Introduction

Let's start with the question of whether it was really a misunderstanding. To do this, we will elaborate three postulates about the credibility of Muhammad and its message:

• If Muhammad did receive a revelation, and if this revelation is authentic, then Islam is the true religion, Jesus is not God, has not been crucified and has not been resurrected;
• If he did not receive it or said he did not receive it, then his disciples misunderstood him, so we are faced with the most colossal misunderstanding in history;
• If he did not receive it at all, but said he did, he lied in bad faith and it was not a misunderstanding, but a fraud.

For us Christians, the first postulate is unacceptable. If it were true, in fact, the foundation of our faith (a faith that, as we have seen, is based on thousands of testimonies and historical documents) would be missing.

On the other hand, the second statement also seems difficult to accept, at least from a scholarly point of view: the hypothesis that Muhammad has been misunderstood is rather strange, mainly because his intention to make himself believe to be a prophet, and not just any prophet, but the last one, the seal of the prophets, is proven.

Therefore, the third hypothesis is the most plausible, so much so that Dante, in the Divine Comedy, places Muhammad, precisely because of his bad faith, in the lower circles of Hell: "Or vedi com'io mi dilacco! Vedi come storpiato è Maometto!" [1] (Hell XXVIII, 30). Others, especially St. John Damascene, identify his message as a Christian heresy destined to die out in a few years.

In any case, it is difficult, if not impossible, to provide a precise and unequivocal answer to the complex questions we have asked. The most widespread opinion among contemporary Islamologists, then, is that Muhammad was really convinced, at least in the first phase of his preaching, in Mecca, in which he plays the role of a heated religious reformer and nothing more, of having received a true divine revelation.

Even more convinced appears later, in the next phase of his public life, called Medinese (to contrast it with the first, known as Meccan), that it was right and necessary to give men a simple religion, in comparison with the monotheisms that existed until then and that he himself had known more or less; a religion stripped of all the elements that did not seem really useful, especially for him.

Everything happened in different phases, in a kind of schizophrenia that caused many doubts regarding the so-called revelation and the bearer of the revelation, even among the most convinced supporters of the self-proclaimed prophet.

The context: the pre-Islamic Arabia of the ǧāhilīya.

The 1975 film "The Message" describes in detail what Mecca was like at the beginning of Muhammad's preaching: a pagan city, immersed in the ǧāhilīya (in Arabic and in Islam, this name, which translated means "ignorance," is attributed to the period before the advent of Islam itself). At that time, in the 6th century CE, Arabia was a frontier area, completely cut off from the so-called civilized world.

It was cut off from the traditional trade routes and the caravan routes (which passed through the "desert ports" such as Palmyra, Damascus or Aleppo to enter Mesopotamia and then, passing the Persian Gulf, reach India and China). However, in periods when the same trade routes were not passable due to wars and political instability, Arabia became a crossroads of great importance. In such cases, there were two routes followed by the caravans: one passed through Mecca, the other through Yaṯrib (Medina).

The cradle of Islam is located right in this area, called Ḥiǧāz, where Mecca (the homeland of Muhammad, born in 570 or 580) and Medina (a city where Muhammad himself took refuge after the disputes arising from his preaching in Mecca: period called hiǧra, in English hegira) are located, main inhabited centers around which orbited nomadic Bedouin tribes, always in struggle with each other.

Herding, hunting, raiding caravans and raids against rival tribes were the main means of subsistence and the harshness of life forged the character of the Bedouins, who had an ideal of virtus, a code of honor: murūwa. This unites the concepts of hospitality and inviolability of the guest, fidelity to the word given, ruthlessness in ta‛r, i.e. revenge for bloodshed and shame suffered.

The religiosity of the nomadic and sedentary people of pre-Islamic Arabia was purely fetishistic: sacred stones were venerated, with vague notions about the survival of the soul after death (completely absurd and mocked was the concept of the resurrection of the flesh, later preached by Muhammad).

Some places were considered holy, in particular the shrine of the Ka‛ba in Mecca, where, during certain proclaimed holy months, people made pilgrimages and held festivals and fairs (in particular poetic contests).

