Medieval Christian accounts of the Quraysh’s miracle demands tracked Arabic sources closely

Evidence

The two fullest treatments were that in the reprobatio and that by Ricoldo. The former, even more than the work of San Pedro or Ricoldo, added convincing authority by its authentic use of sources. It gave greatest prominence to the Qur’anic text so often, but more vaguely, referred to: the Prophet’s insistence that he is called to announce and warn, but not to work miracles for which ‘certain Arabs’ (the Quraysh) had asked: to move the mountains from round Mecca, to make the soil fertile, or to raise up their ancestor Qusayy. The author stressed his sympathy for the Quraysh, when he reported their saying to Muhammad that God should have foreseen the quandary in which their demand had put His Prophet, and should have taught him in advance how to reply. — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 433

Categorization

• QUESTION: The polemicist ‘stressed his sympathy for the Quraysh’ — a striking detail worth chasing: why would a Christian apologist side rhetorically with the pagans against the Prophet?