25 Nov 2011 03:59 PM
The Issa Imperative–Jesus in Islam
A sermon by Marti Martinson on November 20, 2011.
As a Near Eastern religion, Judaism, in its deepest antiquity, must have been influenced by its neighbors, for it is a well accepted fact that Greek Neo-Platonic thought influenced early Christianity. If you recall world history from high school, you might remember the Code of Hammurabi. It is a very ancient Babylonian law code that dates from 1700 BCE, approximately 450 years before the generally accepted time period of the Exodus. However, there is a lost law code that is known about only by incomplete references to its originator, Urukagina, a Mesopotamian king who reigned from 2360 to 2350 BCE -- more than one thousand years before the Exodus.
Listen to the praises of Urukagina and his laws:
Urukagina solemnly promised that he would never subjugate the waif and the widow to the powerful.
He exempted widows and orphans from taxes.
If the poor does not wish to sell, the powerful man (the rich man or the priest) cannot force him to do so.
And now these, from the book of Deuteronomy:
Deuteronomy 10:18 - He doth judgment to the orphan and the widow, loveth the stranger, and giveth him food and raiment.
Deuteronomy 27:19 - Cursed be he that perverteth the judgment of the alien, of the orphan and the widow: and all the people shall say: Amen.
Deuteronomy 24:20 - If thou hath gathered the fruit of thy olive trees, thou shalt not return to gather whatsoever remaineth on the trees: but shalt leave it for the alien, for the orphan, and the widow.
And this psalm:
Psalm 146:9 - The Lord keepeth the alien, he will support the orphan and the widow: and the ways of sinners he will destroy.
Please note that was "the WAYS of the sinners", and not the sinners themselves. But that's a previous sermon.
Now, let us listen to some of the 42 Confessions that a deceased Egyptian would have made to Anubis, when her heart was weighed against the feather of Ma'at, who was both a godddess and a concept of balance, law, order, and truth:
I have not blasphemed.
I have not stolen,
I have not committed adultery.
I have done no evil.
I have not attacked any man.
Sound familiar? Taken literally, the "I have not eaten the heart" confession sounds rather cannibalistic. Yet the scholar E. Wallis-Budge took this to mean "I have not grieved uselessly."
The last example is one of the more famous instances of possible influence is the "Hymn to Aten", by Pharoah Akhenaten (a tyrannical monotheist), on Psalm 104. Akhenaten might have been one hundred years or more before the Exodus. Here is just a portion of the Hymn:
How manifold are all thy works!
You did create the earth according to your desire
Men, all cattle, all that are upon the earth.
And here is Psalm 104:
O Lord, how manifold are your works!
In wisdom you have made them all.
The earth is full of your creatures.
And the last comparison. From "Hymn to Aten":
All trees and plants flourish.
The birds flutter in their marshes.
All sheep dance upon their feet.
And Psalm 104:
The trees of the Lord are full of sap
Wherein the birds makes their nests.
The high hills are a refuge for wild goats.
As modern, liberal, and thinking Christians, we should be able to acknowledge that there must be positive, inter-relational, and influential thought in the realm of religion. Let us not fall into the trap of xenophobic hubris in which has been said that any pre-Christian thought that resembles Christian thought is either "anticipatory plagiarism" or, simply and insidiously, a "trick of the Devil". Truth is truth. Listen to the words of Islamic philosopher al-Kindi from the first half of the ninth century CE:
We should not be ashamed to acknowledge truth from whatever source it comes to us, even if it is brought to us by former generations and foreign peoples. For him who seeks the truth there is nothing of higher value than the truth itself.
Or this, from the thirteenth century Franciscan friar and scientist Roger Bacon:
It is our business to carry on and perfect the work of our predecessors. We should not regard as valueless studies which have at first sight no immediate relation to theology: all truth of whatever kind leads ultimately to God.
It would indeed be hubris, as well as insincere, to dissect the systematic differences in theology between our sisters, brothers, and cousins in the Abrahamic faiths of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. We are not going to do that. Instead, we will just concentrate of the image of our spiritual leader, Jesus, within the body on non-Quranic writings. And there are plenty.
Tarif Khalidi has collected these into a book called The Muslim Jesus. He has stated that he does, in fact, refer to this collection as The Muslim Gospel. The date range for his collection is from approximately 700 to 1700 AD and there are 303 collected statements. As far as to an influence, Mr. Khalidi soberly and plainly wrote:
The overwhelming Christian presence in central Islamic regions such as Syria, Iraq, and Egypt in the first three centuries of Islam meant intimate encounters within a LIVING Christianity suffused with rich and diverse images of Jesus. (29)
Here is a Jesus who is shorn of Christology but who becomes an object of intense reverence, devotion, and love. (45)
Let us begin.
From the al-Zuhd of Ahmad Hanbal (#33): Jesus said, "Place your treasure in heaven, for the heart of man is where his treasure is." From Matthew 6:21: "For where your treasure is, there will be also your heart." This is a verbatim translation of a Gospel saying, but Khalidi said this is interesting because this is an early example of Muslim access either to a Gospel translated into Arabic or to a lectionary.
Again, from the al-Zuhd (#36): Jesus used to say "Charity does not mean doing good to him who does good to you, for this is to return good for good. Charity means that you should do good to him who does you harm." Matthew 5:46: "For, if ye may love those loving you, what reward have ye? Do not also the tax-gatherers the same?" This was a simple recasting of a New Testament passage.
