“Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12)
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We have already seen how the Ibadi and Ash’ari schools deal with the Ahl Al Fatrah.
That was covered in our article here:
https://primaquran.com/2024/07/12/ashari-aqidah-ibadi-aqidah-on-ahl-al-fatrah
The above article shows us how Islam is a very cohesive, coherent and robust understanding of dealing with those people (that are claimed) not to receive a Messenger/Prophet.
We also have shown that Allah (swt) clearly mentioned that he set rites up for all peoples and that he has indeed sent a Prophet to all peoples.
Christianity, the religion that has a vision of God wherein Prophets and Messengers were not sent to all mankind has very often struggled to deal with this.
They have no concept of the fitra, instead all mankind is fallen, (We know you are not on board with this interpretation Church of Christ-Campbellites) so, We will make the exception.
To us this very question exposes the theological and philosophical mess of Christianity.
As regards Christianity. Is this a huge theological problem for Christianity?
Well, this would depend on the type of Christian that you ask. Not Surprising many Christians have a very straight forward response to this. That is that if God wanted the message of the Gospel of Christ Jesus to reach those people he would have. Therefore if they are damned to eternity in hellfire this is the will of God.
Mostly Christians of the Calvinist persuasion are quite o.k with the idea of people in hellfire forever for never even hearing about Jesus. When Christians ask these questions to their teachers it is because they are struggling with the justice of God in such scenarios.
For example:
John MacArthur whom is a believer in hard determinism was very to the point. You can’t receive salvation except through the name of Christ. Yet he goes on to describe the self evident nature of God, but stops short of telling us how exactly this connects a person to the Gospel?
Let’s think for example people who lived all over the world con-current to the first 15 minutes after the alleged death of Jesus on a Patibulum. It is not conceivable that the gospel reached these people.
Than John MacArthur goes on to categorically rebuke other Christian views that would try to claim such people are saved (a part from Christ Jesus) in the same way people were in the TNCH (Christians call it -the Old Testament).
McArthur also quoted the following text:
“In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.” (Acts 17:30-31)
So now we will see how top Christian Apologist William Lane Craig deals with this question.
Now for those who do not know William Lane Craig does not believe that God wills and makes people to do evil (like Calvinist do); rather, he is a Molinist.
We will link to Dr. Craig’s article so you can get an understanding of this view:
https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/question-answer/molinism-vs.-calvinism
Skip to 0:10 seconds to avoid hearing music in the intro.
“Now that does not mean that someone can be saved apart from the work of Christ. What it would mean is that the benefits of Christ death could be applied to someone without his conscious knowledge of Christ.” -William Lane Craig
Prima Qur’an comments: So just let that sink in! WoW! You really wonder how this camp will deal with things like:
“If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” (Romans 10:9)
Now, we could counter by mentioning the mute. However, even than it can be seen that this is a conscious choice.
Than William Lane Craig gives the store away to atheist when he proclaims:
“Rather than live up to his moral law they plunge themselves into immorality and degeneracy and so find themselves condemned before God just on the basis of his general revelation in nature and conscious.” -William Lane Craig
No Craig, stop trying to sell Sam Harris’ book, the Moral Landscape. God is known via reason but moral code and moral law is not known except via revelation! -i.e revealed scriptures, prophets, messengers. Tell us do you believe that morality is known a part from these?
Natural revelation never tells them that God came as a man, lived a sinless perfect life and fulfilled all the righteous demands of the Law, died upon a cross to atone for His people’s sins, and rose from the dead three days later for their justification.
“For God’s wrath is revealed from heaven against all godlessness and unrighteousness of people who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth, since what can be known about God is evident among them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, that is, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen since the creation of the world, being understood through what he has made. As a result, people are without excuse.” (Romans 1:18-20)
So Craig did not really answer that woman’s question at all. He waffled. It is possible but in reality not likely at all.
So the question of God’s justice in regard to the Ahl Al Fatrah remains.
We have heard a pastor once say, “If someone can get into heaven without knowing Christ, then the worst thing you can do to them is tell them about Jesus.”
This same logic applies to the Ash’ari creed who believe that people who never heard about Islam enter into heaven no questions asked.
The last thing on Earth we would want would be the spread of the teachings of Islam, if that were the case!
In one conference of Calvinist it seems one of the Pastors had a heightened sense of the racial distributions of God’s mercy.
In other words why are certain demographics seemingly favoured by God to hear the truth?
