Islam's Jesus

Conclusion

Conclusion There is a great need in the West to better understand the place of Jesus in Islam, particularly his eschatological role. Jesus’s descent from heaven, his personality , and his eschatological role have been vibrant themes in Islamic theology throughout history. This book has explored the place of Jesus in the Islamic eschatological vision and has elaborated on the Qur’anic Jesus because of his importance to Islamic faith. Muslims cannot be considered Muslims if they do not believe in Jesus as a messenger of God who brought the revelation of God to humanity. Islam’s Jesus is neither God nor just a saint. He is one of the greatest messengers of God, and his message is God’s message; denying Jesus as a messenger of God is denying a part of the Qur’an. Both Christians and Muslims believe in the descent of Jesus, even if there are points of disagreement. The majority of Muslim theologians are in agreement that Jesus is a sign of the nearness of the Final Hour and that he will descend from heaven to earth to bring justice and peace. In Islam, Jesus is the only prophet whose return is expected. The Prophet Muhammad both directly and indirectly spoke of the coming of Jesus at the end of his community. One of his famous statements reads: “God will not disgrace a community of which I am the beginning and Jesus the end.”1 The Qur’an makes plain many aspects of Jesus and his message. Many Qur’anic verses speak of Jesus as a messenger of God and of Jesus’s own message . The Jesus of the Qur’an and his message are compatible with the Jesus found in the original Gospel, which emphasizes the common ground between Christians and Muslims. Christians and Muslims constitute over half of the world’s population, and if they can work together, this will help bring peace on earth, which is one of the main goals of Islam for humanity. The Hadith sources of Islam also contain more than 100 sayings of the Prophet on Jesus, his message, and his eschatological role; these sayings indicate Jesus’s importance for Muslims. Interpretation of some of the sayings of the Islam’s Jesus 158 Prophet that speak of Jesus’s descent at the end of time is necessary because the literal meaning of these hadith seems to be impossible and interpretation has become a part of mainstream Islamic understandings of the texts. It is clear that the Prophet used allegorical language when discussing future events. Because there are many fabricated hadith on the subject, one must be careful to use only the most reliable ones as references. This study has attempted to do just this. To a certain extent, a careful examination of even reliable sources is needed to find the real meaning of the text. Muslim theologians since the beginning of Islam have striven to ensure the reliability of the sayings of the Prophet as a source for legal and theological understanding. But understanding the allegorical sayings of the Prophet is not easy. Understanding the real message of any saying of the Prophet, especially when it contains allegorical and figurative language, is a great task. Because of this difficulty, an intense debate has been ongoing as to whether the prophetic sayings on end-time issues, including Jesus ’s descent, should be taken literally or allegorically. Sharing the view of some contemporary scholars, I find the approach that allows for an allegorical interpretation of the sayings of the Prophet more accurate and compatible with the overall theological principles of Islam. There are three major approaches toward understanding the eschatological role of Jesus in Islam. One approach, influenced by modern Western philosophy , denies all narratives that come from the Prophet about Jesus’s descent. They consider these narratives to be a product of the influence of Christianity on Islam. The second approach, which I call “literalist,” accepts all texts as they are, with no interpretation and no questioning. The literalist approach refers to the power of God when asserting the possibility of the literal truth of the Hadith . The third approach, which I call “interpretive,” contends that sound and authenticated hadith should be accepted not in a literal way but allegorically. My rationale for the allegorical approach is based on my understanding of the way the Divine Will deals with humanity—namely, that God has put natural laws in place and they do not change, theologically speaking, except during the...