Jay is correct

Submitted by Michael S (United States), Feb 19, 2016 at 20:36

Daniel, I read your piece on this, which you quoted, from 2005. Technically, you are correct that the WORD "Allah" is essentially equivalent to the WORD "God".

That said, I agree with Jay, that the Islamic "God/ Allah" is not the Christian/Jewish "God" aka "the LORD (all caps vital)/ "Adonai" (when used to mean YHWH). "God", which is essentially what "Allah" means, is a title. It's like calling Obama "The President". I can honestly say, "There is no President but the President"; and I can say "There is no Obama but Obama"; but I cannot say "There has never been any President but Obama".

Muslims confuse the matter, by referring to the god of Muhammed as "THE god"; and Jews and Christians do not help the matter by calling YHWH "The Lord". Christians add to the problem by calling everyone described as "the Lord" (including Jesus -- note that this is intentionally NOT translated in most cases with all caps) as YHWH. Any Orthodox Jew will gladly point out the difference to one, if one hasn't already noticed it; and Muslims insist that Christians do not worship their one, presumably true god.

Regardless of what Jews and Christians actually believe, it is clear that their BIBLE speaks of a unique God, whose TITLE is "Elohim" but whose NAME is YHVH. In the New Testament, He is referred to as the God OF Jesus Christ, not as Jesus; and in the Old Testament, despite the fact that Jews do not speak the name YHWH and the Septuagint translates it as the Greek version of "The Lord", it is indeed YHVH in the original.

It is also clear that the Muslim "Allah" does not refer to YHWH, who has a definite personality and a definite message. Rather, the Muslim "Allah" ("god") is an imposter who is called "The God" but in fact is not The God of the Christians and Jews. The distinction is clear, by reading what the two "God"s have to say: "Allah" commands the murder of Jews, for instance; and YHVH calls for the death of their enemies. Can the same God command both these things? Of course not!

Jay is therefore correct.

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".