People groups , Native Americans, Polynesian peoples, Sub Sahara Africans, Chinese
pretty much most of them died not knowing Christ Jesus at all. So surely God has shown great mercy to Hebrews, Caucasians, and People of the Middle East in general.
We could have titled this article: The Scandal of Christian Exclusivism: God’s Favor or Geographic Lottery?
Calvinists have no satisfying answer for why God’s sovereign will seems to align so neatly with geography and ethnicity.
“I have no answer to the question why uh vast numbers and not just in very definable people groups that we mentioned in this question but there are people in your street who’ve actually never heard of Christ. Never heard a presentation of the Gospel. It’s not just people groups. There are people who live in contemporary America.”
@7:03 “And I think we need to be very careful about approaching any issue and in particularly this one with a premise that God must act in this way. God is not bound to show mercy to any individual or any collection of individuals. So.So God is not bound to show mercy to an individual but he’s not bound to show mercy to a particular people group either.”
As Muslims we can agree that God is not bound to show mercy to anyone for that matter but what Muslims would assert is that God has asserted that he sent a messenger to every people.
Muslims would also assert that God would not expect every to make a fist with their hand and than punish someone born without hands for failing to do so. This is essentially the Christian view. The Christian view is essentially God creating goats with no wings and than cursed them for not flying.
Christians do have text like the following:
“Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.” (1 Timothy 2:4)
Well it would stand to reason he would have some type of system to deliver on this. Eventually to deal with this dilemma some Christians had to come up with a belief in God having three different wills.
- Decretive will: What God actually decrees (not all saved)
- Prescriptive will: What God commands (all should believe)
- Permissive will: What God allows (people to reject)
Such a doctrine is not Sola scriptura. It is theological gymnastics to avoid the plain meaning of the text.
This is theological gymnastics to avoid the plain meaning of the text.
“Indeed, Allah does not wrong the people at all, but it is the people who are wronging themselves.” (Qur’an 10:44)
“Indeed, Allah does not do injustice, [even] as much as an atom’s weight; while if there is a good deed, He multiplies it and gives from Himself a great reward.” (Qur’an 4:40)
So, as we have seen Christians will quote their sources to support their various positions.
“Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.” (John 3:18)
“Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6)
“As the Lord said to Nicodemus, Truly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the spirit, a person will not enter into the kingdom of heaven.” (John 3:5)
Or is the above statement not so true?
Because this is flatly contradicted by the information we receive in Luke:
“Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.” (Luke 23:43)
So some would argue that an exception is made, or there are situations where there are exceptions. So which one is truly the truth?
But than you have to wonder about the debate around unbaptized babies?
The Catholic Church had to go into a full retreat on this issue, because after further reflection the doctrine is quite dark. Secondly Islam was absolutely demolishing the Catholic Church and continues to do so in the Philippines and in South America over this very doctrine!
https://catholicnews.sg/2022/10/30/where-go-the-souls-of-unbaptised-infants/
If you want to get into the details on the issue we would recommend:
The Catholic Church & The Doctrine of Invincible Ignorance. Jesus is not the only way to heaven.
As such it is defined as:
“Invincible ignorance” is a state in which people — such as pagans, non-Christians and children — are ignorant of Christ’s message as laid out in the Gospels not because they refuse to believe, but rather because they’ve not yet had an opportunity to hear and experience it
The Position of the Catholic Church?
847 This affirmation is not aimed at those who, through no fault of their own, do not know Christ and his Church: Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience – those too may achieve eternal salvation.
Source: http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/para/847.htm
This teaching is crystal clear that Jesus is not the only way to heaven!
This is extremely devestating in two ways.
First it contradicts much of their sacred text or writings.
It Contradicts Jesus’ Own Words
“I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6)
“Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already.” (John 3:18)
Second it makes mission work dangerous.
If people can be saved through “invincible ignorance,” then:
- Those who never hear the Gospel are safer than those who do.
- Missionaries are potentially damning people by removing their ignorance.
- The Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20) becomes a curse rather than a blessing.
It definitely contradicts what Augustine had stated on the matter.
Right under the section that explitly states:
Chapter 2 [II.] Faith in Christ Not Necessary to Salvation, If a Man Without It Can Lead a Righteous Life
…before the actual preaching of the gospel reaches the ends of all the earth — because there are some remote nations still (although it is said they are very few) to whom the preached gospel has not found its way — what must human nature do…but believe in God who made heaven and earth, by whom also it perceived by nature that it had been itself created, and lead a right life, and thus accomplish His will, uninstructed with any faith in the death and resurrection of Christ? Well, if this could have been done, or can still be done, then for my part I have to say what the apostle said in regard to the law: Then Christ died in vain. Galatians 2:21 For if he said this about the law, which only the nation of the Jews received, how much more justly may it be said of the law of nature, which the whole human race has received, If righteousness come by nature, then Christ died in vain. If, however, Christ did not die in vain, then human nature cannot by any means be justified and redeemed from God’s most righteous wrath— in a word, from punishment — except by faith and the sacrament of the blood of Christ (St Augustine, On Nature and Grace, Chapter 2).
