Ideas drive history. Any significant conflict comes down, however eventually, to ideas, beliefs, and convictions. Take that analysis to the next level and it becomes clear that the most significant human conflicts we encounter are the most significantly tied to ideas - and to beliefs about God. In other words, theology matters.
This is especially clear when the conflict between Islam and the West comes into view. The deeply and inescapably theological character of this collision should be apparent to all. Those most ardently determined to ignore this dimension are those who are convinced that the West has now entered a secular and post-theological age in which basic convictions and belief about God no longer matter.
This conveniently, but dangerously, ignores the obvious - that the West is based upon a certain understanding of order, rationality, human dignity, and human responsibility that emerged out of the Christian worldview, informed by both the Old and New Testaments. Rival civilizations are based in different belief systems that produce very different understandings and moral actions. Students in most American high schools study the stories of those understood to be champions of freedom. Students in far too many madrassas throughout much of the Islamic world are taught to celebrate martyrs to Islam - even teenage suicide bombers.
In his new book, Faith, Reason, and the War Against Jihadism, George Weigel takes theology seriously as he considers the threat of jihadism. A Distinguished Fellow of Washington's Ethics and Public Policy Center, Weigel is a prominent Catholic intellectual and commentator. Here is the central thrust of his analysis:
How men and women think about God - or don't think about God - has a great deal to do with how they envision the just society, and how they determine the appropriate means by which to build that society. This means taking theology seriously - which includes taking seriously others' concepts of God's nature and purposes, and their commitments to the beliefs arising from those concepts - as well as the theologies that have shaped the civilization of the West. If we have not learned this over the past five years, one wonders if we have learned anything.
Well, one does wonder if we have learned anything. This quality of analysis is virtually missing from most public conversation - which is why Faith, Reason, and the War Against Jihadism is so important.
Weigel also notices the different way Muslims and Westerners view history. He sees theology at work there as well:
Despite the supersessionist claims that some Christians have made throughout history vis-à-vis Judaism, no orthodox Christian holds that God's self-revelation in Christ negates God's self-revelation in the history of the People of Israel. Islam, by contrast, takes a radically supersessionist view of both Judaism and Christianity, claiming that the final revelation to Muhammad de facto trumps, by way of supersession, any prior revelatory value (so to speak) that might be found in the Hebrew Bible or the Christian New Testament.
But Islam and the Christianity-formed West also produced very different theological anthropologies:
Islamic theological anthropology also helps explain Islam's traditional division of the human world into the "House of Islam," the "God-hallowed realm" that embodies God's purposes on earth, and the "House of War," which is composed of all those who have not yet submitted to Allah and his Prophet. From there, it is but a short step to the Muslim conviction that, as Bernard Lewis writes, "The Islamic state [is] the only truly legitimate power on earth and the Islamic community the sole repository of truth and enlightenment, surrounded on all sides by an outer darkness of barbarism and unbelief." Continue >>
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Mohler doesn't realize that his theology (Calvinistic or Semi-Calvinistic) is probably a lot closer to Islam than he thinks. Muslims believe in a deterministic sovereignty of God and that because of this over emphasized or over stated idea of God's omniscience everything is fated to "be as it is to be" or Allah's will. Calvinist and most mainstream Christian's have also this very same view - those who God "elects" according to his will or for his glory and those he predetermines to hell is also for his glory - but yet both are determined by God's absolute foreknowledge. Yes, Islams are indeed acting in accordance to their theology, However, so are the Christians of this age. With Calvinist saying that "Faith is ALL from God" and man plays no part in coming to Christ then this is why in my opinion the church is failing miserably - rid Christianity of the Greek Pagan influences of Augustine, Calvin and Luther and we should begin to see revival in our land. Until then, people will continue think they are Once Saved Always Saved and live a sinful hypocritical lifestyle. Is it no wonder the Muslims are appalled at OUR theology?? With most non-believers in the USA who think we are nothing more than a bunch of hypocrites is it any wonder that Muslims hate us? Granted, Muslims have their own sins, but why do we think we are any better than they are when we exhibit just as sinful behavior as they do? Let's clean up our own house before we go to clean up our neighbors house. Once we as Christians are living as Christ called us to be "be holy as I am holy" then maybe we will have a more positive influence on them.
Too broad a brush! Not all Muslims consider the Koran as obliterating the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Testament.
The conflict and clash is not so much due to theology as it is to worldview distinctions. The more extreme fundamentalists in the Muslim world are much more animistic in their worldview outlook than Mohler seems to recognize. A few years spent in an animistic society might be a lot better for his understanding that such a people is closer to an Old Testament worldview than is our developed "West". Our worldview is much more Greek and Roman in origin than Hebrew. That should be obvious to a seminary president.
Well written article. I'm glad to see we're shedding light on the madness that is suicide bombing, not of God and certainly the main point of discussion with those who have not yet come to know the love of Jesus.