Annette Nestor

Your course and its effects remind me of the remark made by Ronald Knox “The study of comparative religion makes people comparatively religious”. Sorry, but your fondness for commonality has apparently rendered you unable or unwilling to see the overwhelming differences. Take the issue of God for example. Buddhists do not even have to believe in God; Hindus can have as many as 330 million gods; while the monotheistic religions worship only one God.

Your common ground approach is not very helpful. An analogy might be trying to put out a fire with three things: water, gasoline and oil. Hey, think of all the commonalities: they are all liquids for example. But in truth only one will do the job, while the other two will only make matters worse.

Unfortunately your course is taking the usual comparative religion approach, which involves completely ignoring the unique message of the Gospels. Indeed, one cannot objectively read the Gospel accounts without seeing a man and message absolutely unique and distinct from all other religions and religious leaders.

And your courses seek to downplay the overwhelming doctrinal message of Jesus. Jesus spoke constantly about truth and the necessity of right belief – about God, the world, and himself. He made incredibly exclusive truth claims about himself and his mission. No one can read such passages as Matt 11:27; John 1:12; 3:18; 8:12; 10:7-10; 11:25-26 and 14:6-7 (to cite just a few) and still think Jesus is merely one of many religion teachers or ethicists.

Theological liberalism has always sought to downplay the teachings of Jesus, and elevate instead some wishy washy sentimental set of values and ethics. Sorry, it just does not work that way. As C.S. Lewis rightly warned years ago”

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of thing Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch

You raise some very good questions here, so let me respond with three quick replies. Yes it would make for a good article indeed, so I will write it up soonish.

I am sure there would be many good online articles on all this. I will do a bit of looking around for you.

If you want to go into more details, here are some helpful books on the subject:

Comfort, P.W., Complete Guide to Bible Versions. 1991.
Dewey, David, Which Bible? IVP, 2004.
Kubo, Sakae and Walter Specht, So Many Versions? Zondervan, 1983.
Metzger, Bruce, The Bible in Translation: Ancient and English Versions. Baker, 2001.
Grudem, Wayne, et. al., Translating Truth. Crossway, 2005.
Ryken, Leland, Bible Translation Differences. Crossway, 2004.
Ryken, Leland, The Word of God in English. Crossway, 2003.
Scorgie, Glen, Mark Strauss and Steven Voth, eds., The Challenge Of Bible Translation. Zondervan, 2003.
Wegner, Paul, The Journey from Texts to Translations. Baker, 1999.

Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch

I’m aware that different bible versions exist but know nothing of the nature of the differences throughout. I’ve heard people comment about particular versions but they seem to be driven by the stance of their own denomination.

I’m sure there are others just as confused as me. I lean toward a strict interpreation of the scriptures and I certainly want the most accurate interpretation in english of Christ’s words. Is there an accessible quick and ready source to get an understanding about the different versions? I’d like to know how many versions there are (in english language), where do they come from, who commissioned them, when, why, what was their theological stand or agenda, etc.

Or perhaps Bill, if you have that information could you write an entry and give some guidance on which one/s to go to and which one/s to avoid. Any direction you or any contributors can offer will be much appreciated.

Frank Norros

Yes feel free.

Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch

The division is certainly not between good people and bad people or between loving and non-loving but the division between Christ and us. The only thing that we have in common with people of other faiths is that like them we are all sinners. What we don’t have in common with them is that we are saved, through, and only, through blood of Jesus.

David Skinner, UK

Kind regards
Michelle Shave

Sorry, but I will not rushing off soon to join my local interfaith group. I would have thought that my article had made that point clear at least! But let me pick up on one paragraph of yours. You say:

“The reason God was so strong against false gods was that they represented systems of oppression – the worship of money, power and sex. Only by turning away from these idols and worshiping the One True God, the Creator, the God of Love, would people treat each justly and with compassion.”

But with all due respect, where in the world did you get that one from? There is not one passage anywhere in the entire Bible that makes such a claim. God does not reject false religions because of injustice or oppression. He rejects false religions because they are false religions.

He rejects them utterly because only the one true God is to be worshipped and glorified, and because all other gods, idols and religions will ultimately lead people to a lost eternity. The inability of false religions to save anyone is one of the reasons God so detests these useless idols: “Ignorant are those who carry about idols of wood, who pray to gods that cannot save” (Is 45:20).

Sure, idolatry and false religions always have negative and harmful consequences. Immorality is one downside which is often connected to idolatry in Scripture. But that is not the main reason God rejects false religions and gods.

And it seems that the God of the Bible is not too keen on interfaith ventures. We read in Deuteronomy 12:1-3 these words: “These are the decrees and laws you must be careful to follow in the land that the LORD, the God of your fathers, has given you to possess—as long as you live in the land. Destroy completely all the places on the high mountains and on the hills and under every spreading tree where the nations you are dispossessing worship their gods. Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and burn their Asherah poles in the fire; cut down the idols of their gods and wipe out their names from those places.”

Yahweh was not into syncretism, and did not allow Israel to engage in any compromise here. Indeed, Elijah did not sit down and chat with the false prophets. He first challenged them to come up with the goods, and then they were swiftly eliminated.

Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 10:20 that “the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God”. Paul was “greatly distressed” with his encounter with the false gods of Athens. He had dialogue with them, not in order to just get along and try to learn about one another, but to reach them with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. That should be our only motivation as well when talking with people of other faiths. It should not be about encouraging “each person to go deeper in their own faith traditions” as your organisation seeks to do.

So thanks again, but I will have to give the invite a miss.

Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch

When I read the Bible I see a Jesus standing in the prophetic tradition who was less concerned with religious labels than with how people treated each other. Zechariah 7 expresses this very well, especially in Eugene Peterson’s translation where God says ‘You’re interested in religion, I’m interested in people… Treat one another justly. Love your neighbours. Be compassionate with each other. Don’t take advantage of the widows, orphans, visitors and the poor. Don’t plot and scheme against one another – that’s evil.’

The reason God was so strong against false gods was that they represented systems of oppression – the worship of money, power and sex. Only by turning away from these idols and worshiping the One True God, the Creator, the God of Love, would people treat each justly and with compassion.

So yes, Jesus brings judgment and division. But it is not along religious lines but along the line between good and evil – and as Solzhenitsyn pointed out, the line between good and evil runs through every human heart. Look at how Jesus relates to the two main religious “others” of his time and place – the Romans and the Samaritans. Look at how he brings division within his own religious community – the Jews. There is a strong argument for saying that where he talks about division in the family, the family he is referring to is the Jewish people. Jesus emphatically refuses to side with those Jews who take a “us against them” approach to the challenge of Roman, pagan, occupation with all its brutality, exploitation and injustice. Instead Jesus presents us with a challenge, to repent and be transformed, starting with ourselves: to root out evil in our own lives first, to love one another and do justice, and then go out and challenge others to live the same way.

Anyone who seriously tries this will find it is divisive. The rich and powerful especially find it confronting, and it was the men of power – the religious and political establishment – who decided to kill Jesus. This, to me, is the true ‘offense of the gospel’ – the radical call to fight evil by living God’s way.

Yes, Bill, you are right. Jesus was a confrontational radical who stirred things up. Let us go full out to present Jesus and his message in interfaith dialogues. Let us not be too polite and ‘nice’ to avoid the difficult challenges. But also, let us follow Jesus’ example and not make it about “us against them”. All of us need to repent and keep turning to God. All of us fall short of the perfection demanded in the Sermon on the Mount.

Mike Lowe