Midweek Faith Lift
October 25, 2023
Unity, Islam & the Quantum Leap
Rev. Deb Hill-Davis
Spiritual Reflection
October 17, 2023
Muslim and Jewish communities in Duluth gathered last weekend to remove graffiti found on a local mosque - graffiti that showed up the day after Hamas attacked Israel. Members of Temple Israel and the Islamic Center said they were honored to work together and that it was a “blessing in disguise,” bringing the communities closer.
“We are inextricably connected to each other by a power greater than all of us. Our connection to that power and to one another is grounded in love and compassion. It brings meaning and purpose to our lives.” – Brene Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection
Affirmative prayer: My faith, my wellbeing, and my sense of Oneness are amplified by my actions. I release my judgments, intolerance, and the illusion of separation. Today, I reach out if only in prayer to the one I’ve pushed away. Today, I abide in love. Thank you, God, forever. Amen.
What a wonderful story to find this week to help us bridge the gap between our exploration of Judaism and now Islam. While the actions of Hamas and the retaliation of Israel are equally hideous, we can embrace that there are others, both, Jews and Muslims, who do not embrace conflict and we lift them up in prayer. So prayers of gratitude and celebration for our friends in Duluth, Minnesota! As we begin our exploration of Islam, we hold in mind the many Muslims who deplore the actions of terrorists in the name of Islam, as that is not the true path.
As Rev. Paul notes, Christianity has been a journey to understand the nature of Jesus; Judaism is an understanding of the covenantal relationship with God and how to live it, then he writes:
Islam is characterized by a zealous struggle to establish the peace of God. If a struggle for peace sounds contradictory, then we are beginning to understand the dynamic tensions that characterize the Muslim experience.” Unity and World Religions, p.45.
This experience taps into the concept of jihad, or holy war, which is ultimately a personal, internal struggle and not meant to be an actual war. More about that in just a bit.
Islam is one of the “Abrahamic” religions along with Judaism and Christianity. Muslim’s trace their lineage to Abraham through his son, Ishmael, who was born to Hagar, the servant of Sarah his wife. Ishmael is seen as a patriarch of the Muslim faith and an ancestor of Muhammad. Islam originated in 610-630 CE in the Arabian peninsula when the Prophet Muhammad had a series of visions during which he transcribed the words of God into the holy book, the Koran. He began in Mecca, fled to Medina and then gathered enough supporters to return to Mecca and fight to establish Islam as a religion. Islam essentially means peace through submission to the will of God, the one true God, Allah.
This one true God, Allah, is the same God as the God of the Christians and the Jews. Muhammad’s holy war was to establish Allah as the one true God and end the pagan, polytheistic practices in the Arab world. Mecca was the center of that struggle because the Kaaba, or Black Stone, was the center of worship for pagans, thus it needed to become the center of worship for Islam. Muhammad embraced both Christians and Jews and the writings of each tradition, specifically Jesus, into the Koran. Islam, much like Judaism and Unity is considered to be a way of life, not just a religion.
The foundational premise of Islam is: There is no God but God and Muhammad is his prophet. This is akin to Judaism and to our first Unity principle. God is transcendent, absolute, unchanging, and yet involved with his people. Islam honors Jesus as a Prophet, but not as a divine being, hence there is no holy trinity in Islam. Allah has many facets, but Supreme on the list of names is God the Compassionate, the Merciful. The prayer for Islam is the Bismillah al hum du lela, la ilaha il Allah. All is done in the name of Allah and only if Allah wills it.
There is clear focus on following the will of God, which is the guiding factor of Islam. Akin to Judaism, a right relationship with God is of utmost importance and the Koran is full of teachings about how to live in right relationship. The precepts for living are codified into Sharia, which literally means “the way to the watering hole” which in a desert land is the way to life. This is a guide to a Muslim way of life, not to overthrow established codes of law. There is punishment for not following the will of God and a belief in Hell in the afterlife for disobeying God.
