Contradictory Accounts

The Bible and the Qur’an offer contradictory accounts of Jesus, beginning with the narrative of Jesus’ birth. 

The birth of Jesus is a story that most Christians are quite familiar with – Caesar Augustus had issued a decree that a census should be taken, so Joseph and Mary traveled to Bethlehem to be counted. While in Bethlehem, Mary gave birth to Jesus. She placed him in a manger because there were no rooms available. Shepherds in the fields nearby were visited by an angel who announced that a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, had been born. The angel told the shepherds they would find the baby in a manger. Then a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel praising God. After the angels left, the shepherds went to Bethlehem and found the baby, just as the angel said (Luke 2:1-18). 

The Qur’an offers quite a different story about Jesus’ birth. In the Qur’an, Mary gives birth to Jesus under a palm tree. While in labor, she grabs the palm tree wishing she could die. However, Allah provides a stream of water under her feet where she can get a drink, and she is told to shake the palm tree’s trunk so she will have ripe fresh dates. (Sura 19:23-25). 

After she gives birth, she carries the baby back to her people, who question her about the child. She has been commanded to take a vow of silence, so rather than answering, she points at the child. Then the infant Jesus says, “Lo! I am the slave of Allah. He hath given me the Scripture and hath appointed me a Prophet…And lo! Allah is my Lord and your Lord. So serve Him. That is the right path” (Sura 19:30; 36).

Jesus in the Qur’an identifies himself as Allah’s servant, which contradicts the Biblical account of God sending His Son. The most likely source for the Qur’an’s version is from apocryphal writings. The New Testament Apocrypha is a collection of writings that are, for the most part, either about or pseudonymously attributed to New Testament figures. These writings have never been viewed as canonical by any of the major branches of Christianity, nor is there any reason t believe that the traditions they record have any historical validity. The story about the palm tree is quite similar to an account in the Gospel of Pseudo Matthew. 

For a Muslim, Jesus is merely a prophet of Islam, pointing to their final prophet, Muhammad. To believe that Jesus Christ is God is “shirk;”it is blasphemy. The Bible says in 1 John 2:22-23, “Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father either; he who acknowledges the Son has the Father also.”