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'We must overcome our misgivings about 'God' both because of the word's intrinsic, historical merit and because it empowers us to communicate with our Jewish, Christian and other English-speaking neighbors in a meaningful way.'
An Islamic scholar spoke to a crowd of about 450 people at Western Michigan University on Feb. 19 with the message that Muslims, Christians and Jews all worship the same God.
He also brought a message specifically for the many Muslims who were part of the audience: Failure to use the English word "God," in addition to the Arabic word "Allah," gives the impression to Christians and Jews that Muslims do not worship the same God.
Umar Faruq Abd-Allah, chairman of the board and scholar-in-residence of the Chicago-based Nawawi Foundation, explained the history behind God's many names and emphasized his belief that adherents of the three religions worship the same deity, even though they do so in different ways.
Abd-Allah was brought to WMU by the Muslim Students' Association, in collaboration with the Arab Student Association. His foundation is a nonprofit institution that works to spread teachings about Islam in the U.S. through research and education.
In his speech, titled "One God, Many Names: Muslims, Christians and Jews All Call Upon the Same God," Abd-Allah said the three religious groups all invoke the God of Abraham. He said this is a fact clearly affirmed in the Bible and in the Quran, the Islamic holy book....
The weight of a name
As far as names used for God, Abd-Allah said all of them are "beautiful" and meaningful. But while the name Allah is considered to have a unique sanctity for Muslims, he said English-speaking Muslims should not use the name exclusively. He called such exclusive use "a very ill-advised position" that affirms the notion that the Muslim God and the Christian and Jewish God are not the same God.
"We must overcome our misgivings about 'God' both because of the word's intrinsic, historical merit and because it empowers us to communicate with our Jewish, Christian and other English-speaking neighbors in a meaningful way," he advised Muslims in his 2004 essay.
He said the belief that Muslims worship a God other than the deity revered by Christians and Jews has been detrimental to the way Muslims are viewed in America.
American religious conservatives such as the Christian Coalition's Pat Robertson and evangelical Franklin Graham, he said, have erroneously spread the idea that the Muslim God is somehow lesser than the Christian God. For Robertson, he wrote, "the world's troubles turn on the question of 'whether Hubal, the moon god of Mecca known as Allah,' is supreme or whether the Judeo-Christian Jehovah, God of the Bible is supreme." Abd-Allah debunked that notion, writing that Hubal was the chief pagan idol of Mecca and bore no theological or historical connection to Allah.
In discussing the history of different names for God, Abd-Allah said biblical terms such as Elohim come from the same Semitic root as the word Allah and basically mean "the one who is worshipped." In Arabic-speaking countries, he noted, non-Muslims refer to their God as Allah.
"God and his names are part of a universal human legacy," Abd-Allah said. "It's very important for us to understand the beauty of the word God."
Story here.
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