• Directories
    • Business Directory
    • Church Directory
    • Organization Directory
  • Advertise
  • Donate
  • Help
  • Log In
MENUMENU
  • Learning
        • Leader’s Edge
          • Author Interviews
          • Book Summaries
        • Book Reviews
          • Book Look
          • EMQ Book Reviews
        • Publications
          • Anthology
          • Evangelical Missions Quarterly (EMQ)
          • Missiographics
        • Podcasts
          • The Mission MattersNew
          • Missio Nexus
          • People First HR
          • Members Only Feed
        • Blogs
          • Global Issues Updates
          • Member Highlights
          • Mission Advisors
        • Topics
          • COVID-19 ResourcesNew
          • Diaspora Missions
          • Mobilization
          • Muslim Missions
          • Support Raising
        • Media Library
          • Conferences
          • Global Issue Updates
          • On Mission
          • Thought Leader Briefings
          • Webinars
          • Workshop
          • View All
  • Programs
    • Accreditation
    • Alliance for Benefits
    • Bible CertificateNew
    • Church Missions CoachingNew
    • Cohorts
    • Cybersecurity
    • Emerging Leaders
    • Mission Jobs
    • OnBoard
    • RightNow Media
    • The Mission AppNew
    • Women’s Development
  • Events
          • Calendar
          • In-Person Events
          • Virtual Events
          • Event Recordings
          • Awards
        • Upcoming Events

          • Webinar: Through the Wall
            Thu Jan 28 2021, 02:00pm EST
          • Three Easy Ways to Drive Innovation
            Thu Feb 11 2021, 02:00pm EST
          • Three Steps to Kickstart Your Fund Development Program
            Tue Feb 16 2021, 03:00pm EST
        • View All Events
  • Research
          • Missiographics
          • Mission Handbook
          • Research Reports
        • Popular Research
          • Compensation Reports
          • COVID-19 ResourcesNew
          • Field Attrition Report
          • View All Reports
        • Contribute
          • Current Research Projects
          • Submit Data for Mission Handbook
          • Volunteer
  • About Us
        • Who We Are
          • Our Contribution
          • Meet the Team
          • Board Members
          • History (1917–present)
        • Our Beliefs
          • Statement of Faith
          • Community Standards
        • Awards
        • Partner with Us
          • Advertise
          • Donate
          • Sponsorships
          • Volunteer
        • Help
          • Contact Us
          • Advertising Specs
          • Branding Guidelines
  • Join
        • Learn
        • Learn what you cannot learn anywhere else.

        • Meet
        • Meet people you otherwise won’t meet.

        • Engage
        • Engage in a community like none other.

          • Benefits
          • Benefits for Churches
          • Pricing

Sponsored Content

Upcoming Events

  • Webinar: Through the Wall
    Thu Jan 28 2021, 02:00pm EST
  • Three Easy Ways to Drive Innovation
    Thu Feb 11 2021, 02:00pm EST
  • Three Steps to Kickstart Your Fund Development Program
    Tue Feb 16 2021, 03:00pm EST
  • Webinar: Innovating Theological Education: How BibleMesh can Prepare your Staff for Ministry
    Thu Feb 25 2021, 02:00pm EST
  • Association Leaders Gathering
    Tue Mar 2 2021, 08:30am EST

View all events »

Topics

author interview Canada CEO Church Church Missions Church Mission Team Church Planting Coaching Conference Proceedings COVID-19 Cross Cultural Skills Diaspora Evangelism Focus Future Globally Engaged Churches Islam Justin Long Leadership Management Missiology Missionaries Mission Finance and Administration MLC2019 MLC2020 Mobilization muslim Muslim Diaspora Networks Partnership Personal Productivity Podcast Presenter Research Security Short-Term Missions Spirituality support raising Training Trends Unengaged Unreached unreached people groups Weekly Roundup Women

Meta

  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.org

Waging Peace on Islam

Posted on April 1, 2003 by April 1, 2003

by Christine A. Mallouhi.

In the middle of her book, Waging Peace on Islam, Christine A. Mallouhi challenges evangelical Christians with this question, “How can we continually paint Muslims as hostile spiritual enemies with whom we are engaged in the greatest battle of our century, and then be willing to go to our Muslim neighbours and share Christ’s love with them?” (p. 178).

InterVarsity Press, P.O. Box 1400, Downers Grove, IL 60515-1426, 2002, 348 pages, $15.00.

—Reviewed by Alan M. Guenther, Institute of Islamic Studies, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec (Ph.D. cand.).

