Dr Greg Bahnsen - Islam, Judaism and Christianity: Dialogue (Part 4)

No.

Dr. Landis, I have a question for Dr. Monson. Now, last night, this question will deal with the issue of the Christian view of the holiness of God that I roughly posed to Rabbi Landis. And let me preface it this way, though. Last night Dr. Siddiqui delicately referred to Christian doctrines of the incarnation and so on as a rather elaborate mechanism. And I think he applied an unnecessary elaborate mechanism to deal with bridging gaps, a gap between God and man.

So I would like you to address.

The same question I posed to Rabbi Landis mainly. What is the Christian view of the holiness of God and how do you talk about it? What does it mean, what stories, metaphors you use to express it? And what is the concept of faith or practice which is seen to bridge. I suspect that we're going to get to the mechanism that Dr. Siddiqui was referring to.

Right. Well, to answer the question, I think we should go to the Torah because as I said last night in my major presentation, we at least formally agree with each other, the three participants in this dialogue, that this is God's self revelation. And in the Torah, as I interpret it. I will have to depart a bit from Rabbi Landis a bit here. As I see the Torah's teaching, we are not to aim to achieve holiness or transcendence with God by simply obeying his commandments, the prohibitions just say no, or to say yes to a righteous cause, and so forth. Because from the standpoint of the Old Testament law, the law is given to show us the holiness of God. It is a transcription of the holiness of God, and as such, an indictment of us for falling short of what God is. The law was not given, the revelation of the law was not given so that men might simply get up the next day and try harder to obey it and achieve a right standing with God. As I said last evening, Isaiah, the good Jewish prophet, Isaiah, chapter 64 of his prophecy, calls all of our righteousness, that is our best efforts before God, nothing but filthy rags, literally menstruous cloth. It is utterly unclean in the sight of God. Now, at first I think our egalitarian spirit would say, oh, it can't be that bad. But isn't that the point of divine revelation, to kind of shock us into seeing that our ways of evaluating things may be far short of what God requires? That verse tells me something about the great distance between me and God. His holiness is such that even my righteousness cannot span the gap. My best efforts are going to fall short of doing that. And I fool myself according to the teaching of God's word. If I think that I really lead a good life before him, and I've understood the law, have made some kind of noble effort to keep it. Jeremiah the prophet in Jeremiah 17:9 says that the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it. Now, these are not flattering to human nature to call your best efforts menstruous cloth and your heart desperately wicked, so deceitful that you can't know it. Now, this is God's divine revelation about our human condition. We read in the book of Deuteronomy, chapter 25:16, those who violate the law are an abomination in God's eyes. There is nothing to suggest in reading the Torah or the prophets or the Psalms that God expects us by our own moral rearmament to be made right with him. The distance is too great. Our sin is too great. Now, to make that clear, we have to have to understand that sin is not as it's flamboyantly portrayed by many people. It's just the more dramatic and heinous things of murder or adultery or what have you. God finds it sinful in the extreme. When I'm unfair to someone, when I gossip about someone, when I have immoral thoughts about someone, God's holiness is such as Habakkuk said, that his eyes cannot look upon any unclean thing. So we have to begin with the biblical presentation of the distance of God from man as being an extreme moral distance or gap. The gulf there cannot be spanned by my good efforts. And you see this very vividly portrayed in the Torah's teaching about who may approach God at the temple and under what circumstances. The Shekinah glory of God dwells in the holiest place, the holy of holies, into the place this reveals. Only once a year may one man alone enter in that the high priest. You see, God here has the veil of the temple as an outward symbol that you cannot approach him. And now when the high priest comes, and Yom Kippur, he comes only with the blood of atonement. He cannot come in with his good efforts. He cannot come in saying, I'm trying to achieve holiness by getting up and doing better. Today he comes in. And the Jews realized that if he did not follow very exactly the approach that God revealed, he could die in the presence of God. For which reason the Jews would often tie a rope around the ankle of the high priest so they'd have a way of removing the carcass if he died in the presence of God. Now that Tells you something about the Torah's teaching about human sin and approach unto God. No one dare approach unto God without the blood of atonement. Therefore Yom Kippur. The sin must be covered, it must be blotted out. And consequently from the Christian perspective, we do not think the law is given as a kind of outline of morality for all men to find their way back to God. The law is given to show us who God is and therefore how far short we fall of his glory. The only way in which we can approach God is by having a sacrifice of one atonement to approach him through the mediation of the Messiah. We believe Paul tells us in his writings to Timothy that there is but one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. Jesus came into this world. The Christ came into this world in the person of Jesus of Nazareth to bridge the gap that we're talking about. He was both God and man according to our theological conviction and as such then can represent us fully as human beings and can also represent the holiness of God. So that's where God and man meet is in the person of the Messiah.

