Christianity and Islam Essay
Benjamin Anderson
How have Christian theologians and thinkers understood Muhammad as a prophet in Islam
Over his life and more so after, Muhammad was able to greatly transform the world around him through Islam. Though not all were very receptive to these changes. The Christian church and the church of Islam have been adversarial since years after Muhammad’s founding of the religion in the seventh century. From the early middle ages and over the next thousand some years, Muhammad was treated as an outcast in the Christian world, being stereotyped and misunderstood by countless Christian theologians and thinkers. It is only in the modern era where the conceptions of Muhammad have begun to change within the church, and there is a greater respect with regards to his legacy between the two communities. Now, there is debate amongst Christian scholars on whether Muhammad should be a prophet. In this essay, I will describe Muhammad’s standing as a prophet from a Christian viewpoint and how it developed with time.
In the years following the conception of Islam, many Western thinkers were very hostile to the new religion. Word had been going around shortly after Muhammad’s death about him being the next prophet, but many were not persuaded. The earliest recorded Christian acknowledgement of Muhammad, according to Byzantine sources, in the Doctrina Jacobi nuper baptizati. In these readings can be found the statement, “He is deceiving. For do prophets come with sword and chariot?” At that point in time, there were heavily contested areas between religious sects. In the first half of the eighth century, there were a couple of instances of military battle between Christian and Islamic forces, which partially contributed to the negative viewpoint from the Christian leaders. In 732, Charles Martel and his French forces faced Islamic advance in the Northwest Mediterranean in Poitiers. Eight years later, the Byzantine army halted Muslim forces near the Northeastern Mediterranean in modern day Turkey. Through these events, it is evident why there were hostile reactions toward the new religion of Islam. Seeing Islam as a threat in a militaristic sense most likely took away any sort of domestic and tranquil between different communities. Had there been a tranquil globe like we see in a better sense now, there could have been an open discussion without an sort of threat. But because of the large barrier between the societies, it is no surprise that there was heavy resistance to Muhammad and his ideas going into the Middle Ages. Over the thousand years after his death, Muhammad was labelled the “Anti-Christ” and “false Prophet” by many Christian academics. Because of the consistent battling across Muslim Christian fronts, there was not much room in European society to consider and possibly accept the religion of those they were crossed against. It was not until the Enlightenment period when notions began to change. Scottish writer Thomas Carlyle is credited with being the first academic to accept Islam in western Europe. In his works, he proclaimed, “This is the soul of Islam; it is properly the soul of Christianity …. Christianity also commands us, before all, to be resigned to God …. Mahomet’s Creed we called a kind of Christianity; and really, if we look at the wild rapt earnestness with which it was believed and laid to heart, I should say a better kind than that of those miserable Syrian Sects.” (Carlyle 1904:40-66) To Carlyle, the roots of Christianity and Islam were the same and because of that, Christians should accept of Muhammad as a prophet. Even though there were differences between the two, because of the common thread of the faith in God, Muhammad should not be ostracized from the Christian religion. Many other Enlightenment figures followed suit, and because of the growing tranquility between the two religions, allowed for more conversations to be had between theologians during the modern era.
The modern era has facilitated far different conversations on the topic than previous centuries. While there is great disagreement amongst Christian scholars on Muhammad as a prophet, there are many who support Muhammad’s prophethood. William Montgomery Watt, a 20th century Scottish minister and historian, argued for Muhammad as a prophet in Islam on the fact there was no contradiction with Christian teaching. He did admit, however, that, “”
When analyzing Muhammad as a prophet in the minds of Christian theologians and thinkers, he was ostracized heavily for hundreds of years until enlightenment thinkers put him in a light which put him in a better light amongst Europeans, from which open mindedness and respect were able to prevail in the modern era. From this respect came a variance in opinions from different Christian theologians and thinkers leading up to today. To me, there is a certain hypocrisy from both religions in how they interpret prophethood. From my understanding, receiving a message from God would indicate that God’s supposed all-loving being would be understood by the messenger. When looking at the actions of those at the birth of both religions, it seemed like there was not a good understanding for those who had claimed they had heard the word of God. There were many unequal aspects to society, like the trade and use of slaves and the extremely male dominated hierarchy. In my opinion, how can one claim to be the son of God or speak to God and not address the glaring social holes at hand? When going through the Bible and looking at Jesus’ teachings, there are some heartwarming stories from which good lessons can be learned. But while the “Love thy neighbor” and “Do unto others and others have done unto you” are included yet those issues still massively pervaded society seems silly to me.
However, in terms of Muhammad’s status as a prophet in Christianity, I do not think it would make sense to include him as one. To do so would bring thoughts and principles that directly negate the teachings of the Christian church. If the Christian church were to not include part of his teachings and story like Islam does with Jesus Christ, I do not think it would be fair to make someone a prophet for whom the church has to exclude heavy amounts of their work. For Islam as well, while it is good that there is a mutual respect for Jesus and the life he lived, to exclude parts of his life and teachings would not be speaking to God for on that entity’s behalf. To call a figure prophetic only to not acknowledge part of their message would indicate a fault in the will of God, which would not be consistent in either Christian or Islamic teachings. Additionally, since Muhammad came around six hundred years after Jesus and hundreds of years after the rise of the Christian Church, the timeline would not help his case. Since the New Testament had already been written and numerous Christian communities had begun to pop up throughout the world, Muhammad’s revelations, however powerful and enlightening it might have been, would not have been beneficial for the Christian world to adopt at the time. Overall, while it is necessary that the Christian church maintains respect for Muhammad and the teachings of the Muslim church and facilitates conversations to achieve greater understanding between the two communities, I do not believe that his prophethood would make sense for Christian papacy to go through with. While making Muhammad a prophet of Christianity would go a long way in ameliorating the historically challenged relationship between Christianity and Islam, there is hope in the fact that more respect and open mindedness can be shared between the two religions and help foster a more peaceful era between its peoples.
Bibliography:
Walter Emil Kaegi, Jr., "Initial Byzantine Reactions to the Arab Conquest", Church History, Vol. 38, No. 2 (Jun., 1969), p. 139–49, p. 139–42, quoting from Doctrina Jacobi nuper baptizati 86–87
“The Hero as Prophet. Mahomet: Islam.” In: Thomas Carlyle, Heroes and Hero-Worship. London: Cassell. Pp. 40-66.