Introduction
One of the constant challenges related to the issue of credibility in Church teachings is whether there is a continuity of teaching when there is a perception that there has been a serious change. This particular problem is especially germane to the teachings of Vatican II on other religions, and especially Islam. Archbishop Lefebvre was not alone in questioning whether the Council had introduced novel teachings and also contradicted previous magisterial statements about Islam. Hence I will look at the question of credibility in the light of the debate regarding continuity, discontinuity and reform within Vatican II. The need for continuity should not be viewed as an innate conservativism, but rather as a concern to preserve true teachings and transmit them in new situations.
With a change of culture questions of credibility arise as meanings are always culturally mediated. Vatican II was operating within what Bernard Lonergan called a paradigm shift in culture.Footnote 1 This shift related not only to methods in theology but also to a radical religiously pluralist culture in the modern period. No longer did Catholic civil powers have any significant authority over Muslim populations. In fact, quite the contrary state existed in the 1960s with Catholics living as minorities in Muslim majority countries. Further, after a long tradition where Islam was understood culturally as a Christian heresy, in the modern period many Catholic scholars began to treat Islam as a “different” religion and promoted the study of Islam in a rigourous scholarly fashion. It was evident that many Muslims never knew the truths of Catholicism, let alone rejected them or consciously misinterpreted them by following Islam.Footnote 2 And if they did know the teachings of Catholicism but not in their heart they may reject them in “good faith”, that is, not with a clear sense of sinfully rejecting what they know to be the truth. In major European cities Catholics would meet and even marry Muslims and many would enjoy good friendships with wonderful, challenging, and religiously impressive people. While 9/11 changed the landscape in many ways, the 60s enjoyed a different climate in Europe. All these factors required a serious rethink about the Church's attitude towards Islam. Historically, with exceptions, earlier relations had been contextualised by military tensions, land disputes, and a theology of denigration regarding Muhammad.
I want to raise the question here whether Lumen Gentium 16 and Nostra Aetate 3, in which are the only two references to Islam in Vatican II, constitute a credible shift in Catholic teaching given the shift in circumstances and I want to also ask whether that shift represents a continuity or discontinuity from the traditions of the Church, or indeed both.Footnote 3
This latter question can be framed in the light of the current debate related to the interpretation of Vatican II.Footnote 4 The terminological state of the debate is both fraught and sometimes ambiguous. For example, Pope Benedict XVI has spoken about two schools of interpretation: one emphasising “continuity and reform” and the other emphasising “discontinuity and rupture”.Footnote 5 Some commentators on this text have located ‘discontinuity’ as a critique of the Lefebvre traditionalists, while others have seen in this allocution a critique of Alberigo and the Bologna school, which has become associated with discontinuity.Footnote 6 However, Benedict actually includes in the concept “continuity” a level of discontinuity in terms of contexts changing in radical ways, precisely as modernity constitutes a radical change of historical circumstance.Footnote 7 He writes, with nuance: “It is precisely in this combination of continuity and discontinuity at different levels that the very nature of true reform consists. In this process of innovation in continuity we must learn to understand more practically than before that the Church's decisions on contingent matters – for example, certain practical forms of liberalism or a free interpretation of the Bible – should necessarily be contingent themselves, precisely because they refer to a specific reality that is changeable in itself. It was necessary to learn to recognize that in these decisions it is only the principles that express the permanent aspect, since they remain as an undercurrent, motivating decisions from within” (xiii). The magisterium's teaching can change in different circumstances, without making the previous teaching wrong, as long as one can show that the principles of continuity apply even to a teaching that at first sight seems at variance with an older teaching. Benedict is acutely aware that this applied to other religions, though he gives Judaism as the example, but Islam could count equally well (xiii).
