ovde - vera znanje mir

efer to it as “obedience to God”, not “love”. But here they have termed it so, to align themselves
to the Christian vocabulary. Which is a lovely thought but also a little dangerous as it risks falling
into the trap of “settling”. Usually Muslims speak of the adoration of God; but the theme of Love
for God is another discourse, which is not excluded from Islam, but found abundantly in the world
of Sufism.
Either way in this letter, speaking of “love of God” is a novelty. Perhaps it is even an able way of
referring to Pope Benedict’s first encyclical (Deus caritas est). It certainly shows a desire to draw
near to the Christian way of speaking, even if at the same time there is the risk of taking two
meanings from the same word.
Other questions of Vocabulary
In this context, the Arab version of the letter uses different terminologies compared to the French,
Italian, or English versions. We have already noted that where the Arabic speaks of the Gospel the
western languages speak of the Bible. I will give other examples.
For example: speaking of Christ, in the western versions “Jesus Christ” is always cited. In the
Arab version’s: “Issa- al-Massih”. This expression cannot be found in the Koran, but is the
combined result of how the Muslims call Jesus (Issa) – Arab Christians call him “Jasua” – and the
Christian definition of “al-Massih”, Christ, which is found in the Koran. The expression in the
Koran is “Al-Massih Issa Ibn Mariam” (the Messiah Issa son of Mary), while the usual Christian
expression “Jasua’ al-Massih” (Jesus Christ). The text of the letter is littered with expressions
from the Koran intermingled with Christian expressions.
When they quote from the Koran and the Bible, they use two different measures. Quoting from the
Koran they say “God said”, as does every good Muslim. When the quote versus from the bible,
they only say “as it is found in the New Testament”, “as it is read in the Gospel”, etc… Which
means that they use, in terms of the Bible, a more scholarly studious approach, while for the Koran
they use the terminology of a believer in Islam.
But in the end the structure is truly beautiful: from here on in we may say that Christianity,
Judaism and Islam have love of God and of ones neighbour as the heart of their faith. This is the
real novelty which has never before been said by the Islamic world.
Use of the Bible
In quotations from the New and Old Testament, they take for granted that the Bible is the word of
God. This too is a relative novelty. In the Koran this idea is theoretically affirmed, but it is rejected
in practice. Very often Muslims consider the Bible as a product (muharrafah or mubaddalah)
manipulated by later additions to the original nucleus.
The 138 (in note 4) even go as far as to quote St Paul regarding the idea of the “heart”. St Paul is
in general totally rejected by the vast majority of Muslims, he is even considered as a traitor of
Jesus Christ’s message, which according to them was originally an “Islamic message”. Often
Muslims claim that Christ’s message was like that of the Koran, but that Paul introduced the
Trinity, Redemption through the Cross, and the rejection of Moses’ law. A famous anti-Christian
book, published in 2000 and banned in Lebanon, is entitled “Unmasking Paul”!
All of these little signs show a real desire for dialogue at the level of language and biblical
testimonies. There are even some allusions to Hebraism, in order to integrate it in this vision.
Using for example the term “people of the scriptures”, it is clear that this refers to the Jews, even if
the discourse is officially addressed to Christians.
III. Positive appreciation and a critical reading
Let us now try to see other positive aspects of this document, while at the same time pointing out
its gaps and elements which provoke the need for deeper reflections. In short, I would like to make
a critical reading of the Letter.
The search for a common basis… but not a universal one
On coming to the content of the letter my impression is that by staying at this level it is quite easy
to reach agreement. The method being used is to choose excerpts from sacred texts that can be