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" Witnessing God: Missiology through Neo-Calvinism, Islamic Reformism, and Comparative Theology "
Massad, Alexander Ellis
Mouw, Richard J.
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Latin Dissertation
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English
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| Record Number
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1054041
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| Doc. No
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TL53158
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| Main Entry
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Massad, Alexander Ellis
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| Title & Author
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Witnessing God: Missiology through Neo-Calvinism, Islamic Reformism, and Comparative Theology\ Massad, Alexander EllisMouw, Richard J.
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| College
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Fuller Theological Seminary, School of Intercultural Studies
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| Date
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2020
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| Degree
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Ph.D.
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2020
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| Note
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388 p.
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| Abstract
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This dissertation develops a missiological comparative theology through Neo-Calvinist and Sunni Reformist thought concerning the following question: Can Christians and Muslims maintain exclusivist soteriological claims of their respective traditions while maintaining a posture of vulnerability towards the revisionary power of the religious other’s claims? Through an examination of the unexplored missiological foundations of comparative theology through a dialogical study of Neo-Calvinist and Reformist Sunni understandings of the religious other I propose the following thesis: a missiological comparative theology appreciates the kerygmatic moment implicit in Francis Clooney’s comparative theology, it extends comparative theology’s a posteriori autobiographical enquiry into soteriological exclusivist theologies, and highlights the uneasy ethical dimensions implicit in theological categories employed in comparative projects. The dissertation proceeds in four parts. Part one establishes the dissertation in the field of comparative theology and argues that Clooney’s comparative theology contains an unexplored kerygmatic moment, which opens up the practice to missiology. Through an examination of Hugh Nicholson, David Clairmont, and Amos Yong’s engagement with comparative theology I conclude that comparative theology offers evangelically minded Christian theologians a means to denaturalize religious identity through examining ethically problematic histories of inter-religious engagements. Part two of the dissertation justifies a Neo-Calvinist foundation for comparative theology and questions the tradition’s a priori presuppositional approach towards other religions that utilizes Muslims as the religious other par excellence. Part three examines Rashīd Riḍā’s (d. 1935) engagement with European Christians through three principles–ṭa‘n (defamation), taḥrīf (corruption), and da‘wa (calling to faith)–and proposes that Riḍā sought to develop ṭarīq al-da‘wa, which can serve as a point for dialogue with Christian missionaries. I conclude part three with an examination of how contemporary European Muslim imaginatively re-think Muslim non-Muslim relationships based on the concepts of fiṭra and shahāda. Part four reimagines Neo-Calvinist theology of other religions in light of the concepts of da‘wa, fiṭra, and shahāda examined in part three to address problematic historical concepts within contemporary Neo-Calvinist theology. I conclude presenting missiological comparative theology as a means to highlight unexamined antagonistic theological paradigms while promoting the voice of the religious other as constitutive of theologies of mission.
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Comparative religion
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Theology
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Mouw, Richard J.
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Fuller Theological Seminary, School of Intercultural Studies
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