Jesus of the gaps: The evangelistic use of biblical reflexes in the Qur’an

Abstract

Does it help to start with the Jesus of the Qur’an when doing Muslim evangelism? This missiological approach has been, and continues to be, prevalent. In this article we examine the theological legitimacy of appealing to biblical reflexes in the Qur’an for evangelism. Is such an approach biblically legitimate and practically helpful? We first argue, from Acts 17, that the Bible tacitly endorses the evangelistic tactic of making appeals to truth statements in alien religious texts to connect with hearers’ theological imaginations. In doing so, we propose an evangelistic alien text appeal principle. Second, we adopt Qur’an 4:171 as a case study, arguing that some Christological reflexes hinder, and others help, Muslims imagine the biblical Jesus. We conclude that only those Qur’anic Christological reflexes that are imprecise—Jesus of the gaps—are biblically legitimate and helpful for evangelism.

Keywords

Qur’anic Jesus missiology evangelism contextualization alien religious texts Christianity Islam

Introduction

The Qur’an has long been used in evangelistic approaches to Muslims. It has, for example, been critiqued (e.g., as incoherent on Jesus), questioned (e.g., as to how the Muslim Jesus fits in theologically), and compared (with the Bible on Jesus). Christian apologists, missionaries, and evangelists have also utilized biblical reflexes (i.e., characters, terms, and narrative echoes) in the Qur’an as a means for evangelism to Muslims. This approach dates at least back to John of Damascus, and was supported by Samuel Zwemer (1912: 8), who argued that “we must . . . lead them up to higher truth by admitting all of the truth which they possess.”

More recently, this approach has been popularized in the Camel method, an evangelistic method that focuses on Jesus’ attributes and miracles in the Qur’an as a bridge to the biblical Jesus (Greeson, 2010). In this article a “biblical reflexes” approach is defined as: “Appealing to the truth of a claim about Jesus in the Qur’an as a means of opening discussion of the Biblical Jesus.” To be evangelistically useful, this approach needs to be both biblically legitimate and practically helpful in opening discussion. Is it? This article focuses solely on the theological legitimacy of appealing to biblical reflexes. Proponents of methods such as the Camel point to large numbers of positive respondents as evidence of its mission utility. However, we believe mission practice should be primarily governed by biblical warrant.

In this article, we first argue, from Acts 17, that the Bible tacitly endorses the evangelistic tactic of making appeals to truth statements in alien religious texts to connect with hearers’ theological imaginations. We argue that varying degrees of precision in terms and truth claims enable this process to have integrity. Second, we adopt another Qur’anic text, Q4:171 (given later), which is different from the Qur’anic passage used in the Camel method (Q3:42–55). We take Q4:171 as a case study of how Christological reflexes might hinder and/or help Muslims imagine the biblical Jesus. We argue: (a) that some reflexes hinder because the anti-Trinitarian polemic driving this text is theologically precise and rests on core, biblically hostile, Islamic doctrines that frame Muslim theological imagination; and (b) that some reflexes help because the historical reflexive process has rendered some of Jesus’ titles—especially Messiah/masih—so conceptually imprecise within the Islamic imagination that they afford gaps for proper evangelistic “filling.”

The apostolic use of alien religious texts

Prima facie, the truth appeal to Greek religious poetry by Paul in his evangelistic sermon in the Areopagus (Acts 17:28–29) provides biblical warrant for similar truth appeals to the texts of any non-Christian worldview—including Islam. Missiologists have wrestled with how such truth appeals might be made properly. The presenting problem here is the degree to which recognizing theological truth claims as objectively true in any sense, in the sacred texts of another faith, compromises exclusivist commitments by endorsing that text’s religious authority. Paul’s practice shows it can be done legitimately. How?

