Learn more about the diversity within Islam and how culture and faith link together.
Transcript: Islam, Christianity, Culture, and Faith
Frans: Islam, to a great extent, this is kind of what you do, right? More than what you believe. And that is very that very much determines also the culture around you.
Penny: What is a Muslim? How do culture and faith intersect? Do all followers of Islam believe the same thing? Find out more about the Islamic faith and the diversity among Muslims in today's episode of the Diversity and Inclusion for All podcast.
Welcome to the Diversity and Inclusion for All project supported by Calvin University and the Calvin Institute for Christian Worship. Together, we'll listen to key perspectives, build our knowledge, inform our thinking, and get a little better equipped to engage our world.
Welcome back to our series on understanding Muslim-Christian engagement. I'm honored to again be speaking with our guests, Frans van Liere and Doug Howard, two professors, history professors at Calvin University, with expertise and experiences related to inter-religious, interfaith engagement and learning. Today, we're interested in exploring a little bit through some of the stories and experiences of Frans and Doug, just to glimpse Muslims and Muslim cultures and faith a little bit deeper. I know they each have stories to share from travels that they have done in predominantly Muslim countries, as well as different experiences, opportunities they've had to engage significantly with some of our Muslim neighbors. So with that, I'm going to turn it over and just ask, could you share some of your stories that help us gain some good insights into the diversity among our Muslim neighbors and Islam in the world? And give us some insights into, yeah, Muslim-Christian engagement and how to do it well.
Doug: Well, first, I'd say that while we all understand there are parts of the world where Islam is the predominant tradition, Islam is really everywhere. I don't think there's a single country in the world that doesn't have Muslims in it. Here in the United States, about .9%, so nine-tenths of one percent of the population of the United States is Muslim, which doesn't seem like very much. It's a fairly small percentage, but it does mean that there are three million Muslims in the United States, and that's true everywhere in European countries, even though historically, you know, their their culture has not been Muslim and so on. So what that means to me is that Islam today is extremely diverse. So we find Muslims who are Americans, Muslims who are Germans, Muslims who are Nigerians, Muslims who are Bangladeshis, Muslims who are Russians, and so on. And and therefore, the practice and beliefs of Muslims can be quite different in different places.
Frans: Yeah, I agree with that. I think very often people in in America, in Western countries have the idea of, you know, kind of an ideal idea of what a Muslim country is. And very often that's determined by the Middle Eastern experience and the Arabic experience. But we have to realize that there are other Islamic countries. And my own travels in Indonesia show that there's a completely different way of being Islamic in a different country. Indonesia is a majority Islamic country, but Islam doesn't really look very Middle Eastern there. Even the architecture of of mosques is …there's a lot of local flavor. So I think you can see that Islam has adapted to different cultures. There are different cultural expressions of Islam and not just the Middle Eastern variety.
And sometimes Christians say, oh, that's not true Islam. Well, I don't think that it is up to Christians to determine whether this is true Islam and this is not true Islam. I think when people define themselves as Islamic, as Muslim, that is, we should take their word for it and say this is an expression of Islam, even though it doesn't always correspond to what I think Islam should be.
Doug: Well, and also you'll find Muslims like especially Arabs, I think, who don't think that other people have a real practice of Islam, you know, so so so Turks or Bosnians who don't pray five times daily and don't wear the right kind of clothing, a lot of Arabs think all those are you know, they only say they're Muslims or they're Muslims on the outside only. And, Frans, isn't it true that Indonesia has the largest population of Muslims in the world?
Frans: Yes. Indonesia has the largest population of Muslims in the world. So in a way the interesting thing is that sometimes even Indonesian Muslims say, oh, yeah, we don't really have the true version of Islam. And I think that there is within Islam a movement which is maybe a somewhat more of a of a fundamentalist movement that says, well, it's the Arabic version of Islam that's the the true version of Islam. Right? And but I think it would be a disservice to actually say, yeah, that's true. You know, I think that the the different forms of Islam as we encounter them in, for instance, Indonesia, in in Bangladesh, those are genuine expressions of of of Islam as well.
