Round table completion

THEOLOGY OF RELIGIONS IN ORTHODOX CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM

On Wednesday, June 21, the round table on “Theology of Religions in Orthodox Christianity and Islam” took place, with the participation of Dr. Athanasios Ν. Papathanasiou, Editor-in-Chief of the journal “Synaxis”, Associate Professor of the Supreme Ecclesiastical Academy of Athens and Dr. Nayla Tabbara, President of Adyan Foundation, Professor of Islamic Studies, Saint Joseph University, Beirut, Lebanon, moderated by Dr. Pantelis Kalaitzidis, Director of the Volos Academy for Theological Studies. The event was held in the hall of E.S.I.E.A. (The Journalists Union) in Athens and it was the last event for the “Time for Action” series for this season. Its video recording is available in the Volos Academy YouTube Channel, in English

and in Greek.

Presenting the Christian approach through its historical perspective, Athanasios N. Papathanasiou emphasized that according to the Gospel of St John “God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him”, so the saving actions of God are not limited into the boundaries of the institutional church. The recognition of this action of God takes place in the first Christian centuries, as e.g. in the “theology of the seminal word” of St Justin, which finds followers to this day, in the teaching of well-known theologians such as the Orthodox bishop Georges Khodr of Lebanon or the Catholic theologian Karl Rahner. “Every reading of religions is a reading in Christ,” Khodr points out, who also maintains that “it is Christ himself who is received as light when grace visits a Brahmin, a Buddhist, or a Muslim who reads his Scriptures.” In the Eastern Orthodox experience, which includes many types of religious coexistence, the invitation to discover God through the religious Other is familiar, as e.g. in the literary works of Alexandros Papadiamantis and Fotis Kontoglou, while this doesn’t imply any renunciation of the Christian identity. “Co-existence with otherness is not a nightmare; it is not even something additional to our own existence. Otherness conditions our existence. It’s all about actual love. In this perspective, all otherness is accepted except only the otherness that hates otherness”, concluded the speaker.

Speaking from the side of Islam, Nayla Tabbara emphasized the need to study the Qur’an in its historical context, explaining thus the existence of apparent contradictions, which in turn account for the variety of approaches to the religious Other in the Islamic world. The Qur’an includes three phases of understanding diversity. The first is the unrealistic desire for everyone to belong to the same community. In the second, the divergences of the communities become clear and lead to conflicts instead of coexistence, with mutual exclusion. In the third phase, unity is discovered in diversity: there are different communities with common aspects but also with differences, united in their destiny of returning to God and in their struggle for the common good. Although Islam considers itself to be the superior among religions, it accepts that in other religions there are also good elements and ways of salvation. “For each, We have appointed a divine law and a traced-out way. Had God willed He could have made you one community. […] So vie one with another in good works. Unto God ye will all return, and He will then inform you of that wherein ye differ” we read in Surah al-Ma’ida.

This was the last public event of the Volos Academy of Theological Studies for the academic year 2022-2023. A series of training workshops for theologians and teachers of Religious Education are planned for the summer months (some have already been announced), while further conference events will take place from September onwards.