Paul’s preaching adopts different conceptual launch points based on the existing theological imaginations of his hearers. FF Bruce (1977: 293) notes that with a Jewish audience Paul appeals to Jesus as the Messiah, but the Gentiles at Lystra and Derbe “must first be taught what Jews already confess regarding the unity and character of God.” At Lystra and Derbe Paul appeals to God’s activity in creation (cf. Acts 17:24–26; Rom. 1:19–20), a traditional Jewish apologetic bridge for Gentiles (Keener, 2020: 353). Rather than Jewish theological concepts like Messiah, Paul’s appeal to observing creation is universally accessible. In these instances, the existing theological imaginations of one’s hearers properly demand conceptual engagement by the evangelist—indeed existing concepts are the only belief building blocks hearers have in their cognitive toolkit! Later, the early apologists continued this approach. Justin Martyr (100–165) famously appealed to the Logos, central to his hearers’ Stoic or middle-Platonist beliefs, to introduce them to Jesus. The need to appeal to existing religious concepts, then, is unavoidable in evangelism.

We see this conceptual need in the first of two contextualized truth “touch points” in Acts 17, where Paul makes an identity link between “an unknown god” (among the Greek pantheon of gods) and the God of the Bible (17:23). Here, Paul is identifying and speaking into a recognized gap in the Athenian theological imagination and, as his speech progresses, it becomes clear that the identity link he is making is loose and imprecise rather than exact. Perhaps we can say he is speaking (here at least) of God in the general, philosophical sense of the necessary, eternal pre-existent being, rather than Yahweh. This appeal gains much in piquing curiosity, and risks little in theological syncretism due to both the use of the general divine designator and the conceptual emptiness of the altar label. Paul’s appeal to the Athenian altar is not an appeal to a positive religious truth claim, and therefore this appeal is not directly analogous to appeals to a text like the Qur’an. What about appealing to existing religious texts?

Paul goes on to quote two pagan texts for support of his truth claims concerning Christ. The first—“For in him we live and move and have our being”—likely comes from the Cretan poet Epimenides (6th century BC), which referred to belief in Zeus. The second citation—“We are his offspring”—likely originates with the Cilician poet Aratus but is found also in the Stoic Cleanthes’ Hymn to Zeus, popular in the first century (Keener, 2020: 446). It is important to locate these texts as religious authorities. We take it that, while these poems are not scripture per se (Greek philosophical schools had no scripture) they, nevertheless shaped public theological imagination by evocatively expressing accepted metaphysical truths. Indeed, Paul is asserting the specific metaphysical truths “that all humans subsist in God,” and “that all humans find their origin in God.” In short, he is appealing to culturally important texts that make positive religious truth claims.

Evangelical commentators are quick to defend Paul’s exclusivist commitments here by denying a strong identity link between Yahweh and “God.” Bruce (1988: Kindle loc. 11700) asks, “[b]ut did Paul intend to identify the Zeus of Greek philosophy simpliciter with the God of biblical revelation. . .?” and answers himself “[q]uite certainly not.”¹ Bruce is correct to recognize divine identity as the key problem and is correct that Paul’s identity link is loose. This weak linkage is evident from the fact that Paul immediately springboards from these citations to bluntly condemn Greek theology as idolatrous (17:29), ignorant, in need of repentance (17:30), and proven false by Jesus’ resurrection (17:31–32) (Talbert, 2005: 156–57). This rapid move from truth assent to truth dissent preserves his Christian exclusivism, but does it open him up to accusations of disingenuity? Is it valid for Paul to grant the truth of isolated claims of Greek poets without conceding any truth to the surrounding and underlying Stoicism (or any other Greek metaphysic)?

This question is commonly ignored by evangelical scholarship. Bruce (1988: Kindle loc. 11703–6) effectively sidesteps the issue by framing the discussion in terms of general and special revelation. He suggests these citations “could be taken as pointing to some recognition of the true nature of God” and therefore contain, “up to a point . . . an actual apprehension of revealed truth.” This move does not get us very far. All livable religious worldviews contain actual apprehension of at least some generally revealed truths (surely that is how general revelation works!) (Ott and Strauss, 2010: 313) The issue is not whether alien religious texts contain truths but how we can legitimately appeal to these truths in isolation from their context. In our view, you cannot and should not simply extract truths from their textual and worldview context because it is that very context that allows (or disallows) proper evangelistic truth appeals.

