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Chapter 10 Conclusion Theology and Salvation History The assertion that Islam supersedes Judaism and Christianity cannot fully be understood apart from the dynamics of the foundation narratives of the three Abrahamic faiths. All three narratives are formulated in the idiom of family and tell the story of a single family at a different stage in its history. In all three cases, the father-son motif serves as a metaphor for a key theological doctrine : divine election, Christology, and the finality of prophecy, respectively. In all three cases, the specific shape taken by the foundation narrative was conditioned by theological considerations: The Israelite claim that only the Children of Israel had been chosen by God necessitated the marginalization of collateral lines, first Ishmael and his descendants, followed by Esau and his. The Christian claim that Jesus is the Son of God necessitated the marginalization of Joseph, the man who appeared to be—but was not—Jesus’ natural father. The Islamic claim that Muhămmad is the Last Prophet necessitated the marginalization of the Prophet’s sons, natural and adopted. The finality of prophecy is one of several theological premises that shaped the early Islamic worldview. For our purposes, the most important of these premises are as follows: History unfolds according to a predetermined divine plan. A merciful God sends prophets to humanity with instructions about how to attain eternal life. Prophets are human beings who, in theory, are susceptible to sin and error; in fact, because they enjoy the benefit of divine revelation, prophets do not commit sins or make errors.1 The office of prophecy is the exclusive possession of a single family, the descendants of Abraham. Key figures mentioned in the Hebrew Bible and New Testament , including Moses, David, and Jesus, were all true prophets who received divine revelations. Over time, however, the revelations delivered to these prophets underwent tahr̆ı̄f or scriptural distortion. Mistakes crept into the Torah and the New Testament, and these texts ceased to be reliable sources of divine will. This is why God sent Muhămmad to the Arabs. As a lineal descendant of Ishmael, Muhămmad was a member of the family to which the office of prophecy had been entrusted. The purpose of his mission was to restore the original, uncorrupted version of the earlier revelations . Only the faithful and accurate preservation of the revelations received by Muhămmad makes it possible for the Muslim community to assert with confidence that he was the Last Prophet and that the office of prophecy terminated upon his death. These theological premises combined to create a formula that was used 226 Chapter 10 by the first Muslims to assess the validity of earlier sacred texts, on the one hand, and to construct the Sı̄ra or biography of Muhămmad, on the other. If the Hebrew Bible indicates that David coveted the wife of Uriah the Hittite, engaged in illicit sexual relations with Bathsheba, and was responsible for the soldier’s death, or if the Gospel of Matthew suggests that Mary engaged in illicit sexual relations with someone other than the man to whom she was betrothed , the only conclusion that can be drawn from the evidence is that the biblical narrative is corrupt. The only reliable version of these stories is the one found in the relevant Qurānic narrative, where one learns that neither David nor Mary committed any of the sins attributed to them in the Bible. The rectification of the corrupt biblical narratives was followed by the production of Muhămmad’s biography, which was formulated in such a manner as to highlight parallels between his career and those of earlier prophets. These parallels are manifestations of sunnat allāh, or God’s practice. The exact meaning of the linguistic metaphor khātam al-nabiyyı̄n (lit. “Seal of Prophets”) is equivocal. In the first century a.h., some Muslims took the phrase as signifying that Muhămmad confirmed the revelations sent previously to Moses and Jesus. This understanding quickly gave way to the understanding that Muhămmad brought the office of prophecy to an end. The later signification was facilitated by the fact that prophecy is portrayed in the Qurān as the exclusive possession of Abraham’s descendants. The office is hereditary and it passes from father to son—albeit with occasional intervals between one prophet and the next. From this premise, two corollaries follow : In order to be a prophet, Muhămmad must be a lineal...

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