It is said that Mary was thirteen or fifteen years old when the announcement was made to her. The commentators .say that Jesus was specially set apart to speak in the cradle, and later on to the Jews.
The phrase ' son of Mary ' had become so fixed in Mohammed's mind that he puts it into the mouth of the Angel, even when he is addressing Mary herself. There are several interjjretations of the words ' teach him the Book.' The most generally received one is that it refers to the Divine books of previous prophets other than the Law of Moses. There is a curious saying of Imam Mohammed bin Ali Baqir —
'Jesus was so intelligent that, when nine months old, his mother sent him to school. The master said the Bismillah — " In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate " — which the child at once repeated after him. The Master then gave a number of words to be read, of which the first was abjad. Jesus wished to know why he should do this, upon which the master became angry and struck him. The child said : " If you know, explain ; if you do not, listen. In abjad, a stands for Allah la ilah ('there is no God but God'), b for Bahjat Ullah (' grace of God '), j for Jalal UUah (' glory of God '), d for Din Ullah (' religion of God ')." '
Mohammed says that Jesus was sent as an apostle to the Jews, in order to show that his Mission was limited, whilst that of Mohammed was for all people. In Medina, the idea of a Mission far beyond the confines of Arabia had now taken hold of Mohammed's mind, and he thus suggests by the reference to the limited Mission of Jesus his own supei'iority.
In v.*^ of the above ch. 3 a miracle is also re- ferred to —
' " How have I come," he will say, " to you with a sign from your Lord ; out of clay will I make for you, as it were, the figure of a bird ; and I will breathe into it, and it shall become, by God's leave, a bird. And I wUl heal the blind and the leper, and, by God's leave, I will quicken the dead.'"
It is said that the bird was a bat which flew away whilst they looked at it, and, when out of sight, fell down dead. Traditions also state that he cured fifty thousand people in one day, and raised not only Lazarus, but also Shem, the son of Noah, from the dead. The story of the bird was evidently suggested to Mohammed by the account of the creation of twelve sparrows from mud, re- corded in the apocryphal Gospel of Thomas the Israelite.
In tlie same Sicra the death of Jesus is referred
to—
' O Jesus ! verily I will cause thee to die. T will take thee up to myself and deliver thee from those who believe not' (v. 48).
The commentary Ma'alim says that he died for
three hours and tlien went up to heaven : others
* Bj- ' Holy Spirit ' Mohammed means Gabriel.
CHRIST IK" MOHAMMEDAN LITERATURE
883
say it was seven hours. Jalalain says that God took him away in a trance. Others interpret it in tlie sense of protection from adversaries, or the destruction of evil wliich would hinder the ascent to the world of spirits. The difficulty the com- mentators feel over this verse is that it clearly contradicts Sura 4'^^ which distinctly denies that Jesus was put to death. In v.^^ Jesus is compared to Adam, that is, neither had a human father.
The next reference is in SuratxCs Saff (ch. 61), and is intended to show that Jesus had foretold the advent of Mohammed —
' Remember when Jesus the son of Mary said, " O children of Israel ! of a truth I am God's apostle to you to confirm the Law which was given before me, and to announce an apostle that shall come after me whose name shall be Ahmad " ' (v. 7).
Mohammed here confounds the term ' Parakletos,' the Comforter promised by Jesus to His disciples, with the word ' Periklytos,' which has somewhat the same meaning as Ahmad, from the root of which his OAvn name Mohammed {' praised ') also is derived.
The next reference is in Suratu'l Hadid (ch. 57)-
' We gave him the Evangel,* and we put into the hearts of those who followed him kindness and compassion.'
The next reference is in Suratw'n Nisa (ch. 4). It is a denial of the crucifixion of Jesus. The Jews are reproached for speaking against Mary, and —
' for their saying, " Verily we have slain the Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary, an apostle of God." Yet they slew him not, and they crucified him not, but they had only his likeness . . . they did not really slaj' him, but God took him up to Himself ' (v. 156).
Mohammed here adopts the view of Basilides, an early heretic, who affirmed that the spirit who constituted Jesus the Son of God left Him before the crucifixion. He did it to prove that Jesus was not really a man, but only the semblance of one ; and this is opposed to the Koran as well as to the Gospel. Mohammed apparently did not see the inconsistency of adopting the views of Basilides. Another verse denies the Divinity of Christ.