¹ The story of its development is well told in H., Vorgrimler (ed), Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II, Freiburg: Herder & Herder, 1968, vol. III, p. 1–154Google Scholar.

² A most helpful compendium has been produced by the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, Gioia, F. (ed), Interreligious Dialogue: the official teaching of the Catholic Church (1963–1995), Boston: Pauline, 1997Google Scholar. A comprehensive appraisal of developments in the second half of the twentieth century from Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant perspectives can be found in: Waardenburg, J.J. (ed.), Islam and Christianity: mutual perceptions since the mid-20^th century, Leuven: Peeters, 1998Google Scholar, (see especially Christian Troll's chapter, “Changing Catholic views of Islam”, pp. 19–78). Troll has a further article on “Catholic teachings on Interreligious dialogue: analysis of some recent official documents, with special reference to Christian-Muslim relations” in Waardenburg, J.J. (ed), Muslim-Christian perceptions of dialogue today, Leuven: Peeters, 2000, pp. 233–275. For one Muslim appraisal of elements of ambiguity in the late pope's speeches and writing on Islam, see Mahmoud Ayoub's essay “Pope John Paul II on Islam” in Omar, I. A. (ed), A Muslim view of Christianity: Essays on dialogue by Mahmoud Ayoub, New York: Orbis, 2007, p. 232–245Google Scholar. This newly published volume draws together 16 essays on the theme by one of the best informed and committed Muslim contributors to the theological dialogue with Christianity. For a wider appraisal, see B.L., Sherwin and Kashimow, H. (eds), John Paul II and Interreligious Dialogue, New York: Orbis, 1999Google Scholar.

³ Particular attention is drawn to the annual series of Islamochristiana, from 1975 onwards, carrying important articles, mainly in French and English.

⁴ M., Borrmans, Guidelines for Dialogue between Christians and Muslims, Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, New York: Paulist, 1990 (original French edition 1981)Google Scholar.

⁵ N.A. para. 7.

⁶ [Followers of these three faiths]“share a mission to the world that God's name may be hallowed… Each will recall the other to God, to trust him more fully and obey him more profoundly.”‘Jews, Christians and Muslims: the Way of Dialogue’, para. 27, in The Truth Shall Make You Free: The Lambeth Conference, 1988: The Reports, Resolutions, and Pastoral Letters from the Bishops, London: Church House Publishing, 1988, p. 305.When asked for grounds to suggest that Muslims and Christians worship God, I point to three indicators: a. That there are some 14 million Arabic mother-tongue Christians in the world, who also refer to God as Allah and have lived alongside Muslims since the time of Muhammad, therefore presumably knowing the reality of what both communities mean by Allah; b. That many converts from Islam to Christianity bear witness that they used to worship God but now have come to a different relationship with God through their faith in Christ; c. That a survey of the conceptual understanding of God in both traditions carries so much that is common. Christians are of course aware that Jews also worship God, whilst conceiving of God in fundamentally different ways to Christians; the same argument is thus extended to include Muslims.

⁷ Ayoub, op. cit., p. 240.

⁸ N.A., para. 7

⁹ Q. 37: 103–113. The Qur'anic account does not explicitly name the son involved but overwhelming Muslim tradition has identified him as Ishmael. A particularity of this account is that Ishmael is aware of Abraham's intention and is himself commanded by God to submit his life in sacrifice; thus it is a double test of obedience by both father and son, both of whom are revered as Prophets according to Islam.

¹⁰ It is noteworthy that the practice has developed amongst Christians of sending greetings to Muslims on the occasion of one of their great festivals, or ‘Ids, but the custom has been to do so at ‘Id al-Fitr, at the end of the fasting month of Ramadan, rather than at ‘Id al-Adha, the festival that immediately follows the Hajj and thus commemorates the willingness to submit all to the will of God, which might be thought to be the natural occasion if this point of linkage was to be honoured and respected.