In Mecca, gods such as Ḥubal, Al-Lāt, Al-‛Uzzāt and Al- Manāṯ were worshipped, as well as the Black Stone, set in a wall of the Kaaba, a kind of Arab pantheon in which was also the effigy of Christ (the only one not destroyed by Muhammad at the time of his triumphant return from the hegira in 630).

Before the advent of Islam, Arabia (which had seen the flourishing of a great civilization in the south of the peninsula, that of the Minaeans and Sabeans before and of the Himyarites after, was formally under the rule of the Persians, who had expelled the Abyssinian Christians (a people who had flocked from Ethiopia to defend their co-religionists persecuted by the Sabean kings, of Jewish religion, after the massacre of Christians who were thrown by the thousands into a fiery furnace by King Ḍū Nūwās, in Naǧrān, in 523).

In the north, on the border of the Byzantine Empire, vassal kingdoms of Constantinople had been created, ruled by the Gasanid (sedentarized nomads of Monophysite Christian religion) and Laḥmid (Nestorians) dynasties: these states prevented Bedouin raiders from crossing the borders of the Empire, protecting the most remote regions from it, as well as the caravan trade.

Therefore, the presence of Christian and Jewish elements in the Arabian peninsula at the time of Muhammad is quite certain. These elements, however, were heterodox and heretical, suggesting that the "prophet" of Islam himself was misled about many of the Christian and Jewish doctrines.

Muhammad

There is no precise historical information about the first phase of Muhammad's life (a situation curiously analogous to that of Jesus). About himself, on the other hand, there are many legends that today are part of the Islamic tradition, even though these anecdotes have not been investigated by means of a detailed historical and textual analysis (which did happen, on the contrary, for the apocryphal gospels).

For this reason we find two different historiographies on the self-proclaimed prophet of Islam: one, precisely, Muslim; the other, the one we are going to consider, is the modern Western historiography, which is based on more reliable sources, as well as on the Koran itself, which can be considered, in one way or another, a kind of autobiography of the prophet. Muhammad.

The most certain date we have is 622 (I of the Islamic era), the year of the hiǧra, the hegira, emigration of Muhammad and his followers to Yaṯrib (later renamed Medina).

As for the year of the birth of Muhammad himself, the tradition relates, although not supported by sufficient concrete elements, 570, while several historians agree in giving birth to ours around 580, always in Mecca.

Muhammad was part of the Banū Qurayiš (also called Coraichites) tribe, was born when his father had already passed away and lost his mother at an early age. He was then received first by his grandfather and, after the latter's death, by his paternal uncle Abū Ṭālib.

At the age of about twenty, Muhammad took the service of a wealthy widow who was already of advanced age at the time: Ḫadīǧa, a kind of businesswoman who traded perfumes with Syria. With her (who later became famous as the first Muslim because she was in fact the first person to believe that he was the one sent by God) Muhammad married a few years later.

This union was apparently long, happy and monogamous, so much so that ‛Āʼiša, who, after Ḫadīǧa's death, would later become Muhammad's favorite wife, is said to have been more jealous of the deceased than of all the other wives in the life of the "prophet" of Islam.

With Ḫadīǧa, Muhammad had no children, while from the marriage with Āʼiša were born four daughters, Zaynab, Ruqayya, Fāṭima and Umm Kulṯūm. Muhammad's only son, Ibraḥīm, who died at a very young age, had a Christian Coptic concubine as his mother.

On behalf of Ḫadīǧa, Muḥammad had to travel with caravans to sell goods beyond the Byzantine border, i.e. in Syria. During these travels, he presumably came into contact with members of various heretical Christian sects (Docetists, Monophysites, Nestorians), being indoctrinated by them, without having, as an illiterate, the possibility of direct access to Christian sacred texts. However, we reiterate that elements of the Judaic and Christian faiths - or simply monotheistic ideas, ḥanīf, already existed in and around Mecca.

Everything changed, in Muhammad's life, when he was already around forty years old and abandoned paganism to adopt - and start preaching - monotheistic ideas. Muḥammad was convinced, at least in the early years of his "prophetic" mission, that he was professing the same doctrine of Jews and Christians and that, therefore, even these, as well as pagans, should recognize him as rasūl Allāh, messenger, sent from God.

