Muhammad: Meccan Opposition[195] Nöldeke and Schwally, GQ, vol. 1, p. 131.
[196] Cf. Sahih Bukhari, vol. 6, pp. 309 f, where as an explanation of
Qur'an 36:38, Muhammad is reported to have said that the sun sets under
God's throne.
[197] Geiger, WMJA, p. 72, references Hagigah 16 and Taanit 11; cf.
Qur'an 41:18f.
[198] Guillaume, Muhammad, p. 222; Ibn Sa`d, Classes vol. 1, 1,
pp. 264 f.
[199] See p. 88, above, for a discussion of this polemical device.
[200] Cf. the modification of this in a Sira tradition, where this was
revealed concerning "Jesus" being worshiped with God; Guillaume,
Muhammad, pp. 163 f.
[201] Nöldeke and Schwally, GQ, vol. 1, p. 132.
[202] Horovitz, Untersuchungen, pp. 128 f; Jeffery, Vocabulary,
pp. 218 f.
[203] Cf. Irenaeus, "Against Heresies," chs. 25 (parag. 6) and 26, Ante-
Nicene Fathers, vol. 1, p. 351. The Gnostics, as practically all Christians
also, denied that Jesus was physically the Son of God. In parting with
Christianity, however, some Gnostics appear to have rejected the virgin
birth; cf. Speyer, Erzählungen, p. 312, who references Irenaeus ("Against
Heresies," ch. 25, parag. 1, Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1, p. 350.)
[204] Cf. Augustine, "Reply to Faustus the Manichaean," book 23, Nicene
and Post-Nicene Fathers, vol. 4, pp. 313 f.
[205] Andrae, Ursprung, p. 203, poses this question, without, however,
really answering it. Ahrens, "Christliches," ZDMG, 84 (1930), pp. 188 f,
did not think that Muhammad's Christology presented an unsolvable
problem, but he also did not explain how this could have been worked out.
Instead, Ahrens maintains that Muhammad's paying homage to the Ka`ba
was the real reason for him not becoming a Christian. This nonetheless
disagrees with the witness of pre-Islamic Christian poets, who also