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Injil ( ar, إنجيل, ʾInjīl, alternative spellings: ''Ingil'' or ''Injeel'') is the Arabic name for the
Gospel Gospel originally meant the Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words an ...
of
Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
(Isa). This ''Injil'' is described by the
Quran The Quran (, ; Standard Arabic: , Quranic Arabic: , , 'the recitation'), also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation from God. It is organized in 114 chapters (pl.: , s ...
as one of the four
Islamic holy books Islamic holy books are the texts which Muslims believe were authored by Allah through various prophets throughout humanity's history. All these books, in Muslim belief, promulgated the code and laws that God ordained for people. Muslims beli ...
which was revealed by
God In monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 1995. God is typicall ...
, the others being the
Zabur The Zabūr (also ''Zabur'', ar, الزَّبُورُ) is, according to Islam, the holy book of David, one of the holy books revealed by God before the Quran, alongside others such as the '' Tawrāh (Torah)'' and the Injīl (Gospel). Muslim t ...
(possibly the
Psalms The Book of Psalms ( or ; he, תְּהִלִּים, , lit. "praises"), also known as the Psalms, or the Psalter, is the first book of the ("Writings"), the third section of the Tanakh, and a book of the Old Testament. The title is derived ...
), the
Tawrat The Tawrat ( ar, ), also romanized as Tawrah or Taurat, is the Arabic-language name for the Torah within its context as an Islamic holy book believed by Muslims to have been given by God to the prophets and messengers amongst the Children ...
(the
Torah The Torah (; hbo, ''Tōrā'', "Instruction", "Teaching" or "Law") is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. In that sense, Torah means the s ...
), and the Quran itself. The word ''Injil'' is also used in the Quran, the ''
Hadith Ḥadīth ( or ; ar, حديث, , , , , , , literally "talk" or "discourse") or Athar ( ar, أثر, , literally "remnant"/"effect") refers to what the majority of Muslims believe to be a record of the words, actions, and the silent approva ...
'' and early Muslim documents to refer to both a book and revelations made by Allah to prophet Isa.


Etymology

The Arabic word ''Injil'' (إنجيل) as found in Islamic texts, and now used also by Muslim non-Arabs and Arab non-Muslims, is derived from the
Syriac Syriac may refer to: * Syriac language, an ancient dialect of Middle Aramaic *Sureth, one of the modern dialects of Syriac spoken in the Nineveh Plains region * Syriac alphabet ** Syriac (Unicode block) ** Syriac Supplement * Neo-Aramaic languages ...
Aramaic The Aramaic languages, short Aramaic ( syc, ܐܪܡܝܐ, Arāmāyā; oar, 𐤀𐤓𐤌𐤉𐤀; arc, 𐡀𐡓𐡌𐡉𐡀; tmr, אֲרָמִית), are a language family containing many varieties (languages and dialects) that originated in ...
word ''awongaleeyoon'' (ܐܘܢܓܠܝܘܢ) found in the
Peshitta The Peshitta ( syc, ܦܫܺܝܛܬܳܐ ''or'' ') is the standard version of the Bible for churches in the Syriac tradition, including the Maronite Church, the Chaldean Catholic Church, the Syriac Catholic Church, the Syriac Orthodox Church, th ...
(Syriac translation of the Bible), which in turn derives from the
Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
word ''euangelion'' () of the originally Greek language
New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chris ...
, where it means "good news" (from Greek "Εὐ αγγέλιον";
Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th c ...
"gōdspel"; Modern English "gospel", or "evangel" as an archaism, cf. e.g. Spanish "evangelio") The word ''Injil'' occurs twelve times in the Quran.


Identification

Muslim scholars have resisted identifying the ''Injil'' with the
New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chris ...
Gospels. Some have suggested the ''Injil'' may be the Gospel of Barnabas or
Gospel of Thomas The Gospel of Thomas (also known as the Coptic Gospel of Thomas) is an extra-canonical sayings gospel. It was discovered near Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in December 1945 among a group of books known as the Nag Hammadi library. Scholars speculat ...
. More commonly, Muslim scholars have argued that the ''Injil'' refers to a text now lost or hopelessly corrupted. For example,
Abdullah Yusuf Ali Abdullah Yusuf Ali, CBE, MA, LL.M, FRSA, FRSL (; ur, عبداللہ یوسف علی‎; 14 April 1872 – 10 December 1953) was an Indian-British barrister who wrote a number of books about Islam including an exegesis of the Qur'an. A sup ...
wrote: Several verses in the Quran have been understood by some non-Muslim scholars to be problematic to this view, such as: While Muslim scholars interpret this verse as God warning the Christians not to enforce the law contrary to the law sent by God, other scholars see it as affirming the preservation of the
New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chris ...
Gospels:
Gabriel Said Reynolds Gabriel Said Reynolds is an American academic and historian of religion, who serves as Jerome J. Crowley and Rosaleen G. Crowley Professor of Theology and Assistant Professor of Islamic Studies and Theology at the University of Notre Dame. His sch ...
also argued in his research that several words used in the verses that indicate distortion were meant for interpretation of the Gospel, instead of alteration.


Nature

Regardless of scholarly disagreement, Muslims commonly believe that ''Injil'' refers to a true Gospel, bestowed upon Jesus by God. Many Muslims believe that the Injil was revealed by God to Jesus in a manner comparable to the way the
Quran The Quran (, ; Standard Arabic: , Quranic Arabic: , , 'the recitation'), also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation from God. It is organized in 114 chapters (pl.: , s ...
was revealed to
Muhammad Muhammad ( ar, مُحَمَّد;  570 – 8 June 632 CE) was an Arab religious, social, and political leader and the founder of Islam. According to Islamic doctrine, he was a prophet divinely inspired to preach and confirm the mono ...
; as presumed from passages in the Quran stating the gospel was a received message, such as (tr. Pickthall): Muslims reject the view that Jesus or any other person wrote the Injil, instead crediting its authorship to God. Many Muslim scholars continue to believe that the Biblical Gospel has undergone alteration, that the words and the meaning of the words have been distorted, with some passages suppressed and others added. A key Islamic principle of oneness (''
Tawhid Tawhid ( ar, , ', meaning "unification of God in Islam (Allāh)"; also romanized as ''Tawheed'', ''Tawhid'', ''Tauheed'' or ''Tevhid'') is the indivisible oneness concept of monotheism in Islam. Tawhid is the religion's central and single ...
'') and wholeness of God's divinity means that in their view it is impossible for Jesus to be God incarnate or the Son of God, and claims to the contrary within the Biblical Gospels must be due to later additions. Nevertheless, the Bible has been used by Muslims as a historical source.Camilla Adang ''Muslim Writers on Judaism and the Hebrew Bible: From Ibn Rabban to Ibn Hazm'' BRILL 1996 page 251 It is said in the Quran (interpretation of the meaning): According to a hadith collected by al-Bukhari:


See also

*
Biblical and Quranic narratives The Quran, the central religious text of Islam, contains references to more than fifty people and events also found in the Bible. While the stories told in each book are generally comparable, there are also some notable differences. Knowin ...
* Christianity and Islam *
Islamic holy books Islamic holy books are the texts which Muslims believe were authored by Allah through various prophets throughout humanity's history. All these books, in Muslim belief, promulgated the code and laws that God ordained for people. Muslims beli ...
* Islamic view of the Christian Bible * List of Christian terms in Arabic * Scrolls of Abraham


References


External links


A discussion of the Injil and some other scriptures
{{Characters and names in the Quran Islamic texts Christianity and Islam Bible