Sunday, March 13, 2005 12:11 PM Seeking clarity with regard to Islam and Christianity.

I submit my assessment so far. I will not mince words, but try to speak plainly without rancor, as the facts present themselves to me so far in my understanding.

I appeal to the American Indian (per Kant in his Religion.). "Why didn’t God just put Satan out of creation and be done with it?"

Thinking of God as a Monster

I hear now of various degrees of monsters, all the way from the human experience up to the ideal covered with infinities of powers, of clevernesses, of whims. And I hear of a supreme monster, named God, who is all power, etc. Now then I am faced with this deal. I can either do what this monster requires of me at this moment, in a total submission, or I can stick to my moral principles and carry them with me when I then otherwise submit. Now these two cases are to be considered in their extreme (for therein always lies the test), and we find one ready to sell out his parents if that were the guidance, and the other refusing to, having to insist (according to his reservation) upon a different interpretation of the words of the guidance rather than to admit that the monster would actual want anyone to violate the moral law, the law of decency, the ultimate law of self worth (in a community).

I want then to indicate that I take the Muslim as one who has sold out to a monster of some hearsay, he has sold out for pay to a monster/God named Allah. I must confess that I can understand how someone could imagine a monster in this and how it would be insane not to go along, since this monster is simply going to do what he wants to anyway and so it really doesn’t make any sense of anything and so it certainly doesn’t make any sense with regard to a moral law, or any other condition. The only sane thing you can to is simply to submit and pray (to whom?) that you will end up with good pay.

The Christian, in gross contrast, enters the religion with the moral law already part and parcel of their make up as human beings and thus know for sure (certified by Jewish and gentile witnesses) that when a voice purports to be divine it cannot constrain anything which would obviously, to a human, violate the moral law. That cannot be commanded by God. That much the Christian then knows in advance of the revelation given to him and brings that already with him. It’s really the Genesis 3:22 thing taken seriously. And so the good news for the world, it seems to me at this juncture and understanding, is the Paulian, for he can never be a danger to the world, except to the extent he is sane and not like poor, pure Quixote who was willing to risk his life for save good people and even to charge giants who were disguised as windmills. This man is perfect in spirit and is one with the Christ attested to by the witness Paul.

When the Muslim thinks to hear a guidance for him to do what is an immoral act according to natural understandings, e.g., kill your parents, he has no advance ruling telling him that this is impossible, for he is heir also to Abraham who was willing to believe that God could command an immoral act. He was willing to believe this. This is the scary part about Abraham. Thank God for God. He committed no sin. Thanks be to God. Perhaps Abraham thought that if you were going to deal with this monster call Jehovah you must be willing to go all the way in order to make sure. Someone has to be willing to do the immoral in order to satisfy the monster Jehovah.

He has no advance ruling and so can have no other thought than to figure out best how to go about this. Thus this man has essentially sold out the human race in order to cut a deal with the supreme monster, and no one can blame him, for the situation is from a horror film, a monster who simply does what he wants to do, eternally and always at whim.

In this context then the good news of the Paulian is that God is not a monster, but rather our common father who loves us more than he loves his own existence.

In a word. The Muslim faces an uninhibited, supreme monster and realizes that it is insane to even think about not following any guidance whatsoever and without limit, and if it should happen to mean selling out my fellow man, well, too bad. Every man has his price (as was one shouted in the heat of debate in the open English parliament). Who can condemn him? The man is in a living horror film and there is no way out. This is the fact of life. Sell out your fellow man, or sell out yourself. Be smart. Sell out your fellow man. Don't be dumb. Think about it. The monster will have his way one way or the other, so don't be dumb, get real, get on board. Or so it seems to me to play out in intimate thought and exchange.

The contrast now has become quite clear to me, and so I really would appreciate hearing where I am going wrong on this, and let’s not mince words. I am certainly not a Muslim and wish only to convince him that he is on a wrong tack, and so I would certainly like to have my story straight when I meet him on the street. I don’t want to be embarrassed at not having my own story straight.

Moral Difference Between Islam and Christianity

12:45 PM The differences now between Islam and Paulianity and other representations of Christianity are focused and stark in their clarity. On the one hand we have submission in its absolute meaning, and on the other we have a submission with is conditioned by the moral law which Genesis 3:22 indicates, and Kant proves, exists in the human being at birth (in his rationality). Thus when Jesus pronounces the three loves of God, neighbor and fellow Christian he does not do so as an arbitrary law, but one that we ought to already know, for we are humans. And so Jesus, who refused to judge between people, simply announced to them in its utter purity what they already knew in their hearts, God wants us to love each other as he loves each of us. And so part and parcel of the Christian identity is the recognition that whenever the Holy Spirit prompts a person in some guidance, one thing is certain, it will not be a violation of the three loves, and if it seems to indicate that in accordance with one’s own individual understanding and reasoning it is wrong, then it is a misinterpretation of the Holy Spirit and cannot be complied with.

