[86] That the types of miracles that would have vindicated the martyrs did not occur is symptomatic of the mixed sentiments of the Cordoban Christian community. Direct pressure from the Muslim authorities no doubt contributed to the antipathy toward the martyrs. But again the fear of repercussions was neither the only nor even the most significant deterrent to local sympathy for the martyrs. As we suggested above, the religiously pluralistic environment of al-Andalus and the political domination of Muslims had, over time, a definite impact on the attitudes of the more assimilated Christians in the city. Consciously and unconsciously individual Christians learned how to balance the cooperative attitudes that would facilitate their incorporation into Andalusian society with their ongoing need to preserve their religious identity.

The repercussions of this process are perhaps nowhere more apparent than in the second of the objections raised against the martyrs. For in addition to the lack of miracles, Eulogius' opponents objected that his martyrs "suffered at the hands of men who venerated both God and a law and were not killed as ones summoned to sacrifice to the idols . . ."⁽¹⁾ Again the point was to discredit Isaac and the rest by contrasting the circumstances of their deaths with those of their ancient counterparts. But this time the issue was the character of the persecutors, not the victims. The Roman prefects were pagans who implemented sacrificial tests of imperial loyalty, leaving the ancient Christians no choice but to resist and denounce the Roman gods. On the other hand the Muslims, as Eulogius' opponents correctly observed, were monotheists who worshiped the same God as they, though living according to their own revealed law. This was, for the assimilated Christians, a very important difference. As far as they were concerned the fact that Islam was not a pagan religion served both [87] to legitimate their cooperative attitudes toward the Muslims and to render inappropriate the radical attitudes of the confessors.⁽²⁾

This emphasis on the common ground shared by Islam and Christianity as a basis for coexistence was no doubt inspired by traditional Islamic attitudes toward Christianity and Judaism. Because the Muslims considered Muhammad the last recipient of a long series of revelations beginning with those experienced by Abraham, they tended to stress the continuity of revealed truth and the consistent quality of its spokesmen. Perfectly cognizant of the unity of God, Moses and Jesus were as "muslim" (literally, "one who submits" to Allah) as Muhammad ever was. This respect for the pre-Muhammadan prophets manifested itself in the special treatment accorded to "peoples of the book" who, though suffering from the effects of corrupted texts, were nevertheless united in their recognition of the one God. The same perspective that governed Muslim relations with dhimmi populations provided subject Christians with a natural, pre-packaged way of justifying Christian interaction with, and assimilation into, the Islamic society of ninth-century Córdoba. It was the common religious denominator that mattered. The significance of the countless differences in belief and ritual that separated the two religions paled by comparison.

But if this perspective helped alleviate anxiety among the Andalusian Christians who worked and lived in close proximity to Muslims, it did so only at the cost of suggesting that, among other things, the Christological differences that separated Christianity and Islam were relatively insignificant. To argue against the sanctification of the martyrs on the basis of their religious kinship to their executioners, was to imply that the confessors, by merely testifying to the divinity of Christ, had not picked a sufficiently important point of doctrine to merit their self-sacrifice.

Not surprisingly, given his raison d'écrire, this type of "ecumenical" attitude toward Islam was entirely unacceptable to Eulogius:

Those who assert that these soldiers [martyrs] of our own times were killed by men who worship God and have a law, are distinguished by no prudence with which they might at least give heed to cautious reflection, because if such a cult or law is said to be valid, indeed the strength of the Christian religion must necessarily be impaired.⁽³⁾

What is the purpose of believing that a demoniac full of lies could speak the truth? that one enveloped in fallacies could provide a law? that a perverse grove could produce good fruit? In the meantime, that abominable one brings evil from the terrible treasure of his heart, and offers a wealth of impiety to the foolish crowd, so that both he and they are cast down into the eternal void.⁽⁵⁾

Just as Hilary of Poitiers, the principal Latin polemicist in the struggle against Arianism, hyperbolized the doctrinal deviance of Arius, transforming him into the most infamous of heresiarchs, so Eulogius placed Muhammad at the apex of error:⁽⁸⁾