¹¹ D., Madigan, “Jesus and Muhammad: the sufficiency of prophecy” in M., Ipgrave (ed), Bearing the Word: Prophecy in Biblical and Qur'anic Perspective, London: Church House Publishing, 2005, p. 90–99Google Scholar. This work is the record of proceedings at the third “Building Bridges” Seminar under the auspices of the Archbishop of Canterbury; the other two volumes published to date are also worthy of attention: Ipgrave, M. (ed), The Road Ahead: a Christian-Muslim Dialogue, London: Church House Publishing, 2002Google Scholar, and M., Ipgrave (ed), Scriptures in Dialogue: Christians and Muslims studying the Bible and the Qur'an together, London: Church House Publishing, 2004Google Scholar.

¹² See the valuable summary given by the German theologian and scholar of Islam, Christian Troll SJ, in his Muslims ask, Christians answer, Gujarat: Gujarat Sahitya Prakash, 2005Google Scholar (original German ed. Muslime fragen, Christen antworten, Regensburg: Topos, 2003)Google Scholar, Ch. 4. Troll draws attention in his survey to the work of the French Christian-Muslim research group (GRIC: Groupe de Recherche Islamo-Chrétien, founded in 1977) and in particular to the contribution of the French Dominican New Testament scholar, Claude Geffré, who spoke of the Qur'an as “a word of God, genuine but different…” from the Word of God in Jesus Christ. See GRIC, The Challenge of the Scriptures: the Bible and the Qur'an, New York: Orbis, 1989Google Scholar, (original French ed. Ces Ecritures qui nous questionnent: la Bible et le Coran, Paris: Le Centurion, 1987). Troll has recently further contributed to this discussion in his, “Muhammad – Prophet auch für Christen?”, in Stimmen der Zeit, 5/2007.

¹³ Q. 3:85 “If anyone desires a religion other than Islam, never will it be accepted of him; and in the Hereafter he will be in the ranks of the lost”. The key here is the term “Islam”. A minority of Muslim scholars, most notably ibn Arabi (d. 1240), who lived in Muslim Spain, have interpreted this in the generic sense of “all those who submit all to God alone”, but the majority have interpreted it in the particular sense of “all those who submit to Islam, based on the revelation of the Qur'an and Prophethood of Muhammad”.

¹⁴ The Qur'an speaks of an unknown number of Prophets, of whom 25 are mentioned by name, 21 of whom are shared with the biblical tradition. A Muslim is required to believe in all these Prophets without distinction; they all taught in essence the same message, viz submission of all to the one God, living an ethical life based on the revelations that God has sent, and the awareness of human accountability on the Day of Judgement.

¹⁵ Although there are various positions adopted on impeccability within the different schools of Islam, all accept at least that Muhammad was free from sin in all matters that pertained to the message that he received and taught.

¹⁶ See N., Daniel, Islam and the West: the making of an image, Oxford: Oneworld, 1993Google Scholar, and for the wider picture, Goddard, H., A history of Christian-Muslim relations, Edinburgh: EUP, 2000. For a secular literary-critical approach to the Qur'an, see J., Wansbrough, Quranic Studies: sources and methods of scriptural interpretation, New York: Prometheus, 2003Google Scholar.

¹⁷ The best source to trace these discussions is the two-volume work (Survey and Texts) of Gaudeul, J.M., Encounters and Clashes: Islam and Christianity in history, Rome: Pontifical Institute for the Study of Arabic and Islam, 2000Google Scholar.

¹⁸ So Abraham is called “the Friend of God”, Moses is the one “to whom God spoke face to face”, Jesus is uniquely born of a virgin and Muhammad is the Last and Seal of the Prophets. However, being the Seal or authentication of all that went before, does give Muhammad the sense of being “first amongst equals” as is evidenced by him leading all the earlier Prophets in prayer when they met in Jerusalem on the Night Journey and Ascent of Muhammad into heaven. See Encyclopaedia of Islam (Second Series); Leiden: Brill, 1993Google Scholar, Vol. VIII, p. 97–105, entry mi'radj.