This will be the last of the panel up here and then we will go to some of you below who would use the microphones down there. So get your question ready. My question is why did I get chosen to sit up here? I don't know anything about this stuff. I'm from Hazard, Kentucky which is divided in half. Half Polish coal miners who are Catholic, half German coal miners that were living. So I grew up in a holy war. Every Saturday night all these coal miners would go out and get drunk and beat the hell out of each other. But as long as you took away the booze, we worked together in the mines like the most wonderful team in the world. And that's how I reason. I reason from my own past. The Jews believe that they are the children of God and that is non negotiable. The Christians believe that they that Christ is the son of God and that is non negotiable. And this is true. And the Muslims believe that the Quran is the word of God and that is non negotiable. What is negotiable? So that we can all sit down and reason in peace. And I'm infatuated with the militia. I spent a long time there and I'm not saying I know a lot about it. I spent a long time, a lot of places I don't know anything about. But I want to know since this is my last question is how can we come to an agreement and get a little closer to being first cousins and quit screwing around each person under his own tent. I want to address that to Dr. Bonson because I like him.

Well, you set up the dilemma. I think very well. All three religions hold things which are non negotiable. And just because they are non negotiable, the possibilities for peace and rapprochement are going to be limited to the outer edges of the non negotiable. But now having said that, I think there are some good things too. At least my own personal testimony is I'm encouraged. From what we've done the last couple days, you started out by talking about the way in which we can talk to each other and hopefully be gentlemen and try to offer the reasons for our convictions. Even that's a huge step forward. What we can offer to each other is the understanding that we are all made in the image of God. I think we all teach that and therefore we owe each other dignity and respect. In the Bible verse in the New Testament that most clearly calls Christians to defend their faith, we are told specifically this is to be done with gentleness and respect. That is to say we have to take account of the dignity of the person who is at that point an unbeliever. And if we all believe that, then of course we are not giving up our non negotiables. What we are saying is as we rationally look at these things we consider non negotiable. Let's not turn this into some kind of shouting match or a rah rah session or worse into some kind of war against each other. Now secondly, I think that the way in which we're going to solve our differences is going to be through a patient hearing of the evidence that each other offers. I have not been convinced in the slightest, and this is no insult. I have not been convinced in the slightest BY Anything that Dr. Siddiqui has said yet that the contradictions within the Qur' an or between the Koran and the Bible have been bridged. But I am confident that Dr. Siddiqui understands now that's what my problem is and he's going to try to help me with my problem. I understand some of his what I think are misperceptions, but at least problems he has with Christianity. He listed them very nicely for me last night when we talk to each other this way. And I could multiply the illustrations for Rabbi Landis as well. As long as we are willing to go to this common fount of religious truth in the self revelation of God, and slowly and patiently listen to each other, maybe even have to corner each other and say now I do want an explanation of circumcision in the temple and blood to I do not want simply it written off with, you know, we all have our different interpretations. After all, God would be extremely limited with me if in revealing himself his attempt to tell us the truth now been completely lost because there are all these different interpretations. I really think God's bigger than our attempt to approach the Bible with different perspectives and come up with different answers. But we will never get to oneness on that matter until we understand that the source of our peace is going to be God's revelation. These two men are wonderful men and they're very educated men and I'm fascinated to hear them and share their perspectives. But I have to be very honest with you. When it comes to bridging that gap between humanity and God, their opinions are irrelevant just as mine are. I mean when all said and done I could go out on the street and pick up any number three guys here, three guys, what do you think about God? That's irrelevant. God does not take care of things by way of a democratic vote. He doesn't say, get a number of people together and let's see if we can vote in the truth about who I am and how I relate to you. What kind of God would that be? Moreover, God does not have any obligation to approach man in a cafeteria style. God doesn't have to come and say hello unto me. Judaism looks good to you. Islam was good to you. Christianity, you know, take your pick. You know, if you don't like it, leave that platter behind but take what you want. God has no obligation to do things that way. But if God has revealed himself and made his will clear, then there can be reproach. Ron, if we will all humbly stand before his word and say this is what we must take account of and interpret together. That's the best I can offer right now. Of course as a Christian I believe that the word of the Holy Spirit is going to do a lot to bring people piece but now I'd get the theological.