Of all the authors of heresy since the Ascension, this unfortunate one, forming a sect of novel superstition at the instigation of the devil, diverged most widely from the assembly of the holy church, defaming the ancient authority of the law, rejecting the visions of the prophets, trampling the truth of the holy gospel, and detesting the doctrine of the apostles.⁽⁹⁾

Three characteristics of the false prophet, as depicted in the [89] gospels and the epistles, seemed, in Eulogius' opinion, to fit Islam's prophet like a glove. First of all, it made sense chronologically because Muhammad had experienced his visions some 600 years after Christ had closed the door behind him to any modification of his message. Secondly, it fit in terms of the sheer numbers of Muslims that had occupied the eastern, western, and southern shores of the Mediterranean, for Christ had specifically warned his followers that many would be led astray by such "ravenous wolves in sheep's clothing."⁽¹¹⁾ Finally, the "false prophethood" of Muhammad provided an explanation for both the existence of recognizably Christian themes within his doctrinal scheme, and their modification at his hands. It made sense that a false prophet, surfacing in the wake of Christian missionary success, would incorporate twisted versions of the more salient aspects of Christianity to "season his error," making it more attractive to prospective converts. This allowed Eulogius to account for, among other things, the Qur'anic afterlife: Muhammad had adopted it from Christianity, but had adapted it to meet his own lusty needs until it resembled a brothel.⁽¹²⁾

In terms, then, of the chronology of the two religions, the great number of Muslims, and the Christian doctrinal resonances within Islam, the New Testament image of the false prophet suited Islam. It thus provided Eulogius with the perfect way of sidestepping the criticism that Islam, as a religion that recognized the Christian God, did not merit the radical denunciations pronounced by the martyrs. Though admitting that Muslims were not pagans, the priest could nevertheless chastise his fellow Christians for allowing themselves to be led astray by one of the false prophets that Christ had predicted would emerge in his absence.

But if Eulogius selected this model because it made sense out of the readily observable characteristics of Islam in the ninth century, he also realized that it would provide him with a polemically useful way of assessing the character and motives of the movement's founder. For it made sense to him to describe the false prophet, defined as the perfect antithesis of the true prophet, as a parody of his holy counterpart. Inasmuch as John the Baptist, in the well-worn pattern of the Old Testament prophets, rejected all material things, living on locusts and honey in the wilderness, his antithesis would be expected to embrace every polluting aspect of the world. [90] Similarly, if the source of John's inspiration and the force that moved his lips was God, the devil had to be the one behind Muhammad's fabrication of revelation. If, in short, it made sense to see Islam as a false prophecy, then it made sense to see its founder as a diabolically inspired profligate.

The words that Eulogius put into the mouth of the priest Perfectus illustrate how he made polemical use of the contrast between the probity of the true prophet and the supposed degeneracy of Muhammad:

In what manner can he be considered one of the prophets, how can he avoid being punished by a curse from heaven, who, blinded by the beauty of Zainab, the wife of Zaid, one of his countrymen, and taking her on the basis of some barbaric law, as if an irrational horse or mule, joined himself to her in adultery, and claimed to have done it at the command of an angel?⁽¹³⁾

O head empty of brains and heart occupied with the privilege of Satan! O corrupt vessel and abode of unclean spirits! O tongue worthy of being cut in two by a sword! O instrument of the demons and symphony of the devil! What madness and insanity compel you to be polluted with such blasphemies? What, O sewer of filth, snare of perdition, abyss of iniquity and cesspool of all vice, has deprived you of your human senses?⁽¹⁴⁾

It is not difficult to understand why Eulogius incorporated this text into his argument. For while it clearly stated that Muhammad "made headway" in directing the Arab idolators toward God thereby conceding the monotheistic common ground of Christianity and Islam, it nevertheless left no doubt that the latter was a diabolically inspired product of a moral reprobate that merited the strongest repudiation.