¹⁹ Q. 5: 16

²⁰ Q. 4: 171 and 9: 30. For an entry level introduction to the question see my Understanding Islam: the first ten steps, London: SCM, 2006, p. 175–179Google Scholar.

²¹ Q. 112

²² There are of course Christians, some of whom are lay people who have been sitting before the pulpit each week for decades and others who are clerics, who do speak of Jesus in some biological way as a son of God, and call to bear witness thereto a biological understanding of the virgin birth. The Qur'an is adamant that Jesus was born of a technical virgin (there is no mention of Joseph in the Qur'anic accounts) but this is seen as a sign of the all-powerful nature of God, rather than as a sign of Jesus’ being part- semi- or wholly-divine. A typical Muslim response would be to draw attention to Adam and Eve, who had neither mother nor father, and yet no-one holds them thus to be divine. The infancy narratives of Jesus are contained in the Qur'an in Q. 3: 35–47 and 9: 16–35.

²³ The Qur'an indeed refers to Christians and Jews as exaggerators who go too far or who commit excess in their religions; Q. 4: 171.

²⁴ From 1989 to 1991, the “Islam in Europe” Committee of the Council of European Episcopal Conferences and the Conference of European Churches conducted a wide consultation, with conferences in Milan, Leningrad and Birmingham, into teaching about Islam and Muslims in Europe in theological education. One central methodology is exemplified on the question of Christology: it was argued that Christian ministers and pastoral workers serving in Europe ought both to study about Islam and Muslims as a discrete subject and to study Qur'anic Christology, revelation, understanding of God, ethics etc. as part of those courses as taught currently in theological establishments. A “Final Report” was drawn up after the 1991 conference in Birmingham and splendidly translated into the four principal languages of Europe, the better thus to gather dust. CCEE and KEK: Islam in Europe Committee, Final Report: The presence of Muslims in Europe and the theological training of pastoral workers, 1991.

²⁵ Ahl al-Kitab, literally “People of the Book” or perhaps better understood as “People of the Earlier Revelations” explicitly refers to Jews and Christians but also to two other groups, whose identities are less clear: the Sabeans, sometimes held to be the Mandæans of Iraq and sometimes also the Zoroastrians, and the Magians, often taken to refer to the Zoroastrians of Persia; see Q. 22: 17.

²⁶ Q. 57: 27. Nothing is known of the content or structure of the Injil, except that it existed. Muslim scholars have searched to identify it within the Christian tradition. Opinions range widely from those who see it as somehow related to the four canonical gospels, or to the direct speech of Jesus contained in those gospels, or as a source that stood behind the existing gospels that has since been lost (the mysterious Q of modern NT scholarship?) or to one of the apocryphal gospels. A case has been made by some, and widely supported in popular Islam following the work of Ahmed Deedat, to link it with “The Gospel of Barnabas”, which western scholarship, including some Muslims in the West, has identified as a 15^th century Italian forgery but which “by happy coincidence” has Jesus recounting all that a Muslim would want him to say, including denying his divinity and foretelling the coming of Muhammad (see Slomp, J., “The Gospel in Dispute (A critical evaluation of the first French translation with the Italian Text and introduction to the so-called Gospel of Barnabas)” in Islamochristiana, Vol. 4, 1978, pp. 67–112).

²⁷ The term is deliberately chosen as a reminder that the Qur'an brooks no simplistic reading but possesses a multitude of commentaries from a wide range of perspectives: linguistic, historical, traditional, philosophical, rational, and mystical. The term is taken from Neal Robinson's book, Discovering the Qur'an: a contemporary approach to a veiled text, London: SCM, 1996Google Scholar.

