The Rightly-Guided Injil

Section 8: The leper, the sabbath and the Beatitudes

The Gospel According to Islam · Chapter 2, John and the Beginning of the Ministry · Section 8

The leper, the sabbath and the Beatitudes. 21 verses.

8

1And it came to pass that there came a leper, beseeching him, and saying unto him, If thou art willing, thou canst make me clean. 2And Jesus, moved with compassion, put forth his hand and touched him and said unto him, Be thou clean! 3Then, strongly admonishing him, immediately he sent him away, 4Saying, See thou say nothing to any man, but go and show thyself to the priest, and offer for thy cleansing those things which Moses commanded.1 5And it came to pass on the second sabbath of the first month, that Jesus and his disciples passed through the corn fields; and his disciples plucked ears of corn and did eat, rubbing them in their hands.

6And certain of the Pharisees saw them and said unto them, Why do ye that which is not lawful to do on the sabbath days? 7And Jesus, answering them, said, Have ye not read so much as this, what David did, when himself was an hungered, and they which were with him, 8How he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar, the high priest, and did take and eat the shew bread, and gave also to them that were with him, which it is not lawful to eat but for the priests? 9And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for man, and not man for sabbath; therefore a man is lord of the sabbath and not sabbath the lord of man.2

10And Jesus began to preach out of the synagogues to the poor and to the publicans and sinners.3 11And one day he went up a mount, and his disciples were gathered around him and a multitude with them. 12And he began to preach, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 13Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. 14Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. 15Blessed are they that do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. 16Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.

17Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. 18Blessed are the peace makers: for they shall be called the children of God. 19Blessed are they that are persecuted for righteousness sake: for great is their reward in heaven.4 20And many other things did he preach, and when he was finished, the people were astonished at his doctrine. 21For he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.5

  1. Mark 1:40-44; Matt. 8:1-4, Luke 5:12-16. ↩
  2. Mark 2:23-28; Matt. 12:1-8; Luke 6:1-5. In the last sentence, the Gospels use the expression “Son of man,” which in the Hebrew means “man” or “mankind.” The expression is sometimes used to refer to oneself impersonally, just as in our times some writers refer to themselves as “the author” or “the reporter.” In addition to these usages, the expression is also used as a title of a figure expected in Jewish messianism, although even there it originally did not refer to a particular figure but to an ideal human being. The Gospel writers and their traditional exegesis often confuse the three usages of the expression. In the present usage, for example, “Son of man” is taken to refer to Jesus as the promised figure, and the following sense is given to Jesus’ reply: Jesus, as the expected “Son of man”, is the Lord of the Sabbath; hence, the holy day should be dedicated to his worship! ↩
  3. Luke 5:30; 7:22. ↩
  4. Matt. 5:1-12. ↩
  5. Matt. 7:28-29. See notes 49, 50. ↩

From the Gospel of Thomas

The Gospel of Thomas keeps many sayings of the teacher. Each carries a colour mark: green agrees with the Qur’an as the measure, blue is beyond the measure (the Qur’an says nothing either way), gold is unclear. The note on each gives its canonical parallel and the Qur’anic verse, or the reason for the mark.