So much for continuity and discontinuity. The word “reform” is equally fraught. On the one hand there is good evidence that Congar's use of the term may have influenced John XXIII, and subsequently Paul VI, and may thus be in the background in Benedict's usage. Congar did not assume any change in the deposit of faith or authoritative doctrinal teachings through the necessary process of reform.Footnote 8 On the other hand, “reform” is seen by some as the reform of doctrine that is irreformable. These voices are heard from both the radical left and right (if one permits such terms simply to make a point). Certainly among some who have been called “traditionalists”, Vatican II was seen as heretical in its teachings on Islam.Footnote 9
I summarise briefly what I take to be an acceptable hermeneutical approach to the Council texts. I will assume that there can be no change of dogma or a radical change in authoritatively taught doctrinal matters. The changes that normally take place are related to (a) using a doctrinal principle or teaching that may or may not have a venerable tradition and applying it in different contexts (e.g. once capital punishment was justifiable and now it is very difficult to justify)Footnote 10 or (b) bringing to bear another second doctrinal principle that has not been related to the problem and thus affecting the application of the first principle. (e.g. “error has no rights” now being balanced, not rejected, in Dignitatis Humanae with the social doctrine of the civic freedom to follow one's religion, within limits).Footnote 11 If the teaching principle has no precedent then technically the question of discontinuity or continuity is inappropriate. The application of the teaching in different contexts is what might be termed pastoral, while not forgetting that the different contexts themselves will generate shifts in the understanding and grasp of the principle as it existed explicitly. It is thus inevitable that change will sometimes appear as discontinuous precisely so that a continuity of doctrinal teaching can be facilitated.Footnote 12
All this is clear, although what is not so clear is identifying binding doctrine in the Council texts. Since the tradition of ‘theological notes’ has fallen away, grading the authority and nature of teachings is a more difficult task.Footnote 13 And since the genre of the Council documents is quite radical, the difficulties are compounded.Footnote 14Finally, the Catholic Church in the modern period has been developing a doctrine related to the development of doctrine, so that the basic concepts of “change” and “development” are not at stake, or should not be. Presumably they are presupposed by most parties concerned as a fundamental Catholic idea.Footnote 15
Continuity and discontinuity in the case of the Catholic Church's teachings on Islam
There is perhaps some humour when we look at the genealogy of this teaching. Initially when the Catholic Church had been canvassed regarding matters for the Council's agenda there were no responses suggesting Islam be addressed, other than to condemn it, nor much interest in addressing the question of other religions.Footnote 16 It was perhaps the blessings of this non-democratic church that Pope John XXIII was friends with Jules Isaac, the Jewish historian. Isaac, if some accounts are to be believed, prompted John XXIII to request Cardinal Bea to address (and drop) the charge of deicide made against the Jews within the Christian tradition. This draft on the Jewish people caused an adverse response in the Arab Muslim world and generated requests from bishops in Arab countries that there be positive statement about Muslims. Hence, the Jews might be said to have helped the Muslims, as constructed by the Catholics. Another personal papal friendship also played an important role. Paul VI's friendship with Louis Massignon perhaps proved equally significant as Pope John's with Jules Isaac in pushing the Council in a certain direction.Footnote 17
I will focus exclusively on what appears to be a matter of doctrinal teaching regarding Islam, which at face value is both novel and discontinuous. Lumen Gentium 16 says: that Muslims “nobiscum Deum adorant unicum”, “adore with us the one God”. The conjunction ‘nobiscum’ (with us) indicates that the Church's teaching is not related to a phenomenological description of Islam, but affirms a theological assessment that Islam's God is also the same God as worshipped by Catholics. So I will first briefly set out the Council's teaching before then asking about the novelty and doctrinal status of this teaching.
Lumen Gentium, promulgated November 1964
Following the rules set out for interpreting the Council in the 1985 Synod, I will begin with the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church as illuminating the teachings in Nostra Aetate, a decree.Footnote 18 It is clear from the Acta that the Council Fathers understood that Nostra Aetate was a further elaboration of Lumen Gentium's comments. Lumen Gentium 16 says: “But the plan of salvation also embraces those who acknowledge the creator, and amongst these the Muslims are first; they profess to hold the faith of Abraham and along with us they worship the one merciful God who will judge humanity on the last day.”Footnote 19 Four points are helpful in understanding the context of this remarkable and important sentence.
First, paragraph 16 occurs after the treatment of the relationship of the Church and other Christian bodies. It begins by noting that the gospel is related to the “people of God” in various ways, using the term ordinatur (related to, ordained towards) to distinguish a different level of relationship from the previous groups that have been denoted firstly as incorporantur (incorporated: Roman Catholics), coniunguntur (joined to: catechumens), and coniunctam (conjoined with: other Christians – they are coniunguntur with Christ in LG 15). The use of ordinatur clearly indicates a distinct difference between non-Christian religions and other Christian denominations, a distinction based on baptism and full incorporation into the Church.
