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269 Louis Massignon, the Melkite Church and Islam ARAM, 20 (2008) 269-297. doi: 10.2143/ARAM.20.0.2033133A. O'MAHONY 269 LOUIS MASSIGNON, THE MELKITE CHURCH AND ISLAM ANTHONY O’MAHONY (Heythrop College, University of London) LOUIS MASSIGNON: ASPECTS OF HIS LIFE AND THOUGHT Louis Massignon (1883-1962) saw the relationship between Christianity and Islam through the lens of the tragic figure of the mystic al-Hallâj (857- 922).1 Al-Hallâj, who was ‘martyred’ in Baghdad for heresy, represented for Massignon a direct parallel to the suffering of Jesus on the cross.2 As Christi- anity had suffering and compassion as its foundation, so too, according to Massignon, did Islam. Indeed, he regarded suffering as fundamental to Semitic and Jewish tradition: “This brings us to a fundamental problem of Semitic, and particularly Jewish psychology, in its most ‘Kirkegaardian’ aspect: there is a hidden but divine good in suffering, and this is the mystery of anguish, the foundation of human nature”3 Massignon’s mystical Catholicism belonged to the core and essence of his being, and it informed his entire understanding of Islam. It was ‘commitment’ to the other outside his own Christian faith which made Massignon such a powerful witness. The Dominican scholar Jean-Pierre de Menasce OP states, “If the attitude of Christians towards Muslims and Is- lam (and consequentially towards all the great religions) has changed in the last forty-years, through objective understanding, through gripping the highest and most central values, through a complete respect for people and institu- tions, and all this as a result of Christian intensity and not despite it, this is a great extent owed to Louis Massignon”.4 Indeed, the explicit recasting of 1 Herbert Mason, ‘Louis Massignon et al-Hallâj’, Presence de Louis Massignon. Hommages et témoignages. Textes réunis par Daniel Massignon, Paris: Éditions Maisonneuve et Larose, 1987, pp. 105-112. 2 Roger Arnaldez, ‘Hallâj et Jèsus dans le pensèe de Louis Massignon’, Horizons maghré- bins. Louis Massignon. Hommes de dialogue des cultures, no. 14-15 (1989), pp. 171-178. 3 L. Massignon, ‘Nature in Islamic Thought’, Testimonies and Reflections: Essays of Louis Massignon Selected and introduced by Herbert Mason, Notre Dame, Indiana, University of Notre Dame Press, 1989, p. 83. For an interesting account of Massignon’s relations with Jewish oriental scholarship see, Joel L. Kraemer, ‘The Death of an Orientalist: Paul Kraus from Prague to Cairo’, The Jewish Discovery of Islam, Edited by Martin Kramer, Tel Aviv, University Press of Tel Aviv, 1999, pp. 181-223. Kraemer states: “Even though Massignon’s study of Islam was engage and mystique, he respected the philological skills of Jewish scholars like Goldziher and Kraus. Goldziher had helped him with his Kitâb al-tawâsîn, and Kraus contributed to his Akhbâr al-Hallâj. Massignon was impressed by the appreciation that Goldziher, Kraus and other showed for al-Hallâj and tried to explain their attraction to Sufi texts”, p. 192. 4 J-P. De Menasce, ‘Reconnaisance à Louis Massignon’, Mémorial Louis Massignon, Cairo, Dar-es-Salam, 1963, p. 81. These views expressed by De Menasce are more surprising as he was 07-0398_Aram20_16_O'Mahony 269 09-16-2008, 17:23 270 LOUIS MASSIGNON, THE MELKITE CHURCH AND ISLAM western missionary effort, by the French theologian and Cardinal of the Church, Jean Danielou S.J. after the Second World War, as one finding Christ even more then preaching him, can be traced directly to Danielou’s association with Massignon.5 Christianity and Islam have been pitted against each other because of their overtly worldwide mission. There was for many centuries a territorial standoff between Islam and Christendom, with the attendant isolation of many of the Eastern Churches from the Western Christendom.6 According to David Burrell it would be difficult to find a longer, more sustained animosity than that be- tween ‘official’ Christianity and Islam. For if the Jew was the ‘other’ in the midst of Christendom. Islam was the ‘other’ facing it, and with power at is dis- posal. Massignon came to the view that Islam was more resourceful spiritually than it ever had been militarily and that these resources could be mined by Christians to recover dimensions of their faith hitherto hidden.7 The French deeply sceptical of Islam as a distinct religious tradition, “Islam, without doubt, is to be ranked among the heresies. The biblical revelation, although poorly known, is not unknown and is for- mally rejected with respect to the essential truths: the Incarnation and the Trinity”, in, ‘La théologie de la mission selon Kraemer’, Neue Zeitschrift für Missionswissenschaft, Vol. 1, 1945, p. 251. 