Okay, thank you very much. Now we thank the panel and we have some people down here that would like to ask some questions. So this gentleman I think has to leave early so maybe he has a short question.

I have a question with me from last night to Dr. Pence, last night you left me at least myself with three notions and let me run them by you and I certainly hope you either take them back or you support them because they are troubling to me. The first notion, which was a.

You.

Know, we imply that Christianity is the religion of love and forgiveness and peace, where Judaism and Islam more or less the religion of violence. If you meant it in a way that Muslims and Jews should have peace.

With each other, I agree with that.

But if indeed you meant to imply that Christianity is the only religion with love or more love in it than Judaism and Christianity, that's wrong. The three religions in theory preach love and peace and so forth, but in practice, which should be really the interpretation of the religion or the output of the religion? When you look at the human history, including the contemporary, you find a lot more violence in the Christian world than in the Muslim or the Jewish world. And I can go and give you overwhelming evidence, including just this last year.

Do you have a question for me?

Yeah, I am.

This is the notion. This, this is the first, the second notion. You mentioned that 99%, you mentioned that number 99% of the Christian books, they agree. The overwhelming scholarly evidence negates that. For instance, the Christian dictionary points out to at least 5,000 variations in the book of Gospel View. In fact, some scholars went as far as saying every sentence has a variation in it. And in that regard aside, put the scholarly definition aside, let's go to the practice. Within the Christian denominations there are fundamental differences. Take for example the issue of drinking. Some Christian denominations say it's illegal, prohibited, as is the case in Christianity in Islam and Judaism. But other Christian determinists say no, it is legal. I personally, for instance, and I'm being very honest here, if I somebody can convince me, Jesus introduced such a substance to be used by people whom he was sent to save and be the first one to reject him. This substance is killing over 80,000 people here in the United States of America alone every year. So that's the second ocean. The second notion is that 99% of the books do not agree. That's the second. The third notion which comes emanating from the second notion, he mentions in a way that the Jews before Christianity and the Muslims after Christianity are deviates, but the one in the middle is the right one. And yet we found so many things common to Christianity, to Judaism before Christianity and Islam after Christianity, it's in common between Judaism and Islam and is also supported by some Christian denominations.

So why, how you can say such.

A statement that they are dividends and you are in the middle, you are the right one.

Okay, let's have a brief answer to the question.

