By "grace" I mean, the restoration of the relationship between God and man.
This question is aimed at our Muslim friends online - I want to learn.
Please add to your comments reason and (scriptural or other) sources. A 'yes' or 'no' answer would be helpful, but more detail is better. I am only guessing in my assumption, I might be wrong. Help me learn.
Given your definition of grace, I think Christianity and Islam emphasize grace equally. However, there are groups within Christianity (e.g., Calvinists) and Islam (e.g., Sunnis who subscribe to Al-Jabiriyah) that focus more on God's sovereignty than on grace, claiming that God's sovereign predestination is ultimately the reason why anyone does or does not appropriate grace.
As a Calvinist Christian I certainly believe that the God of the Bible is a Sovereign God and while Islam emphasizes sovereignty, the God of Christianity is much more personal and the God of Islam more transcendent. I disagree with those who think that Calvinism is not focused on grace. There is no more gracious doctrine than the doctrine of election, thus the Reformers focused on grace alone and faith alone.
What theological distinctives, explicit in Islamic theology, are of the kind that Christians (and their New Testament scriptures, especially Romans and the Pauline Epistles) put under the rubric of "grace"? [According to Christians, God extended through His sinless Son, in human form, a means by which a sinful and rebellious creation (mankind), who could not be righteous by their own efforts of behavior, could obtain the righteousness of Jesus through His payment of death for their sins on the cross (He died on our cross in our place). That is grace.] // It is said that "there is no more gracious doctrine than the doctrine of election" of the Reformers. But that doctrine is also a doctrine of the non-elect being damned. If there is no basis on which God distinguished between two equally sinful men (Smith and Jones), in His election of Smith to salvation and Jones to damnation, and non-elect Jones is not extended the same grace extended to Smith, then the distinction is capricious and Jones, who is damned before the foundation of the earth, can fairly complain "there is no grace here."
It seems to me that the main sentence will be more accurate saying: " Islam focuses more on God's transcendence and anglo-saxon-german Christianity focus more on grace". There are large Christian groups that focus more on God's solution to shame, others on God's provision form freedom/peace while others focus on grace (solution to guilt). See, Muller, R. (2006). The Messenger, The Message, The Community: Three Critical Issues for the Cross-Cultural Church-Planter. Saskatchewan, Canada: CanBooks. Recuperado a partir de www.canbooks.com; and Georges, J. (2014). The 3D Gospel: Ministry in Guilt, Shame, and Fear Cultures. Timē Press.
Thank you for your question
It seems to me that the best comparison is between Islam's understanding of divinity and the understanding of Christianity, or the comparison between Islam's understanding of grace and Christianity's understanding of it
With this comparison, the answer is correct
I may not have understood the question
Thank
“Grace is love that cares and stoops and rescues.”(John Stott)
“[Grace] is God reaching downward to people who are in rebellion against Him.”(Jerry Bridges)
“Grace is unconditional love toward a person who does not deserve it.” (Paul Zahl)
As a person who is imperfect, God's grace allowed His son Jesus Christ to come and give Himself as an atonement for my sin. No greater love is or has been demonstrated than a Sovereign, Almighty God giving Himself for me.
My research and Thesis 'Psychotherapy and Evangelical Christianity' (UEA 2004) investigates this as it relates to the unique link between God, people, and the need for the spiritual dimension within clinical psychotherapy.
God's grace is only possible because He IS eternal sovereignty.
Dear David,
May I suggest that Grace is both cognitive and experiential, you need to realise and understand your need of grace, accept grace as a free gift from God which needs to be accepted and experience its cleansing and forgiving power over sin. (An old word not used much today because we think we are so perfect!!!)
Question: Do you agree or disagree that Islam focuses more on God’s sovereignty and Christianity focuses more on grace?
Answer: Disagree.
Reason: In my opinion:
Islam focuses on original law, handed down as original fear, imposed as original sovereignty. Islam breeds a culture that affords suicide as an opportunity to buy one's way in to the promises of life after death if the suicidal death is a sacrifice, martyred for the cause of the Islamic belief system against those who do not believe.
