To the Muslim, Jesus Christ is merely one of the many prophets of Allah (Sura 4:171; 5:74). According to Islam, the prophet Muhammad supersedes Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is not the Son of God or a part of any Trinity (Sura 5:17; 5:116; 19:35). We are told that He was nothing but a slave on whom God showed favor (Sura 43:59); yet elsewhere we are told the Messiah is not a slave (Sura 4:172).
Jesus Christ did not atone for anyone's sins, although he was himself sinless (Sura 3:46) and is one of those who are near to God (Sura 3:45). Positively, the Qur'an says that Jesus performed miracles (Sura 3:49; 5:110) and was the Messiah (Sura 3:45; 4:157, 171). But Jesus Christ did not die on the cross. Various Muslim traditions say that he either miraculously substituted Judas Iscariot for himself on the cross, or the God miraculously delivered him from the hands of the Romans and Jews before He could be crucified. Most Muslims believe that Jesus Christ was taken bodily into heaven without having died (Sura 4:157). However, Sura 199:33 says he died and would be resurrected.
It is interesting to compare Jesus and Muhammad according to the Qur'an:
Jesus did miracles (Sura 3:49; 5:110), but Muhammad did not (Sura 13:8: "thou art a warner [of coming divine judgement] only"; also 6:37; 6:109; 17:59 and 17:90-93).
Jesus was sinless (Sura 3:46), but Muhammad sinned and needed forgiveness (Sura 40:55: "Ask forgiveness of thy sin"; 42:5: "Ask forgiveness for those on the Earth"; 47:19: "Ask forgiveness for thy sin"; 48:2: "that Allah may forgive thee of thy sin").
Jesus was called "the Messiah" and was even born of a virgin (Sura 3:45-57). Yet Muhammad is supposed to be the greatest of the prophets!
Aside from contradiction, I'm curious as to why Muslims view Jesus as inferior to Muhammad.
Muslims view Jesus as inferior to Muhammad because they believe that Muhammad was the one Allah/God chose as his personal main man...sure he might not be as pious as Jesus but he seems to be Allah's fav...who knows why sometimes your just attracted to people...besides...they had different missions...Muslims believe that Muhammad's was the more important regardless of his personality or nature...
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This is severely interesting, imo. I hope some of our Islamic friends on here will respond. I had not considered this, and am curious as to the answer.
Muhammad was chosen by God to be his top prophet...Jesus' personal qualities etc don't put him above God's judgment do they?
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One day, I shall come back. Yes I shall come back, until then there must be no regrets, no tears, no anxieties...just go forward in all your beliefs and prove to me that I am not mistaken in mine.
muslims do not view any of the prophets as inferior of superior to each other. they were what they were; men chosen by God to deliver the truth about him to age in which they were born. each prophet posessed an ability that was above and beyond the period of time he existed in.
Jesus was a miracle man. Born from a Virgin, he from the very start was set aside from the common folk of the time. He needed to be more obviously special in ability in order to make his sayings more effective. He had the gift of healing the sick and when need be, bring people back to life. He is NOT seen as "god" or "son of god" or anything related to the divine except exist as God's messenger.
Moses, againt was a messenger who tried to reveal the truth to the people in Egypt. His special ability was magic, since at the time it was one of the biggest pride's of the Pharoah's. He outdid any trick the royal magicians had up there sleeve when by the thrust of his stalk into the Red Sea, he split it into half.
Muhammad was when compared to the earlier prophets all things ordinary. Him being the last in line didn't need extraordinary and obvious abilities to make himself more plausible becaues humans had evolved into beings of relevant enough intelligence. His "special powers" if you will, was more abstract and profound. He had a way with words. Which was amazing because he was illiterate. At the time in Arabia people took pride in their ability to write poetry, but with his verses, Muhammad astounded all and stablized his status as the Modern messenger of God.
So no, to the muslims all prophets are the same in importance in that they were all men, beings from the Homo Sapien species who were prominent in that they were hand picked by God to deliliver his Message. Muhammad, they don't regard as more important as Jesus, just more relevant because he is the most recent in the long line of Messengers.
....Perhaps Muslims view Muhammad as "superior" to Jesus (which they really don't, as Punkyhermy has discussed above) because he is, how we say, more akin to a human being unlike the Übermensch and divinity that the latter is made out to be by the accepted Scripture....
