Jesus
Jesus in Judaism, Christianity and Islam
Three faiths call Abraham their father. What do they say about Jesus, and where do they differ? Set honestly side by side, from the Christian faith.
Jews, Christians and Muslims all three call Abraham their father in faith. Yet they look at Jesus very differently. For Christians He is the promised Messiah and the Son of God. For Judaism He is a Jewish teacher of the first century, but not the Messiah. For Islam He is a great prophet, but no more than that. Here we set the three honestly side by side.
Thread writes from the Christian faith and does not present other religions as equally true. But whoever speaks about someone else's faith must do so honestly: with the sources given, with respect, without mockery. The short quotations from the Qur'an come from a free, older translation; the verse is always named.
Abraham, a shared father
God called Abraham away from his country and promised that in him all the peoples of the earth would be blessed. From his sons Isaac and Ishmael, peoples grew. Judaism sees in him the patriarch of Israel, with whom God made an everlasting covenant. Muslims honour Ibrahim as a prophet and as an example of surrender to the one God. Christians read in Paul that Abraham was made righteous through his faith, and that all who believe, Jews and Gentiles, are his children. The same father, but a different answer to the question of who Jesus is.
A short comparison with still other faiths is under Who is Jesus?
Jesus and Judaism
Jesus was a Jew, as were His first disciples. Why, then, do most Jews not see Him as the Messiah?
Jesus was a Jew
Judaism
Jewish scholars today often write with respect about Jesus as a Jewish teacher of the first century, who lived and thought within the Judaism of His time. The historian Geza Vermes simply called his well-known 1973 book 'Jesus the Jew'.
The Bible
Jesus was circumcised on the eighth day and presented to God in the temple. On the sabbath He went to the synagogue 'as his custom was' and read there from Isaiah. He kept the feasts of His people in Jerusalem: Passover, the Feast of Tabernacles and the Feast of Dedication (Hanukkah). Whoever wants to understand Jesus comes to know Him as a Jew.
The same books, a different order
JudaismTanakh
The Jewish Bible is called the Tanakh, after its three parts: Torah (the law), Nevi'im (the prophets) and Ketuvim (the writings). It counts 24 books, because, for example, the twelve minor prophets together form one book. It ends with Chronicles, with the call to return to Jerusalem. Judaism reads it together with the oral teaching, which was later written down in the Mishnah and the Talmud.
The Bible
The Protestant Old Testament contains the same books, counted differently (39) and ordered differently: law, history, poetry, prophets. It ends with Malachi, who announces the coming of Elijah, and so points ahead to the New Testament. Catholic and Orthodox Bibles have a few more books. Jesus Himself spoke of 'the law of Moses, and the prophets, and the psalms'.
Which books belong in the Bible?Which Messiah was expected?
JudaismIsaiah 11; Jeremiah 23:5–6; Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, Kings 11
Many Jews expected, and still expect, a Messiah from the house of David: a king who brings the exiles home, rebuilds the temple and brings peace among the nations. The medieval scholar Maimonides summed it up this way. Because Jesus died without doing those things, and the world is not yet at peace, most Jews do not see Him as the Messiah. That God would become man also clashes, for them, with the 'Hear, O Israel': the LORD is one.
In Jewish interpretation the suffering servant of Isaiah 53 is usually the people of Israel itself. Since the apostles, Christians have read Jesus there.
The Bible
Christians see in Jesus the Son of David, and also read in the prophets of a Messiah who must suffer. Paul knew that a crucified Messiah was a stumbling block to many. Jesus explained it Himself: the Messiah had to suffer and so enter into His glory. What is not yet fulfilled, such as peace among the nations, Christians await at His return.
The first Christians were Jews
Judaism
Judaism and Christianity only grew apart over the course of the first centuries. Today there are also Jews who follow Jesus as the Messiah, the Messianic Jews, but Judaism as a whole does not recognise Him.
The Bible
At Pentecost Peter spoke to Jews from many lands, and thousands were baptised. The apostles were Jews, and so was Paul. In Romans 9–11 he writes of his great sorrow for his people, that God has not cast away His people, and that Christians from the Gentiles are grafted like wild branches into the olive tree of Israel: they do not bear the root, the root bears them. How 'all Israel shall be saved' (11:26) should be read exactly is something Christians differ on.
