'The Messengers Passed Away Before Him'

S 3:144 And Muhammad is nothing but a messenger. The messengers passed away before him. So if he dies or is killed, you turn back on your heels? And he who turns back on his heels will not harm Allah at all. And Allah will reward the grateful.

Can Allah Be Harmed?

S 5:75 The Messiah the son of Maryam is nothing but a messenger. The messengers passed away before him and his mother is truthful. The two of them used to eat food. See how we make the signs clear to them. Then see how deluded they are!

In both verses we read that the messengers passed away before the person being spoken of. If 'Muhammad' in the first verse refers to the founder of Islam, then how was he a messenger? It doesn't say: 'The other messengers.' As Isa elsewhere is called a messenger, then it follows that he died if we understand from the word khalat that he died. .

Isa's Death

Tawaffa (Cause To Die)

In the second, the subject is the Messiah. There is no 'was' in the text, so we may conclude from this verse that he is alive, his mother too. But although it says that he is a messenger and other passages making it clear that he died, it says that the messengers passed away (again it doesn't say 'The other messengers') before him, which suggests that he wasn't a messenger.

Verb

[edit]

خَلَا • (ḵalā) I (non-past يَخْلُو (yaḵlū), verbal noun خُلُوّ (ḵuluww) or خَلَاء (ḵalāʔ))

1. to be empty, to be devoid (of) (+مِنْ (min) or عَنْ (ʕan))

2. to pass synonyms ▲

   Synonym: مَضَى (maḍā)  خلا - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

   
   

   As this word is used, it isn't necessarily so that 'the messengers' died. They just passed.

Still a Messenger and Prophet?