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9 - The Islamic Jesus

from Part II - The Diversity of Reception

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 November 2024

By
Nicolai Sinai
Edited by
Markus Bockmuehl
Markus Bockmuehl
Affiliation:
University of Oxford
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Summary

In the Islamic tradition, Jesus is revered as a prophet to the Israelites, not as divine himself. The Qur’an selectively adopts Christian narrative lore about Jesus and Mary, omitting key gospel narratives like the passion. Jesus’s miraculous conception is acknowledged, paralleling Christian tradition without implying divinity, while his death on the cross is recast as a divine deliverance of Jesus from his enemies. The post-Qur’anic tradition portrays Jesus as a world-renouncing ascetic and stresses his humanity and subordination to God.

Keywords

JesusIslamQur’anMuhammadMary
Type
Chapter
Information
The New Cambridge Companion to Jesus , pp. 137 - 153
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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References

Further Reading

Akyol, Mustafa. 2017. The Islamic Jesus: How the King of the Jews Became a Prophet of the Muslims. New York: St. Martin’s Press.Google Scholar
Ali, Kecia. 2017. “Destabilizing Gender, Reproducing Maternity: Mary in the Qurʾān.” Journal of the International Qur’anic Studies Association 2: 89–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andrae, Tor. 1987. In the Garden of Myrtles: Studies in Early Islamic Mysticism. Translated by Birgitta Sharpe. Albany: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Brinner, William M. (trans.). 2002. ʿArāʾis al-Majālis fī Qiṣaṣ al-Anbiyāʾ or “Lives of the Prophets” as Recounted by Abū Isḥāq Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm al-Thaʿlabī. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Cook, David. 2002. Studies in Muslim Apocalyptic. Princeton: Darwin Press.Google Scholar
Jeffery, Arthur. 1951. “The Descent of Jesus in Muhammadan Eschatology.” In The Joy of Study: Papers on New Testament and Related Subjects Presented to Honor Frederick Clifton Grant, edited by Sherman, E. Johnson, 107–26. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Khalidi, Tarif. 2001. The Muslim Jesus: Sayings and Stories in Islamic Literature. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Lawson, Todd. 2009. The Crucifixion and the Qur’an. London: Oneworld.Google Scholar
Melchert, Christoph. 2020. Before Sufism: Early Islamic Renunciant Piety. Berlin: De Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morrissey, Fitzroy. In press. “Jesus in Islamic Mysticism.” In Son of Mary: Jesus in Muslim Tradition, edited by Stephen, R. Burge. Atlanta: SBL Press.Google Scholar
Mourad, Suleiman A. 2011. “Does the Qurʾān Deny or Assert Jesus’s Crucifixion and Death?” In New Perspectives on the Qurʾān: The Qurʾān in Its Historical Context 2, edited by Reynolds, Gabriel S., 349–57. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Nurbakhsh, Javad. 2012. Jesus in the Eyes of the Sufis. New York: Khaniqahi Nimatullahi Publications (originally published 1983).Google Scholar
Reynolds, Gabriel S. 2009. “The Muslim Jesus: Dead or Alive?” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 72.2: 237–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robinson, Neal. 1991. Christ in Islam and Christianity. Albany: State University of New York Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robinson, Neal. 2003. “Jesus.” In Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān, edited by McAuliffe, Jane Dammen, vol. 3, 7–21. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Schimmel, Annemarie. 2018. Jesus und Maria in der islamischen Mystik. [Xanten]: Chalice Verlag (originally published Munich: Kösel Verlag, 1996).Google Scholar
Shoemaker, Stephen J. 2003. “Christmas in the Qurʾān: The Qurʾānic Account of Jesus’ Nativity and Palestinian Local Tradition.” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 28: 11–39.Google Scholar

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