Source: (https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1503.htm)
There are very deep divides in the Orthodox Church on the issue of people being saved a part from the redeeming nature of Jesus.
God is not the author of confusion, but of peace” (1 Corinthians 14:33)
Some will argue that no one is saved by “ignorance”, meaning that they will be harmed by the additional knowledge of Christ Jesus, or some how saved by the law of nature.
“No one is condemned on the ground of not believing in something they never heard, but on the ground of their sinfulness.”
To which we reply on what consistent basis of justice are they not given the same opportunity to hear the saving gospel?
Indeed why are entire tribes and ethnic groups given over to ruin because of this?
Even than those advocates in the Orthodox Church make exception to this so called “Law of Nature.” Those against Invincible Ignorance will make exception when it comes to the Theotokos (Mother of God) whom they mean to be Mary the Mother of Jesus. The Roman Catholics are with them on the sinless nature of Mary.
They do this to avoid the issue of sin being inherited. Protestants do not make Mary an exception. But then we get into an infinite loop issue that if Mary did not inherit sin, than why not make her father sinless for her to escape the conundrum in the same way Mary is made sinless to escape the conundrum for Jesus.
Protestants have avoided this altogether; namely because little baby fetus Jesus was receiving nourishment from a ‘sinful’ woman. It was her ‘sinful’ body that providing for his sinless body.
The Belief of Jesus descending into hell to save the Old Testament prophets.
“After being made alive, he went and made proclamation to the imprisoned spirits-to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water.” (1 Peter 3:19-20)
Peter once wrote of Paul’s letters:
“There are some things in them that are hard to understand” (2 Peter 3:16).
Meaning Jesus did not keep good on his promise.
“But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.” (John 16:13)
Meaning that the Holy Spirit did not make these scriptures clear.
However, we can say the same thing of Peter’s letters and especially the above text.
This rather ambiguous text of ((1 Peter 3:19-20) is used by many to say that this is how the Old Testament Prophets eventually were saved. In spite of what you heard about the Prophets in the Old Testament they all went to hell. They have to if everyone who does not believe in Jesus is to be saved. So this doctrine came about.
Even though we have many other text that would contradict this point blank.
“Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked with God” (Genesis 6:9)
Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox believe a Non Christian who never confessed faith in Jesus Christ is saved!
John of Damascus said that God freed Trajan from Hell after the prayers of Saint Gregory the Great!
“Further, the Damascene in the same sermon relates that Gregory, while praying for Trajan, heard a voice from heaven saying to him: “I have heard thy voice, and I pardon Trajan; : and of this fact the Damascene adds in the same sermon, “the whole East and West are witnesses. ” Yet it is clear that Trajan was in hell, since “he put many martyrs to a cruel death” [De his qui fide dormierunt]. Therefore the suffrages of the Church avail even for those who are in hell.”
Source: (https://www.newadvent.org/summa/5071.htm)
This particular incident comes to us by different ways with some interesting omissions and additions. In one rendition Trajan is physically resurrected since without physical baptism, one who lived after Christ can be saved.
Another view is that a soul can be in hell and be quit of all pain (maybe just roaming around watching everyone else suffer for their sins) who knows what he does in his spare time).
There is a whole book one can read about this idea of Christians saints that could pray for people to be released from hell!
To us it is clear that Christianity does not have a cohesive position on this very important question. The Orthodox, Catholics, & Protestants each seem to have views that once probed ends up causing problems for other doctrinal positions.
The morewe explore and look into the disparate views of the Christian tradition we can’t help but to see how chillingly distant and dark their vision of the divine truly is.
We would not be surprised if one of them ever wrote a treaties entitled: “The Unloved Parts of God.”
“Or like the darkness in a deep sea, covered by waves upon waves, topped by clouds. Darkness upon darkness! If one stretches out their hand, they can hardly see it. And whoever Allah does not bless with light will have no light!” (Qur’an 24:40)
If you think the above is a mess wait until you read how much of a mess their doctrine of salvation is!
May Allah guide the Ummah!
May Allah forgive the Ummah!
Prima Quran 