Luke 10:25-37 in Hadith

Some of the earliest examples of adaptations of parts of the New Testament into Arabic are found in Hadith literature. One such example is an adaptation of Luke 10:25-37 (a passage that contains citations from Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18). For reference, here is the Syriac translation of this passage from the Peshitta:

Jesus then replies, telling the story of "the Good Samaritan" who went to great lengths to help a man that was attacked by bandits while receiving no help from a Priest and a Levite. Afterwards, Jesus asked the scribe:

Scholars have debated the meaning of Jesus' enigmatic answer to the scribe's question ("who is my neighbor?"). Jesus encourages him to emulate the Samaritan who helped the victim who was presumably a Judean. As some scholars explain, in Jesus' time, the Judeans and Samaritans were two distinct groups which were occasionally hostile or wary of each other. Therefore, Jesus' answer may imply that your "neighbor" does not have to be someone from within your group, but that the neighbor may also be a member of another group. In other words, the neighbor can be any human being no matter to which group he belongs.

A similar exchange between Jesus and an interlocutor is found in the Hadith corpus in a report attributed to the Successor Shumayt b. 'Ajlan of Basra. Versions of this report are found in the following works of three authors: 

• Ibrahim b. 'Abdallah b. al-Junayd al-Khuttali (d. 260/874) in his Kitab al-mahabba li-LLah ("The Book about Loving God"), tradition no. 207.

• Abu Bakr al-Bayhaqi (d. 458/1066) in his Shu'ab al-iman ("Branches of Faith"), tradition no 6502.   

• and Ibn 'Asakir (d. 571/1176), citing al-Bayhaqi, in his Tarikh Madinat Dimashq ("The History of Damascus") under the entry for Jesus.

The chains of transmission of these versions converge on the figure of Shumayt himself, who may have originated this report. Alternatively, the report originates with his son or student. On the one hand, Shumayt was a student of the famous Basran ascetic al-Hasan al-Basri (d. 110/728). On the other hand, one of Shumayt's students was the Basran Ja'far b. Sulayman (d. 178/794). Therefore, Shumayt probably died in the middle of the second Islamic century.

Here is Shumayt's version as it appears in al-Khuttali's book:

The similarity between this report and Luke 10:25-37 is clearly evident. Here, the interlocutor's follow-up question "who are the children of my kind" corresponds to the scribe's follow-up question "who is my neighbor." The report also resembles Mark 12:28-34 and Matthew 22:34-40. However the latter two passages from the New Testament do not contain the question "who is my neighbor." Therefore, the report seems to most closely resemble Luke 10:25-37 in this regard. Jesus' explanation in the report that one's kind, i.e. one's neighbor, is any human being calls to mind a possible moral of the story of the good Samaritan, that any human can be your neighbor, no matter his tribal or confessional affiliation.

In the report, Jesus calls to love God and be devoted to him with three personal things: (1) one's heart, (2) one's desire, and (3) one's soul. This echoes Deuteronomy 6:5's commandment to love god with three things (1) your heart, (2) your soul, and (3) your might. When Luke cites this verse a fourth thing is added: (1) your heart, (2) your soul, (3) your might, and (4) your mind. Mark similarly has four things: (1) your heart, (2) your soul, (3) your mind, and (4) your might. Matthew has three: (1) your heart, (2) your soul, and (3) your mind. Since the list of the report includes only three things it is perhaps also inspired by Deuteronomy 6:5 or Matthew 22:37.

In the report, Jesus says that one should behave mercifully (tarham|ترحم) toward one's own kind, but in Deuteronomy 6:5 and its derivatives, one is required to love one's neighbor. Why then does the Islamic report speak of "mercy" instead of "love"? The word mercy may be inspired by the Syriac word "love" (tarham|ܬܪܚܡ), e.g., as found in the Peshitta's version of Luke 10:27. This Syriac word can mean "love" as well as "mercy," like its Arabic cognate. Thus, the report is very likely based on a Syriac text. 

The Bible and the NT uses the same verb "love" to describe how a person should treat God and his neighbor. However, the report uses two different verbs: It tells the person to "love" God, and to have "mercy" on the neighbor. This distinction is perhaps rooted in a theological consideration that the same verb cannot be used to describe both man's relation to God and his relation to his fellow man.

The statement "if you do a good deed, do not let it distract you etc." which appears at the end of the report appears to be an addition with no basis in the New Testament.

There is another report that closely resembles Shumayt's report. It is on the authority of the Medinan Sa'id b. Abi Sa'id al-Maqburi (d. ca. 123/741). Some versions of this report are found in the works of these authors:

• Ibn Hanbal, Kitab al-zuhd ("On Asceticism"), tradition no. 332.

• Abu 'Ubayd, al-Khutab wa-l-mawa'iz ("Speeches and Sermons"), under the chapter about Jesus.

• Abu Bakr Ahmad b. Marwan al-Dinawari, al-Mujalasa wa-jawahir al-'ilm ("Study Sessions and Gems of Knowledge"), tradition no. 2249.

The chains of transmission of these versions converge on the figure of Yazid b. Harun of Wasit (d. 206/821), who cites a Medinan chain of transmission. He may have invented this report attributing it to al-Maqburi who was Shumayt's contemporary or slightly older than him. 

Here is al-Maqburi's version as it appears in Ibn Hanbal's book:

Here Jesus calls to love God and be devoted to him with three personal things: (1) your heart, (2) your perseverence (كدود or in some variants كدح), and (3) your might. The phrase "your soul" (نفسك) is also mentioned here though it has been transposed to the commandment to love one's neighbor: "behave mercifully toward the children of your kind as you behave toward your soul." 

Al-Maqburi's report ends with the Golden Rule ("Whatever you do not want to be done to you, do not do to others"). This rule does not appear in relation, or in proximity, to Luke 10:25-37, Mark 12:28-34, and Matthew 22:34-40. It does appear elsewhere in the New Testament in Luke 6:31 and Matthew 7:12 (see my discussion here). Whoever is responsible for the wording of al-Maqburi's report must have added the Golden Rule as it is thematically related to Leviticus 19:18 ("love thy neighbor as yourself"). The addition of the rule is a sign that al-Maqburi's report is more developed than Shumayt's report. 

The relation between the report of al-Maqburi and that of Shumayt is not totally clear. Al-Maqburi's report may be derived from Shumayt's report or, less likely, vice versa. Alternatively, they both derive from a common source. In any case, both reports are adaptations of Luke 10:25-37, probably from a Syriac source. Shumayt's adaptation can probably be dated to his lifetime, to the last decades of Umayyad era or the first decades of the Abbasid era.

1st uploaded March 2026