ORTHODOXY AND ISLAM

About the author: Yuri Maksimov is an Orthodox religious scholar, lecturer at the Moscow Theological Academy, member of the Synodal Working Group for the Development of the Concept of Interreligious Relations of the Russian Orthodox Church, author of five books and more than a hundred articles on the relationship between Islam and Christianity, patrology, theology, hagiography, history of Byzantium, etc., some of which have been translated into English, German, Georgian, Romanian, Serbian and Bulgarian.

Content

God

Predestination

Sin

Jesus Christ

Mohammed

Scripture

Posthumous life

How to become an Orthodox Christian?

From the author

The Orthodox Church teaches that all people are created by God in His image and are related to each other, and that Christ's commandments about love for one's neighbor have no boundaries. That is why St. Theodosius of the Caves said: "If you see someone naked or hungry, or in trouble, whether he be a Jew or a Muslim, be merciful to everyone, deliver him from trouble as much as you can, and you will not be deprived of God's reward, for God Himself in the present age pours out His mercies not only on Christians, but also on the infidels" (Testament).

At the same time, it must be understood that the respect, mercy and personal affection that an Orthodox Christian shows to a person of a different faith does not mean sympathy or agreement with the convictions that this person shares. There are insurmountable doctrinal differences between Orthodoxy and Islam on a number of dogmas.

However, as St. Nicholas the Mystic pointed out in a letter to the Caliph al-Muqtadir, "because we are divided by the way of life, manners and objects of worship, of course, we should not be disposed to hostility and deprive ourselves of communion" (1 letter).

Many Christian saints had acquaintances and conversations about faith with Muslims, for example, St. John of Damascus, St. Constantine the Philosopher, St. Theodore of Edessa, St. Samon of Gaza, St. Gregory Palamas. Following their example, the Orthodox Church welcomes dialogue with Muslims aimed at clarifying and witnessing the faith in the face of people of other faiths, with the aim of eliminating errors and misunderstandings, in the words of St. Basil the Great: "If there is any mutual affinity between the teachings, then the knowledge of them will be useful to us. If there is no such affinity, then to study the difference of the teachings, comparing them with each other, will serve a great deal to confirm the best teaching" (Discourse 22).

Although this book is written by a Christian, I have tried to present the Muslim teachings as adequately as possible, based on my ten years of experience in studying them. Over the years, I have had the opportunity to be a participant and witness of many polemical conversations, and I have managed to make sure that the main problem in dialogue is ignorance and misunderstanding of the faith of the interlocutor.

To overcome this problem, this book was written, in which the most important points of the doctrine of Orthodox Christianity and Islam are compared. Namely, the doctrine of God and the related doctrine of predestination, the concept of sin, then the chapters on Jesus Christ and Muhammad, then on the Bible and the Koran, and, finally, the doctrine of life after death.

Each chapter of the book is divided into two parts: the first gives the Muslim teaching on this point, and the second - the Christian one. The tenets of religion are set forth according to its own sources – in the case of Islam, these are the Koran and Sunnah (sacred tradition), early biographies of Muhammad, works of ancient and modern theologians, and in the case of Christianity, the Bible and the Holy Tradition of the Orthodox Church, expressed in the decisions of Councils and in the writings of the Holy Fathers.