CommuniChristi.

Islam attests God is a oneness.

I have often contemplated that oneness was OK for God, it is only in human hands that absolute power corrupts absolutely.  

Yet would oneness be OK even for God?

I know the Allah entity forbids Muslims to enquire into himself as he prefers to remain unknown.  While for Christians, attesting the incorruptible omnipotence of God does not prevent us from enquiring into the mechanisms through which he maintains his incorruptibility, or his living omnipotence.  Contemplation suggests a consistency about the laws of the universe.  What corrupts in one place corrupts in another.  What lacks love in one place, lacks love in another.   What purifies, loves & gives life in one place, purifies, loves & gives life in another.

Absolute oneness seems a cold, empty & sterile thing.  It is so whole & complete in itself it has no need or motivation to do anything.  Unless we need or want something, none of us would get out of bed to go to work in the morning.   God would not create a universe & all living things, unless it fulfilled some need or purpose in & for himself

Yet God did create a universe, & one which supports life.  Which implies said universe & the life it hosts fulfills some purpose or need in God.   i.e.   God is a living process not a sterile completeness.

Absolute oneness is the sterility of death, Trinity is the dynamics of life.  If absolute oneness is a state so self-contained & complete it is effectively death; I have to assume the God of life made more intelligent choices for himself, & counsels more intelligent choices for we the created as well.

Christianity attests a Godhead of three divine persons who are in a dance of love around each other, each seeking to fulfill the other, & it is the dynamics of this living dance that causes the universe to be.  It is our privilege to be a part of that divine purpose, no matter how humble our part.  Christians live in joint venture partnership with a God who not only wants, but for some purpose of his own, needs the human experiment to succeed.

I find that reassuring.

I also understand why Muslims find no such reassurance in their arbitrary & uncaring Allah entity.

Its nice to be needed.

It is also reassuring to be needed. 

It may be my cynical nature, but even in God I find a greater surety in self interest than I do in pure altruism.   While I accept the true nature of God is unknowable to man; it seems to me that Trinity, a living process driven by its own internal dynamics & needs; must be closer in spirit & intent.  Trinity seems consistent with the living processes which called the universe into being, & which maintain it.  A continuing process of living dynamics always striving higher & higher, which we can depend on to form some other estate when this universe expires.    

By comparison I do not find the oneness of God to be terribly interesting.  Such a stasis of wholeness & self sufficient completeness would have no reason to have called our current universe into being, no reason to maintain it; nor any need to form another estate when this one expires. 

The Bible holds man can only be saved by (incrementally) corrected behaviors, (The living of Torah & Canons) Islam holds man can only be saved by the corrected rituals which form the five pillars of Islam.   Christianity holds corrected behaviors as moral, Islam holds correct ritual as moral.  Both use the word moral, yet there is no common definition.   It is not proven man can by any means contribute to his own salvation; for myself I can see how corrected behaviors might incrementally accrue to a salvation.  (At the very least, corrected behaviors make a better human & a better society in the life we do have)   While I have as much faith in salvation by corrected ritual as I have in salvation by good luck charm. 

Christianity will always attest behavioral change by means of redemption in Christ’s sacrifice for us, the sole hope of mans salvation; & will always attest our higher natures (Isaac) which developed last, shall be first.   We will always hold Islam is welcome to Ishmael, the first born & so called original God.   For ourselves we have a duty of care to Ishmael, (he is the first born & one of Gods beloved children) yet is not sovereign, the last born Isaac was granted dominion.

I attest the Trinity as truly God.   

As for the oneness of God?  My position is any doctrine which does not work for man, & seems not to work for God either, is in some way seriously flawed.  It could not be received direct from the most high God, which causes me to ask why it might be allowed, & why it has attracted a loyal constituency. 

Is there only one standard of measure by which we can validate a religion?  Or are there two?  We cannot posit Christianity & Islam as the same because they are not.  Yet we can posit a God of intelligent design might allow insurance against failure.  Intelligent design means a God who gave Christianity directly, as the sole means of our salvation in the highest; while allowing the Allah entity to give Islam as the ultimate safety net in case we fail at the former.  Thus we cannot evaluate Christianity & Islam by the same criteria as each other, & neither should we.  

There is no way to address the devoutness of the adherents of two faiths, nor to address the otherness off Islam, other than Islam being a specific for an other purpose.  An other purpose that God would prefer to sub-contract out to another party, in order to differentiate from that which is received directly from him. 

 ….Blessed be the names of the Father, the Son & the Holy Ghost… Reign forever…amen… 

                              Ken Maynard   e-mail…    communichristi@gmail.com   

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