Christianity focuses on original sin, offering forgiveness through acceptance, and baptism of a life everlasting through the belief of a resurrection of a life led by God the man, who came to life, was crucified and was buried, rose from the dead after three days, and now is seated at the right hand of God the Father. Christianity opposes suicide, and as of the resurrection of Christ, opposes martyrdom seeing living a full life of acceptance of trials and suffering as the payment proving the belief in a greater good through the walk in Christ.
By the way, Judaism focuses on the original virtue. Judaism sees suicide as a sin, and the only sins in the Hebrew are the ones derived from failure to follow the big ten (commandments)
It depens on the variation of Islam or Christianity, but in the general sense we can not compare the transcendental focuses of two contexts of collective memory (not even within the same tradition that abrahamic religions share).
Everything evolves with the concept of Sovereignty..because it gives People Policies and codes of life. Sovereignty strongness and firmness make society strong..but people of society if don't work on that policies then it makes society weak..christianity focus on ethics bcz concept of sovereignty is not dominant in it.
Thank you Nayab!
It is nice to have Moslems write to this question. This is my aim, not to hear what other Christians and certainly not what postmodernists think. It is not knowledge I am after but understanding. They do not have your shoes and I want to slip my feet into your shoes to understand. Calm dialog will help us understand one another. It is the only way.
It appears like you are saying that sovereignty is a more dominant concept in Islam than grace, that everything flows from God's sovereignty. Is that correct?
In part, I agree with you. See my next post.
Regarding the Christian perspective, Nayab - I would *not* say that Christianity focuses on ethics, ...but I understand how a Moslem can think this way. Ethics is not the main focus of the New Testament. My aim here is not to argue but to learn. In this
My aim here is not to argue but to learn. In this post, I am parenthetically commenting on the Christian faith, which is not the aim of my question. My question regards Islam, not Christianity.
Many would say that the focus of Christianity is grace and I understand that line of thinking from both the Old and New Testaments. I even agree with it in ONE way, but not in another.
From God's perspective the aim of the Scriptures, both Old and New, is grace. God created us "in His image". We "walked with God in the cool of the day" -- relationship. This is what God created us for, relationship with Him. Not a side-to-side relationship, but and up-and-down relationship. A Father-child relationship, not a buddy-buddy relationship. Unfortunately, we rebelled. Since that time, we can see all through the Old Testament (and of course in the New) that God's aim is to reconcile that relationship, and the only way to do that is for God to bear the cost, because we are no longer holy and cannot pay for it. (Payment is necessary because God is not only holy, but just. A judge cannot simply ignore the law when it is inconvenient for him. Payment for the infraction must be made for God to continue to be Himself, to be just. (Hence, Jesus - the One who paid the price.)
From our human perspective, it is not grace that drives our faith - this by itself only produces spoiled children - but Lordship. When we recognize, when we awaken from our stupor and see the situation we are in, AND see who God is, the only choice we have is to submit ourselves to Him - this is, Lordship.
This might look like ethics, but it is *not*. It is actually closer to sovereignty than grace. Now I will get personal and share myself. The reason I am a Christian and not a Moslem is because I see that payment must be made. God is just. He cannot simply wave a magic wand and say, "You lived well, come into my Kingdom." That would be to side-step justice which goes against God's nature. "Good" is not the same as perfect. We might be good (relative measurement), but we are not perfect (objective measurement).
God was in a bind. He wanted to have a relationship with us, but we broke off the relationship. According to justice, we have to pay for our wrongs (Numbers 18:22; Deuteronomy 24:16; 2 Kings 14:6) - but we cannot because by rebelling we made ourselves unholy. He made us holy. We made ourselves unholy - unlike Him. It is a dilemma. The only solution to renew the relationship AND for God to remain true to Himself (remain just) was for someone holy to pay for us - die for us. This is why I am a Christian. Jesus paid the debt we owe.
Perhaps the reason why Moslems think this lordship is the same as ethics is because of their own perspective of ethisc - that one must live a good life to warrant salvation. This is *not* why I seek to live a good life. God took care of that! That is a done deal. My motivation to live as I do is two fold, 1.) God's grace motivates me. Having someone pay the biggest price for your benefit is humbling, sobering. 2.) The second reason is, this is the way we *should* live anyway. Had sin never come into the world, we would be living holy lives with no conflict between God and us. This is the Lordship aspect I wrote about - I accept His direction for my life, and live accordingly. My life does not save me. (Adam and Eve did not do this. They chose a different way - and all of mankind followed.) I do *not* follow God in order to be saved (like a Moslem), but since I am saved, I am able live as I should (with His power and direction).
