What Muslims Believe About the Virgin Mary

In our time sometimes it seems as if Muslims and Christians have no common ground whatsoever. But the unique place which Mary, the mother of Jesus, has in the Muslim faith provides a great deal of common ground between the two dissimilar religions.

In Islam, Mary is commonly called Maryam, Umm Isa--- Mary the mother of Jesus. No other woman is given greater mention than Mary in the Koran. The nineteenth Surah of the Koran is named after her and is mostly about her life. There is more mention of Mary in the Koran than in the Bible.

In the Koran, Mary is dedicated by her mother for service to God while she was still in the womb. Muslims do not believe in the Immaculate Conception of Mary, which is the teaching that Mary was born, by a special grace of God, without Original Sin, because Muslims don't believe in Original Sin.

The story of the Annuciation, when an angel came to announce that Mary would bear a son while yet a virgin, is affirmed in the Koran.

The virgin birth of Jesus is an article of faith in Islam, though Islam denies that Jesus had any divine nature. He is considered to be similar to Adam, who was also created without a human father.

Mary is considered to be the most virtuous of women. When Mohammed wished to praise his daughter Fatima, he said that she would be the highest of women in heaven after only the Virgin Mary.

One of the great shrines of Christianity is that of Our Lady of Fatima in Fatima, Portugal. The town of Fatima was named after a Muslim princess who lived in Portugal in the Middle Ages. This princess was named after Mohammed's daughter Fatima.

In 1917 in this town of Fatima, three shepherd children had a series of visions of the Virgin Mary. The children said at the final vision there would be a miracle that everyone could see. On Oct. 13^th, 1917, there occurred an event later known as the Miracle of the Sun, which was witnessed by believers and scoffers alike, and even by people in nearby towns.

There is some Christian speculation that the Virgin Mary was sent to a town with a Muslim name in order to show God's love for the Muslims. There have been a number of instances in which Muslims have shown respect for Our Lady of Fatima, in some cases even for the statue of Our Lady of Fatima in spite of the fact it is not a part of the Islamic faith to have statues and images.

Recently in Soul magazine, published by an American shrine of Our Lady of Fatima, it was told how Ilsur Metshin, the Muslim mayor of Kazan, Russia, authorized the funding and construction of a new church for the city's small Catholic minority. The church has a small chapel for a statue of Our Lady of Fatima. Perhaps this shows that the common ground of beliefs regarding the Virgin Mary can heal the wounds of mistrust between Christian and Muslim.