Last night, I spoke with a first generation Pakistani named Annis (that’s probably spelled wrong) whose son was serving community service at The Point.  We discussed religion (he’s an interesting mix of Islam, Hindu and Christian) and then we talked about death.

His mother had died a few years back and he told me how she saw the ghost of Muhammad before she died.  According to Annis, before people die they see apparitions of a religious figure.

In Pakistan, Islam is the predominant religion, but there’s a mix of Hindu and Christianity.  Nevertheless, most Pakistanis bury the traditional Islamic method: direct burial.

The body is washed.

The body is shrouded in linen.

The body is prayed over.

The body is buried.

So far, Annis wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t know.  Then he asked me, “Do you believe that the spirit dwells around the body after death?”

I replied, “I don’t know for certain there’s a spirit and I don’t know if it dwells around the body.”

He then asked, “When you talk about a newly deceased person at your funeral home, do you use present tense or past tense?”

I thought about it for a couple seconds and replied, “Present tense.”

“See!” he said.  “You believe the spirit is still dwelling around the body.”  And although I didn’t buy his logic, I did appreciate how he used this point to explain his understanding of direct burial.

“We believe that the spirit is only at peace when it is buried.  So we must bury right away and treat the body properly or the spirit will not find peace.  If a body is not treated properly, that spirit will not find peace.”

“Well,” I thought to myself, “that explains a number of burial customs.”

A spirit will only find peace when it’s body is buried properly.

This is easily the most disturbing death related news item that I’ve ever posted on my blog.

As I write this article there is a bill in the Parliament of Egypt that seeks to legalize necrophilia.

This bill originates out of the teachings of a Moroccan cleric named Zamzami Abdul Bari (pictured to the right).  The cleric believes that the marriage commitment remains valid after death.  Based on that assumption, he believes that a man, and a woman, should have the right to have sex with the corpse of their spouse.  He calls this “Farewell Intercourse”.

Idea’s have consequences.  And theology, as well as hermenutics, matter.

The Egyptian bill, if passed into law, would only allow a spouse to have sex with their deceased partner up to six hours after death.

I wonder how you’d enforce such a law?

Thankfully, Egypt’s National Council for Women (NCW) is petitioning the Islamist controlled parliament to vote down the necrophilia bill as well as another bill that seeks to essentially legalize pedophilia (lowing the marriageable age limit for girls to 14).

I wish this was a joke, but it’s not.  The world is sick.  And it seems to only become sicker when men seek to consolidate power for themselves.

The photo above is considered the oldest copy of the Qur'an. It is said to have been written in 651, only 19 years after Muhammad's death. The word "Qur'an" means "dictation" and is believed by Muslims to be the very dictation and final revelation of Allah (God).

God is a god of risks.

He risked when he created mankind.  He risked his name when he let Israel bear it.  He risked himself when he became a child; and yet the risk he took when he let the Church become his representation on earth was greater still.

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Why didn’t Jesus just take the easy way out and just dictate or personally write his own book?

Like Allah via Gabriel via Muhammad, if Jesus would have just written a book there would be less plurality, less infighting, less misrepresentation and less bad PR and (possibly) more unity.

In a book, Jesus could have spelled out exactly what he wanted so that when the church fails to meet the standard, it would have been clearly the church’s fault … and not Jesus’ fault.

Instead we have an Old Testament that we’re not sure how to interpret as New Testament believers and which we’ve often used for our violent agendas; four often varying accounts of Jesus’ words and life, two of which are from people who weren’t even one of the twelve and to cap it off, we have Paul.  All written in different contexts, often in different languages by different people … and so we have different interpretations, thousands upon thousands of denominations and rarely the unity presented in Islam.

If only Jesus had taken the easy route of leaving behind his own words … his own interpretation of everything … like the Qur’an, which claims to be the EXACT dictation of God’s desires.   In fact, if you want to copy God’s literary style … learn the Qur’an.   If you want to speak God’s language … learn Arabic.   If you want to write like God … well, you get the point.

The Qur’an is written in one language, from the context of one man, at one time period and has the final authority on all things with little room for varying interpretations.

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But instead of writing a book, Jesus formed a community. A community of differing approaches, differing (rarely deferring) personalities that have been bereft with plurality from its very incipiency.

And this community provides the interpretive lenses through which the world sees Jesus.

In a sense, the church becomes the incarnation of Christ, just as Christ became the incarnation of God.  We represent the Representation of God.  Moving and acting as Christ, just as Christ moved and acted as God.

Lesslie Newbigin writes, “The only hermeneutic of the gospel (to the world), is a congregation of men and women who believe it and live by it” (The Gospel in a Pluralist Society; 227).

The Body of Christ, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, through the illumination of the scriptures, is the active work of Jesus in the world.

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Do you think God’s ultimate witness to the world is His people … His church?

Let me know your thoughts by commenting HERE.