CHAPTER V

THE DOCTRINE OF THE DIVINE AND UNDIVIDED TRINITY IN THE UNITY OF GOD MOST HIGH

WHAT has been said in the fourth chapter concerning the way of salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ cannot be properly understood by the seeker for the truth until he has studied the doctrine of the Most Holy Trinity. Our use of the word Trinity is often a stumbling-block to our Muslim brothers, because they do not know what the Christian doctrine on this subject really is. Hence they fancy that it is directly contrary to belief in the One True God. But this is by no means the case. God forbid! On the contrary, the doctrine of the Divine Unity is the very foundation of our belief in the Trinity. All Christians believe in One God, not in three Gods.

Any one who studies the commentary of Jalalu'ddin on Surah v. 77, and his note, as well as those of Baizawi and Yahya' on Surah iv. 156, will see that these commentators fancied that the Christians believed that the Most Holy Trinity consisted of Father, Mother and Son, imagining that the Virgin Mary was a goddess, and was one of three separate Deities. Now there can be no doubt that in Muhammad's time the common people among the Christians were very ignorant and had fallen into gross errors, offering worship to the Virgin Mary and to the saints, just as ignorant Muslims to-day perform pilgrimages (زيارات) to the graves of dead Walis (أولياء). But as no man of learning can say that such conduct is in accordance with the teaching of the Qur'an. so no scholar now fancies that the errors of ignorant Christians in Muhammad's time should be supposed to represent the