Both Unity and Islam focus on the Unity of God, the one Power and Presence. Unity diverges in that there is no emphasis on submission to the will of God, although we do understand that our lives will manifest more good when we live in alignment with our true, divine nature. The Muslim understanding of the human relationship to God is illustrated in the following statements from the Koran:
Whichever way you turn there is the face of God (2:115);
There was no refuge from God except in Him (9:118);
It is their hearts, not their eyes, that are blind (22:16)
We belong to God, and to Him we shall return (2:156)
Humankind is intimately involved with God and God loves creation:
We created man. We know the prompting of his soul.
And we are closer to him than his jugular vein. (50:16)
All beings are God’s and unto God they shall return which implies that the spark of Divine energy is present in all even if not explicitly stated.
Within Islam, there is a prohibition on imagery, so the architecture, art, calligraphy of the Muslim tradition expresses the beauty and balance of the creation in transcendent ways to demonstrate harmony in the universe. Medicine, science and philosophy are also areas where the practice of Islam has impacted the west. We know of the poets Hafiz and Rumi whose beautiful writings have been translated into English. The essential teaching of Islam is that there is only one duty and that is to align with the will of God. The teachings of the Koran and the Hadith, later writings of Muhammad, are simply instructions on how to do that. The Hadith means “habits” which when practiced daily, lead one to a life of harmony and peace.
There is a version of the “Golden Rule” throughout the world’s religions. In Judaism, it is phrased, “That which you abhor, do not do it to your neighbor.” In the Christian tradition, we say “Love God and love your neighbor as yourself.” In the Hadith, it says “No one is a true believer unless he desireth for his brother that which he desireth for himself…Do you love your Creator? Love your fellow-beings first.” Islam emphasizes faithfulness to God, to the community and to maintaining the solidarity of the community and to doing the will of Allah.
There is one branch of Islam, the Sufis, which is the mystical path of Islam and perhaps most akin to Unity practices and teachings. There are 5 Elements of Islam and 5 Pillars of Islam, which we will explore next week. As part of the Five elements, there is the path of Ishan which we would call Spirit. This is the mystical path of the Sufis that invites a direct experience of the Oneness Known by many names. It is very similar to the path of the Kabbalah in Judaism and the Desert Fathers and Mothers of the early Christian mystical tradition. The poets Rumi and Hafiz are part of the Sufi tradition as are the whirling dervish dancers who seek to have that direct experience in their dancing.
The central teaching of Sufism is the development of Presence and Love. As Rev. Paul notes, “Presence is the deep and abiding understanding of, and identification with, the qualities of God.” P. 57, Unity and World Religions. He continues, “The spiritual and psychological practices of Sufism are harnessed to “help the personality move from a state of being in separation from God to a realization of oneness.” This sounds very much like our Unity practices and principles! Realizing and living from the Truth of who we are is what Charles and Myrtle pledged in their Covenant. We have a lot of commonalities with the Sufi or mystical branch of the Muslim tradition.
Part of the Sufi practice is Zikr which is the remembrance of God that through meditation, chanting and whirling brings one into a direct experience of the Divine. In that experience, one realizes the intense love energy that is the Divine, that is all that is. Sufi teacher, Bayazid Bitsami writes:
The thing we tell of can never be found
by seeking, yet only seekers find it.
This is the way of negation, the apaphatic path, that we explored with the Christian mystics like Meister Eckhart. It is in emptying ourselves that we can shine the light of Spirit, of the Divine, ever more clearly. It is not unlike what the woman who was the Peace Pilgrim said:
It isn't more light we need, it's putting into practice what light we already have. When we do that, wonderful things will happen within our lives and within our world.
The great poet Hafiz speaks of the light and love of God and the joy of receiving God’s grace. He writes:
Even
After
All this time
The sun never says to the earth,
“You owe
Me.”
Look
What happens
With a love like that,
It lights the
Whole
Sky.
At it’s purest, Sufism, Islam, is a religion of love….may it be so.
Blessings on the Path,
Rev. Deb