So it is the problem of God's need to remain just that I cannot be a Moslem. We need forgiveness. A "good life" will never be good enough because good is not the same as perfect - and God is perfect.
Let me try to illustrate this. You have a small cup of water. Someone puts one drop of cyanide (poison) in it. Will you drink it? NO! Let's start with a liter of water and add one drop of cyanide. Will you drink it? NO! You have a barrel of water and add one drop of cyanide. Is it pure? Will you drink it? NO!
Why will you not drink it? Because it is not pure! God cannot accept us into His presence because we are not pure - and He is. This is why I think that the Moslem faith does not work. It is illogical at a character level of the Divine being. God demands justice. Islam has no payment system for that justice. There MUST be a payment - justification - for us to be counted as pure, and allowed into God's presence.
So I think that using a Lutherian juxtaposition of law (sovereignty) and grace is probably not a good comparison in this case first because the NT writers did not see it that way. Paul's use of the argument was really misinterpreted by Luther to accommodate his (Luther's) need to understand his position vis a vis the Catholic Church. It did not come out well. I think it might be better to compare the actions of the Gods. Here you would see that the Christian God goes out of his way to accommodate his creatures' human propensity to choose badly. The God of Israel constantly looks for ways that He can help them get closer as well as draw others in. On the other hand, the Muslim God, as represented by his strict followers, seems to be the opposite and even a bit capricious. He seems to find every possible injunction against those he dislikes. He seems (again according to the actions of his stringent followers) to like punishment for those who don't fit perfectly and retribution for those who don't know him and immediately acquiesce to his seemingly stringent rules. So, my view is that it is grace versus legalism, not sovereignty because, in both paradigms, sovereignty is assumed whether the God is graceful or legalistic.
Grace is biblical. Legalism is not. Although this is not to say that correct worldview is not important, it is.
Look at the woman who has the bleeding problem. She says to herself, If I just touch his (Jesus') clothes I will be healed. This is a bit unbiblical. Yet, her perspective of Jesus was right. So Jesus calls her faith great.
After conversion, God expects growth. Then worldview, theology is critical. Legalism is not the same. That is a focus on man's action - which do not save, not on God's actions.
David, You assume wrongly. I am *not* Reformed. Not at all. In fact, I have an extremely dim view of both Calvin the person and his theology. If you may notice, Nayab made a comment about ethics as being the foundation of Christianity. Being good - ethics - is *not* the basis of the Christian faith. If one misses that, they have not read the OT and NT scriptures very much. If someone thinks that it is, I ask, "How 'good' is good enough?" Answer: Perfect - because God is perfect. So ethics cannot the basis of Christianity. Therefore, I did *not* "slip" this in. I was correcting her perspective of Christianity - and I do not fault her either. It is natural for us to look at things from our own perspective -- which is why I am asking MOSLEMS about THEIR faith. Are you a Moslem?
Vinod, Please use BOTH upper AND LOWER case letters. Your post is hard to read because visually it is screaming at us.
Nayab, I was pretty sure you are Muslim. My question was actually to David. Thank you for responding. I really appreciate dialoging with Moslems as it helps to build bridges rather than walls.
My question is directed to Moslems, not to Christians, Hindus. postmodernists, etc. (Sorry, no offense meant, but non-Moslems might find another dialog to join.)
I am so tempted to address the silliness and illogic that is gathering here -- but I won't. I want to know what Moslems see as the core concept of their own faith -- sovereignty or grace. If you are a Moslem you are encouraged to respond. I look forward to reading your views regarding this issue.
Well, Steve, if by grace, you mean the relationship between man and God, that is exactly what Islam also came to do. If you read the Islamic history, the first thing the Prophet did was to explain the relationship between man and God and to turn the Arabs away from their skewed understanding of this relationship. Therefore, in this aspect, that is, in your definition of "Grace", Islam and Christianity are similar.