Second, paragraph 16 in one broad stroke tries to encompass the entire “non-Christian” world, both religious and non-religious, to show how they are all ordained, in different ways, towards the people of God. No one is left outside the scope of God's providential grace.
Third, within this amorphous mass of “non-Christians” it makes distinctions, possibly following Pope Paul VI's encyclical Ecclesiam Suam (1964, 107), which is the only place we find such distinctions in previous magisterial teaching, between the Jewish people, who are closest to the Church, followed by Muslims, and then those who search for the unknown God in shadows and images. This latter shadowy group get a more clarified image and elaboration in Nostra Aetate. In Ecclesiam Suam they are said to be: “the followers of the great Afro-Asiatic religions”. Non-religious persons for Paul VI are on the outer circle which corresponds to LG's structuring.
Fourth, this positive affirmation of Islam must be read within the dual context, on the one hand, of the Church claiming to be the unique means to salvation chosen by God and, on the other hand, the affirmation that God will leave no one without the chance of saving grace if, through no-fault of their own, they do not know the gospel (LG 16 repeats this teaching three times).Footnote 20
Fifth, the Council's teachings on other religions see all these religions within the category of praeparatio evangelicae.Footnote 21 That means that the truth, goodness and beauty they may contain are all steps towards the fullness of the gospel but are not commensurate or equal to the truth of the gospel.
Sixth, the Dogmatic Constitution on Revelation makes it clear that “The Christian dispensation, therefore, as the new and definitive covenant, will never pass away, and we now await no further new public revelation before the glorious manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Dei Verbum 4). This a priori rules out the possibility that Muhammad or the Qur'an could be understood within the category of public revelation. It does not rule out the possibility that both could in principle testify to the true revelation witnessed to in Jewish-Christian scripture. The Council Fathers would steer clear of this implied issue as there was no consensus on the status of the Prophet or the Qur'an amongst Catholic scholars.Footnote 22
So what does this single sentence “along with us they worship the one merciful God who will judge humanity on the last day” amount to? To many, including Robert Caspar and George Anawati who were both enlisted onto the drafting committee of LG and NA, along with Nostra Aetate itself, it signifies a “radical change” in the attitude of the Church towards Islam. Caspar calls it a “revolution, in the Copernican sense of the word”Footnote 23; and Anawati, calls it an “advance in the Church's attitude to Islam” after near “constant condemnation” of Islam up until the twentieth-century.Footnote 24
Yet there is a slight problem: these two experts are speaking about Islam, whereas the statement about God that I am focussing on is not per se about Islam but about Muslims. This distinction is contested, but worth noting. Catholic and Muslim scholars, with varying degrees of understanding or criticism, note that Islam is never mentioned in either Lumen Gentium or Nostra Aetate, only Muslims. Some cautious exegetes take this to indicate that Islam, per se, is not in any way being endorsed as a “religion” for as a religion it contains both truth and error, but pious Muslims are being affirmed as being oriented towards the one true God.Footnote 25 Others argue that Muslim believers cannot exist without Islam as a religion, so that the latter should be assumed in the reference to the former. (Caspar and Anawati both hold this position.) Others argue that Islam is actually affirmed in the texts by the choice of the word “submission” in NA 3, for the word denotes the translation of the Arabic, Islam, into English. Others argue that the Latin has been mistranslated and Flannery and Tanner have obscured the explicit reference to Islam.Footnote 26 I agree with the latter two groups. But, the distinction is useful to bring to mind the fact that institutional Islam was criticised by the magisterium in what Anawati calls a classical form: “Islam was necessarily condemned, Mohammed was a false prophet, the Koran was a collection of errors, the truths contained in it had been taken from the Bible, and so on”.Footnote 27 But it is difficult to find any authoritative magisterial teaching saying that the one God in Islam is a false God and the most comprehensive study in this area supports this claim.Footnote 28
In fact there is an interesting prefiguration of this teaching in Pius XII's encyclical Fidei Donum (1957) where Pius speaks critically and descriptively of Islam. He says, without naming Islam or Muslims: “Of course, you know the religious tenets of those people who, although they are quick to profess [profiteri] that they worship God, nevertheless are easily attracting and enticing the minds of many into another path which is not that of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of all nations” (19). The assumption here is that if they were professing the true God, then it would lead to Christ. But if we now insert the presupposition that a Muslim might profess to worship the one God and might not knowingly and intentionally deny the truth allied to this, namely: the incarnation, then Pius’ statement need not be understood as a clear doctrinal statement that Muslims do not believe in the one God. The positive teaching is prefigured in the interesting way the Latin profitentes is now used in LG to refer to the fact that Muslims “profess to hold the faith of Abraham and along with us they worship the one merciful God … ” So while there may be a historical shift in a positive attitude towards the “religion” Islam, there is no clear discontinuity in now affirming that the one God professed in the prayers of Muslims is the true God.
