Ali 'Imran · Madani · ayah 65 of 200

Ali 'Imran 3:65

يَـٰٓأَهْلَ ٱلْكِتَـٰبِ لِمَ تُحَآجُّونَ فِىٓ إِبْرَٰهِيمَ وَمَآ أُنزِلَتِ ٱلتَّوْرَىٰةُ وَٱلْإِنجِيلُ إِلَّا مِنۢ بَعْدِهِۦٓ ۚ أَفَلَا تَعْقِلُونَ

“O People of the Scripture, why do you argue about Abraham while the Torah and the Gospel were not revealed until after him? Then will you not reason?”

Saheeh International

Essence

Reason should stop anyone claiming Ibrāhīm for a label that arose with the Torah and the Gospel, long after him.

A reflection

Does the same argument cut against Muslims?

A thoughtful reader spots an apparent flaw. If the Torah and the Gospel came after Ibrāhīm, so did the Quran. Muslims call him a Muslim. Is that not the same anachronism?

It is a fair challenge, and a classical commentator raises it himself, almost word for word. He answers in two steps.

First, the claims are not equal. The Quran itself states that Ibrāhīm was ḥanīf and muslim. The Torah and the Gospel nowhere call him a Jew or a Christian. Another commentator quotes an early grammarian: neither book gives him the name of either religion, while the name islām runs through every scripture.

Second, the words are different kinds of words. 'Jew' and 'Christian' name communities that formed around a later scripture. A commentator notes that Judaism followed the Torah, and Christianity followed the Gospel. Muslim, in the next ayah, is a description: one who submits himself wholly to Allah. The Quran uses it of Nūḥ, of Ibrāhīm's sons, of Pharaoh's magicians, of the disciples of Jesus.

So the claim is not that Ibrāhīm carried a membership card issued centuries later. It is that he did what the word means. He surrendered to Allah alone.

What remains open is the human temptation the ayah exposes. Every community wants the great ancestor on its side. Muslims are not immune either. The honest question for all of us is whether we resemble Ibrāhīm, not whether we have claimed him.

The full entry has 5 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.