Adam in Islam and Biblical Theology

(Ādam) through a comparative reading of the Qurʾān, classical Islamicnncommentary and ḥadīth, and biblical theology. Taking Samy Tanagho’s popular treatment as a conversation partner rather than as a controlling authority, the study argues that a grammatical shift in Q 2 35 38—fromnndual address to Adam and his wife toward the plural imperative ihbiṭū and the collective modifier jamīʿan—places real pressure on the claim that Adam’s transgression was an isolated, fully repaired slip (zalla) withnnno structural consequence for his descendants. That pressure is not identical to the Pauline doctrine of original sin; Islamic theology has itsnnown vocabulary of fiṭra, prophetic impeccability (ʿiṣma), and divinennrelenting Q 2 37 . The essay registers that diversity. It also situates…

In Christian–Muslim encounters, the figure of Adam occupies a foundational place in anthropology, the origin of moral evil, and the mechanism of salvation. A recurring category error is the unexamined projection of one revelatory paradigm onto the other. Classical Sunninndogmatics locates primary revelation in inlibration—the uncreated speech of God (kalām Allāh) made Book, associated with the preserved tablet (al-lawḥ al-maḥfūẓ; Q 85 21 22 and delivered to a receivingnnprophet. Biblical theology, by contrast, locates the climactic act ofnnrevelation in incarnation—the eternal Word made flesh in space and timenn John 1 14)—and treats the canonical Scriptures as dual-authored, historically conditioned, and textually transmitted witnesses to that Word Kaiser, 2008; Bates, 2026d).