CHRISTIANITY IS DIFFERENT FROM ISLAM!

One of the most common lies of the day is that all faiths are equally true. Or equally false. Or at least equally valid. It’s something I considered on a previous post and may well return to. However, I’d like to here briefly flag up the specific differences between the two great rival faiths of the day: Christianity and Islam. Differences between Christianity and other religions are easier to flag. Christianity is an offshoot of Judaism – Jews simply rejecting the New Testament and the claims of Jesus. Buddhism is essentially atheistic, with no specific god – although still supernaturalistic (reincarnation etc). Hinduism? It gets the best stories and has been essential in giving a nationalistic identity to once disparate tribes; but where, despite the New Atheistic scorn, large numbers of credible scientists, academics and philosophers will argue for the burden of proof favouring Christianity, I’m not aware there is any Hindu equivalent to Professor John Lennox proposing an actual scientific basis for the flying monkeys or elephant headed deities of Hindu scripture. (Sikhism I know very little about so I won’t pretend otherwise).

So then, back to Islam and why it is different. In addressing this I am responding to one of my great heroes – that is my grandfather, who has, at ripe old age of 90, authored a compelling book (currently lost in a minefield of copyright complications) proposing bridges between the three ‘Abrahamic’ faiths. I’ll begin by acknowledging his similarities. Christianity, Judaism and Islam are indeed all looking to the same God – the one who revealed Himself to Abraham. They are all monotheistic and each believe in Heaven, Hell and a similar moral code on Earth.

However, beyond that, I have to disagree that they are at all on the same page (although, let me make clear at the outset, I am very much for ongoing mutual tolerance and respect... just let's not be scared of debate and criticism within that!). Christianity involves following Jesus Christ – hence the title. Christians believe he is the Son of God, and the means by which we can re-enter into relationship with God and become acceptable to Him in our sin. Popular ignorance (and in that I do not include my grandfather!) would have Muhammad as another tribe’s interchangeable Christ figure – their culturally applicable bridge to knowing God. However, if so, they don’t know Muhammad and they don’t know Christ.

Attitudes to Peace: Whatever the conduct of Christians down the years, Jesus was in his lifetime a man of peace. The Jews expected a warrior deliverer to free them from the Romans, but Jesus instead told followers to ‘turn the other cheek’, assuring them that ‘blessed were the peacemakers’. Ultimately, he walked willingly to a sacrificial death, coming ‘not to be served but to serve’. For Muhammad, on the other hand, his revelations quickly put him personally at the head of a conquering army. After he had taken Mecca in 630, his second successor Omar took Egypt, Persia and Palestine. This initial tide was to take Islam right into Europe (and conquest of Spain), only being halted by defeat in France in 732. (The Ottomans would later take up the mantle, conquering the likes of Constantinople and the Balkans until ultimately halted by failure in Vienna, 1683). Now if I point out that Islam lends itself to fighting, I will be quickly directed to the Crusades, in which the Christian Pope launched a ‘holy war’ of his own. However, I’d venture that has little to do with Jesus if we’re here comparing faith founders. The early church was marked and known by peaceful martyrdom right up to the point when Rome got its hands on it and changed absolutely everything. Besides which, as an aside, people often forget that Islam was ultimately successful over Christianity in the Crusades and, in actual fact, it was often Christians who were slaughtered by their own (read about the sacking of Constantinople in the Fourth Crusade).

And Muslims? Well I don’t want to misrepresent the many. Thankfully for all, the official policy of Sunni Islam is formed by a Hadith (an official saying of Muhammad outside of the Qu’ran) claiming that military Jihad is secondary to the greater Jihad of winning the personal battle to live a holy life (in fact, Jews and non-conformist Christians living in contested areas welcomed both the first Muslim invaders and the later Ottomans as more tolerant and peaceable governors than either their Byzantine or Catholic rulers). However, there have always been those from inside and outside of Islam willing to question the authenticity of such a proclamation. Some,examining both their holy book and the example of both their founder and the early Caliphs, have periodically returned to a literal interpretation of Jihad. Most pertintently to our world, one such voice was Wahhabi – an 18^th Century figure sponsored by his local Arabic rulers. Their name? The house of Saud – ultimately bound to form Saudi Arabia and strike oil. Calls for Jihad are also more legitimate and commonplace in Shia Islam (15% of the Muslim world) as officially practised in Iran. Again, this is not to implicate the bulk of moderate Muslim – they are in the firing line perhaps more than anyone where extremists are concerned. But the link between Islam and violence is far more legitimate than is any such link in biblical Christianity (George W Bush take note!).

Pharisees: It should be noted that Jesus signed his death warrant when taking on the fussiness of the religious authorities. Much of his anger was directed at the fact their love of legalism had surpassed the principles behind it. We see this throughout the gospels – Jesus is at pains to point out, for example, that Sabbath rest was meant to be a good and beneficial thing. Now he saw the Pharisees wanting to punish those healing on the Sabbath, or even picking up a stick! Similarly, they couldn’t abide or hear those failing to observe their own man-made and elaborate washing rituals. Such rule-checking also gave them great status in the community, something else he criticised.

This has clearly come once more to pass in the ‘Hail Marys’ and candles of Catholicism, but even more so it has come to characterise Islam. Where Muhammad urged only modesty in women (and a lot of the Qu’ran seems to celebrate women), creeping legalism has in some places buried them beneath the burqa. Where he prescribed against worshipping images, presumably concerned that people would end up worshipping depictions of him instead of Allah, we end up with murder over a Danish doodle (and who’s going to worship THAT?!).  It seems that Islam (and some state-sponsored Christianity!) has largely become the very thing Jesus would most rail against. Is this just a man-made error both have wandered into or an integral difference between the two? I believe the latter, because Islam is a meritocracy based on earning salvation through works - thus lending itself to a great fear of rule-breaking. Christians, on the other hand, can do nothing, short of believing, to save themselves. From the start of the Islamic calendar the careful rituals of prayer, eating, fasting and pilgrimage were set in place; whilst in contrast the Christian New Testament fulfils and ends slavery to the minutiae of Jewish law.

And the rest! But ultimately, those are just the two points I wanted to make. Outside of them there are huge numbers of differences between Christianity and Islam. Only the former offers relationship with God, the doctrine of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, resurrection, the guarantee of forgiveness and much more besides. Above all, Jesus dropped that bombshell of being the long-prophesied Son of God, where Muhammad never claimed to be any more than a Prophet. The new tendency to lump the two religions together as the same old problem (usually with images of 9/11 playing onscreen) is lazy and counter-productive. On another occasion I’ll take a historical hammer to the idea that rational reason alone is any more inherently peaceful – the Renaissance-sparked ideas and technologies having ultimately led us to the great and godless wars of the 20^th Century (because the problem is people!). Neither can you get far in the wishful thinking of seeing Christianity and Islam as similar enough to ultimately pull in the same direction (sorry Grandpa). I admire a lot of Muslims in that they have more principle and remain more distinctive than many Christians. I enjoy the flavour they give my local community in Tooting. I know Muslims I like very much (generally the ones willing to discuss this stuff!). But, ultimately, I think they’re mistaken, and I don't think their beliefs are particularly similar to mine.