Do Muslims Celebrate Easter?

Someone sent this question: “I know Muslims believe in Jesus, but what do you believe about Jesus? And do you celebrate Easter?“

Asalamu Alaikum,

Thank you for contacting Sunna Files Website with your question.

Muslims actually believe that God raised Jesus to heaven as the Quran says what means {Rather, Allah raised him to Himself (The heaven).} (4:158)

But this raising to Himself is not connected with the resurrection of Jesus from the dead.

In fact, in the Quran, in the passage, longer passage in surah 4 verse 157 onwards, the impression we get is that Jesus was not crucified by his enemies. And the best way, I think, to understand that, is that his enemies did not succeed in killing him.

But instead of that, the Quran says God raised Jesus to the heavens. So, we at least agree with our Christian friends that Jesus ascended into heaven. Our difference is over the question of the crucifixion itself.

Jesus’ Birth

In the Quran, we have a story that is similar to the Gospel according to Luke where the angel comes to Mary and gives her a glad tidying that she will have a son. She’s surprised. How can I have a son when no mortal has touched me, she says.

And the response from the angel is that this is easy for God. Whenever He decrees something, He only says to it (كُن) be and it becomes. So, Muslims understand from this that Jesus was born miraculously and specially.

Does that indicate his divine sonship?

For Muslims, no.

This just indicates that God is capable of creating by a wide variety of means. Most people are born in a normal way. And Jesus was born in a special way. But everyone is created by God.

Miracles of Jesus

In the Quran, it is mentioned that he healed the blind, he cured the leper, he raised the dead back to life. And all of this is done with the permission of God.

Something that is uniquely mentioned in the Quran, but is not mentioned in the canonical Gospels, is that Jesus was able to fashion birds out of clay and then breathe into them. And they would become alive. But again, by the permission of God.

And now we should add here that the Muslim perspective is always that Jesus is acting as an agent of God, as God’s emissary, His messenger. And all of the power that is bestowed on him is coming from another source, from God, Who is his creator and Who is his God.

So from the Muslim perspective, there is only one God and it is the same God that Jesus himself worshiped.

The Christian Perspective

From the Christian perspective, Jesus was a miracle worker because he was the second person of the Holy Trinity, that he himself was God. And that belief actually developed in history over time.

People began at one time to think of Jesus as the son of God in a metaphorical sense, meaning that just as the prophets of old were regarded as sons of God. And Jesus began to be proclaimed in this way.

This became especially important in the context in which the early Christian Gospel was being preached in the Greco-Roman world, where people were already … some heroes and important figures were already considered to be sons of God.

Like Caesar, for example, was considered to be the son of God. So, if you wanted to say something important about Jesus, you needed to use that terminology, so people could say, okay, you have somebody special there as well.

But the term “son of God” was eventually and very quickly understood by others in a literal sense. So then, it was thought that Jesus is literally the son of God and it would be a later phase for someone to think of Jesus as being the Son of God and therefore in some way God Himself, somewhere equal to God.

But if he’s equal to God, you cannot have two divine beings of equal status. Then somehow, they have to be one. So, these are developments that went stage by stage over time. So, that we can find in the Apostles’ Creed from the second century there is no mention that Jesus is as a god.

Then in the Creed from the Council of Nicaea in the year 325 AD, however, we have it explicitly stated that Jesus is very God of very God. So, you see a development from no mention that he’s God.

I hope this helps answer your question. Please keep in touch.

Walaikum Asalam.