Who Defines Perfection?

I was recently forwarded the following question from a Muslim living in the DFW area, and clearly conversant with Christian theology and scripture. Looking at it might help us clarify some of the  issues that are part of interfaith dialogue at that level of theology. 

"Now the question: James in his Epistle mentions "the Father of Lights" with whom there is no shadow of change. This is a clear statement on the Eternal, Absolute, and Perfect nature and attributes of God. If one agrees with this how can one maintain that Jesus is one of Trinity. Becoming human means change which is impossible with God. It also means a degradation of his Perfect attributes. Jesus himself is a witness to this degradtion, when he says only the Father knows the coming of the Hour (recorded by both Matthew and Mark, I believe). Theoretically, this does not add up. Could you please comment.”

It’s useful to begin with what is least obvious in this question, that we find here a Muslim interpretation of Christian scripture that yields an internal inconsistency within Christian scripture. But of course the internal inconsistency isn’t in Christian scripture. It is an internal inconsistency in a Muslim reading of Christian scripture. Some Christians do exactly the same thing with the Qur’an. 

The idea that statements in scripture, propositions to use the common Christian term, must be consistent is a problem for all religions with a written text. Prior to the Enlightenment this wasn’t such a serious problem in Christian theology because each passage was assumed to have multiple meanings. Inconsistency at a literal level might be resolved in the realm of ethics or analogy. But the Enlightenment se-sacalization of scripture left Christians facing social pressure to regard the Bible as just a book of propositions whose internal consistency was supposedly a problem. 

Interestingly Muslims rather early faced the problem of consistency in the Qur’an. Interpreted literally, the Qur’an attributes to God all sorts of imperfect attributes related to change. God speaks, reaches out, etc. Noting this led to the first great theological rift in Islam, pitting the Mutazila against the Hanbalis. The latter prevailed and Muslims were obliged to believe apparently inconsistent statements in order to preserve the integrity and eternity of the Qur’an. What humans could not resolve God would resolve in God’s time. More importantly, God would not be subservient to mere human reason. 

Ultimately for Christians and Muslims, not to mention Jews and others, the sacredness of the text (whoever conceived) is its most important attribute, not its internal consistency as understood by finite human minds. All religions in the modern era must tread carefully between the Scylla of abandoning all rational interpretation to preserve the sacred character of scripture and the Charybdus of reducing it to a flawed but interpretable work of human hands. 

Moving to the specific metaphysical issue: 

From a Christian perspective the doctrine of the Trinity is exactly the doctrine that describes the perfection of God’s attributes. Christianity isn’t responsible to an understanding of God developed within Greek philosophy. And thus it need not ascribe “perfection” to that which is unchanging in the Greek sense. Certainly the Bible asserts at times that God is unchanging. But that can (and really is) the assertion that God is unchanging in love for God’s creation and people. In fact the incarnation reveals the perfection of God’s unchanging love. James’ use of the term “Father of Lights” has no meaning apart from the assertion “Father of the Son, Jesus Christ with the Holy Spirit.” 

Put in other words, for Christians the meaning of the word “God” (or Elohim/YHWH, Theos, Deus, and for that matter Allah) is defined by God’s self-revelation in Jesus Christ. We know God fully only because we know God’s Son as God’s Son who with the Holy Spirit defines both God’s internal life and God’s relationship to the world. So-called natural revelation is limited in its capacity to show God’s true nature. 

And again, this isn’t a problem unknown to the world of Islamic thought. While the Qur’an is the “mother of all revelation,” existing unchanged in eternity, its meaning cannot be grasped apart from the Prophet and his words and sayings. To seek knowledge of God’s nature apart from the Sunnah would be, would it not, folly? Or even heresy? And beyond that does not the Ummah have a role in at least providing limits to orthodox interpretation and theology? “My people will never agree on an error.” 

So to address the question above. There is no inconsistency within a Christian interpretation of scripture, although there may be (as there are among Muslims) disagreements among Christians. And this is because the meaning of scripture is found only within the Christian community that regards it as scripture. Those outside the community have no standing as interpreters.

Of course this leaves a problem: while it is easy to assert that God as understood by Christians is not the God described by the Greeks, it is harder to assert that God as understood by Christians is not the God of the Jews or for that matter Muslims. We all describe God as the one and only God and relate this God to both Israel and Jesus. Therefore our various Gods must be the same God, or no God at all. We are each, in the other’s eyes, heretics. Which is better than being atheists.

To my knowledge in the last 1300 years we’ve never succeeded in convincing one other to give up  heresy and embrace our respective views of God. We might want to abandon the effort, and instead work on the things we can and do agree on in terms of doing justice in the world. But in a sense this is just what James advises in his letter: “You say you have faith without works, I will show by my works, my faith.” That is surely something we can all strive to do.