According to news reports, the muslim world is in a serious uproar over a perceived attack on their religion by the Pope.
Muslims around the world expressed outrage Friday over Pope Benedict XVI’s comments on Islam, with Turkey’s ruling party accusing him of trying to revive the spirit of the Crusades and scores taking to the streets in protest.
Pakistan’s parliament unanimously condemned the pope, and the Foreign Ministry summoned the Vatican’s ambassador to express regret over the remarks.
Muslim leaders railed against the Pope’s remarks, demanding personal apologies and calling for protests:
Salih Kapusuz, a deputy leader of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s party, said Benedict’s remarks were either “the result of pitiful ignorance” about Islam and its prophet, or a deliberate distortion.
“He has a dark mentality that comes from the darkness of the Middle Ages. He is a poor thing that has not benefited from the spirit of reform in the Christian world,” Kapusuz was quoted as saying by the state-owned Anatolia news agency. “It looks like an effort to revive the mentality of the Crusades.”
“Benedict, the author of such unfortunate and insolent remarks, is going down in history for his words,” he said. “He is going down in history in the same category as leaders such as (Adolf) Hitler and (Benito) Mussolini.”
[...]
Lebanon’s most senior Shiite Muslim cleric denounced the remarks and demanded the pope personally apologize.
“We do not accept the apology through Vatican channels … and ask him (Benedict) to offer a personal apology – not through his officials – to Muslims for this false reading (of Islam),” Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah told worshippers.
[...]
Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, of the Islamic Hamas group, said the pontiff (sic) had offended Muslims everywhere and called on him to reconsider his statement. He said there would be organized protests later in the day “to express Palestinian anger.”
In Iraq’s Shiite Muslim-stronghold of Kufa, Sheik Salah al-Ubaidi criticized the pope during Friday prayers, saying his remarks were a second assault on Islam.
Based upon all the breathless headlines and fiery rhetoric one could be excused for thinking that massive violent protests had erupted everywhere. As with the Danish cartoon imbroglio, where the credulous media and opportunistic imams fanned the flames of muslim malcontent against the West, such violence may yet appear, but for the now the reaction has been somewhat, er, limited:
In Cairo, Egypt, about 100 demonstrators gathered in an anti-Vatican protest outside the al-Azhar mosque, chanting “Oh Crusaders, oh cowards! Down with the pope!”
Dozens of lawyers in Indian-controlled Kashmir also protested, while two separatist leaders were placed under house arrest as they were planning to lead demonstrations.
So out of a religion numbering its adherents in the vicinity of 1.2 billion, only about 200 at most showed up to protest? More people than that routinely show up to support-the-troops rallies or to inveigh against government encroachment upon individual property rights, but the media does not seem as interested in those stories. Why is it that, prior to anything really even happening, this is front-page world news? The Supreme Pontiff must have said something really nasty, wouldn’t you think? This is how the New York Times Service reported it:
Pope Benedict XVI weighed in Tuesday on the sensitive issue of rapport between Islam and the West: He said that violence, embodied in the Muslim idea of “jihad,” or holy war, is contrary to reason and God’s plan, while the West was so beholden to reason that Islam could not understand it.
[...]
In all, the speech seemed to reflect the Vatican’s struggle over how to confront Islam and terrorism, as the 79-year-old pope pursues what is often considered a more provocative, hard-nosed and skeptical approach to Islam than his predecessor, John Paul II.
As such, it distilled many of Benedict’s long-standing concerns, about the crisis of faith among Christians and about Islam and its relationship to violence.
And he used language open to interpretations that could inflame Muslims, at a time of high tension among religions and three months before he makes a trip to Turkey.
And here’s the part that supposedly has unleashed the onslaught of almost hundreds of angry Muslims:
He began his speech, which ran over half an hour, by quoting a 14th-century Byzantine emperor, Manuel II Paleologus, in a conversation with a “learned Persian” on Christianity and Islam —”and the truth of both.”
“Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword by the faith he preached,” the pope quoted the emperor, in a speech to 1,500 students and faculty.
Pretty harsh indeed. Telling muslims that the only thing they’ve added to the discussion of theology is “evil and inhuman” — anyone who said such a thing today would be fomenting justifiable anger (albeit, not justifiable violence). Yet, the Pope didn’t draw that conclusion. Instead, he was quoting a Byzantine emperor from the 14th century.