Before moving to Nostra Aetate, it is worth commenting on the curious phrase “and along with us” they worship the one merciful God. Andrew Unsworth makes a very convincing argument that this phrase derives from Paul VI, who used it first when speaking French in Bethlehem in January 1964, who said on that occasion that “those who profess monotheism and with us render religious worship to the one true God, the living and supreme God, the God of Abraham, the most high… May these peoples, adorers of the one God (adorateurs d'un Dieu unique), also welcome our best wishes for peace in justice”.Footnote 29 Unsworth makes the argument that Paul VI was probably drawing from his close following of Massignon and secondarily from Jean Daniélou and Henri de Lubac, who were also dependent on Massignon. They all emphasise “adoration” and “prayer” as the traits that are to be valued highly in Islam, even though they all equally felt that Islam's fulfilment lay in Jesus Christ.Footnote 30 The expression then found its way into Ecclesiam Suam, 107 (August 1964): “there are those who, it is said, adore God [Deum adorant] according to a monotheistic form of religion, especially the Muslims who adhere strictly to this way”. The drafting committee of Lumen Gentium would have had Ecclesiam Suam to hand and clear evidence of this is that Paul VI's concentric circles of closeness are employed by both LG and NA, with the latter providing more finesse. The certain influence of Massignon on Paul VI both intellectually and personally as well as on Casper and Anawati is significant, as is the fact that the two most decisive contributions from the floor of the Council regarding Nostra Aetate came from students of Massignon: Melkite patriarch Maximos IV (Saigh) and Archbishop Descuffi.Footnote 31 It is significant in this double sense that Massignon saw in Islam's adoration of the true God a genuine longing for Christ (especially exemplified in the mystic Hallaj) and a clear recognition that conversion to Christ would fulfil the longing inherent with Islam.Footnote 32
Nostra Aetate, promulgated October 1965
NA finally leads us to the magisterial “tradition” in terms of judging the question of novelty and status of this teaching. It stacks the decks in one direction by providing a supporting quotation regarding a teaching from Pope Gregory VII in 1076! It indicates, despite Cardinal Bea's formal relatio to the document, that there is magisterial precedence in the Church's teachings.Footnote 33
Paragraph 3 of NA says: “The church also looks upon Muslims with respect. They worship the one God living and subsistent, merciful and Almighty, creator of heaven and Earth, [note 5] who has spoken to humanity and to whose decrees, even the hidden ones, they seek to submit themselves wholeheartedly, just as Abraham, to whom the Islamic faith readily relates itself, submitted to God”. The note cites Pope Gregory VII in his letter to al-Nasir (1076), King of Mauritania. There is considerable scholarly discussion as to the interpretation and intention of Gregory's letterFootnote 34 but the passage cited from Gregory's letter says the following: “God, the creator of all, without whom we cannot do or even think anything that is good, has inspired to your heart this act of kindness. He who enlightens all people coming into the world (John 1.9) has enlightened your mind for this purpose. Almighty God, who desires all people to be saved (1 Timothy 2.4) and none to perish, is well pleased to approve and asked most of all that besides loving God people love others, and do not do to others anything they do not want to be done unto themselves (Matthew 7.12)”. So far, Gregory sounds like a modern Catholic liberal. The most important passage now follows, which makes Gregory sound like John Hick: “We and you must show in a special way to the other nations an example of this charity, for we believe and confess one God, although in different ways [licet diverso modo], and praise and worship him daily as the creator of all ages and the ruler of this world”.Footnote 35
But rest assured Gregory was not a latter day Hick! Gregory had political motives for making peace with the king, who had just allowed him to ordain a bishop in his, the king's, territory. It is also clear that Gregory would have carried out a crusade if he had had half a chance. In a letter of 1073 Gregory spoke of the Saracens as “a horrible and perverse nation”.Footnote 36 Kedar argues, contextually, that the concluding paragraph probably desires the conversion of the Muslim king to Christianity. Nevertheless, amidst all that, we still have a clear glimpse of a magisterial teaching that says that Christians and Muslims believe and worship the one God [unum Deum]. However, the actual status of the letter as magisterial teaching is unclear. It could be judged (anachronistically) as a low-level papal letter, now promoted by its inclusion in the twenty-first Ecumenical Council of the Catholic Church, but nevertheless, only within a Decree. Most importantly, the Fathers of the Council accepted this letter as a precedent. There were no objections to its inclusion in the debate on the floor. It was accepted as affirming a link with positive magisterial teaching in the eleventh-century.