It was only later, when he was already in Medina, that he himself pointed out the notable differences between his preaching and the official Christian and Jewish doctrine. In fact, the Koran contains distortions of the biblical narratives (both Old Testament and New Testament), as well as Muhammad's docetic ideas in Christology and his confusion regarding the doctrine of the Trinity (in his opinion formed by God, Jesus and Mary).

According to Ibn Iṣḥāq, the first biographer of Muḥammad, when he was asleep in a cave on Mount Ḥīra, outside Mecca, the angel Gabriel appeared to him with a brocade cloth in his hands and telling him to read ("iqrāʼ"); Muhammad, however, was illiterate, so it was the archangel who recited the first five verses of the sūra 96 (called "of the clot"), which, according to him, were literally imprinted on his heart.

This night is called laylat al-qadr, night of power. At first, Muḥammad did not think of himself as the initiator of a new religion, but as the recipient of a revelation transmitted also to other envoys of Allah who had preceded him. He believed, in fact, that what inspired him were passages from a heavenly book, umm al-kitāb (mother of the book), already revealed also to Jews and Christians (called by himself ahl al-kitāb, i.e. people of the book).

Speaking again of the early period in Mecca, it is not difficult to imagine the reaction of the city's notables to Muhammad's preaching, for none of them wanted to subvert the religious status quo of the city, endangering its economic prosperity and ancient traditions, just because of the word of Muhammad, who, although urged, never performed any miracles or gave any tangible sign of the revelations he claimed to have received.

Thus began a persecution of the "prophet" and his followers, to the point that Muhammad had to send at least eighty of them to Abyssinia, to take refuge under the protection of a Christian king.

The Islamic scholar Felix M. Pareja, as well as older Islamic authors, for example Ṭabarī e al-Wāqidī, places in this period the famous episode of the "satanic verses", to which the Qur'an seems to refer in sūra 22/52. [3]

It happened, in fact, that Muhammad, in order to try to come to an agreement with the fellow citizens of Mecca, would have been tempted by Satan while reciting the sūra 53/19 and would have proclaimed:

"How is it that you worship al-Lāt, al-‛Uzzāt and al-Manāṯ Lât, 'Uzza and Manât? They are the exalted Ġarānīq, from whom we await their intercession."

As we have seen, these three goddesses were a fundamental part of the Meccan pantheon and protagonists of various rites that attracted hundreds of pilgrims to the Ka‛ba every year: their title was that of "three sublime cranes" (Ġarānīq) and admitting their existence, in addition to the power of intercession with Allah, if on the one hand it meant reconciling with the Meccan elite and allowing the return of their exiled followers, on the other it meant discrediting himself and the rigid monotheism he had professed until then.

Evidently, the game was not worth playing, so much so that the next morning the "Messenger of God" recanted and declared that Satan had whispered those verses in his left ear, instead of Gabriel in his right; they were to be considered, therefore, of satanic origin. In their place, the following were dictated:

"How is it that you worship al-Lāt, al-‛Uzzāt and al-Manāṯ? [These three idols] They are only names that you and your fathers have invented, and Allah gave you no authority for them."

The episode just cited brought even more discredit to Muhammad, who, with the death of his wife and his uncle-protector Abū Ṭālib, remained without two valid supporters.

Given the situation, he was forced (and the sūra of this period reveal the desolation and abandonment in which he found himself, with the sūra of the ǧinn sūra counting how many goblins became Muslims at those very times) to seek protection elsewhere, something he accomplished by finding valid listeners among the citizens of Yaṯrib, a city north of Mecca, then populated by three Jewish tribes (the Banū Naḍīr, the Banū Qurayẓa and the Banū Qaynuqā‛ and by two Bedouin tribes).

Between the Jews and the Bedouins there was not a good relationship and Muhammad, by virtue of his fame, was called to be an impartial arbiter between the contenders, so that in the year 622, the first year of the Islamic era, began the hiǧra, hegira of the "prophet" and his followers, about one hundred and fifty. The term hiǧra does not mean just "emigration," but estrangement, a kind of renunciation of citizenship and belonging to Mecca and the tribe, with the consequent deprivation of all protection.