And the Talmud?
JudaismBabylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 43a
The Talmud, completed centuries after Jesus, mentions a 'Yeshu' in a few places. Whether and how those passages refer to Jesus of Nazareth is debated by scholars. The best known is explained among the sources on the historical Jesus.
The Bible
Christians need not be afraid or angry about this. Already in the gospels, opponents ascribed Jesus' miracles to an evil power, and Jesus answered them calmly.
The Talmud among the historical sources
Never again: Christians and antisemitism
For centuries Christians did Jews great harm. They called them 'Christ-killers', forced them into baptism, drove them out (as from Spain in 1492) and allowed pogroms. In 1543 Luther wrote a hateful tract against the Jews. That old hostility helped prepare the ground in which the persecution of the Jews in the twentieth century could grow.
The Bible does not teach this. On the cross Jesus prayed for those who crucified Him. The apostles named Herod and Pilate, the Gentiles and Israel together in His death, and saw in that death God's way for the sins of all people. Paul expressly warns Christians from the Gentiles against arrogance towards Israel.
The churches have acknowledged this. In Nostra Aetate (1965) the Catholic Church declared that what happened in the passion of Christ cannot be charged against all the Jews then alive, nor against the Jews of today, that the Jews must not be presented as rejected or accursed, and that it deplores every form of antisemitism. In 2015 the Evangelical Church in Germany distanced itself from the writings of Luther and other Reformers against the Jews. In 2020 the Protestant Church in the Netherlands acknowledged that the church had helped prepare the breeding ground for antisemitism. Whoever follows Jesus stands beside their Jewish neighbours.
Jesus and Islam
In the Qur'an Jesus is called Isa, the son of Maryam. What the Qur'an says about Him, with the verses given: where it touches the Bible, and where it differs.
Born of the virgin Mary
Qur'an3:42–47; 19:16–34; 21:91
An angel brings Maryam the news that she will have a son, though no man has touched her. Maryam is greatly honoured: a whole sura bears her name, and according to 3:42 she is chosen above all the women of the world.
O Mary! Lo! Allah giveth thee glad tidings of a word from him, whose name is the Messiah, Jesus, son of Mary.
Qur'an 3:45 The Bible
Luke and Matthew also tell that Jesus was born of Mary without a human father, through the Holy Spirit. For Christians that means more than a miracle: God Himself enters the world.
The Messiah, a word from God
Qur'an3:45; 4:171
The Qur'an calls Jesus al-Masih, the Messiah, and also 'his word' and 'a spirit from Him'. No other prophet receives these titles. At the same time the Qur'an says He is 'only a messenger' and compares Him with Adam, whom God also created without a father (3:59).
The Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, was only a messenger of Allah, and His word which He conveyed unto Mary, and a spirit from Him.
Qur'an 4:171 The Bible
John also calls Jesus the Word, but adds: the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and He became flesh. The same words, a different meaning.
One God, three personsThe Gospel
Qur'an5:46; 57:27
God gave Jesus the Injil, the Gospel, with guidance and light, confirming the Torah that was already there.
The Bible
For Christians the gospel is not a book Jesus received, but the good news about who He is and what He did, written down by His disciples. Many Muslims believe that today's gospels are no longer the original Injil. What the manuscripts show about that, you can read under 'Is it true?'.
Has the Bible been changed?Son of God?
Qur'an4:171; 19:35; 112:1–4
The Qur'an firmly rejects that God would take or beget a son, and says: 'say not "Three"'. God is one; He begets not and was not begotten.
It befitteth not (the Majesty of) Allah that He should take unto Himself a son. Glory be to Him! When He decreeth a thing, He saith unto it only: Be! and it is.
Qur'an 19:35 The Bible
Here lies the greatest difference. But notice what Christians mean: not that God took a wife and fathered a child, nor that there are three gods. They confess one God, and that the Son is 'begotten, not made', eternally with the Father. Christians too would reject a god with a bodily son.
One God, three personsCrucified?
Qur'an4:157–158
The Qur'an says they did not kill Jesus and did not crucify Him, but that it appeared so to them, and that God took Him up to Himself. Most classical commentators read this as meaning that someone else died in His place. A few modern thinkers read it differently: that not they, but God had the last word.
They slew him not nor crucified him, but it appeared so unto them … But Allah took him up unto Himself.
