Do Muslims and Christians worship the same God? — Nabeel Qureshi’s imprecision.
Wheaton College recently placed a tenured political science professor, Larcyia Hawkins, on administrative leave for “theological statements that seemed inconsistent with [their] doctrinal convictions.” The major evangelical institution focused critiques on her statements about Muslims and Christians worshipping the same God.
Nabeel Qureshi, a New York Times bestselling author and convert to Christianity from Islam, interacted with the story in a blog post. His answer: No, “Muslims and Christians do not worship the same God.”
Unfortunately, the able scholar seriously drops the ball here. Qureshi chides those who answer yes, writing of their vacuous semantics and unsubstantiated assertions. Quite the contrary is true. Every piece of evidence Qureshi raises is either missing the point, philosophically inconsequential, or is actually vacuous semantics and unsubstantiated assertions.
Qureshi starts his argument by conceding some shared territory:
[F]or years after leaving Islam and accepting Jesus as Lord, I believed that Muslims worshiped the same God as Christians but that they were simply wrong about what He is like and what He has done. After all, I had been taught as a young Muslim to worship the God who created Adam and Eve, who rescued Noah from the flood, who promised Abraham a vast progeny, who helped Moses escape Egypt, who made the Virgin Mary great with child, who sent Jesus into the world, who helped disciples overcome, and who is still sovereign today.
I needn’t say more. Thanks for reading!… Ok, I kid. In all seriousness though, keep these similarities in mind as we examine the reasons Qureshi gives for such a change of heart.
Theological Differences — Yup. This is it.
Jesus is the open-shut case, according to Qureshi. “For Christians, Jesus is certainly God, and for Muslims Jesus is certainly not God. How can it be said that Christians and Muslims worship the same God?” Goodness. If Qureshi thinks Miroslav Volf, the Pope, and a slew of others have somehow missed the obvious distinctions of Christian orthodoxy and Muslim orthodoxy, then I’m at a loss.
First, Qureshi’s rhetorical question is aimed at a non-existent straw man. No one is saying there are no differences. Just like no one is saying there are no significant similarities (some of which he himself listed above). There are TONS of differences and TONS of similarities.
Second, he badly misses the philosophical and linguistic point. Qureshi lists three major theological differences: the divinity of Jesus, the fatherhood concept of God, and the Trinity. Yes, those differences mean a young Nabeel worshipped a different God than he does now. That is, if our standard for the word “same” in this context is identical properties .
Take Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and myself as an example. Trump believes Barack Obama has the properties of being President of the United States, husband and father of two girls, Ivy League educated, black, and not born in the United States. I believe the same about Barack Obama, except I think he was born in the United States. Therefore, we don’t hold exactly the same beliefs about Barack Obama.
What follows? Do I believe in a “different” Barack Obama? Yes, in one severely rigid and obvious ontological sense. Are Trump and I attempting to refer to the same man when we say the “President of the United States in 2015”? Of course. Trump is mistaken about Barack Obama’s history, and I am correct, but his error does not entail he is referring to a different entity. Philosopher, and Christian, Francis Beckwith articulates the point clearly:
The fact that one may have incomplete knowledge or hold a false belief about another person — whether human or divine — does not mean that someone who has better or truer knowledge about that person is not thinking about the same person.
The question of incomplete knowledge or false belief is philosophically inconsequential when using “same” in this context.
If you’re the sort who is unsatisfied with distinguishing “same” based on the clearly divergent meaning, here are just a few philosophical implications of your rigidity.
- Any Jew who did not believe God is a Trinity of persons in a single divine essence was not worshiping the same God as orthodox Christians now do.
- Adam, Noah, Moses, and David were not worshiping the same God as orthodox Christians now do.
- Jews, and Christians for that matter, who accept Jesus as Messiah but reject him as also being God, are not worshiping the same God as orthodox Christians.
