Günter Lüling
Günter Lüling was a German Protestant theologian, philological scholar and pioneer in the study of early Quranic studies and Islamic origins. From 1962 to 1965 he was the Director of the German Goethe-Institut in Aleppo, Syria.
Thesis
A student of Albert Schweitzer and Martin Werner, he attempted to demonstrate the textual link between pre-Islamic Christian hymnody in the Middle East and the composition of the Qur'an. He theorized that the early believers of what later became Orthodox Islam were one of the last communities sticking to a — what Lüling believed to be the true — non-Trinitarian Christian creed, for whom Jesus and the Holy Spirit were not divine. Their theological positions were adopted by later generations and evolved to become an ethno-centric religion of Arabs — Islam. He also proposed that the Meccan and Central Arabian adversaries of Muhammad, the "mushrikun",, were not polytheist pagans but Trinitarian Christians — the associates being Jesus and the Holy Spirit. In early post-prophetic times mushrikun was reinterpreted from its original meaning to become "idolators" or "pagans".An example of what Lüling believes to be the underlying Christian hymn of the Quran is Quran 96 (Al-ʻAlaq), which Lüling believes was originally addressed to Christians not Muhammad. With his approach of research Lüling was an early representative of the "Saarbrücken School" which is part of the Revisionist School of Islamic Studies.