Yaṯrib would later be called Medina (Madīnat al-nabī, the city of the prophet). Newly arrived here, in order to win over the Jews, who constituted the wealthy and notables of the city, M. introduced innovations in the primitive Islamic ritual, in particular by orienting the qibla, the direction of prayer, toward Jerusalem. However, when the Jews themselves became aware of Muhammad's confusion in biblical matters, they mocked him, making enemies with him forever.

At that very moment, then, the division began to take place between what would evolve as Islam, on the one hand, and Judaism and Christianity, on the other. Muhammad could not admit that he was confused or that he did not know the biblical episodes he had repeatedly quoted to his followers. What he did, then, was to use his ascendancy over his disciples and accuse Jews and Christians of deliberately falsifying the revelation they received; the same ascendancy and authority are sufficient for Muslims today to continue to believe such accusations.

Once again, however, the intention of Muhammad was not to found a new religion, but to try to restore what, according to him, was the pure and authentic, primitive faith, based on Abraham, who for him was neither a Christian nor a Jew, but a simple monotheist, in Arabic ḥanīf. By that word he was known to the pagan Arabs, who considered themselves his descendants through Ishmael.

And so it was that, in the Qur'an, Ishmael became Abraham's beloved son, instead of Isaac; it is Ishmael whom Abraham is commanded to sacrifice in Jerusalem, where the Dome of the Rock stands today; it is Ishmael who, together with his father, builds the shrine of the Ka‛ba in Mecca, where, moreover, his mother Hagar had taken refuge after being driven out of the desert by Sarah.

Always to take revenge on the Jews, even the direction of the qibla changed, and it was oriented towards Mecca. Islam became the national religion of the Arabs, with a book revealed in Arabic: the reconquest of the holy city thus became a fundamental purpose.

In Medina, in the figure and in the person of Muhammad, religious and political authority meet, and it is there that the concepts of umma (the community of Muslim believers), of Islamic state and of ǧihād, holy war, are born: the community of Medina, with the various religions. That were professed there (Muslim, Jewish, pagan), lived in peace under the rule of the arbiter, and already political and religious authority, who came from Mecca.

The Muslims prospered particularly well, guaranteeing themselves considerable income through raids on passing caravans. Successes and failures (successes were called divine work, failures lack of faith, indiscipline and cowardice) alternated in the campaigns against the Meccans.

In a few years, however, Muhammad decided to get rid of the Jewish tribes that had become hostile in the meantime: the first were the banū Naḍīr, followed by the banū Qaynuqā‛, whose property was confiscated but whose lives were spared; a more atrocious fate, on the other hand, befell the banū Qurayẓa, whose women and children were enslaved, and whose men, once their property was confiscated, had their throats slit in the square (there were about seven hundred dead: only one of them was spared as he converted to Islam).

In the sixth year of the Hegira Muhammad In the sixth year of the Hegira M. claimed to have received a vision in which he was given the keys of Mecca. He then began a long campaign of reconquest, violating a truce (something that was terribly dishonorable for the time) and taking, one after another, the rich Jewish oases north of Medina. The economic and military success was a magnet for the Bedouins, who began to convert en masse (obviously not for religious reasons). It all culminated in the triumphal entry into the city of origin in 630, without encountering resistance. The idols present in the Ka‛ba (except the effigy of Christ) were destroyed.

The following two years saw the consolidation of the strength and power of M. and his followers, until, in 632, the "prophet" died, in the midst of fever and delirium, without indicating successors.

What emerges from an analysis of Muḥammad's life is above all his great ambiguity, along with his personality that scholars often define schizophrenic, because of how contradictory his attitudes and speeches are, as well as the very revelations reported in the Qur'an. It is for this reason that Muslim scholars and theologians will resort to the practice of nasḫ wa mansūḫ (abrogating and abrogating, a procedure according to which, if one passage in the Qur'an contradicts another, the second nullifies the first). [4]

It may serve as an example of this the episode in which M. goes to the house of his adopted son Zayd (this same episode is quoted in the conclusion of this article) and many others: extravagant and suspicious circumstances in which Allah literally comes to Muhammad's aid and reveals to him verses admonishing the unbelievers and the doubtful who dare to accuse him of having entered into contradiction; or also words encouraging Muhammad himself not to want to follow the laws and customs of men and to accept the favors that God bestowed only on him:

"Sometimes they have wanted to see themselves in Muhammad two almost contradictory personalities; that of the pious agitator of Mecca and that of the overbearing politician of Medina. [---] In his various aspects he seems to us generous and cruel, timid and bold, warrior and politician.