This next one, Khalidi asserts, is perhaps the best known saying of Jesus among modern, educated Muslims (#42). Jesus used to say, "Truly I say to you, to eat wheat bread, to drink pure water, and to sleep upon dunghills with the dogs more than suffices him who wishes to inherit paradise." Khalidi notes that this is an ascetic ideal that is most severe, but you cannot but wonder if there was an influence from the Christian ascetics called the Monastic Desert Fathers.
On the subject of possessions we find two quotes:
(#77) The day Jesus was raised to Heaven, he left behind nothing but a woolen garment, a slingshot, and two sandals.
(#222) Jesus owned nothing but a comb and a cup. He once saw a man combing his beard with his fingers, so Jesus threw away the comb. He saw another drinking from a river with his hands cupped, so Jesus threw away the cup.
Clearly these are simple reflections of the tradition of non-attachment to material goods.
As an explicit example of Sufism influencing the concept of Muslim sayings of Jesus, there is this from the year 900 AD (#136): Jesus said to his disciples, "You will not gain God's bounty until you wear coarse wool with joy, eat barley with joy, and make the ground your bed with joy." The garment of coarse wool was known as a suf and was an early badge or uniform, which explains the word Sufi. There is no Biblical comparison.
One of the newest sayings, from about 1700 AD, is from the Bahir of Mulla Majlisi (#296): Jesus said, "There is no graver disease of the heart than cruelty, and there is nothing more unbearable to the soul than LACK of hunger. These two act as bridles of banishment and abandonment." Khalidi discerns that this is a complex saying with a meaning that is not entirely clear. Jesus appears to be preaching against hardness of heart AND a luxurious lifestyle. Through these two sins, God "reins in" or "bridles" the sinner by banishing him from His presence or else just leaving the sinner to his own sin, "abandoning" him. Yet we have the stories of the Prodigal Son and the Good Shepherd, no rest until everyone, even the last hold-out, is home. Lamentations 3:31: The Lord will not cast off forever.
And how familiar does this ring (#65)? Christ said, "If you desire to devote yourselves entirely to God and to be the light of the children of Adam, forgive those who have done you evil, visit the sick who do not visit you, be kind to those who are unkind to you, and lend to those who do not repay you." Perhaps the Neo-Cons and Bankers should be given a copy of that.
And this short, prescient, quip (#24): It was revealed to Jesus, "A land is cursed if its rulers are young boys."
It was said earlier that truth is truth. Why then a need to write this sermon? Why then your need to endure this sermon? Coexistence. The many sheep of the one shepherd. For we are at the precipice; we are at the crossroads where humanity will or will not live with heterogeneous cultural differences. Witness the fairly-homogeneous fractured American society, now paranoid, embittered, and reactionary. What chance does a multi-religious or multi-cultural society have here, much less among the entire world?
Coexistence. The many sheep of the one shepherd. All the wars waged in the name of God, started by Christians, Jews, or Muslims. All the oppression of the alien, the widow, the orphan, done in the name of God, by Christians, Jews, or Muslims. All of the desecration and destruction of holy sites and texts done in the name of God, by Christians, Jews, or Muslims. But there is the story of Muhammad's entry into Mecca, when he had all idols and images destroyed.....EXCEPT for an image of Mary and her Son, which he covered with his cloak out of reverence.
Coexistence. The many sheep of the one shepherd. Fast forward to France, 1321 AD. The implausible, psychotic, and paranoid delusion is believed that the Muslim King of Granada, Spain, offered the Jews a huge amount of money to destroy Christianity. They sub-contracted the leper population to poison wells, fountains, and rivers in the towns, and when "discovered", led to both of them being persecuted, confined, and executed. No doubt with rendition and water-boarding.
Coexistence. The many sheep of the one shepherd. The Muslim Jesus discussed here today, Khalidi wrote, may very well be a fabrication; but some Westerners believe the very same of the Christian Jesus. Yet Khalidi writes of the IMPERATIVE that Christianity and Islam have with each other:
It is said that no prophet was sent in the interval between Jesus and Muhammad. Jesus yet remains a towering figure in his own right - one who rises above the two religious environments, the one that nurtured him AND the one that adopted him. Amid the current tensions between Christianity and Islam, it is salutary to remind ourselves of an age and tradition when we were open to each other, more aware of and RELIANT upon each other's witness. Jesus inside the Islamic tradition ceases to be an ARGUMENT and becomes a LIVING and MORAL VOICE, DEMANDING to be heard by ALL who seek unity.
Retired Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong denies the Virgin Birth and the literalness of the miracle stories, the literalness of the numeric 12 disciples, and even the literalness of Holy Family. But he will NOT let go of Jesus as an experience of God that DID happen and that can STILL happen in us.....as shepherd, as truth, as the life, as the way.
Finally, from the Kitab Dhamm al-Dunya (#111): Jesus said, "The world existed and I was not, and it shall exist and I shall not be in it. All I have are my days in which I am now living. If I sin in them, I am indeed a sinner."
May this be so with us. Amen, and blessed be.
Readings
Psalm 104:24-35
John 10:11-18
Posted by Sue Mosher at November 25, 2011 03:59 PMPosted to Sermons