Roger Bacon held Islam as imperfect Christianity from ignorance, not evil

Evidence

Bacon bases his theory of religion not on biblical history but on Greco-Arabic scienti- fic and philosophical works, and on the descriptions of rival religions that he has gleaned from his own reading (including the Itinerary of William Rubruck). Adherents of rival religions are not blind or evil; they are simply at different stages in the progression toward God. “The rational soul was born to know and to love,” Bacon affirms; “Truth however can be perceived in a sect to the extent in which that sect contains knowledge of God in whatever way, because all sects refer to God.” Each religion reflects the soul’s knowledge of God, even if that knowledge is at times imperfect, leading to religious error. Such error can be imputed to ignorance, and when infidels are properly instructed (following Bacon’s own method), they should be able to recognize the truth of Christianity. Islam (like other religions) is not antithetical to Christianity: it is merely a garbled and imperfect form of it. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1151

Categorization

• XREF: Counterweights the main vaulted Anidjar/Aziz/Razack narrative of inherent Islam-West opposition: a 13th-century Latin theologian who grounded Islam as a developmental stage toward God, not an antithesis — nuance for that genealogy.
• ADDENDUM: Complicates the ‘Complaints About Immodesty Go Way Back’ and other vault claims by showing a medieval Christian intellectual frame of Islam as privative error of ignorance rather than demonic opposition.