So was there continuity or discontinuity regarding this doctrinal matter? Nearly all magisterial statements on Islam prior to the nineteenth-century are negative in tone, but one must also remember that in this context nearly all assume: (a) that Islam is a Christian heresy such that Muslims knowingly have perverted the truth of the gospel; (b) that Islam is a Christian heresy in claiming revelation after the closure of the canon; (c) that Islam is a pretender in claiming greater divine authority than that of Christ; (d) that Muhammad and the Qur'an could not be granted legitimate authority as this would contradict the gospel, specifically teachings on the incarnation and trinity; and (e) the expansion of Islam was a direct threat to Catholicism. After the nineteenth-century all but the last of these assumptions became historically problematic. One might say that the discontinuity was not in any doctrinal teaching on the one true God, but a discontinuity in the image of Islam before and after the Council. A doctrinal insight about Islamic monotheism present from very early on seems to be salvaged from the rubble of anti-Muslim rhetoric, rubbed clean and set forth for the world to see. As noted earlier, it is difficult to find criticisms from earlier popes against the doctrine of the one God, although there are lots of criticisms regarding Muhammad and the Qur'an (as one would expect, given the presuppositions held at the time).
One more comment on Nostra Aetate. I want to cite comments from Archbishop Descuffi's intervention, a Latin Rite Archbishop of Smyrna, at the Council on 29 September 1964 when the second draft of NA, which now included a reference to Muslims, was being discussed. Descuffi was an associate of Massignon. His speech on the Council floor contains a unique and radical suggestion: that Islam could be closer to Catholicism than Judaism – and not for anti-Semitic reasons! That comment was not included in the draft in any way, but Unsworth notes that his intervention led to major changes in the final text which includes phrases from his speech. Descuffi reflects the most appreciative assessment of Islam to be found, even while drawing upon the classical “borrowing” thesis, which, I would argue, still undergirds the Council's teachings.Footnote 37 Descuffi argues: “What is said here about their faith in a single personal God who rewards [the just], their religious sense … is undeniable. But let me add, to their credit, that in their religion there are found many elements in common with ours, from which they have borrowed.Footnote 38 Although they have no knowledge of the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Redemption, they nevertheless recognise Jesus Christ as a true prophet … they teach that he will come to judge the living and the dead, including Muslims. They affirm his many miracles, his miraculous birth. They recognise the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, her purity and virginity, her singular perfection, and, praying to her as their Mother with a sincere and devout heart, they confidently ask of and obtain from her remarkable favours, healings and even miracles.… What I am now saying is not a figment of my imagination or the product of exaggeration in the hope of some gain, but the fruit of ten years’ experience, what I have seen for myself in Ephesus, in the place called Panaga Kapula, i.e., the House of Mary, our Lady Mary. For the last ten years I've seen about 100,000 Muslims throughout the year join the same number of Christians and together with them, and this is the only place in the world where this happens, venerate the Virgin Mary the mother of Jesus… If we may add to these particular facts the fact that Muslims observe the natural law of the Decalogue, fasting, almsgiving and prayer, we can see that we find them closer to us than the Jews.’Footnote 39 I cite this to indicate the complex possibilities that are opened even by these cautious steps forward.