Indeed, his speech wasn’t about Islam at all. The Pope used the Manuel II Paleologus quote to set up this tension:
The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. “God”, he says, “is not pleased by blood – and not acting reasonably (F×< 8`(T) is contrary to God’s nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats… To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death…”.
The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God’s nature.
(emphasis added). The entire speech was a discussion of the relationship between reason and religion (or science and theology). The Pope decries the effort to separate the two (what he calls “dehellenization”) as resulting in the decoupling of ethics and morality from a rational view of the world:
In the meantime, it must be observed that from this standpoint any attempt to maintain theology’s claim to be “scientific” would end up reducing Christianity to a mere fragment of its former self. But we must say more: if science as a whole is this and this alone, then it is man himself who ends up being reduced, for the specifically human questions about our origin and destiny, the questions raised by religion and ethics, then have no place within the purview of collective reason as defined by “science”, so understood, and must thus be relegated to the realm of the subjective. The subject then decides, on the basis of his experiences, what he considers tenable in matters of religion, and the subjective “conscience” becomes the sole arbiter of what is ethical. In this way, though, ethics and religion lose their power to create a community and become a completely personal matter. This is a dangerous state of affairs for humanity, as we see from the disturbing pathologies of religion and reason which necessarily erupt when reason is so reduced that questions of religion and ethics no longer concern it. Attempts to construct an ethic from the rules of evolution or from psychology and sociology, end up being simply inadequate.
An oversimplification of this speech is that, if you accept that Man was made in God’s image, you must accept that Man is part physical (reason, science, empiricism) and part spiritual (theological, philosophical). The conversation between Manuel II Paleologus and the “educated Persian” was one bookend of the clash between reason and religion (i.e. using reason to lead people to God vs. using violence to force people to accept God). The other bookend came as reason and secularism developed in a manner that eschewed the question of God, depriving the question of all rational inquiry. The Pope suggests that through Logos (Greek for “word” and “reason”) we can better understand God, not through reason alone, nor through the scriptures alone.
Whatever the merits of his argument, it clearly was not an attack on Islam as religion of violence, as suggested by many of the news reports. Instead it was an attack on the other bookend, extreme secularism that attempts to construct rules for society based upon nothing but rationality, empiricism and knowledge. While paying all due homage to the wonderments human reason has bestowed upon modernity, the Pope questions the choice to divorce rationality from faith:
While we rejoice in the new possibilities open to humanity, we also see the dangers arising from these possibilities and we must ask ourselves how we can overcome them. We will succeed in doing so only if reason and faith come together in a new way, if we overcome the self-imposed limitation of reason to the empirically verifiable, and if we once more disclose its vast horizons. In this sense theology rightly belongs in the university and within the wide-ranging dialogue of sciences, not merely as a historical discipline and one of the human sciences, but precisely as theology, as inquiry into the rationality of faith.
The Pope concludes that it is through our rational understanding of faith that we can better understand other cultures and find more common ground:
“Not to act reasonably, not to act with logos, is contrary to the nature of God”, said Manuel II, according to his Christian understanding of God, in response to his Persian interlocutor. It is to this great logos, to this breadth of reason, that we invite our partners in the dialogue of cultures. To rediscover it constantly is the great task of the university.
As I mentioned above, it does not matter a great deal if you agree with his arguments or not, but any reasonable interpretation of the Pope’s speech would not suggest that he was attacking Islam nor calling it a violent religion. In fact, he implores the secularists to understand that muslims are people of a devout, and unquestioning faith in God, who are somewhat bewildered by the Christian faith’s insistance on using reason to comprehend God, as if God could possibly be defined by what we think of Him. Indeed, what the Pope is urging is a return by the strict rationalists to faith and by the strictly faithful to the rational.
What confounds me most about the reporting of this whole non-event is the collective media’s prejudices are so glaringly obvious and so dangerous to boot. Muslims are seen as so intemperate and irrational as to become violent at the mere mention of a slight (one invented by the same media) and the Pope is some sort of neo-nazi who is trying to lord Catholocism over the muslim masses.
