This seems to be the obverse of an attitude some of our students come with (and sometimes leave with): that 'Allah' is a Muslim God.
Attacks after Malaysian court rules Christians can worship Allah - Times Online: "many Malaysian Muslims, who make up 60 per cent of the population, say that Allah should be reserved to refer exclusively to the Muslim deity and that use of it in a Biblical context encourages conversion to Christianity, a crime under the country’s Islamic laws."
The attitude by both some Muslims in Malaysia and some Christians in the UK and USA ignores the fact that Arabic-speaking Christians have no other 'ordinary' word for God. We should note that both sides are doing their theology in a language other than the original language concerned and have imported the word into their own languages.
I could say more but I'll leave it for now. It is, however, an interesting study in sociolinguistics as well as theology and interfaith dialogue.
No comments:
Post a Comment