Islam and Mary

[Mr.Ruggerio]

On a subject I was wondering on, as I’d like to hear some discussion on this.

First, regarding Islam, Mary is mentioned more frequently than any other women in the Koran and held in unusually high regard by Moslems, higher even than some protestants. This high regard, I submit, is out of place and almost unjustified given the tenets of the faith, as I understand them.

Now, assuming that the Koran is blasphemous in its origins, doesn’t the high regard in which she is held, suggest something about the regard with which she is held by the very devil himself. Assuming, the angel Gabriel really didn’t dictate the book. I mean in a sense (and no disrepect is intended) but hasn’t she, so to speak charmed the very serpent himself (unlike Eve)? Think what that says about the character of this woman that being the case. I mean why would the Koran be written that way, such that the stuff about her seems almost gratuitious.

Just speculating and looking for feedback and further thoughts.

 

[Rodrigo_Bivar]

I think Mary’s prominence in the Quran is because Muhammad was ignorant of Christianity. There were allegedly a picture of Jesus and Mary in the Ka’aba and he did think Christians believe Allah, Jesus and Mary were the Trinity.

 

[Loginus]

I think Mary’s prominence in the Quran is because Muhammad was ignorant of Christianity. There were allegedly a picture of Jesus and Mary in the Ka’aba and he did think Christians believe Allah, Jesus and Mary were the Trinity.

Exactly, not everything non-catholic is “inspired by Satan”.

 

[Mr.Ruggerio]

No. You miss my point. Mary’s prominence in the Koran is superfluous. It’s some extra thing grafted on for no apparent theological reason. Even if M. just borrowed erroneously from Christian theology himself all that explains is how, not the why.

 

[Mr.Ex_Nihilo]

On a subject I was wondering on, as I’d like to hear some discussion on this.

First, regarding Islam, Mary is mentioned more frequently than any other women in the Koran and held in unusually high regard by Moslems, higher even than some protestants. This high regard, I submit, is out of place and almost unjustified given the tenets of the faith, as I understand them.

Now, assuming that the Koran is blasphemous in its origins, doesn’t the high regard in which she is held, suggest something about the regard with which she is held by the very devil himself. Assuming, the angel Gabriel really didn’t dictate the book. I mean in a sense (and no disrepect is intended) but hasn’t she, so to speak charmed the very serpent himself (unlike Eve)? Think what that says about the character of this woman that being the case. I mean why would the Koran be written that way, such that the stuff about her seems almost gratuitious.

Just speculating and looking for feedback and further thoughts.

Perhaps this reverence to Mary was the reason Pope John Paul II kissed their holy book. As a son to a mother would kiss them in filial love, perhaps John Paul II was reaching out to Islam through the reverence to the Virgin Mary from their own holy book.

Nonetheless, to answer the questions, I suspect the reason is that the Koran contains some truths and some untruths. I still think the basic morality of the Koran reflects a kind of thinking that is not much different than the Israelites during the time of Joshua-- and that’s not necessarilly a bad thing.

Unfortunately, although there are certainly many pieces of wisdom in their holy book, the general outline of the book seems to be predominantly geared toward this kind of annexation of other lands in the name of Allah through Islam. Even if there are many noble and peaceful Muslims around the world, the books uneven preoccupation with conquest tends to lead me to the conclusion that the religion is mostly focussed on the warrior’s image of God, even if there are some things I can agree with it on.

Reasons like this are why I defend some aspects of Islam, at least when they agree with Catholicism. I’ve never held that Islam was inherently evil. I’ll stand by that claim too.

 

[inJESUS]

No. You miss my point. Mary’s prominence in the Koran is superfluous. It’s some extra thing grafted on for no apparent theological reason. Even if M. just borrowed erroneously from Christian theology himself all that explains is how, not the why.

mmm yes i think i got your point. Indeed Christians regard her with high esteem for a reason…am not sure about why Muhammad wrote about her with such esteem…maybe he just knew how much she is esteemed and he didn’t have a problem with the idea so he included it in his book…though Islamically i don’t seem to understand why…the best answer you’ll get is Allah knows best i guess.

 

[Charlie_Zeaiter]

Hmmm… I have a really controversial thought on this. It may be a bit perverted, but maybe Muhammed liked Mary because she was a virgin.

Oh dear… I think I gonna get in trouble for submitting this reply.

 

[Loginus]

Hmmm… I have a really controversial thought on this. It may be a bit perverted, but maybe Muhammed liked Mary because she was a virgin.

Oh dear… I think I gonna get in trouble for submitting this reply.

If this were true then she wouldnt be a virgin in the Qur’an now would she?

