Surah 3. Aal-Imran, Ayah 39

In view of the fact that the expression kalimah if often used in the Qur'an to denote an announcement from God, or a statement of His will, or His promise (e.g., 4:171 , 6:34 and {115}, 10:64 , 18:27 , and so forth), we must conclude that in the above passage, too, the "word from God" which would be confirmed by the birth of John (described in the Gospels as "John the Baptist") refers to a divine promise given through revelation: and this, indeed, is the interpretation adopted by the famous philologist Abu 'Ubaydah Ma'mar ibn al-Muthanna, who lived in the second century H. and devoted most of his labours to the study of rare expressions in the Arabic language; his identification, in the context under discussion, of kalimah with kitab ("revelation" or "divine writ") has been quoted by Razi in his commentary on this verse and is, moreover, agreeable with a similar announcement conveyed to Mary regarding the birth of Jesus (see verse {45} of this surah).

Notice: "a Word from Allah", not "the Word of Allah", the epithet that mystical Christianity uses for Jesus. As stated in iii. 59 below, Jesus was created by a miracle, by Allah's word "Be", and he was.