Aside from "heresiarch" and "false prophet," Eulogius also applied the label "antichrist" to Muhammad, who, like Arius, earned the ignominious title by refusing to accept the divinity of Christ. Yet while Eulogius used the term praecursor antichristi interchangeably with pseudopropheta in reference to Muhammad, he passed up the opportunity to elaborate. Why? Because Alvarus was already working on just such an interpretation. The entire second half of the Indiculus luminosus, Alvarus' sole contribution to the defense of the martyrs, was dedicated to a line-by-line commentary on the passages in Daniel and Job that had traditionally been regarded as references to antichrist.

Alvarus began with the description of the fourth beast found in Daniel:

The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth, which shall be greater than all the kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it into pieces. And the ten horns of the same kingdom shall be ten kings: and another shall rise up after them, and he shall be mightier than the former, and he shall bring down three kings. And he shall speak words against the High One and shall crush the saints [92] of the most High: and he shall think himself able to change times and laws, and they shall be delivered into his hand until a time, and times, and half a time.⁽¹⁶⁾

Alvarus then moved on to Daniel 11. He quickly demonstrated how Muhammad had spoken "great things against the God of gods," and identified the god Maozim of the prophecy with the deity whom the Muslim muezzins venerated from the "fuming towers" of the mosques.⁽¹⁹⁾ Coming to the passage, "and he shall follow the lust of women," Alvarus launched into a tirade against Muhammad's sexuality, transforming him into a libertine worshiped by adulterous Arabs for his unmatched sexual prowess.⁽²⁰⁾ Moreover, he ridiculed the paradise of the Qur'ân, depicting it as a supernatural brothel.⁽²¹⁾

Alvarus ended his treatise with another commentary, this time on Job 40 and 41. Gregory's classic interpretation of the behemoth and the leviathan as prefigurations of antichrist suggested to Alvarus the connections between the beasts and Muhammad. He found passages which seemed appropriate expressions of the shallowness of Islamic culture, the demonic source of Muhammad's inspiration, and the relentless ruin of ignorant Arab souls. He also found verses which put the problems of mid-ninth-century Córdoba in biblical perspective. The leviathan, breathing fire and belching smoke, and the behemoth, "wielding his tail like a cedar," [93] embodied the persecuting force which Christians, like the confessors, did well to combat.⁽²²⁾

There is every reason to believe that Eulogius not only knew of but applauded, the work of his friend. He may even have commissioned it, for both the initial apologetic portions of Eulogius' martyrologies and the first half of Alvarus' work decry the same lack of community support for the martyrs, inveigh against the same types of oppression, and laud the same zeal of the confessors. Alvarus' purpose was much the same as that of Eulogius: to present Muhammad and Islam in such a way as to justify the martyrs' suicidal behavior.

To date, the scholars that have given their attention to these specific characterizations of Islam and its prophet have had difficulty keeping this apologetic context in mind. This has led to some potential misconceptions about, for one thing, the supposed apocalypticism of Eulogius and Alvarus. R. W. Southern, for instance, described the two as "inspired by the idea that the rule of Islam was a preparation for the final appearance of Antichrist."⁽²³⁾ And Allan Cutler, as we have seen, went so far as to explain the actions of the confessors and the writings of Eulogius and Alvarus in terms of their supposed messianic expectations.

The fact that Eulogius used the term praecursor antichristi without even alluding to its apocalyptic implications is difficult to explain if he really was convinced that the martyrs were engaged in some sort of cosmic millenarian conflict. Even Alvarus, who spilled a great deal of ink substituting Muhammad for Antiochus, the behemoth, and the leviathan, carefully avoided extending the analogy to any speculation about the nature of the new age or the events that would usher it in. It is true that he offered his own estimate of the amount of time that Islam, as a political power, had left. But having arrived at a date, he immediately shifted his attention to a lengthy apology for undertaking a scriptural interpretation that contradicted Jerome. By so doing, he cut off his treatment of Daniel 7 after verse 25, leaving the succeeding passages, which pertained to the rendering of judgement after the fall of the eleventh horn, untouched. It would seem that Alvarus regarded the numerical calculation, like the identifications of the three displaced kings, as just one more means of identifying Muhammad with the Danielan antagonist, so that he could take advantage of the passages that [94] seemed particularly appropriate for riddling Muhammad's character.