I think the best reason is simply because Mohammed was an orphan so he would have a deeper appretiation for Mothers. This could also be the reason why in alot of laws respect for parents is so essential.

 

[HailMary]

The Age of Islam, one day will end, because it is simply that, an age. And when those that convert to Christianity, they will convert through Mary, the Gate of Heaven, and enter into God’s House.

 

[Loginus]

The Age of Islam, one day will end, because it is simply that, an age. And when those that convert to Christianity, they will convert through Mary, the Gate of Heaven, and enter into God’s House.

The Age of Christianity, one day will end, because it is simply that, an age. And when those that convert to Islam, they will convert through Mary, the Gate of Heaven, and enter into Allah’s House.

 

[melbourne_guy]

The Age of Christianity, one day will end, because it is simply that, an age. And when those that convert to Islam, they will convert through Mary, the Gate of Heaven, and enter into Allah’s House.

Longinus you tried to sound smart by using reverse logic but it sounded really stupid. I dont think theres a muslim out there who would think poeple would convert to islam through Mary.

 

[melbourne_guy]

longius that reverse logic sounded really stupid as muslims dont refer to Mary as the “gate of heaven”, and i dont think muslims would atribute any conversions to mary, they pay her little tribute if any.

 

[Angelos]

Hmmm… I have a really controversial thought on this. It may be a bit perverted, but maybe Muhammed liked Mary because she was a virgin.

Oh dear… I think I gonna get in trouble for submitting this reply.

LOL Charlie, let me tell you that you were pretty close to the truth. I’ll prove very soon through some verses in the Islamic Scripture that Mohammed had actually dreamed of having a virgin like Mary throughout his life Wait for my analysis…

Peace to all…

Coming soon: Angelos’ analysis of Islam’s approach to the Virgin Mother of our Lord

 

[inJESUS]

LOL Charlie, let me tell you that you were pretty close to the truth. I’ll prove very soon through some verses in the Islamic Scripture that Mohammed had actually dreamed of having a virgin like Mary throughout his life Wait for my analysis…

Peace to all…

Coming soon: Angelos’ analysis of Islam’s approach to the Virgin Mother of our Lord

well it is a fact that Muhammad had a fondness for virgins…after all he liked Aisha most, he advised others to marry virgins to “fondle” with them, and he promised his pious men virgins in janna.

Volume 7, Book 62, Number 17:

Narrated Jabir bin 'Abdullah:

When I got married, Allah’s Apostle said to me, “What type of lady have you married?” I replied, "I have married a matron’ He said, “Why, don’t you have a liking for the young virgins and for fondling them?” Jabir also said: Allah’s Apostle said, "Why didn’t you marry a young girl so that you might play with her and she with you?’ :nope:

 

[Angelos]

No. You miss my point. Mary’s prominence in the Koran is superfluous. It’s some extra thing grafted on for no apparent theological reason. Even if M. just borrowed erroneously from Christian theology himself all that explains is how, not the why.

Hi Ruggerio

I agree with you - to some extent - that the Quran praises Mary and obliges Muslims to believe in Her spiritual purity as well as virgin motherhood for no apparent theological reason. I assure you that the Islamic scripture has various reasons to exalt Mary more than the other faithful women, and most of those reasons lack a purely theological foundation. The same thing can be said about Islam’s approach to the fundamental Christian tenet of the Lord’s passion & death. The strong denial of Jesus’ crucifixion and the efforts to interpret that significant historic incident as a simple deceptive miracle emerge from Mohammed’s plans to offer Jesus’ story as a precious sacrifice to his anti-Judaic sentiments.

What does the Quran teach about Mary? Let’s have a look at a few verses concerning Jesus’ mother so as to decipher the real reason for Mohammed’s uncanny love and respect for Mary. First of all, it is necessary to state that Mary is the only female name present in Mohammed’s scripture. (Interestingly, the 19th chapter in the Quran is named after Mary even though it is impossible to prove that it was Allah or Mohammed himself that consented to dedicate a chapter to Mary’s honor!) Therefore, we should keep in mind that Mohammed considered no other female name worthy enough to include into his book. Mohammed’s own mother is never mentioned in the Quran, but there are a few chapters referring to his many wives, which indicates Mohammed’s strange wish to replace his mother with his wives. Mohammed seems to hate the idea of making associations between his biological mother and his followers (Muslim faithful) on the basis of surrogate motherhood, but he definitely loves to designate all his wives as the foster mothers of the believers. This awkward designation is most probably based on Mohammed’s fear that some handsome Muslim men might try to snatch some of the wives away from him:

**Al Ahzab 033: 006 **The Prophet is closer to the Believers than their own selves, and his **wives **are *their *mothers.

