The Islamic Jesus by Mustafa Akyol

Author:Mustafa Akyol
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press

THE DISCIPLES AND THEIR “TABLE”

The details the Qur’an gives about the life of Jesus are scarce, yet there is a remarkably generous focus on the disciples—or, in Arabic, the hawariyun. Some Muslim scholars have argued that the word comes from the Arabic word hawira, which means “pure white,” which they took as a reference to the moral cleanliness of Jesus’ followers. It seems more accurate, however, to think that the term has a non-Arabic origin: A very similar term, hawarya, meaning “messenger,” had been used for the disciples in Ethiopian Christian sources.49

What is more interesting is that the disciples, whose image in the New Testament is not always very bright, have a very positive image in the Qur’an. In three separate passages of the Qur’an, they are pictured as ideal believers that Muslims should emulate. The first passage is in the chapter “Family of Imran,” and tells us how the disciples believed in Jesus in spite of some other fellow Jews:

When Jesus realized they [still] did not believe, he said, “Who will help me in God’s cause?” The disciples said, “We will be God’s helpers; we believe in God, witness our devotion to Him. Lord, we believe in what You have revealed and we follow the messenger: record us among those who bear witness.”50

Notably, the term used above, “helpers,” or ansar, has become a powerful term in Islamic tradition. The Medinan Muslims who hosted the refugees from Mecca, who just like the Prophet himself had migrated to save their lives, were called helpers. In the modern era, various Muslim parties, some of them violent, also labeled themselves as helpers—such as Ansar al-Islam in Iraq or Ansar al-Sharia in Libya, which are terrorist groups that unfortunately have a very militant notion of “helping” God and His cause.

The second Qur’anic passage about the disciples of Jesus is located in one of the late and short chapters of the Qur’an titled “Solid Lines,” or Saff, which tells believers to be steadfast in the heat of the battle with pagans. It again refers to the disciples as helpers:

You who believe, be God’s helpers. As Jesus, son of Mary, said to the disciples, “Who will come with me to help God?” The disciples said, “We shall be God’s helpers.” Some of the Children of Israel believed and some disbelieved: We supported the believers against their enemy and they were the ones who came out on top.51

The last part of this verse is admittedly a bit perplexing. For it is hard to explain how, in the context of Jesus and disciples, God “supported the believers against their enemy and they were the ones who came out on top.” The history of early Christianity rather is the history of the suppression of Christians—whether they were Jewish or Gentile. That is why some Muslim commentators have offered a very long-term solution to this problem, arguing that the believers’ victory was realized only with the advent of Islam.52

The third Qur’anic passage about the disciples introduces another curious theme, indeed a miracle.

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