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

was not even able to save himself from the Jews, be able to save you from my hands? 27
Islam's contempt for the idea of Christ crucified is evident, but once again, no Muhammad, no Qur'an,
no Islam as such. Muawiya's call to Constantine to convert to the religion of “the God of our father
Abraham” recalls the Qur'an's quasi-creedal formulation: “We believe in God, and in that which has been
sent down on Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, and Jacob, and the Tribes, and that which was given to Moses and
Jesus and the Prophets, of their Lord; we make no division between any of them, and to Him we
surrender” (2:136). But this Qur'an passage is itself noteworthy for not mentioning the new revelations
purportedly delivered to the prophet who was reciting that very book, and who was supposed to confirm
the message that the earlier prophets brought.
It is also odd that Sebeos makes no mention of the Ishmaelite merchant Mahmet in connection with
Muawiya's letter; maybe this mysterious Arabian leader was not as central to this Abrahamic religion as
he would later become.
And so the earliest accounts depict an Arabic monotheism, occasionally featuring a prophet named
Muhammad who situated himself in some way within the religion of Abraham, but there is little else to go
by. An anonymous non-Muslim chronicler writing around the year 680 identifies Muhammad as the leader
of the “sons of Ishmael,” whom God sent against the Persians “like the sand of the sea-shores.” He
specifies the Ka‘ba—the cubed-shaped shrine in Mecca—as the center of the Arabians' worship,
identifying it with Abraham, “the father of the head of their race.” But he offers no details about
Muhammad's particular teachings, and like all other early chroniclers, he never mentions the Qur'an or
uses the words Muslim or Islam. 28
Writing ten years later, in 690, the Nestorian Christian chronicler John bar Penkaye writes of the
authority of Muhammad and of the Arabians' brutality in enforcing that authority, but he still knows of no
new holy book among the conquerors. He also paints a picture of a new religious practice that is far
closer to Judaism and Christianity than Islam eventually became:
The Arabs…had a certain order from the one who was their leader, in favour of the Christian people and the monks; they held
also, under his leadership, the worship of one God, according to the customs of the Old Covenant; at the outset they were so attached to
the traditions of Muhammad who was their teacher, that they inflicted the pain of death upon any one who seemed to contradict his
tradition…. Among them there were many Christians, some from the Heretics, and some from us. 29
The First Use of the Term Muslim?
Also in the 690s, a Coptic Christian bishop, John of Nikiou, makes the first mention of Muslims:
And now many of the Egyptians who had been false Christians denied the holy orthodox faith and lifegiving baptism, and embraced
the religion of the Muslims, the enemies of God, and accepted the detestable doctrine of the beast, that is, Mohammed, and they erred
together with those idolaters, and took arms in their hands and fought against the Christians. And one of them…embraced the faith of
Islam…and persecuted the Christians. 30
There is, however, reason to believe that this text as it stands is not as John of Nikiou wrote it. It
survives only in an Ethiopic translation from the Arabic, dating from 1602. The Arabic was itself a