²⁸ Q. 50: 16

²⁹ There is a famous discussion amongst the Sufis about the ultimate relationship between God and the creation, which some have seen as a form of monism. The key exponent was ibn Arabi and the technical term wahdat al-wujud, translated as “unity of being”. This discussion is extremely technical and prone to many misunderstandings. The best introduction to its complexity is in the Encyclopaedia of Islam (second series), Leiden: Brill, 2002, Vol. XIGoogle Scholar, entry wahdat al-shuhud/wudjud, p. 37–39.

³⁰ Adam is the first Prophet and thus sinless (but see note 15 above for an idea of the complexity of the concept within different schools of Islam), therefore “the fall” is usually seen in terms of “an error of judgement” by two people who lived in a state of absolute innocence, thus with no awareness of right and wrong. The result of the fall was the sending of Adam and Eve to earth, where, after a period of time, they repented and were reconciled with God. However God forgave them completely and restored them to the state of absolute harmony between God and creation, which is the definition of islam. For God, it is not impossible to forgive and restore absolutely and hence there is no need for a doctrine of Original Sin.

³¹ Within the Shi'a school of Islam, in which the Martyrdom of Imam Husayn plays a seminal role, there is an interesting discourse on redemptive suffering. See Ayoub, M., Redemptive suffering in Islam: a study of the devotional aspects of Ashura in Twelver Shi'ism, The Hague: Mouton, 1978CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

³² It was the theme of the doctoral thesis of one of the greatest contemporary Scots Christian scholars of Islam, Wm Montgomery Watt. See W.M., Watt, Free will and predestination in early Islam, London: Luzac, 1948Google Scholar.

³³ Q. 5: 73; 42: 11 etc.

³⁴ For an overview of the centrality of tawhid in Islamic thought, see al-Faruqi, I. R., Al Tawhid: its implications for thought and life, Hendon: International Institute of Islamic Thought, 1992Google Scholar. For a taste of the polemic surrounding the question of the Trinity, see Thomas, D., Anti-Christian polemic in early Islam: Abu ‘Isa al-Warraq's “Against the Trinity”, Cambridge: CUP, 1992. For a thoughtful modern Christian theology reflecting on the Trinity in inter-faith relations, see Ipgrave, M., Trinity and Inter Faith Dialogue: plenitude and plurality, Bern: Peter Lang, 2003Google Scholar

³⁵ Jean Marie Gaudeul's Encounters and Clashes, op.cit., contains several helpful abstracts of exchanges on this theme, from which one might gain a flavour of the discussions.

³⁶ This interpretation of history, which is by no means universally accepted by Muslims but which shares common generic positions with a Muslim understanding that Christianity becomes corrupted by later alleged followers of Christ, is documented at length in two books widely read in Britain: ‘Ata'ur-Rahim, M. and Thomson, Ahmad, Jesus Prophet of Islam, London: Ta-Ha, 1996Google Scholar, and A., Thomson and ‘Ata'ur-Rahim, M., For Christ's sake, London: Ta-Ha, 1996Google Scholar.

³⁷ Q. 9: 31.

³⁸ For an analysis of Muslim commentary on these verses, see N., Robinson, Christ in Islam and Christianity: the representation of Jesus in the Qur'an and the classical Muslim commentaries, London: Macmillan, 1991Google Scholar.

³⁹ Q. 19: 37–40

⁴⁰ H., Goddard, Christians and Muslims, from double standards to mutual understanding, London: Curzon, 1995Google Scholar.

⁴¹ A., Siddiqui, Christian-Muslim dialogue in the twentieth century, London: Macmillan, 1997Google Scholar.

⁴² K., Cracknell, In good and generous faith: Christian responses to religious pluralism, London: Epworth, 2005Google Scholar.

⁴³ M., Fitzgerald, and Borelli, J., Interfaith dialogue: a Catholic view, London: SPCK, 2006Google Scholar.

⁴⁴ J., Dupuis, Towards a Christian theology of religious pluralism, New York: Orbis, 1997.Google Scholar