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Media double standard alert: if I said that Islam was stuck in the Middle Ages, it would be more evidence of my inveterate "Islamophobia." But when Hans Küng says it, it gets written up favorably in the Times, because Hans Küng holds the Correct Opinions about what must be done about Islam (it's all up to us, not to Muslims) as well as about Israel (terrorists!) and about Christianity and Judaism (just as violent as Islam!).
"Islam is stuck in the Middle Ages, says leading interfaith expert," by Ruth Gledhill in the Times, June 16 (thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist):
Islam is stuck in its own version of the “Middle Ages” which is contributing to a global crisis, one of the leading experts on Islam, Judaism and Christianity argues today.Professor Hans Kung, a leading Roman Catholic and theologian from Germany, warns in a lecture of a “deadly threat” to all humankind unless new efforts are made to build bridges with Islam. He says in London that Islam has “special problems” with modernity because, unike Christianity and Judaism, it has never undergone a “serious religious reformation”. He questions whether Islam is even capable of adapting to a post-modern world in the way that Christianity and Judaism have done. But he also outlines why he is hopeful that the present problems around radicalisation within Islam can be resolved, and how the other two Abrahamic faiths are subject to some of the same problems on their extremist edges. Violence has been practicised in the sign of the crescent, but also in the sign of the cross, he warns. In his lecture, seen by The Times, Professor Kung says: “The options have become clear: either rivalry of the religions, clash of civilizations, war of the nations - or dialogue of civilizations and peace between the nations as a presupposition for peace between the nations.
“In the face of the deadly threat to all humankind, instead of building new dams of hatred, revenge and enmity, we should tear down the walls of prejudice stone by stone and thus build bridges of dialogue, bridges particularly towards Islam.” Professor Kung, author of Islam: Past, Present and Future, published last year and one of the most authoritative works on the subject, is speaking on “Challenges to Islam, Christianity and Judaism” in a lecture organised by the Royal Fine Art Commission Trust and Sky Arts. It will be broadcast on Sky Arts later this month. He describes how liberal Jews, Christians and Muslims often get on better with each other than they do with fellow Jews, Christians and Muslims from the traditionalist wings of those religions. A Roman Catholic “imprisoned in the Middle Ages” will find himself closer to the “medieval element” of Islam and Judaism than with liberal Catholic believers. Professor Kung says that one of the main causes of conflicts between religions is the persistence of out-dated ways of thinking. Islam and Christianity regard the actual Middle Ages as the “great time” for their religions. But modernity has forced all three religions of the book onto the “defensive”, and they all face challenges over how they react to their own “Middle Ages”. He argues today that Christianity and Judaism have moved on, but not Islam. “It remains an open question if the ecumenical paradigm of post-modernity will develop also in Islam.”
Professor Kung, who aged 80 is a contemporary of the Pope and worked with him as a theological adviser to the Second Vatican Council in the early 1960’s, was influential at the council in persuading the Roman Catholic Church to adopt a more positive attitude to Judaism and religious freedom. He has also spoken out constantly in favour of the official recognition of the State of Israel by the Vatican and for a two-state-solution for Israelis and Palestinians.
Professor Kung, whose own liberal views cost him his official Catholic teaching licence in the last century, says that the essence of all three religions must be preserved, but those who want peace and reconciliation will not be able to avoid criticism. They must engage in self-criticism to enable their faiths to adapt to modernity. Referring to Christianity, for example, he says: “Jesus Christ as a basic model is a constant, but the law of celibacy is a variable.” He argues: “After the Reformation Christianity had to undergo another paradigm shift, that of the Enlightenment. Judaism after the French Revolution and Napoleon experienced the Enlightenment first, and as a consequence, at least in Reform Judaism, it experienced also a religious reformation. Islam, however, has not undergone a serious religious reformation and so to the present day has quite special problems also with modernity and its core components, freedom of conscience and religion, human rights, tolerance, democracy.”
Does Hans Küng have any idea why Islam has not gone through this kind of reformation? Arguably the Wahhabi movement was a Reformation, a return to the core texts and teachings of the religion, and that just created an Islam more virulent and violent than ever. But why has there not been a reformation in the direction of human rights and freedom conscience?
