Possibly Caliph Abdul Malik depicted on a coin
In the last five to ten years, revisionist theories about Islamic origins have trickled down to the popular level. They’ve usually only been in academia but now their scholarship can easily be found in books published by mainline publishers and not only by a particular University Press. The reason that these theories exist, is because of the huge gap between the life of Muhammad and the first Islamic details about him. Ibn Ishaq’s biography of Muhammad dates back to Ibn Hisham’s redaction, two centuries after Muhammad’s death. The canonical Hadith collections take another half century before they are put into circulation. In other words, sources about Islam are 200-300 years after Muhammad lived. These are extremely late sources.
What happened in these first two centuries? How did Islam begin? The Quran doesn’t tell us much since it’s very vague and poetic. I think Muslims would admit that it’s not there to give us historical details about the founding of Islam but rather to promote doctrine regarding key Islamic beliefs.
The problem with all of these revisionist theories is that they contradict each other. After all, much has to be based on speculation since the sources are lacking. We have a few writings from Priests, Monks, and chroniclers regarding the Arab invasions. We also have some inscriptions and a few coins as well.
While I do admit that the traditional Islamic sources are late, they at least give a consistent message about Muhammad, his career as a Prophet, his founding of a religion and ummah, and the early conquests outside of Arabia. The revisionists seem to claim contradictory things since they don’t include these late sources.
I’ve read quite a bit from the revisionist camp. I’ve read popular writers like Robert Spencer, and Tom Holland. I’ve also read more scholarly writers such as Fred Donner and Dan Gibson. I’ve also watched many YouTube videos on the subject. It’s something that I’m interested in, although until I have reasonable proof that one of their theories is correct, I won’t be using it in my dialogues. I have no problem giving the traditional Islamic narrative to any Muslim that I dialogue with since I believe that Christianity is true, regardless of how Islam was founded.
I can’t stress enough that these contradictory theories are problematic. However, these revisionists all have one thing in common and I think that’s worth looking into. They all say that the Arabs get a large boost in the Islamic direction with Caliph Abdul Malik who reigned from 685 to 705. They’re unanimous on this. They mention that he puts far more emphasis on the person of Muhammad and makes him the center of the religion. He also stresses Islam as a distinct religion from Christianity and Judaism. The coinage and inscriptions start to take a different turn with his reign as well. During his reign, the Dome of the Rock is built and established as the first main holy site outside of Arabia.
These revisionists won’t say that orthodox Islam as we know it today began with Abdul Malik. In fact, most of them say that the religion we know as Islam didn’t fully emerge until about the mid to late 8th century. Still, Abdul Malik is the game changer for them. They’ll say that there is a good chance that Muawiya, the predecessor of Abdul Malik probably wasn’t a Muslim, but after Abdul Malik, the Arab religion rapidly starts to look more and more like the Islamic religion that we know today.
The fact that the revisionists disagree on much is significant. However, what they agree on is significant as well. I encourage these revisionists to keep working. I also encourage orthodox Muslims to keep researching this as well. I think if we all work hard enough, we can find the beginnings of Islam, despite the huge lack of early sources.
I’ve only just started to research this topic, and I find it absolutely fascinating (especially Dan Gibson’s work, which still amazes me!), although I agree with your approach that until these revisionist theories crystalize into something verifiable and credible, we probably should not use them at this time, at the risk of weakening our more dependable and central arguments.
Hi Kent,
“we probably should not use them at this time, at the risk of weakening our more dependable and central arguments.”
Very true. Apologists on our side often accuse Muslims of double standards by using liberal theories about our Scripture based on nothing but speculation. I think this assessment is correct. However, if we go based on speculation, we fall into the same trap. We need to go on evidence alone.
Jay Smith has completely fallen in love with the Mecca – Petra theory. He now uses this in his debating with Muslims. I think this is a mistake. This theory is too much in its infancy. It has some evidence for it but much of it cannot be proved yet.
As you would suggest, stick to the traditional arguments while we work on these theories.
God Bless,
Jay Smith’s talks on the theory you mention are very stimulating, but both you and Ken are correct to avoid these newish theories. We shouldn’t need them really, the Koran hoists itself on its own petard, and it should only be required to point out how ridiculous it is for rational men to believe in it.
But when it comes to Islam we are not dealing with men who are rational when it comes to their religion, we need to do enough to plant the seed in their minds that they are being deceived. We could also do with educating our public figures such as politicians, but then again we are not often dealing with reasonable men.
I personally believe that a wide spectrum of arguments & methods is called for, as there is a wide spectrum of recipients to cater to.
To use just two examples:
Jay Smith claims that several Muslims converted after Shabir Ally could not respond to the a-historicity of the Quran in their classical debate.
And Nabeel Qureshi famously had the path straightened by Christian apologetics and polemics against Islam. He admits that this method won’t work on many Muslims – more often it is the love of a Christian that draws them to Christ – but it was necessary for him.
