Do Christians and muslims worship the same God?

[delericho]

Oh, boy, you picked the *wrong* analogy

Neither "sky blue" nor "midnight blue" is fully characterized by a single wavelength of light. Both are names for *human experiences*

Yes, and they're given different names because they're different human experiences. And while a person may not be able to tell the difference for various reasons (low light, a defect in the eye, whatever), when they're measured objectively it will be found that, sure enough, there are differences.

Is "different things are different" really a controversial statement around here?

 

[Ryujin]

Yes, and they're given different names because they're different human experiences. And while a person may not be able to tell the difference for various reasons (low light, a defect in the eye, whatever), when they're measured objectively it will be found that, sure enough, there are differences.

Is "different things are different" really a controversial statement around here?

See the previous comment about "three blind men describing and elephant" for your answer to that

 

[Staffan]

Out of all of it there are interesting and very clear results. Folks (including well practiced artists) do not has a precise sense of color. Perfect tone does not exist as an analogue to perfect pitch. Color perception is very sensitive to context, meaning, light conditions and adjacency.

Or, in the "a picture is worth more than a thousand words" category:

 

[delericho]

- deleted -

 

[delericho]

See the previous comment about "three blind men describing and elephant" for your answer to that

Aye. I know we've had some ridiculous arguments on here, but I really didn't expect to have so much dispute over a statement that was little more than: this and this are different!

I mean, had I known I would have gone with shades of green - that's a much more controversial colour.

 

[Deset Gled]

Getting suspended for your religious beliefs is to be expected?

In general, no. But at Wheaton College, yes.

Professors at Wheaton are required to reaffirm, in writing, their conformance to the school's Statement of Faith. They literally have to sign a contract on a yearly basis that says their religious beliefs are in line with the school's beliefs.

I'm not saying I agree with this practice. But anyone who works there has to be aware that being fired is an completely expected consequence of publicly making statements that go against the school's doctrine in even the slightest way.

 

[Eltab]

If memory serves (and my apologies to Protestants if I'm misremembering here), the core of the Protestant belief of the Sola Fide is that, since humanity became "entirely depraved" (ie, fell completely into sin), it doesn't matter what a person does, salvation is denied.

This sounds more like Calvin than Luther. But they both could read each others' works.

 

[Umbran]

Yes, and they're given different names because they're different human experiences. And while a person may not be able to tell the difference for various reasons (low light, a defect in the eye, whatever), when they're measured objectively it will be found that, sure enough, there are differences.

Is "different things are different" really a controversial statement around here?

No, you're missing the point - which is that *same* things are different. Or, more to the point, the fact that they are different doesn't mean they aren't the same for our intents and purposes. There are levels of differences that *don't matter* and will mislead you into thinking that difference is meaningful, when it isn't.

Think, for example, human skin color. We have groups of people who are, to appearances and measure of the wavelengths of light that come off their skins, different. But, that difference is not meaningful. They are still part of the same species, and have few other differences that are meaningful. We can measure a difference, but they are still part of the same thing!

This can go especially for theology, where you can have the blind men and the elephant thing going on - just because we can point to differences, doesn't mean we aren't talking about the same thing.

 

[Dog Moon]

As far as I know, they all worship the same God. The Prophets are generally sent down to guide people who have gone astray because if they hadn't gone astray, there would be no reason to send a Prophet.

Jesus was sent down to guide the people, but the Jews refused him. The Christians decided to follow the way of Jesus, following the right path to worship, except they then decided to give Jesus the status of being the son of God and also created the Trinity. This brought them far from the direction that God wanted for them, as can be seen when God sent:

Muhammad, the final Prophet to guide them back from the wrong path. The Christians were committing the most grieveous of sins: shirk (taking other Gods besides God), by raising up Jesus to a Godhood status and God did not appreciate this. He sent Muhammad to guide people in the correct way of worship, thus creating Islam. Muslims believe that Jesus was not the son of God, but was just a Prophet, like Muhammad and all the others who came before.

I can't recall any quotes from the Quran off hand regarding Judaism, but I know there are many times when the Quran speaks of God sending Jesus to the people, how the Christians made his Prophet to become his son, which angered God.

So in the perception of Islam, I believe they all worship the same God, but likely neither of the other two Religions would believe the same thing. If they did, then it would be easier to accept the two Prophets Jesus and Muhammad and there wouldn't be a split in the Religions. After all, if Christians believed that the Muslim God was also their Christian God, then they would need to accept the Prophet Muhammad as another of his Prophets and that the Quran is the word of God and if they did that then they probably would be Muslims and not Christians.

 

[delericho]

No, you're missing the point - which is that *same* things are different. Or, more to the point, the fact that they are different doesn't mean they aren't the same for our intents and purposes. There are levels of differences that *don't matter* and will mislead you into thinking that difference is meaningful, when it isn't.

I haven't missed that point - it's obvious. But what's also true is that sometimes differences, and even small differences, can matter a great deal.

Context is very important in this: On the day we picked up the bridesmaids' dresses for our wedding, the differences between shades of blue could have mattered a great deal.

What isn't clear is whether the differences matter in this case.