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7. Did Christ sin Like Adam did?
Next I focused on that event in the life of Adam, which has made him different from all other human beings, namely his expulsion from heavenly Paradise. I asked myself what the respective passage in the Koran tells us about the nature of Adam and whether Christ has a nature, which is comparable to that of Adam in this regard. For this I carefully studied what is taught about Adam in this verse of the Koran:
Then Satan has made them (i.e. Adam and his spouse) to stumble away from it (i.e. from this commandment of Allah), and thus he (Satan) has brought them out of that (environment), in which they had been. And (then) we (i.e. Allah) have said: “Drop down (i.e. from the Garden of Paradise down to earth) (and be) enemies to each other ! And on earth you have an abode and enjoyable necessities of life, up till a time.” (Sura al-Baqara 2:36)
فَأَزَلَّهُمَا الشَّيْطَان عَنْهَا فَأَخْرَجَهُمَا مِمَّا كَانَا فِيهِ وَقُلْنَا اهْبِطُوا بَعْضُكُم لِبَعْض عَدُو وَلَكُمْ فِي الأَرْضِ مُسْتَقَرٌّ وَمَتَاعٌ إِلَى حِينٍ (سُورَة الْبَقَرَة ٢ : ٣٦)
Of course, again I tried to find verses, where the Koran teaches that Christ experienced similar things to what Adam went through. However, I was not able to find such passages. Therefore I concluded that the Koran teaches the following differences between Adam and Christ:
DIFFERENCE 29 : Satan had power over Adam, However, nowhere in the Koran do we find a report that Satan had any power over Christ. Here Adam and Christ are again fundamentally different.
DIFFERENCE 30 : Satan caused Adam and his spouse to stumble away from God's commandment, by disobeying God and eating of the forbidden tree. But the Koran knows of no stumbling away from God's commandment that Christ would have committed. Here also Adam and Christ are deeply different.
DIFFERENCE 31 : Adam has sinned and has fathered sinful children. But Christ has not sinned, rather he has cleansed and relieved (abra'a) the sick of their polluting illness, as we found from our analysis of Sura Al 'Imran 3:49. Here Adam and Christ are again so deeply different that each one is the opposite of the other.
Finally, even though Adam and Christ were both men, they nevertheless even here differed in a fundamental way:
DIFFERENCE 32 : Adam as a man married a woman (Eve) and with her he fathered physical children. But Christ as a man did not marry any woman and he never fathered any physical child. In this Adam and Christ, even though both were men, are deeply different.
In the Koran we find seven verses, in which human beings in general are referred to as “Banu Adam”, that is “Sons of Adam”, because all humans descend from him. Here are the references: Suras al-A'raf 7:26+27+31+35+172 -- al-Isra' 17:70 -- and Ya Sin 36:60. The fathering of the first child of Adam and his wife is described in this way:
(It is) he (i.e. Allah), who has created you from one (single) soul (i.e. Adam) and he has set from it (i.e. this soul) its spouse to cohabit unto her. So when he had covered her (i.e. his spouse in sexual intercourse), she (as a pregnant woman first) bore a light burden (as fetus in her womb). Then she went with him (for a time). And when she was weighted down (with the baby in her belly), they called Allah, their Lord (saying), “Truly, if you bring to us a righteous one (as a child), then we will (truly) be among the thankful.” (Sura al-A'raf 7:189)
هُو الَّذِي خَلَقَكُم مِن نَفْس وَاحِدَة وَجَعَل مِنْهَا زَوْجَهَا لِيَسْكُن إِلَيْهَا فَلَمَّا تَغَشَّاهَا حَمَلَت حَمْلا خَفِيفا فَمَرَّت بِه فَلَمَّا أَثْقَلَت دَعَوَا اللَّه رَبَّهُمَا لَئِن آتَيْتَنَا صَالِحا لَنَكُونَن مِن الشَّاكِرِين (سُورَة الأَعْرَاف ٧ : ١٨٩)
The descent of all human beings from Adam and his wife is described in the following manner:
O you humans! Take refuge (with) your Lord, who has created you from one (single) soul (i.e. Adam); and he has created from it (this soul) its spouse; and he has disseminated from (the two of) them many men and women ... (Sura al-Nisa' 4:1)
يَا أَيُّهَا النَّاس اتَّقُوا رَبَّكُم الَّذِي خَلَقَكُم مِن نَفْس وَاحِدَة وَخَلَق مِنْهَا زَوْجَهَا وَبَث مِنْهُمَا رِجَالا كَثِيرا وَنِسَاء ... (سُورَة النِّسَاء ٤ : ١)
But about Christ we never read in the Koran of him having any wife or of him having fathered any physical child, like the Koran mentions for example about Noah, Abraham or Jacob. So Adam is very different from Christ in this regard, even though both of them were men.
You can imagine how disappointed I was: Not even in concentrating on the createdness of Adam and Christ, was I able to find a similarity between them. Rather I uncovered further deep differences between the two. By this time I had lost all hope of saving the standard Muslim interpretation of Sura 3:49 as entailing an equality in the natures of Christ and Adam. Nevertheless, I gave it one last try.