The value of a theological imagination approach is to help the hearer to recognize a key lesson from Acts 17—in contextualization, conceptual precision is key. In principle (and very roughly), the more precise a truth claim/concept is, the stronger and therefore more exclusive (i.e., harder to share belief in) it is. For example, in Christian/Muslim encounters, everyone is happy to share belief in the “divine creator.” Things start getting conceptually controversial when we speak jointly of “God.” The term is broad enough to work for general conversations about affirmations like “God is good” but can also be used far more precisely/richly when we say, “God is three-in-one” or “Yahweh is God.” Further, virtually no one is willing to concede that the Trinitarian God and monistic Allah are identical theological concepts. Notice here, too, that the way to add precision is to add content and so the more content a term or concept has, the more exclusive it is. So, (again roughly) individual theological concepts/terms are less precise than formally articulated doctrines.

Notice how the issue of precision plays out for Paul in Athens. The idea of “the unknown God” is extremely imprecise (as far as we know!). Straightforwardly, the term can refer to any God the hearers do not know, and therefore “the unknown God” is open for Paul to adopt with integrity as a descriptor of the creator. Tactically that makes it a very useful starting point as the idea concedes very little to Greek polytheism. The later appeal to a creating and sustaining God, on the other hand, is far more content rich—particularly if we reasonably assume it to be referring to Zeus. There is certainly some conceptual overlap of “Zeus” with “the God of the Bible”: Zeus was the great god above all gods and the source of all. At the same time Zeus, like Yahweh, is a specific being and therefore perhaps understood by the Greeks to be a rigid designator. Nevertheless, Paul did not use the term Zeus, but the more general theos and ultimately, the evangelistic propriety here hinges on how that term was understood and whether it is broad (imprecise!) enough that it might properly be applied to Yahweh as well as Zeus (perhaps with modification).

From this study we suggest an evangelistic alien text appeal principle:

P1: Know your hearers’ theological imagination, and then choose the minimally precise gospel relevant religious truths you can identify in their texts as evangelistic starting points.

This principle may appear somewhat counter intuitive. Is not maximal conceptual clarity and accuracy the goal of evangelism? Yes, of course. But remember this discussion concerns appeal to texts and precision should not come at the cost of conceding too much in terms of religious authority to alien texts. The principle outlined allows the evangelist to creatively adopt broad terms/concepts that open communication but leave space for discussion. In fact, as we are about to see as we turn to the Qur’an, the very best touch points are those with virtually no theological content at all!

The Qur’an and the Bible

The Qur’an contains a high saturation of biblical and biblically based traditions, claiming to be a fulfilment of the Torah and Gospel (Q3:3–4), frequently alluding to biblical narratives and figures—including Noah, Abraham, Moses, and Jesus (Sinai, 2017: 138). However, the precise relationship between the biblical and Qur’anic narratives is both unclear and disputed.²

Qur’anic examples of historical disagreements with the Bible include: conflating Jesus’ mother Mary with Moses’ sister, making Haman an official under Pharaoh, and blaming “the Samaritan” for the golden calf incident hundreds of years before Samaritans existed (Durie, 2016: 4–5). There are also substantial theological dislocations and repurposings. Rippin (1993: 250) argues that biblical narratives found in the Qur’an are “in a recognisable form but the accounts are always shorn of their overall Biblical narrative context.” Similarly, Bannister (2021: 83) observes that, as the Qur’an recycles Biblical material “it adjusts and adapts them, reshaping them to fit its own theology and agenda.”

This Qur’anic dislocation and repurposing includes theological terms and concepts. Durie (2016) uses linguistic analysis to argue that biblical terms in the Qur’an underwent a “creolization” in which they were profoundly re-understood along Islamic lines, and in the process stripped of their essential Christian meaning and context. Durie describes such terms as biblical reflexes in an explicit shift away from understanding them as having a biblical subtext (cf. Reynolds, 2010). We find his argument persuasive and argue that such an understanding aligns nicely with our theological imagination approach since the reflexive process renders the conceptual relationship between the biblical Jesus and the Qur’anic Jesus as enigmatically imprecise. Here, the missiological utility rests on whether there exist in the Qur’an significant Christological truths or concepts worth appealing to as launch pads, and imprecise enough to be legitimately extracted from the surrounding and underlying Qur’anic theology.

