“Where the spirit is”: Christian Muslim spirit(uality). an international dialogue

Abstract

Introduction: Christianity, for too long, had a monopoly on the Holy Spirit. Said the Christian creed since 320 A.D., the Holy Spirit is the third person of a triune God. And those who define this as well as those who would follow, founded and resided in the Church. And as the creed became the written law of the Church, the Holy Spirit, too, found it's abode, residence there in the Church. To find the Holy Spirit, said all ancient and modern theologians of the Church, find the Church: Where the Spirit is, is where the Church is: Catholic, Holy, and Apostolic! With this domestication of the (concept of the) Holy Spirit began the creeds of the Church. The creeds said to believe in one God and sectioned Him to Father, Son and Holy Spirit. But as centuries of religious history of monotheism progressed, we discovered that it was not God who is sectioned (into three); it was His revelation, into three (monotheism): Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The point to be made emphatically, is that the creeds might not have expressed God in history but sectioned his revelation, sectioning monotheism itself, not according to heavenly mandates but according to creeds and (three) races. Today, Islam from among monotheism, is bursting upon Christendom, in the East and in the West, showing us the possibility for a new (Christian) understanding of the works of the Holy Spirit (of Acts I). Saidthe Scriptures, the Spirit is (descending on believers) to diffuse their languages, localities releasing them to witness. The creeds came later after the Scriptures and localised God Himselfthe very Spirit that came to diffuse tongues.