Boreal

Shared Prophets

Mary

66:12 And Mary, daughter of Imran, who guarded her womb, and so We breathed into it of Our Spirit; and she believe in the truth of her Lord’s Words and His Book and was one of the pious.

Mary is the only female mentioned by name in the entire Koran. In the Koran, Mary is born into the family of Imran (Amram in the Bible), father of Moses. This means Mary was a descendent of Moses, unless Allah was under the impression that Imran was her father.

3:33 Allah chose Adam, Noah, the family of Abraham and the family of ‘Imran above all mankind;

3:34 Descending one from another; and Allah is All-Hearing, All-Knowing!

3:35 [Remember] when the wife of ’Imran said: “Lord, I have vowed to You what is in my womb to be devoted [to Your service]. Accept it from me, for You are the All-Hearing, the All-Knowing.”

Mary’s mother, in the next verse, gives the impression of disappointment at having birthed a female; however, God knew she was no ordinary female and that there was nothing to be disappointed about. He even gave Mary her name.

3:36 And when she delivered her, she said: “Lord, I have given birth to a female”, – and Allah knew best what she gave birth to; the male is not the same as the female – “I have named her Mary and I commend her and her descendants to You to protect her from the accursed Devil.”

Allah, during Mary’s development, entrusted the care and feeding of the future mother of Jesus to Zachariah, the father of John the Baptist and one of Mary’s relatives. Zachariah would later discover that God himself looked after her welfare.

3:37 Then her Lord accepted her graciously and made her to grow into a fine child, entrusting her to Zachariah. Whenever Zachariah went to see her in the sanctuary, he found that she had some provision. “Mary,” he asked, “where did you get this?” She replied: “It is from Allah, and Allah provides for whom he wishes without measure.”

Mary’s last statement prompted Zachariah to ask God for a favour of his own.

3:38 Thereupon, Zachariah prayed to his Lord saying: “Lord grant me from Your Bounty fine descendants. Indeed You hear every prayer!”

3:39 Then the angels called him while he was at prayer in the sanctuary, saying: “Allah bids you rejoice in John, confirming a word (Jesus) from Allah, a master, chaste and a Prophet and one of the righteous.”

3:40 He said: “Lord, how will I have a son, seeing I have been overtaken by old age and my wife is barren?” “This is how Allah does whatever He pleases,” He replied.

Allah did for the barren old wife of Zachariah what He had done for Abraham’s equally compromised no-name spouse; she would give birth to a son, and that son would grow up to be John the Baptist. The old man asked God to give him a sign to prove to those around him that He had granted his wish.

3:41 He said; “Lord give me a sign.” Allah said: “Your sign is that you will not speak to anybody for three days, except by signs; and remember your Lord often and give praise evening and morning.”

The angels visited Mary with the good news that she had been purified (she would no longer experience menses), and that she should do what God demanded of her.

3:42 And when the angels said: “O Mary, Allah has chosen you and purified you, preferring you to all womankind.”

3:43 “O Mary be obedient to your Lord, prostrate yourself and bow down with those who bow down.”

For reasons that are unclear in the next verse, Allah revealed that lots were thrown to see who would take care of Mary.

3:44 This is part of the tidings of the Unseen which We reveal to you. You were not in their midst when they cast their pens (casting lots) to see who will take charge of Mary, and you were not in their midst when they were disputing.

Returning to the angels with the good news:

3:45 When the angels said: “O Mary, Allah bids you rejoice in a word from Him, whose name is the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary. He shall be prominent in this world (through prophethood) and the next (through intercession) and shall be near to God.”

3:46 “He shall speak to people from the cradle and while an old man and will be one of the righteous.”

***

In Islamic traditions, Jesus, after defeating the forces of evil during the end days, will marry, have children and live to a ripe old age and upon his passing be buried in Medina next to Muhammad.

***

Mary was somewhat sceptical until Allah assured her that, like in the Bible, having a virgin give birth is an easy matter for God and that He would teach her offspring all he needed to know before sending him as His Messenger to the Jews.

3:47 She said” “Lord, how can I have a child when I have not been touched by any man?” Allah said: “Thus Allah creates whatever He pleases. Whenever He decrees a matter, He simply says to it: ‘Be’, and it comes to be.”

3:48 And He will teach him the Book, the Wisdom, the Torah and the Gospel.

3:49 And [send him forth as a] Messenger to the Children of Israel [saying]: “I bring you a sign from your Lord. I will create for you out of clay the likeliness of a bird; then I will breathe into it and it will become a bird, by Allah’s leave. And I will heal the blind and the leper and will raise the dead, by Allah’s leave. And I will inform you concerning what you eat and what you hoard in your homes. In all this there is surely a sign for you, if you are believers!”

Jesus Conceived

For the actual impregnation, Allah sent His do-it-all angel Gabriel, the “Spirit” in Revelation 19:17, in the form of an attractive man.

19:16 And remember [the account] of Mary in the Book when she withdrew from her people to an eastern place.

19:17 She screened herself away from them, and We sent to her Our Spirit and it appeared to her in the form of a well-shaped human being.

19:18 She said: “I seek refuge with Allah from you, if you do fear Allah.”

19:19 He said: “I am only the messenger of your Lord to grant you a boy most pure.”

19:20 She said: “Shall I have a boy, when no man has touched me and I have not been an unchaste woman?”

19:21 He (the angel) said: “Thus [it will be], your Lord has said: ‘This is an easy matter for Me; that We may make him (the boy Jesus) a sign unto mankind and a Mercy from Us.’” And thus it was decreed.