Well, you actually Might as well have no answer because there's no way with if we're going to do justice to any of those things with just saying a sentence or two first. I should have taken notes from the very beginning. That's why I asked you, do you have a question? Because I wasn't sure where you're going with this. As I heard you, forgive me if I've got it wrong, but as I heard you, you did not represent my view of Christianity as a religion of love vis a vis Islam and Judaism correctly. And that may be my fault for miscommunicating. I don't believe that only Christianity teaches love and peace. But, you know, we have to eventually take off, you know, the gloves and deal some hard historical facts. There are many things that embarrass me about the way professed Christians have acted in the past in terms of the way they've treated other people. I was telling Rabbi Landis that last night as we ended. I said, I don't want anyone to think that I endorse just anything, you know, Christians have done. They've done some despicable things. And in that sense, our religion is superior to those who think that's true of the other two as well. But I am troubled by the idea that only the Jews have been persecuted. I don't want to get into a rousing argument over this, but you have to remember we as Christians still smart from the fact that it was the Jews and the Romans together who crucified our Savior. That is not an act of peace and harmony and, and that sort of thing. In the city of Rome, it was the Jews who stirred up opposition to the Christians in the early days and so forth. That doesn't mean that they're worse than we are. It just means that we all have blood upon our clothing. None of us are free of guilt when it comes to this. I have more of a historical as well as a theological problem with my friends who are of Muslims, because I think the history of Muslim advance by means of the sword is something that cannot be denied as a historical fact. But now, then again, they may say, for all I know, Rabbi, excuse me, Dr. Siddiqui may say, just as I have just said those things, but I don't endorse them. I don't think that is the true Islam. I don't think that's the way it should be. And then if we had time, we would have to go further into that. I've been waiting to read some parts of the Quran that certainly seemed to me that you are to hunt down Christians and Jews and that you are allowed to kill them. I may misinterpret that, there's no doubt about it. But I would like an answer to that. So that's what I was bringing up last night. You know, these questions of how do we speak to each other and follow out this approach of peace and rapprochement if we have in our writings an endorsement of something other than that, or what appears be to appears to be. The second thing he brought up was the textual variation. The number of textual variations in the New Testament, to take one example, which are considered substantial, that is to say, make a semantic difference, is 1% are in that range. And I'd be happy to take you to the books on textual criticism. I'd be happy to go through all the variants of Luke's gospel that she'd like. Actual criticism is something that I know, I think a little bit about. And I see when you bring up that there is a difference in this word and third, that does not in itself constitute a substantial difference textually. Because if the sense of the text is not affected by that difference or if the theological variation that's going to arise from that is not going to determine one school of thought or another. It's not considered significant that there are numerous variations beyond the 1% that I talked about. There's no, no doubt about that. But substantial differences that is in the content of the New Testament is about 1%. You understand textual criticism. I would stand behind that claim and I'll give the objective evidence in another form from that. Your third point. Can you real quickly remind me I.

Didn'T do the point is that the Jews and the Muslims are deviates where you in the center is the only right one, even though they agree with.

Each other on many things.

And some Christian denominations agree with both of them as well.

Okay, let's just face a hard fact here. Logically, my training is as a philosopher. That's what he's in. And I love the Lord Jesus Christ with all my heart and so forth. But to the degree that I use my mind, I have been trained to think logically in terms of worldviews and so forth. You've got a real logical problem here in terms of the Jesus of history. Jesus appears, making claims which if they are not true, are just preposterous. That he's going to be the judge of all mankind, that men cannot come to the Father except through him, and so wasn't solid. Now I've come to believe this and it I think disbelieving them is harder than believing them. But if you take the Jesus of history seriously, it's Jesus who claims that exclusive conduit between God and man. And it will do no good for us to say, well, Jesus is a good prophet or a teacher of God's way and so forth. There are just one of many options. Jesus doesn't give us that option. He claims to be all or nothing in that regard. He does not say that therefore the Jews who will not follow him have no truth whatsoever, or that people of other faiths cannot know anything correct about the world or we should live our lives or anything. He does say that when it comes to this question of mediation between God and man, he is the only way. And you know, I would really waste your time, I think, if I came here and I tried to downplay the scandal of that exclusive claim. I know that's not popular in a democratic egalitarian society. But then again, I'm not sure God has to be too concerned to please us in terms of our egalitarian notions. The real issue here has to do with what Jesus himself claims. Logically he is the only way or he's not the way, because that's the way he set up the terms of the discussion.

All right, thank you very much. Now we want to give these other people a chance to answer, ask some questions. But Dr. Siddiqui requests to make, I hope a short statement.

Last night I made this statement about the variations that are there and Dr. Benson mentioned that it's only 1%. And then I went back to some of my studies that I have done and I just found one thing that I would like to read to you. This is the interpreter of the Bible. It's one of the very authoritative works written on this. It says it has been estimated.

Not everyone buys that claim. Now let's be clear.

Well, it's been used by majority of the Christians, especially in English schools and in the United States, not by the churches of. It has been estimated that these manuscripts and quotations differ among themselves between 150,000 and 250,000 times. The actual figure is perhaps much higher. A study of 150 Greek manuscripts of the Gospel of Luke has revealed more than 30,000 different readings. It is true of course, that the addition of the readings from another hundred thousand of Luke manuscripts of Luke would not add another fertile obedience to to the list. But each manuscript study does add substantially to the list of variants. It is safe to say that there is not one sentence in the new Testament in which the manuscript tradition is wholly uniform. Not one single statement. In the New Testament where the manuscript tradition is uniform, you can see now 1% and 99% difference.