The Qur’anic Jesus

The Qur’anic reflex problematic finds clear focus in the figure of Jesus. The evangelistic utility of the Qur’anic Jesus is plausible due to the Qur’an holding Jesus in high regard. Bannister (2021: 139) notes that “Jesus stands out, head and shoulders, above every other qur’anic prophet.” Jesus is mentioned more often than Muhammad (29 times to four), and, prima facie, Jesus possesses titles of greater honor than other messengers. Apart from the titles of Q4:171, Jesus is also called the Truth’s Word / Statement of the Truth (Q19:34), a sign and mercy of God (Q19:21), and Eminent or Illustrious (Q3:45). While Moses is the only other figure called Eminent, only Jesus is eminent “in this world and the Hereafter” (Q3:45). The Qur’an teaches that Noah, Abraham, Moses, and Muhammad all sinned, but Jesus did not (Larson, 2008: 331). Larson (2008: 338) recalls a Pakistani Muslim villager explaining why, on the basis of the Qur’an, he believed Jesus to be greater than Muhammad: “Your Prophet was a Prophet from birth, ours became one at age 40; Your Prophet did miracles, ours did none; Your Prophet is alive, ours is dead.”

Despite this positivity, the Qur’anic Jesus has a complicated reflexive relationship with the biblical Jesus. Reynolds’ (2015: 185) observation serves as a warning: “the history of Islamic thought on Christ is fundamentally independent from the study of the Bible and the tradition of Christological thought in the Church.” In part, this is because virtually none of his biblical biography has transferred to the Qur’an. The reader is told virtually nothing of his teaching, his movements, his ministry patterns, his character, or his interactions with ordinary people (Shumack, 2020: 9). Instead, the Qur’an alludes to just a few features of Jesus’ life including: the circumstances and significance of his virgin birth (Q3:45–49; 19:16–36; 21:91); his miracles (Q2:253; 3:49; 5:110); the last supper (Q5:111–15); and his death and ascension and exaltation to heaven (Q4:157–59; 5:117). To be clear, the Qur’an gives mixed messages regarding the death of Jesus, but discussing this is outside the focus of this study. Of particular importance are Jesus’ origins: “The Qur’an devotes more than two-thirds of its total number of verses on Jesus to his origins” (Anderson, 2016: Kindle loc. 3258). Jesus is frequently named as the son of Mary, whom the Qur’an doubly honors by declaring her divinely chosen “above all women” (Q3:42), and giving her the unique distinction of being the only woman named in the Qur’an (Anderson, 2016: Kindle loc. 3267). Interestingly, many of these highlighted details are reflexes of extra- biblical texts. For example, the miracles of Jesus speaking as an infant and then creating a bird from clay (Q3:46–49; 5:110; 19:24–26, 30–33) derive from the Infancy Gospel of James, and the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, respectively (Anderson, 2016: Kindle loc. 3656).

The issue is not that the Qur’an is disinterested in the biblical/historical Jesus, rather, it is that the Qur’an appears more interested in co-opting Jesus for its own theological purposes. To do so it must first deny core Christian beliefs. Khalidi (2001: 12) points out that “the Qur’anic Jesus, unlike any other prophet, is embroiled in polemic.” Anderson (2016: Kindle loc. 3249) explains “Everything it said about him either confirmed or challenged prevailing views.” Similarly, Zwemer (1912: 7) observes that the Qur’an is unique among the sacred books of the East for giving Jesus a place, “but does it by displacing Him. With regret it must be admitted that there is hardly an important fact concerning the life, person, and work of our Savior which is not ignored, perverted, or denied by Islam.”

In addition to denying core Christian beliefs, second, the Qur’an must somehow place Jesus within the Islamic metanarrative. This transposition is achieved via repurposing him as an Islamic messenger in the tradition of Muhammad. In Islam, God sends messengers (rasul) to warn people to turn from idolatry onto the straight path of the one true God or face impending punishment. Most people ignore the warning and are punished by God, which becomes a sign to future generations. Those who listen to the messenger, the rightly guided, become successors and inherit the land and property left by the incalcitrant (Bannister, 2021: 139). In the Qur’an, Jesus’ person and message has been squeezed into its theology of history as one of God’s messengers (Anderson, 2016: Kindle loc. 3321). To smooth Jesus’ transition from son of God to Islamic messenger, the Qur’an renames him Isa.³ Importantly, the Arabic translation of Jesus is not Isa but Yasū’a. Both Muslim and non-Muslim scholars have not conclusively explained why the Qur’an uses the name Isa (Nickel, 2020: 48). Matthew 1:21 explains Mary’s son is to be named Jesus “because he will save his people from their sins.” Jesus, the Greek form of Joshua, means Yahweh saves. The Qur’an replaces this name with Isa, and thus the salvation associated with Jesus is deftly removed. Ibrahim (2020: 108) notes that Arabic-speaking Christians, aware of this linguistic difference, typically do not refer to Jesus as Isa.

