Re: Return of Hazrat Isa A.S.
aoa, psyah,
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I feel some people here are being disingenuous when it comes to the term tawaffee, there are a myriad of meanings of this term.
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I assure you that we are not being disingenuous.
I may comment on your points of tawafee later. In short, my concentration was on a specific part of it that is tawafee used for a person not a thing and subject (Fa-il) being Allah.
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In English if someone has died we often say "he has passed on by" which people understand to mean "he has died" however literally it means "he came and went away again on his journey"
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first of all, we are not talking here about english. secondly, the term used for death is 'pass away' and not 'pass on by'. That is new to me wrt death. so please try not to cloud things. we already have lot of clutter here.
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First of all the verse has come as refutation to him being either harmed or killed ... so since the topic is about death then the refutation is about preservation of death ...
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Imam al-Zamakhshari (Persian 11[SUP]th[/SUP] century scholar) said in his tafseer regarding “INI MUTAWAFEEKA..’. He wrote ‘INI MUMEETAKA HATAF ANFAK..’ i.e., I will give you natural death. ‘‘MA QATALUHU’ and ‘MA SALABAHU’ explains ‘MUTAWAFEEKA’. All three terms points to three forms of death. He was not killed neither crucified (death due to crucifixion) so Allah will give him a natural death. Being tortured only doesn’t fit well here.
Pls consider following verse to understand the meaning of 'SALABUHU' :
5:33) The reward of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger and strive to create disorder in the land is only this that they be slain or crucified ....
So among the forms of punishment are slaying and crucifixion. Certainly, here 'YUSALABU' refers to death due to crucifixion and not just putting the convict on the cross.
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Second reason is that we all die once ... should Isa (AS) come again then he cannot have died and then be born again that is indeed reincarnation a belief outside Islam.
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This is not what we believe in. We don’t believe in any form of re-incarnation. When a person is called Hatim tai, it doesn’t mean that actual Hatim Tai is re-incarnated. It only means that he is good in philanthropy similarly as Hatim was. Similarly, if a person is called Rustam or Hercules, it means he is strong because physical strength was Hercules’ and Rustam’s main attribute. So coming of Isa (as) means a person from within Ummah of the holy prophet(pbuh), who will be raised in later days. As the holy prophet (pbuh) was compared to Moses (as) in Quran and in Old Testament prophecies, similarly a messiah similar (not same) to Jesus (as) will come in later days. I will talk about this aspect sometime.
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Third reason is that there are other verses and words in the context that refer to the raising ... and the raising cannot be meant as a form of elevation of dignity and honour as earlier discussed.
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Pls show me the verses you are referring to. Although I have commented on this point earlier but here are some verses where ‘Rafa’ is used for elevation/exaltation of honor.
2:253) These Messengers have We exalted, some of them above others: among them there are those to whom Allah spoke; and some of them He exalted by degrees of rank
6:83) And that is Our argument which We gave to Abraham against his people. We exalt in degrees of rank whomso We please. Thy Lord is indeed Wise, All-Knowing.
6:165) And He it is Who has made you successors of others on the earth and has exalted some of you over the others in degrees of rank, that He may try you by that which He has given you.
7:177) And if We had pleased, We could have exalted him thereby; but he inclined to the earth and followed his evil inclination. ..
(above verse about Balam baura. If taken as per your translation, it would be: We wanted to take him up to the heavens but he inclined towards the earth. )
19:57) And We exalted him to a lofty station. ( Do you believe hazrat Idris (as) was also taken bodily to heavens?)
35:11) Whoso desires honour, then let him know that all honour belongs to Allah. Unto Him ascend good words, and righteous work does He exalt.
So ‘rafa’ of a person by Allah means raising in honor before Allah.
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Other reasons are that to believe otherwise creates contextual problems andmany hadith have to be relegated to allegory to account for the deficiency inthe assumption that "tawaffee" in this context means"death" ... of Isa (AS).
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Actually, that is the main problem. If hadiths mention a certain fact then even those can be used to interpret clear verses from the holy Quran. This is not our way. For us, Quran is THE main source. If something is stated here unambiguously then hadiths and other sources should be interpreted in the light of the understanding we got from Quran not otherwise.
Allegoric words occur in prophecies. There are many examples but the relevant example would be the case of first coming of Isa (as) . Jews are still waiting for his first coming. They are waiting for the one who will re-establish kingdom of David(AS). They thought that as per their scripture, Elijah (a previous prophet) will descend from heavens to harbinger the coming of messiah as it was believed Elijah was taken to heavens in a chariot.
.... Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD"-Malachi 4:5
Prophet Elijah was to come who was considered to be taken up to heavens. Here is how Jesus (as) explained:
"In fact, he [Elijah] already has come, but he wasn't recognized, and was badly mistreated by many... Then the disciples realized he was speaking of John the Baptist."-Matthew 17:10-13(LIVING BIBLE-CATHOLIC EDITION) (this account can also be found in: Mark9:11-13)
Clearly, Jesus (as) taught that this was a true prophecy. Jesus (as) agreed that Elijah indeed "must return before the Messiah comes." But then, to the surprise to everyone there, Jesus claimed that John the Baptist was the fulfillment of this prophecy. So Elijah name was attributed to Yahya (as) [John the baptist]. If actually an older prophet was to come then prophethood claim by Jesus (as) can be questioned. That is what Jews did.
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With regards to the hadith by Ibn Abbas ... yes I don't have a problem in saying that "mutawaffeeka" means "I will give you death",but the hadith does not say that this was said in response to this verse ...and then it also does not indicate if this was the predominant opinion of the day. And even then the words used by Ibn Abbas trusting the face value of the hadith reference and translation is "we will bring death to you" is a future statement so it cannot be demonstrated that "death" was brought to Isa (AS) anywhere in these verses.
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BTW, if you accept the term ‘MUTAWAFEEQA’ as future death then there are problems for you since the next word is ‘RAFIOOQA’.So ‘Rafa’ comes after death and it demolishes the concept of ascension of living Jesus (as).
. However, while, Jesus a.s., having completed his mission, remained where he ascended, the Prophet Muhammad 
Brother Kchughtai,
will look into details.