And so the difference is in the submission, which is utter and total and without any condition on the part of the Muslim, and it is conditioned by the Christian by the moral law.

I think that is it, more or less. It is really quite simple. The Muslim sells out his fellow humans (conceptually speaking) for his own skin. That is the anathema of the human species, and it is precisely what he is compelled to do by his own rationality. No one can blame him, he is able to tell himself throughout eternity, for it is the only smart thing when you are dealing with the supreme monster of all, God.

Letter to Muslim Correspondent

12:54 PM Dear Mr. B.

Let’s start from the beginning. We hear about this monster in the sky who can and does do anything he wants to do. Period. We have no choice but to obey him, for even if he should do something else than what he promised, we can’t control that, and so all we can do is to hope that he keeps his word and then just do whatever in the world it is that this monster tells you to do. And one thing is clear, if you are sincerely in search of this guidance, then if you make a mistake and are not following the guidance at all, still you get paid for trying. You don’t get as much pay as if you were actually following guidance, but you still get paid for trying, so don’t give up. Just keep trying always to get it right.

The point here is submission with a capital S. This is the real thing, where the rubber hits the payment. In order to possibly get on the good side of this monster you must sincerely be willing to do anything whatsoever it is that he guides you in, or rather what you believe he is guiding you in. There is no restraint in Submission as opposed to mere submission, without a capital s. No one presumes to insist in the face of clear language that God could not say any such thing. Abraham is the epitome of the Muslim with a capital M. He was willing to do anything, without any exception whatsoever, that he was told to do, including the murder of an innocent child. He was at least willing to believe that God could give such a command. He held nothing back.

The Christian, in stark contrast, does not submit in that way at all. His submission includes as part and parcel the advance fact that the monster (God) only commands in accordance with the three loves of God, neighbor and fellow Christian. Now the Christian expects guidance from the monster (the Holy Spirit) and has a sure sign in the three loves. This is not to say that the guidance could not also be the do something which were not germane to the three loves, e.g., take this road, but only that no guidance could contradict the three loves and any perceived guidance to do something called for by the three loves was a certain guidance.

And so we get back to Kant’s assertion that the moral law is part and parcel of the human at birth and is contained within his own rationality, and to what is attested to by the Jewish scriptures, just before the garble which divides the scriptures, i.e., something is missing.

Mafia Analogy

6:48 PM The mafia conception. The Godfather knows what to do and how to do it and when to do it and generally is responsible for making sure that everything clicks. If you decide to submit to the Godfather you can be sure you will be well rewarded in this world, indeed you will be paid very well. And as long as you fulfill the requirements for a nominal Catholic you will be promised by that guy (the Pope) an entrance into heaven after a purgatory. Just keep up all the rules and the regulations and have your babies baptized and dedicated to Christ.*

[* I’m guessing at this, and a Catholic expert would have to rule on that. I’m sure there would have to be some way into purgatory.]

What can we say about this? that the moral law is of course left at the door for the absolute submission of the member to the Godfather, and it really out to be Submission with a capital S to mean absolutely and utterly and completely. What is right from now on is what the Godfather says is right and the sole duty is to comply with what Godfather says. That is the road to happiness. Rejoice in what the Godfather asks you to do, for this means he has confidence in you and will pay your according to your virtue to him.

Here all talk of the moral ceases (except for the moral obligation of the Godfather to keep his promises and to pay his help well). And we are left merely with the hired work we are providing for pay, for reward.

Now, Mr. B., in all sincerity, and I hope to be corrected by you, I really think this is also the model for the Islamic conception, so much so that I can imagine it having first arisen as an effect of that Islamic conception. For surely Allah is the Godfather in the sense I have just described. Don’t you think? And I don’t mean to be demeaning in any way. The Hitlerism thing was exactly the same thing. Get behind the honest, intelligent leader and do what he says do, for he possesses also power. And the greatest leader, of course, will be Allah, the most honest, the most intelligent and the most powerful. I see the Roman Catholic Church in this same way, and even most of the protestant camp, for they have merely substituted the Christian scriptures for the pope and so still require experts to tell them what is right and wrong and what they are to do. And so I am not picking in Islam and would think to use the Mafia Model as a purely technical description of a system of submission, as a sort of epitome.

