1 And a disciple of Jesus had prepared a tomb, hewn out in a rock, for the body of Jesus to be buried.
2 And he went to the place, wither they took Jesus to crucify, and asked for his body.
3 And the centurion said unto him, They have already taken his body:
4 For the centurion thought that he had come for the body of Jesus Barabbas.
5 And then the disciple goeth to the sepulchre, and rolled the stone, but he found nothing.
6 And the next day in the morning Mary Magdalene and other women came to the tomb with sweet spices that they might anoint the body of Jesus.
7 And when they came unto the sepulchre, they found the stone rolled away, and the body of Jesus was not there. And they were greatly affrighted.
8 Now as these things were happening, Jesus journeyed on the way to Galilee.
9 And he met some of the people who had believed in him when he was preaching, and he told them what he had told to those which went to Emmaus.
10 And it came to pass that Jesus fell sick on the way, and could not travel any further.1
11 And he tarried with some of his disciples in a village, and told them who he was and what had happened to him.2
12 And they administered him, and they sent word to other disciples, whosoever they could find, that Jesus was not dead, but liveth.
13 But Jesus’ condition continued to worsen, and after a few days God took him3 to Himself. May peace be upon Jesus the day he was born, and the day he died, and the day he will be raised to life again.
14 And there went around divers sayings about Jesus: It was said, He is not dead but liveth. Some said, He was not crucified, and others, He was crucified and buried but he rose from the dead.4
15 But God did not make some of the sayings that went around among the disciples of Jesus save a source of hope for the believers, and a means of honouring His messenger.
16 Thus doth God help and honour His messengers, and createth for His righteous servants a way when there appeareth to be no way.5
17 For God is full of mercy and grace for men, but most of them are ever prone to reject faith, and they make their own gods besides Him.
The Qur’anic text
The passages of the Qur’an that this chapter follows. All the passages are gathered on The Qur’an on Jesus.
Jesus Denying Claim to Divinity
5:116 And ˹on Judgment Day˺ God will say, “O Jesus, son of Mary! Did you ever ask the people to worship you and your mother as gods besides God?” He will answer, “Glory be to You! How could I ever say what I had no right to say? If I had said such a thing, you would have certainly known it. You know what is hidden within me, but I do not know what is within You. Indeed, You ˹alone˺ are the Knower of all unseen.
5:117 I never told them anything except what You ordered me to say: “Worship God—my Lord and your Lord!” And I was witness over them as long as I remained among them. But when You took me,6 You were the Witness over them—and You are a Witness over all things.
5:118 If You punish them, they belong to You after all.7 But if You forgive them, You are surely the Almighty, All-Wise.”
5:119 God will declare, “This is the Day when ˹only˺ the faithful will benefit from their faithfulness. Theirs are Gardens under which rivers flow, to stay there for ever and ever. God is pleased with them and they are pleased with Him. That is the ultimate triumph.”
5:120 To God ˹alone˺ belongs the kingdom of the heavens and the earth and everything within. And He is Most Capable of everything.
Notes
- The flogging, lack of sleep, and fatigue of the journey finally took a toll of Jesus’ health. He probably never met any of his close disciples but continued to meet several of the men who heard him and admired him. He earlier hid his identity from everyone, but now that he was sick and weak, he took some of the “disciples” in confidence to get necessary help. ↩
- The disciples with whom Jesus was staying probably did not know the whereabouts of his close companions and confidants. They slowly and cautiously took the news of Jesus’ escape from death to whomsoever they regarded as “believers.” Indeed, the news must have been the first reason to establish communications between the believers. ↩
- Qur’an 5:120; 4:157. ↩
- For a few months, various reports went around concerning Jesus. It was reported that he was crucified and his body was taken for burial. It was reported that he was not dead but lived and that he was seen by some people. Then there were also the reports of the empty tomb seen by the women who went to anoint the body of Jesus.
As a result of these reports, it soon began to be believed by many that Jesus was crucified and buried, but he was later resurrected. Some people no doubt knew that Jesus was never crucified, but people were generally inclined to believe the more exciting reports that implied Jesus’ resurrection after death. Yet reports about Jesus’ escape seem to have went around, and given rise, in New Testament times, to such sects as the Basilidans and the Docetae, and to the Marcionite Gospel and the Gospel of Barnabas, all of which taught, in one form or another, that Jesus did not in reality die on the cross. ↩ - Jesus’ escape from crucifixion did not postpone his death for too long, but it gave him something that he would have valued much more: the success of his mission. By providing the circumstances for reports about the empty tomb and his meetings with some people after he was supposed to be dead, his escape gave rise to belief in his resurrection, which provided the disciples with fresh hopes and a new source of faith in Jesus. It also provided Jewish messianism with the only kind of Messiah it could have: an imaginary being like the Risen Lord whom the chief priests and Romans could not arrest and kill. (After all, the Messiah was largely a creation of human imagination and fantasy, and it is only understandable that he should have “come” in human imagination and fantasy.) But the coming of the Risen Lord was not worthless, not only because man’s imagination and fantasy is not worthless, but also because with the success of the Risen Lord, there also survived something of Jesus, the messenger of the true living God. ↩
- This refers to the ascension of Jesus Christ ↩
- as your creation, they cannot escape the punishment. ↩