Chrześcijanie i muzułmanie ‒ wrogość od zarania?

Abstract

Many contemporary people perceive Christian-Muslim relations as intrinsically hostile and tend to assume that these contacts were such from the very beginning. However, a picture that appears from the early Christian writings shows a rather different situation. The article presents different early Christian interpretations of the rise and spread of Islam in the 7th century CE and contains the argument that mutual hostility between Christians and Muslims was not intended but emerged as a result of a series of events. After a brief presentation of the diversity of Christianity in the 7th century in the Middle East, the author investigates possible sources of Muhammad’s knowledge about Christianity and his attitude towards Christians, and finally focuses on early Christian reactions to Islam as expressed in chronicles and other writings preserved to our times.