Relate in the book (that is, the Ḳur-án) the history of Mary, when she retired from her family to a place towards the east, in the house, and she took a veil [to conceal herself] from them; and We sent unto her our spirit Gabriel, and he appeared unto her as a perfect man. She said, I beg the Compassionate to preserve me from thee! If thou be a pious person, thou wilt withdraw from me.—He replied, I am only the messenger of thy Lord [to inform thee] that He will give thee a pure son, endowed with the gift of prophecy. She said, How shall I have a son, when a man hath not touched me, and I am not a harlot? He answered, Thus shall it be: a son shall be created unto thee without a father. Thy Lord saith, This is easy unto Me; and thus shall it be that We may make him a sign unto men, showing Our power, and a mercy from Us unto him who shall believe in him: for it is a thing decreed.—And she conceived him; and she retired with him [yet unborn] to a distant place far from her family; and the pains of childbirth urged her to repair to the trunk of a palm-tree that she might lean against it. And she gave birth to the child, which was conceived and formed and born in an hour.[330] She said, Oh! would that I had died before this event, and had been a thing forgotten [and] unnoticed!—But he who was below her (namely Gabriel, who was on a lower place than she) called to her, Grieve not. God hath made below thee a rivulet: and shake thou towards thee the trunk of the palm-tree (which was dried-up); it shall let fall upon thee ripe dates, fresh-gathered: therefore eat of the dates, and drink of the water of the rivulet, and be of cheerful eye on account of the child: and if thou see any one of mankind, asking thee concerning the child, say, I have vowed unto the Compassionate an abstinence from speech with mankind respecting him and other matters; therefore I will not speak to-day unto a man after this.
And she brought him [namely the child] unto her people, carrying him. They said, O Mary, thou hast done a strange thing. O sister of Aaron, (he was a righteous man; and the meaning is, O thou who art like him in chastity,[331]) thy father was not a man of wickedness, nor was thy mother a harlot. Then whence gottest thou this child?—And she made a sign to them, [pointing] towards him, [namely the child, as though she would say,] Speak ye unto him. They said, How shall we speak unto him who is in the cradle, an infant? He [however] said, Verily I am the servant of God:[332] He hath given me the book of the Gospel, and hath appointed me a prophet; and He hath made me blessed wherever I shall be, and hath commanded me to observe prayer and give alms as long as I shall live, and hath made me dutiful to my mother, and hath not made me proud [nor] wicked. And peace from God [was] on me on the day when I was born, and [will be] on the day when I shall die, and on the day when I shall be raised to life.—This [was] Jesus the son of Mary. I have spoken the saying of truth, concerning which they (namely the Christians) doubt, saying that Jesus is the son of God. It is not [meet] for God to get a son. Extolled be His purity from that [imputation]! When He decreeth a thing that He desireth to bring into existence, He only saith unto it, Be,—and it is: and thus He created Jesus the son of Mary without a father.—And say, Verily God is my Lord and your Lord: therefore worship ye Him: this is a right way, leading to Paradise. But the sects have differed among themselves; that is, the Christians have differed concerning Jesus, as to whether he be the son of God, or a deity with Him, or the third of three. And woe unto them who have disbelieved in that which hath been stated, or in other matters, on account of the assembly of a great day, the day of resurrection, and its terrors. How will they hear, and how will they see, on the day when they shall come unto Us in the world to come! But the offenders to-day (that is, in the present world) are in a manifest error: they are deaf, so that they hear not the truth; and blind, so that they see it not. And do thou, O Moḥammad, warn them (namely the unbelievers of Mekkeh) of the day of sighing (the day of resurrection, when the evil-doer shall sigh for his having neglected to do good in the present world), when the command for their punishment shall be fulfilled, while they (in the present world) are in a state of heedlessness with respect to it, and while they believe not therein. Verily We shall inherit the earth and whomsoever are upon it (the heedless and others; they being destroyed); and unto Us shall they be brought back to be recompensed. (xix. 16-41.)
