Little-known Quirk of Faith

by | January 30, 2022

By James Haught

Here’s an odd twist of religion: Multitudes of Muslims believe that Jesus will return to Earth soon — not to spread Christianity, but to abolish it in support of Islam.

Muslim scholar Mustafa Akyol outlines this bizarre tenet in The Islamic Jesus: How the King of the Jews Became a Prophet of the Muslims. In a New York Times commentary, he explained:

Islam has two major scriptures: The Quran, supposedly dictated to Muhammad by the Angel Gabriel, and the Hadiths, sayings of Muhammad recorded by others.

The Hadiths foretell two saviors: The first is the Mahdi, a holy leader who will unite Muslims worldwide — and the second is Jesus, who will come to renounce Christianity and affirm Islam as supreme. One Hadith says:

“The Son of Mary will soon descend among you as a just ruler; he will break the cross and kill the swine.”

A 2012 Pew Research poll found that half of Muslims in nine Islamic nations expect the Mahdi to arrive soon, perhaps in their lifetimes.

Author Akyol says millions of Muslims feel inferior, so they seize upon the savior predictions in hope of better times. “The main quandary of the Muslim world for the past two centuries,” he wrote, is: “Why have we moved so far backward compared to the West?”

Perplexed, many Muslims conclude that “only divinely guided saviors can find a way out,” he said. “This belief discourages pursuing the real solutions to the gap between the Islamic world and the West: science, economic development and liberal democracy.”

Over the centuries, various Muslim leaders have proclaimed themselves the Mahdi and launched holy wars that ended in defeat or triggered bloody persecutions.

The first was al-Mukhtar in 686 A.D., whose uprising was quashed by majority Muslims. Another such doomed jihad erupted in Morocco in 1610.

In 1844 in Persia, Baha’u’llah, the Promised One of All Religions, declared that he was the Mahdi coming for Muslims, Jesus coming for Christians, the Messiah coming for Jews, Lord Krishna coming for Hindus, etc. His followers, the Baha’i, were massacred by thousands.

In 1881, a Sudanese holy man claimed to be the Mahdi and started a jihad that captured Khartoum, killing defenders including British general “Chinese” Gordon. (Gordon was no stranger to holy wars. He got his nickname by previously leading an army against Taiping religious fanatics in China.) Then Lord Kichener arrived with artillery and Maxim machine guns to wipe out the Sudan rebels. One battle killed 11,000 poorly armed holy warriors and only 48 of Kichener’s forces.

In 1979, a proclaimed Mahdi led rebels to seize the Grand Mosque in Mecca, causing a two-week siege that killed 300.

It’s strange that, for hundreds of millions of Muslims, the second coming of Jesus is entwined with belief in another messiah, the Mahdi.

(Daylight Atheism — June 7, 2021)

(Charleston Gazette-Mail church page, Oct. 9, 2016)

— 

*Associates and resources listing last updated May 31, 2020.*

Canadian Atheist Associates: Godless Mom, Nice Mangoes, Sandwalk, Brainstorm Podcast, Left at the Valley, Life, the Universe & Everything Else, The Reality Check, Bad Science Watch, British Columbia Humanist Association, Dying With Dignity Canada, Canadian Secular Alliance, Centre for Inquiry Canada, Kelowna Atheists, Skeptics, and Humanists Association.

— 

Other National/Local Resources: Association humaniste du Québec, Atheist Freethinkers, Central Ontario Humanist Association, Comox Valley Humanists, Grey Bruce Humanists, Halton-Peel Humanist Community, Hamilton Humanists, Humanist Association of London, Humanist Association of Ottawa, Humanist Association of Toronto, Humanists, Atheists and Agnostics of Manitoba, Ontario Humanist Society, Secular Connextions Seculaire, Secular Humanists in Calgary, Society of Free Thinkers (Kitchener-Waterloo/Cambridge/Guelph), Thunder Bay Humanists, Toronto Oasis, Victoria Secular Humanist Association.

— 

Other International/Outside Canada Resources: Allianz vun Humanisten, Atheisten an Agnostiker, American Atheists, American Humanist Association, Associação Brasileira de Ateus e AgnósticoséééBrazilian Association of Atheists and Agnostics, Atheist Alliance International, Atheist Alliance of America, Atheist Centre, Atheist Foundation of Australia, The Brights Movement, Center for Inquiry (including Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science), Atheist Ireland, Camp Quest, Inc., Council for Secular Humanism, De Vrije Gedachte, European Humanist Federation, Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations, Foundation Beyond Belief, Freedom From Religion Foundation, Humanist Association of Ireland, Humanist International, Humanist Association of Germany, Humanist Association of Ireland, Humanist Society of Scotland, Humanists UK, Humanisterna/Humanists Sweden, Internet Infidels, International League of Non-Religious and Atheists, James Randi Educational Foundation, League of Militant Atheists, Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers, National Secular Society, Rationalist International, Recovering From Religion, Religion News Service, Secular Coalition for America, Secular Student Alliance, The Clergy Project, The Rational Response Squad, The Satanic Temple, The Sunday Assembly, United Coalition of Reason, Union of Rationalist Atheists and Agnostics.

— 

About Canadian Atheist

Canadian Atheist is an independent blog with multiple contributors providing articles of interest to Canadian atheists, secularists, humanists, and freethinkers.

Canadian Atheist is not an organization — there is no membership and nothing to join — and we offer no professional services or products. It is a privately-owned publishing platform shared with our contributors, with a focus on topics relevant to Canadian atheists.

Canadian Atheist is not affiliated with any other organization or group. While our contributors may be individually be members of other organizations or groups, and may even speak in an official capacity for them, CA itself is independent.

For more information about Canadian Atheist, or to contact us for any other reason, see our contact page.

— 

About Canadian Atheist Contributors

Canadian Atheist contributors are volunteers who provide content for CA. They receive no payment for their contributions from CA, though they may be sponsored by other means.

Our contributors are people who have both a passion for issues of interest to Canadian atheists, secularists, humanists, and freethinkers, and a demonstrated ability to communicate content and ideas of interest on those topics to our readers. Some are members of Canadian secularist, humanist, atheist, or freethought organizations, either at the national, provincial, regional, or local level. They come from all walks of life, and offer a diversity of perspectives and presentation styles.

CA merely provides our contributors with a platform with almost complete editorial freedom. Their opinions are their own, expressed as they see fit; they do not speak for Canadian Atheist, and Canadian Atheist does not speak for them.

For more information about Canadian Atheist’s contributors, or to get in contact with any of them, or if you are interested in becoming a contributor, see our contact page.

— 

Image Credit: James Haught.

Category: Education Tags: ,

About Scott Douglas Jacobsen

Scott Douglas Jacobsen is the Founder of In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal and In-Sight Publishing. Jacobsen works for science and human rights, especially women’s and children’s rights. He considers the modern scientific and technological world the foundation for the provision of the basics of human life throughout the world and advancement of human rights as the universal movement among peoples everywhere. You can contact Scott via email, his website, or Twitter.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.