  • Unclear Thomas 4. An old man should ask a week-old child about the place of life. The first will be last, and all will become one.6
  • Unclear Thomas 7. A lion eaten by a man is blessed, because it becomes human. A man eaten by a lion is cursed.7
  • Unclear Thomas 8. The wise fisherman keeps one large fish and throws back all the small ones. Let those with ears hear.8
  • Agrees Thomas 9. The sower’s seed falls on road, rock and thorns, and some on good soil, which yields sixty and a hundredfold. (Compare Mark 4:3-9.)9
  • Unclear Thomas 10. Jesus has set fire to the world and is watching over it until it blazes.10
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 16. Jesus has come to bring division, not peace: fire, sword and war, and households set father against son. (Compare Luke 12:51-53.)11
  • Agrees Thomas 20. The kingdom is like a mustard seed, the smallest of seeds, which grows into a plant sheltering birds. (Compare Mark 4:30-32.)12
  • Unclear Thomas 21. Mary asks what the disciples are like. They are children in a field that is not theirs, who give it back. Be on guard like a householder against a thief, and let a wise person reap when the grain ripens.13
  • Unclear Thomas 23. Jesus will choose one in a thousand and two in ten thousand, and they will stand as one.14
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 24. The disciples ask to be shown where Jesus is. Light is inside a person of light, who lights the whole world. Without that light there is only darkness.15
  • Agrees Thomas 25. Love your brother as your own soul and protect him as the pupil of your eye.16
  • Agrees Thomas 26. You see the speck in your brother’s eye and not the beam in your own. Remove the beam first. (Compare Matthew 7:3-5.)17
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 27. Unless you fast from the world you will not find the kingdom, and unless you keep the Sabbath as a Sabbath you will not see the Father.18
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 29. If flesh came from spirit it is a wonder, but if spirit came from flesh it is a wonder of wonders. He marvels that such wealth lives in such poverty.19
  • Agrees Thomas 31. No prophet is welcomed in his own village, and no doctor heals those who know him. (Compare Luke 4:24.)20
  • Agrees Thomas 32. A city built on a high mountain and fortified cannot fall or be hidden. (Compare Matthew 5:14.)21
  • Agrees Thomas 33. Preach from the housetops what you hear. No one hides a lamp under a bushel. It goes on a stand for all to see. (Compare Matthew 10:27; 5:15.)22
  • Agrees Thomas 34. If a blind man leads a blind man, both fall into a pit. (Compare Matthew 15:14.)23
  • Agrees Thomas 35. No one can plunder a strong man’s house without first binding his hands. (Compare Mark 3:27.)24
  • Agrees Thomas 36. Do not worry from morning to evening, or from evening to morning, about what you will wear. (Compare Matthew 6:25.)25
  • Agrees Thomas 42. Jesus says only: be passers-by.26
  • Agrees Thomas 45. Grapes do not come from thorns or figs from thistles. A good person brings out good and an evil one brings out evil from what fills the heart. (Compare Matthew 7:16; 12:33-35.)27
  • Agrees Thomas 47. No one can ride two horses or draw two bows or serve two masters. Old wine does not go into new skins, nor new wine into old. (Compare Luke 16:13; 5:36-39.)28
  • Agrees Thomas 54. Blessed are the poor, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs. (Compare Luke 6:20.)29
  • Agrees Thomas 57. The kingdom is like a man whose enemy sowed weeds among his wheat. He lets both grow until harvest, when the weeds are pulled and burned. (Compare Matthew 13:24-30.)30
  • Unclear Thomas 58. Blessed is the one who has suffered and found life.31
  • Unclear Thomas 59. Look to the living one while you are alive. After death you will look for him and not be able to find him.32
