the Vatican (later joined by Orthodox churches) organised several meetings between Christian leaders and representatives of other religions. These initial efforts resulted in the formation of new institutions for carrying on the work of interfaith dialogue. The WCC initiatives were based on a radical liberal reinterpretation of Christianity and had petered out by the 1990s.

Since 9/11 there has been a sea change in relations between Islam and the non-Muslim world, fed by the fear of a clash of civilisations and a war of religions. The attacks evoked not just condemnation of the violence but also a wave of sympathy for Muslims, with many in the West pointing out that most Muslims had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks and asserting that their religion is peaceful. One visible result has been a new evangelical engagement in the interfaith dialogue movement, replacing the older, liberal, WCC involvement. Furthermore, some evangelicals are now joining Islamists and the ideological left in asserting the peaceful nature of Islam and are very critical of any opposing views.

Western government responses

The US and the British governments concluded that there was no such thing as “Islamic terrorism” and that Al-Qaeda was a heretical strain of Islam. Government policies therefore sought to bring the Muslim community into the mainstream of society and strengthen its institutions so as to prevent its radicalisation. This thinking was developed through appropriate legislation, indoctrination of the security forces and pressures for a cultural shift in society – a change that was to include Christianity.

US Congress and British Foreign Office funding was given to Christian organisations, conferences and consultations with the aim of bringing about reconciliation between Islam and Christianity. “Ecumenical” relations were redefined to include Islam, and concepts such as the “Abrahamic religions” were introduced to consolidate Islam, Judaism and Christianity into one monotheistic system. Western governments encouraged Christians’ involvement in interfaith dialogue and the reshaping of their theologies. Many evangelicals have responded with enthusiasm to these government initiatives, basing their approaches on postmodernist and liberal concepts of religion as culture and disregarding orthodox Christian claims regarding the absolute truth content of the faith. Their response has created confusion among grassroots evangelicals, who sense that basic Biblical and Christian positions are being shelved.

An initiative of Western governments: the C-1 World Dialogue

Western governments, through the medium of the Davos-based World Economic Forum, have founded a framework for interfaith dialogue aimed at improving relations between Islam and the West. The Council of 100 Leaders (the West-Islamic World Dialogue, C-100) was founded in 2004 as a community of political, business, religious, media and opinion leaders that promotes dialogue and understanding between the West and the Muslim world. In 2007 its name was changed to C-1 World Dialogue, and the inaugural meeting of its Executive Committee was held in London in March 2009.

High ranking Anglicans are prominent in this venture. A Chairman of C-1 is Richard Chartres, Bishop of London, and his co-Chairman is the Grand Mufti of Cairo. The Director General (and co-founder) of C1 is Canon Alistair Macdonald-Radcliff (formerly Dean of All Saints’ Cathedral in Cairo).

Muslim agenda and initiatives

Muslim governments were deeply worried by the effects of the 9/11 attacks and the resulting equation of Islam with violent jihad as well as by their weakened legitimacy and security. They decided to regain a respectful position for Islam in the world while expanding its influence and looked for partners in the West to further this ambition. Realising that the WCC had run out of steam, Muslim governments went out of their way to woo evangelical Christians whom they now viewed as an important political force in the West.

Jordan

The Jordanian Royal Family has endeavoured to exercise intellectual and theological leadership within Islam by founding and supporting a think tank, the Amman Al al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought, and its interfaith activities. This institute has launched international consensus-building initiatives within Islam such as its “Amman Message”. It has sponsored scholarly fatwas on takfir and jihad aimed at countering extremist Islamist interpretations and practice. Finally it sponsored the “Common Word” initiative that has had a major impact on Western Christians. King Abdullah II also founded the Jordanian Interfaith Coexistence Research Center (JICRC) in 2003, which organises an annual conference for Muslim and Christian leaders from the Middle East under his chairmanship.

Saudi Arabia

The Bush administration placed immense pressure on the Saudi regime to moderate its established form of Islam (Wahhabism) and to engage with Christians. The Saudi government was also worried by the dangers to its legitimacy and internal security from the jihadi radicals. As a result the Saudi government entered into interfaith dialogue against the wishes of some Wahhabi hardliners. In November 2007 King ‘Abdallah met with the Pope to promote mutual understanding between their religions. He also prompted Saudi clerics to call for joint Jewish-Christian-Muslim conferences and organised the July 2008 Madrid “World Conference on Dialogue” under his patronage, which was attended by some evangelicals. The King followed this up by sponsoring a two-day Special United Nations General Assembly gathering on Interfaith Dialogue in November 2008 and an International Conference on Interfaith Dialogue held in Geneva from 30 September to 1 October 2009 under the auspices of Swiss President Hans-Rudolf Merz. One aspect of the King’s interest in interfaith dialogue is his sponsorship, along with the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, of a campaign for a global law against blasphemy, meant especially to protect Islam from all criticism.

