An Inside Look At Insider Ecclesiology: The "Jamā ‘At Al-Mu’manīn" Or “Assembly Of The Believers” In The Thought Of Mazhar Al-Mallouhi -- By: J. Scott Bridger
Journal: Southern Baptist Journal of Theology
Volume: SBJT 20:2 (Summer 2016)
Article: An Inside Look At Insider Ecclesiology: The "Jamā ‘At Al-Mu’manīn" Or “Assembly Of The Believers” In The Thought Of Mazhar Al-Mallouhi
Author: J. Scott Bridger
SBJT 20:2 (Summer 2016) p. 75
An Inside Look At Insider Ecclesiology: The Jamā ‘At Al-Mu’manīn Or “Assembly Of The Believers” In The Thought Of Mazhar Al-Mallouhi
J. Scott Bridger is Associate Professor of Global Studies and World Religions at Criswell College, Dallas, Texas. He earned his PhD at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary and a MA in Arabic Language, Literature and Islamic Studies at the University of Haifa. Previously he taught at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary where he served as the Director of the Jenkins Center for the Christian Understanding of Islam. Dr. Bridger has published extensively on Islam and Christianity and his most recent book is Christian Exegesis of the Qur’an: A Critical Analysis of the Apologetic Use of the Qur’an in Select Medieval and Contemporary Arabic Texts (Pickwick, 2015).
Introduction
Mazhar al-Mallouhi is a self-ascribed Arab Muslim follower of Christ. He has published a number of Arabic novels as well as contextualized Arabic renditions and commentaries on Genesis, the Gospels, and Acts. His aim in all of these works is to make Jesus and the message of the Bible understandable to Arab Muslims.1 He speaks of “naturalizing” Christ and presenting the Scriptures to Muslims in a manner they can fully understand and accept.2Mallouhi sees a high degree of continuity between Arab-Islamic culture and
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his faith in Christ. He argues that a follower of Christ need not separate from the Muslim community in order to obey the teachings of Christ. Mallouhi has been associated with Frontiers since at least the early 1990s and his Arabic books, commentaries, and articles are advocated by that organization in their church planting practices.3 Commenting on his influence, Greg Livingstone, the founder of Frontiers, notes, “… Mazhar Mallouhi has been my primary mentor in the Arab world since 1968. This Syrian Muslim, my shepherd, has been more committed to seeing me demonstrate Christ among Muslims than anyone else.”4
In what follows, I begin by briefly surveying respected works of evangelical theology regarding the dual notions of the “localness” and “universalness” of the church. Expounding how these notions are understood in the New Testament and in evangelical theology is important for the analysis of Mallouhi’s views on nature of the church or jamā’at al-mu’manīn5 in the second section of ...
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