21AR26-35

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AR 26:35 - Are most Muslims actually syncretists?

In this issue:

ATHEISM - "misguided Christian beliefs have led to enormous harm"

CHRISTOLOGY - determining when "the divinity of the messiah [became] the decisive criterion by which to distinguish between what later would develop into two separate religions"

ISLAM - "70+ percent of Muslims worldwide practice a syncretistic mix of orthodox Islam and traditional religious beliefs"

PERSECUTION - the new religion called "Christianity" and Rome's oppression

Apologia Report 26:35 (1,540)
September 2, 2021

ATHEISM
"There are no good, compelling reasons to accept the claims of Christianity" says trial lawyer John W. Campbell in his debut work: Cross Examined: Putting Christianity on Trial - which Publishers Weekly (Aug 2 '21) gleefully describes as "a resounding and meticulous refutation of Christianity. Starting with the premise, 'Christianity should be singled out because of its unique cultural and sociopolitical significance,' Campbell demonstrates that 'there are no good, compelling reasons to accept the claims of Christianity and many compelling reasons to reject them for naturalism.' Campbell's criticisms fall into two categories: contradicting apologetical arguments with empirical evidence, and analyzing the logic gaps within biblically inspired beliefs. For example, when discussing cosmological arguments for God (which assert that, since everything must have a cause, God must be the 'uncaused cause'), Campbell points out that quantum mechanics can offer just as satisfying an explanation - and that even if such a supernatural entity existed, it would not necessarily resemble the Christian god: 'The very concept of the scientific method, with its implicit refutation of dogma and insistence on following the evidence wherever it leads, is the antithesis of Christian epistemology, which relies on divine revelation.' The conclusion Campbell hopes his audience will reach is that 'much of the Bible is simply useless baggage that should be quickly discarded' and that 'misguided Christian beliefs have led to enormous harm.' This provocative work rests comfortably next to works by E.O. Wilson, Richard Dawkins, and Robert Ingersoll. Even those who disagree with Campbell will find his arguments worth engaging with." [1] (It's enough to give the legal profession a bad name.)

Seriously, this mirrors a growing cultural willingness to cast aside previous levels of restraint to rake up tired criticisms of religion. Also see "'Christian Evangelicals Are America's Taliban': Actors, Journalists Equate American Christians to the Taliban" by Megan Basham (DailyWire, Aug 30 '21) <www.bit.ly/3t5GkOo>

And, similarly, by association: <www.bit.ly/3t5IRIo>

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CHRISTOLOGY
Messianic High Christology: New Testament Variants of Second Temple Judaism, by Ruben A. Bühner [2] -- Baylor University Press reports that "Bühner brings the New Testament Christologies closer to their first-century Jewish context. In doing so, he augments our understanding of the correlation between early devotion to Christ and early Jewish thought and practice more broadly, and challenges current historical reconstructions."

This is because "most New Testament concepts of Christ's divinity are to be understood precisely as part of contemporary discourse within early Jewish messianism. While early understandings of Christ are not simply identical with some other Jewish messianic expectations, they should be understood as deliberate developments in acceptance of and in dialogue with the wider Jewish discourse produced by some Jewish subgroups."

Bühner (New Testament, University of Tübingen) argues that "it was not until the second and subsequent centuries that Jews as well as non-Jewish followers of Christ began to consider the divinity of the messiah as the decisive criterion by which to distinguish between what later would develop into two separate religions."

At issue: "The depiction of Christ as divine is often assumed to be the categorical difference between early Jewish messianism and New Testament Christology. Despite the prolific accomplishments of recent scholarship on Second Temple messianism and on the origin and development of 'high' Christology, research has largely treated these as two separate lines of inquiry. As an unintended result, earliest Christianity appears not as an organic outgrowth of ancient Judaism, but as something of an anomaly. Ruben A. Bühner calls this line of thinking into question in Messianic High Christology. Through a curated set of exegetical comparisons, each between a christological text and one or two messianic texts, Bühner reveals to what extent Second Temple messianism is indeed the primary context for the high Christologies of the New Testament...."

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ISLAM
The Muslim Majority: Folk Islam and the Seventy Percent, Robin Hadaway (senior professor, missions, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary) [3] -- B&H Academic explains: "More than 70 percent of Muslims worldwide practice folk Islam, a syncretistic mix of theologically orthodox Islam and traditional religious beliefs and practices. The Muslim Majority is unlike many published works on evangelism to Muslims, which argue for either apologetic or contextualized 'bridge' approaches. These approaches are often ineffective in reaching adherents of popular Islam. Instead, author and missiologist Robin Hadaway outlines a contextual approach that addresses the unique perspective of popular Islam. Hadaway explains the differences between folk Islam and orthodox Islam and explores best practices for reaching the vast majority of Muslims with the gospel of Jesus Christ."

Imagine replacing Islam with what passes for "Christianity" in a similar study. In your mind, and initially with no more explanation than the above, how close might the results come to 70% in this case as well?

(Hadaway's 2010 doctoral thesis on folk Islam is available at <www.bit.ly/3zC6rPs> as a free download.)

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PERSECUTION
Christian Persecution in Antiquity, by Wolfram Kinzig [4] -- Baylor University Press explains that Kinzig (Church History, University of Bonn) "makes clear the critical role played by the experience of persecution in the development of the church's identity and sense of belonging in the ancient world." He finds that the "prolonged experience of distrust, oppression, and outright persecution helped shape the ethos of the Christian faith and produced a wealth of literature commemorating those who gave their lives in witness to the gospel."

Kinzig also "examines the motivations and legal mechanisms behind the various outbursts of violence against Christians, and chronologically tracks the course of Roman oppression of this new religion to the time of Constantine. Brief consideration is also given to persecutions of Christians outside the borders of the Roman Empire. Kinzig analyzes martyrdom accounts of the early church, cautiously drawing on these ancient voices alongside contemporary non-Christian evidence to reconstruct the church's experience as a minority sect. In doing so, Kinzig challenges recent reductionist attempts to dismantle the idea that Christians were ever serious targets of intentional violence. While martyrdom accounts and their glorification of self-sacrifice seem strange to modern eyes, they should still be given credence as historical artifacts indicative of actual events, despite them being embellished by sanctified memory."

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SOURCES: Monographs

1 - Cross Examined: Putting Christianity on Trial, by John W. Campbell (Prometheus, mid-September 2021, hardcover, 624 pages) <www.bit.ly/3j7WALw>

2 - Messianic High Christology: New Testament Variants of Second Temple Judaism, by Ruben A. Bühner ( Baylor Univ Prs, 2021, hardcover, 244 pages) <www.bit.ly/384w7It>

3 - The Muslim Majority: Folk Islam and the Seventy Percent, by Robin Hadaway (B&H, 2021, paperback, 256 pages) <www.bit.ly/3AXo3Wi>

4 - Christian Persecution in Antiquity, by Wolfram Kinzig (Baylor Univ Prs, hardcover, 2021, 181 pages) <www.bit.ly/3gAbFDX>

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