A Papal Gaffe of Pontiffic Proportions?
If you’ve been following the news lately you know how Muslims around the world have responded negatively towards remarks in Pope Benedict XVI’s speech at the university of Regensburg. For the sake of a coherent post, I’ll summarize. In the first part of the speech, Benedict quoted the medieval emperor Manuel II Palaiologos, who, in a dialogue with a “learned Persian” said the following:
“Show me just what Mohammad brought that was new and there you will find things only bad and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.”
Now making the assumption that Benedict intended to claim the thoughts and intentions of Palaiologos as his own, Muslims around the world have made death threats, burned the current pope in effigy, and so on (in fairness many of these actions may have been made by extremist groups). The problem is that the quote is taken entirely out of context. The full text of the pope’s speech has hardly anything to do with Islam or Muhammed at all. In fact, it’s a discourse on the proper interworkings of faith and reason. And I must say, it’s quite good. Benedict expounds upon the Greek philosophical roots of reason in Christianity, and the trend towards subjective reinterpreting of the gospel (a stunning indictment of the Emergent movement).
That’s besides the point, however. Benedict quotes the emperor in order to make a point regarding a dichotomy between violence and reason in religion. The rest of the quote mysteriously missing from many news reports follows:
“God is not pleased by blood, and not acting reasonably (“syn logo”) is contrary to God’s nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats…. To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death….” [edits the pope's]
Benedict’s idea here is the same as Palaiologos’: that the god of Islam is one who is absolutely transcendent. For muslims, Allah is true, to be sure, but his truth is beyond the grasp of reason and rational discussion. He may act in accordance with human reason, or he may not, as he wills. Even if he was to demand idolatry, his followers would have to obey. Benedict sees post-modernism staking claim on the other side of the fence, saying that there is no absolute truth. Meanwhile reason hangs in the balance, amidst this sea of irrationality.
The pope then goes on for a while at length on the historical roots of reason in the Christian faith, and the trends up through the Enlightenment to the modern day. I was very impressed with the speech as a whole. I like a pope who understands the philosophical heritage of Christianity and speaks out on the need for a true understanding of the role of both reason and faith in religion. I also liked the fact that the pope didn’t immediately retract his statements when the whole world threw a hissy fity. He merely expressed his sorrow that his comments upset some people. However, after that things started to go awry…
In the news today, there’s a story about how Benedict has given a conciliatory speech, saying that he hopes his comments will give “encouragement toward positive, even self-critical dialogue both among religions and between modern reason and Christian faith.” Of course, that hasn’t been the result. So far the reactions to his speech have been crazed demonstrations, the burning of a church, and a nun’s murder. But are you really surprised?
He also said, “In no way did I wish to make my own the words of the Medieval emperor. I wished to explain that not religion and violence, but religion and reason go together.” I suppose the clarification was in order, given the massive misunderstanding that has led to the same violence that Benedict denounced. Then we get to the interesting part:
“I hope that in several occasions during the visit … my deep respect for great religions, in particular for Muslims — who worship the one God and with whom we are engaged in defending and promoting together social justice, moral values, peace and freedom for all men — has emerged clearly.”
Hmmm… say what? Muslims — who worship the one God? Does the pope intend to say that Christians and Muslims share a god in common? Apparently so. What follows is a statement from the Vatican’s website on the issue:
The position of the Pope concerning Islam is unequivocally that expressed by the conciliar document Nostra Aetate: “The Church regards with esteem also the Muslims. They adore the one God, living and subsisting in Himself; merciful and all-powerful, the Creator of heaven and earth, Who has spoken to men; they take pains to submit wholeheartedly to even His inscrutable decrees, just as Abraham, with whom the faith of Islam takes pleasure in linking itself, submitted to God. Though they do not acknowledge Jesus as God, they revere Him as a prophet. They also honor Mary, His virgin Mother; at times they even call on her with devotion. In addition, they await the day of judgment when God will render their deserts to all those who have been raised up from the dead. Finally, they value the moral life and worship God especially through prayer, almsgiving and fasting”
Now wait a minute. The pope in his speech at Regensburg expressed a clearly perceived disparity between the god of Islam and the god of Christianity:
The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: Not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God’s nature. The editor, Theodore Khoury, observes: For the emperor, as a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, this statement is self-evident. But for Muslim teaching, God is absolutely transcendent. His will is not bound up with any of our categories, even that of rationality. Here Khoury quotes a work of the noted French Islamist R. Arnaldez, who points out that Ibn Hazn went so far as to state that God is not bound even by his own word, and that nothing would oblige him to reveal the truth to us. Were it God’s will, we would even have to practice idolatry.
As far as understanding of God and thus the concrete practice of religion is concerned, we find ourselves faced with a dilemma which nowadays challenges us directly. Is the conviction that acting unreasonably contradicts God’s nature merely a Greek idea, or is it always and intrinsically true?
How does Benedict go from saying that the claims of the two religio-philosophical claims presents us with a dilemma, to saying that we share the same God? The “one God” cannot be transcendant to the point of violating logical laws and at the same time not contradict a nature that necessitates he act “reasonably.” Furthermore, how does a well-respected theologian who was taken great pains to defend objective truth against post-modernism make a claim of religious pluralism that finds its taproot in post-modernism itself? Something must give.
I will agree with the Vatican that Islam and Christianity share certain traditions together, but that’s where the similarities stop. The natures of Allah and God are irreconcilable. Surely it is obvious to all that the indivisible singularity of Allah clashes with the triune nature of the Christian deity? What about Muhammed’s claim that the New Testament documents were corrupted in transmission? How does that square with any Christian tradition? To me, that is an unforgivable blunder, also unsupportable, and demonstrates that Islam is indeed a Christian cult, borne out of its traditions but violating a necessary orthodoxy.
It’s too bad Benedict has bowed to the pressure. I was really starting to like him.
A very informative and well-written critique. Thanks, Brian.