A Genuine Reformation is Underway

God Himself Is a Society

G. K Chesterton was a very perceptive theologian.  He was not always right by our lights, but time and time again he saw things far more clearly than many others.  That's why we return to him again and again.  

These days the doctrines of Islam have come far more into focus.  The West's response to the theological doctrines attending Islam has been one of condescension and ignorance.  This is not surprising, since the West views all religions--especially the Christian religion--as a hangover from a more ignorant, superstitious age.  Rather, the West--particularly the Commentariat and Western governments--have viewed Islam and Christianity through the prism of Marxist and neo-Marxist doctrines.  It's all to do with capital (property) and who has it and, therefore, who is exploiting whom.

To the Western mind there is little difference between Christianity and Islam, except that Christians don't go around slaughtering others, at least not now.  Once they did, during the time of the Crusades and so forth.

Chesterton perceived, however, that it is Islam's doctrine of its deity, Allah that makes it so antithetical to Christianity and to a free and just society.  In particular it is the Triune nature of God as He has revealed Himself to be. It turns out that the doctrine of the Trinity has vast implications for human society, just as the monist doctrine of Allah has vast implications for Islamic society--differences which we now see starkly illustrated every day.

Chesterton writes:

The complex God of the Athanasian Creed may be an enigma for the intellect; but He is far less likely to gather the mystery and cruelty of a Sultan than the lonely god of Omar or Mahomet.  The god who is a mere awful unity is not only a king but an Eastern king. [G. K. Chesterton, The Collected Works of G. K. Chesterton (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1986),  Volume I: Heretics, Orthodoxy, The Blatchford Controversies. p. 340, Emphasis, ours.] 

In Islamic theology, god is monistic--one, not many.  In Christianity, God has revealed Himself to be both one and many. Oneness and plurality are equally ultimate in God.

The heart of humanity, especially of European humanity, is certainly much more satisfied by the strange hints and symbols that gather round the Trinitarian idea, the image of a council at which mercy pleads as well as justice, the conception of a sort and liberty and variety existing even in the inmost chamber of the world.

For Western religion has always felt keenly the idea "it is not good for man to be alone."  The social instinct asserted itself everywhere as when the Eastern idea of hermits was practically expelled by the idea of monks. . . . For to us Trinitarians (if I may say it with reverence)--to us God Himself is a society.  It is indeed a fathomless mystery of theology, and even if I were theologian enough to deal with it directly, it would not be relevant to do so here.  Suffice it to say here that this triple enigma is as comforting as wine and open as an English fireside; that this thing that bewilders the intellect utterly quiets the heart: but out of the desert, from the dry places and the dreadful suns, come the cruel children of the lonely god; the real Unitarians who with scimitar in hand have laid waste the world.  For it is not well for God to be alone. [Ibid.]

ISIS is as it is because it believes in a monist god.  Its fruits are satanic.  Its deity is the conception of a creature, a diabolical creature, the Father of Lies.  It explains why Islamic societies struggle (and fail in most cases ) to form limited governments with divisions of powers.  It explains why there can be no separation of church and state.  It illuminates why there can be no equally ultimate institutions of government within the same social structure, such as church, civil state, and family, each with their own sovereignty and boundaries and legitimacy, each saying to the other, "thus far, and no further may you go".

But when it is understood and believed that God is Triune not only are such vital aspects of human existence possible, they are both essential and commanded by God.  And yet (in a Christian framework) all these diversities can be and must also be one.  They are complementary.  They each reinforce the other.  [An apt example is Paul's extended metaphor on the Church as a body.  I Corinthians 12:12ff.]

In the Islamic tradition, the prevailing ethic is submission--submission to external forces of command and control.  That is why, in Islam, apostasy carries the death penalty.  In the Christian tradition, the prevailing ethic is consent--mutual consent in which every human being consents to being both a superior and an inferior, and Christian society is therefore marked by a consent to bear authority and a consent to submit to authority.  This amazing reality (which the West is now trading away) is derived from the mutual social relationships of the Member of the Trinity within the Godhead.

ISIS is not an Islamic aberration: it is a consistent expression of that false religion.  It represents the reformation of Islam back to its essence and roots.