Libya

Libya has long been involved in interfaith initiatives, organising conferences and dialogue especially with the Vatican. Recently it has shown interest in dialogue with evangelicals, sponsoring and hosting through its Islamic Call Society the “Evangelical Christian-Muslim Dialogue” events held in Chicago (November 2006) and Tripoli (January 2008). The January 2008 meeting saw many evangelical leaders present (including Brother Andrew) from a variety of evangelical Christian institutions such as Wheaton College, North Park University, Fuller Theological Seminary and the Arab Baptist Seminary in Beirut, Lebanon, as well as representatives of organisations such as World Vision International, Sojourners, Venture International, and Evangelicals for Middle East Understanding.

Iran

Iran’s interest in interfaith dialogue preceded 9/11 as part of its efforts to neutralise Western opposition to its radical policies and gain Christian sympathy for its version of Islam. In 1998 former President Mohammad Khatami proposed to the United Nations a dialogue among civilisations that strongly emphasized interfaith dialogue. As a result the UN declared 2001 as the “Year of Dialogue Among Civilizations”. In 2004 Khatami founded the International Institute for Dialogue among Cultures and Civilizations. As a follow-up to these Iranian efforts, the Alliance of Civilizations (AoC) was established in 2005 at the initiative of the governments of Spain and Turkey under the auspices of the United Nations. Iran has held several interfaith dialogue meetings with the Vatican and with the World Council of Churches, and in February 2007 a delegation of American Christians including Mennonites, Quakers, Episcopalians, United Methodists and Baptists were invited to Tehran for a series of talks on interfaith relations and peacemaking. It has also tried to reach out to evangelicals.

Muslim scholars and “A Common Word” Letter

Pope Benedict’s September 2006 Regensburg lecture seemingly suggesting that Islam was violent and unreasonable caused outrage and violent protests among Muslims around the world. A group of 38 Muslim scholars wrote him an open letter (13 October 2006) to correct his views on Islam. When they received no response, 138 Muslim scholars, coordinated by The Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought, wrote an open letter to the world Christian community called A Common Word Between Us and You. On the surface the letter looked like a well-intentioned and urgent plea for a better understanding between Muslims and Christians, so as to avert an apocalyptic war between the two largest religious blocs in the world. It presented the very Christian concepts of love for God and love for neighbour as themes they hold in common.

However, the letter actually falls into the tradition of Muslim da‘wa (a call to convert and submit to Islam), which historically was often linked to the threat of violent war and conquest (jihad) should the call be rejected. It clearly asserts the concept of tawhid (the monolithic unity of God) and the finality of the prophethood of Muhammad, while reducing and “Islamising” Jesus into a mere human prophet inferior to Muhammad. Underlying the letter was the erroneous view that the war against Islamist terrorism is a global war of an aggressive Christianity against Islam, fuelled by a Christian disposition to animosity and hatred towards Muslims.

Evangelical responses

1. Yale Response to “A Common Word”

The Common Word letter had a tremendous impact on the Christian world, calling forth a plethora of enthusiastic responses that revealed new developments among evangelicals regarding interfaith dialogue with Muslims. One of the most high-profile responses was the 18 November 2007 “Yale Letter” drafted by evangelical Christians at the Yale Center for Faith and Culture and signed by over 300 Christian leaders, many of them evangelicals. Among the four authors of the letter were two well known evangelicals: Miroslav Volf, Henry B. Wright Professor of Theology at Yale University Divinity School and Director of its Center for Faith and Culture, and Joseph Cumming (a former member of Frontiers, a mission to Muslims heavily committed to extreme contextualisation), Director of the Reconciliation Program at the Yale University Divinity School Center for Faith and Culture. The following July a conference was held at Yale, bringing together Muslim and Christian scholars, on the theme of “Loving God and Neighbor in Word and Deed: Implications for Muslims and Christians”. A “Final Declaration of the Yale Common Word Conference” was issued on the last day.

The Yale Common Word Conference and its Final Declaration included several problematic issues:

• Accepting responsibility for both the Crusades and the contemporary war on Islamist terrorism in the name of all Christians, so reinforcing the Muslim view of all Christians as one bloc, responsible for any perceived offence given to Muslims. This encourages Muslims to punish indigenous Christians in Muslim lands for all the supposed Christian sins against Islam.

• The affirmation of the Islamic source texts as “sacred texts” along with the Bible, which could imply that the Qur’an is a revealed word of God.

