Some medieval Christians grasped the Qur’anic Christ accurately

Evidence

Vitry felt more sympathy for the Qur’anic picture when he summed it up, of Christ, as ‘the greatest of the prophets before (Muhammad’s) time’ and, of Mary, as ‘the most holy of all women’. He understood very well the Qur’anic idea of Christ’s persecution by the Jews, and of the Ascension, and he attributed Muhammad’s disbelief in the crucifixion to his ignorance of the virtue of humility. — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 927 (#expands, via linked claim)

The greatest and the characteristic contribution of mediaeval thought to the study of Islam was the persistent sense of how that religion witnesses to Christ. This was often, as when the Qur’an was said involuntarily to teach the Trinity, wholly unintelligible to Muslims; it came a little closer to Muslim interpretation when it developed the Qur’anic ‘corroboration’ of the Christians, and really close when it stressed God’s election of Jesus and Mary. We shall see that in practice there was also some perception of Islamic works of religion and an appreciation of … Islamic virtues. — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 1079 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Medieval Christian polemic interpreted Qur’anic texts as nastily as possible; Medieval Christians valued Qur’anic Christ references over Islamic monotheism — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 920; Medieval Christian readers judged the Qur’an by its Christology (+4 more)

Related

• Some medieval Christians read the Quranic Christ sympathetically as humility-erasing error (similarity 0.96)
• Medieval Christians valued Qur’anic Christ references over Islamic monotheism (similarity 0.91)
• Medieval Christian readers judged the Qur’an by its Christology (similarity 0.91)
• Medieval Christians read the Qur’an as inadvertent testimony to Christian truth (similarity 0.89)
• Medieval Christians held an irreducibly equivocal attitude toward Qur’anic Christology (similarity 0.88)
• Medieval Christians valued Qur’anic Christology over its proclamation of divine unity. (similarity 0.87)
• Medieval Christians read Qur’anic praise of Christ as a self-condemning admission against Muhammad. (similarity 0.86)
• Medieval attacks on the Qur’an obscured its evident piety to unlearned readers (similarity 0.85)
• Medieval Christians saw Islamic Christology as true yet fatally uncomprehending of key terms (similarity 0.85)
• Medieval Christian polemic interpreted Qur’anic texts as nastily as possible (similarity 0.85)
• Medieval Christian readers distinguished Qur’anic text from Islamic commentary on the crucifixion (similarity 0.85)
• Medieval Christians understood Islam only as a distorted copy of Christianity (similarity 0.84)
• Medieval Christians viewed Qur’anic truths solely as borrowings from Scripture (similarity 0.84)
• Medieval monks judged the Quran’s Christ story by doctrinal error rather than factual accuracy (similarity 0.84)
• Medieval Christians understood Muslims as revering biblical prophets and Jesus (similarity 0.84)

Broader Connections

• Some medieval Christians read the Quranic Christ sympathetically as humility-erasing error #expands (0.90) — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 927
• Medieval Christians read the Qur’an as inadvertent testimony to Christian truth #exemplifies (0.85) — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 1079
• The Qur’an holds the place in Islam that Christ holds in Christianity #complicates (0.75)