Now if we get back to the analysis of Mariology in the Quran, the first thing we see is that Mary is said to be a pure lady chosen by Allah for His wise plans related to Jesus’ birth:

**003: 42 **Behold! the angels said: "O Maryam! Allah hath chosen thee and purified thee, chosen thee above the women of all nations.

Apparently, this greeting by the angels is very similar to the words said by Gabriel to Mary at the time of annunciation. The Quran does not only confirm Mary’s purity and praise Her as the woman greater than all the others, but also extends this privileged status to Mary’s family on a racial level in the opening verse of Mary’s story:

003: 033. Lo! Allah preferred Adam and Noah and the Family of Abraham and the Family of 'Imran above (all His) creatures.

to be continued…

 

[Angelos]

continuing from above

However, the third chapter of Mohammed’s Scripture presents as a part of divine revelation a narrative missing from the Canonical Gospels. This narrative takes the reader back to the days of Mary’s parents and recounts how Mary was conceived. The main theme of this interesting account is the parents’ promise for the child’s dedication to the Temple of God prior to birth, the equivalent of which we can find in prophet Samuel’s story in the Bible (1 Samuel 1: 28). According to the account in Mohammed’s Scripture, Mary’s father is Imran – Moses’ father at the same time !– and Mary’s parents decide to dedicate the child they expect to the service of God in the temple. Even though Imran’s wife does not give birth to a son, she keeps her promise by sending the newborn Mary to the Temple, where Zechariah grows her up:

003:35-37. (Remember) when the **wife of 'Imran **said: My Lord! I have vowed unto Thee that which is in my belly as a consecrated (offering). Accept it from me. Lo! Thou, only Thou, art the Hearer, the Knower! And when she was delivered she said: My Lord! Lo! I am delivered of a female - Allah knew best of what she was delivered - the male is not as the female; and lo! I have named her Mary, and lo! I crave Thy protection for her and for her offspring from Satan the outcast. And her Lord accepted her with full acceptance and vouchsafed to her a goodly growth; and made Zachariah her guardian. Whenever Zachariah went into the sanctuary where she was, he found that she had food. He said: O Mary! Whence cometh unto thee this (food) ? She answered: It is from Allah. Allah giveth without stint to whom He will.

It’s not difficult to guess that Mohammed’s scribes adopted this story from a famous *apocryphal Gospel *attributed to James the apostle (protevangelium). Thus, the reason for the presence of this narrative in the Quran is primarily Mohammed and his followers’ unawareness of what is written in the Canonical Gospels.

Another interesting point about Mary in the Islamic Scripture is that She is identified as Aaron’s sister in addition to Her identification as Imran’s daughter:

66: 12. And Mary, daughter of 'Imran, whose body was chaste, therefor We breathed therein something of Our Spirit.

19: 27-28 Then she brought him to her own folk, carrying him. They said: O Mary! Thou hast come with an amazing thing. O sister of Aaron! Thy father was not a wicked man nor was thy mother a harlot.

Most polemicists bind this strange and unhistorical identification to the claim that the authors of the Quran confused the Mary in the Old Testament with the Mary in the New because both women had the same name. I, nevertheless, personally believe that such a weird case of mistaken identity occurred in Mohammed’s book due to the Islamic endorsement of the story of Mary’s dedication to the Temple along with the meaning of such a dedication in the Old Testament. If we take into account the link between Samuel’s dedication and his call to prophetic mission and combine it with the Old Testament account calling Moses’ sister Mary “a prophetess”, it becomes easier for us to find out why the writers of the Quran mistakenly refer to Jesus’ mother as Aaron’s sister:

Exodus 15:20. So Mary the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand: and all the women went forth after her with timbrels and with dances.

to be continued (after I eat dinner )

 

[inJESUS]

mmm very interesting…i always knew Muhammad confused some things …good “theological” analysis

 

[Angelos]

continuing from above (back from dinner )

Strikingly, the Quran relates the story of Mary’s miraculous pregnancy and Jesus’ birth in the early Meccan period along with the stories of other prophets, and the sentence used in the 19th chapter to introduce the account of Mary’s pregnancy forms a pattern with the opening sentence of those stories:

19:16. And make mention of Mary in the Scripture, when she had withdrawn from her people to a chamber looking East

19: 41. And make mention in the Scripture of Abraham. Lo! he was a saint,* a prophet*.

19: 51. And make mention in the Scripture of Moses. Lo! he was chosen, and he was a messenger (of Allah), a prophet.