Why might Islam not be capable of these things? Has Küng examined the nature of divine revelation in Islam, and the role of ijma, which make it virtually impervious to large-scale reevaluation? Does he really think non-Muslims can help Muslims get around this? On what grounds does he come to this conclusion?
And why does he think that denigrating Western traditions and promoting a spurious moral equivalence will help Islam change in the right direction? It is absurd, yes, but that is what he does:
He also sets out what the three religions have in common, such as injunctions against murder, respect for life, and he will explain how must Muslims do not take the extremist view. “They do not recognize themselves in our picture of Islam, because they want to be loyal citizens of the Islamic religion,” says, calling for fairness in the condemnations by the West. “Those who make Islam responsible for kidnappings, suicide attacks, car bombs and beheadings carried out by a few blind extremists ought at the same time to condemn Christianity or Judaism for the barbarous maltreatment of prisoners, the air strikes and tank attacks carried out by the US Army - several 10,000 civilians have been murdered in Iraq alone - and the terrorism of the Israeli army of occupation in Palestine.”
Uh huh. Even if those characterizations were true, Dr. Küng, which they most assuredly are not, what Christian and Jewish Scriptures provide a basis for them? What mainstream Jewish and Christian teachings are these "barbarians" acting upon? The analogy with the Islamic jihadists founders on this point, but the likes of Hans Küng and Karen Armstrong never seem to get that far.
Posted by Robert at June 16, 2008 11:08 AM
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Just one little note: Hans Kueng is a leading Roman Catholic theologian in roughly the same way as Alger Hiss was a leading American patriot. The Times' Ruth Gledhill is notorious among Catholics for absurd mistakes in fact driven by wishful thinking, but even by her standards, this is an enormity.
Posted by: Paolo![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/nav-commenters.gif)
at June 16, 2008 11:54 AM
“In the face of the deadly threat to all humankind, instead of building new dams of hatred, revenge and enmity, we should tear down the walls of prejudice stone by stone and thus build bridges of dialogue, bridges particularly towards Islam.”
I don't know whether you noticed that the Irans push walls down - to kill homosexuals. So right away, I think there might be a little problem.
As for building new dams of hatred, revenge and enmity, there is no need to build new ones since Islam is still using the old ones.
Posted by: tanstaafl at June 16, 2008 12:02 PM
What a lot of nonsense! Apart from anything else, I do wish people would not refer to the 'three' Abrahamic faiths. There are only two, as followers of Islam do not worship the God of Abraham.
Posted by: Sencit at June 16, 2008 12:55 PM
Sorry, but Hans Kung is not really a Roman Catholic. He pretends to be Roman Catholic, but he criticize much too often the Catholic Church. He is some kind of new "Monseigneur Lefebvre": he pretends to represent the Church in the place of the pope.
Posted by: Coaltaxopeuh at June 16, 2008 1:09 PM
So Professor Düng can describe the problem, but his solution to the problem is SURRENDER!!
What a buffoon..
Of course the Times would like that.
Why not discuss the OBVIOUS solution: They have their islamic countries they can live in. They have lots of oil so they don't even have to work for food.
And WE stay in OUR beautiful WESTERN countries FREE of moslams and their mindless barbarities.
My solution is simple and it will work! I know there are many who would agree. I know because I have read countless blogs on which this solution of mutual disengagement is being put forth.
But.. NO-oohh.. we have to "dismantle prejudices".
What a A LOAD of DÜNG!!!!
Posted by: Ummah Gummah at June 16, 2008 1:13 PM
Kueng is another mental case just like Dinesh.
Not to be taken seriously. But it is astounding that the media is always so eager to promote the drivel from these mental acrobats...
Posted by: sheik yer'mami at June 16, 2008 1:14 PM
“They do not recognize themselves in our picture of Islam, because they want to be loyal citizens of the Islamic religion,” says, calling for fairness in the condemnations by the West.
Not a religion.
This ‘citizenship’ of Islam can be viewed culturally, or politically, but not religiously. No other religion has ‘citizenship’ viewed this way. Factoring in ‘death for apostasy’ then makes this cultural/political citizenship more as a cult than a religion, because any member whether of one’s free choice, or born to it involuntarily, may not leave this cult, under penalty of death. Not a religion, more like a political-cult-culture of Islam that is in serious need of reform to become part of the modern world. Do they want to? It does not appear their idea of ‘reform’ goes that way, since it goes against Mohammed’s laws of total submission to his Allah. Once a citizen of Islam, you are stuck with it for the rest of your life, and the rest of the lives of all your descendents as warriors for Mohammed's Allah.