• The inclusion of Islam in “our common Abrahamic heritage” and in the “Judeo-Christian-Islamic monotheistic heritage” implies that Islam, like Christianity, is God-given and God-revealed. This is a step towards affirming Muhammad as a prophet and the Qur’an as a word of God and so denying the uniqueness of Christ and the Bible.

• An end-time vision of a better world based on the cooperation of Muslims and Christians in alleviating poverty. The Biblical hope of a better world rests ultimately on the preaching of the gospel of Christ and the building up of His Church.

• Identifying Christian mission as one of the main factors causing tensions in the world, which encourages Muslims in their view that Christian mission is an aggressive attack on them.

• Ignoring the right of individual humans to choose, change and proclaim their religion without fear of sanctions. The issue of full reciprocity was not effectively addressed. While Muslims in Western states have full freedom to propagate their faith and build mosques, the Christian right freely to propagate Christianity and build churches in Muslim lands is either severely limited, or as in Saudi Arabia, totally non-existent.

2. The new evangelical “Grace Approach” to Muslims

This is based on a naive approach of seeing only the good in Islam in the desire to follow the radical teachings of Jesus on love, grace, acceptance and forgiveness. It also reflects postmodern and liberal approaches to Christianity and culture and a theology of ecumenical inclusivism towards Islam. Some of the main characteristics of this movement are:

• Regarding Islam as a true though deficient way to God. On this view Islam is an Abrahamic faith, differing from its supposed Jewish roots only in degree, not in kind. The Qur’an is a valid commentary on the Jewish scriptures and a correction to the inadequate Judaism of Muhammad’s time. Muhammad was a prophet from the line of Ishmael, whose original mission was a kind of apostleship to the Jews. This view adds a fourth category to the New Testament’s three (Jews, Gentiles and the Church of God): Arab Muslims, who are seen as ethnic descendants of Abraham through Ishmael. The implication is that they therefore have a special relationship with God outside of Christ. This understanding of Islam threatens to compromise the uniqueness of the Christian Church as the people of God.

• Discouraging fear of radical Islam. Steve Bell, National Director of Interserve UK, has argued that Christians need not fear a Muslim takeover of Britain. As the Muslim community becomes more prosperous, Muslims will peacefully integrate into their societies and support a more moderate form of Islam1. The problem with this view is that Islamic fundamentalism and radicalism are not simply products of poverty, but are theological and ideological movements with deep roots in classical Islam. Islamism has infiltrated many Muslim institutions in the UK and many British-born, prosperous Muslims have become increasingly radicalised.

• Sympathy with Muslim grievances and acceptance of Christian guilt for the victimisation of Muslims throughout history. This includes guilt for the Crusades and for the suffering imposed on Muslims in colonial times, and today in Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan. Christians must compensate by actively supporting “just” Muslim political causes. Many Christian individuals and churches have confessed the evils in their history and apologised for them. But Muslims have not accepted any blame for evils committed in the name of Islam and have never apologised to its many victims. Until they do so, dialogue on this basis will inevitably be biased in their favour.

• A sympathetic understanding of the motives of Islamic terrorists. On this view Islamic terrorism is caused by the injustices perpetrated in the Muslim world, not by Islam’s essentially violent nature. Brother Andrew urges a sympathetic understanding of the motives of Islamist terrorists.2 However, seeing terrorists as oppressed people without any hope, whose violent response is understandable, is not a Biblical perspective. The Apostle Paul preached boldly to Jewish and Roman leaders and offered them the gospel of Christ, but he did not seek to excuse their evil practices. It is also important not to deny or minimise the suffering imposed by Muslims on Christians over the centuries.

• Engagement in dialogue with Muslims. On this view Christians should search for areas of common ground with Muslims and develop relationships of trust and respect, honesty and openness. They should be able to challenge and critique each other’s beliefs and practices. However, “dialogue” has different meanings. Western Christians understand it as an intellectual engagement to resolve problems; Muslims see it as a bridge they can walk over to further their goals. Moreover, persecution of Christians across the Muslim world is not abating as a result of dialogue, yet this item is rarely on its agenda.

