Peter the Venerable framed Islam’s debate ban as irrational sheep-like counsel

Evidence

Peter realizes, he says, that the first reaction of his Arab readers will be that they would never abandon the law given them by their prophet. He also is aware that the Koran enjoins death on those who dispute the Muslim law. This, he says, astounds him, because his Arab readers are “not only rational by nature, but logical in temperament and training” they are, moreover “learned in worldly knowledge” (Contra sectam, §30). The injunction against debating religion flies in the face of the Arabs’ propensity for learning: no rational man should accept something as true without first verifying its truth for himself. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 857