98 No god but God
similar perspectives, and both had nearly identical moral and ethical
values. Where there was disagreement between the two faiths, Newby
suggests it was “over interpretation of shared topics, not over two
mutually exclusive views of the world.” To quote S. D. Goiten, there
was simply “nothing repugnant to the Jewish religion in Muhammad’s
preaching.”
Even Muhammad’s claim to be the Prophet and Apostle of God,
on the model of the great Jewish patriarchs, would not necessarily
have been unacceptable to Medina’s Jews. Not only did his words and
actions correspond perfectly to the widely accepted pattern of Arabian
Jewish mysticism, but Muhammad was not even the only person in
Medina making these kinds of prophetic claims. Medina was also the
home of a Jewish mystic and Kohen named Ibn Sayyad, who, like
Muhammad, wrapped himself in a prophetic mantle, recited divinely
inspired messages from heaven, and called himself “the Apostle of
God.” Remarkably, not only did most of Medina’s Jewish clans accept
Ibn Sayyad’s prophetic claims, but the sources depict Ibn Sayyad as
openly acknowledging Muhammad as a fellow apostle and prophet.
It would be simplistic to argue that no polemical conflict existed
between Muhammad and the Jews of his time. But it is important to
understand that this conflict had far more to do with political alliances
and economic ties than with a theological debate over scripture. This
was a conflict fueled primarily by tribal partnerships and tax-free mar-
kets, not religious zeal. And while Muhammad’s biographers like to
present him as debating theology with belligerent groups of “rabbis”
who show “hostility to the apostle in envy, hatred, and malice, because
God had chosen His apostle from the Arabs,” the similarities in both
the tone and manner of these events and the stories of the quarrels
Jesus had with the Pharisees points to their function as literary topoi,
not historical fact. Indeed, scholars have for centuries been aware of
the intentional connection the early Muslims tried to draw between
Jesus and Muhammad in an attempt to add legitimacy to the Prophet’s
mission.
Bear in mind, Muhammad’s biographies were written at a time
when the Jewish minority in the Muslim state was Islam’s only remain-
ing theological rival. It is not surprising, therefore, that Muslim histori-
ans and theologians would have buttressed their arguments against the