Saint Muhammed

Lets have Muhammed convert to Christianity. Maybe he converses with a Christian merchant passing through Mecca, is intrigued, and eventually converts. We'll put this event sometime in his 30s, so between AD 600-610. We'll also assume that he's every bit the missionary that he was in OTL.

What're the results?

(As I recall there are actually some AH stories out based on this idea). But let's consider the issues.

Mohammed is an extremely able individual, the fact that he was practically illiterate makes his accomplishments stand out even more. But one aspect of his life we rarely think about is he also married a very astute woman, who (at least in part) helped to guide his career.

Also, since at least some of his initial success was commercial, which (I think) gave him a base upon which to begin his work)

But I also believe that many of the ideas he based (or God, depend on your POV) Islam on were responses to his cultural environment.

If he converts, and the first part of his life is similar, then his religious response to his environment would be similar. Perhaps a schismatic Arab Christian Church with its patriarch in Mecca?

Arianism

Muhammed disliked intensely the idea of God having children. In Arabia a certain Goddess was regarded as being Allah's Daughter and that idea made him livid. He disliked the Son of God aspect of Christianity almost as much (though if God did have to have Children a Son is preferable LOL). He would be more likely to convert to an Arian theology.

Norman also makes a good point about the importance of Khadija.

Arab Arianism

Tom-B

Given Mohammed's Charisma and ability, if Mohammed had converted to a brand of Arianism, what do you think the results would have been?

Would we have had the arab explosion out of the desert?

How about the Crusades?

Conversion of the Turkic Peoples?

Fall of Constantanople?

I was kinda hoping we might have him convert to different sects, and not automatically assume he'd be a mainstream Christian. If we wanna be goofy, we could have him become a Gnostic.

As for the consequences of an Arian Arab church, they'll probably explode out of the desert. Anyone think that they might focus more of their efforts on the pagan Persians and leave the Christian Byzantines alone more than in OTL? They might even ally with the Byzantines...

They could very well convert the turks, though I doubt there will be much of a drive for crusades agains them, assuming they hold the holy land. After all, the crusades were originally supposed to help out the Byzantines, who were a different denomination than the crusaders. Of course, the Orthodox and Catholic Churches are much more similar than either would be to an Arian church.

Allah's daughter was Allat. (The second `a' is long.)
Whatever sort of Christianity Muhammad adopted, the world would be safer if jihad and killing is not an integral part of holy writ.
[Alla_h] is short for [al-'ila_h] = "the god".
[Alla_t] is short got [al-'ila_hat] = "the goddess".

Mohammed the Adoptionist?

There appears to have been a heterodox offshot of Christianity called adoptionism which held that Jesus was the son of God only by adoption and divine grace and didn't posses an intrinsically divine nature. This arose in Spain in the 8th century after the Islamic conquest. If this represents an Islamic-oriented version of Christianity, one could argue that a Chrisitian Mohammed would choose that particular path. Thus, you are like to see it arising as an offshoot of Nestorianism.

This line of thought apparently has its origins in an mid-2d century work that held that Jesus was a virtuous man chosen by God. This was followed by a movement called Monarchianism that Jesus was a man who God caused to be born via a virgin birth and later received the Holy Spirit as an adult via baptism. This later became the position of an Antiochene school which, in emphasizing the humanity of Christ in oppositon to the Arians, held that Christ was human and was taken up by God (apparently assuming a junction of the divine Word and a human in the same person.

Nestorius, influenced by this, held that Mary did not give birth to the Second Person of the Trinity but only to a man who was apparently gifted with some sort of divine nature by God afterwards. In fact, one of the sticking points was Nestorius' objection to Mary being referred to as the "Mother of God" One of Nestorius' metaphors for this was the Jesus was the temple (the house) of God. The Nestorian Church was the only Christian denomination tolerated in Persia when Mohammed converts to Christianity in this hypothetical. Note that the Nestorians had a particular enmity towards the Monophysites who composed a large percentage of the Christian population in the Levantine provinces of the Byzantine Empire.

One could see a Mohammed perhaps going to Persia to study Nestorianism and the founding his own offshoot. I think he'd likely stay in the East as Nestorianism had by then spread to China.

DominusNovus said:

I was kinda hoping we might have him convert to different sects, and not automatically assume he'd be a mainstream Christian. If we wanna be goofy, we could have him become a Gnostic.

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It is possible that if he had done this, he might have established an Arab Church based on the belief that Jesus was not the son of God, but a messenger. Might not be Arianism, but it would certainly share some beliefs.

I also agree that the arabs were due for a cultural explosion anyway, so that even a basic change like this would only deflect it, but not stop it.

I am not convinced that the Arab Church would have focused itself on pagans, it might have attacked other Christians, particularly since some very central tenets of the church are invloved.

Norman said:

It is possible that if he had done this, he might have established an Arab Church based on the belief that Jesus was not the son of God, but a messenger.

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Thats pretty much was Islam says about Jesus anyway.

Mary

One interesting thing about the Koran is that Mary gets a whole chapter. Some of the suras relate to incidents from the Infancy Gospels (hmm this is linking to the No Bible thread). Nestorianism had a tendency to downplay Mary. Also Jesus was divine in Nestorianism--it's just the human and divine were totally seperated so Mary only gave birth to the human aspect.

Also Muhammed's visionary aspect is being overlooked.

Suppose Muhammed get's a mix of different Christian influences. They intoixicate him but he thinks all the theologies are seriously flawed in one or more respect. He starts reciting a book called something like the Perfect Gospel. It's theology is something akin to adoptionism but it includes a picture of Jesus who is miraculous from birth and a special role for Mary.
The Muhammedan Christin Church proclaims "There is no God but Allah, Jesus is the Only Saviour and Muhammed is the Only Evangelist."

It replaces the entire New Testament with the Perfect Gospel (supplemented by a Hadith after his death) and relegates the Old Testament to very subsidiary role. It is hostile both to other Christians as well as pagans. It is very militant.

Tom_B said:

Suppose Muhammed get's a mix of different Christian influences. They intoixicate him but he thinks all the theologies are seriously flawed in one or more respect. He starts reciting a book called something like the Perfect Gospel. It's theology is something akin to adoptionism but it includes a picture of Jesus who is miraculous from birth and a special role for Mary.
The Muhammedan Christin Church proclaims "There is no God but Allah, Jesus is the Only Saviour and Muhammed is the Only Evangelist."

It replaces the entire New Testament with the Perfect Gospel (supplemented by a Hadith after his death) and relegates the Old Testament to very subsidiary role. It is hostile both to other Christians as well as pagans. It is very militant.

Click to expand...

Don't think they'd call Muhammed the only Evangelist. Doesn't fit quite right. This is an interesting design, but it'd probably end up too similar to OTL's Islam to make things much different.

What if Muhammed becomes an Orthodox Catholic Christian?