Identical source material can yield opposite religious impressions

Evidence

To read San Pedro and Ibn Ishaq side by side is to be given a striking lesson in the way the same material can be used in order to give totally different impressions. If San Pedro, who knew Islam, was unwilling to surrender any ‘Christian’ story, it is not surprising that less well-informed writers were more so. — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 1320 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

For any outsider, and surely for most Muslims, this would be regarded as defaming the Prophet in the worst possible way; in Iran this was done for the exact opposite purpose. Claiming that the Prophet instigated murder had as its purpose not to defame the Prophet but to justify murder by showing that the Prophet himself had encouraged it. It is an argument with far-reaching impli­ cations and devastating consequences. — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 586 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Each religion saw the other as a corruption of its own truth. — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 1039; Polemics could condemn a rival religion using only its own scriptures; The same raw source material can be shaped into opposite polemical portraits — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 1320 (+7 more)

Related

• The same raw source material can be shaped into opposite polemical portraits (similarity 0.90)
• The same claim about the Prophet can serve opposite moral purposes (similarity 0.81)
• Polemics could condemn a rival religion using only its own scriptures (similarity 0.81)
• Each religion saw the other as a corruption of its own truth. (similarity 0.81)
• Best-informed authors combined fabulous Christian legends with reliable Islamic sources without resolving conflict (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• The same raw source material can be shaped into opposite polemical portraits #corroborates (0.95) — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 1320
• The same claim about the Prophet can serve opposite moral purposes #corroborates (0.92) — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 586
• The same biblical evidence was used to argue opposite positions on crusade #corroborates (0.92)
• Competing Christian confessions read the same conquests from opposing viewpoints #corroborates (0.90)
• The same religious trait could justify praise or condemnation depending on the observer’s aim. #corroborates (0.88) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 127
• Commentators project civilizational difference onto shared scriptures to serve their arguments #corroborates (0.85)
• Religion can either reinforce or reduce prejudice depending on its function. #corroborates (0.80)