And when God sent him [Jesus] to the children of Israel, he said unto them, Verily I am the apostle of God unto you; for I have come unto you with a sign from your Lord; for I will make for you of earth the similitude of a bird, and will breathe into it, and it shall be a bird,[333] by the permission (or will) of God;[334] (and he made for them a bat; for it is the most perfect of birds in make; and it flew, while they looked at it; but when it had gone out of their sight, it fell down dead;) and I will cure the blind from his birth, and the leper; (and he cured in one day fifty thousand, by prayer, on the condition of faith;) and I will raise to life the dead, by the permission of God; (this he repeated to deny his divinity: and he raised to life ´Áriz [Lazarus] a friend of his; and a son of the old woman, and the daughter of the publican; and they lived, and children were born to them; and Shem the son of Noah, who died immediately;) and I will tell you what ye eat and what ye store up in your houses. Verily therein will be a sign unto you, if ye be believers. And I have come unto you as a verifier of that which was before me, of the Law, and to make lawful unto you part of what was made unlawful to you therein; (and he made lawful to them, of fish and fowls, whatsoever is without fin or spur; and it is said that he made lawful all, and that ‘part’ is used in the sense of ‘the whole:’) and I have come unto you with a sign from your Lord; therefore fear ye God, and obey me in that which I command you, as to the confession of the unity of God and the service of Him. Verily God is my Lord and your Lord; therefore worship Him. This is [the] right way. But they accused him of falsehood and believed not in him. And when Jesus perceived their unbelief, he said, Who [will be] my helpers for God? The apostles[335] answered, We [will be] the helpers of God. We have believed in God; and bear thou witness, O Jesus, that we are Muslims [or resigned]. O our Lord, we have believed in that which Thou hast sent down of the Gospel, and we have followed the Apostle, Jesus; therefore write us down among those who bear witness of Thy unity and of the truth of Thine apostle.—And they (that is, the unbelievers among the children of Israel) devised a stratagem against Jesus, to slay him treacherously; but God devised a stratagem against them; for He put the likeness of Jesus upon one who intended his slaughter, and they slew him; and Jesus was taken up [into heaven],[336] and God is the best of those who devise stratagems.... It is related that God sent a cloud to Jesus, and it took him up; but his mother clung unto him and wept: whereupon he said unto her, Verily the resurrection will unite us.—It is also related that he will descend shortly before the resurrection and judge according to the law of our prophet [Moḥammad], slay Antichrist and the swine, break the cross, and impose the capitation-tax [on unbelievers].—Also, that he will remain, according to one tradition, seven years; according to another, forty years; and die, and be prayed over: but it is probable that [by the latter period] is meant the whole time of his tarrying upon the earth, before the ascension and after. (iii. 43—47.)
Remember when the apostle said, O Jesus, son of Mary, is thy Lord able to cause a table to descend unto us from heaven?[337] He replied, Fear God, in demanding signs, if ye be believers. They said, We desire that we may eat therefrom, and that our hearts may be at ease in consequence of additional evidence, and we may know, with increased knowledge, that thou hast spoken truth unto us in asserting thyself to be a prophet, and may be witnesses thereof.—Jesus the son of Mary said, O God, our Lord, cause a table to descend unto us from heaven, that it (namely the day of its descent) may be unto us a festival,[338] unto the first of us and the last of us (or those who shall come after us), and a sign from Thee of Thy power, and of my prophetic office; and provide us with food thereby; for Thou art the best of providers.—God said, in reply to him, Verily I will cause it to descend unto you; but whosoever of you shall disbelieve after its descent, I will surely punish him with a punishment wherewith I will not punish any [other] of the peoples.—And the angels descended with it from heaven: upon it were seven cakes of bread and seven fishes; and they ate of them until they were satisfied. And in a tradition related by Ibn-´Abbás it is said that the table brought down from heaven bread and flesh, and they were commanded not to act deceitfully, nor to store up for the morrow; but they [that is, some of the people] did so, and were transformed into apes and swine. (v. 112-115.)
