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MONDAY-SUNDAY
November 12-18, 2001
volume 12, no. 156
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Mary is the key to opening Moslem hearts
" It is our firm belief that the fears some entertain concerning
the Moslems are not to be realized, but that Moslemism, instead, will
eventually be converted to Christianity - and in a way that even some
of our missionaries never suspect. It is our belief that this will
happen not through the direct teachings of Christianity, but through a
summoning of the Moslems to a veneration of the Mother of God. This is
the line of argument:
Mary, Mother of God.
The Koran, which is the Bible of the Moslems, has many passages
concerning the Blessed Virgin. First of all, the Koran believes in her
Immaculate Conception, and also, in her Virgin Birth. The third
chapter of the Koran places the history of Marys family in a genealogy
which goes back through Abraham, Noah, and Adam. When one compares the
Korans description of the birth of Mary with the aprocryphal Gospel of
the birth of Mary, one is tempted to believe tht Mohammed very much
depended upon the latter. Both books describe the old age and the
definite sterility of the mother of Mary. When, however, she
conceives, the mother of Mary is made to say in the Koran: 'O Lord, I
vow and I consecrate to you what is already within me. Accept it from
me.'
When Mary is born, the mother says: 'And I consecrate her with all of
her posterity under thy protection, O Lord, against Satan!'
The Koran passes over Joseph in the life of Mary, but the Moslem
tradition knows his name and has some familiarity with him. In this
tradition, Joseph is made to speak to Mary, who is a virgin. As he
inquired how she conceived Jesus without a father, Mary answered: 'Do
you not know that God, when He created the wheat had no need of seed,
and that God by His power made the trees grow without the help of
rain? All that God had to do was to say, So be it, and it was done.'
The Koran has also verses on the Annunciation, Visitation, and
Nativity. Angels are pictured as accompanying the Blessed Mother and
saying: Oh Mary, God has chosen you and purified you, and elected you
above all the women of the earth. In the nineteenth chapter of the Koran there are 41 verses on Jesus
and Mary. There is such a strong defense of the virginity of Mary here
that the Koran, in the fourth book, attributed the condemnation of the
Jews to their monstrous calumny against the Virgin Mary."
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