It is very dangerous when ignorance and fanaticism are allowed to dictate and shape our views of the other. Ignorance is the enemy of the ignoramus, and fanatics don’t really hold ideas, but are held by them. These are the people Jesus often referred to as “having eyes that see not, having ears that hear not, nor do they understand.”

Unfortunately, such is the case with many, actually too many, evangelical “Christians” whose morbid hatred of Islam goes beyond the pale of acceptable reason.

On 13 May, the Saudi Arabian newspaper “Arab News” reported that certain Baptist evangelicals in Texas strongly protested positive remarks about Islam made by a Professor of Religion who asserted that “Allah” is actually the Biblical God of Abraham and the Prophets.

During a recent conference in Austin, Texas, Dr. Charles Kimball of Wakes Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C., reportedly said Islamic teachings about Allah involved “the same God that Jews and Christians are talking about.”

Leaders in Basin Baptist Network in the Midland/Odessa area in Texas reportedly released an April 5 resolution “refuting” the “false and precarious” teaching that God as revealed in the Bible and Allah as presented in the Quran, are the same.

Well, I don’t really understand these people’s way of thinking, apart from the impression I have of them, namely that they happen to be in the grip of overwhelming ignorance and fanaticism.

And I really wouldn’t want to pay attention to their ignorant beliefs were it not for the fact that these beliefs are widespread and poisoning the minds of millions of Americans and non-Americans and blinding them from knowing the facts.

Hence, I am going to lay down the bare facts with regard to the Islamic concept of God as recorded in Islam’s Holy Book, the Quran.

Verse 64, ale’ Omran

“O People of the Book! Come to common terms between us and you: That we worship none but God; that We associate no partners with Him, that we adopt not, from among ourselves, Lords and patrons other than God. If they turn back, say ye: Bear witness that we are Muslims, bowing to God’s will.”

Verse 84, ale’Omran

“Say, we believe in God and what has been revealed to us, and what was revealed to Abraham and Ismael and Isaac and Jacob and the Tribes, and what was given to Moses and Jesus and the Prophets from their Lord, we don’t make any distinction between any of them, and to Him do we submit.”

Verse 255, the Cow

“God, there is no god but He, the Living, the self-subsisting, Supporter of all. No slumber can seize Him nor sleep. To Him belong all things in the heavens and on earth. Who is thee can intercede in His presence except as He permits. He knows what appears to His creatures as before or after or behind them. Nor shall they compass aught of His knowledge except as He wills. His Throne does extend over the heavens and the earth, and He feels no fatigue in guarding and preserving . For He is the Most High, Supreme in glory."

Verse 35, the Light

“God is the Light of the heavens and the earth. The parable of His Light is as if there were a niche, wherein there is a lamp, the lamp enclosed in a glass, the glass is like a brilliant star, lit from a blessed tree, an olive, neither of the east nor of the west, whose oil is well-nigh luminous, though no fire has touched it. Light upon light, and God does guide whom He will to His light. God does set forth parables for men, and God knows all things.”

Sura (chapter) “Sincerity”

“Say God is One, God, the Eternal, the Absolute; He begets not, nor is He begotten, and there is none like unto Him.”

Now, given these descriptions of the Creator, does the Islamic concept of God seem any different from the Biblical concept of God?

True, Islam doesn’t believe in a triune God nor does it believe that Jesus is God or Son of God, but rather believes that Jesus is a great Prophet and moral teacher.

But this doesn’t alter the fundamental fact that Allah is the God of Abraham, Moses, Jesus and Muhammed, though interpretation of the attributes of God differs even within the same religion.

It is obvious that the issue at hand is more than academic and goes beyond the realm of theological discussion. The pseudo-belief by many evangelical Christians that Muslims worship a different God, or a Moon God as Pat Robertson of the 700-Club keeps babbling, has serious ramifications for world peace and the so-called “clash of civilizations.”

Indeed, some Christian fundamentalists, like Robertson and Jerry Falwell, who died this week, would stop short of advocating the conversion or annihilation of Muslims, possibly in a nuclear holocaust….because they worship a different God…and therefore they are evil.!! Convert them or kill them, Robertson would say, supposing he has not already said that.

Didn’t he claim during the annual Strategic Forum in Herzlya in Israel in 2004 that the conflict in the Middle East was “between the Biblical God Yahweh ... and the Moon God.?”

I know that I am probably giving more attention than I should to these silly, and stupid perceptions, held and preached by an essentially silly and stupid man who claims to be God’s representative on earth.

However, I believe it is imperative to prevent such rich and influential ignoramuses and fanatics from poisoning the minds and hearts of the commoners by inculcating in their heads brazen lies abut the “other.”

Needless to say, this ignorant and hateful preaching will only deepen Islamophobia and lead to further more poisoning of the already troubled relations between billions of Christians and Muslims.

Muslims don’t and won’t seek “legitimacy” and “recognition” from the likes of Robertson and Falwell and other representatives of Evangelical Zionism. However, for the sake of peace, mutual understanding and mutual respect, it is important that we get to know each other, in a spirit of love and good will, a task that is difficult to carry out without isolating and exposing the fanatics and ignoramuses amongst ourselves.

Khalid Amayreh Khalid Amayreh is an independent Palestinian journalist living in East-Jerusalem. This article originally appeared on www.tlaxcala.es