Our series now brings us to 10:9 in the Qur’an:
Those who believe, and work righteousness,- their Lord will guide them because of their faith: beneath them will flow rivers in gardens of bliss.
The preceding verses have stressed that Allah made the sun and the moon and the consequent ability to measure time. Given this, if people spurn Allah because of their satisfaction with what this world has to offer, then their eternal home will be the Fire of Hell. By contrast, as verse 9 states, those who adhere to Islamic beliefs and practices are assured of a different eternal home - the gardens of bliss beneath which flow rivers.
Verse 9 does not state anything beyond what we have noted already in this series. Paradise is for good Muslims. However, the preceding verses (5-8) invite comparison with Romans 1 and its diagnosis of the human problem:
For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles (Romans 1:20-23).
This is all by way of explaining why “the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven” (Romans 1:18). By contrast with the Qur’an, it is not merely God-denying satisfaction with what this world has to offer that causes people to face eternal condemnation. Rather, it is the suppression of truth, a refusal to respond rightly to God’s self-revelation, that is, a refusal to glorify him and give thanks to him. Indeed, instead of giving glory to God all people, including all Muslims, have exchanged the glory that belongs to the incorruptible God for the “glory” that is deemed to inhere in “the image of the likeness of corruptible man”, along with beastly images.
Idolatry is a far more profound reality than Muslims appreciate. Muslims may feel they are escaping idolatry by insisting on Allah’s oneness. But idolatry is much more subtle than this. It involves treating “man” or “people” as if they were God; depending on our own wisdom and that of others as the basis for living our lives. The irony, of course, is that when we do not ground our lives in God’s self-revelation (”the truth”) then our thinking necessarily becomes futile and our foolish hearts inevitably become darkened.
Paradise is for those who experience God’s gracious intervention in history, in Christ, as they respond to it in faith. As Paul has just stated, citing from Habakkuk 2:4, “The righteous will live by faith” (Romans 1:17). Here “live” connotes the total experience of salvation, culminating in the enjoyment of a consummated relationship with God in Paradise.
Posted August 17, 2009
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