By José Domingos Barao*
According
to a Muslim whom I interviewed, Islam believes that Jesus Christ is a prophet
like any other prophet.
The Identity of Jesus for a Muslim
Mr.
Mohamed Mwang, 35 years old, believes, like the Christians, in the virginal
conception of Jesus by the Blessed Virgin Mary. And because of that, he
believes that Jesus was truly human. However, he does not believe that Jesus
Christ was also the Son of God since, according to him, God remains God and as
such, it is impossible for him to believe that God could be “father and son”.
Mohamed
told me that there are many similarities between the Koran and the Bible,
though Muslims reject all the writings of Paul concerning Christ. However, I
discovered that Mohamed, and indeed many other Muslims like him, have quite a different
interpretation of the events of man’s salvation. For example, Mohamed claims
that Jesus told his disciples not to tell the people that he was the anointed one
of the Lord since this could mislead people into believing that he was the Son
of God.
He says also that at the end of time, God, and Mohammed (the Prophet), who claims to be the last and greatest of all the
prophets, will ask Jesus why did he make the people believe that he is the Son
of God. But Jesus, Mohammed says, will reply that he never claimed to be the
Son of God but rather, that this was made up by his disciples.
About
sin, Mohammed believes that there is no original sin and as such, God didn’t
send Jesus Christ on earth in order to atone for the sins of the world. He says
that if Jesus really died for our sins, there would be no more sin in the
world. He adds that the sin of Adam and Eve was restricted to them only and did
not affect their descendants. Everyone is born without sin but one becomes
sinful as he matures due to harmful desires.
A person’s sins are forgiven when the parties
concerned implore one another and ask for forgiveness. Afterwards, a person
also asks forgiveness directly from God. While Mohammed admits that Jesus
Christ faced rebellion and suffered, he was not the one who was crucified. The
soldiers, who wanted to kill and crucify Jesus, mistook him for Simon the
Cyrene who was therefore killed.
The
mission of Jesus, according to Mohammed, was meant for all times to limit
itself only to the twelve tribes of Israel. That is why Jesus says in the Bible
that he was only sent to the twelve tribes of Israel. Mohammed claims that later
it was Mohammed (the prophet), whom
God sent, after Jesus, to the whole world.
Mohammed
holds that when Jesus said that God would send someone after him who would
bring all things into fulfillment, he was in this way announcing not the coming
of the Holy Spirit as Christians claim, but the coming of Prophet Mohammed. It
is only at the end of times, Mohammed says, that Jesus Christ will appear on
earth in order to restore peace and reconciliation among peoples.
*José Domingos Barao
is a Brazilian who is studying theology in Nairobi, Kenya, as a seminarian for
the FMS of Quebec.
