Abstract
André Scrima’s interest in Christian–Muslim dialogue goes beyond a historical or comparative approach. In this sense, knowledge from within the two monotheisms is achieved through an apophatic theology. Through it, the spiritual and mystical language that is characteristic of any authentic religious experience offers the possibility of a renewed approach to the differences between Islam and Christianity, and at the same time, clears a path for a truly authentic encounter. Fresh insight into the faith of the other does not put into parentheses the specific identity of the two monotheisms, but deepens it from the perspective of its apophatic content, where the possibility of experiencing the transcendent in a much deeper way is rooted, not by making new affirmations, but by adopting an attitude of stillness and silence.
Highlights
The question “what is it to be a Christian or Muslim?” can be answered in two complementary ways
This complementary “definition” goes beyond simple adherence to external practice. If we choose this last definition, it is possible to see that it raises a new type of question in the field of interreligious dialogue. Should it still be seen as a confrontation between irreconcilable doctrines, or as a quiet recognition that all doctrines belong to the same mystery? Should it still dream of a general consensus, or should it settle for a “different” one, which, as the word indicates, must “differ” (Breton 1994)?2 For the Romanian Orthodox theologian and monk André Scrima (1925–2000), religions are irreducible to each other, they are no less “relative” to the mystery that transcends them
The influence of Dionysius the Areopagite and Gregory Palamas is noticeable in Father Scrima’s early writings, especially in his licentiate work, completed under the supervision of Dumitru Stăniloae, and entitled Apophatic Anthropology. It is on the privative propositions (Dionysii Areopagitae 1857, col. 588B) and the terms of pre-eminence of Dionysius the Areopagite that André Scrima relies in order to first reject, through the two notions of the unspoken and the forbidden, the automatic connection between the positivity of theological affirmations and the content of the mystery in itself, and to defend the specific status of apophatic knowledge, which is never a simple corrective of affirmative theology
Summary
The question “what is it to be a Christian or Muslim?” can be answered in two complementary ways. To be either is to adhere to given religious doctrines, to participate in particular rites, to follow a moral code, to attend special places of worship, to be guided by a religious hierarchy, to respect Holy Books, and so on This “definition”, which concerns the visible aspects of religion, needs to be complemented by another which comes from within, that is, from the place where the believer searches for a more profound and authentic sense of God who, as St. Augustine famously put it, is “interior intimo meo et superior summo meo”, “deeper within me than my innermost depths and higher than my highest parts” We shall see how a concept like the unspoken and its corollary, the forbidden, can lead us to look at Islam and Christianity from a completely different perspective; no longer from their visible, clear and familiar face, but from Father Scrima’s own experience; that is to say, a disconcerting encounter with the face of the other and its ineffable mystery
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