"Jesus and Mohammed"
Luke 15:1-10
September 16, 2007

One cow is lost in the middle of the blizzard. You’ve managed, with the help of a good horse and a good buddy, to bring in ninety-nine cows, but one is till missing, the maverick that always wanders off alone. How much is it worth to you to go after that one stupid cow?

You had $500 in cash all saved up to take to the bank, 10 $50 bills lying in a neat stack on your desk. You go to count them and there’s only 9! Where could that other one be? You tear the house apart looking for it. Time’s running out. You need to get to the bank. How much is it worth to you to find that $50?

You decide to risk life and limb in the blinding, freezing snow to find that one stupid cow. Finally, as the storm begins to fade, there she is, lying in a heap of snow and ice, her horns caught in the cactus, but warm air still coming out her nostrils. You drag her home, call all your neighbors and throw a party! I found her, I found that little maverick!

You’re just about to give up and put all the furniture back in place when you see this crisp, green piece of paper poking out of the floor vent. Yep, there it is, that 10^th $50 bill. Heck with the bank, you can get there Monday. Call all the neighbors and throw a $200 dance! You found it!

Now isn’t that just like God, to keep looking for that one who is lost, to keep looking, to never give up, until that one is found?

Jesus is keeping company with “tax collectors and sinners”, people avoided and despised by godly people like “the Pharisees and the scribes.” Tax collectors were known for their unethical behavior. The Roman authorities contracted out collection of taxes; how a tax collector got the money was up to him. Usury, fraud and excessive profits were common. Tax collectors were ritually unclean.

Jesus defends associating with these people by using parables. God is shepherd/housewife; the lost sheep/coin are people who repent, who turn to God. God willingly accepts them; in fact, God rejoices, as does the community! Neither the sheep nor the coin can find their owner; God cares about those unable to find God for themselves. But, as so often happens, there are twists in these parables which helps people remember them: what shepherd would leave his flock “in the wilderness”? The Pharisees would find God symbolized by a woman as outrageous, and first-century shepherds were considered lawless and dishonest. Would a shepherd really care about one sheep out of 100? Yup, God is like that.

In the year 610, an Arab merchant was feeling lost. He could no longer participate in this crude, superstitious, murderous society. He had a deep hunger for moral order, for a society based on respect for human dignity. He had a craving for God. Mohammed left his home in Mecca and went up to a desert mountain called Hira and sat in a cave to meditate. There he experienced the first of a series of revelations given to him by the Angel Gabriel, the same angel who came to Mary, Jesus’ mother, six centuries before. Just as Jesus went to the desert to meditate at the start of his mission, and was visited by angels, Mohammed’s spiritual journey began in the same way. He believed that God found him in that cave, and saved him from despair.

This was no accident, because Mohammed was familiar with Christianity and with Judaism. However, his knowledge of those faiths came to him third-hand. He heard a jumble of stories from the Bible, alternate versions of these stories, and folk traditions about them that had been filtered through multiple cultures. When Mohammed’s revelations from Gabriel were put down on paper in the form of the Koran, a distinctive version of the Jewish and Christian stories emerged; a new religion was born, one that would soon grow to be as large as Christianity.

The word Islam is the name of the religion, and means “the peace that comes when one’s life is surrendered to Allah.” And, Allah, of course, is God, the God of Abraham, Moses, and Jesus, the One God. Those who follow this faith are called Muslims. The Koran, as the Muslims believe, isthe name of the book which was dictated by God through Mohammed in small segments over 23 years. But more than a just a book, the Koran is the Word Of Allah; it is the Proclamation of God to the world, just as we believe that Jesus Christ is the Proclamation of God to the world.

It is painfully obvious to us today that horrible things are being done in the name of religion, especially Islam. Most of us understand that terrorism is a terrible distortion of the Islamic religious faith, and that most Muslims deplore what is happening in the middle east. We know we cannot blame 9-11 on all Muslims. And yet it is very difficult for us to keep an open mind to Islam. I can’t give you a full picture of the faith in any of these sermons in this series, but I will try to offer up just a glance at what scholars consider the very best of each way of believing, with the understanding that all religions have at one time or another not lived up to their full potential.