Alvarus' choice of apocalyptic texts is also indicative of his restricted intentions. Job 40 and 41 contain nothing but detailed descriptions of the physical and behavioral characteristics of the two monsters, and as such, served perfectly the needs of an exegete looking for a biblical portrait of Muhammad but unconcerned with the details of the conflagration. Revelation was the obvious choice of texts for anyone trying to relate biblical eschatology to contemporary events, and Alvarus, aside from a short reference to Christians who bore the "mark of antichrist" by fraternizing with Muslims and becoming absorbed in Arabic culture, completely ignored it.

The strongest evidence against the attribution of any special apocalyptic sentiment to Alvarus, however, is the manner in which he vindicated his exegetical novelty in light of existing patristic interpretations: "I believe Antiochus, Nero, and all the others whom the blessed doctors reveal, to be confirmed precursors of antichrist. They would also consider Muhammad to be an instrument of antichrist if they could be here in our own times." Continuing in the same vein: "Jerome said that there were many antichrists, and we have seen what the apostle John preached. Whosoever, then, denies Christ as proclaimed by the apostles is an antichrist."⁽²⁴⁾ These passages suggest that Alvarus' decision to describe Muhammad as a praecursor antichristi did not necessarily mean that he anticipated the end of the world. There had already been many such figures, and Alvarus, by imputing such characteristics to Muhammad, was simply adding one more to the list.⁽²⁵⁾

Just as the point of Alvarus' exegesis was not to equate Muhammad's efforts with those of the ultimate antichrist of Revelation but, more generally, to portray him and his religious legacy as anti-Christian, so Eulogius' use of the Leyre biography is not necessarily indicative, as historians have claimed, of the extent of his knowledge of Islam. Dozy, in reference to the Cordoban clergy as a whole, wrote:

Living in the midst of the Arabs, nothing would have been easier than to instruct themselves [about Muhammad and his teachings]; but, obstinately refusing to partake of the resources that were to be found at their very doorsteps, they preferred to believe and repeat all the absurd fables that were reported elsewhere about the Prophet of Mecca.⁽²⁶⁾

It is possible that Eulogius did subscribe completely to the Leyre account of the life of Muhammad. The fact that he, like his Christian opponents, knew enough about Islam to distinguish it from paganism would not necessarily preclude ignorance about the details of the prophet's life. But given the fact that Eulogius had polemical reasons for using a biography that not only filled out his identification of Muhammad and the pseudopropheta, but added the weight of authority to his interpretation, we cannot simply assume that he considered this account accurate. We have already seen, in the previous chapter, that Eulogius' determination to defend the martyrs led him to offer a variety of explanations for the lack of miracles without fully considering the implications of his arguments. The same determination may account for his decision to use the Leyre account, not because it most accurately reflected his own understanding of the origins of Islam, but because it most effectively served his apologetic purposes.

1. Liber apologeticus martyrum 12 (PL 115:857; CSM 2:481).

2. Most previous historians have completely missed the point of this objection. Pérez de Urbel, for example, wrote: "The Christians, for their part, did not pay much attention to the Muslim teachings. Living amongst the Arabs and rubbing elbows with them on a daily basis, they disregarded their religion and despised their culture." San Eulogio, p. 67. Franke, p. 15, more accurately observed that al-Andalus was characterized by a "pervasive religious indifference."

3. Liber apologeticus martyrum 17-18 (PL 115:860-1; CSM 1:486).

4. Ibid. Galatians 1.9.

5. Ibid.

6. Liber apologeticus martyrum 19 (PL 115:861; CSM 2:487).

7. Eulogius thus becomes the first identifiable Latin ecclesiastic to assess Islam as a religious phenomenon. See my article, "The earliest Spanish Christian views of Islam," Church History 55 (1986), pp. 281-93. For a recent treatment of early Greek Christian views of Islam, see: John Moorhead, "The earliest Christian theological response to Islam," Religion 11 (1981), 265-74.