  • Unclear Thomas 60. Jesus sees a Samaritan carrying a lamb to Judea. The lamb will be eaten only once it is dead. The disciples must find a place of rest so they do not become a corpse and be eaten.33
  • Agrees Thomas 62. Jesus tells his mysteries to those worthy of them. Do not let your left hand know what your right is doing. (Compare Matthew 6:3.)34
  • Agrees Thomas 63. A rich man plans to invest and fill his barns so that he lacks nothing, and he dies that night. (Compare Luke 12:16-21.)35
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 67. Whoever knows everything but lacks himself lacks everything.36
  • Agrees Thomas 68. Blessed are you when you are hated and persecuted, and no place will be found where you were persecuted. (Compare Matthew 5:11.)37
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 69. Blessed are those persecuted within themselves, who have truly come to know the Father. Blessed are the hungry, for the belly of the one in need will be filled.38
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 70. What you bring forth from yourselves will save you. What you do not bring forth will destroy you.39
  • Unclear Thomas 74. Lord, many stand around the trough but there is nothing in the well.40
  • Agrees Thomas 76. The kingdom is like a merchant who finds a pearl, sells his goods and buys it. Seek likewise the treasure that does not fail, which no moth devours. (Compare Matthew 13:45-46.)41
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 81. Let the one who has grown rich be king, and the one who has power renounce it.42
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 83. Images are visible to people but the light in them is hidden by the image of the Father’s light. He will be revealed and his image hidden by his light.43
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 84. You rejoice when you see your likeness. When you see the images that existed before you, which neither die nor appear, you will bear a great deal.44
  • Agrees Thomas 86. Foxes have holes and birds have nests, but the son of man has nowhere to lay his head. (Compare Matthew 8:20.)45
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 87. Wretched is the body that depends on a body, and wretched the soul that depends on both.46
  • Unclear Thomas 88. The angels and prophets will come and give you what is yours. You should give them what you have and ask when they will come for what is theirs.47
  • Agrees Thomas 89. Why wash the outside of the cup? The one who made the inside made the outside. (Compare Luke 11:39-40.)48
  • Agrees Thomas 90. Come to me, for my yoke is easy and my lordship gentle, and you will find rest. (Compare Matthew 11:28-30.)49
  • Agrees Thomas 92. Seek and you will find. What you asked before and I did not say, I now want to tell, but you do not ask. (Compare Matthew 7:7.)50
  • Agrees Thomas 94. Whoever seeks will find, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. (Compare Matthew 7:8.)51
  • Agrees Thomas 95. If you have money, do not lend it at interest. Give it to those from whom you will not get it back. (Compare Luke 6:34-35.)52
  • Agrees Thomas 96. The kingdom is like a woman who hides a little leaven in dough and makes large loaves. (Compare Matthew 13:33.)53
  • Unclear Thomas 97. The kingdom is like a woman carrying a jar of meal. The handle breaks on the road and the meal spills out unnoticed. At home she finds the jar empty.54
  • Unclear Thomas 98. The kingdom is like a man who wants to kill a powerful man. He tests his strength by driving his sword into the wall, and then kills him.55
  • Agrees Thomas 107. The kingdom is like a shepherd whose largest sheep strays. He leaves the ninety-nine to find it, and says he loves it more than the ninety-nine. (Compare Matthew 18:12-13.)56
  • Beyond the measure Thomas 112. Woe to the flesh that depends on the soul, and woe to the soul that depends on the flesh.57

