DAR AL HARB - U.S.A. - MASSACHUSETTS: NOT ALL CHRISTIAN & MOSLEM HISTORY IS 'HOSTILE'

Christian-Muslim history not all hostile

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While "it's not like they're all coming together and singing 'Kumbaya,' " Syriac Christians found crossroads of cooperation with their Muslim rulers, he says. Excerpts from a recent interview with Penn follow.

Q Obviously you speak or read Syriac. How many people do these days?

A Very, very few. It is a liturgical language in various Syriac churches. We're talking, in terms of Western scholars, a few hundred. In terms of the United States, there may be a few dozen people who are working in Syriac Christianity.

Q What documents are you studying?

A They're literally cowhide. Most of them no one has looked at in over a thousand years. A number are copies of copies of copies, written only 400 or 200 years ago, copies of stuff that are a lot more ancient. There's one story of a person who allegedly was martyred by Muslims because they thought he was a convert to Christianity. The veracity of the story is questionable, but it's important because it tells us what people [were] talking about.

Q I'm assuming none of these ancient writers was gracious enough to leave "A History of Muslim-Christian Relations." The documents you're reading -- are they Scripture, business records, diaries?

A Some are attempts at writing history. Outside of the Koran, [these are] our earliest accounts of Islam. We have letters from [Christian] bishops and patriarchs, everything from talking about "how do we try to decrease taxes" to "how can we use Muslim rulers to help minimize the threat of other Christians who we don't like." We have a number of apocalypses -- think of the Book of Revelation, but updated -- talking about the end of the world. A number of Syriac Christians believe that the rise of Islam is the harbinger of the end of time. We get story collections about different holy men. We also have collections of canon law.

Q The $64,000 question: What have you learned that we didn't know?

A You get tons of different depictions of Muslims. Some are antagonistic: They will talk about Muslims as horrible conquerors, murderers, sexual perverts, God's wrath, as a people that God will eventually destroy. At the same time, we can have, for example, a Christian bishop in the 650s who writes that Arabs aren't opposed to Christianity, they respect our religion, honor priests and holy men. We have records of Muslim rulers helping fund Christian monasteries.
I came across a document that I really don't think anyone has read in a thousand years, which is an extended prayer by a Christian on behalf of a Muslim ruler, claiming that the ruler is chosen by God to lead the Christians, just as God chose Moses and David to lead Israel. We have, in the seventh century, canon law saying that Christians could perform a kind of last rites over a Muslim, that Christian priests can exorcise and heal Muslims using Christian relics. . . . We have stories about a bishop who goes out in the middle of the night because there's a Muslim thief who's stealing only because he's poor. The bishop gives him a lot of money to start a new life. It's almost like a "Les Mis" story. It's not all altruistic. Christian bishops often see their main opponents not as Muslims but other Christians. What you don't get is Christians who are being extensively martyred for their faith.

Q What implications for our current situation [does] this suggest?

A It's so quick for us to try to put the encounters of two religious traditions into a five-second sound bite, a "clash of civilizations." This research suggests that even from its very beginning, Christian and Muslim relations were not solely antagonistic. I'm beginning to get hints that there is overlap. [Sources] talk about folks they call Christian who proclaim that Jesus isn't the Messiah. You have folks Muslim rulers consider Muslim, yet the person is confessing Jesus as the Messiah.



Pertinent Links:

1) Christian-Muslim history not all hostile