The personality of Abd al-Jabbar is a scholar that could be seen to have contributed much in Islamic theology and in so doing influenced many thinkers after him to develop inter-religious competition in trying to question the Christianity’s basic tenets such as the Incarnation and Trinity in relation to the divinity of Christ. Abd al-Jabbar in trying to establish his thought sees Christians as deviating from religion of Christ and would see them as those who practice their invented religion. He did not see Christians worshipping Christ, but only trying to worship like Christ. On this ground he criticized Christians as not following the footsteps of Christ. In the Critique of Christian Origins, he criticized virtually everything that has to do with Christian liturgies and the sacraments, especially, that of reconciliation, the virginity of the Virgin Mary. All these critics from him influenced the thought of Muslims to see Christians as those who are not in conversation with true religion. Thus, while the person of Christ is demeaned, the person of Muhammad becomes Sacrosanct. What we see here is polemics as Christians are seen as those who are not on the right track.

The debates and arguments among Christian, Islamic and Jewish religions as articulated by Hoyland is quite an eye opener for anyone who is yet to discover the value of scripture, tradition, and corresponding dialectical reasoning and logic. They both prove to us the reality of faith and reason in every religious activity. The debates between the Patriarch John I and the emir, and that between the Monk and the Arab are really enjoyable as arrival at consensus, acceptance, and tolerance of the other’s faith and belief were all drawn from the proofs from both scriptures, traditions, and dialectical reasoning and logics based on categorical definitions. To this effect, we observe the toleration and acceptance of the Gospel that was initially rejected by the Muslims after Patriarch John answered before the emir the question arising from there. Also the issue of Christology and Trinity got their proofs both from the scriptures and dialectical reasoning and with that the emir and Arabs to some extent were convinced. However, there is an observation that to some degrees in the debates and arguments that there was no Victor nor vanquished

The consequences of falling from Divine grace

One thing I have come to understand through this article is that God or Christ can allow anything to happen to His followers as a way of showing His dissatisfaction over our attitude. The Arab invasion and raid of Christianity and attack on Christians, according to Sophronius was as a result of Christians’ failure to live up to God’s injunction, that is their failure to live up to their baptismal promises , their inability to appreciate the sacrifice of Christ at the cross through their sinful lives. Hence, as a punishment God allowed the Saracens to invade and attack them to the point of losing their temple and their home just like Adam and Eve lose their paradise-garden of Eden. However, the Christians refer them because of their vengeful character as Barbarians,God-hating, God-fighters who insult the cross, Jesus and the name of God, whose leader is the devil (cfr, Christmas sermon of Sophronius)

While Shari’a laws are antithetical to nationalism, they project and express coherent pluralism , unity, peace , equality, mutual respect, equal opportunities,relationality, and others, one can easily, on this ground identifies them with natural law which among other things is emphasizing on the common good. However, what I don’t seem to understand is whether Shari’a laws mean different thing for different countries. This is because in some developing countries like my country, Nigeria I don’t the Muslims have really understood what the laws entail and what the law required of them. This is a place a particular will have as their “motto”, “born to rule”, this is where a Muslim president will appoint all the service chiefs from one particular tribe and religion, this where a particular section and religion in the country has had it as their birth rate to produce a president of a a supposed secular state. Given this observation one can say that Shari’a laws in principle can be said to have close sameness with natural law, but in practice project nationalistic and communistic principles. Thus the content of the code of Shari’a laws I can say is wrongly applied and as such in praxis has the interest of particular sections and religions. Hence, their assurance social order and social justice is utopian

One of the major ideologies of shi’ites is such a belief that a religious leader is a political leader. The idea which arose from the belief that to establish an order in Islamic order, there should be a divine guidance. To this end, the shi’ites believe that those who belong and are related to the family of Muhammad have had such a privileged position of becoming both religious and political leaders. Given this privileged position I can say that invariably shi’ism is projecting two kinds of leadership which are theocracy and monarchy. Such two leadership types that appear to be antiquated in relation to the contemporary style of choosing of choosing leaders. However, if such a leadership where the Imam is the political leader continues it could always generate a resistance and intolerance in the Islamic community where we have both sunnis and shi’ites living together. I will still maintain that religious leaders should not participate in political leadership, but can offer an advocacy or response to political issues.

The issue of the origin and the evolution of the Islamic law and the root from which it is founded is thought provoking as I did not see any yardstick or the root cause of determining the cumulative doctrine. In trying to differentiate doctrinal schools from the personal schools of thought, certain characteristics of the doctrinal school are highlighted and amongst all of them is the axis of authority that is grounded methodological principles and the substantive positive laws. Granted and accepted as such stands tall for determining a law. However, what I am not coming to terms with is how some schools over time gain acceptance in the doctrinal school against the others. For instance ,Abu Hanifa, Malik, and Shafii. The questions now are, how were their metamorphosis into this doctrinal school determined? Is it based on the approval or the number of followers each school had?, Was there different sources of reference being relied on by these personal schools? If so, it means that certain sources were not taken to be true. In this case one could say just like in the early Christian, these schools that could not make it to the doctrinal school must have set bad precedents which were not to the interest of Islamic religion. Hence, their school might have had in their thoughts some heretical tendencies as it was the case in the early Christianity to have not made it in the doctrinal school.

The inseparability of Muhammad and the Qur’an is one of the fundamental issues that thinkers and scholars of the modern and contemporary time have been grappling with. There is no gainsaying that it has divided these scholars. Some are in favor of the standpoint that the Qur’an is a possible text through which we can know about the personality, the sayings, the life and the actions of Muhammad. The thinkers in this group include majorly Bell and Watt. In their thought, they believed that sunna, Hadith, Asbab al- nuzul and Sira al point to the fact of the life,the sayings, occasions of revelation of some passages and the interpretations , all explain the biography of Muhammad as they all provide useful information about him which was later to be transmitted. However, all these have nothing to do with the historical evidence to show that Muhammad is intimately related to the Qur’an. Thus, there is no sufficient extant materials for a proof. To this end the thinkers and scholars are said to have been theologically driven and motivated as against historiographical proof and for that reason could be described as sanguine scholars.

a My observation in the reading of Hadith and Sunni is that what the Code of canon law does for the church, that is, Catholic church. They share views as both of them contain moral and legal laws which are for the ordering of the religious activities and the regulation of the lives of the adherents or believers. While Hadith is known as the words of prophet Muhammad mainly for the practice of religious obligations, the Code of Canon is the law made by the hierarchical authorities of the Catholic for the same purpose. On the part of the Hadith, there is observable contradiction as the Hadith has shared one meaning. It was initially understood as the book of Allah that was to be guided by Muhammad in such a way that whoever accepts has accepted God in his or her heart. Thus one becomes blessed as he or she adorns his or her heart with the book of Allah-Hdith. Over time Hadith becomes the words of the prophet Muhammad with the character of infallibility. Hence, no person has the authority to add or remove anything from the Hadith as the words of the prophet. Any attempt to do that will be tantamount to blasphemy. To accept it, is an invitation of a blessing and to reject it is an invitation of a curse. From this understanding one sees the latae sententiae interdict which implies the penalty for contravening the Code of Canon law.

Against this background, I see Hadith sharing the same status with the Code of Canon law as they contain both moral, legal and penal codes which regulate religious obligations and the ordering of the external government of the religious organizations. In the light of this I don’t think there should be a contradiction if Hadith is both referred as the word of God through Muhammad since it is believed that the Qur’an which is the Islamic scriptures are revealed to him. The Code of Canon law also shares this “sacrosanctiness”

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— Oscar Wilde.

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