Jesus Christ’s is without doubt the most misunderstood character in history. By mistake or by design, his message and personality have been misconstrued and misrepresented by his sympathizers and detractors alike. Of course, his deification at the hands of the Christians deserves a separate sermon; but even as a man he is widely considered as what today would be called a pacifist. No doubt, he was a compassionate man, as all prophets of God are, but by no means was he soft or weak – far from it! But that is the image of Jesus often presented, and usually accepted, without question.
To counter this deliberate or accidental distortion of history is paramount, especially because many Muslims too have unfortunately come to accept the popular image. Anybody familiar with the contents of the Quran would know better of course; and precisely therein lies the problem. Because an overwhelming majority of Muslims (even those who recite it regularly) do not have the foggiest idea about the meaning of the Quranic verses. If anything, their familiarity with the gospels is even less. Like the average Christian, the sum total of Biblical knowledge on the part of the average Muslim is for the most part limited to a handful of quotes attributed to Jesus in the New Testament, such as ‘Love thy neighbour like thyself’.
The gospels, despite having obviously suffered from the effects of mistranslation and worse, make it abundantly clear that far from the victim the Western civilization makes him out to be, Jesus knew perfectly well when force was called for. A case in point: he advised men to carry their swords while travelling. Also, he was not averse to chasing merchants and money changers out of a temple, whip in hand. What makes this Biblical narration especially illustrative is that before doing that he goes to the trouble of making that whip from cord! He knew it when it was an occasion to use force.
Like all messengers of God, Jesus had very good reasons to be blunt and uncompromising. By the time he was sent to the Israelites (Jews) with God’s final warning to them, the time for diplomatic measures had long gone.
‘Turn the other cheek’ is an excerpt from Jesus’s famous Sermon on the Mount that is often pressed into service to paint the picture of a peacenik, almost a weakling. Seen in its context, the quote is part of as exquisitely-worded description of a God-fearing man concerned with his own duties in contrast to perpetually obsessing about his rights. This was a much-needed reminder to a people obsessed with the letter of the Law but blissfully indifferent to its spirit. As is the unfortunate tendency of all religious groups in their decline, his audience was guilty of emphasizing religious rituals at the cost of the underlying wisdom behind them, and of hypocrisy and self-deception of the highest order (‘You strain out a gnat, yet gulp down a camel!’). It is grossly dishonest to tear the statement loose from its context, and to use it to present Jesus as a push-over. Neither was Jesus weak, nor an advocate of weakness or cowardice.
Like all messengers of God, Jesus had very good reasons to be blunt and uncompromising. By the time he was sent to the Israelites (Jews) with God’s final warning to them, the time for diplomatic measures had long gone. Therefore, a popularity contest or a public-relations campaign could not have been any farther from his mind. He told the Israelites to their faces that God’s favour was going to be taken away from them in that very generation. That God had decided to withdraw it from them because they had consistently been guilty of not listening to the prophets sent to them, even killing some of them. He foretold in poignant detail how Jerusalem would be surrounded by pointed stakes but the believers would be able to escape just in time before its destruction. Fully aware of the nature of his mission, he was hardly averse to ruffling a few feathers. Those hardened in their ways seldom take kindly to messengers of God telling them to get their acts together. Making many enemies was therefore an integral part of his job description; and he was not the least bit shy of discharging his duties.
Jesus had such a kingly presence that nobody could dare to manhandle or dishonour him. He was surrounded by enough loyal men for anybody to entertain such ideas. Attempts to bribe his close associates to give his location away to his enemies, the efforts on the part of the Israelites to get him on the wrong side of the Roman magistrates so that he could be dealt with ‘legally’, and the campaign aimed at riling the public up against him on grounds that he was guilty of blasphemy (all chronicled in the gospels) make that much clear. Being more than a handful for his enemies, Jesus was capable of giving as good as he got. By no means was he shy of insulting the Pharisees and the Scribes, and the absolute mockery they had made of their religion. He was anything but a soft target for the Israelites – a far cry from the pacifist he is made out to be.
It is also unfortunately true that having passed through many hands, the gospels contain accounts about people beating and spitting on Jesus (may God preserve us). A Muslim is supposed to turn to the Quran for clarification regarding all such matters. The Quran describes Jesus as ‘eminent’ in this life and the next, and paints a very different picture from such reports: Jesus was not just a prophet but a messenger (rasool) of God. God ensures that His messengers always prevail. Their defeat or humiliation at the hands of their enemies is out of the question. Jesus was also especially strengthened by the presence of Archangel Gabriel (AS). The Biblical stories to the contrary can therefore safely be rejected as apocryphal on account of the Quranic testimony as well as their contradicting other parts of the Bible.
Jesus’s ‘Ascension’ to heaven and his ‘Second Coming’ are other Christian beliefs lapped up almost wholesale by many Muslims, with only the necessary modifications concerning the identity of the group that is going to be vindicated when that happens. This is yet another consequence of the all-to-familiar but mysterious reluctance on the part of the Muslims to find out what the Quran has to say on any given subject, or (in case they bother to consult the Quran at all) their tendency to reading into it their prior beliefs and biases. The Quran is full of guidance, but it opens itself only to those who are interested in being guided and who submit themselves wholeheartedly to its message.