8. The exile of Hilary to Phrygia in 356 exposed him to all of the theological intricacies of the Arian conflict. His writings provided subsequent generations of Latin ecclesiastics with a vocabulary for dealing with later Christological heresies.

9. Liber apologeticus martyrum 19 (PL 115:861; CSM 2:487).

10. Matthew 7.15, 24.11, 24.24, etc. Eulogius was not the first Christian author to describe Islam as a heresy, or Muhammad as a false prophet. John of Damascus, whose depiction of the "Ishmaelites" in his treatise on heresies proved paradigmatic for generations of Greek Christians trying to cope with Islam, preceded him by more than a century. See: D.J, Sahas, John of Damascus on Islam: The "Heresy of the Ishmaelites" (Leiden, 1972); A. Khoury, Polémique byzantine contre l'Islam: VIIe au XIIIe siècles (Leiden, 1972).

11. Memoriale sanctorum 1.7 (PL 115:744; CSM 2:375), 2.1.2 (PL 115:766-7; CSM 2:398-9).

12. Memoriale sanctorum 1.7 (PL 115:744-5; CSM 1:375-6).

13. Memoriale sanctorum 2.1.2 (PL 115:766-7; CSM 2:398-9). Qur'ân S.33.37.

14. Memoriale sanctomum 1.7 (PL 115:745; CSM 2:376). Cf. Memoriale sanctorum 2.1.2 (PL 115:766-7; CSM 2:398).

15. Liber apologeticus martyrum 16 (PL 115:859-60; CSM 2:483-6).

16. Daniel 7:23-5.

17. Indiculus luminosus 21 (PL 121:535; CSM 1:293-4). Alvarus was the first Latin author to transform Muhammad into antichrist. Beatus of Liébana, the eighth-century Spanish author of the most popular commentary on Revelation, never mentioned Islam or its prophet.

18. Indiculus luminosus 21 (PL 121:536; CSM 1:294-5). Alvarus placed the beginning of Muhammad's reign in 625. Eulogius, on the basis of the Leyre biography, had the prophet "rise up" in 618.

19. Daniel 11.36, 38. Indiculus luminosus 25 (PL 121:540; CSM 1:298). Alvarus may have been playing on the similarities between Maozim and muezzin (muadhdhin), but it would be a mistake to suppose that he was ignorant of the difference. Daniel, Arabs and Medieval Europe, pp. 41-2.

20. Indiculus luminosus 23 (PL 121:538; CSM 1:296-7).

21. Indiculus luninosus 24 (PL 121:539; CSM 1:297-8).

22. Indiculus luminosus 26 (PL 121:542; CSM 1:301), 30 (PL 121:548; CSM 1:307).

23. Richard W. Southern, Western Views of Islam in the Middle Ages (Cambridge, Mass., 1962), p. 22.

24. Indiculus luminosus 34-35 (PL 121:553; CSM 1:312-13). I John 2.18: "Even now there are many antichrists."

25. From late antiquity, "antichrist" had two quite distinct meanings. The book of Revelation was the main source for the concept of a specific antichrist that would play a key role in ushering in the Last Days. But from the time of Tertullian (see, for example, Adversus Marcionem 5.16), Christian leaders also adopted a more general usage of the term based on I John 2.22 -- "He is the Antichrist who denies the Father and the Son" (cf. I John 2. 18, 4.2-3; 2 John 1.7) -- and applied it to heretics. It proved an especially popular epithet for those ecclesiastics, like Arius and Nestor, whose Christological views contradicted the formulae of the ecumenical councils. Hilary wrote of Arius: "When you preach the Father and Son as Creator and Creature, do you think that you can avoid, through disguised names, being regarded as antichrist?" De trinitate, 6.42 (PL 10: 191). Isidore of Seville included both the specific and general meanings of the term in Etymologies 8.11.20-2). For more information about antichrist, see: Richard Kenneth Emmerson, Antichrist in the Middle Ages: A Study of Medieval Apocalypticism, Art and Literature (Seattle, 1981).

26. Dozy 1:319.

27. Southern, pp. 25-6.

28. Glick, p. 176.