This claim has nothing to do with what I have just said. I hope you understand the logical differences between what I am saying. I don't dispute this sort of thing. Although the Interpreter's Bible Dictionary is not the scholarly work that is being portrayed as being. You pick up FF Bruce. And here's a man who's considered one of the leading English experts in textual criticism and read what he has to say about this. It's not a question of how often you have words spelled differently or even different words there. It's a question of how many of these textual variants have theological substance to them. And I stand by my claim.

Ladies and gentlemen, you recognize that this is a very technical biblical criticism problem, and I don't think that we can solve that within a few minutes. Let's take your next question.

Hey.

This question directed to Dr. Manson. As a Muslim who only recently reverted from Christianity and talked with Shani in the US Marine Corps, I would be greatly interested in seeing you become a Muslim and me be able to call myself a Christian. Please let me explain. In the name of Allah, if being Muslim is simply an Arabic word for one who submits himself or herself to God's will, and you as a Christian, who I hope is following God's will, could easily be called a Muslim. And if being a Christian simply means that one follows in the path of Jesus, who himself was by no means a Christian and was disappointed by the ways of the Jews, and also, if you take the definition of the word Muslim, it's definitely considered Muslim. I therefore claim that I want to grant your wish to follow Jesus Christ in his ways. Please show me how to follow them. But I must limit you to the very same techniques you use to deny Judaism or Islam. I ask, after listening to subjective and weak interpretation of your paraphrasing of the Qur', an, where, quote, textually, unquote, as you put it, does Jesus Christ and his. Not his disciples not beating around the push statements by others, but by Jesus Christ himself, does this say in your Bible, I am God, worship me? Because if Muslims knew, perhaps sexual evidence as you consistently require.

They would be.

Christians, as you would like them to be today.

So would you like me to show you? Now, let me say, with respect to your use of vocabulary, if Muslims are willing to call me after what I presented last night about the messianic claims of Christ, a Muslim well, then go ahead and call me a Muslim. I'm not concerned about the labels. I am concerned about the substance of our theological convictions. However, and you wanted me to show you. Secondly, now, Jesus himself claiming to be.

God.

Not that I am his son, because I consider myself God's son too. And I consider everybody just a real.

Well, let's stop right there. Because you have to understand that Son of God is a notion used in the New Testament in two different ways. There is a sense in which those who. Who follow God, those who belong to him and are redeemed, are called his children. They are sons of God. You find another use of the expression son of God in the New Testament, which clearly is a messianic title, that the one who is coming, that is the anointed one of God, is his chosen son. But then there's a sense which Jesus termed, that went beyond either of those because he implied that he was equal with God. And we know that that's the way he used it, because we go on to read that they picked up stones to stone him because that's what he was doing and that's what his opponents understood him to be saying.

My question. You didn't ask my question. My question was because you require this of the other religions, this sexual evidence, this concrete evidence. I'm asking you to give me concrete evidence, not implication of quote, unquote. I am God. Worship me.

Would you like it to write you a letter? Why don't we take your name? And I think that that would demand too long a time, not give some of the others. I hate to rush off, but let's get the next question.

I have a question for both Dr. Siddiqui and for Rabbi Landes. What I would like to know. Same question with significant difference. First, to the rabbi, what is the future of Judaism if Palestine does not become the geographical nation of Israel?