Propound unto them, as an example, the inhabitants of the city of Antioch, when the apostles of Jesus came unto it;[339] when We sent unto them two,[340] and they charged them with falsehood; wherefore We strengthened them with a third;[341] and they said, Verily we are sent unto you. They replied, Ye are not [aught] save men like us, and the Compassionate hath not revealed anything: ye do nothing but lie. They said, Our Lord knoweth that we are indeed sent unto you; and naught is imposed on us but the delivering of a plain message, shown to be true by manifest proofs, namely the cure of him who hath been born blind and of the leper and the sick, and the raising of the dead. [The people of Antioch] said, Verily we presage evil from you; for the rain is withheld from us on your account: if ye desist not, we will assuredly stone you, and a painful punishment shall surely betide you from us. [The apostles] replied, Your evil luck is with you because of your unbelief. If ye have been warned, will ye presage evil and disbelieve? Nay, ye are an exorbitant people.—And there came from the furthest part of the city a man (namely Ḥabeeb the carpenter, who had believed in the apostles) running: he said, O my people, follow the apostles: follow those who ask not of you a recompense, and who are rightly directed. And it was said unto him, Art thou of their religion? He replied, And why should I not worship Him who hath created me, and unto whom ye shall be brought back after death? Shall I take deities beside Him? If the Compassionate be pleased to afflict me, their intercession will not avert from me aught, nor will they deliver. Verily, in that case (if I worshipped aught but God), I should be in a manifest error. Verily I believe in your Lord; therefore hear ye me.—But they stoned him, and he died;[342] and it was said unto him at his death, Enter thou into Paradise. And it is said that he entered it alive. He said, O would that my people knew my Lord’s forgiveness of me and His having made me [one] of those who are honoured?—And We sent not down against his people after him (that is, after his death) an army of angels from heaven to destroy them, nor were We sending down angels to destroy any one. It (namely their punishment) was naught but one cry which Gabriel uttered against them; and lo, they were extinct. (xxxvi. 12-28.)
We have cursed the Jews ... for their disbelief in Jesus and their uttering against Mary a great calumny and their saying, We have killed the Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary, the apostle of God,—Yet they killed him not nor crucified him; but one (namely the person whom they crucified) was made to appear to them like Jesus; and verily those who disagreed respecting him were in doubt concerning him, or his slaughter; for some of them said, when they saw the slain person, The face is the face of Jesus; but the body is not his body:—and others said, It is he:[343]—they had no knowledge of him; but only followed an opinion. And they did not really kill him; but God took him up unto Himself; and God is mighty [and] wise. And there is not of the people of the Scripture one but he shall assuredly believe in him (namely Jesus) before his death; that is, before his own death, or before the death of Jesus, when he descendeth shortly before the resurrection;[344] and on the day of resurrection he (namely Jesus) shall be a witness against them (iv. 155-157.)
When God shall say, on the day of resurrection, O Jesus, son of Mary, hast thou said unto men, Take me and my mother as two deities, beside God?—Jesus shall answer, after being agitated (or after it shall have thundered), Extolled be Thy purity from the imputation of aught that is unsuitable to Thee, as the having a partner, and other things! It is not for me to say that which is not right for me. Had I said it, Thou hadst known it. Thou knowest what is in me; but I know not what is in Thee; for Thou well-knowest things unseen. I said not unto them aught but that which Thou commandedst me; namely Worship ye God, my Lord and your Lord;—and I was a watcher over them, commanding them to abstain from what they said, while I remained among them: but since Thou hast taken me to Thyself,[345] Thou hast been the watcher over them, and Thou art the witness of all things. If Thou punish them, (that is, such of them as have continued in unbelief,) they are Thy servants and Thou mayest do with them as Thou pleasest; and if Thou forgive them, (that is, such of them as have believed,) Thou art the Mighty, the Wise. (v. 116-118.)
