15AR20-03

Apologia Report 20:3 (1,232)

January 21, 2015

Subject: Blasphemy, terror, and the future of Islam

In this issue:

ISLAM - "a religion in crisis"

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ISLAM

Why it's taken so long for the right questions to be asked publicly by so many, we cannot say. However, something about the recent terrorism events in France has had that result across a spectrum of interlocutors.

In his New York Times (Jan 14 '15, pA25) Op-Ed piece "Islam's Problem With Blasphemy," Turkish journalist Mustafa Akyol <thewhitepath.com> - author of Islam without Extremes [1] - writes: "Muslim statesmen, clerics and intellectuals have added their voices to condemnations of terror by leaders around the world. But they must undertake another essential task: Address and reinterpret Islam's traditional take on 'blasphemy,' or insult to the sacred. ...

"The Quran praises other prophets — such as Abraham, Moses and Jesus — and even tells Muslims to 'make no distinction' between these messengers of God. Yet for some reason, Islamist extremists seem to obsess only about the Prophet Muhammad. ... "Satirical magazines such as Charlie Hebdo <charliehebdo.fr> have run cartoons ridiculing God (in the Jewish, Christian and Muslim contexts), but they were targeted with violence only when they ridiculed the Prophet Muhammad. ...

"In other words, the zeal comes not from merely respect for the sacred, but from militancy for what's sacred to us — us being the community of Muslims. ...

"[T]his religious nationalism is guided by religious law — Shariah ... while Shariah is rooted in the divine, the overwhelming majority of its injunctions are man-made....

"The only source in Islamic law that all Muslims accept indisputably is the Quran. And, conspicuously, the Quran decrees no earthly punishment for blasphemy - or for apostasy (abandonment or renunciation of the faith), a related concept. ...

"Tellingly, severe punishments for blasphemy and apostasy appeared when increasingly despotic Muslim empires needed to find a religious justification to eliminate political opponents.

"Before all that politically motivated expansion and toughening of Shariah, though, the Quran told early Muslims, who routinely faced the mockery of their faith by pagans: 'God has told you in the Book that when you hear God's revelations disbelieved in and mocked at, do not sit with them until they enter into some other discourse; surely then you would be like them.'

"Just 'do not sit with them' - that is the response the Quran suggests for mockery. Not violence. Not even censorship." <www.goo.gl/gSIAA6>

In her Los Angeles Times column ("Not an Islam I can recognize," Jan 12 '15, n.p.), Patt Morrison interviews Khaled M. Abou El Fadl (an American lawyer and Islamic jurist, professor of Islamic law at UCLA, and the head of its Islamic studies program). Fadl notes that "In France there's a particularly exaggerated racial and ethnic problem, even more than the rest of Europe - a general sense that the French look at Arabs and Muslim immigrants as inferior people. ...

"There is no single [Islamic] law position about whether someone who curses or insults the prophet deserves punishment or not. When it came to faulting the prophet, there were Muslim poets who would mock him or his refusal of wealth or his rejection of alcohol. These precedents were discussed in Islamic law, [with] enormous debates as to whether this is something that the state can take jurisdiction of, whether punishment is a number of lashes or not at all."

El Fadl claims that "The view that insulting the prophet deserves death was born with 'The Satanic Verses' by Salman Rushdie and the fatwa issued [in 1989] by Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini, trying to capitalize on a political moment. Think about it: Generations of Western travelers traveled up and down the Muslim world, wrote numerous works, called the prophet every type of name, and it was a non-issue because it had no political resonance.

"The Koran notes that at the time of the prophet, even some followers accused him of being insane or having epileptic fits. And nowhere in the Koran does it say 'kill them.' Nowhere." <www.goo.gl/BS28yY>

From his platform on the GetReligion blog (Jan 13 '15) Richard Ostling asks: "What is terrorism's long-term impact on world Islam?" He observes: "First Things published an article on 'Challenging Radical Islam' <www.goo.gl/00y3Fn> that's must reading for reporters. Author John Azumah, a Christian expert on Islam at Columbia Theological Seminary, carefully balances the ideological complexities. Contra the left, he says 'key aspects of the ideology of radical violent Muslim groups are indeed rooted in Islamic texts and history.' Yet he criticizes the right, contending that in principle Islam or the Koran or the Prophet Muhammad aren't the real problem. ...

"Have groups that slaughter the innocents in God's name become a permanent faction within this great world faith? If so, won't that grievously damage Islam's stature in the long-term?

"Azumah says 'a battle for the soul of Islam' is already altering the landscape, and makes the remarkable claims that 'disillusioned young Iranians are leaving Islam in droves and giving up on religion altogether. Other ordinary Muslims are turning away from Islam to other religions, including Christianity.'"

Sasan Tavassoli, a onetime Muslim in Iran and now Atlanta-based Presbyterian missioner to Iranian expatriates, "notes that Operation World [2], which monitors nations' trends for its Christian 'prayer guide,' says Iran has the fastest growth rate for evangelical churches in any nation, 19.6 percent per year. ...

"One well-seasoned observer to consult would be J. Dudley Woodberry, retired dean of the School of Intercultural Studies at Fuller Theological Seminary, who has been a pastor in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. In addition, two 2014 books from obscure publishers develop this theme:

* "Too Many to Jail: The Story of Iran's New Christians, by Mark Bradley (a pseudonym) [3] claims that the nation had fewer than 500 known Christian converts from Islam at the time of the Khomeini revolution, compared with 100,000 or more today. The book develops the same theme of Iranians' alienation from their national religion and resulting exploration of other faith options.

* "Beyond that one nation, there's A Wind in the House of Islam: How God Is Drawing Muslims Around the World to Faith in Jesus Christ [4]. Veteran Southern Baptist missionary David Garrison bases his scenario on three years and a quarter-million miles traveling across the Muslim world and compiling stories from 1,000 converts. Book promotion says this is 'the greatest turning of Muslims to Christ in history,' a claim skeptical journalists of course won't take at face value." <www.goo.gl/GbuUdn>

Concluding her Op-Ed piece "It’s Time for Islam to Mature or Perish," Rachel Lu reports for The Federalist: "Islam is a religion in crisis. If Muslims cannot find good ways to articulate and live their faith within the context of the modern world, the result will be more violence. Over the longer run, there are other serious implications for Islam as a faith. Already there are reasons to think that Christianity is ascending as an ever-more-important spiritual influence in areas of Africa and Asia that have traditionally been Islamic strongholds. Muslims are finding it more difficult to reach their own people, theologically and spiritually; other faiths are starting to fill the gap." <www.goo.gl/RFYRBz>

And last, did you know that the Lausanne Movement held a "Global Consultation on Islam" last year? Find event video presentations and other related content at <www.goo.gl/ZSo5Wc>.

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SOURCES: Monographs

1 - Islam without Extremes: A Muslim Case for Liberty, by Mustafa Akyol (W. W. Norton, 2013, paperback, 368 pages) <www.goo.gl/GErDEt>

2 - Operation World: The Definitive Prayer Guide to Every Nation, by Jason Mandryk (IVP, 2010, paperback, 978 pages) <www.goo.gl/mdECGu>

3 - Too Many to Jail: The Story of Iran's New Christians, by Mark Bradley (Melville, 2014, paperback, 256 pages) <www.goo.gl/eccQtx>

4 - A Wind In The House of Islam: How God Is Drawing Muslims Around The World To Faith In Jesus Christ, by David Garrison (Wigtake, 2014, paperback, 328 pages) <www.goo.gl/5jdj1t>

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