His way of acting was extremely realistic: he had no problem in abrogating one revelation by replacing it with another, in going back on his word, in making use of hired assassins, in letting the responsibility for certain actions fall on other people, in making up his mind between hostilities and rivalries. His was a policy of compromises and contradictions always aimed at achieving his goal. [Monogamous until his first wife lived, he became a great friend of women as circumstances permitted and showed a predilection for widows". [5]

Annex

1. "Look how I am torn! Look how battered Muhammad is!". Dante places Muhammad among the sowers of discord in the IX Bolgia of the VIII Circle of Hell, whose penalty is to be torn to pieces by a demon armed with a sword. Muhammad appears in Canto XXVIII, vv. 22-63, cut from chin to anus, with entrails and internal organs hanging between his legs; he himself appears to Dante and shows his wounds by opening his chest, explaining that he and his companions have sown scandal and schism in the world, for which reason they are now fessi, that is, cut by a demon who mutilates them with a demon who mutilates them with a sword (with the wounds healing and then being reopened).
2. The five pillars of Islam are: šahāda, the profession of faith; ṣalāt, prayer five times a day; zakāt, almsgiving or tenth; ṣawm, fasting in the holy month of ramaḍān; ḥaǧǧǧ, pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in a lifetime in the month of ḏu-l-ḥiǧǧǧa).
3. "And We have not sent before you [O Muhammad] a Messenger or a Prophet without Satan whispering to his people that they should not understand correctly when they conveyed to them the divine precepts. But Allah thwarts the plans of Satan and makes clear His precepts, for Allah is All-Knowing, All-Wise."
4. It is thus, for example, that we observe Meccan verses, therefore older, speaking of Christians as the best among men, while other verses from the Medinan period encourage Muslims to fight against fighting Christians until the latter do not pay, humiliated, the tributes of the ǧizya and the ḫarāǧ, i.e. the particular taxes that Christians and Jews must pay to the Treasury of the Muslim state to benefit from its protection as second-class citizens.
5. Pareja, F.M., Islamologia, Rome, Orbis Catholicus, 1951, p. 70.

A brief profile of Benedict XVI

The pontificate of Benedict XVI lasted only a few years. eight yearsNevertheless, he has been transcendental in the history of the Church for his reflections on faith and doctrine. Faithful to his motto, "collaborator of the truth", the intellectual impulse to the dialogue between faith and reason, and the fight against abuses and division in the Church were the standards of his pontificate.

He always had a clear and fraternal stance with all persons and theological positions that deviated from the truths of faith of the Church.

On the other hand, Benedict XVI considered that it was necessary to act in favor of a just order in society, and that the common good should be promoted through economic, social, legislative, administrative and cultural action. His three encyclicals are the culmination of his great theological work in response to the problems of today's world.

Some milestones in his life

• June 29, 1951: Joseph Ratzinger was ordained priest with his brother Georg in Freising Cathedral.
• In 1953: D. in Theology with the dissertation People and House of God in the Doctrine of the Church of St. Augustine.
• March 24, 1977: appointed him Archbishop of Munich and Freising. Joseph Ratzinger, not yet 50 years old when he was appointed archbishop, was already a well-known and respected theologian. That appointment gave an unexpected turn to his life. He was a student, researcher and teacher of theology. He accepted government positions out of obedience and service to the Church. The same year the Pope also created him a cardinal.
• April 19, 2005: Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was elected as the successor of Peter and presented to the world as Pope Benedict XVI at 78 years of age. In his first words he remembered St. John Paul II and defined himself as a "simple and humble worker in the vineyard of the Lord". Following the example of his predecessor, he visited 24 countries.
• December 25, 2005: Publishes his first encyclical Deus caritas est dedicated to the love of God. As Pope he continually speaks of the "joy of being a Christian".
• November 30, 2007: Publishes the encyclical Spe Salvi where he deals with the theme of hope. He also published the first part of his work Jesus of Nazareth, a great theological and pastoral work, which he finished publishing in 2012.
• June 29, 2009: Publishes his latest encyclical Caritas in veritate on social justice in the 21st century. It was in the latter that he criticized consumerism and also the current economic system completely removed from the common good.
• February 11, 2013:  He announced his resignation from the pontificate, generating a cultural and theological revolution, which will shape his great legacy to the history of the Church, and will definitively mark the way in which popes will have to conceive their pontificates.
• December 31, 2023: Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI dies in Rome at the age of 95. With him disappears the last of the pontiffs personally involved in the work of the Vatican Council II.