19: 54. And make mention in the Scripture of Ishmael. Lo! he was a keeper of his promise, and he was a messenger (of Allah), a prophet.

19: 56. And make mention in the Scripture of Idris. Lo! he was a saint, a prophet

After these verses, the Quran claims that the list belonged to the messengers of Allah:

19: 58. These are they unto whom Allah showed favour from among the prophets, of the seed of Adam and of those whom We carried (in the ship) with Noah, and of the seed of Abraham and Israel, and from among those whom We guided and chose. When the revelations of the Beneficent were recited unto them, they fell down, adoring and weeping.

This might mislead one to the assumption that Mary was one of the prophets since in the verses I quoted above the one remembered in the Book with the other saints and prophets is not Jesus, but surprisingly His mother Mary. Thus, it is possible to claim that the Islamic Scripture alludes to Mary’s prophetic mission although it does not say it directly because of the traditional belief that only men are sent as Messengers:

21: 07. And We sent not (as Our messengers) before thee other than men, whom We inspired. Ask the followers of the Reminder if ye know not ?

Still, in the same chapter where the concept of prophetesses is refuted, the Quran does not avoid including Mary along with Jesus to the list of messengers:
21: 91. And she who was chaste, therefor We breathed into her (something) of Our Spirit and made her and **her son **a token for (all) peoples.

In chapter 23, once more, the Quran refers to Mary in the same context as the other messengers:

23: 50. And We made **the son of Mary **and **his mother **a portent, and We gave them refuge on a height, a place of flocks and watersprings.

23: 51. O ye messengers! Eat of the good things, and do right. Lo! I am Aware of what ye do.

There is something else to be stressed in the two quotations above. According to the writers of the Quran, Mary and Jesus are equal in many ways. Thus, it is both Mary and Jesus that are Signs from Allah; both Mary and Jesus have been raised to a lofty place. These verses absolutely assert that Mary is nothing less than Her son Jesus!

 

[Angelos]

continuing

In the light of these evidential sentences in the Islamic Scripture, we can say that Mohammed did not have the chance to read the Canonical Gospels and presumed that the Apocryphal texts narrating Jesus’ birth and infancy were regarded by the Church as authentic and authorized parts of the Christian Scripture. While quoting from those apocryphal texts, Mohammed became familiar with the amazing Christian reverence and love towards Mary because of Her direct involvement in God’s plan of salvation through the mystery of incarnation, but he mistakenly concluded that this sort of devotion to Jesus’ mother had led Christians to believe in a Trinity based on sexuality. Thus, he thought that traditional Christian Trinity consisted of the Father (Allah), Mother (Mary), and Son (Jesus):

005: 116. And when Allah saith: O Jesus, son of Mary! Didst thou say unto mankind: Take me and **my mother **for **two gods **beside Allah ?

005: 17. They indeed have disbelieved who say: Lo! Allah is the Messiah, son of Mary. Say: Who then can do aught against Allah, if He had willed to destroy the Messiah son of Mary, and **his mother **and everyone on earth ?

Consequently, he embraced Mariology since he supposed it was a part of the Christian Scripture, but condemned the so-called Trinity that was produced by his own words making Jesus and Mary equal in various aspects and presenting some events in Mary’s life as the counterpart of those in Jesus’ life. For instance, Mohammed incorporated the narrative of Mary and Jesus’ birth in the 3rd chapter. He also adopted the idea that both Mary and Jesus were fed miraculously by Allah. This adoption later enabled him to debunk Jesus and Mary’s divinity since Mohammed was better than anything else at reading apocrypha and then using some of the accounts therein to criticize the basic Christian creed:

005: 75 And they both used to eat food. (Mohammed supposed that Jesus and Mary could not be gods because they ate! Actually, this argument was the result of absolute ignorance of the Christian belief in incarnation and Jesus’ true human nature More, by putting forward this argument, Mohammed walked in the footsteps of pagans who did not believe that Mohammed was a prophet because they saw him eat! )

In short, he accepted with much joy whatever he found in the writings he came across with so as to benefit from them in his struggle against Christianity.

Nonetheless, he wrote in the Quran that Jesus is nothing more than a prophet whereas he could not write the equivalent of this strong statement while denying the supposed Christian faith in Mary’s divinity. He was satisfied with the sentence confirming Mary’s sainthood, but did not write she was nothing more than a prophet’s mother, which would have been absurd in that context:

005: 75. The Messiah, son of Mary, was no other than a messenger, messengers (the like of whom) had passed away before him. And his mother was a saintly woman. And they both used to eat food.

 

[inJESUS]

which proves that the Quran confused the 2 Marys