# Can a Christian really speak with God? *A Christian who speaks with God, and the one-god-further argument* - URL: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/eo90sv4jvho/s/25/ - Date: 2021-01-05 · Kind: question · Transcript tier: machine · Recording: Monday Nights with Mufti #196 | Q&A Unscripted & Unrestricted! 😉 | Mufti Abu Layth (1:51:46–1:57:08) - Status: general teaching - Watch from the start of the segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eo90sV4JVHo&t=6706s - Recording page: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/eo90sv4jvho/ **Topics:** Christians and other faiths; Atheism and the existence of God; Salvation and non-Muslims **Question as asked:** My Christian stepdad says he speaks with God. He told me other people he knows do too. I believe Islam brings us closer to God. What are your thoughts? **Summary (not a quotation; machine-made, unchecked):** Anyone can have a direct line to God whatever they call Him; he says the atheist one-god-further argument is a fallacy. **Checked position (checked by two independent reviews, not by the channel):** Mufti Abu Layth says he believes that anybody and everybody has a direct line to Allah, whatever they call him. **Evidence, his words at 1:52:12:** “God is not the God just of Muslims or of Islam. I believe that anybody and everybody has that direct line to Allah whether they call him God” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eo90sV4JVHo&t=6732s) ## Longer summary A super chat says the questioner's Christian stepfather says he speaks with God and asks for Mufti Abu Layth's thoughts, since Islam is believed to bring us closer to God. Mufti says God is not only the God of Muslims, and he believes everybody has a direct line to Allah, whatever they call him. He then addresses the atheist argument, made by Dawkins and others, that believers are atheists about thousands of gods and atheists just go one god further. He calls it a fallacy because people have generally had one concept of God, personified through symbols such as Brahma, Osiris or Ram, or deputised to lesser beings like angels, so Muslims disagree with the symbolism but not that it was the same God. ## Sources and names cited - Richard Dawkins ## Transcript (machine tier, 1:51:46–1:57:08) [1:51:46] It will be an honor to have him on. Cool. Let's There was another uh super chat. My Christian stepdad says he speaks with God. He told me other people he knows do too. I believe Islam brings us closer to God. What are your thoughts? Mist is possible, Isa. uh Palam Isa Palar, right? [1:52:12] So yes, you see, look people, God is not the God just of Muslims or of Islam. I believe that anybody and everybody has that direct line to Allah whether they call him God, whether they call him whatever. And and you know this is a point I want to uh clarify as well because sometimes atheists will say uh and it's a very uh interesting statement they make [1:52:50] Dawkins has made it and many others as well. They say that look there have been 3,000 guards. Okay. And they say the difference between you and me is you are also an atheist in 2,999 but I just go that one god further. [1:53:14] So they say there's no real difference. You're also an atheist in these thousands of gods but I'm just going one god further. And that is our difference. And when they say it like that, it sounds like, well, hm, okay. But this is actually a fallacy. You know why? Because God ultimately to these people generally speaking has just been God. [1:53:43] It's just one concept. However, they have personified God differently. So God is this invisible force that helps people Now some people have then interpreted certain aspects of him differently. Some people have said maybe he's set deputies and he's deputized other semi-gods to do things or forces like the wind and this and these are like deputies of the god or god. [1:54:16] Now whether they called him Brahma or they called him Ishvar or they called him you know they go or Bal or uh they called him uh as Allah or Yazdan or these things it is still ultimately even when they said Ram or they said these they ultimately had the concept of God but they then may have reflected did onto a particular symbol. [1:54:49] So whether it was Osiris or you know whatever it was the point is that God was always the concept of God but it was just personified and reflected using certain symbolisms at times things at like forces fire agni vun or at time people like you would say um [1:55:25] Ram or Christ or so on that this is how they personify God. So yes, we disagree with the way they tried to capture the image of God. We disagree with the the metaphors or the symbolism, but ultimately we do understand that they weren't it wasn't a separate god. Now in some cases that might have happened that some people may have actually believed in you know in let's say multiple kind of gods but ultimately most religions believed in an ultimate [1:56:02] being from whom these other beings are derived. Just as uh in the monotheistic faith the way we see angels and we see these things they used these other demigods like that. So, so this argument of the atheists that look you also disbelieve in Zeus and in Thor and in Odin and in you know all these other Vishnu and Shiva and Brahma and Krishna and Ram and Jesus and oh sorry not Jesus but uh for these people they the atheists will say you know you [1:56:39] disbelieve in all these other gods so we just go that one god further and say the god of Abraham but that's not true because the concept ultimately was the same. It was just God. So I I think that was a point that really needs to be explained because it's mis it's a misleading argument. I kind of like cleaning. ## Cite Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment eo90sV4JVHo/s/25. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/eo90sv4jvho/s/25/ Not a fatwa: these answers were given to specific people at specific times. Ask a qualified scholar about your own situation.