Twenty-eighth in a series
There is more one could say about societal implications from idea differences, but I think the point has been made in the most recent posts that significant differences exist. That is enough for now. Today, we again shift to another area in our discussion. This post begins looking at inconsistencies within Islam itself. Just like the previous material, we won’t cover everything. Just enough to make the point. This material comes from A War for God.[1], with much of it originally cited from Answering Islam.[2]
Islamic Monotheism
Islamic monotheism differs in some significant respects from Christianity’s view.[3] Its blend of monotheism asserts;
Allah has no Being; he is only absolute will.
As Allah has no Being, he has no essence (or nature).
As Allah has no essence, he has no essential attributes, nor can we know Him.
As Allah has no essential attributes any attempts to depict Him are blasphemy.
The above view about Allah raises a number of inconsistencies of a theological, metaphysical, moral, and logical nature. While this material is not an exhaustive list of inconsistencies, it does address the most serious of them concerning the nature of God and man, and the relationship (if any) between them.
As mentioned at this series beginning, Islam incorporated religious ideas from many cultures. These included heretical Christian ideas, such as nominalism, agnosticism, and determinism.
Nominalism
The above view of Islamic monotheism is a nominalist view, leaving no room for plurality. Nominalism is a doctrine that universals (abstract concepts) exist only as names without a basis in reality. This is also the doctrine underlying Critical Theory, derived from Greek philosopher writings.[4],[5] We outline some inconsistencies below.
Theological
Islamic monotheism is inconsistent with its own view of the Qur’an.
The Qur’an is the uncreated and perfect expression of the mind of Allah. It is a part of Allah but separate from Allah. Allah’s speech is an eternal attribute; it is uncreated. If His speech is an eternal attribute and not identical to Allah, then there must be plurality within Allah.
According to the Muslim scholar Yusuf Ibish, “It (Qur’an) is not a book in the ordinary sense, nor is it comparable to the Bible, neither the Old or New Testament. It is an expression of Divine Will. If you want to compare it with anything in Christianity, you must compare it with Christ himself.”[6] But within Christianity, this is an argument for the plurality of God’s nature.
Logical
Islam is inconsistent in its arguments for the unity of Allah and against the plurality of God.
The same argument Islam uses to affirm oneness within Allah, it denies in affirming God’s oneness within Christianity.
Muslims also misunderstand Christ’s relationship with God. Phrases such as “only begotten,” “Son of God,” and “Son of Man” imply a physical aspect inconsistent with scripture. It takes a spiritual matter and relegates it to the physical plane. Instead, these terms refer to a special relationship between Christ and God the Father. There is a priority in rank implied, with Christ, God’s Word, proceeding eternally from God the Father and submitting to His will.[7]
Absolute Will Inconsistencies
Allah is absolute will and is not essentially just or loving. Instead his will is merciful (nominalism again). He could just as easily not to be merciful. There are at least two problems with this position.
Metaphysical
Orthodox Islam claims that Allah is a necessary Being. He cannot not exist among other things as He is responsible for all creation. If He is necessary, then it is His nature to exist. He must have a nature or else He could not be by nature a necessary kind of Being. Orthodox Islam also believes that there are other attributes of Allah, such as self-existence, eternality, and uncreatedness. We define essence as essential attributes or characteristics of being.
If these attributes are true, then Allah must have essence or else they would not be essential attributes. If Allah has essential attributes, then He cannot be just absolute will—He must have Being.
Moral
If Allah is only will, without any real essence, then He does not do things because they are right—they are right only because He does them.
S25.51: “If We willed, We could raise up a warner in very village.”
This is a serious moral problem as right and wrong become arbitrary. This leads Muslim scholars into great difficulty around concepts such as predestination, which the Qur’an both supports and rejects. Within Christianity, God is the source of not only existence, but also morality and knowledge. See the Atonement section below.
Agnosticism
If Allah has no essence, then the Islamic view of Allah is a form of agnosticism. Agnosticism is the doctrine that God is unknown and unknowable. At the core of Islam is the notion man cannot know Allah; he must simply obey Him. One is not to meditate on his essence but instead to submit to His will. Allah cannot be known by man. He is extrinsic and has no personal relationship, even with those who worship Him.
Fadlou Shehadi, commenting on the Muslim scholar Al-Ghazali says, “If God is a unique kind of being unlike any other being in any respect, more specifically, unlike anything known to man, it would have to follow by Ghazali’s own principles that God is utterly unknowable. For, according to Ghazali, things are known by their likeness, and what is utterly unlike what is known to man cannot be known.”[8] Within Christianity, man has some (not full) knowledge of God through; His creation, man’s nature, and God’s revelations. Islam’s view presents several inconsistencies, including those noted below.
Moral
Allah is not essentially good but only called good because He does good. Islam names Allah by His actions, even though they are not part of Allah’s nature. If all actions come from Allah, then why is He not also called evil since He must also be the source of evil? Or faithless since He must also be the source of disbelief?
If Islam says there is something in Allah that is the basis for calling Him good, then it has admitted Allah’s names do tell us something about His essence. This again refutes the nominalist view of who Allah is.
Philosophical
The Neoplatonic thought expressed by Plotinus teaches (1) the One is absolutely and indivisibly one, and (2) man cannot know the One except by a mystical experience relying on Intellect. This implies that there is no similarity between the One and what flows from it because the One is beyond Being. Thomas Aquinas countered this argument in his writings. Effects must resemble their cause since “you cannot give what you have not got.” You cannot produce what you do not possess.
