The Doctrinal Debate of Michel Nau

This chapter analyzes and compares Michel Nau’s polemical and apologetic methods in refuting the “truth” in Islam. The subject of the chapter is Nau’s L’Etat Présent de la Religion Mahométane in which he engages in ethnographic narrative and perhaps fictionalized debate with Muslims. Nau’s descriptions of the Muslim population of Syria reflect degrees of detachment in line with the perceptions conveyed in the letters of the missionaries. He shows little hostility toward the general population, yet he was eager to represent Islam as an irrational and devious religion. The chapter underscores that Nau’s methods of argumentation were consistent with medieval approaches to refuting Islam, as was done by Peter the Venerable, Raymon Lull, and Riccoldo da Monte Croce among others. This comparison between Nau’s method and that of his predecessors clearly reveals the attachment to faulty medieval syllogistic reasoning.