Reform for the ‘citizens of Islam’ would mean to undo centuries of punishments, some severe, under a supremacist world domination doctrine, to enslave mankind for Allah rather than liberating it. Modern values of personal liberty, such as freedom of conscience, freedom of thought and belief, equal rights and our universal human rights, are not protected by Islamic doctrines. Their Medieval doctrines are better suited to enslavement rather than liberation of the human soul. Religion is a matter of faith more than control with total submission, both body and mind, to a rigid dogma beyond question by its believers, or anyone whether or not a member of this cultural-political supremacist cult. Since we on the outside, as non-members, are powerless to influence the outcome of any such possible reforms, which seem impossible in fact, we are left to pressing for the liberation of its ‘citizens’ from the mind crippling ideological doctrines of this enslaving culture. This is especially true as it regards women. Our politics of democracy and personal freedoms are foreign to Islam, and unless they find a way to reform internally, by pulling themselves up by their own bootstraps into modernity, there is little hope for this political culture. For now they remain more closely aligned to a religiously inspired cult than a religion. In fact, to call Islam’s total control of the individual a ‘religion’ is an affront to all other faiths. Faith is between man and God, not fear of being punished or killed for not submitting to this total control mechanism.
What we can do to edge Islam closer to modernity is to keep pressing for the liberation of its ‘citizens’ away from the totally enslaving doctrines into a more enlightened way of life based on our universal human rights. If Islam can live with this, then we can dialogue with it as a ‘religion’. Otherwise, there is no possibility of dialogue with an enslaving cult calling itself a ‘religion’. As it stands at present, Islam has no resemblance to any other faith based religion in the world. In fact, it acts more like a cult.
at June 16, 2008 2:06 PM
This all comes as something of a shock to me, as I had thought he was dead.
Posted by: M Al-Content at June 16, 2008 2:21 PM
This all comes as something of a shock to me, as I had thought he was dead.
Posted by: M Al-Content
--
Don't be shocked. he is dead. Brain-dead.
How can he describe the problem and then deduce that surrender is the solution to the problem. IMHO - and not only mine - all this "dialog" merely serves the interests of islam.
They understand exactly one language. That being the language of violence.
The evidence is mountains high. And they often say so themselves.
Read the KKKorag. It's all in their un-alterable Manual-of-War agains the Rest of the World.
Posted by: Ummah Gummah at June 16, 2008 2:43 PM
Quite right, Paulo. Kung as a theologian is barely even Christian, much less Catholic. He in fact was stripped of his teaching faculty and allowed to remain a priest. He is a leading heretic, is all.
As for Coaltaxopeuh's comparison to Marcel LeFebvre, that's all wrong. The Archbishop was doctrinally orthodox and fought all his life against the reforms Kung helped institute at Vatican II, and he couldn't ever be accused of heterodoxy. Kung, on the other hand, rejects doctrines like a literal resurrection, the virgin birth, and what not.
I'm not saying that VII was heretical or even heterodox, but the excommunicated archbishop and Kung are nothing alike. It's ironic that Kung remains a priest while LeFebvre was damned, although LeFebvre merely acted against the wishes of the pope by consecrating biships in the Tridentine rite, whereas Kung is a bonafide heretic.
Regards,
HAID
Posted by: Haid Dasalami at June 16, 2008 3:01 PM
Haid,
OK, you are right. Lefebvre has ever conserved an orthodox faith: it was more a kind of schismatic act keeping the same faith as a basis. Kung is more a kind of heretic: he is deeply trying to influence catholic people against the basis of catholic faith.
However, I like to compare such people as Kung to Lefebvre because it makes them think about what they are doing.
Posted by: Coaltaxopeuh at June 16, 2008 3:46 PM
"...the other two Abrahamic faiths" -- Dhimmi imbecile known as "Hans Kung."
Good God.
The ONLY two Abrahamic faiths are Judaism and Christianity.
Islam worships a pagan rock idol that doesn't exist.
GET THAT THROUGH YOUR MORON HEAD, YOU DHIMMI!
