Greetings.
Way back – in a thread entitled ‘Quran says that Jesus Christ died a natural death’ you wrote: 'I wonder what
@muhammad_isa and
@Grandad will think about this?’
I was ‘Grandad’ in those days, but have – recently – changed my name. I did not reply way back. Permit me to do so now.
The Qur’an does
not say that Yeshua died a natural death. It says that he
will die a natural death.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines ‘death’ as: ‘A permanent cessation of all vital functions – the end of life.’; and this is what most people understand whenever they hear the word, or see it written.
However, the Qur’an uses
two different terms when referring to death: ‘
tawaffâ’ and ‘
mawt’. Only ‘
mawt’ accords with the Merriam-Webster definition.
A major point of distinction between ‘
mawt’ and ‘
tawaffâ’ is that only the
former is associated with killing, murder or manslaughter (‘
qatala’).
‘
Mawt’ stems from the trilateral root ‘
mīm wāw tā’ – ‘
māta’.
Abdur Rashid Siddiqui reminds us that:
‘Māta means to die, to perish, to lose life. Mawt from this root means death or demise. This is the opposite of life. The word Mawt is used for absence of life in living creatures as well as plants and metaphorically for inanimate objects like stone where there is an absence of greenery (Qāf 50: 11). When a person dies he loses all sensation and consciousness whereas during sleep one only suffers loss of consciousness; even this is described figuratively as death (al-Zumar 39: 42; al-Anʿām 6: 60). Death is something that is inevitable: it is the most predictable event. In the Qur’ān it is referred to as Yaqīn (certainty) (al-Ḥijr 15: 99; al-Muddaththir 74: 47). It is stated that “every soul shall taste death” (Āl ʿImrān 3: 185).’ (‘Qur'anic Keywords: A Reference Guide’).
Here is the relevant Sūrah:
‘She (Mary) went back to her people carrying the child, and they said: “Mary! You have done something terrible! Sister of Aaron! Your father was not an evil man; your mother was not unchaste!” She pointed at him. They said: “How can we converse with an infant?” (But) he said: “I am a servant of God. He has granted me the Scripture; made me a prophet; made me blessed wherever I may be. He commanded me to pray, to give alms as long as I live, to cherish my mother. He did not make me domineering or graceless.
Peace was on me the day I was born, and will be on me the day I die (‘
amūtu’) and the day I am raised to life again.’ (Maryam: 27-33; my emphasis).
Note that Yeshua (ʿalayhi as-salām) uses the word ‘
amūtu’ and not ‘
qatalūhu’; and from this it is clear that he is foretelling his natural, biological, death, and not a violent death at the hands of others.
You will know that Islam does not consider Yeshua (ʿalayhi as-salām) to be divine. This means that he must share in human mortality.
Shaykh Sayyid Hussein Nasr writes:
‘Islamic tradition holds Jesus will return near the end times to fight the Antichrist (al-Dajjāl) and will thereafter
eventually die and be resurrected with the rest of humanity.’ (‘The Study Quran: A New Translation and Commentary’; my emphasis).
Blessings.