Doug: Even the most basic things that we associate with Islam can be quite different depending on Islamic culture. So, for instance, we might think, well, Muslim is a person who reads the Qur’an and and believes what's in the Qur’an. So I have a story about that a few years ago. I was teaching the Developing a Christian mind course at Calvin a “DCM” course that was required in the interim [a one-month, intensive course in January] and I invited some Muslim women to come to class to talk to students about their experiences, Muslim women in the United States. And one of the women was a convert to Islam. And she talked about the story of how she moved from her native Methodism to becoming a Muslim eventually. And one of the students in the class who was a female Muslim Calvin student from Bangladesh was dumbfounded, and she asked this Muslim American woman, how did you know about Islam and and the woman visitor said, well, I read the Qur’an and this Muslim student from Bangladesh said: the Qur’an? I never read the Qur’an! She said, I learned Islam from my mother. How did you know how to pray, if you don't have your mother to teach you, since your mother was a Christian. So I was really surprised by that. And I talked to this friend afterwards. Indeed, this Muslim female Bangladeshi woman had not read the Qur’an in her native language ever. The first time she read the Qur’an was in English in the United States in my class.
Frans: The idea of the Qur’an being untranslatable and and only the true Qur’an is only in Arabic. We have to realize that many Muslims, they they don't know Arabic or they know Arabic only imperfectly and only a little bit. They hear the Qur’an. They hear it recited in prayer. But if they want to read it and know what it says, they very often they have to access that in in translation. Most Indonesian Muslims also are accessing the Qur’an in a in an Indonesian translation rather than reading it in Arabic. But, of course, hearing it in prayers recited that is regarded as the true the true Qur’an. But that's you know, that's during prayer. That's a more ritual reading of the of the Qur’an.
Doug: That the issue of language difference is huge. So language and national difference in the Islamic world is really a major issue. So Iranian Muslims, they speak and read Persian. Most of them are monolingual. They don't learn Arabic. What that means is therefore, not only they don't read the Qur’an in the original, they also don't read Arab writers. They don't read Arab theologians. They know Iranian writings on Islam. And so Iranian Islam tends to be quite nationalistic. The same goes for Turks. Turks, they don't read Iranian writers or theologians. They don't read Arabs, they read Turks. And so Turkish Islam has its own writers who have written from their own perspective. Turkish Islam has Turkish Muslim saints. They go to those shrines to pray. They go to and they go to those authors and read them. So often the the national traditions that have developed, because we live in a modern world of nation states, the national traditions have a very large influence on the kind of Islamic belief and practice that you find in different Islamic countries.
Frans: The veneration of saints is kind of an interesting phenomenon. I remember in Indonesia, in Surabaya, I visited the shrine of a saint. And I, I didn't hadn't quite realized that in some forms of Islam, the veneration of saints, local saints, this one was that the man who brought Islam to Indonesia is very often very important. And that's how that veneration of saints and holy men is has helped to root Islam in in different places, in different places in the world and localize the form of Islam. I have to add that within fundamentalist Islam, they really look down upon this veneration of saints and they think that it's an un-Islamic thing. So it's a it's a controversy within Islam. And fundamentalists don't really like local saints and and very often try to to root out the veneration of saints and especially the veneration of local saints in Islam.
Doug: Right. And my experience in Turkey. There are Turkish saints whose burial places are places of pilgrimage, but often only for Turks. So, for instance, the Tomb of Eyüp el-Ensariwho is a priest who was reportedly a historical figure, an Arab present at the first siege of Constantinople in the seventh century, he's buried outside Constantinople. outside Istanbul and his shrine is a place of pilgrimage. Or Hajji Bektash another quasi-historical mythic figure, has a shrine in central Anatolia that certain kinds of Turkish Muslims visit. Or Hajji Byram Veli, who's buried in Ankara, is a great and another great place of pilgrimage. Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi, who's a more international saint, is also buried in Konya. And so in these ways, Turkish Islam has built into it over the decades, over the centuries a regular observance of pilgrimage and prayer at the shrines of saints, even though a lot of Muslims who consider themselves very conservative would say there is no such thing as saints in Islam, as Frans said.