Posted by: darcy at June 16, 2008 6:12 PM
"...Islam is stuck in the Middle Ages""
and is trying to drag the rest of the world back into it..
at June 16, 2008 7:58 PM
"The Times' Ruth Gledhill is notorious among Catholics for absurd mistakes in fact driven by wishful thinking, but even by her standards, this is an enormity."
-- from a posting above
There is, however, still The Tablet. Lucy Lethridge, I am told, et al.
Posted by: Hugh at June 16, 2008 8:11 PM
Hans Kung has devoted the past twenty-five years of his life to writing an ecumenical trilogy of the Abrahamic faiths. His book on Islam was his final installment. He could have abandoned that effort and concluded, instead, that there are only two genuine Abrahamic faiths and that Islam is an impostor. But instead he blindly trudged forth to complete his trilogy.
Dr. Kung is wrong about Islam being part of the Abrahamic faith. Had he studied the life of Muhammad, he would have realized that Muhammad's lip service to "People of the Book" was only because he believed he would be welcomed in Medina as the long-anticipated Messiah. When the Jews saw him as an impostor, he drove the Jews from the city and declared that there would be only Islam in the Arabic peninsula. So much for Muhammad's ecumenical ambitions.
If there are readers who still believe that Islam is an Abrahamic faith, I would recommend that they read the short monograph "Allah: Is He God?" by P. Newton and M. Rafiqul Haqq, available online at http://www.answering-islam.org/Authors/Newton/allah.html This is the best available statement on the subject. It should be distributed in every school and college in the country to stop this insidious debate.
at June 16, 2008 8:27 PM
Someone should send Mr Kung a copy of a handy little booklet, 'Jacques Ellul: Islam et Judeo-Christianisme', which was published in 2004 by the Presses Universitaires de France.
After an instructive introductory essay by Alain Besancon, which draws out the commonalties between Islam and classic paganism, and a rather nice foreword by Dominique Ellul, the book presents Ellul's essay from 1991 (during the first Gulf War), entitled "Les Trois Piliers du Conformisme' - 'the three pillars of conformity' (a sly allusion to T E Lawrence's Seven Pillars of Wisdom), together with a reprint of Ellul's discussion of dhimmitude in his foreword to 'The Dhimmi: Jews and Christians Under Islam' (1985). Curiously, the editor notes that this preface was published in the English, Hebrew and Russian editions of 'The Dhimmi', but "has never appeared in French".
Anyway, I commend 'Les Trois Piliers Du Conformisme' to any Francophone reader who has been confronted with the 'three Abrahamic religions' claim, for Ellul demolishes that specious claim with a ruthless thoroughness that is a joy to behold.
A good companion work for those who only read English, is Australian Anglican scholar Rev Dr Mark Durie's 'Revelation? Do Muslims and Christians Worship the Same God? God, Jesus and Holy Spirit in Christianity and Islam'. It costs about $15 Australian and can be ordered online from various Australian sources.
Like Ellul's essay, Dr Durie's booklet (handbook, really), is blessedly brief and lucid. And once one has read it one does not merely opine, one KNOWS, that the conceptions of God and man and of the relationship between them, that are presented in the Bible, on the one hand (informing, therefore, both Judaism and Christianity), and in the texts of Islam, on the other hand, are not merely different, but radically, diametrically opposed to one another. They have nothing in common at all; they collide head-on. Dr Durie has even helpfully summarised the key differences and oppositions in tabular form at the end of the book.
Bat Yeor - Jewish, and a friend of the late M. Ellul - reviewed Dr Durie's book with pleasure and gave it her imprimatur.
Leaving aside the sections about the Muslim Isa vs. the Christian Jesus, I think that Jews would probably find the book quite as useful as Christians would.
It should be in the back pocket of every priest and every pastor and every rabbi in the non-Muslim world.
Another interesting writer who identifies Judaism and Christianity as essentially related, but regards Islam as standing over against them, indeed, opposing them, since it is nothing more than a re-branded paganism or 'pagan monotheism', is Franz Rosenzweig, Jewish author of 'The Star of Redemption'.
If Kung chooses to ignore the witness of people of the calibre of Besancon, Ellul, and Rosenzweig, and swallow instead the spurious business of 'three Abrahamic religions', he is several kinds of fool.