The land of Israel, as the name called, is now the homeland of the Jewish people. This is its present reality. It's a reality that will constantly unfold. It's a reality that has the spiritual dimension and it has a reality that is also stuck in materiality. Being a people that stands between spirituality and materiality, we're stuck with the difficulties in both. I fancy, just easily say, oh, we're a spiritual people. And those of us from our people that haven't fulfilled totally our spiritual and moral destiny, well, you know, that's what happens with human beings and just kind of wash it away in the way that someone will wash away thousands of years of persecution of The Jewish people by saying, I'm sorry that it happened. We're stuck. We're stuck in our own reality. We have to do with real human beings. They would have become very difficult decisions. I'm scared stiff about what's happening right now because I'm scared stiff that my people will be overwhelmed and destroyed by enemies. On the other hand, I'm scared stiff that we don't come to a decision, we don't come to an accommodation. Then we'll take care as best as possible, as best as possible, the human rights and dignities of all inhabitants of that region. That's the incredible difficulty that we find ourselves right in. And that's the credible difficulty of this particular, particular. This particular faith and this particular people. But you know what? This is something that we've waited for for thousands of years. And these are the difficulties that we have to live with and these are the difficulties that we have to overcome. I believe that eventually they will. Because I believe that Dr. Satan, Dicky, as much as I disagree with so much that he said, and perhaps also what she's about to say, nonetheless, nonetheless, I don't want no reason I should burden him with my agreement, right? No reason I should do that to him. But I know that within these line of people, he's not alone. There are other tactics and dickies. And there are ways that we will come together and there are ways that we need to come together and to find these imperfect solutions. And these imperfect solutions will take place in this world and will take place between Jews who remain as Jews and between Muslims and pretendings of Muslims. We need no help from the Christians because the Christians have screwed things up a couple thousand years ago. And that's specifically there are Christians who believed in Christianity, who were molded by Christianity, who, Who casually throw in a crucifixion charge, which I don't appreciate, which my people have suffered terribly for. Million and a half Jewish children went to their death during the Holocaust partially because of that crucifixion charge.

I deny that.

Do you deny it?

Then it's because of that charge?

Yes. Well, then as a student of philosophy.

We stand as much against the horrors of Hitler Encourage you to.

Rabbi.

All right, let's go on to the next question here. Now, time is limited to 10 more minutes, but some of you are not going to get your questions. Let's take your question. Oh, Dr. Siddiqui is going to answer this too.

Well, very quick answer to the question about the future of Islam. You know, Islam is ideal. Islam is a Vision it is the Muslim people. And if you want to know what is the future of the Muslim people, I would say vote the Muslim people if they ignore the plight of their own. Of course they should be concerned about the plight of others as well. But it will go to the Muslim people if they do not recognize what is happening to the Palestinian people. They should be very much concerned about that and they should see that their rights are recognized. At the same time, they should be also very much concerned about the Jewish people. Because I do not want to see what happened in the west, what happened in Germany. I do not want to see this happen. I do not want to see a single Jew suffer. But at the same they should not have a reason because they suffered. So they bring suffering to other people who are innocent, who are not involved in the Holocaust, who had done nothing. What the west did paid from somebody else's pocket. You are your suffered. So go take from the pocket of the Arabs. And now the Arabs and the Jews have to fight each other and bleed to death. And the west is supplying arms to both and getting happy that these people are suffering and these people are killing each other. And they are always saying that Arabs and Jews, Arabs and Jews. Well, who has created the whole thing? And the amount of hatred that exists, I'm sorry to say the amount of hatred that exists in the Western world against the Arab world. It was just shown in last year in the Gulf War, the way the bombing was done, the carpet bombing of the cities where the million people were killed and hundred thousand children are going to die in Iraq. This shows the amount of hatred. The crusader spirit exists in the mind of the people. And it is the phenomena of his life is just a kind of a bleeding thing. So that Middle east cannot stand on its own. It remains bleeding ground and fighting ground. And this is so unfortunate. And that's why the Christian world has to realize what wrong it has done to a large number of people to the world of civilization and culture. And it has to take this very seriously and have to come to terms with it and also to see what kind of solution. Together we can make Muslims, Christians and Jews to bring peace in the day.

Throughout my college years and watching the news since then, and even last night, just a few seconds ago, what I noticed is that there seems to be.

A.

The people are equating the west with Christianity. And in much the way that Israel is synonymous with Judaism, the Middle east is synonymous with Islam. It appears that Western culture is often in many people's minds synonymous with Christianity. I would like to find out, maybe briefly from each person their perspective is, and especially, Dr. Bonson, how you would, as an expert on Christianity, what you would see as the. The relationship between Western culture at large and the Christian faith. And is it adequate to say that Christianity is represented by Western culture?