Birth of Jesus

23:50 And We made Mary’s son and his mother a sign, and We sheltered them on a lofty ground which had [settled] meadows and a spring.

In Allah's account of the birth of Jesus, the Christian Messiah comes into this world under a palm tree on a desert oasis. Like other major events the Bible describes as occurring in Palestine, and which the Koran centres in or around Mecca, Allah may have wanted to leave the impression that Jesus was born near the city.

19:22 So, she conceived him and she withdrew with him to a distant place.

19:23 Then labour pangs drove her towards the trunk of a palm tree. She said: “I wish I had died before this and had become completely forgotten.”

With no Joseph in sight, Jesus, perhaps with the assistance of Gabriel, helped in his own delivery.

19:24 Whereupon [the babe (Jesus) or (Gabriel)] called her from beneath her: “Do not grieve. Your Lord has created below you a stream.

19:25 “Shake the trunk of the palm tree towards you and it will drop upon you fresh ripe dates.”

***

Dates ripen in the Middle East to the point of falling off the tree in late September or early October, which would indicate that this was the period of Jesus’ birth.

***

Is Mary, in the next revelation, being told to lie about eating?

19:26 “Eat, drink and rejoice. Then if you see any human say: ‘I have vowed to the Compassionate to fast, and so I shall not talk today to any human being.’”

Jesus’ First Words

The infant Jesus, only hours after his birth, as Allah said he would, at the request of his mother who is being accused of having been unchaste, loudly proclaimed that he was not the Son of God but a prophet sent by Allah, who praises Allah and does as He commands.

19:27 Then she brought him (the child) to her people, carrying him. They said: “O Mary, you have surely committed a strange thing.

19:28 “Sister of Aaron, your father was not an evil man and your mother was not unchaste.”

Was Mary, like Zacharia, expected to announce the birth of her son à la Marcel Marceau? Pointing to her son in response to accusations of having a child out-of-wedlock would indicate that she was.

19:29 Whereupon she pointed to him. They said: “How will we talk to one who is still an infant in the cradle?”

Jesus:

19:30 He [Jesus] said “Indeed, I am the servant of Allah, Who gave me the Book and made me a Prophet.

19:31 “And He made me blessed wherever I am and has commanded me to pray and to give the alms, so long as I live;

19:32 And be devoted to my mother; and He did not make me arrogant and mischievous.

19:33 “Peace be upon me the day I was born, the day I die and the day I rise from the dead.”

Allah echoed the baby Jesus’ claim:

19:34 Such was Jesus, son of Mary; it is the truth which they (the Christians) dispute.

19:35 It is not fitting for Allah to have a son. Glory be to Him; when He decrees a thing, He simply says: “Be”, and it comes to be.

***

Or a daughter for that matter:

37:149 Ask them: “Are the daughters your Lord’s and theirs the sons?

37:150 “Or have We created the angels as females, while they were witnesses?”

37:151 It is out of their perversion that they will say:

37:152 “Allah has begotten”, but they are liars.

37:153 Has He preferred daughters over sons?

37:154 What is the matter with you; how do you judge?

37:155 Do you not remember? 37:156 Or do you have manifest authority?

37:157 Produce your Book, if you are truthful.

***

How wrong the wrongdoers, i.e., Christians, were. They will be held to account.

19:36 Allah is truly your Lord and my Lord; so worship him. That is a straight path.

19:37 Yet, the sects among them differed. Woe to those who have disbelieved from the spectacle of a great Day!

19:38 How well they will hear and how well they will see, on the Day they will come onto Us; but the wrongdoers today are in manifest error.

19:39 And warn them of the Day of sorrow, when the issue is decided, while they are heedless and do not believe.

Jesus said the meek would inherit the Earth; not so, says Allah.

19:40 It is We Who shall inherit the earth and whomever is on it, and to Us they shall be returned.

In a conversation He will have with Jesus on Judgement Day, Allah has the son of Mary denying he ever claimed his mother was a god—a claim that, to my knowledge, does not appear in the New Testament.

5:116 And when Allah said: “O Jesus, son of Mary, did you say to the people: ‘Take me and my mother as gods, apart from Allah?’” He said: “Glory be to You. It is not given me to say what is untrue. If I said it, You would have known it; You know what is in my soul, but I do not know what is in Thine (God has a soul?!). You are indeed the Knower of the Unseen.

5:117 “I only told them what You commanded me: ‘Worship Allah, your Lord and mine’, and I was a watcher over them while I was among them, but when You took me to yourself, You became the Watcher over them; for you are the witness of everything.

5:118 “Should you punish them, they are surely your servants; but should You forgive them, You are truly the Mighty, the Wise.”

5:119 Allah said: “This is a Day in which their truthfulness shall profit the truthful; they will have Gardens beneath which rivers flow; dwelling therein forever; Allah is pleased with them and they are pleased with him. That is the great triumph.”

Who is the father of Jesus? Is it the “well-shaped human being” that visited Mary when she conceived Jesus? In the Koran, when a physical presence is required when dealing with mortals, including Muhammad, God uses angel intermediaries—Gabriel almost exclusively—and Mary would not have been the exception.

21:91 And she who guarded her chastity (Mary), and so We breathed into her Our Spirit and made her and her son (Jesus) a sign unto the world.

Based on this simple observation, the “Spirit” breathed into Mary’s womb is that of Gabriel, and a “spirit” that needs a functioning, anatomically correct male facsimile to be administered can only mean one thing.