The upsurge in fundamentalism has its roots in a crisis of confidence in two world faiths, argues Bill Musk. I am convinced that there is a struggle going on for the soul of Islam that is mirrored by an equivalent struggle for the soul of Christianity.
Those twin struggles are at their heart about the certainty to be derived from written, holy texts — the Qur’ân and the Bible.
Insecurity under the surface Nobody needs convincing that religion figures significantly in some of the major controversies currently embroiling our world in violence.
On the surface it might appear that confident people of faith know exactly what they are convinced about, to the extent that they are prepared to struggle for the domination of their particular view over all others.
A look under the surface, however, suggests hints of internal insecurity within each faith — I am here thinking especially of Islam and Christianity, though the claim might well be applied to other faiths at the beginning of the 21st century.
The struggle for the soul of Islam has been provoked by the insistent and powerful voices and deeds of Islamists within recent decades.
Those Islamist voices have insisted that theirs is a more faithful obedience to the Qur’ân. The owners of such voices see themselves as taking the divine word literally, unlike the majority of their orthodox, fellow Muslims. In consequence, they announce themselves as truly muslim, authentically submitted to God.
Two religions — two jihâds The matter of jihâd constitutes a potent nub of the friction between Islamists and their fellow religionists.
Did God intend for jihâd to be a sort of spiritual battle against the world, the flesh and the devil, or did God rather intend it to be a physical battle against his enemies?
How did the Prophet Muhammad respond to the command to wage war on God’s behalf? Did he spiritualise the command or literally obey the command?
To Islamists it is obvious what the plain answers to such questions amount to.
Within Western Christianity, especially, part of the worldview of rightwing or fundamentalistic evangelicals allows a view of Muslims as particularly standing in the way of all that God intends for the world today.
In the USA especially, 21st-century evangelicals have boldly proposed a facing up to some of the breakdown and moral bankruptcy within their society as a whole. The concern of such a “moral majority” for their own nation is nurtured within a theology that has much to say about God’s action in the wider world.
Christian fundamentalists, representatives of whom have tended to gain disproportionate access to policy makers at national level, propose an end-time scenario that pits the people of God against the enemies of God in a desperate battle concluding in Armageddon.
The enemies of God, quickly re-identified since the fall of the Communist USSR in 1991 as including particular Muslim regimes or movements, constitute an “axis of evil” that needs defeating.
Taking on the fundamentalists If orthodox Muslims generally believe that literally obeying God’s word is the duty of Muslims — and they do — how do they deal with those who claim that theirs is a more faithful obedience or submission than the orthodox Muslim community’s?
The Islamists seem to have grabbed the moral and theological high ground. They are the ones martyring themselves in a fight against a rampant, Western, “Christian” oppressor and seeking, in doing so, to fight in the way of God.
They are the ones trumpeting that their interpretation of the Qur’ân is more in line with the heritage derived from Prophet Muhammad’s own example.
If orthodox Christians, especially evangelical Christians, believe that the Bible is the word of God — and they do —– how do they deal with those who claim that theirs is a more faithful obedience to that Word than the orthodox Christian community’s?
The fundamentalistic evangelicals are the ones with a clear, biblical view on what is going on within their own nation and within the world as a whole. Theirs is a black-and-white, all-or-nothing message: “This is God’s will! These are God’s enemies! It’s in the Bible!”
How do you argue with that without looking suspiciously unfaithful to Scripture or unprepared to stand up for what God would want?
How do you avoid ‘the certainty trap’?
The certainty trap 
Bill Musk's new book(Artwork: © William Carey Library)In both religions, the fundamentalists need to be challenged on their hermeneutics, that is, on their approaches to the interpretation of holy text.
That challenge requires a review of how the relevant holy texts came to be – is the history all squeaky clean, or are there some murky, less transparent parts to the stories? How have religious texts historically been received or responded to, both within Islam and Christianity? What kind of dynamics bear upon the interface between divine author, human transmitter(s), recipients and interpreters of holy Scripture?
Within Islam, this is a delicate issue, for the historic bent of Islam is towards fundamentalism, towards literalism. Within Christianity, especially at the evangelical end of the spectrum, this is a delicate issue as well. Anything that looks like undermining the “infallibility” or “inerrancy” of Scripture brings suspicion on the proponent of a more open approach.
Falling into the certainty trap makes us both defensive and antagonistic to each other’s religions and to the world around us. The consequences of this are plain to see.
So, in my book,
The Certainty Trap, I’ve tried to carve out some space where orthodox believers of each faith — both Muslim and Christian — can stand up and be counted.
To avoid the certainty trap, we need to inhabit this more open space where we can treat the holy texts of both religions faithfully — without imprisoning them in a literalist or fundamentalist approach.
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The Certainty Trap,
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Bill Musk is the recently appointed Bishop of North Africa, a new episcopal area within the Diocese of Egypt with North Africa and the Horn of Africa, and is a former CMS mission partner. He has published numerous books on Christianity and Islam.