Letters
"Is there any doubt that the God of Adam, Noah, Abraham, and Moses is indeed the God of the Muslim, the Jew, and the Christian?"
posted 4/01/2002 12:00AM
Knowing Godhead
Timothy George attempts to answer the question "Is the God of Muhammad the Father of Jesus?" [Feb. 4] by arguing that the doctrine of the Trinity sets us apart from Islam. Therefore, he argues, the answer to the question must be (in part) no.
Using this logic, one would also conclude that the God of the Jews is not the Father of Jesus. Moses certainly wouldn't have affirmed the Trinity! Does that mean the God of Moses was not the Father of Jesus?
George may be correct in his conclusion. But I'm very uncomfortable with the path that he takes to get there.
James Rigney
Picayune, Mississippi
I am a trinitarian and a Christian, but I remain confused after reading Timothy George's article. Is there any doubt that the God of Adam, Noah, Abraham, and Moses is indeed the God of the Muslim, the Jew, and the Christian?
Jew, Muslim, and Christian all worship and serve a common God, but from the Christian perspective, the Islamic and Jewish belief systems contain error and/or are incomplete.
Glenn A. Hartquist
Kirkland, Washington
'Is the God of Muhammad the Father of Jesus?" The answer is no, for unlike the "God of Muhammad," the Father of Jesus is a triune God.
Muslims deny this doctrine, seeing it as polytheistic. The doctrine is not polytheistic but teaches that the one God has existed eternally in three Persons. The confusion centers on the word Person, which really means role. In ancient times, the Latin word persona meant a mask which an actor wore as he played a part or role. Thus it was possible for an actor to play several roles in the course of a play.
This is the idea behind the doctrine of the Trinity: one God who has appeared on the stage of history in three roles. Just as steam, water, and ice are all one, namely H20; and just as coal, graphite, and diamond are all one, namely, carbon, even so are the three Persons who make up the one true God.
The Rev. John S. Jennings
Archdale, North Carolina
Timothy George's article was informative and wonderfully written. I cannot agree, however, that Allah is the same God as the Father of Jesus.
When Muhammad was born, Arabs worshiped about 360 gods. Allah was the name for the moon god. Muhammad's family had a particular devotion to Allah, the moon god.
In fact, Muhammad's father was named after Allah. Allah is not just another name for God the Father but is the name of the moon god worshiped before the founding of Islam.
That is the reason the crescent moon is part of the symbol of Islam.
Jerry L. Fretz
Seattle, Washington
Timothy George responds:
It is true that Muhammad was the son of a man named Abdullah, which means "the servant of Allah." It is also true that there is inscriptional evidence linking the name Allah with an astral deity whose symbol was the crescent moon. It does not follow from this, however, that Muslims think of the moon god when they say, "There is no God but Allah." Muhammad broke with the pagan polytheism of his day to acknowledge the one sovereign creator God. Arabic-speaking Christians prayed to Allah (the Arabic name for God) long before Muhammad was born.
Christians have always thought it appropriate, and indeed necessary, to read the Hebrew Scriptures in the light of Jesus Christ. The Old Testament not only predicts the Incarnation but also foreshadows the doctrine of the Holy Trinity.
When applied to the Trinity, the word Person means infinitely more, but surely not less, than fully relational and truly mutual in the deepest sense. The unwitting heresy of modalism that reduces God to a "role" in a play misses entirely the communitarian character at the heart of God. As a Puritan divine once put it, "God is within himself a sweet society."
April 1 2002, Vol. 46, No. 4
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