As witnessed in the Danish cartoon shenanigans, the muslim world does get overwrought about ridiculous things, but that was also in response to serious instigation on the part of the media and perfidious imams spreading fake cartoons and intentionally seeking to cause mass riots. And the Pope is definitely trying to offer Catholicism as a means to reconcialiation of the clashing cultures, but that’s part of his job, to spread the faith, and he is attempting to do it through rational discourse, not insults and belittlement. If the media could have even an ounce of integrity in this matter, there would be no threat of riots and there might even possibly be steps made towards peace between Islamic nations and the West. That the media instead seeks to exploit preconceived notions about the evil motivations of the parties, presumably hoping for a bigger and better story. If they get their wish, I sincerely hope that people understand how much of the blood belongs on the media’s hands.
A good article, indeed. A great article actually. Despite being a devout Muslim myself, I do not see why Muslims rage over such trivial issues. I especially liked your contrast between what happened during the danish cartoons and what is currently happening now.
However, the pope states a fallacious assumption. For the sake of saving time, I will use your interpretation rather than quoting his speech: “[M]uslims are people of a devout, and unquestioning faith in God, who are somewhat bewildered by the Christian faith’s insistence on using reason to comprehend God”.
If our subject of study is limited to the commons, this statement “could” be true. It “could” also be true with regards to common catholics, common Jews, and most common devout followers of almost all ideologies, religious or otherwise.
However, when examining Islamic theology itself, we find that the Pope got his facts wrong. The Quran challenges unbelievers with reason. For instance, it mentions, repeatedly, the complexity of the universe, urging everyone to analyze, examine, and study its structures and technique. Everyone is then encouraged to use this acquired knowledge to find their way to God.
In his argument, the Pope failed to realize the difference between how Muslims view “the being of God,” and “the creed of God.” In Christianity, the arguments regarding the being of God lay an important foundation to understanding faith. In Islamic tradition, talking about God’s being does not provide basis to anything practical. Hence, Ibn Hazm’s view of God’s transcendency is viewed as a part of a philosophical argument that only interests academics.
On the other hand, when examining, or implementing, God’s creed, Muslims are “ordered” to use their rationale. What you might see now is a lack of use of rational thinking by many Muslims, due to the unusual circumstances many of them are put in (poverty, poor education, intellectual censorship, political oppression, etc.) These circumstances apply to all; laymen, intellectuals, elitists, etc.
I am not angry myself, yet I understand the anger. I realize the violence, yet don’t justify it. We all understand that Muslims are now viewed in America to be the next communists. In Europe, there is a rise to Islamophobia everywhere. We are living in a time of a severed relationship between the West and not the East, but Islam. For the time being, I urge public figures (not all, just those internationally known) either talk absolute facts when mentioning Islam, or not talk about it at all. Enough Headaches, please.
How about urging all public figures (not just those internationally known), to not call Christians and Jews the descendants of monkeys and pigs, Sami?
I appreciate Sami’s reasonable foray into the discussion. But the key issue — forced conversion by violence — is a question of bypassing reason by the agressors and necessarily on the part of the “converted.”
So, forced conversions? Are you for ‘em, or agin’ em? the Quran? Most Muslims?
Why haven’t Islamic scholars weighed in on this issue? Are there any? eg. scholars who are Muslim who understand Islam and other theology.
The Quran does not advocate forced conversion any more than the Bible advocated the Crusades.
Mike, the pope made specific factual innaccuracies in his speech. Whether or not he needs to apologize for them or not, of course, is a question of opinion, but you have not addressed those inaccuracies here, nor in your post on Q & O. I think Omar will back me up, if he ever comes back.
Michael,
I appreciate your in depth analysis both of the Pope’s speech and the world’s response. I do think that Islamic indignity is growing, thanks mostly to a sensationalist media. Nevertheless, it brings to the forefront an issue of growing concern. Regardless of the true context of the Pope’s comments, many Christians do feel that Islam is spread by force (as well as by reason). It isn’t politically correct to say so, but there it is.