Perhaps Benedict XVI could excommunicate him.
Posted by: dumbledoresarmy at June 16, 2008 10:56 PM
He says in London that Islam has “special problems” with modernity because, unlike Christianity and Judaism, it has never undergone a “serious religious reformation”.(from article)
Yes it has. Iran is an example of Islamic reformation along with elements in Turkey, Malaysia, Indonesia, Egypt etc. It is a reformation of becoming more tyrannical, more oppressive, more threatening to non-Muslims. It is an attempt to go back to the "pure" times of Mo hammed. It is time that non-Muslims blow up the bridges with Islam and defend themselves before it's too late. Leave them to their 7th century mentality. The words of this nut is a recipe for the destruction of our western culture.
Posted by: Briars at June 16, 2008 11:02 PM
Professor Hans Kung, a leading Roman Catholic and theologian from Germany..
______________________
Wasn't he EXCOMMUNICATED for writing the book against Papal infallibility back in the 70s or something?
That would certainly NOT make him a "leading Roman Catholic" theologian.
*shaking my head*
Posted by: Monkeywho at June 17, 2008 2:37 PM
Sometimes with these great ideas - for getting along with Islam - you could get the impression that you are being dictated to.
It is like your arm is being twisted - to understand Islam better - along with the line/dictate - that all Muslims are not terrorists - end of conversation - no examination of Islam allowed passed this point.
There must be a reason that the west is rejecting Islam - these are all put down to racism and the new word Islamophobia - but the emphasis is rarely ever placed on Muslim behaviour and demands.
Muslims not only want to live in a world of 15 centuries ago - they want everyone else to live there as well.
I don't know the outcome of this cultural clashing - but I know one thing for sure - we should stand for the things that we want and for what we believe in.
Fine words with those who believe that Islam should conquer all - by any means - is of little interest to me. All I know that there is a point in western society in which the backward view of Islam should not be allowed to pass.
Posted by: Cole at June 17, 2008 5:00 PM
“Those who make Islam responsible for kidnappings, suicide attacks, car bombs and beheadings carried out by a few blind extremists ought at the same time to condemn Christianity or Judaism for the barbarous maltreatment of prisoners, the air strikes and tank attacks carried out by the US Army - several 10,000 civilians have been murdered in Iraq alone - and the terrorism of the Israeli army of occupation in Palestine.”
I have nothing but a high school diploma (which they probably gave to me out of pity), and even I can immediately see where this professor is going wrong. As Spencer said, there's no theological basis for the US Army's actions or how prisoners are treated in Guantanamo Bay. I also like how he uses the term "murder" to describe collateral damage in Iraq.
What's scary about multiculturalism is that regardless of nationality, age, level of education and socio-economic position, every multiculturalist is exactly the same, as if they share a hive mind. But they don't share one, and multiculturalism isn't exactly being taught anywhere, so how is it that they all have identical arguments and ways of thinking? Whether it's a middle-aged professor or a teenager on the Internet, there's no difference.
Posted by: Jesus Christ Supercop at June 17, 2008 7:24 PM
Daniel Pipes has just identified in Frontpagemag today that the enemy is Islamist extremist utopians who of course must be discredited and destroyed. They are distinct from moderate , 'cultural' Muslims who should be supported in reforming Islam.
Now Professor Hans Kung, in the abouve article has also suggested that the terrorists are a extremist minority and by 'bridging out' we can prevent radicalisation. There seems to increasing agreement on the nature of the threat ( Extremism) and the its prevention through winning the "hearts an minds" of possible proto-extremists. Of course some of hwhat Kung says is leftist boilerplate ( US troops = Imperialist American murderers) and surely this undermines the "bridging out " dialogue that might prevent radicalisation?
He of course a second problem in that he is a Catholic priest and he says such things as "... the essence of all three religions must be preserved" !!! I am no priest but from my own meanderings on this site and others , the 'God of Abraham' and hence Jesus Christ are the opposite of Allah. The good Prof , in trying to accommodate Islam is throwing 'Jesus under a bus'... the essence of Islam is that not only does it not understand the Gospels in placing Jesus as a prophet, it seeks to usurp the Bible by denigration ...as corrupt. Talk about a Christian feeding himself to the lions.
Posted by: David Xavier at June 18, 2008 2:33 AM
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