Christianity and Islam | Page 3

Islam now presents to us. The course of
this development was greatly influenced by Christianity, but Christian
ideas had been operative upon Muhammed's eager intellectual life at an
even earlier date. We must attempt to realise the working of his mind,
if we are to gain a comprehension of the original position of Islam with
regard to Christianity. The task is not so difficult in Muhammed's case
as in that of others who have founded religious systems: we have
records of his philosophical views, important even though fragmentary,
while vivid descriptions of his experiences have been transmitted to us
in his own words, which have escaped the modifying influence of
tradition at second hand. Muhammed had an indefinite idea of the word
of God as known to him from other religions. He was unable to realise
this idea effectively except as an immediate revelation; hence
throughout the Qoran he represents God as speaking in the first person
and himself appears as the interlocutor. Even direct commands to the
congregation are introduced by the stereotyped "speak"; it was of
primary importance that the Qoran should be regarded as God's word
and not as man's. This fact largely contributed to secure an
uncontaminated transmission of the text, which seems also to have
been left by Muhammed himself in definite form. Its intentional
obscurity of expression does not facilitate the task of the inquirer, but it
provides, none the less, considerable information concerning the
religious progress of its author. Here we are upon firmer ground than
when we attempt to describe Muhammed's outward life, the first half of
which is wrapped in obscurity no less profound than that which veils
the youth of the Founder of Christianity.
Muhammed's contemporaries lived amid religious indifference. The
majority of the Arabs were heathen and their religious aspirations were
satisfied by local cults of the Old Semitic character. They may have
preserved the religious institutions of the great South Arabian
civilisation, which was then in a state of decadence; the beginnings of

Islam may also have been influenced by the ideas of this civilisation,
which research is only now revealing to us: but these points must
remain undecided for the time being. South Arabian civilisation was
certainly not confined to the South, nor could an organised township
such as Mecca remain outside its sphere of influence: but the scanty
information which has reached us concerning the religious life of the
Arabs anterior to Islam might also be explained by supposing them to
have followed a similar course of development. In any case, it is
advisable to reserve judgment until documentary proof can replace
ingenious conjecture. The difficulty of the problem is increased by the
fact that Jewish and especially Christian ideas penetrated from the
South and that their influence cannot be estimated. The important point
for us to consider is the existence of Christianity in Southern Arabia
before the Muhammedan period. Nor was the South its only
starting-point: Christian doctrine came to Arabia from the North, from
Syria and Babylonia, and numerous conversions, for the most part of
whole tribes, were made. On the frontiers also Arabian merchants came
into continual contact with Christianity and foreign merchants of the
Christian faith could be found throughout Arabia. But for the Arabian
migration and the simultaneous foundation of a new Arabian religion,
there is no doubt that the whole peninsula would have been speedily
converted to Christianity.
The chief rival of Christianity was Judaism, which was represented in
Northern as in Southern Arabia by strong colonies of Jews, who made
proselytes, although their strict ritualism was uncongenial to the Arab
temperament which preferred conversion to Christianity (naturally only
as a matter of form). In addition to Jewish, Christian, and Old Semitic
influences, Zoroastrian ideas and customs were also known in Arabia,
as is likely enough in view of the proximity of the Persian empire.
These various elements aroused in Muhammed's mind a vague idea of
religion. His experience was that of the eighteenth-century theologians
who suddenly observed that Christianity was but one of many very
similar and intelligible religions, and thus inevitably conceived the idea
of a pure and natural religious system fundamental to all others.
Judaism and Christianity were the only religions which forced
themselves upon Muhammed's consciousness and with the general
characteristics of which he was acquainted. He never read any part of

the Old or New Testament: his references to Christianity show that his
knowledge of the Bible was derived from hearsay and that his
informants were not representative of the great religious sects:
Muhammed's account of Jesus and His work, as given in the Qoran, is
based upon the apocryphal accretions which grew round the Christian
doctrine.
When Muhammed proceeded to compare the great religions of the Old
and New Testaments with the superficial pietism of his