Bulletin du Musée National de Varsovie (41.2000)

biblical account but appears in the Talmud. The Koran relates that Abraham
prepared to sacrifice not Isaac (Ishak) but Ismael (Ismail), although his name
is not mentioned in the Koran. The Islamie version of the murder of Abel
(Habil) by Cain (Kabil) also differs from the Biblical account. According to
the Koran, both brothers madę sacrifices to God, but God accepted the
sacrifice of only one of them, which provoked the other brother’s envy.

Among the prophets appearing in both the Bibie and the Koran who have
been portrayed most freąuently in miniaturę paintings are Moses (Musa),
Isaac (Ishak), Henoch, (Idris) Samuel (Isma’il) Jeremiah (Irmiha), Hiob
(Ayyub), David (Daud), Jonah (Yunus) Elias (Ilyas), Solomon (Sulayman),
Jacob (Yakub), Joseph son of Jacob (Yusuf), John the Baptist (Yahya).

This essay is concerned with the figures and events taken from the Gospels
that appear in miniaturę paintings. The individuals from the New Testament
appearing most often are Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and Jesus himself. The
nineteenth Sura of the Koran, called Maryam, is devoted to Mary, but she is
freąuently mentioned in other Suras as well. The Koran does not consider
Mary divine, but only as the mother of Jesus. The archangel said to Mary,
“I am only a messenger of your Lord, in order to give you a pure boy.” She
said, “How shall I have a boy if no mortal has touched me, nor have I been
unchaste?” He said, “Thus it will be!” (Sura XIX, verses 19-21).4 5

The Koran portrays the life of Mary in a version similar to that of the
Gospels, yet nevertheless somewhat different from them. The Islamie painters
who depicted various events from the life of Mary, Jesus and the Holy Family
used the Christian representations that they found in illustrated manuscripts
of the New Testament, mainly in Syrian and Byzantine sources. For example,
the Annunciation is portrayed in accordance with the version familiar to the
Eastern churches, which relates that the Archangel Gabriel encountered Mary
while she was walking to a spring for water. There is a scene like this in
a mosaic in San Marco in Venice. Yet these artists were not always able to find
models in Christian painting and in those cases they were forced to create
their own images, especially when the version appearing in the New Testament
differed from that in the Koran. The story of the Nativity of Jesus may serve
as an example. According to the Koran, Jesus was not born in a stable, but in
a deserted and isolated place. A uniąue miniaturę in the work The History of
the Prophets (Qisas al-anbiya, late 16th century manuscript) presents such
a version. Jesus is lying on the ground in swaddling clothes, while Mary is
standing nearby, supported in her weakness by a palm tree (ill. 1). An interesting
Mughal miniaturę from the 17th century depicts the birth of Jesus in a tent.'

The representation of the Madonna and Child is one of the favourite
themes of Islamie miniaturę painting, particularly in India during the reign

4 This topie is discussed by Sir Thomas W. Arnold in Painting in Islam, New York 1965 (based
on the 1928 edition).

5 Cf. Album indiyskikh i persidskikh miniatur XVI-XVIII w., ed. by L.T. Gyuzalyan, Moscow
1962, ill. no. 55.

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