st. john of damascus (676-749 - Cristo Raul

"
God
"
ON THE MAHOMETAN CONTROVERSY. 93
observed, was devised long before Mahomet s time.
The real Christ ascended without any such passage
of death into heaven ; and, when questioned by the
Almighty as to whether he had given himself out to
be the Son of God, and himself God, made answer :
forbid ! Thou knowest that I said it not, nor
disdain to be Thy servant. Wicked men wrote this
statement concerning me, and they lied and are
deceived." 1 Such are the figments contained in that
book of Mahomet, the Koran, which he pretends to
have had delivered to him by God.
From this point the section in the De Haeresibus
Liber" takes a more directly controversial tone;
the assertions of Mahometans, and the replies of
Christians, being thrown into an argumentative
form. It may be the simplest way of exhibiting
these arguments, and showing the line taken by
a Christian apologist in those days, to combine
what we here find with the substance of the two
short Disputations, and set down the result in the
form of a debate between a Christian and a
Mahometan.
CHR. You say that Mahomet had his commission
from God. Now what evidence is there of
directly
this ? We have the testimony of Moses and of a long
series of prophets to the divine mission of Christ,
and the events of his life are all clearly foretold in
their writings. has the same evidence not been
Why
accorded to Mahomet ?
1
The substance of this passage
is found near the end of
Sura v.