Do Christians and Muslims Believe in the Same God? Reflections on Miroslav Volf's Allah: A Christian Response

Abstract

Miroslav Volf's Allah: A Christian Response is an important book that advances Christian–Muslim dialogue. This article outlines Volf's thesis, critically evaluates some key claims made in the book, and examines some of the methodological presuppositions in Volf's project. It also seeks to situate Volf's claim about the “same God” within a Christian typology of “revelation” so that the significance of his claims might be better understood.

Keywords:

• Miroslav Volf
• God
• Allāh
• revelation
• ethics

Acknowledgement

I am grateful to Reza Shah-Kazemi for his generous critical response to this paper. I am also indebted to Sven Ensminger, Rev. Dr Damian Howard, Rev. Dr David Marshall, and especially Prof. Miroslov Volf, who engaged in his customary generous and charitable exchange regarding two early drafts.

Notes

This had already been argued by Nicholas of Cusa (1995), and more recently by authors such as Rowan Williams (2004), Christian Troll (2012, 25–29), Robert Caspar (1992) and others.

Detailed accounts of this view and the complexities involved can be found in Capéran (1912), Daniélou (1957), and Dupuis (1977, 53–157). Not all Christians would be happy to subscribe to it and it does not have a dogmatic status as such, but it seems a helpful way to proceed.

See the Vatican II document Lumen Gentium (Paul VI 1964, 14–16); and further elaboration in D'Costa (2011); and, for the working out of the salvific implications of this, D'Costa (2010, 161–211).

See, for example, Ruether 1980. See also my questioning of this position in D'Costa (2012), with two responses.

These are the terms used in Dominus Iesus, a formal document of the Roman Catholic Church (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith 2000, 22).

See, for example, Pope John Paul II, Veritatis Splendor (1993, 4, 12, 40).

And see also the excellent discussion in Marshall (1999, 78–88).