Christian-Muslim Dialogue: Festschrift in Honor of Prof. Pier Giorgio Gianazza SDB

Description

This volume stands as both a tribute and a testimony – a tribute to the life and scholarship of Professor Pier Giorgio Gianazza SDB, and a testimony to the living encounter between Christianity and Islam in thought, history, and faith. Published by STS Publications in Jerusalem, the book gathers a rich collection of essays by scholars and colleagues who, each in their own way, extend the horizon of dialogue that Gianazza has cultivated over decades of teaching, writing, and personal engagement.

The Festschrift opens a wide window onto the terrain of Christian–Muslim dialogue: a landscape marked by the tensions of polemic and the promise of friendship, by the necessity of truth and the patience of listening. The contributions traverse theology, history, philology, and lived experience, exploring how Christians have spoken with and about Muslims – from the early centuries of Islam to the complexities of today’s Middle East.

Among these studies appears the article “John of Damascus’ Encounter with Islam – The Hundredth Heresy: Polemics and Dialogue – A Pendulum Effect.” This contribution explores one of the earliest and most complex Christian engagements with Islam. In John of Damascus, a Church Father living under Muslim rule, polemical clarity and dialogical curiosity coexist. The study traces how John, in naming Islam the “hundredth heresy,” inaugurated a discourse that oscillates between refutation and understanding, boundary and bridge. The metaphor of the “pendulum” captures the dynamic rhythm of Christian–Muslim relations through history – swinging from confrontation to dialogue, from fear to respect, from separation to shared pursuit of truth.