However, if you put Christianity and Islam in their historical context, and grace is understood in that context, I will say to some extent your assertion is right. Christianity came at a time when the Jews had forgotten about "grace" and prioritised law/ethics above grace. Jesus Christ basically came to show them that religion is not all about the law/ethics but mercy/grace supersedes law/ethics in the sight of God. Hence some of his assertion for example that "it is not what goes into the mouth that is important but what comes out of it..." when he was challenged that his disciples did not wash their hands before eating according to the law/ethics. In essence, the Jews had an understanding of God, His Sovereignty and relationship with man, thus, this was not a problem. The work of Ismail Raji Faruji "Christian Ethics" is a good reference on this.
Islam, on the other hand, came to the Arabs at a time when there was a skewed understanding of God, His Sovereignty and relationship with man. Hence, the task of the Prophet was first to clarify these issues before going to other social issues in the Arab society (see Quran 7: 54 - 59; 39: 5 -8; 6:102 - 106; 10:36-36;42:21). Nonetheless, the issue of mercy/grace was also part of the message of Islam because, at that time, the Arab society was also in turmoil. Thus, grace can be seen in the emancipation of women, kindness to the poor and venerable, the emancipation of slaves and admonition to free them, forgiveness to those who sin against one or commit evil etc (see Quran 42:37; 42:40; 16:126-127; 24:22; 17:31; 9:60; 2:177). However, based on the historical situation of the Arabs at that time, Islam had to legalize for them hence law/ethics became paramount in the message of Islam. Recall that it was not really necessary for Jesus to do this because the Jews had the OT and it contains their laws - which is why Jesus said "I have not come to abolish the law but to fulfill them". The work of Toshihiko Izutsu "God and Man in the Quran" is a good reference on this.
Allahu Aalam
Allahu, while I accept the last paragraph at least, I am finding it difficult to see these things in the Qur'an particularly in the verses you gave. I honestly find the verses less than instructive, and not conveying the coherence you insist they have, and which your explanation does.
Are these problems of translation?
Allahu, many things the Jesus-figure did were opposed to the legalistic function of the law (not all Judaism was like that), so the saying of the Jesus-figure you allude to may mean exactly as you say (adding confusion), indicating a return to non-legalistic responses (my belief), or be simply a misunderstanding.
These verses talk about forgiveness 42:37; 42:40; 16:126-127; 24:22;
These verses talks about helping the needy 9:60; 2:177; 4: 36
These talk about women 4:1; 4:7 - 11; 2:228; 4:19; 2:187; 30:21; 33:35;
These talk about slaves 4:36; 4:92; 5:89; 58:3; 24:32 - 33;
For a better understanding of these verses please see their explanations/Tafsir.
I will not say Jesus calls for a non-legalistic response, rather, I will want to believe that he meant people could be excused for their mistakes in not following the law or when they are pressed and could not follow the law as a result.
In many ways, correct or not, Jesus was perceived as demanding a different response to the law, through individual understanding and choice, thereby accentuating a higher level of responsibility and a finer grasp of the internal spirituality, in that there is no force or communal reasoning, of religious response.
The verses, Musa, you have provided above are scarcely ethically based, or offer an original response by and large, but simply commentary. Honestly, my immediate thought was 'so what?' You can marry those slaves with better characters, etc? Hardly earth-shattering insight! The miundanity, indeed banality, is one of my problems with Islam.
My research so far into Arabia at this time does not indicate turmoil, but at woest change. Although very little is known of the period prior to Muhammed, it is difficult to find the anarchy claimed.
The Islam focuses more on God’s sovereignt
Ayat alkursi
"Allah! There is no god but He - the Living, The Self-subsisting, Eternal. No slumber can seize Him Nor Sleep. His are all things In the heavens and on earth. Who is there can intercede In His presence except As he permitteth? He knoweth What (appeareth to His creatures As) Before or After or Behind them. Nor shall they encompass Aught of his knowledge Except as He willeth. His throne doth extend Over the heavens And on earth, and He feeleth No fatigue in guarding And preserving them, For He is the Most High. The Supreme (in glory)."
[Surah al-Baqarah 2: 255