This brief overview foreshadows that the Jesus imagined by the ordinary Muslim has a complicated conceptual relationship to the Jesus of the Bible. Biblical names, concepts, and theologies are variously deployed and changed, affirmed and denied, repurposed and adopted without full theological meaning transferring across. Conceptual complications surrounding Jesus flags that making evangelistic appeals to the Qur’anic Jesus should first dig deeply into just how Isa operates as a biblical reflex. Exegesis of Q4:171 is a good place to start.

Christological reflexes in Q4:171

People of the Book! Do not go beyond the limits in your religion, and do not say about God (anything) but the truth. The Messiah, Jesus, son of Mary, was only a messenger of God, and His word, which He cast into Mary, and a spirit from Him. So believe in God and His messengers, but do not say, “Three.” Stop! (It will be) better for you. God is only one God. Glory to Him! (Far be it) that He should have a son! To Him belongs whatever is in the heavens and whatever is on the earth. God is sufficient as a guardian.⁴

This ayah is densely populated with biblical reflexes that shape the Muslim imagination about Jesus. All have significant gospel weight in their Christian form. Does that carry across into Islam? Let us walk through the key terms and concepts and see.

Messenger (rasul)

Q4:171 insists that Jesus, like Muhammad, is only a rasul (messenger) of God (Nasr, 2015: 267). The use of rasul (and not, say, nabi/prophet) firmly places Jesus in an Islamic theology—or rasulology—of divinely sent messengers into the world. Durie (2016: ch. 5) outlines stark differences between Qur’anic rasulology and biblical prophetology. When these differences are combined with the central theological importance of the messenger within Islam, it is clear that rasul is both radically alien to Christian theology and Islamically precise.

Trinity (thalatha)

Q4:171 further castigates Christian Trinitarian belief in Jesus’ divinity as going “beyond the limits” and going astray. Ibn Kathir⁵ describes exaggeration and “going to extremes” as typical Christian behavior (Tafsir Ibn Kathir, n.d.). Both Muslim and Christian scholars have questioned whether the Qur’an challenges Trinitarian theology per se, or merely heretical versions. Parrinder (1995 [1965]: 133) argues that Q4:171 criticizes heretical Trinitarian doctrine (cf. Watt, 1983: 50). Tafsir al-Jalalayn⁶ (n.d.) and Tafsir Ibn Kathir (n.d.), for example, two of the most popular Qur’an commentaries, both interpret Q4:171 as rejecting Trinitarian belief in Father, Mary, and Jesus (see Q5:116; 72–75). Nasr (2015: 267) follows Parrinder in taking it that Q4:171 (and Q5:73) does not condemn the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity but tritheism. Therefore, Christians can agree with Q4:171’s condemnation of tritheism and that Mary is not included within the Trinity.

Nonetheless, here is a case where underlying theology matters. The fundamental Islamic doctrine of tawhid stands behind the denial of Jesus’ divinity, and not mere Christian heresy. As a doctrine holding to the complete, monistic, unity of God, tawhid excludes both tritheism and the distinctly Christian conception of monotheism: Trinitarianism (cf. Dodds, 2019).

Son of God (ibn)

Q4:171 denies that God has a son, which is “certainly one of the most insistent themes of the Qur’an” (Nickel, 2015: 427). Sinai (2017: 201) bluntly states: “The Qur’an does . . . unequivocally deny the divine sonship of Jesus Christ.” As with Trinitarian belief some scholars have suggested the Qur’an is merely trying to correct Christian heresy and not orthodoxy. Parrinder (1995 [1965]: 127; Cragg, 1999: 209) believes Q4:171 is rejecting adoptionism, the mere taking of a son. Some argue that the Qur’an (e.g., Q112; 5:72–75, 116–17; 6:100–1) is denying physical procreation as per pagan polytheism (Nasr, 2015: 727, 1580). However, the Qur’an’s use of metaphorical meanings of “son”—e.g., “son of the road” (ibn al-sabil; cf. Q2:177, 215; 4:36)—might open the possibility of Islamically acceptable non-physical interpretations of sonship.