Sami,
How do we reconcile teachings from the Hadith that do appear to advocate conversion by the sword? (e.g. – The Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) said: I have been commanded to fight against people until they testify that there is no god but Allah, and he who professes it is guaranteed the protection of his property and life on my behalf except for a right warrant, and his affairs rest with Allah. – Hadith 11). Am I misinterpretting this? Does it not have the weight of scripture? I don’t have answers to these.
glasnost,
I am not debating you, though even if you are right I don’t think it changes the validity of Michael’s post, though I could be wrong, but specifically what are the inaccuracies which Omar should address.
Even with my limited knowledge of the Quran, Norman, I can answer that one. The answer is that the hadith is not the Qu’ran. It’s not the prophet Muhammad, and it’s not the alledged divine relevation. It’s a collection of statements and teachings by Islamic preachers in the centuries after the publication of the Qu’ran. To my understanding, some schools of Islam have essentially re-interpreted or outright disregarded those statements, and some haven’t, but although it is unfortunately found within the broader religious envelope, it is in fact a perversion of the core doctrine.
A comparable metaphor would be Thomas Aquinas’ just war theory as a perversion of the message of Christ, or the commandments in books of the Torah dealing with the treatment of slaves… modern Judaism, and I say this with religious Judaist education, has had to gloss over and essentially de jure ignore large segments of its own holy books.
I think that Mike’s post is perfectly valid on its own, and adds an important perspective on this current conflict. On the other hand, Lance, on Q and O, Mike said that Juan Cole’s discussion of the factual errors in the Pope speech was wrong, without describing why. I followed him here to contest.
I agree with Mike that the larger context of the pope’s speech was about faith and reason. Personally, I do in fact think that the section of the speech that is being cited a lot is, however, a veiled swipe at Islam and forced conversion.
There’s nothing wrong with decrying forced conversion, but quoting a figure who does in fact,seem to claim that forced conversion is inherent in the Qu’ran, is an inflammatory thing to do. Pope shouldn’t have done it. If he was going to do, he definitely shouldn’t have gotten his facts wrong.
As for the facts – here we go:
In the seventh conversation (*4V8,>4H – controversy) edited by Professor Khoury, the emperor touches on the theme of the holy war. The emperor must have known that surah 2, 256 reads: “There is no compulsion in religion”. According to the experts, this is one of the suras of the early period, when Mohammed was still powerless and under threat. But naturally the emperor also knew the instructions, developed later and recorded in the Qur’an, concerning holy war. Without descending to details, such as the difference in treatment accorded to those who have the “Book” and the “infidels”, he addresses his interlocutor with a startling brusqueness on the central question about the relationship between religion and violence in general, saying: “Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached”. The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable.
Juan Cole points out that the pope sets up a dichotomy here – he quotes a tolerant verse from the Qu’ran, represents it as coming from a time when “ when Mohammed was still powerless and under threat.
which according to Cole, is not correct, and cole is convincing – saying that Mohammed was ruling Medina at the time, so “powerless” is not very accurate.
Second, the Pope then quotes the emperor saying:Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached”.
And there is no command from Mohammed to spread the faith by the sword.
Norman,
With regards to your question, let us examine the text:
1. The word “People” in the above mentioned Hadith refers to the Pagans of Mecca, which were at war with the Muslims at the time of mentioning this Hadith.
2. How did we know this? First, from the historcial context of the Hadith. Second, the hadith appears contradictory to the Quranic verse stating, “No compulsion in religion.” When faced with an “apparent contradiction,” scholars utilize certain logical procedures to alleviate the contradiction. One of them would be the examination of which verse applies to general settings, and which is limited to specific circumstances. In our case, the general verse stands “No compulsion in religion,” in all settings regardless of the factors of When or Why. While this Hadith has to be interpreted as “time-sensetive” and only applied to the “People” of Mecca, at that specific time in history.
3. Upon examining verses and Prophetic traditions, which deal with forced conversion, I found that all of them refer to specific situations. The vast majority were given as “rules of engagement” during the times of war.