5 See on Jean Danielou see the systematic study by Fritz Frei, Médiation unique et transfigu- ration univer selle themes christologiques et leurs perspectives missionnaires dans la pensée de J. Danielou Bern, Peter Lang, 1981. For relations with Massignon, see Marie-Thérèse Bessirard, ‘Louis Massignon and le Père Daniélou’, Louis Massignon et ses contemporains (éd) Jacques Keryell, Paris, Éditions Karthala, 1997, pp. 163-180. We also think of here Massignon’s influ- ence upon his contemporary Jules Monchanin (1895-1957). On 5 May 1939, at the age of 44 and after many years of patient waiting, Jules Monchanin embarked from Marseilles for India. It was the fulfilment of many years of studying, waiting and hoping. He had wanted to go to India for some ten years hoping to secure the approval of an Indian bishop for a plan of total adaptation to Indian life, and, although two bishops were interested by the originality and uniqueness of Monchanin’s plan of a Christian-Hindu contemplative life, at once totally Christian and fully Hindu, each for his own reason was hesitant to have the French priest establish a foundation in his diocese. From ordination, Monchanin had been drawn to India as a result of his contact with missionaries destined for the East. In their concern with the apostolate they deeply questioned for sociological, economic, and political matters relating to the westernization of Asia as well as the forms and the dynamics of Christian missionary work in Asian culture. The depth of Indian spir- ituality struck him perhaps most strongly in personal contacts. Indian students and friends in Ly- ons gave living proof of India’s vitality and convinced him of the great wealth of spiritual wis- dom India had to give the Church. Thus, in the early thirties it became apparent to Monchanin that he called to give his life to the Church in India. He was convinced that not only does Indian spirituality have to be rethought as Christian but also Christianity must be rethought as Indian: Indian spirituality must be transfigured in the Trinity and Indian mysticism will infuse a new life within Christianity. See Française Jacquin, ‘Pour une comprehension des cultures: Louis Mas- signon et l’abbé Monchanin’, Louis Massignon et le dialogue des cultures (Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf, 1996), pp. 341-356. 6 See the essays in the various volumes edited by A.O’Mahony, Palestinian Christians: Reli- gion, Politics and Society in the Holy Land, London, Melisende, 1999; The Christian Communi- ties of Jerusalem and the Holy Land: Studies in History, Religion and Politics, Cardiff, Univer- sity of Wales Press, 2003; Eastern Christianity: Studies in Modern History, Religion and Politics, London, Melisende 2004; and Christianity in the Middle East: Studies in Modern His- tory, Religion and Politics, London, Melisende 2008. 7 David Burrell, ‘Mind and Heart at the Service of Muslim-Christian Understanding: Louis Massignon, as Trail Blazer’, The Muslim World, Vol. LXXXVIII, no. 3-4, 1998, pp. 274-276. 07-0398_Aram20_16_O'Mahony 270 09-16-2008, 17:23 A. O'MAHONY 271 Jesuit André d’Alverny S.J. observed of Massignon “Everywhere, it is a man of prayer, one of the great men of prayer to whom believers of all religions relate and who give unbelievers themselves a secret and happy wound”.8 Massignon’s keen sense, as observed by David Burrell, of there “being but one God, complemented by his careful delineation of the proper notes of each traditions which affirms that ‘onenesss’ as an article of faith, lead him to find resonances between the assertions of each tradition”. That is the very oneness of God leads him antecedently to suspect correlations between divergent tradi- tions, while his respect for those divergences forbids him seeking commo- nalities in other ways.9 Jacques Waardenburg in one of the early accounts of Massignon’s life and work has stated first his understanding was that of the universality and unity of human reason. Wherever reason functions on data, which are analogous but which occur in different historical and social con- texts, the result will be a parallelism which at first sight would seem to have its root in a borrowing or in an imitation, while in reality there is only the same functioning of reason in different individuals.10 Secondly to explain existing parallels if the idea of a certain realm of human imagination. The latter has to use certain images in order to represent non-material and non-rational realities and such images occur at different places and times, and in different social and cultural contexts. At a deeper level, however, they may be considered to be the expression of ‘archetypes’ which manifest themselves at singular points in his- tory, which have a eschatological significance. Lastly is theological rather than philosophical and is meant to explain religious rather than rational or imagina- tive expressions in the realm of mysticism. Certain striking parallels, which can be established between religious or mystical vocations in different reli- gious traditions, could be attributed to one divine grace operating in different minds and souls.
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