The Muslims' Perceptions of Christianity

Staff Writer


Table of Contents

The Muslims’ perceptions of Christianity have always been based on the fundamental principle of Islam, that is, there is no god but God and Muhammad is the prophet of God. Every argument takes bearing from the fundamental belief of the indivisibility of God. Below is a brief description of how Muslims perceive Christianity.

From the Qur’an

The Qur’an objects to the idea of God being one but in three persons – Father, Son and the Holy Spirit. It does not acknowledge the Trinity, and it extends to Christianity’s doctrine of the Incarnation and as such, the authenticity of the Bible. As described elsewhere in this blog about the nature of Jesus, the Islamic theological and scriptural understanding of the nature of Jesus are unique when compared to Christianity.

The Muslim polemics about the oneness of God, the Sonship of Jesus and the authenticity of the Bible can be better described in the Second-century discourse between Caliph al-Mahdi and Patriarch Timothy, leader of the Nestorian Church (164-208). It goes this way.

The Being of God Himself

For Caliph al-Mahdi, the doctrine of the Trinity suggests three distinct beings who can be separated and cannot be equal. He argues that the relationship between God and Jesus Christ implies that the Father begot the Son physically and that there was a relationship between the Eternal and one born in time, and thus objects that Jesus’ human traits and actions prohibit his being divine and that the Divinity came under the control of men when Christ was crucified. He continues and argues that the Christian scriptures were altered hence, there is no place in it where the coming of the prophet Muhammad was predicted and suspects that the scriptures were corrupted. Caliph al-Mahdi found no reason not to believe in how the Qur’an constructed Christianity (Al-Taubah 9:30-31; Al-Ikhlas 112).

The Polemics against the Trinity

In the third century, the Arabic philosopher Abu Yusuf Ya‘qub b. Ishaq al-Kindi introduced the Aristotelian logic to disprove the doctrine of the Trinity. In On First Philosophy which comprises four sections, he dealt with issues, such as the honouring of Greek love of wisdom, the eternity of the world and the existence of one true God. It is in his third and fourth sections of On First Philosophy that he argues that God is the originator and source of unity in all other things, and human language is inapplicable to him.

Another argument came from a ‘convert’, al-Tabari. He tried to expose the inconsistencies between the Bible and the Nicene Creed in his Radd ‘ala al-Nasara. He reread the Bible to give some predictions that include Muhammad in the Bible in his Kitab al-din wa-al-dawla.

Zaydi Imam al-Qasim Ibn Ibrahim’s (d. 246) Radd‘ala al-Nasara, reveals how he was influenced by Christianity. He argues that God is not like or similar to any of his creations but acknowledges God’s goodness and generosity as divine attributes. That was a refutation of the idea that God has a begotten Son and that his Son is the image of him.

The Influence of Kalam

In the third century, Islamic theological reasoning was maturing into a somewhat systematic discipline that was methodological. Its leaders were thinkers, such as the Mu‘tazila.

The Mu‘tazila referred to themselves as Ahl al-tawhid wa-al‘adl (the People of God’s Unity and Justice). During these periods, the concentration of Qur’anic and Muslim polemics was on the doctrines of the Trinity and the divinity of Jesus as against the oneness of God and the humanity of Jesus.

Conclusion

Like I said at the beginning that this will be a brief account of how Muslims perceive Christianity. The Qur’anic and Muslims’ perceptions of Christianity and Christians are principally attacks on the Christian concept of monotheism and the divinity accorded to Christ as the Son of God and second person of the Trinity. The attacks against Trinity sound like a projection and defence of their concept of Tawhid and the message of the prophet Muhammad.   

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