——–
Having said that. Now let us look at the Hadith in its proper context. We would read, “I [had been given permission] to fight against [pagans of Mecca] until they testify that there is no God but Allah, and he who professes it is guaranteed the protection of his property and life on my behalf…”
So now we understand that this Hadith is actually ordering the Muslim army to refrain from fighting any individual who declares Islam as his religion. Another story explains this further. A Muslim military leader killed a soldier on battlefield. When the soldier was assured of his death, he claimed to become a Muslim. The Muslim leader knew it was a trick to get out of being killed, so he proceeded to kill the man. When the prophet learned of this, he became angry as no one had seen before, and accused the leader of killing a sacred soul.
In short, this Hadith establishes the rules of shifting of royalties during the times of war, and has nothing to do with forced conversions.
——–
glasnost,
Unfortunately, your analysis of Prophetic tradition is quite wrong. Hadith is the collection of the sayings and actions of the Prophet Muhammad. You might find some sayings of his followers, in the same books, but they are clearly distinguished from his teachings.
You are not correct about the authenticity of the Hadith. It is true that Hadith has been orally transmitted through generations until it was transcribed two hundred years later. Despite it being less authentic than Quran, Hadith has been the subject of examination of scholars throughout Islamic history. The process which is used to authenticate, whether this Hadith has been said by the prophet or not, is quite complex.
There were some Muslims who dismissed Hadith totally, but I do not know of any Muslim academic scholar who did such thing. However, there are groups of Muslims who were not satisfied with the process of authentication, and argued that Hadith is mostly fabricated. From an academic view, their argument holds no water, since the process accurately marks which text is authentic and which is fabricated.
————-
This is me trying to be brief
If you need further explanation of any of the mentioned points, I will be glad to share my email with you to further discuss these matters.
The angle of Benedict’s discussion re forced conversion is this: a historical majority of imams and Moslems have endorsed conversion by the scimitar, despite the Koranic injunction against compulsion. This is either a gross longstanding repudiation of (what Moslems believe are) Allah’s direct words, or else Islam posits a dichotomy between Allah’s will and Allah’s revelation, such that one can not truly know anything about Allah by reading the Koran.
The Catholic faith is not like this; God is Logos itself — Greek “word” and “reason” both — as stated in John 1, and thus it follows that divine revelation and human reason (which is itself a gift of God) may not contradict one another. They have the same metaphysical underpinning in a rational God who created a rational universe. So Benedict critiques both sides from the middle — both the Islamic and Protestant devolutions into irrational fideism (faith without reason) and the secular devolution into metaphysically bankrupt positivism (reason without faith).
The former error requires an understanding of God as an arbitrary trickster or tyrant to be appeased, despite any verses cited to prove the contrary. The young-earth creationists, five-point Calvinists, and Moslems share this disconnect which enables them to deny that God would reveal Himself in the workings of His creation, or that God loves everyone He has created, and other non sequiturs.
The latter error, which consumed an equal amount of Benedict’s discussion, requires one to forswear metaphysical certainty about anything and thus ultimately to reject reason itself as untrustworthy. Once the moral order and the sacredness of people as beings created in His image are discarded as artifacts of the now-rejected divine revelation, the secularist world must inevitably end in Darwinian will-to-power.
Benedict’s commentary was to say to all sides that you cannot have the benefits of Western rationality without the catholic Christian faith; you can have a residue of it for a time, but as it is shunned, extirpated, and persecuted so too will be the underpinnings of civilization itself.
Sami – I don’t think that most Americans see Muslims as the next Communists – yet. There is genuine anger and intolerance for things that indeed should not be tolerated: the headchoppers and homocide bombers, the misogyny and the wild mobs chanting vicious slogans. I think that your view is that this is not a valid expression of Islam but rather comes from “poverty, poor education, intellectual censorship, political oppression, etc.” I hope that you are right but you must admit that Islam – as they see it – is clearly the animating spirit for these extremists.
So I think that, while there are Americans willing to write Muslims off altogether (“too many extremists per 100 Muslims…”) most are not there yet. After all, Muslim immigrants are strongly represented in professional occupations (Doctors, Scientists, and Technologists) and they have an average income higher than that of white Europeans. For perspective, you need only look to WWII when America rounded up Japanese immigrants and sent them to camps to ensure that they didn’t form a fifth column.
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Craig, that’s summary of the pope’s speech brings a greater clarity to me then I previously had. Good work.
I’m still not sure that that was the wisest quote for the Pope to use when discussing Islam, but Mike is also right about how universally overblown this is.
