I was reading just recently about one of the traditions concerning the False Prophet of the Hagarenes. According to this tradition, the False Prophet was accustomed to receive revelations from the Angel Gabriel [actually, the Devil] at a fixed time during the day. One day, however, the Angel did not come. At that point, the False Prophet was a guest in a friend's house. This friend had a dog. Later, once the False Prophet had moved on to a different place, the lying spirit did indeed manifest itself to him. The seer asked the spirit why it did not come at the appointed time on the previous day, and the spirit replied that "we angels never enter a house where there is a dog."
This is only one example of the theological, philosophical and moral problems that are inherent in what is objectively a blasphemous faith. It is fundamentally unsurprising that that religion, which rejects the notion of the human being as "the image and likeness of God," also shows blatant and consistent disregard and contempt for other things in God's Creation that manifest His vestige.
God created dogs, as He did also pigs. All of the animals were created by God according to the first chapter of the Book of Genesis. At the end of that chapter, the Lord God looks about on all the things that He has made and pronounces them "very good." It is true that later, in the dietary laws of the Torah, certain animals are designated by God as "unclean," but this says nothing whatsoever about the moral goodness or moral evil of those animals themselves. The laws are established to distinguish Israel, to make him holy (that is, "set apart") from his neighbours. To say that all things are "very good" does not exclude the possibility that some things are "better." In this way, the Lord distinguishes the people that He sets aside as "peculiarly His own." He assigns to them from among all existent things (which are good on account of their being), what He designates as the "better" things.
The Hagarenes, however, on the basis of their false revelation, insist on believing that animals like dogs and pigs are evil in themselves. This is the reason why they believe, for example, that before the final judgment Isa al-Masih (a caricature and parody of the Lord Jesus) will return in order to accomplish the following things: 1) He will break the Cross [that is, he will destroy Christianity finally and forever], 2) He will kill all the pigs, and 3) He will judge the living and the dead in the final resurrection.
Why would the Lord Jesus be interested in killing pigs in His Second and Glorious Coming? And why, we could ask for the same reason, do the angels despise some of the things that God has made? The false beliefs of the Hagarenes are not able to answer these questions.
The revelation that comes from the true God gives us a beautiful, contrary example. The Holy Bible that is accepted by the historical Churches of Christianity contains the Book of Tobias. (Protestant Christians also keep the book among the Old Testament Apocrypha.) The Book of Tobias contains two references to "the dog." The story is that of a young man who sets out on a journey at the behest of his father in order to recover some lost wealth and to seek a wife from among his own people. In the circumstances of this journey, the hero, Tobias, is accompanied by the Angel Raphael, who is concealed in human form. It is the angel's role to guide and protect the young Tobias in what would otherwise be perilous circumstances. When the Angel Raphael first appears in the story, and when he and Tobias prepare to set forth on their errand, one other being suddenly appears in the story: a dog. The dog is only mentioned twice and very briefly, but the dog functions in the story as the symbolic indication of the angel's mission. On both occasions, as they set out on the journey, and as they prepare to go home, after accomplishing their work, the Holy Spirit records that "the dog followed them." It is not the angel's function to "lead" Tobias (that would interfere in his freedom). The angel is there to guide and protect. The dog is the symbolic statement of this. The dog is suited by nature, and has been trained by mankind, to guide and protect. He does not guide in such a way that he leads his master against his will, but, rather, guides him according to his will. A seeing-eye dog, for example, guides his master in such a way that he perfects the will of his master by making it possible for him to execute his will in safety. In just the same way, the angels of God, like Raphael, unlike the malicious demons (e.g. the False Prophet's lying spirit masquerading as the Angel Gabriel), do not interfere in our freedom. They "lead from behind" (to borrow an expression from contemporary life) to encourage us to practice virtue in safety. The dog is the effective symbol of the virtues that are part of this kind of guidance and protection, namely: loyalty, faithfulness, perseverance and patience. It is, of course, not true that the dog possesses these virtues in himself. In God is the fullness of virtue (the fullness of perfection) and different virtues are manifest in different creatures according to the Divine Will.
The False Prophet's blasphemous religion does not like this animal, because it does not believe in virtue. According to that faith, human beings are to be moved to live a moral life through fear and coercion. The religious law itself is fundamentally coercive. In this kind of system, true virtue is impossible, because virtue must be freely chosen and practiced. Conversely, it does not eliminate vice either, but only channels it and rarefies it.
We would do well to cultivate the virtues of which the dog in the Book of Tobit is a symbol. Our life and society is in dire need of loyalty, faithfulness, perseverance and patience. The only way we grow in virtue is by faithfulness to the struggle.
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