I have recently learned that Islam holds special reverence for both Jesus and Mary. Could anyone tell me more about this? Are the gospels of the Christian New Testament or the sayings of Jesus (the sermon on the mount, for example) incorporated into Islam?
Of course I know that there are many Muslims learn about Christianity either because they are interested in other cultures and religions, or that they live in a predominantly Christian society, etc. My question is specifically regarding the roles, if any, that Jesus and Mary play in the religion of Islam.
Jesus’s status is a little unclear in Islam - this Wikipedia article might help.
For a start, Jesus is called Isa, (pronounced ee-sa) and Mary is Maryam. Isa is not divine in Islam and is not the son of God. He is still highly esteemed as the second-last prophet (the final one being Muhammad). Some Qu’ranic verses suggest that Isa was somehow “sent” by God, which is where it gets complicated. I don’t fully understand it from here on in.
In Islam all the prophets are believed to have been sent from God. The prophets of the Qur’an and of the Bible are mostly the same. There are some in the Bible that aren’t in the Qur’an, and vice versa, but mostly it’s the same list.
There are stories about Jesus and Mary in the Qur’an that aren’t in the Bible. The Annunciation is in there, though. In the Qur’an nativity story, Mary gives birth (with considerable labor pains) under a date palm tree, and afterward she shakes the trunk to make ripe dates fall for her to eat. Then she brings the baby back to her people, and because she isn’t married, tongues wag. So to protect her reputation, Jesus works his first miracle. He speaks up (even though he’s a newborn baby) and tells everyone that his birth was miraculous. God created him without a father (but then Adam was created without a father or a mother). One cute story about Jesus is how he makes a bird out of clay, breathes on it, and then it flies away out of his hand.
There are plenty more stories about Jesus, and his sayings, that circulate in Islam, especially among the Sufis who are big on Jesus. One of these is inscribed in Persian on the Taj Mahal. “Jesus said: The world is a bridge. Pass over it, don’t build houses on it.” There has been a whole book published on this topic, titled The Muslim Jesus, by Tarif Khalidi.
In the Qur’an, ‘Isa (Jesus) is called al-masîh ibn Maryam (the Messiah/Christ, son of Mary). Messiah for the Muslims means neither the king of Israel nor the son of God. I guess it just means that Jesus was a very special prophet and miracle worker.
I’m in no way an expert in these matters, but the Economist had a really interesting article on this last year. I cannot vouch for its accuracy, but it is a good read.