HOW ARE MUSLIMS FITTING INTO THE U.K.?
In view of the thwarted terrorist plot coming from the United Kingdom this week, I thought you might find it helpful to be connected to some sources on the way Muslims are becoming integrated (or failing to become integrated) into British life. Understand that there was no immediate confirmation of the religion or ethnicity of those arrested or of their motives. But officials did suggest they had ties of some kind of Pakistan, a predominantly Islamic nation, and others suggested the plot had the hallmarks of al-Qaida, which, of course, has misused Islam as a cover. Click here for an opinion piece suggesting British Muslims are not radicals or separatists. Before the Thursday news about the airline plot, a police official called for an investigation into the radicalization of British Muslims. British Muslims were reported feeling very edgy after news broke Thursday about the plot. Some Muslim leaders in Britain were reported to be shocked at the scale of the terrorism said to have been planned and grateful that police stopped it. For a dated (with recent comments), but quite thorough, background report, click here for the Guardian's 2002 series on Muslims in Britain. And for an online British Muslim newspaper, click here. Finally, click here for the Web site of the Muslim Council of Britain. By the way, an American Muslim group has expressed dismay at language President Bush used to describe those arrested in Britain.
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WE READ SCRIPTURE, SCRIPTURE READS US
It happens among commenters on this blog just as it happens in many other places -- differences of opinion rooted in the different ways we read holy writ.
The fancy name for describing the ways in which one reads and studies scripture -- the -ology, or science, of it, if you will -- is hermeneutics. One can read scripture as a complete literalist, at one end of the scale, or read it as if it were merely literature, at the other end. In between are all kinds of shades.
The question of authority is one that must be considered with all of this, too. Am I reading something that is binding on me in all ways or, rather, something that was written to guide people thousands of years ago but must be placed in today's context to have any real meaning?
These questions are pretty much in play no matter whether one is reading the Bible, the Qur'an or any other sacred texts, though, of course, there are differences. For instance, Muslims believe the Qur'an was dictated to the Prophet Muhammad and that an exact copy exists in heaven. So there would seem to be less room for interpretive techniques in Islam. Nonetheless, there are different schools of thought about the Qur'an within Islam and they wind up with different approaches to understanding the book.
I think it's vital that people who make arguments from scripture about any subject be clear in their own mind how they read and understand scripture and be clear in explaining that to others. Arguments between extreme literalists and extreme literaturists (I just made that word up) tend to be like ships passing far apart in a very dark night.
I am a Christian but would not describe myself as a literalist when it comes to reading scripture. Rather, I affirm the vow I took when I became first a deacon and later an elder in my church: "Do you accept the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be, by the Holy Spirit, the unique and authoritative witness to Jesus Christ in the Church universal, and God's Word to you?" To which I replied, "I do."
I also have found Donald G. Bloesch, a former seminary teacher and author, to be helpful to my understanding in this regard. His book, Essentials of Evangelical Theology, says, in part, this:
"(John) Calvin, too, upheld biblical infallibility and inerrancy without falling into the delusion that this means that everything that the Bible says must be taken at face value. . .
"Many latter day evangelical Christians have felt the need to extend the meaning of inerrancy to cover purely historical and scientific matters, even where the treatment of these in the Bible does not bear upon the message of faith. It is no longer sufficient to declare that Scripture is the infallible standard for faith and practice: it is now regarded as totally inerrant. A view of error is entertained that demands literal, exact, mathematical precisions, something the Bible cannot provide. . .
"Such persons mistakenly believe that this approach insures the canons of orthodoxy whereas in reality it is a suicidal position that rests the case for Christianity on the shifting sands of scientific and historical research. The discovery of one discrepancy in Scripture can then discredit the entire Christian witness."
As for the idea of inerrancy, Bloesch says, it's the message of faith in the Bible that is inerrant, not the precise words: ". . .we must not identify the precision of journalistic reporting with the trustworthiness of the Gospel records."
And he adds this: "The simplest believer who comes to the Bible emptied of his own understanding and truly seeking the will of God for his life will discover what the Bible is really saying more quickly than an exegete trained in the latest biblical scholarship who nevertheless tenaciously clings to his own preconceptions."
I also have learned from a book called Faith Seeking Understanding: An Introduction to Christian Theology, by Daniel L. Migliore, who writes this: ". . .a church with an infallible teaching office or an infallible Bible no longer allows Scripture to work as liberating word in its own way."
And this: "Christians do not believe in the Bible; they believe in the living God attested by the Bible. . . The Bible is the Word of God only in a derivative sense. The living Word of God is Jesus Christ, and it is with him that we are brought into relationship by the witness of Scripture."
And this: ". . .the Bible is faithfully interpreted when it is read as a source of freedom in Christ to overcome every bondage, including the use of the Bible itself as a weapon of oppression."
And my, oh, my, how often I've seen the Bible used that way.
To read my latest Kansas City Star work, click here.
A good example is found in the September issue of The Atlantic Monthly, which has a piece by Hanna Rosin about former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani (pictured here).
