We have been studying Proverbs, and much the same advise is given there. Such is wisdom.
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I wouldn’t have any idea but I like the sentiment it expresses. Who speaks for all Christians for that matter? I’ve learned to be grateful for what few bright lights may emerge in any faith tradition.
Of course you wouldn’t, and I don’t expect you to care enough to research the matter for yourself. So what’s new?
Yeah I guess I’m just lazy like that but at least I’m not cantankerous and snide.
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Interestingly there is strong evidence that the best poetry in the Quran was lifted straight from fourth and fifth century Christian hymns and prayers that were originally in Aramaic/Syriac.
There’s also strong evidence that Mecca didn’t even exist until the eighth century – and that “Muhammed” was originally a title for Christ; it means “the beautiful one”.
This makes sense of the seventh and eighth century Christian writers who called Islam a Christian heresy.
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Okay, now I’m laughing. Are we back to the idiocy of claiming Moses came from India?
Solomon was an elf?!? 
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You might have noticed that my comment was based on the fact that Karen Armstrong was talking about the tendency of Islam to “look back,” as is the habit of many pre-modern religions, including Judaism, and that the Enlightenment grew from a tendency to “look forward,” which many people argue is a trait of Christianity’s speculative theology that the Enlightenment appropriated. However, the Enlightenment eventually caused its scepticism to include Christianity, possibly because of its reference to OT scriptures. Islam saw Christianity’s “speculative theology” as opposed to Islamic thinking and its role as a “book religion,” which is seen as desecrating the sacred.
Ibn al-Arabi’s quote was one of the three things that Karen Armstrong said she wanted Muslims to know she thought about Islam. It was not connected to what I mentioned about her book – indeed, I said that I didn’t find the quote in the book. I even listed the dates in which he lived, probably not clearly enough, to show that it was a view that was older.
Lastly, the exclusivity of Christianity in its duplicitous relationship with the sacred is shown by the fact that Christianity spread through the world on the back of conquests and colonialism of various nations. In doing this, many indigenous peoples have observed how their sacred sites, objects, and teachings were deemed as devilish and attempts were made to wipe them out before actually understanding them. Even scriptures like the Tao te Ching were interpreted and translated by Missionaries into a Christian understanding, and the polytheism of Hinduism was criticised from the perspective of the OT.
Perhaps before launching an attack, you should graciously try to understand what was said, which is curiously what I read as the point of the text that Armstrong quoted: “Everyone praises what he believes; his god is his own creature, and in praising it he praises himself. Consequently, he blames the disbelief of others, which he would not do if he were just, but his dislike is based on ignorance.”
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That’s a quote from an ancient author; I don’t know the name but I recall it from a Greek readings course.
I disagreed with it then and still do. It’s a very cynical view of human beings that in my experience I have found false in the case of a few people now and then.
It is a quote from Ibn al-Arabi in The Spiral Staircase by Karen Armstrong, a spiritual memoir from 2004, about when she left a Catholic convent to the present when she still thinks about God and spirituality. In it, there is a transcription of an interview that she did, quite possibly the one that was in the video Interview so it might be just circling to some degree.
It may be that Ibn al-Arabi thought that people are motivated purely by self-interest, and he was distrustful of the way sincerity or integrity is often displayed, but if Karen is quoting him, then because it resonates with her experience. It also resonates with me from the time I presented myself as a sincere and integer Christian when I started at the nursing seminary and got a lot of attention from younger women in my class. I had to question myself and my faith, whether I was the person I presented myself to be.
It led to me experiencing people in my parish in the light of that encounter and asking myself what was motivating us to go to Bible lessons or preach and how much “our god is our own creature.” I already realised that I and others were hearing what we wanted to hear on many occasions, which became obvious when I was told by listeners what they found important in what I had said. It was also when confronted with some OT texts that I noticed how we avoided “difficult” parts and how some of the younger women sang themselves into a trance-like condition but had difficulty with the bible.
You could say that I had become cynical, or that I had become wise because I was sceptical of appearances – including my own. For example, some people I was working with were critical of the church but were so loving towards the sick and dying that it made me doubt my idea that faith made us more loving people.
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I somehow doubt that it was original, given that it was first written something like two millennia ago.
Not quite, Ibn al-Arabi lived from1165–1240.
From “The Need to be Whole: Patriotism and the History of Prejudice” by Wendell Berry
John Lukacs wrote in 1992 that “fifty years [after Hitler’s National Socialism] nationalism still remains the most potent political force in the world.” He followed Bernanos (and George Orwell) in distinguishing between nationalism and patriotism:
When Hitler . . . in Mein Kampf, said that “I was a nationalist, but I was not a patriot,” he knew exactly what he meant, and so ought we. Patriotism . . . is defensive, while nationalism is aggressive; patriotism is rooted to the land, to a particular country, while nationalism is connected to the myth of a people, indeed to a majority; patriotism is traditionalist, nationalism is populist. Patriotism is not a substitute for a religious faith, whereas nationalism often is; it may fill the emotional—at least superficially spiritual—needs of people. It may be combined with hatred. . . . “The ardent nationalist,” said Duff Cooper, “is always the first to denounce his fellow countrymen as traitors.”
Berry, Wendell. The Need to Be Whole: Patriotism and the History of Prejudice (pp. 425-426). Shoemaker + Company. Kindle Edition.
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Great quote! Nice to know this was a Dale contribution somewhere along the way.
That’s irrelevant because he wasn’t the fist to say it, unless you think he had a time machine and traveled back and said it in ancient Greek or Latin (I don’t recall which).
From another source I read that Armstrong described him as a mystic, which is also an indication that he was not bound by the orthodoxy of the day, and that he was more open to what other traditions say. It has always been the mystics that have shown that the commonailities between traditions was in their practice, despite great differences in their teaching, which still remains true today. Therefore, his openness towards traditions that, as you say, are older may be reflected in this.
As you probably gather, I consider mysticism as the only true way to reflect on the sacred Unity that we call God, and all fundamentalism goes against the grain.
All mysticism that is not grounded in objective text/truth is just navel-gazing, and the most it ever discovers is lint.
A true male view of the sacred Unity, and the reason why religion has become the point of contention throughout history.
- I think you’ve just been “chauvinized” by a Mystic.
LOL
That’s hilarious given that the point I made was hammered home by the student association attorney when I was a university student – a female lawyer known among the local legal community as “The Bitch”.
The problem with the male-dominated Christian faith is that female symbolism is often not understood. The importance of conceiving and giving birth in faith is hinted at repeatedly throughout the narratives, and Sara laughs at first because she knows that nothing short of a miracle can get her pregnant. Mary also asks, “How can this be?” These are important milestones, and sensitive songwriters have sung that if the child was born only in the stable and not in our hearts, who benefits? The receptivity in the conception, the initial passivity of the female role in bearing life, is an aspect that men are often opposed to, although it is an important aspect of the Christian faith.
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