3. Radical contexualisation and the Insider Movement in missions

Among those involved in the Grace for Muslims approach and the Yale response are proponents of the Insider Movement, a missiological trend built on an extreme form of contextualisation (C5) in Muslim missions. It recommends that Muslims who accept Jesus should not be “extracted” from their families and culture but remain as “insiders”, not just within the Muslim cultural milieu but also within the Muslim religious framework. They should continue to attend the mosque and to recite the double shahada (“There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is his apostle”)

and read the Qur’an alongside the Bible. On this view the Qur’an is one of a series of authentically divine, “God-breathed” books, and Muhammad is an authentic prophet of God who is to be praised for bringing the polytheistic Arabs to a monotheistic faith. His example (sunna) and teaching are regarded as to some degree binding (including his teachings on Christ, the cross, the Bible, Christianity and Judaism). The Insider Movement teaches that Ishmael is included in the covenant with Isaac as part of the “chosen people” of God. Muslims, as Ishmael’s descendants, thus have a unique place in God’s salvation plan. The movement distances itself from traditional Christian forms and endorses Muslim rites and traditions, many of which were developed in conscious opposition to Christianity and the Bible. In its extreme form the movement recommends that Christian missionaries to Muslims convert to Islam in order to be more effective.

A critique of the Insider Movement

The New Testament does not sanction the view that Muslims have a unique place in God’s plan. It stresses the uniqueness of the revelation and covenant given to Israel, through which God’s salvation in Christ is offered to all humanity. It is only through the unique Saviour Jesus that salvation is offered and only in the Church He founded as His body that fellowship is to be practised. The Insider Movement model inevitably leads to a marginalisation of Christ, the Bible and the Church.

While converts from Islam do not need to give up all their old cultural forms and may even retain religious forms that are not contrary to the Bible, they ought clearly to reject anything that denies the finality and deity of Christ, His sole position as God’s final Apostle, Priest and King, and the final authority of the Bible. For believers from a Muslim background this involves rejecting Muhammad as an apostle from God and the Qur’an as a word from God.

Practitioners of the Insider Movement presume that Islam can be reformed from within by authentic Jesus movements. God’s purpose, however, is not the reform of Gentile religious systems but the formation of a new community of true believers in Christ. To be capable of reform in a Christian sense, Islam must be a form of Christianity, which it is not. While some aspects of truth and some analogies may be found within it and be used to win Muslims to Christ, they cannot form the basis of a true Christian community.

Some non-Western believers, including converts from Islam, have criticised the Insider Movement as a new form of imperialism by Western missionaries. This is causing a growing alienation between Western missionaries and indigenous Christians. Most Muslim converts to Christianity in North Africa, for example, do not call themselves “followers of Isa”, nor do they conform to the Insider Movement paradigm. They openly call themselves “masihiyin” (the Arabic term for Christians), worship in a recognisably Christian form and are not ashamed of the cross as a symbol of their new faith.

Conclusion

The danger inherent in these new Christian approaches to Islam is the implicit reduction of Christianity to something compatible with Islam and of the Biblical Jesus to the status of the Qur’anic Jesus. They could revive old heresies such as Arianism, which rejected the Trinity and the eternal deity of Christ, and which Islam, being unitarian, is well able to exploit. In their search for common ground with Muslims, Christians involved in interfaith dialogue are increasingly embracing a unitarian paradigm focused on the one God and the human Jesus.

The ancient heresy of Marcion is also re-emerging, for embracing only a Gospel of grace, and thereby rejecting the wrath of God, is leading, as it did for Marcion, to a rejection of the Old Testament and ultimately of Israel as the “elder brother”, thereby producing anti-Semitism. The new evangelical approaches have also caused disunity, arguments and splits within Christian churches, movements and missions.

The churches must preach love for all Muslims as human beings created in God’s image and for whom Christ died. They should certainly not preach fear of Islam or hatred of Muslims. But neither should they be naive as to what is happening in the Muslim world or fail to support the suffering churches there. Since its inception Islam has sought to stifle Christianity in its domains, and this process is still being actively pursued today in most Muslim states and societies.

The churches must both distinguish between individual Muslims and the religious-political system of Islam, and recognise that Islamist terrorists (jihadists) are much more than a miniscule fringe group with no legitimacy in Islam. The violence perpetrated by such groups is rooted both in the ideology of large contemporary Islamist movements and in the traditional, orthodox and classical version of Islam presented in the authoritative Islamic scriptures and commentaries.

Finally the dangers of the political pressures in the dialogue movement must be fully recognised. The new Christian approaches are actually helping the Islamisation of the West. Christians should not offer themselves as pawns to powerful governments, whether Western or Muslim, seeking purely political advantage. While Muslims affirm the unity of religion and the state, Christians must always guard themselves against such manipulation. The Islamic version of peace may be realised when all people submit to the political rule of Islam, but the Christian vision is realised only when Christ rules the hearts of people.

© Patrick Sookhdeo March 2010

1 “Christians do not need to fear Islamic takeover in UK, says Interserve head”, Christianity Today, 18 July 2008.

2 Brother Andrew and Al Jansen, Light Force: The only hope for the Middle East. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 2004, pp179, 188.

Copyright © Barnabas Fund – 9th March 2010

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