From Thomas’ argument, if Allah produces good, then He must be Good. If He produces Being, then He must have Being. If this is so, then Allah is intrinsic and the Islamic view of Allah based upon neoplatonic thought cannot be true. Objections to this idea usually confuse Aristotle’s ideas of material or instrumental causes with efficient causes.[9] A definition of each of these follows:
- Efficient cause: That by which something comes to be, as an artist’s mind is the efficient cause of a painting.
- Instrumental cause: That through which something comes to be, such as a brush that an artist uses to create a painting.
- Material cause: That out of which something is made. An example of this is hot water that causes an egg to harden, but a candle to soften. These reactions are due to the material condition of the egg and candle, while the hot water is the same in both instances.
Religious
Religious experience within a monotheistic context by definition involves the relation between two persons: the worshiper and God. How can someone worship something about which they can know nothing? According to Ludwig Feuerbach, “Only when a man loses his taste for religion does the existence of God become one without qualities, an unknowable God.”[10]
Some have deified Muhammad, as it is only through him that one can even hope to approach Allah. Muhammad is at times praised, such as, “If Muhammad had not been, then Allah himself would not have existed.”[11] Muhammad himself taught against such views. This position undercuts Islam’s theological view of Allah. Not only can you not make depictions of Allah, one cannot make depictions of Muhammad either—in his own words a mere man.
Need for Atonement by Man
Islam cannot square up the need for atonement for sin with Justice.
God is infinite, but we are finite. We cannot harm God. The most we can do is to rebel against His sovereignty by breaking his laws, to sin. Committing sin requires punishment, or God is not just. Atonement for sin requires blood. From Leviticus 17:11, “For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you on the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood by reason of the life that makes atonement.” Hebrews 9:22 reiterates this same idea.
It is only as believers in Christ that we have atonement for our sins, and justice has been meted out. Christ’s infinite payment atoned for the infinite weight of our sins. In Islam it is simply enough that your good deeds outweigh the bad. In addition, Allah can forgive whom he chooses to forgive. This is arbitrary and not justice.
Determinism
The relationship between Allah and his creation is master and slave. Allah is absolutely sovereign. Orthodox Islam teaches the predestination of one’s fate. This doctrine is a form of determinism.
Logical
Allah is not logical as He performs contradictory actions. Islamic scholars will point out that these contradictions are not in Allah’s nature, but instead in His will. Others create a distinction between what Allah does and what He allows His creatures to do by their free choice. This later position is not supported by orthodox Islam as it holds to predestination.
There are two problems with this position. First, for the above to be true, Allah must have a necessary essence or being. Second, the actions which flow from nature represent their source.
Moral
“Say: Nothing befalls us save that which Allah has decreed for us” (59.51). Allah could have saved everyone if He so chose, but He did not desire to do so! How can humans therefore be responsible for their own actions.
Theological
Allah is not only the source of good, but of evil. The Prophet said, “Adam and Moses argued with each other. Moses said to Adam, ‘O Adam! You are our father who disappointed us and turned us out of Paradise.’ Then Adam said to him, ‘O Moses! Allah favoured you with His talk (talked to you directly) and He wrote (the Torah) for you with His own Hand. Do you blame me for action which Allah had written in my fate forty years before my creation?’ So Adam confuted Moses, Adam confuted Moses, the Prophet added, repeating the statement three times” (Al-Bukhari hadith).
Al-Ghazali states, “He (Allah) willeth also the unbelief of the unbeliever and the irreligion of the wicked and, without that will, there would neither be unbelief nor irreligion.” Further, “that we have no right to enquire about what Allah wills or does. He is perfectly free to will and to do what He pleases.”[12]
Metaphysical
The ultimate conclusion is that there is only one agent within the universe: Allah, as He is the only one who can cause any action.
Aquinas wrote against this view in his Summa contra Gentiles to counter the Islamic teachings in Spain and the Latin Averroism developing in the Middle Ages. One Islamic creed states, “Allah Most High is the Creator of all actions of His creatures whether of unbelief or belief, of obedience or of rebellion: all of them are by the Will of Allah and His sentence and His conclusion and His decreeing.”[13] The ultimate conclusion is that Islamic confessions of faith rise from “No God but God” and beyond “No one acts but God” to “No one has being but God.“[14]
Footnotes:
[1] Wolf, Dan, A War for God, Living Rightly Publications, 2017.
[2] Geisler, Norman L. and Saleeb, Abdul, Answering Islam, Baker Books, 2002.
[3] For more on that discussion, see Wolf, Dan, pp. 112-132, A War for God, Living Rightly Publications, 2017.
[4] See series beginning with, Wolf, Dan, Critical Theory Idolatry, Virginia Christian Alliance, https://vachristian.org/critical-theory-idolatry/ , Sept. 24, 2020.
[5] Wolf, Dan, pp. 128-140, The Light & The Rod: Why Biblical Governance Works, Living Rightly Publications, 2020.
[6] Geisler, Norman L. and Saleeb, Abdul, p. 139, Answering Islam, Baker Books, 2002.
[7] Wolf, Dan, pp. 50-59, The Light & The Rod: Why Biblical Governance Works, Living Rightly Publications, 2020.
[8] Geisler, Norman L. and Saleeb, Abdul, p. 142, Answering Islam, Baker Books, 2002.
[9] Wolf, Dan, pp. 50-59, The Light & The Rod: Why Biblical Governance Works, Living Rightly Publications, 2020.
[10] Geisler, Norman L. and Saleeb, Abdul, p. 145, Answering Islam, Baker Books, 2002.
[11] Ibid.
[12] Ibid, p. 148.
[13] Ibid, p. 149.
[14] Ibid, p. 150.