While studying “the best” Islamic sources, I’ve realized that they’re much more problematic than it appears at first glance. Muslims like to boast that their traditions have been meticulously preserved by the first three generations of Muhammad’s followers (considered to be “the best Muslims”), but once one starts examining the evidence, the claim crumbles to dust. Just take a look at the following hadiths (capitalization mine):
Sahih Bukhari, Volume 3, Book 34, Number 335:
Narrated Ata bin Yasar:
I met Abdullah bin ‘Amr bin Al-‘As and asked him, “Tell me about the description of Allah’s Apostle which is mentioned in Torah. He replied, ‘Yes. By Allah, HE IS DESCRIBED IN THE TORAH with some of the qualities attributed to him in the Quran AS FOLLOWS:
“O Prophet ! We have sent you as a witness (for Allah’s True religion) And a giver of glad tidings (to the faithful believers), And a warner (to the unbelievers) And guardian of the illiterates. You are My slave and My messenger (i.e. Apostle). I have named you “Al-Mutawakkil” (who depends upon Allah). You are neither discourteous, harsh Nor a noise-maker in the markets And you do not do evil to those Who do evil to you, but you deal With them with forgiveness and kindness. Allah will not let him (the Prophet) Die till he makes straight the crooked people by making them say: “None has the right to be worshiped but Allah,” With which will be opened blind eyes, and deaf ears and enveloped hearts.”
Ka’b Al-Ahbar said: “THE FIRST LINE OF THE TORAH SAYS: Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah and My chosen slave. Verily, he is neither rude nor harsh. And he is a man who would not yell or scream in markets. And he will never award an ill deed with an ill deed, on the contrary, he will, always award ill deeds with forgiveness. He is birth will take place in Mecca and his immigration will be to Taiba (one of the names of Madinah) and his dominion will be the Sham (what is now known as Palestine, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan).
THE SECOND LINE OF THE TORAH SAYS: “Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah. His nation are constantly praising, they praise Allah for whatever occurs to them whether it is good or bad. They praise and thank Allah in every situation and glorify Allah while they stand on a place that is higher than floor. They are people who always watch the sun (to know prayer times) and pray each prayer on its time even if they were in a filthy place. They wear Izaar that they wrap around their waists. And they wash and cleanse their parts at nights and their voices during the time of night are like that of bees (referring to their prayers). (Sunan Al Daarimi, Kitab: Al Muqadima (The Introduction), hadith #7).
I guess the first thing that comes to your mind is “Whaaat? What are these people even talking about? Such passages don’t exist in the Torah!” Well, there are several other “authentic” narrations that contain alleged quotations from the Torah and the Gospel that are not present in our Holy Bible. Muslims will reply that the aforementioned passages were present in the authentic Torah and Gospel, the ones untouched by the corruption of Jews and Christians. But here goes the question “Where are those original Torah and Gospel then, since the first Muslims seemingly had them at their disposal? What happened to those books? Did the evil Jews and Christians manage to steal and destroy them? When and how? Why not a single Muslim writer ever mentions this incredible event? The (not so) early Muslims preserved detailed descriptions of how Muhammad “answered the call of nature” and how he boasted about having sex with all his eleven wives in one night, but they failed to protect the very words of Allah? One can hardly come up with something more pathetic. But if early Muslims messed up the original Torah and Gospel (and then hypocritically put the blame on Jews and Christians) what else did they mess up? Ignoramus et ignorabimus, at least for now.
Even Jonathan A.C. Brown, famous Muslim scholar, admits in his book “Misquoting Muhammad”: “As for the first crucial century of Islam, beyond its broad outlines, it lies out of historical sight”.
God help us all.
Hi Orangehunter,
This is interesting stuff. The fact that Islamic sources are ignorant of the two faiths they claim to abrogate is extremely obvious. I’ve actually written on this before:
http://allanruhl.com/a-serious-question-about-the-taurat-and-the-injeel/#more-749
My experience with Muslims is that the Hadith doesn’t hold the same weight the Quran does. It is true that Islamic orthodoxy claims this but this belief is not always held by the Muslims themselves.
My friend from Gaza threw the Hadith under the bus in a discussion that we had but he fought tooth and nail to defend the integrity of the Quran. Also, apologist Shabir Ally seems to hold the Hadith in lower regard. Perhaps there is a disparity between Muslims in Muslim countries and those outside Muslim countries.
God Bless,
I don’t dispute the primacy of the Quran according to Muslims, my point is that there is no valid way to evaluate the veracity of information, contained in the sources of the Islamic faith, including the “authentic” collections of hadiths. This means that we don’t really know what happened in Arabia in the first half of 7th century, we can only guess. And it damages the Quran seriously, because without the hadith huge portions of the Quran simply make no sense. Can a Muslim tell us who is Abu Lahab? Who is Zayd? What exactly is the beast, mentioned in Sura 27:82? What will the Islamic Jesus do when he comes during the Final hour? All these and many other things, briefly mentioned in the Quran, are explained in the hadiths…which we can’t really trust.
Christ Is risen, He Is our blessed Lord and Savior.