How does Qureshi respond? Christians and Jews worship the same God. Muslims do not worship the same God, and according to Qureshi, it’s not hypocritical to say as much. He argues, “The response should be obvious to those who have studied the Abrahamic faiths: the Trinity is an elaboration of Jewish theology, not a rejection.” In short, vacuous semantics. If Christian theology is just a mere “elaboration” of Jewish theology, why can’t Judaism make room? Because from the orthodox Jewish perspective, Trinitarianism (three persons, one God) isn’t an elaboration. It’s a rejection of the great confession of orthodox Jews — “Hear O’ Israel. YHWH is our God. YHWH is one.” Like Christianity, Islam can be viewed through the elaboration, or rejection, lens regarding Jewish theology. The terms are functionally relative and depend on who you’re talking to and what you’re referencing. Ironically, Jews believe Islam is far less an “elaboration” than Christianity. Learned rabbis don’t refer to the Islamic concept of God as idolatrous, yet, that is exactly the language used toward the Christian concept of God. Qureshi wants to have his cake and eat it too.
From my view, there are three reasonable options.
- Christians are worshiping a different God than Jews and Muslims.
- Christians, Jews, and Muslims are all worshiping different Gods.
- All three classically theistic Abrahamic faiths are worshiping the same God understood in very different ways.
The obvious problems of option one are likely sensed by Qureshi, as Jesus was Jewish. He wouldn’t want to be insensitive to his own religiously Jewish heritage.
Qureshi selects an unreasonable variation of the first option → Muslims are worshiping a different God than Jews and Christians.
Why is it unreasonable? The Jewish and Islamic concepts of God are far closer than the Jewish and Christian conceptions. Both Judaism and Islam share a belief in a unitarian creator God (one person, one God). Christians believe in a trinitarian creator God (three persons, one God). Therefore, if any single Abrahamic religion is to be separated from the other two, it should be the one with a fundamentally different conception of the one creator God.
Option three is what Qureshi denies, which leaves option two.
The implications of option two are incredible. Before even getting off the ground as a possibility, there must be an exactly specified “orthodox” conception for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam respectively. Assuming that could be accomplished, which is a fantastic IF, each Jew, Christian, and Muslim would have to affirm their respective conceptions to the letter. Then, to avoid a rapid expansion of “Gods”, because adherents will come to slightly different concepts based on subjective experience and variable comprehension abilities, authorities would have to specify how many different theological beliefs were permissible before someone was officially worshiping another God. Any number besides one is logically arbitrary. If there is even one difference, then, technically, the individual is worshiping another God. Therefore, there would nearly be as many “Gods” as people who can conceive of him.
If that sounds absurd, then Qureshi is wrong and option three must be correct.
My Takeaways
I understand Wheaton College’s concern for truth. Beliefs have consequences. To be honest, I think Qureshi’s imprecision stems from the same concern. There is a desire to not muddy the theological water, rightly, but I hope those in authority can see philosophical distinctions more clearly than Qureshi when evaluating Larcyia Hawkins’ administrative leave. A tenured professor should not have to worry about speaking in loving solidarity with those she shares so much common ground with, even amidst the immense theological divide. All those desiring to be oriented to the Good are fighting the same fight.
Truth and love must coexist or else neither is fully had.
As a Christian philosopher/theologian in training, it saddens me to read such imprecision from a trained theologian like Qureshi. Imprecision is unacceptable in times like these. Religious academics have the ethical responsibility, as far as I see, to carefully define terms. Then, and only once those terms are exceedingly clear, draw lines of difference exactly where they are and not one inch further. Qureshi must be even more careful than most, since his life experience as a former Muslim is no doubt taken, prima facie, as credibility to unsuspecting Christian lay readers.
Being precise is a job for all of us. If you hear the question, “Do Muslims and Christians worship the same God?”, and it’s unclear what the interrogator means, answer with a question:
“What do you mean by ‘same’ because it makes all the difference?”
