An Atheist Explores the Qur'an Part Ten: Jesus’ Magical Picnic (The Table (al-Ma’idah) 101-120)

The Table (al-Ma’idah) 101-120
Jesus’ Magical Picnic.

Welcome to the next instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Qur’an version).
In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the Qur’an, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.

For more detail, see the introductory post https://bit.ly/2ApLDy0
For the online Qur’an that I use, see here http://al-quran.info and http://quran.com

And now:

The Table (al-Ma’idah) 101-120
 “When the Disciples said, ‘O Jesus son of Mary! Can your Lord send down to us a table1 from the sky?’ Said he, ‘Be wary of Allah, should you be faithful.’”

Finally the titular Table makes its appearance, in another of those incidents that I don’t recall from the Bible but apparently is in there according to the Qur’an. But more on that shortly.

First we get an injuction about certain practices appertaining to camels (no, nothing like *that*) – “Allah has not prescribed any such thing as Baḥīrah, Sāʾibah, Waṣīlah, or Hām; but those who are faithless fabricate lies against Allah, and most of them do not apply reason”. Recall that the slitting of a camel’s ears were forbidden before, these are all practices involved in sanctifying camels to pagan gods, or actions mandated by pagan gods. The footnotes here mention “the slitting of ears, the forbidding of their use for burden, their dedication to idols, and restriction of their flesh to males” but also notes that it’s a matter of disagreement which is which. But the gist is evident, and the verse obviously implies that there are people that still do such practices and claim that it the new religion is okay with it.

There are some verses involving making a dying testimony, which requires two reliable witnesses who can be non-Muslim if no-one else is available. It’s all a bit prolix and not terribly interesting otherwise, then we’re onto the Biblical stuff.

There are some references to the miracles performed by Jesus, all of which are done by the “leave of Allah”, most of which are healing the sick etc. but also including one where Jesus makes a model bird from clay and breathes life into it. After Jesus’ death the disciples ask for a magic table to come down from heaven for them as proof. Allah agrees, but on threat of death should they disbelieve afterwards.

Now, I don’t remember the bird or the table from the Bible, but I wonder if they are, like some of the Old Testament retold stuff we get in the Qur’an, a misheard or misremembered telephone-game version of the New Testament, or if they stem from New Testament material that found its way to Arabia but was redacted in the West following the rationalising of all the different gospels etc. that were floating around at the Council of Nicaea. The “table” is reminiscent of the tongues of fire at Pentecost, as I surmised earlier, and I wonder if it’s a metaphorical version of the same event. I like the thing with the bird, though.

And that’s it for The Table. I don’t have too much more to add. It felt a bit more comprehensive and specific, possibly because it’s one of the last surah and so partly acts as a summation of what has gone before. I hope we get more of the New Adventures of Jesus though.

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