The contribution of Benedict XVI's work and theological thought to Christianity and humanity is already prolific and effective today. One of his concerns was to respond to current problems through reflection and interpretation of the Holy Scriptures.

Joseph Ratzinger worked closely for many years with St. John Paul II, who appointed him to the position of prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in November 1981, where he became known as a theologian, inspiring the Church for 31 years.

He was a direct witness of the post-conciliar crisis, of the questioning of the essential truths of the faith and of the experimentation in the liturgical field. Already in 1966, one year after the end of the Vatican Council II, said he saw the advance of a "cut-price Christianity".

Thus, the theologian pope was able to express with great argumentative force and, at the same time, with great spiritual unction what constitutes the heart of the Christian faith and the mission of the Church. In the face of ecclesiastical scandals, Benedict XVI called for conversion, penance and humility.

In September 2011, he invited the Church to be less worldly: "historical examples show that the missionary witness of the Church detached from the world is clearer. Freed from material and political burdens and privileges, the Church can dedicate herself better and in a truly Christian way to the whole world; she can be truly open to the world...".

Jesus Christ: the central core of Joseph Ratzinger's theology

His legacy as a theologian and pastor, the main elements of which it is good to remember at this time and where the work of a lifetime comes together, focuses on the figure of Christ.

Jesus Christ present in scripture and in the liturgy, and his relationship with the Church and with Mariais the central core of his theology. In Jesus Christ, God himself has made himself visible and has shown mankind his saving Love.

Pointing out that this revelation of God is not a simple fact of the past, but a divine force of today and for the future, accessible in the Church of the saints, empowered as witnesses of the resurrection through the Holy Spirit.

Among the theological and ontological pillars of her thought is also the person, and the meaning that love, truth, beauty and hope have for her, themes that are reflected in her encyclicals.

For the proclamation of the Christian message, Benedict XVI insisted on both faith and reason; and from the relationship between the two we can deduce his conception of theology, catechesis and preaching. Finally, with regard to mission, his affirmations on ministry and preaching are interesting. Eucharist (with important implications for ecumenical theology), creation, religions and the relationship of the Church.

Benedict XVI: humility and service to the Church

Benedict XVI was one of the great theologians of the 20th and 21st centuries; an intellectual who sought throughout his life, through the study of theology, research and teaching, the face of God. At the same time, he was a simple man, very cordial and gentle, even shy, who placed his life at the total disposal and service of the Church.

When in 2005 he was elected Pope with the name Benedict XVI, he commented in an interview that during the conclave he prayed "to the Lord to elect someone stronger than me, but in that prayer He evidently did not listen to me". The name was not by chance, he chose it in honor of Benedict XV and Benedict of Nursia, the Pope of Peace and the initiator of monastic life in the West, respectively.

Resignation from the pontificate

One of the most surprising and humbling actions of Benedict XVI, as well as a demonstration of his courage, was the fact of his resignation as Pope. It was a historic event in the life of the Church. Only in 1294, seven hundred years earlier, Celestine V had resigned the papacy. The reality is that until that time no one thought that the bishop of Rome had an age limit. Pope Benedict XVI broke a millenary tradition and did so in a thoughtful and reasoned manner.

It is for all these reasons that the figure of Benedict XVI, as pope, theologian, formerly prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, is and will be of special transcendence for the history of the Church. He notoriously influenced Francis I, and will also influence subsequent papacies. His interpretative contributions to the Second Vatican Council have defined some of the lines of the Catholic Church, as have the dozens of works of extraordinary theological and metaphysical value that he wrote. His legacy will remain beyond and will reach heights that are now difficult to value in their just measure.