The basic theology in Islam is the same as Judaism and Christianity—(1) God is the one God, invisible, full of power and majesty, all compassion and mercy. (2) Creation is the result of the will of God, and is good, important. Important enough to lead the early Muslims to science before the rest of us. (3) The human self, the greatest of God’s creations, is good and independent, but forgetful that God is Creator. So we must surrender ourselves to God with commitment and gratitude, and treat others with full equality before God. (4) There will be a day of judgment when each individual will answer to God for their lives on this earth.

There are 5 pillars of faith in Islam that direct the personal holiness of the believer—

1.       Shahadah, their creed: “There is no God but God, and Mohammed is his prophet.” Strong monotheism.

2.       Prayer—at least 5 times a day (story p. 245).

3.       Charity.

4.       Ramadan, holy month of fasting.

5.       Pilgrimage to Mecca.

Social teachings—

1.       economics—A society’s health requires that material goods be widely and appriopriately distributed.

2.       Status of Women—sanctified marriage to protect women; does permit up to 4 wives; veiling for protection abroad; extremes a product of local custom, not religiously binding.

3.       Race relations—stresses racial equality

4.       Use of Force—“Let there be no compulsion in religion;” teaches forgiveness, the return of good for evil when circumstances warrant, but not “turn the other cheek.”

Later in life, Mohammed became an outstanding general. Having seized the sword first in self-defense—he did not intend to become a martyr—he held on to the sword the end. He lived a life of toleration. His followers, however, practiced much less toleration, it seems.

Mohammed, like Jesus, had a very strong sense of the transcendence and oneness of God. Mohammed rejected the doctrine of the trinity, saying that there is but one God. He rejected the idea that God had a son. He saw Jesus as a remarkable prophet, teacher, healer, and bringer of justice.

Mohammed had some fanciful ideas about Jesus. He believed that Jesus was never crucified, that the crucifixion was a hoax. Just about the only detail about Jesus that has any supporting evidence in first-century historical accounts outside the Christian tradition is the fact that he was crucified, so it’s an interesting twist that Mohammed denies it. Mohammed also saw Jesus as a sort of angel who would be present at the last judgment of humanity. Jesus, or Isa, is a very big deal in the Koran, and respect for Christianity as a religion that is “al kitab,” or of the book, is deeply embedded in Islam.

Christian mysticism is deeply indebted to Islamic mysticism, known as Sufism. The great Muslim poet of the 13^th century, Rumi, wrote a poem about Jesus:

JELALUDDIN RUMI (1207-1273)

“What Jesus runs away from”

The son of Mary, Jesus, hurries up a slope as though a wild animal were chasing him.

Someone following him asks, ‘Where are you going? No one is after you.’

Jesus keeps on, saying nothing, across two more fields.

Are you the one who says words over a dead person, so that he wakes up?

I am.

Did you not make the clay birds fly?

Yes.

Who then could possibly cause you to run like this?

Jesus slows his pace.

“I say the Great Name over the deaf and the blind, they are healed. Over a stony mountainside, and it tears its mantle down to the navel. Over non-existence, it comes into existence. But when I speak lovingly for hours, for days, with those who take human warmth and mock it, when I say the Name to them, nothing happens. They remain rock, or turn to sand, where no plants can grow. Other diseases are ways for mercy to enter, but this non-responding breeds violence and coldness toward God. I am fleeing from that. As little by little air steals water, so praise is dried up and evaporates with foolish people who refuse to change. Like cold stone you sit on, a cynic steals body heat. He doesn’t feel the sun.”

Jesus wasn’t running from actual people.

He was teaching in a new way, a deeper level to religion and spirituality, and that is why Jesus is running. He is running to offer us something he can’t just magically wave his hand and make happen. There’s something more that we must actively seek out ourselves, and find the way he found it. He is running so that we will be inspired to run with him – run away from coldness of heart, run toward the warm glowing heart of God. There’s more to the spiritual life than gaining power and control. The ultimate quest is to know God directly, to be one with that loving, cosmic reality. Love itself is the quest, and Jesus is running away from all that would rob life of love, and toward all that would unite us with it.

We know that God runs to find us, even if we are only stumbling toward God. Let us pray that our Muslim brothers and sisters will feel God’s radical love for them, and for all the world, so that we may all rejoice with the angels when the lost are found.

Amen.