Qur'an 4:157–158 Some old European translations write 'someone who resembled him' into the text itself. The Arabic only says that it appeared so to them; the substitution is interpretation. Pickthall translates more literally.
The Bible
For Christians the cross is the heart of the gospel: Christ died for our sins, was buried and was raised. Historians too, believers or not, count the crucifixion under Pontius Pilate among the surest facts about Jesus.
What historians know
The differences side by side
Six questions, three answers. Short, so not complete: within each faith there are also different streams.
| Judaism | Christianity | Islam | |
|---|---|---|---|
| God | One God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob: 'Hear, O Israel: the LORD is one' (Deut. 6:4). | One God in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Matt. 28:19). | One God (Allah), strictly one: He begets not and is not begotten (sura 112). |
| Jesus | A Jewish teacher of the first century, not the Messiah. | The promised Messiah and the Son of God, truly God and truly man (John 1:14; 20:28). | Isa, a great prophet and the Messiah, born of the virgin, but not a Son of God (4:171). |
| Cross and resurrection | He died on a Roman cross; His resurrection is not accepted. | He died for our sins and rose from the dead on the third day (1 Cor. 15:3–4). | Not crucified: it appeared so to them, and God took Him up to Himself (4:157–158). |
| Holy Scripture | The Tanakh (the Hebrew Bible), read with the oral teaching of the Mishnah and the Talmud. | The Old and the New Testament; the Old contains the books of the Tanakh. | The Qur'an as the final revelation; the Torah, the Psalms and the Gospel are said to have been given by God earlier (4:163; 5:46). |
| Salvation | Living in the covenant with God, by His commandments, with repentance (teshuvah), prayer and good deeds. | By grace, through faith in Christ, not by our own works (Eph. 2:8–9). | Faith in God and good deeds; on the Last Day deeds are weighed (7:8–9). |
| Abraham | The patriarch of Israel, with whom God made His covenant, continued through Isaac (Gen. 17:19). | The father of all who believe, Jews and Gentiles (Rom. 4:16; Gal. 3:7). | Ibrahim, an upright believer, 'not a Jew, nor yet a Christian' (3:67); with Ishmael he built the Kaaba (2:127). |
What Christians believe about Jesus
Christians believe that in Jesus the promises to Abraham and Israel are fulfilled. He is the Messiah from the house of David and the eternal Son, one with the Father. He died on the cross for our sins and rose from the dead, and through Him the Father sends the Holy Spirit. Jesus Himself said that Abraham rejoiced to see His day. That is no judgement on the worth of our Jewish and Muslim neighbours, but it is the heart of what Christians confess: Jesus is the way, the truth and the life.
Talking with each other
Conversations about Jesus with Jewish or Muslim neighbours are best begun by listening well. Ask what Jesus, or Isa, means to the other, and tell what He means to you. You don't have to agree to respect each other. Peter wrote that Christians should be ready to explain where their hope comes from, 'with humility and fear'.
Sources
The quotations from the Qur'an: M. M. Pickthall, The Meaning of the Glorious Koran (1930; in the public domain). An older English translation. It follows the standard verse numbering.
Sources
- Sefaria, “Tanakh: Torah, Prophets, Writings”
- Chabad.org, “Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, Melachim uMilchamot, hoofdstuk 11”
- Heilige Stoel, “Nostra Aetate, verklaring over de houding van de Kerk tegenover de niet-christelijke godsdiensten (1965), nr. 4”
- evangelisch.de, “EKD-Synode distanziert sich von Martin Luthers Judenfeindschaft (11 november 2015)”
- NOS, “Protestantse Kerk erkent op herdenking Kristallnacht schuld in WO II (8 november 2020)”
- Project Gutenberg, “De Koran, uitgegeven onder toezicht van dr. S. Keyzer (eBook 19786)”
- Wikisource, “Le Koran, traduction de Kazimirski”
- Projekt Gutenberg-DE, “Max Henning, Der Koran”
- Tanzil, “M. M. Pickthall, The Meaning of the Glorious Koran (1930)”
- University of Toronto, Department of Near & Middle Eastern Civilizations, “Todd Lawson, The Crucifixion and the Qur'an (2009)”
- SOAS Research Online, “Review of Todd Lawson, The Crucifixion and the Qur'an (M. Shah)”