Medieval Christian authors held contradictory views of Saracen religion simultaneously

Evidence

This sort of confrontation of images of Saracen religion becomes more common as more information about Islam and its prophet reaches Europe. Some authors will even try to accommodate both versions: William of Malmesbury, writing in about 1125, knows that the Saracens are monotheists yet still believes they erected a statue of Muhammad in the temple of Jerusalem. Even King Alfonso VI of León and Castille describes the mosque of Toledo as the “habitation of demons” (though not, indeed, of idols). The twelfth-century Pseudo-Turpin Chronicle, a medieval “bestseller,” has one Saracen explain that Mahoumet is their messenger sent by God but another invokes him as “my God.” The same chronicle tells us that Mauhoumet made an idol of himself in Spain, used his necromancy to fill it with demons, and set it up to protect the Saracens from Christian attack. Hence the reader might believe that Mauhoumet is at the same time a man whom the Saracens accept as their prophet and an idol that this false prophet made of himself. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 723

Categorization

• SEED: An essay angle: how contradictory images of an enemy can coexist in a culture, using the Muhammad-as-prophet/icon as case study.