Sayings that conflict with the Qur’an, and sayings that only repeat another, are listed with the reason for each on the page of sayings set aside.

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Notes

  1. A riddle about an old man and a small child. Its sense is not given and no reading settles it. ↩
  2. The lion and the man. No parallel and no clear sense. ↩
  3. The wise fisherman. A parable found only here; Matthew 13:47-48 has a net, but the point is different. ↩
  4. Mark 4:3-9; Matthew 13:3-9; Luke 8:5-8. Qur’an 2:261 likens the reward of giving to a grain that grows seven ears, a hundred grains in each. ↩
  5. Fire cast upon the world. The sense is uncertain; compare Luke 12:49, where the fire is a figure of judgment. ↩
  6. Parallel to Luke 12:51-53. It makes Jesus’ mission fire, sword and war, which the Qur’anic portrait does not (19:33). ↩
  7. Mark 4:30-32; Matthew 13:31-32; Luke 13:18-19. Qur’an 14:24-26 likens a good word to a good tree, firm in root and high in branch. ↩
  8. A string of images: children in a field, the householder and the thief, the reaper. The parts do not join. The thief is kept as saying 103. ↩
  9. One in a thousand and two in ten thousand. Obscure. ↩
  10. Light within a person of light. It depends on Thomas’s doctrine of an inner light, for which the Qur’an gives no basis. ↩
  11. No canonical parallel in this form; compare Leviticus 19:18 and Mark 12:31. Qur’an 49:10: the believers are brothers; 59:9 praises those who prefer others to themselves. ↩
  12. Matthew 7:3-5; Luke 6:41-42. Qur’an 2:44 rebukes those who bid others to righteousness and forget themselves. ↩
  13. “Fast as regards the world” and keep the Sabbath “as a Sabbath”. The first phrase is unclear. The Qur’an says the Sabbath was laid on those who differed over it (16:124). ↩
  14. Flesh and spirit, wealth and poverty. It rests on Thomas’s own doctrine of body and spirit. ↩
  15. Mark 6:4; Matthew 13:57; Luke 4:24; John 4:44. The Qur’an records messengers rejected by their own people: 36:13-30; 2:87. ↩
  16. Matthew 5:14. Qur’an 2:143 calls the community a witness over the nations. ↩
  17. Matthew 5:15 and 10:27; Luke 8:16 and 12:3. Qur’an 5:67: convey what has been sent down to you. ↩
  18. Matthew 15:14; Luke 6:39. Qur’an 6:50: are the blind and the seeing equal? ↩
  19. Mark 3:27; Matthew 12:29. Qur’an 4:76: the plot of Satan was ever weak. ↩
  20. Matthew 6:25; Luke 12:22. Qur’an 65:3: whoever puts trust in God, He is enough for him. ↩
  21. No canonical parallel. Qur’an 57:20 and 18:45 call the life of this world a passing enjoyment, and the tradition says the same: be in this world as a stranger or a traveller (Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī, Book of Softening the Hearts). ↩
  22. Matthew 7:16-18 and 12:33-35; Luke 6:43-45. Qur’an 14:24-26 sets the good word beside the evil word. ↩
  23. Luke 16:13; Matthew 6:24; Mark 2:21-22. Qur’an 39:29 sets the servant of many masters beside the servant of one. ↩
  24. Luke 6:20; Matthew 5:3. Qur’an 90:12-16 and 107:1-3 on feeding the poor. ↩
  25. Matthew 13:24-30. Thomas begins “the kingdom of the Father”; Matthew has “the kingdom of heaven”. Qur’an 22:17: God will decide between them on the Day of Resurrection. ↩
  26. Blessed is the one who has suffered and found life. No clear sense. ↩
  27. Look to “the living one” while you are alive. The reference is obscure. ↩
  28. The Samaritan with the lamb, a riddle about a corpse that is eaten. No parallel. ↩
  29. Matthew 6:3. Qur’an 2:271: to give in secret is better. ↩
  30. Luke 12:16-21. Qur’an 18:32-44, the owner of the two gardens, and 57:20. ↩
  31. Knowing the All yet lacking oneself. It is Thomas’s doctrine of self-knowledge. ↩
  32. Matthew 5:11; Luke 6:22. Qur’an 2:214 on the trials of those who came before. ↩
  33. Those “persecuted within themselves” know the Father. It is Thomas’s doctrine of inward knowledge. ↩
  34. What you bring forth from yourselves will save you. The Qur’an makes salvation depend on faith and righteous deeds, by God’s mercy (103:3). ↩
  35. The trough and the cistern. Obscure. ↩
  36. Matthew 13:45-46; Luke 12:33. Qur’an 57:20-21 sets the lasting reward against the passing life. ↩
  37. The rich should reign and the powerful renounce it. The sense is unclear. ↩
  38. Images and the light of the Father. It belongs to Thomas’s doctrine of image and light. ↩
  39. Images that came into being before you. It belongs to Thomas’s doctrine of a heavenly twin. ↩
  40. Matthew 8:20; Luke 9:58. Qur’an 25:20: the messengers ate food and walked in the markets. ↩
  41. Wretched is the body that depends on a body. It rests on Thomas’s contempt for the body. ↩
  42. The angels and prophets come and give you what is yours. Obscure. ↩
  43. Luke 11:39-40; Matthew 23:25. Qur’an 2:177: righteousness is not in turning the face but in faith and deeds. ↩
  44. Matthew 11:28-30. Qur’an 2:185: God intends ease for you; 3:50: ʿĪsā made lawful some of what had been forbidden. ↩
  45. Matthew 7:7; Luke 11:9. Qur’an 2:186: “I am near; I answer the call of the caller.” ↩
  46. Matthew 7:8; Luke 11:10. Qur’an 40:60: “Call upon Me and I will answer you.” ↩
  47. Luke 6:34-35. Qur’an 2:275-276: God has forbidden interest and makes charity increase. ↩
  48. Matthew 13:33; Luke 13:20-21. Thomas says “the kingdom of the Father”; see the note on “Father” on the page of sayings set aside. ↩
  49. The jar of meal that empties on the road. No parallel. ↩
  50. The man who tests his sword on a wall and then kills a powerful man. No parallel, and the violence of the image is unexplained. ↩
  51. Matthew 18:12-13; Luke 15:3-7. Qur’an 39:53: do not despair of the mercy of God. ↩
  52. Woe to the flesh that depends on the soul. It is Thomas’s dualism. ↩