-
Triumph Of Jesus AS And His Immediate Followers
Believers! Be God’s helpers the way Jesus, son of Mary, said to the disciples: “Who will be my helper in the cause of God?” The disciples replied: “We are God’s helpers.” Consequently, one group from among the Israelite professed faith, while another became adamant on disbelief. Then We helped the believers against their enemies; so, they triumphed over them. (Sura As-Saf, Ayat 14)
Note the word ‘believers’ in bold in the translation above. Are these the same believers who said to Jesus (AS) that they were God’s helpers (also in bold)? If so, do we know from some reliable source in what manner Allah gave them triumph over the disbelievers? There is no context, in this ayah, to enable us to distinguish the believers who said that they would help Allah (His cause) from those whom Allah (SWT) gave triumph. In fact, someone reading the Qur’an for the first time would take those whom Allah gave triumph to be those who said that they would help Allah to Jesus (AS). I read the following in Flavius Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews:
“Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the Sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned…” (https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0146%3Abook%3D20%3Asection%3D197)
According to it, Jesus’s followers, such as James, were persecuted by Jewish high authorities. If this source is reliable, then it couldn’t have been political superiority that Allah (SWT) hinted at using the words . In Sura Al-Mujadilah, Ayat 22, Allah (SWT) says:
This is because God has decreed: “I and My Messengers are destined to be dominant.” In reality, God is extremely Powerful and very Mighty.
In the tafseer to this Ayat, Ghamidi sahab writes:
This is a statement of the established practice of God ordained from the very beginning of time: the rift between truth and falsehood in the times of messengers of God reaches its culmination in dominance for God and His messengers, and the devils who try to fight with them with their groups are necessarily humbled and humiliated.
So the Jewish authorities who disbelieved in Jesus being a Rasoolullah should have been humbled and humiliated before Jesus’s death.
Sponsor Ask Ghamidi