Islam
can be a frightening topic for someone to read about or talk about, but
the more I read about how to minister to Muslims, the more struck I am
by the simplicity of the approach and the intriguing secret behind the
Qur'an, the holy book of Islam.
Building Bridges by the late Fouad Elias Accad emphasizes some excellent
ways to foster relationships between you and the Muslims around you,
but there is one specific emphasis that this book has when it comes to
ministry toward readers of the Qur'an: The Qur'an itself.
It turns out that the Qur'an is extremely favorable towards Jesus, the
Bible, and Christians. Indeed, the Qur'an is an incredibly pro-Christian
book, says Pastor Accad. The Qur'an is
peppered with passages that affirm and highly esteem Jesus and those who
are His disciples (Christians), such as the latter part
of Surah 5:82 (A Surah is a chapter of the Qur'an; keep in mind that believer here is referring to a Muslim): "you
are sure to find that the closest in affection towards the believers
are those who say, ‘We are Christians,’ for there are among them people
devoted to learning and ascetics. These people are not given to
arrogance," (M. A. S. Abdel Haleem translation). That's quite a
complement from Muslims to Christians! However, if one peruses Google
for passages on Christians from the Qur'an, they'll come across both
favorable and unfavorable attitudes towards Christians in the Muslim
world of religious thought. This is where I'm in over my head at this
point, because Pastor Accad takes it back to how the Qur'an was
translated from its original Arabic.
Due to this book's focus on how pro-Bible, pro-Jesus, and pro-Christian
the Qur'an is, it does quote texts from the Qur'an at length, which
makes the reading a little dry at times, so I recommend it for those of
you who are intrigued by the deep study of written language. A thin book with fascinating insights and illustrative stories, it is an excellent curriculum for learning how to build bridges between your Muslim neighbors and Jesus the Messiah.
A sheikh is a teacher or leader in a Mosque or a Muslim community. Another title a teacher of Islam can be known as is an Imam. Setting foot in the Mosque, I met the sheikh whom shall remain nameless.
He was a bearded man of average height, dressed in sandals, a thobe and a kofia. I took off my shoes and he his sandals before we walked through the main area in order to enter his office. I made sure to keep the conversation from getting the awkward hidden agenda
feeling behind it by simply telling him the truth: that I went to Bible College,
am a pastor in training, and would like to hear what Islam is and is not
from someone who is qualified in Islamic thought, rather than from CNN or Fox News.
As you may know, I have been reading a lot of books about Islam and ministering to Muslims, but to quote Indiana Jones, "You gotta get out of the library!" meaning, you must balance good study habits with actual experience. Here then is the conversation we had over the span of an hour in his office. The use of quotations will simply be to simulate the experience of the conversation and should not be taken as authentic quotes from the sheikh. Still, the essence of his responses have been kept the same and not tampered with. The conversation was pleasant and cordial, and we made sure to schedule a follow up meeting afterward.
I began the conversation by showing him that I have a Qur'an already and also a list of questions I came prepared with.
"But we can talk about anything you already have prepared," I said.
"Well," he began, "Let's let you ask the questions so that I don't spend the entire time talking about something not important."
"No problem... I didn't write this question down, but it just dawned on me to ask you about 9/11. How long has this Muslim Community Center been here?"
"Since 1995. It was about 6 years old when 9/11 happened."
"What was it like for the Muslim community when that happened? Was there a lot of fear or concern in your congregation?"
"Muslims were watching 9/11 on tv when it was happening and were afraid. They were wondering what Americans would do because the terrorists were said to be Muslims, but there were a lot of swift actions by the government and the local community that checked any aggression against us."
The sheikh then explained that these three things happened the day after the terrorist attack:
~The federal government quickly established a proper understanding of their true enemy. I was amazed to learn from this Muslim leader that President Bush, in the following week, went to a Mosque in Washington D.C., respectfully took off his shoes, and gave a brief speech to the congregation, telling them that Muslims are not the enemy; terrorists are the enemy, and that's who they are fighting against. (Michigan Daily)
~The local governments positioned a squad car outside of Muslim gathering centers, such as Mosques and schools for Muslim children, in order to protect the Muslims from any angry Americans.
~The local churches visited the Mosques to drop off flowers and offer their condolences, assuring them that the local Christians know they're not the enemy. The Christian women also offered to accompany the Muslim women who wear the burka whenever they needed to go out. Again, the motivation was to protect the Muslims from the threat: big bad angry Americans.
"After the terrorist attacks," the sheikh began, "the American Muslims needed to start being more independent. Usually, if a Muslim in America wanted to pursue further education in Islam, they would go to Egypt or another Muslim country where there are plenty of schools and training centers for deep study of the Qur'an; they would also fly Muslim scholars and educators into America in order to train Muslims here. When 9/11 occurred, it became extremely difficult to fly scholars into this country as well as for students to fly out of the country for Islamic studies. This is why America is seeing more elaborate mosques and more Muslim schools popping up. The American Muslims needed to be more independent from Muslim countries and develop their own centers for training."
This made a ton of sense, and I could immediately see how the appearing of more mosques can be interpreted wrongly, just like the stationing of squad cars outside of mosques after 9/11 could be interpreted wrongly.
I then began to ask him the questions I had prepared. "Are there a lot of different translations of the Qur'an, and do you have one you recommend?"
"Yes, there are a lot of different translations. The one I recommend is the Abdullah Yosuf Ali translation." He then emailed me some further resources on understanding Islam and Qur'anic translations. Later on, he gave me a copy of this translation.
I then asked him, "If one were to start studying the Qur'an, where would one begin?"
"In devotional practices, you would start at the beginning and proceed to the end" (just like we start in Genesis). "The first surah is regarded as most important in the Qur'an." He also stated that there are several different ways one can read the Qur'an: by topic, chronologically, devotional, as well as some others. There were times when the sheikh would recite the Qur'an from memory in beautiful, melodious Arabic.
There were a couple of other questions I had, but the majority of our discussion was on the Muslim's view of the Qur'an as well as 9/11. I asked him at one point about his thoughts on Isis, to which he expressed a disapproval toward them to the point of saying they weren't even Muslims.
He then showed me around the property, which required me to put on my shoes and then take them off again, causing me to vow to myself slip-ons for next time!
In summation, a genuine studier needs to inquire if all the reading that they're doing is accurate or not. Just because something is in a book doesn't make it true; simultaneously, just because something is in a book doesn't make it false. As stated before, I've been doing a lot of reading on Islam, and this meeting with the sheikh helped confirm some and refute some of the things I've read. It is true that one sheikh doesn't define all of Islam, but the point is that if you want to be a good student, you have to get out of the library at times. If you want to be a minister of the Gospel, you have to get out of your comfort zone and learn how to minister to real live people.