It is only the Paulian then, it seems to me, who is clear headed in this present world. For he comes to his faith knowing in advance the form of all pronouncements of God which have to do with pleasing him, namely loving him (but only as a response of your own nature), loving neighbor and loving Christ. He can expect nudges of the Holy Spirit from time to time and he may even wonder at some nudges and wonder if they were from the Holy Spirit or not, e.g., take this road. But he cannot fail to know if it is not the Holy Spirit when the nudge violates the three loves (and of course according to one’s own understanding and conscience) and he cannot fail to know that it is the Holy Spirit when the nudge accords with these three loves.

The member of the Mafia comes in to his fellowship as in total Submission, with a capital S. The Paulian comes into his fellowship as in submission, with a small s, for he brings with him the understanding that the requirements for fellowship have to do with whether he is sincere pursuit of the three loves as the supreme condition for pleasing God. These three loves (which represent for our purposes the moral law in its fullest and most perfect expression, namely where it even becomes a duty to die for a fellow Christian) are the standard for interpretation.

And therein then lies the difference, the standard for interpretation. There is no standard for the Muslim except merely the logical one of consistency and coherence. All else is a variable and on the table of sincere individual interpretation, and no more is required for the promised payoff. There is no principle which states that whatever the text might actually say, it is impossible that Allah will have said anything immoral, and so it is impossible that this text be taken at face value, and instead we must use it in a figurative way to illustrate some point, as by analogy.

I question whether that principle is at hand in Islam. I think it is not. I wish to be corrected. This cannot arise in the Christian religion in the Paulian mode, for there the individual, independent of external pronouncements of church or scripture (a la Genesis 3:22), knows that all assertions of scripture and of church must be interpreted in a moral way, for it is absolutely impossible for God to guide anyone to violate the moral law. [God knew all along that he was going to intervene and stop an actual crime (on the part of Abraham), leaving merely the “crime” of being willing to violate the moral law.]

The Godfather occasionally instructs a lieutenant to give a poor woman a dollar, and so it could be said that he is a moral man and even that he only murders someone when it is absolutely necessary in the interest of the fellowship.

7:16 PM Mohammed was faced with the Roman Catholic Church and he may have copied the idea from them, except basing it entirely on written documentation which is very clear to all understanding people.

He would not want a Joseph-Smith style of ongoing revelations, for that would cause mischief as he saw with the Roman Catholics 300 years after Constantine.

Recap of Islam

Islam is like a Godfather association, or really only in a one to one relationship between servant (rather than member) and leader and who is told to cooperate with others and does so. It is a total submission. The Godfather tells him what to do and gives good guidance and can be trusted to provide a good pay off for sincere intention in complying with this guidance. There is no restrain of any sort. It is total Submission with a capital S. The Godfather may tell him to kill an associate and this is what the member will do, without question (once it is clear) and without hesitation, for he knows the Godfather is right in all that he does. When someone becomes a servant of the Godfather he brings no moral restraints with him, for this is Submission par excellence. He has nothing in advance of the guidance which could help him interpret the guidance except internal consistency. He is unable to say of a clear dictum that there must be some interpretation to be applied here, for at face value this order is immoral according to anyone’s plain understanding. He is in the position of Abraham who is willing to believe that God might require of him that he commit an immoral act, and he has no way of knowing in advance that this is impossible for God to utter. He was too soon to know this.

Today, with the knowledge of the Paulian conception, Abraham would realize that God was trying to tell him something else when God spoke these words to him, for it would be impossible for the Paulian to accept a revelation which called upon him to commit what is an immoral act according to plain understanding. All Christian scriptures are bound to the moral interpretation by virtue of their own immediate face value testimony (Genesis 3:22 and Jesus refusing to judge between the two brothers) as well as the clear reasoning of Immanuel Kant.

We cannot judge of Abraham for all we know is that he was willing to act the part of a man sincerely set on an immoral and even inhuman act. God spared us the moment of truth, so that we really cannot say of Abraham that he would have committed the crime or not, but only that he acted like he would have done it.

If nothing else we can assume that at the moment the hand raised with the knife that Abraham could still have finished the job down to the downward lunge, but that example was denied us by God, for it would have made us heirs to a murderer. That example was only given later, that extreme example, when Jesus lay down his own life voluntarily for the sake of the whole world, that it might witness the love and agony of God the Abba/Daddy.

And so the moral difference (between Islam and Christianity) is as stark as black and white. submission versus Submission, the one total and thus approaching the demonic and the other conditioned upon the correspondence with the three loves of Christ. One with no analysis of interpretative accuracy except internal consistency with one and the other with an independent, moral gage of the three loves.

9:32 PM Abraham almost proves a perfect life, but is spared that example by the intervention of God, and so we can’t know for sure whether he would have been so unrighteous or immoral (with regard to slaying his son). Jesus totally proves a perfect life and is not spared that example by the intervention of God, and so we can know that a man can be perfectly moral or righteous on his own.

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