Frans: Of course, the same thing happened with Christianity as it as it spreads in the Middle Ages, of course, right? …Local saints, they are their local people and they help to establish a connection to the people of the land. And so that's how I think Saints and a generation of saints very often functions.
Penny: So it really feels like there is a huge diversity in this group of people who would say, yes, I am Muslim. There. I know there are women I know who identify as Muslim. Some wear a headscarf or a hijab and some do not. But they would both say, well, yes, I'm a Muslim. And then, you know, you guys were talking about giving all these examples of different sort of blending of national cultures with Islam and Islamic traditions.
I'm wondering if you can help me understand a little bit how culture and faith sort of overlap and are integrated in Islam and how that may be similar or different for how we do that in Christianity or predominantly Christian cultures. So, for example, in in the United States, which which is a very religiously diverse place. But I would still say that majority culture United States would identify as Christian again with a lot of diversity. Right. Conservatives and liberals and everything in between. But we have holidays. We have things that are part of our American culture, Christmas, that people would recognize kind of coming out of a Christian tradition. Whether or not they're very faith-oriented. Is is is that similar to Islam? Like are there a lot of I'm going to say secular Muslims, or is that less so in Islam than it is of Christianity?
Doug: Yeah, for sure. There are, depending on the place, a lot of secular Muslims, Muslims who were raised, we would say, in a Muslim culture who don't practice very much. And they are Islamic; there are Muslim cultures whose whose practices look a lot more secular to other kinds of Muslims. Here's a story about the setting of Islam in America. All right, so here in Grand Rapids, we have several mosques, and one of them is a large mosque that was built about 12 or 13 years ago and has a large worship space. Large worship hall. And when you go there today, the main worship hall is is is a kind of male space. And there's a screen, a partition. That separates the male worship space from the female worship space, the female worship spaces on the left and in back towards the wall and is separated from the main space by this screen. So some of the American Muslim women who who are converts to Islam were really annoyed by this screen. They said we can't see the imam when he preaches and we can't participate fully in this in the worship service because we can't see our our brothers there who are praying also. And so they advocated for removing the screen so that men and women would be together and worship. And they were opposed by their sisters, who mostly were immigrant Muslims from African countries, from Asian countries, who were very uncomfortable removing the screen, because then they would be seen by men in worship. And they felt that the screen protected them from the ever-present male gaze and they valued their privacy in worship. They value their their space as Muslim women separated from men. I should say there was a compromise. Finally, it was resolved that the screen was partially removed towards one end. And the American women who wanted to see the preacher when he was preaching, they sat over their.
Frans: Islam, to a great extent, this is kind of what you do, right? More than what you believe. And that is very that very much determines also the culture around you.
Penny: So things like women and men worshiping in divided spaces or even wearing a headscarf. How much of that is actually written, baked into the Qur’an, baked into these absolute beliefs, and how much of it is culturally determined?
Doug: Well, both. And it reveals a kind of Protestant way of looking at things to ask the question, really, you know, if you don't mind me saying so. If it's it's baked into the tradition, whether we would see it in the Qur’an or some Muslims would see in the Qur'an or not. Those who think that women should wear the headscarf find it baked into the Qur’an. And those who don't think this is such a necessity don't find it so clear in the Qur’an.
Frans: It is always a matter of how you interpret those scriptures, right? I mean, what Doug said, it's it's very much in a Protestant attitude that says, oh, here we have a scriptural verse. And it's pretty clear and this is what it says, and that's therefore what we do. Even in Protestants, in the Protestant tradition, it's not always that that clear. Even though people sometimes claim it is, but it really isn't.