However, such moves ignore a foundational theological conviction of avoiding association with God, or shirk. If tawhid is the core doctrine of Islam, then shirk is the greatest sin. The Qur’an declares it is inappropriate for God’s glory that he should have offspring (Q4:171; 19:92, 35) and Tafsir al-Jalalayn (n.d.) comments “Glory be to Him transcending the possibility that He should have a son!”⁷ Plainly, some biblical concepts are unfit for appropriation or borrowing. As we shall see presently, Qur’anic concepts with minimal precision are far more suitable candidates for evangelistic communication.

Messiah

The Qur’an calls Jesus Messiah (masih in Arabic) 11 times. Linguistically, masih was borrowed from Syriac but its possible linguistic derivation in Arabic is obscure (Durie, 2016: 214). This unanalyzability has led to much speculation regarding its meaning. One interpretation is Messiah refers to “his having been purified by God of sin” (Nasr, 2015: 267). Baidawi⁸ suggested it was Jesus’ surname and an honorific title. The use of masih in Q4:171 and 5:75 suggests Jesus is one in a long line of divinely sent messengers. Razi⁹ suggested masih means to travel or go on pilgrimage. Ibn Kathir (Q3:45; n.d.) suggested masih referred to Jesus’ healing ministry. Lexicographer “Firozabadi in his Arabic dictionary said that there were over fifty explanations of Masih” (Parrinder, 1995 [1965]: 30–31). These disparate interpretations suggest much confusion over what the Qur’an means by Messiah. One Muslim scholar, former Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia Ibn Baz, commented there is no practical value to knowing what masih means (Durie, 2016: 216). Summarizing the evidence, Anderson (2016: Kindle loc. 3349) concludes “qur’anic usage of the term [masih] to be essentially content-free . . . the term functions as an empty honorific.” Durie (2016: 218) comments, “The case of al-Masih is a relatively clear example of discontinuous adaptation of a linguistic fragment—a linguistic signifier, separated from its signified.”

Word of God

Jesus is called a “word of God” (kalimah) (Q4:171). Again, the term is given a variety of interpretations in Islamic commentary. Nasr (2015: 267) suggests it refers to Jesus as “the bringer of the Gospel, which, like the Torah and the Quran, represents God’s Word and message to humanity.” Baidawi explained kalimah to mean Jesus came into existence by God’s command without a human father (Parrinder, 1995 [1965]: 45). Ibn Kathir concurred, and referenced the Qur’anic parallel between Jesus and Adam (Q3:59) who were both created by God’s command. Ibn Kathir (n.d.) further clarified that “Isa was not the word. Rather, Isa came to existence because of the word” (cf. Parrinder, 1995 [1965]: 47) Here, kalimah represents God’s creative command, and Jesus is its result. Polemically, this interpretation of kalimah does succeed in countering Christianity’s high Christology. Nasr (2015: 267) objects to this interpretation since all creation is in existence by God’s command, this interpretation would universalize the meaning of Jesus’ unique title and render it meaningless. Explaining kalimah to mean Jesus is created by God’s command is Islamically coherent and orthodox, but it leaves us in the dark concerning why Jesus alone has this title. Similarly, the Qur’anic Adam–Jesus parallel demands explanation: if Jesus “is special in the sorts of ways that Adam was special. . . . why does a ‘new Adam’ appear on the scene? Islam seems to have no need for one. It is religiously unexpected, unnecessary, and unexplained” (Shumack, 2020: 81). Like Messiah, the meaning of kalimah remains mysterious.