Tentative conclusions
Let me return to the original question: are the doctrinal teachings on Islam continuous, discontinuous, and reforming? I'm not entirely sure that the matter under discussion is an “authoritatively taught doctrine” Before Lumen Gentium, and even then, the level of its authority is not entirely clear. Is this now a formal doctrine with magisterial authority: Muslims worship the same God as Catholics? If it is, it is novel in one sense, but is neither continuous nor discontinuous with accepted formal teachings. But it does exemplify the rule I stipulated regarding doctrinal principles. The principle of continuity perhaps can be seen in terms of the affirmation that Muslims worship the true God, but previously this principle was also operative with the assumption that Muslims were heretical and had perverted Christian truths. Herein lies the discontinuity. With the latter assumptions being dropped, we can see that a principle that led to the claim of heresy is now a principle that leads to the claim of commonality in the worship and adoration of the one true God. The principle of continuity is at least linguistically registered by reference to Pope Gregory VII, even if there is some ambiguity about the overall teachings of Gregory VII about Muslims. By that citation we are given an instance of a textual claim that does bear signs of continuity in the teaching of the magisterium from 1076 to 1964! One might also argue that the discontinuity is implicitly acknowledged in paragraph 3b of NA when it says “considerable dissensions and enmities between Christians and Muslims have arisen in the course of the centuries” and urges moving forward to work together to “promote social justice and moral values as well as peace and freedom for all people”. Such discontinuity operates at the level of social context and historical circumstance. It is inevitable that change will sometimes appear as discontinuous precisely so that a continuity of doctrinal teaching can be facilitated. This is clearly illustrated in this case about adoring the same God: from heretical pretender to common ground. The discontinuity is the presupposition of continuity given the changed cultural conditions and the questions of credibility with regard to scholarship and experience. Benedict's analysis of continuity and discontinuity certainly seem to hold in this particular case.
What of the development of doctrine? Subsequent to Vatican II, successive popes have reiterated the teachings of the Council on this point.Footnote 40 The God that Muslims adore is the one God that Christians adore. The significance and meaning of this claim have been developed in different directions by theologians and historians of religion – but the jury is still out. I will briefly mention four trajectories that have developed from this Council teaching. One line of interpretation emphasises that the knowledge of God in Islam is a natural knowledge available through the use of reason aided by grace. This would be in line with Vatican I, that natural knowledge of God was available to all.Footnote 41
The second line of interpretation is that this special knowledge of God is dependent upon the Jewish-Christian tradition and not in any way an affirmation of the status of Muhammad or the Qur'an in terms of revelation or inspiration. However, this is not simply natural knowledge as it is reliant on inspired Jewish-Christian scripture, even if inadequately transmitted and improperly interpreted.Footnote 42
The third line of interpretation is a positive and discriminating appraisal of both the Qur'an and Muhammad as it is argued that the claim regarding the true God must implicitly affirm the partial value of the two mediating forms, although in very different ways.Footnote 43
The fourth group also develops a positive appraisal of Islam but to the extent of arguing that it must be a valid salvific religion – while not always specifying whether this claim is de facto or de jure.Footnote 44 The fourth has been ruled out by Dominus Iesus para. 4, 8; and the third would require careful specification. I would personally support the second and third and while there is mileage in the fourth, only at a level of de facto, the trajectory of this position is inevitably deeply misleading. It obscures the difference in kind of the self-revelation of Jesus Christ compared to any other form of knowledge of God.
I hope I have shown that Vatican II made important moves related to significant cultural shifts and that its teachings have a certain credibility and continuity. It shows that the Catholic Church was able to take difficult, complex and courageous steps, to retain credibility with integrity. That the steps were unplanned and probably hurried and were subject to all sorts of complex socio-historical factors on the Council floor, does not take away from the important advance. The single doctrine regarding Muslims worshipping the same God as Catholics is perhaps the first step in a significant development of doctrine. Its importance can hardly be minimized.
To give this proper attention, the question of the Jews would require exploration, as would the comments regarding Abraham to be found in the Council documents, as well as close attention to the other features of Conciliar teaching on Islam. This paper just touches the tip of a very large iceberg. Its conclusions are thus very provisional and we must also remember that icebergs have sunk ships.