Muhammad's wiki article, the refrence- Esposito (1998), p.12, Esposito (2002b), pp.4–5, F. E. Peters (2003), p.9
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One day, I shall come back. Yes I shall come back, until then there must be no regrets, no tears, no anxieties...just go forward in all your beliefs and prove to me that I am not mistaken in mine.
Last edited by Grand-Moff-Gav on Dec 23rd, 2007 at 07:42 PM
he was different according to islam because he was the most perfect of exampled to follow. he did not sin{contrary to what was suggested before} and was an example for all mankind to follow for alll time as opposed to jesus, who was just an example for the israelites of the time.
he was also special because he is seen as a seal of the prophets, and onto him was granted the final revealation which was for all time and all people unlike god's previous revelations. his special ability was his way with words, which could astound all men and touched their souls.
and really, you cant make the virgin birth and miracle argument for jesus, after all, muslims also beleive that moses was able to directly SEE god on sinai, and do much magic, that wud make him superior to jesus but that isnt the criteria by which to judge such things in islam. moses was given what he needed to touch the lives and make people around hims beleive{limited physical wonders- same with jesus}, while muhammad was given a speech of truth which wud not REQUIRE physical miracles to make people beleive but make the truth apparent to them through simple words.
also as far as supernatural occurances go, muhammad was taken to the heavens on shab-e-miraaj{the night of ascencion} where he lived for a time and saw all the heavens and led all the prophets of old in prayer at the dome of the rock and met all the major prophets and angels and had a personal audience with god himself who was seated at the highest place in heaven and the only thing seperating them was a translucent viel and muhammad was apparently very near to god. another interesting thing to note is that the reason{in islam} that god forgave adam after decades and decades of crying after him and havva{eve} fell, was that he asked god'f forgiveness in the name of muhammd. and when asked as to where he heard the name, i think he replies that it was written sumplace having to do with the creation of the universe which {dont remember completely right noe} implied heavily that the world had been created for muhammad or in his name or honour or sumthin, which is wierd. also, muhammad chose not to let angel gibrail destroy a certain tribe byt crushing them between two mountains after they severely wounded and ridiculed him even after gibrail offering to because muhammad beleved that they wud sumday turn to the truth- which they did according to tradition. so technically, from the islami viewpoint, muhammad isnt without his set of miracles either.
but why are we judging the two anyway? are they really that important?
This is the only paragraph of your post that I find especially weird...unless I'm mislead about what you are saying. What do you mean by "his special ability was magic"? Did he inherit magic as a genetic trait? Did God make him magical as a child? Or, as your next sentence semi-implies, did he learn it just because he was a prince of Egypt?
Its because Jesus personal relationship to God as Abba(Aramaic word for Daddy) is different how Muhammad practise and believes in God in His Allah. Jesus taught God which is Love while Quran teaches God(allah) which is full hatred. Quran should not be the basis of understanding of Jesus teachings because it is different to Muhammad.
Because that's what human beings do: they compare, evaluate, choose, divide. This way there is always a Them the Us can feel superior to, and feeling superior ultimately means feeling more deserving of resources for survival, feeling safer from Death.
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do not let bias cloud your judgement. the christian god can be every bit as full of hatred and cruelty as the muslim god. and both can be full of love too. it depends on how you interpret it. factually, in an ubiased way, they are both generally dominating and hating, permeated by places of love and affection or favour. it will depend on the folloerr.
however, to say that the christian god is "love" is absolutely wrong.
One day, I shall come back. Yes I shall come back, until then there must be no regrets, no tears, no anxieties...just go forward in all your beliefs and prove to me that I am not mistaken in mine.
factually, i CAN well comment on the nature of CLAIMED beings whose traits, decisions and commandments are supposed to be written in impeccible books. as long as we assume that what those books say is all true, then we can well set up a hypothetical argument which can FACTUALLY, prove or disprove things about the nature of said hypothetical being. {e.g. the bible says[just an example] that a square circle exists in this universe. now irrespective of whether it is REALLY true or not, we can use our intellect to see if a FACTUAL contradiction exists inside the claim. and since it does[square and circle being two different shapes] then we can say for a certainty that the claim is factually false or self contradictory. }
because he has often done hateful and egotistical things in the bible which not only take away COMPLETENESS of his claimed love, but also, make him a lot less than a REASONEABLY loving entity.
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