Christianity and Islam Part 2

Our task is drawing to its close. We have pa.s.sed in review the interaction of Christianity and Islam, so far as the two religions are concerned. It has also been necessary to refer to the history of the two civilisations, for the reason that the two religions penetrate national life, a feature characteristic both of their nature and of the course of development which they respectively followed. This method of inquiry has enabled us to gain an idea of the rise and progress of Muhammedanism as such.

An attempt to explain the points of contact and resemblance between the two religions naturally tends to obscure the differences between them. Had we devoted our attention to Islam alone, without special reference to Christianity, these differences, especially in the region of dogmatic theology, would have been more obvious. They are, however, generally well known. The points of connection are much more usually disregarded: yet they alone can explain the interchange of thought between the two mediaeval civilisations. The surprising fact is the amount of general similarity in religious theory between religions so fundamentally divergent upon points of dogma. Nor is the similarity confined to religious theory: when we realise that material civilisation, especially when European medievalism was at its height, was practically identical in the Christian West and the Muhammedan East, we are justified in any reference to the unity of Eastern and Western civilisation.

My statements may tend to represent Islam as a religion of no special originality; at the same time, Christianity was but one of other influences operative upon it; early Arabic, Zoroastrian, and Jewish beliefs in particular have left traces on its development. May not as much be said of Christianity? Inquirers have seriously attempted to distinguish Greek and Jewish influences as the component elements of Christianity: in any case, the extent of the elements original to the final orthodox system remains a matter of dispute. As we learn to appreciate historical connection and to probe beneath the surface of religions in course of development, we discover points of relations.h.i.+p and interdependency of which the simple believer never even dreams.

The object of all this investigation is, in my opinion, one only: to discover how the religious experience of the founder of a faith accommodates itself to pre-existing civilisation, in the effort to make its influence operative. The eventual triumph of the new religion is in every case and at every time nothing more than a compromise: nor can more be expected, inasmuch as the religious instinct, though one of the most important influences in man, is not the sole determining influence upon his nature.

Recognition of this fact can only be obtained at the price of a breach with ecclesiastical mode of thought. Premonitions of some such breach are apparent in modern Muhammedanism: for ourselves, they are accomplished facts. If I correctly interpret the signs of the times, a retrograde movement in religious development has now begun. The religion inspiring a single personality, has secured domination over the whole of life: family, society, and state have bowed beneath its power. Then the reaction begins: slowly religion loses its comprehensive force and as its history is learned, even at the price of sorrow, it slowly recedes within the true limits of its operation, the individual, the personality, in which it is naturally rooted.

CONCLUSION AND BIBLIOGRAPHY

The purpose of the present work has been to show not so much the ident.i.ty of Christian and Muhammedan theories of life during the middle ages, as the parallel course of development common to both, and to demonstrate the fact that ideas could be transferred from one system to the other. Detail has been sacrificed to this general purpose. The brief outline of Muhammedan dogmatics and mysticism was necessary to complete the general survey of the question. Any one of these subjects, and the same is true as regards a detailed life of Muhammed, would require at least another volume of equal size for satisfactory treatment.

The Oriental scholar will easily see where I base my statements upon my own researches and where I have followed Goldziher and Snouck. My chief source of information, apart from the six great books of tradition, has been the invaluable compilation of Soj[=u]t[=i], the great Kanz el-'Umm[=a]l (Hyderabad, 1314). To those who do not read Arabic may be recommended the French translation of the Boch[=a]r[=i], of which two volumes are now published: _El-Bokahri, les traditions islamiques traduites ... par_ O. Houdas and W. Marcais. Paris, 1906.

Of general works dealing with the questions I have touched, the following, to which I owe a considerable debt, may be recommended:--

J. Goldziher. Muhammedanische Studien, Halle, 1889 and following year.

Die Religion des Islams (Kult. d. Gegenw., I, iii. 1).

C. Snouck Hurgronje. De Islam (de Gids, 1886, us. 5 f.).

Mekka. The Hague, 1888.

Une nouvelle biographie de Mohammed (Rev. Hist. Relig., 1894).

Leone Caetani di Teano. Annali dell' Islam. Milan, 1905 and following years.

F. Buhl. Muhammed's Liv. Copenhagen, 1903.

H. Grimme. Muhammed. Munich, 1904.

J. Wellhausen. Das arabische Reich und sein Sturz. Berlin, 1902.

Th. Noldeke. Geschichte des Qorans. Gottingen, 1860. (New edition by F. Schwally in the press.)

C.H. Becker. Die Kanzel im Kultus des alten Islam. Giessen, 1906.

Papyri. Schott-Reinhardt, I. Heidelberg, 1906.

Th. W. Juynboll. Handleidung tot de kennis van de Mohammedaansche Wet. Leyden, 1903.

T.J. de Boer. Geschichte der Philosophie in Islam. Stuttgart, 1901 (also an English edition).

D.B. Macdonald. Development of Muslim Theology, Jurisprudence and Const.i.tutional Theory. New York, 1903.

A. Merx. Idee und Grundlinien einer allgemeinen Geschichte der Mystik. Heidelberg, 1893.

A. Muller. Der Islam im Morgen- und Abendland (Oncken's collection).

W. Riedel. Die Kirchenrechtsquellen des Patriarchats Alexandrien.

Leipsic, 1900.

G. Bruns and E. Sachau. Syrisch-romisches Rechtsbuch. Leipsic, 1880.

E. Sachau. Syrische Rechtsbucher, I. Berlin, 1907.

E. Zachariae v. Lingenthal. Geschichte des griechisch-romischen Rechts. 3rd ed., Berlin, 1892.

H. v. Eicken. Geschichte und System der mittelalterlichen Weltanschauung. Stuttgart, 1886.

W. Windelband. Lehrbuck der Geschichte der Philosophie. 4th ed., Tubingen, 1907.

C. Baeumker und G. v. Hertling. Beitrage zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters (collected papers).

G. Gothein. Ignatius von Loyola und die Gegenreformation. Halle, 1895.

In conclusion, I may mention two works, which deal with the subject of this volume, but from a different standpoint:--

H.P. Smith. The Bible and Islam (The Ely Lectures for 1897).

W.A. Shedd. Islam and the Oriental Churches (Philadelphia, 1904).