At least the Pope didn’t hand out any visual aids. One picture is worth a thousands words.
I have a few questions. First, how did Islam spread so rapidly? What would have happened to the two captive reporters if they hadn’t converted to Islam? Why is it wrong to be critical of Islam and it’s followers?
Christians for the most part enjoy arguments/debates concerning their beliefs. Jews are very casual about their relationship with God. It appears that the majority of Muslims are ready to take the life of anyone or group who might say, “are you sure about that”?
From what little I know about the history of Islam and its followers, it appears that Muslims are a shade of their former selves. Indeed today the questions can be asked about what is new, good and positive that comes from Islam?
Sami,
Thanks for a reasoned repsonse. You haven’t converted me, but you have changed my thinking on this point. Peace.
Sorry for my delayed response, everyone; I was out of town and unable to adequately address the excelllent comments. I also didn’t expect so many responses, so thank you all for taking the time to do so.
Sami:
Thank you for comments. I can appreciate that the limited characterization of Islamic teaching provided by the Pope in his speech may indeed contain inaccuracies, although I would contend that is because he was being very generally, and maybe unfairly so. Nevertheless, his speech was not about Islam, and the anecdote (which he read form a book) was only intended to set up the theme of the speech — acting contrary to reason is acting contrary to the nature of God.
That being said, I do think it is reasonable and fair to critique the Pope’s inaccuracies about Islam (although he claimed to be citing experts on the subject) and its followers. My beef is with the media seeking to exploit tensions between Christians and Muslims, apparently in an attempt to create a fight where none was needed or would have occurred absent the media’s mis-interpretation of the speech.
glasnost:
Regarding the allged inaccuracies, I answered that somewhat above, but let me be clear. Cole was wrong in attributed factual mistakes to the Pope where (i) the Pope was quoting from a book without approving of the quote’s characterization of Islam, nor giving any indication that he agreed with it (and in fact referred to the emperor’s tone as brusque and forceful) and (ii) neither of your (Cole’s?) examples are “facts” but instead the Pope reading someone else’s words and citing another’s opinion. In both instances, the Pope was merely trying to explain the background to the quote he wanted to use: “not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God’s nature.”
Norman:
I understand that many people think that Islam is spread by force, and the perverted version of Islam promoted by Islamo-fascists is indeed often spread this way. However, the Pope’s speech was not about that, the media should never have suggested that it was, and when the leaders of Islam either remain silent as to how perverted the Islamo-fascist message and practice are (or they are ignored by a negligent and irresponsible media), that view will continue to dominate.
craig:
Excellent comment. Thank you.
Cole was convincing?
Mike, one of the points here being made by Cole is definitely the pope’s own words. I don’t want to overinflate the importance of one factual error, so I’ll let it go, but if it was critical, I’d suggest that you reread the highlighted passage and the pope’s speech again – Cole is taking aim at the pope’s words.
Juan Cole points out that the pope sets up a dichotomy here – he quotes a tolerant verse from the Qu’ran, represents it as coming from a time
“ when Mohammed was still powerless and under threat.”
which according to Cole, is not correct, and cole is convincing – saying that Mohammed was ruling Medina at the time, so “powerless†is not very accurate.
The Times of London also picked this up.
It doesn’t really contest the general thrust of your statements. Then why bring it up? Oh, you know, general anal-retentiveness
Second, the Pope then quotes the emperor saying:Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preachedâ€.
glanost:
If you’re going to be anal-retentive about it, at least read the speech –
and, you point out that the Pope is reading someone else’s words (from someone else’s book) –
How is the Pope making a factual mistake here?
So after he had washed their feet, and had taken his garments, and was set down again, he said unto them, Know ye what I have done to you? 13: Ye call me Master and Lord: and ye say well; for so I am. 14: If I then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another’s feet. 15: For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you. 16: Verily, verily, I say unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord; neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him. 17: If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them. 18: I speak not of you all: I know whom I have chosen: but that the Scripture may be fulfilled, He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me. 19: Now I tell you before it come, that, when it is come to pass, ye may believe that I am he. 20: Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that receiveth whomsoever I send receiveth me; and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me. John 13:12-20
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