Spirit of God

Q4:171 describes Jesus as “a ruh (spirit) from [God].” The meaning of the word itself is unclear. Durie (2016: 220) reports “Scholars—both Muslim and non-Muslim alike—have found it difficult to interpret the various uses of ruh in the Qur’an in a coherent way.” While ruah in Hebrew can mean wind, breath, or spirit, ruh in Arabic primarily means blowing and not breathing, and excludes the concept of the “breath of life” (Durie, 2016: 220–22). The Qur’an mentions the Holy Spirit (ruh al-qudus) on four occasions; three of these (Q2:87, 153; 5:110) involve Jesus (Reynolds, 2015: 186). However, the ruh al-qudus sometimes refers to the angel Jibril (Durie, 2016: 226). For example, regarding Q16:102, Nasr (2015: 685) avers, “According to most commentators, the Holy Spirit here refers to the Archangel Gabriel [Jibril], the angel of revelation.”

Clearly, Q4:171 is using ruh to refer to Jesus, but again several different meanings have been suggested. Some commentators think it refers to Jesus’ purity or to God’s mercy (Nasr, 2015: 1392). Ibn Kathir (n.d.) clarifies that to say something is “of God” is merely to honor it, such as the she-camel “of God” (Q7:73), not divinize it. Others see the term as a reference to Jesus’ celibacy because the identification of Jesus with spirit “must have contributed to the idea that he favoured the spirit over the body” (Reynolds, 2015: 192). Yet others view the conjunction of kalimah and ruh to indicate Jesus’ virgin-birth. God created Jesus with a word spoken to Maryam, explains Ibn Kathir (n.d.), “meaning He created him with the word ‘Be’ that He sent with Jibril to Maryam. Jibril blew the life of Isa into Maryam by God’s leave, and Isa came to existence as a result.” Cross-referencing Q4:171 with Q66:12, Nasr (2015: 267, 1392) concurs, noting the differences of opinion among commentators as to whether ruh means the angel Jibril or the spirit of Jesus created in Mary’s womb. Shumack (2020: 81) aptly concludes: Jesus’ “titles Word of God, and Spirit from God are simply different ways of saying that, despite being virgin-born, Jesus is merely human.”

This brief exegesis of Q4:171 points to two divergent forms of biblical reflex. The first reflex is dissonance concerning Trinitarian beliefs about Jesus. Here we see Islamic theological precision. That is, the ayah is taking a strong stand against Christian Trinitarian truth claims. To be sure, the author of the Qur’an might not always get their Christian doctrine correct (or may well be responding to heresy), nevertheless the underlying theological value at stake is crystal clear: Trinitarian doctrine conceptually assaults core Islamic doctrines of tawhid and shirk, and its rasulology.

The second reflex is resonance with the Christian honorifics “Word of God,” “Spirit of God,” and “Messiah.” This resonance is only possible because the Qur’an seems oblivious to the biblical meaning of these terms and fails to locate them adequately within the Muslim theological imagination. Attempts to do so by Muslim theologians are diverse and speculative. These terms remain so imprecise as to be conceptually vacuous. Thus, resonance speaks not of a commonly held detailed theology, but a faint outline that invites further definition. We are now ready to consider the mission utility of appealing to these reflexes.

Appealing to the Quran evangelistically

A biblical reflex approach to using the Qur’an in evangelism appeals to the objective truth of a claim made in the Qur’an about Jesus. This appeal serves as a means of opening dialogue about the biblical Jesus. Section one (“The apostolic use of alien religious texts”) demonstrates that the legitimacy of a biblical reflex approach requires both (a) an appropriate biblical/Christian term for Jesus is identified in the Qur’an, and (b) the Qur’an provides conceptual space for that term to be understood truly by a Muslim. That is, any biblical reflex found in the Qur’an must carry across enough theological meaning for it to be properly identified as true by both Christians and Muslims. After a brief overview of the Qur’anic Jesus, in section four (“Christological reflexes in Q4:171”) we saw that the Christological reflexes in Q4:171 fell into two types: terms in which the Qur’an polemically repurposed the Jesus of Trinitarian faith to conform to Islamic theology (rasul, thalatha/wahid, ibn); and honorifics that carried little or no meaning across into their new Qur’anic context (masih, kalimah, ruh). We have termed these respectively, dissonance, and resonance.¹⁰

We also proposed a related contextualization principle that evangelists should know their hearers’ theological imagination as best they can, and then identify the most minimally precise, gospel relevant, biblical reflex, truths in their texts as starting points. The requirement for minimal precision stems from the need to gain the greatest assent from both evangelist and hearer to the starting truth point.