Doug: So another kind of example about cultural practices, and my wife and I lived in Turkey for a year while I was doing my doctoral research. And we lived in a neighborhood in Istanbul in an apartment building. And this was a wonderful small apartment that maybe had like 20 or 25 flats and families living in them. And in the …and the the leader, so to speak, of the apartment community was, oh, a widowed woman who was an older grandmotherly type, Asiye Teyze. And when Sandy was going to the hospital to have our baby, when I came home from the from the hospital and our son had been born, the women had gathered in Asiye Teyze’s apartment to like keep the vigil for the birth while we were gone. And so she stuck her head out the door and asked me, you know, did did the baby arrive? And I said, yes. And she said, was it a boy or a girl? And I said, it was a boy. And there was this whoop of of cheers from inside the apartment because all the women of the apartment had gathered there. When we were leaving Turkey that next summer, I called a taxi to take our stuff to the airport and we we loaded up our suitcases and their belongings in the taxi. We were driving away. And the people, you know, our friends from the apartment had gathered outside. And I looked out the back window, the taxi as we drove away. And Asiye Teyzehad a pitcher of water that she poured over the steps. And and washed the steps with the water. I had never seen anything like this …it was a very moving kind of scene. And I, I asked my Turkish teacher about it when I returned, and he said she was cleansing the path from the evil spirits that might follow you. Now, if you read the Qur’an, you'll never find anything like this. You know, in in in the lettered, literate Islamic tradition, it doesn't matter. Muslims believe this and practice it and and the women matriarchs of the tradition are the keepers of that faith.
Frans: And I think that's why it is why I think fundamentalism is also so insidious. Right. I mean, fundamentalism says, oh, that's not in the Qur’an. So that's not true Islam. You know, I don't think that fundamentalists should have the exclusive right to determine what is Islamic and what is not. That's sort of a fallacy. And sometimes you find even Christians aiding that kind of thinking and saying, oh, all those folk traditions, you know, that's not true Islam. True Islam is only this. And then in a way, I think you give you get the last word to the fundamentalists in determining what what is Islam and what isn't. And I think one of the things in interfaith dialog is that we should we should value the diversity of the other religious tradition, just as I feel that that's the diversity within Christian Christianity should be should be valued.
Doug: Yeah, I agree. And I really want to let Muslim men and Muslim women and Muslim children show us their Islam. And that means that we'll find people at all stages of faith in all walks of life and with all their experiences of God, and they will show us what Islam really is.
Penny: And then, too, when we do hear one story in the news about someone who identifies as Muslim, or if we meet one person who identifies as a person of Islamic faith, to not suddenly say, oh, all Muslims are like that, or, you know, everyone believes that because there's such a diversity.
Doug: Right. I heard someone say that when you've met a Muslim, you've met one Muslim.
Frans: Have an open eye and an open heart, and let people tell their stories and appreciate the diversity of those stories is what I would say certain.
Penny: Thank you so much. In this short time with just a few of your stories. I think I've really seen: wow, there is a huge diversity in Islam! Right? And people of Islamic faith can be conservatives and liberals. They can believe in certain aspects or saints or wearing the hijab headscarf or not. I think it's helpful for me anyway, as I'm thinking about Christian-Muslim engagement or just living in my world where I have … like Muslim neighbors or colleagues or students in my classroom, that it's not “one size fits all,” that there's a real diversity among Muslims. And I think one of the tips I'm taking away from what both Frans and Doug have … you've said is that I kind of have to leave space for people to talk, too, if they wish to, to tell me about their Islam, their faith, and what's really important to them.
Thank you so much for sharing some of your stories, insights with us today. I hope that our listeners have just a slightly more nuanced idea about the breadth and diversity of Islam and how Islamic faith and cultures can mix and inform each other.
Stay tuned for more episodes in this series on Muslim-Christian engagement or interfaith relations. And I want to thank again our guests, Frans van Liere and Doug Howard.
If you enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe to our podcast to stay informed about future episodes. Do you have a friend who would be interested in today's topic? We'd love it if you'd share our work with them. Our hope is that this project will spark good conversations and provide learning resources that inspire diversity and inclusion work.
All views and opinions expressed in our episodes are those of the individual and do not necessarily reflect the views and positions of Calvin University or the Calvin Institute for Christian Worship.