I would want to make very clear that Western culture is not to be equated with Christianity, though Christianity is a very important influence in the development of Western culture and its distinctives. Remark was just made by my friend Daniel Siddiqui about the alleged hostility toward the Arab world, as is illustrated in the most recent Gulf War encounter. Now, I don't deny that there is hostility toward Arab people, so don't misunderstand this remark. However, I believe that the evidence offered of that is an example of a great misunderstanding which prevents us from moving ahead and achieving this goal of peace that we want. There was, that was not in any sense a war of religion. The United States of America, by the way. I don't believe the United States should have been involved in that. And I have a tape series where I go through the Christian war and so forth. So don't think that I'm here, you know, wrapping myself in the flag of Americanism. I don't believe in that sort of thing. As a Christian, I. I don't believe that war was appropriate. But even those who do support the war from the standpoint of the Western world in the United States do not believe this was Christianity or Western religion versus Arab religion. It was not a religious war. Now, if you have a culture where there is some hostility toward a group of people, let's say it's the Arabs, and let's say there's religious hostility toward those who Muslims, then when we do get involved in a scrap like this, you see the worst elements of human nature come out, don't you? And so if someone hates Muslims, and that is not at all the way I feel, but I do. There are people like that, then it's not surprising that when they see this war going on today and say some scurrilous things about Muslims. But I, as a Christian, I condemn that. I condemn the war too, by the way, for different reasons than Dr. Siddiqui perhaps, but I want to make it very clear that everything that is done in the Western world, which has seen a great deal of influence from Christianity, is not the same as Christianity. If it were, we wouldn't need as many preachers and prophets standing up for the sake of the teaching of God's word and condemning the Western world for what it does for the way it uses money, for its materialism, its sexuality, its disregard of innocent human life and on and on and on. We as Christians have quite a job to do here. And the very fact that I believe we need to be doing our reforming work in the Western world should tell you what my view of the Western world is. It's a mixed bag.

Okay, one more question.

Okay, this question is directed to Dr. Ponson. I'd like for Dr. Siddiqui to respond to it. Does Allah or any non Christian view provide a transcendental foundation for knowledge as you find in the triune God of Christianity? For those of you who may not be familiar with this kind of in house discussion among philosophers, a discussion of prayer transcendentals goes back. Well, it goes back as far as Aristotle anyway, but especially to the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. And you don't want a long lesson in the history of philosophy. So let me be real brief. A rationalistic approach to the theory of knowledge, especially as it was advanced on the continent of Europe, had claimed certainty for a certain kind of foundation in the things that we know. And yet the rationalists didn't agree among themselves. You had dualist and monist and atomist and so forth. And yet all claiming clear and distinct, you know, indisputable foundations for what they're thinking. The empirical schools more on the continent, excuse me, on the, in the British Isles, said that we don't really have anything in our minds when we approach the world that of sort like a tagula rasa and what we know must be based simply on our sense experience. Now this led ultimately in David Hume's philosophy to skepticism. And I'll explain to you why if you want to know. But here's the problem as Kant comes on the scene. We don't have any foundations for knowledge then because neither rationalism nor empiricism can provide them. Kant said what we need are preconditions of intelligibility. I don't agree with Kant and how he found those preconditions. But he felt that one must look into the nature of the human mind and explain why we believe in causality and substance and continuance of personal identity and so forth and so on. A transcendental. The call for a transcendental is the call for a perspective or a worldview in terms of which we can make sense of science, rationality, moral absolutes, perhaps human dignity and so forth. My own conviction, and this is one of the things that I labor in my writings and lectures around the United States to make clear, my own conviction is that only the Christian worldview provides just such a transcendental that will allow for moral absolutes, rationality, human dignity, and the process of science as well. Now, let me anticipate what my friends here might say. To the degree to which Judaism and Islam have a common view of God the Creator and his personality, I would imagine they would want to say that it's precisely that which they too think provides the philosophical foundations for certainty and science and morality and so forth. And then we have to eventually get back to discussing whether the Unitarian God of Judaism or the God of Allah can take care of all of the philosophical problems that would be raised in terms of an adequate worldview in the way that we as Christians believe that we can. But obviously I'm not going to answer that yet. That's just a program for further study. I think religion does necessary for rationality and morality. And I believe that the only logically coherent form of that that is materially, formally adequate is the Christian worldview.

Well, there are several points that come here. First of all, one of them is the relation between reason and revelation. In Islam, we believe that reason is also a gift of God. And God has given us various ways of knowledge, various ways that we can learn things, our senses, our reason and our intuition. And then also there is something else that also is there within the human being that is called the pitra, that is the human within the human true nature of the human being, that.

Give.

