—no pain or accidental attribute ever attached to it; and He also said:

“O Jesus, I will take you, raise you to Myself, purify you from those who disbelieve, and place those who follow you above those who disbelieve until the Day of Resurrection.” ⦗Āl ʿImrān 3:55⦘.

In Sūrat al-Māʾida He reports that Jesus said:

“I was a witness over them so long as I remained among them; but when You took me, You Yourself became the Watcher over them, and You are Witness over all things.” ⦗al-Māʾida 5:117⦘.

Thus, by his death He meant the death of the human nature that had been taken from Mary the Virgin.

He likewise says in Sūrat al-Nisāʾ:

“They did not kill him for certain; rather, God raised him unto Himself.” ⦗al-Nisāʾ 4:157⦘.

By this He alludes to the divine nature, the creative Word of God. On this basis we say: the Messiah was crucified and suffered in his human nature, but he was neither crucified nor did he suffer in his divine nature.

The reply may be set out in several ways. One of them is to say: their claim that Muhammad—may God’s blessings and peace be upon him—affirmed in the Messiah both a divine and a human nature, in the sense maintained by these Christians, is a manifest and well-known falsehood against Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him