robert spencer-did muhammad exist__ an inquiry into islams obscure origins-intercollegiate studies institute (2012) (1)

translated as “the burning.” Accordingly, the Qur'an commentator Ibn Kathir explains that the nineteen are
“the first of the guardians of Hell. They are magnificent in (their appearance) and harsh in their
character.” 39 While this interpretation is plausible, the cryptic nature of the verse has led many Islamic
theologians and apologists to speculate about the mystical significance of the number nineteen.
To shed some light on this puzzling sura, Lüling looks closely at verses 11–17. In the traditional
rendering, this passage is full of questionable material. Like Qur'an 96:9–19, it denounces an anonymous
miscreant. Of whom is Allah, the sole creator and judge of all things, demanding that he be left alone to
deal with? Again by examining the rasm and noting grammatical and other anomalies in the Arabic, Lüling
smoothes out the difficulties and presents a reconstruction that makes more sense than the standard
Qur'anic text. This reconstruction reveals the text as a Christological confession:
11. He has created me and the one He has created as a unique being.
12. And He has made him a property obedient to His will.
13. And He has testified to him by witnesses.
14. And He paved for him the way.
15. Then he desired that he might be increased.
16. Not at all that he was rebellious against His commandments.
17. So finally He has made him step through death up to the heights. 40
Among other emendations, Lüling reads dharni, the contextually bizarre imperative in 74:11 to “leave
me alone” or “dismiss me,” as dharaani, “He has created me.” And so, he argues, this passage begins to
become clear as a Christian confession of faith—but not one reflecting the theology of the Byzantine
Empire or the Church of Constantinople. Rather, it is a rejection of Trinitarian Christology.
For centuries the Byzantine Empire had been convulsed by controversy over the nature of Christ. Once
the emperor Constantine converted to Christianity and issued the Edict of Milan decriminalizing
Christianity in 313, the rapidly growing new faith became important for the unity of the empire.
Constantine sought to safeguard that unity by calling the first ecumenical council—that is, a meeting of all
the bishops in the empire—to settle the question of the nature of Christ. This council met at Nicaea in 325.
At Nicaea the theology of Arius, a priest of the Church of Alexandria, was anathematized, and Arius
himself was defrocked and excommunicated. Arius taught that Christ was not coeternal with God, as the
victorious party taught, but was a created being, albeit an exalted one. After the council, Arians still
wielded considerable influence within the empire; they came close on more than one occasion to
becoming the dominant form of Christianity and reversing the decision of Nicaea. Their power waned,
however, and eventually the political and social restrictions that the empire imposed on them became so
onerous that they left its domains for points east: Syria and Arabia. 41
The Arians were by no means the first or only Christian group to view Christ as created. The Jewish
Christian Ebionites viewed Jesus as the Messiah but not in any sense divine. Their influence spread to
Syria and the surrounding areas in the centuries immediately before the advent of Islam. 42 The Pseudo-
Clementine Homilies, three Christian writings falsely attributed to St. Clement of Rome that actually
appear to be fourth-century Jewish Christian texts, declare that “our Lord neither asserted that there were