When the son of Mary was proposed as an instance (when the saying of God was revealed, Verily ye and what ye worship beside God [shall be] fuel of hell [Kur. xxi. 98], and the polytheists said, We are content for our gods to be with Jesus, for he hath been worshipped beside God,[346]) lo, thy people, the polytheists, cried out in joy thereat, and they said, [Are] our gods better, or [is] he? We are content for our gods to be with him.—They proposed not it (namely the instance) unto thee otherwise than as a cause of dispute (knowing that the word ‘what’ applieth to that which is not endowed with reason; so that it doth not reflect upon Jesus, on whom be peace!): yea, they are a contentious people. He (namely Jesus) is no other than a servant whom We favoured with the gift of prophecy; and We proposed him, by reason of his having come into existence without a father, as an instance of the divine power unto the children of Israel. And if We pleased, We would substitute for you angels to succeed in the earth.[347] And verily he (namely Jesus) shall be a sign of the [last] hour:[348] it shall be known by his descending: wherefore doubt not thereof.—And say unto them, Follow ye me in confessing the unity of God: this, which I command you to follow, is a right way. And let not the devil turn you away from the religion of God; for he is unto you a manifest enemy.—And when Jesus came with manifest proofs (with miracles and ordinances), he said, I have come unto you with wisdom (with prophecy and with the ordinances of the Gospel), and to explain unto you part of [the things] concerning which ye disagree: therefore fear ye God, and obey me. Verily God is my Lord and your Lord; wherefore worship ye Him: this is a right way.—But the parties disagreed among themselves respecting Jesus, whether he were God, or the son of God, or the third of three: and woe unto them that transgressed in that which they said respecting Jesus, because of the punishment of an afflicting day! (xliii. 57-65.)
Verily the similitude of Jesus in the sight of God is as the similitude of Adam. He created him (Adam) of earth: then He said unto him, Be,—and he was. In like manner he said unto Jesus, Be, without a father,—and he was. This is the truth from thy Lord: therefore be not thou of those who doubt. And whosoever of the Christians argueth with thee respecting him, after the knowledge that hath come unto thee concerning him, say, Come ye, let us call our sons and your sons and our wives and your wives, and ourselves and yourselves will assemble: then we will invoke, and will lay the curse of God on those who lie, saying, O God, curse the liar respecting the nature of Jesus!—And the prophet invited a company from Nejrán to do so, when they had argued with him respecting Jesus; and they said, [Wait] until we consider our case: then we will come unto thee. And their counsellor said, Ye know his prophetic office, and that no people have execrated a prophet but they have perished. They however quieted the man, and departed, and came unto the prophet. And he had come forth, having with him El-Ḥasan and El-Ḥoseyn and Fáṭimeh and ´Alee; and he said unto them, When I pray, say ye Amen. But they refused to execrate, and made peace with him on the condition of their paying tribute.—Verily this is indeed the true history, and there is no deity but God, and verily God is indeed the Mighty, the Wise. (iii. 52-55.)
O people of the Scripture (that is, of the Gospel), exceed not the just bounds in your religion,[349] nor say of God [aught] but the truth. The Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary, [was] only the apostle of God, and His Word, which he transmitted unto Mary, and a spirit (that is, a being possessing a spirit) from Him. (He is mentioned in conjunction with God, in order to show him honour, and is not, as ye assert, the son of God, or a God with Him, or the third of three; for the being possessing a spirit is compound, and the Deity must be confessed to be pure from the imputation of composition and the relationship of a compound being to Him.) Therefore believe in God and His apostles, and say not, There are three gods, God and Jesus and his mother.[350] Abstain from this, and say what will be better for you; that is, assert the unity of God. God is only one god. Extolled be His purity from the imputation of His having a son! To Him belongeth whatsoever is in the heavens and whatsoever is in the earth: and God is a sufficient witness thereof. The Messiah doth not disdain to be a servant unto God, nor do the angels who are admitted near unto Him. (iv. 169, 170.)