Editorial

There is a very specific focus in this issue of Theology upon women writing on biblical and pastoral issues. I am very keen to encourage more women to contribute articles and reviews to Theology, so it is a great delight to be able to have four women (and one man writing about women) doing so this time. Professor Ann Loades, at Durham for many years and now at St Andrews, opens with a literary meditation upon poor Lazarus, as our latest addition to Difficult Texts. Then: Emma Percy asks the splendid question: ‘Can a eunuch be baptized?’; Che Seabourne writes on ‘New directions in redaction criticism and women’; Beverley Jameson on ‘Permission to rant’; and finally Mari Joerstad on Jeremiah and intercession. Quite a feast.

From an earlier editorial (January 2016) you will have gathered that Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks is my favourite Jewish writer. Professor Mona Siddiqui, however, is my favourite Muslim writer. Both write as scholars and practising people of faith who also can relate knowledgeably and eirenically to the other Abrahamic faith traditions and to wider secular Western culture. Mona Siddiqui’s recent book Hospitality and Islam: Welcoming in God’s Name (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2015, 274 pp.: 9780300211863, $38, hbk) offers a rich account of hospitality in Islamic and Christian history contrasted sympathetically with secular writings on hospitality. She argues that Islamic (and Christian) understandings of hospitality are deepened and enriched by a belief in God:

In the Qur’an … hospitality is first and foremost a duty towards others, and a way of living in which we are constantly reminded of human diversity. There are overlapping discourses on food as a blessing to be shared with others and food as a means of enjoying the company of others. There are multiple commandments to give charity and shelter, to feed others, to look after widows, neighbours, travellers and orphans. We must give and be generous because this is how God is and God’s giving knows no limits. Hospitality is not necessarily premised on pleasure, and yet pleasure enhances the experience of doing hospitality. (Hospitality and Islam, pp. 12–13)

She is well aware that critics of Islam have argued, at least since medieval times, that Muslims are too preoccupied with physical/sensuous rewards in the next life in return for good works (including hospitality and charitable giving) done in this life. However, she maintains that this rests upon a highly superficial view of Islam and of the Qur’an in particular. The latter, she points out, uses separate Arabic words to differentiate between charitable giving that is a required duty (one of the five pillars of Islam) and charitable giving that goes beyond duty. And the fundamental premise of all good work is compassion (she points out that the Arabic word for compassion/mercy rahma has the same root as the word for womb rahim). It is God’s compassion to us that should inspire us to be compassionate to each other. Indeed, every chapter but one in the Qur’an begins with the invocation: ‘In the name of God, the Lord of Mercy/Compassion, the Giver of Mercy/Compassion’:

It is to God we turn for all our needs, for God is always the ultimate refuge. If the structural context implicit in the devotional vocabulary of Christianity is different from than that of Islam, the practical obligation to show care and hospitality remains the same. I would contend that offering hospitality [especially to the stranger] as a way of imitating the divine, as well as being obedient to God, is embedded in the rich vocabulary of charity, generosity, mercy and compassion which permeates the entire Qur’an. (Hospitality and Islam, pp. 124–5)

At a time of deep international concern about the so-called refugee crisis this reminder is especially important. Hospitality to the stranger in need has long been a strong moral imperative within Judaism, Christianity and Islam even if their adherents have sometimes ignored it. This imperative is not simply based upon feeling sorry for the dislocated and needy (although that is important). It derives from a belief about God’s prior compassion for us and from faith that we do not live in a fortuitous universe but in a universe created through love and compassion. Muslims share this key value with Jews and Christians. Mona Siddiqui and Jonathan Sacks are excellent guides for thoughtful Christians.