The human being a feeling, a sense to know the truth, to learn the truth. And in order to enhance that thing, enhance our reason, in order to enhance our intuition and our fitra, revelation came. So revelation is necessary. Without the revelation, you cannot know. You may know certain things, but you may not know the extent of them. For example, you may you know what is right and wrong, but then you do not know how to approach the right and how to avoid the wrong and to what extent. So for this purpose the prophets come. So prophets are necessary, very important, and the humanity needs them. But at the same time, prophets do not bring something which is totally against our understanding, against our reason, because they appeal to the reason. And the reason is and the great lot. He said it is the balance of God on this earth. So one has to use must reason and also reason and revelation. And the Fitra, they all work conjointly. As far as the development of science in the Western world, Dr. Benson already mentioned that west does not is not identical to Christian as the Western development of sciences and everything and Technology, advancement in technology. That is not because of Christianity. In fact, I may argue it is inspired by Christianity. Because in the Renaissance what happened that it was the Arabic knowledge, it was the knowledge that came through Islam, it was that opened the way towards the recognition of that the world is different from God. Because if you have incarnational theology, that you cannot really do the study of science, because then you will worship the world, then you will worship the things. And if you worship something, then you cannot study them, you cannot investigate them. And that's what happening in the past. That's why in the past, in the Middle Ages and long time, for centuries, the west was not able to do that. In fact, a lot of things were un. And when the scientists opened their mouth and said such a thing, they were burned alive. And because they were not allowed to say certain things against. Because it was the world where the Incarnation has taken place. And how can you do certain things, how you can speak about that. But when the church was somehow pushed aside, now you just deal with the spiritual matters and the moral issues, don't get involved into the world things. Then the west progress. So it was the separation or the limitation of the power of the Church made the progress for the West. This did not happen in the Muslim world that way. In fact, in the Muslim world the progress was with Islam. And as long as people followed Islam, they were progressing. And there was scientific development, cultural development, all of these things happened because in Islam is the whole concept of monotheism and monotheism, the transcendence of God. God is not in the world. God is not incarnate. God is God and Word is word and man is man. And so you are able to study, you worship, you study, you make scientific investigation. You do all these things and the development comes. Of course, there is another whole story that how the secularism in the west took them to the other direction. And why, when the Muslim world came to a decline. This is. This is another story, a story that is very interesting and one should really think about it, that why Muslim world did not progress after giving these ideas to the west, why they themselves did not follow them. There are historical reasons, there are political reasons, there are many other reasons for.

That darkness in my kind. The men who are accredited as being at the forefront of the scientific revolution in the Western world. You look at them like Fagan or Newton or Gross Test there so ever. You're not claiming that they were not professing Christianity, but rather professing Islam. I mean, their writings are explicit about the Christian. What was their religious profession. It was not Islamic, was it?

They were not open to make that because again, there was always a cliff between the western Islamic world because of the Crusades. But if that was recognized because you know that when in the Western universities, universities of France and others, they went the idea was how we can study the Arabic sciences without many Arabic religions. So they were always very conscious that let us not bring the living and just bring the science up there. And so they were learning Arabic sciences. In fact, Arabic was taught in the Western universities and many of the great scientists, they did study Arabic language and this is the way how they got the notions and the ideas. It's a very good book by brick Wall. It's the making of man. May he bring some that how this Arabic civilization helped in the growth of the Renaissance and the coming of the West.

Thank you very much. Now, let's have Rabbi Landis has a minute here to or so tell us what he. We're out of time.

Ultimately, I'm the lame or the working side of you wants to say this debate is taking place about Christian science and Muslim science. Jewish scientists are working on a cure for cancer. But that's a good exciting. It brings down to a more substantive point the position ultimately, I think we're going to be judged by the following not whether or not here's some major disagreement, but not whether or not we have the adequate God concept, but whether or not our religion who have got whether or not they have inadequate moral concept. I look forward to developing it further with my colleagues because I believe that ultimately this generation will be judged by what and how we do peace of the world.

Thank you very much. Thank you for being here. Now, of course, we want you to know that Orange coast has courses relating to these topics and we'll be glad to have students. And also you may attend Fullerton where Dr. Sadaki will teach you a course on world religions. So if you have specific questions, perhaps these gentlemen would be kind enough to deal with them individually. But now we must give you a chance to go and to give the panel a chance to go. Thank you very much for coming.