We think that Q4:171 nicely fulfils these requirements, but only with respect to the honorific reflexes. Clearly, the reflexes rasul, wahid, and ibn, are so reimagined in the Qur’an that they describe not the biblical son of God Jesus, but the Islamic messenger and merely human Isa. Christianly understood, the terms are theologically false and therefore unable to be utilized with integrity. Moreover, the polemical posture of these terms naturally leads any conversation into the apologetic minefield of Trinitarian controversy. In short, appeal to the truth of these reflexes in any sense, is both biblically illegitimate and practically fraught.

Happily, the opposite is the case with respect to the honorific reflexes. Because the terms masih, kalimah, and ruh are conceptually empty or vague in Islam they can be affirmed as true by the Christian evangelist with integrity. Moreover, for the Muslim they naturally elicit reverence, interest, and intrigue (Anderson, 2016: Kindle loc. 3493). If traditional Islamic explanations of Jesus’ honorific titles like Messiah and kalimah remain unconvincing, then a commitment to the Qur’an’s truthfulness will provide impetus for some Muslims to look elsewhere for answers. LV Werff (cited in Larson, 2008: 330–31) suggests: “In the Muslim world, the concepts/names of the Messiah stand like large containers waiting to be filled or refilled by the Holy Scriptures and human experience in faith.” The evangelistic utility here is obvious. What has been emptied by the Qur’an can be re-filled with the gospel and, in this sense, they appear to be an Islamic counterpart to Paul’s usage of the Athenian altar to the unknown god.

Another benefit of our theological imagination approach is that it facilitates subversive fulfilment. Goheen and Sheridan (2022: 202) describe subversive fulfilment as the gospel fulfilling non-Christian religious longings and desires in a way that subverts the pre-existing worldview. These honorific Qur’anic reflexes that convey resonance with the Bible—masih, kalimah, and ruh—are ideal candidates for subversive fulfilment. Jesus’ honorific titles represent both religious concepts and arguably embody religious desire directed toward Jesus, the one through whom and for whom all people have been made. Christians can show how the gospel fulfils the true meaning of these honorific titles for Jesus in a way that better satisfies conceptual intrigues in the Muslim theological imagination, while simultaneously subverting Qur’anic theology. This subversive fulfilment reverses the Qur’an’s displacement of Jesus from his place of pre-eminence, retrieving and reconnecting the signified with the signifier (Durie, 2016: 218).

Evangelists use various images to describe their attempts to contextualize. In agreement with the Camel method, Larson (2008: 336) speaks of bridges: “Christians can recognize bridges to the gospel from the Islamic portrait of Jesus.” However, a bridge seems too strong a metaphor for the Qur’anic Jesus. A bridge suggests elements of direct continuity between the Qur’an and the Bible. The Qur’anic distortions and recasting of Jesus entails that such simple albeit partial continuity cannot be affirmed. Zwemer (1912: 178) talks about stepping-stones, believing that the Qur’anic Jesus “is so inadequate, so distorted, so insufficient, and so utterly obscured by the glory of their own prophet, that we can only use this knowledge as a stepping-stone to higher things.” Certainly, stepping-stone is a better metaphor than bridge for conveying the sort of discontinuity we see in Qur’anic biblical reflexes. In light of this study, we would like to offer another image—gaps.¹¹ It is not clear doctrine but conceptual gaps that offer space for shared truths that can be used as starting points. It is the Jesus of the Qur’anic gaps that offers the best prospects as an evangelistic launch point.

Footnotes

Authors’ note

We can confirm this is our original work and we have the rights to the work. We are submitting the work for first time; it is not being considered for publication elsewhere and has not already been published elsewhere.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Adam Dodds

Notes

Author biographies

Adam Dodds is a Systematic Theologian and Missiologist. He also researches and writes about Islam and Christian-Muslim relations in order to further the Church’s mission. He is Lecturer in Systematic Theology at Alphacrucis University College, Brisbane, Australia.

Richard Shumack is a Christian philosopher who has lived and worked for many years among Muslim communities where he developed his passion for helping Christians and Muslims speak constructively about faith and who Jesus is. He is Director of The Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam, Melbourne School of Theology, Australia.

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