In the middle of her book, Waging Peace on Islam, Christine A. Mallouhi challenges evangelical Christians with this question, “How can we continually paint Muslims as hostile spiritual enemies with whom we are engaged in the greatest battle of our century, and then be willing to go to our Muslim neighbours and share Christ’s love with them?” (p. 178). This question illustrates the two themes of the author in critically evaluating how Christians have viewed Muslims as an enemy to be conquered and in proposing that we rather reach out in love, getting to know Muslims at a personal level with a willingness to recognize a sincere seeking after God. These two approaches to Islam are represented respectively by the Crusades and by the missionary efforts of St. Francis of Assisi during the Crusades.

Throughout her work, the author presents personal anecdotes of encounters with Muslims as well as quotations from Muslim authors as illustrations to demonstrate the fallacy of many Western Christian assumptions about Islam and Muslims. Although written before the events of 9/11, this message that all Muslims are not uniformly terrorists bent on taking over the world is perhaps more relevant now than ever. The author rightly points out that many Christians in the West who fear Islam have never gotten to know a Muslim at a personal level. That is why the anecdotal approach of this book is so helpful—it allows us to hear and see real, living Muslim men and women through the experience of one who married into a Muslim family by marrying a convert from Islam, and who spent much time in Muslim communities in North Africa and the Middle East.

After an introductory chapter, Mallouhi introduces us to St. Francis and reflects on his life and teaching in a devotional manner. His efforts to preach the gospel to Muslims, however, are not described until much later in the book. In the next chapter, she reviews the history of Christian encounters with Islam, beginning with a brief summary of early encounters and then moving on to Crusades which are seen as a prototype of how Christians have dealt with Islam for most of their history. The author admits that her approach is lopsided in describing Christian atrocities in greater detail than Muslim ones, but justifies her approach in that she is writing for a Christian audience to challenge them to re-evaluate their behavior. In my opinion, however, a greater weakness is the adoption of the Crusades as a prototype of Muslim-Christian relations. While Europe was definitely influenced by the experience of raising armies and the reports of battles, these battles restricted to Mediterranean coastlands did not loom so large in the imagination of the vaster geographical region under Muslim control. Their perception of Christianity had been shaped much more decisively by the earlier encounters with Christian theologians and scholars as Muslims conquered territories populated primarily with Christians—Iraq, Syria, Egypt, North Africa and Spain. The current preoccupation with the Crusades in Muslim writings is more a product of post-colonial reflection on that history, than it is of the Muslim historians of that time.

The fourth chapter on “The Problem of Palestine” at first seems to detract from the unity of the book, dealing as it does with a problem local to one region that involves Arabs (both Muslim and Christian) and Jews, rather than Muslims and Christians. However, as is clearly presented, Western Christian attitudes toward this issue are very much shaped by the prejudices and assumptions Mallouhi is seeking to address. Furthermore, the relevance of the problem extends much beyond the Palestinian or even Arab world, and is a vital element in the perception of the West by Muslims in every country. Nevertheless, not enough emphasis is given to the fact that the majority of Muslims are not Arab. Although understandably restricted by the author’s personal experience, it would have been helpful to examine the expressions of Islam in other regions such as Central Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia. For example, Sufism in India and Pakistan is much more a part of traditional Islam, including the school of thought from which the Taliban and the Tablighi Jamaëat have sprung.

After these discussions of historical and modern contexts, the book addresses current Christian attitudes towards Muslims and makes a plea to move from “crusading” approaches (such as prayer walks in cities in the 10/40 window) to an approach patterned after the practice of St. Francis—loving individual Muslims and demonstrating Christ in our daily lives with them. Much emphasis is placed on recognizing similarities between the two faiths rather than fighting over the differences, though those are candidly acknowledged. The author encourages us to get to know Muslims intimately and recognize their spiritual quest after God as legitimate. Her presentation of the pillars of Islam is a delightful, sympathetic description. She ends with closer examination of the mystical approach of St. Francis and that of Muslim Sufis, seeking parallels in their practices and inner longings. Although I appreciate the effort to find points of contact in the mystical aspects of the two faiths, I am reluctant to dismiss the importance of theological statements of faith in favour of the recognition of their longing for God, as readily as the author seems to do. All in all, I think this is a valuable resource to encourage Western Christians to re-examine their prejudices towards Islam.

Copyright © 2003 Evangelism and Missions Information Service (EMIS). All rights reserved. Not to be reproduced or copied in any form without written permission from EMIS.

GoToOlder PostNewer PostAll PostsBook ReviewsEMQSectionVolume 39 - Issue 2

Comments are closed.

Subscribe to Our Mailing List

Keep up to date with our community.

Menu

  • Join
  • Directories
  • Events
  • Donate

About

  • Who We Are
  • Statement of Faith
  • Awards
  • Resources

Help

  • Contact Us
  • Terms
  • Cookies Policy

Connect

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Google+

PO Box 398
Wheaton, IL 60187-0398

Phone: 770.457.6677
678.392.4577

© Missio Nexus.
All Rights Reserved.

Membership website powered by MembershipWorks