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Hi, Frank —
- Where are you getting your information?
It all depends on what you mean by sainthood.
- Do you mean recognizing individuals
as exemplars of holiness?
- Do you mean recognizing individuals
as being in Heaven?
- Do you mean recognizing people
as powerful intercessors?
- Do you mean veneration?
- Do you mean canonization?
I have never heard of Muslim saints
of the sort Christians have; it would
seem to me to interfere with their
practice of Monotheism. (Not that
the Christian concept of saints is
polytheistic, just that Muslims are
so fanatical about guarding their
Monotheism, it seems unlikely they
would conceive of sainthood in the
way that we do.)
Be that as it may, saints in the
Christian church go back to the earliest
years, so much so it's hard to provide
any proof of when the concept started.
You can find examples in the catacombs
from the early (first couple of centuries)
persecutions of Christians saying Saint
So-and-so, pray for us. You
can see from the Martyrdom of Polycarp
in the turn of the 2nd century how
after his martyrdom, the faithful
snatched up his bones reverently
and kept them for veneration. There
was undoubtedly a transition where
those asleep in the Lord were first
recognized as holy men and women
and referred to as holy So-and-so (meaning, this
person is a holy person) to
the point where Saint was considered
a title rather than an adjective
(in Greek and Latin, Saint and holy are
same word) and the position was a
bit more formal.
It was further formalized in the
Catholic church in, I believe, the
12th century when the present system
for recognizing saints, canonization,
was introduced, requiring multiple
miracles and an examination of the
person's life (prior to this, saints
were determined mostly by acclamation,
such as that you saw when Blessed
Teresa of Calcutta and the Venerable
Pope John Paul II died).
It may be, wherever you are getting
your information from, is confusing
the formal canonization process with
the existence of saints. One has
only to look at the Orthodox churches
(which broke off in the 11th century,
some in the 5th century) to see that
saints were recognized and venerated
long before this procedural change
in the Catholic Church.
So, saints in the Christian church
were venerated in every way they
are now in the early church long
before Islam in the 7th century.
Indeed:
- the Oriental Orthodox churches,
which broke off in the 5th century
- the Assyrian Church of the East,
which broke off in the 5th or
6th century
- the Eastern Orthodox churches,
which broke off in the 11th century
all venerate saints exactly as the
Catholic Church does, proving that
the practice pre-existed Islam in
the 7th century. Moreover, Islam
provoked a Christian heresy called
Iconoclasm, that is, the destruction
of icons. Icons are depictions of
saints. Thus, icons (and hence saints)
had to pre-exist Islam for Islam
to have that effect.
Hope this helps!
Eric
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