Doesn’t a minority of Muslim scholars read Surah 4:157 differently, without denying the crucifixion happened?

A minority of Muslim scholars, and some academics, read Surah 4:157 as denying that Jesus’s enemies truly defeated or killed him, since God raised and vindicated him, rather than as denying the physical event of the crucifixion itself. Stated fairly, this reading would soften, or even dissolve, the contradiction with the historical record above.

That said, this remains a minority position. The mainstream Islamic view, reflected in the traditional ‘substitution’ interpretation, still holds that someone was made to appear in Jesus’s place, and does deny the crucifixion as Christians understand it (see the fuller overview of interpretive positions on this question). So the historical tension stands for the position most Muslims actually hold: a seventh century text set against first century Christian, Roman, and Jewish sources. Naming the minority reading here is what keeps the case honest, not what undoes it.