1. Mary/Maryam in the Islamic tradition

Introduction
The Christian and Muslim monotheistic traditions give an important place to Mary, Mother of Jesus. In the Muslim tradition, the name of Mary, under the forms of Maryam, Myriam, Meryem, and Mariamou, is often chosen for girls. Maryam is an exceptional Quranic figure: as the only woman named in the Quran, she appears thirty-four times. Sura 19, named after Mary, devotes a story to her. For Muslims, Maryam is a "sign" (Aya) of God, that is to say a "miracle", a manifestation of the will and power of God who has chosen her to give birth to the prophet Jesus. Christianity and Islam meet in the figure of Mary/Maryam, mother of Jesus. We should particularly emphasize several common elements in the Quranic stories and the Christian apocrypha in the gospels [see Christianity module II, page 2]. The devotion of Mary is common in both traditions so in Turkey, the "House" of Mary (Meryem Ana) near Ephesus, "discovered" and "authenticated" by the Catholic Church in 1896, is also the place for Muslim prayers and ex votos.
Source 1

Quran 19, 22-26

So she was pregnant with him, and she went to deliver in a far place. Then the birth pains came to her, by the trunk of a palm tree. She said: "I wish I had died before this, and became totally forgotten!" But then he called to her from beneath her: "Do not be sad, your Lord has made below you a stream. And shake the trunk of this palm tree, it will cause ripe dates to fall upon you. So eat and drink and be happy."

Quran 19, 22-26. Trans. by Progressive Muslim Organization (public domain).
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Quran...
(19/12/2014)

Sura 19, entitled “Maryam”, tells the story of the annunciation to Maryam of a miraculous birth by a "perfect human figure". Who was he? The interpretations of the text saw in him the figure of Gabriel, the messenger par excellence that made the Revelation to Muhammad. The angel chose a human appearance so as not to frighten the young girl who was still a virgin. Maryam, who was ashamed and humiliated knowing that she was pregnant, ran away to hide from her family. The proposed excerpt relates to the miraculous birth of Jesus near a palm tree. The Muslim imaginary includes images of the cradle of Islam and the Arabian peninsula with its vast desert, criss-crossed by multiple fields of oasis. The precious water in the deserts is the source of life. It is refreshing and purifying. The palm tree symbolizes wandering, nourishment and the comfort offered to travellers. The palm-date tree already had a symbolic dimension in the great civilizations of antiquity, from Rome to Persia. In Islam, it is also a tree above all others, the image of the promise of resurrection, divine mercy and paradise. Its dates are present in many rites, such as the breaking of the fast, the welcoming of a newborn child into the world, marriage and mourning.

Source 2

Mariam and Isa

The aesthetics of the image are characterized by a space without depth. Devoid of shadow and perspective, the setting is reduced to a few symbolic elements: the mountainous desert flooded with light. Life is concentrated in two poles with vivid colours: in contrast to the whitish arid appearance of the desert, a palm tree bearing fruit dominates the scene and below there is a shining fountain lined with a few stones. Sparse vegetation stands like a bouquet framing the figures. The faces of Mary and the child are devoid of any traits allowing the viewer to recognize them. The artist is intent in showing the posture of the honourable and protective mother with her face slightly turned toward Jesus. The newborn child world is dressed. His left hand, raised toward the sky, seems to foreshadow his prophetic mission and allude that he is the "divine word". A third figure stands back according to the style of Persian miniatures, which often include an onlooker without any relation to the scene.

Persian illumination
Wikimedia Commons. Usable under the conditions of the GNU Free Documentation License: Public domain
Image under URL: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mariam_and_Isa.jpg
(19/12/2014)

Source 3

Discourses of Rumi

It is pain that guides us in every enterprise. Until there is an ache within, a passion and a yearning for that thing arising within us, we will never strive to attain it […].It was not until the pains of birth manifested in Mary that she made for the tree. Those pangs drove her to the tree, and the tree that was withered became fruitful.We are like that story of Mary in the Quran. Every one of us has a Jesus within, but until the pangs manifest, our Jesus is not born. If the pangs never come, then our child rejoins its origin by the same secret path through which it came, leaving us empty.

Discourses of Rumi, trans. A. J. Arberry.

Jalal ad-Din Rumi is a Persian poet from the thirteenth century. He lived in Konya, Anatolia (present Turkey) in the Seljuk Sultanate and founded a Sufi order. His book In It What's in It is a compendium of his talks that were collected after his death. It contains anecdotes, allegories and advice on taking a spiritual journey intended for his pupils and disciples. The “in it” is inwardness. Rumi was educated in religious sciences in the classical tradition. In It What's in It includes plenty of references to the hadiths and the Quran. The excerpt is verse 19, 23: when "the pains of childbirth prompted her to move toward the trunk of the date tree”. Resource 1 clarifies the Quranic verse indicated by Rumi. After having experienced the pain of exile and the separation from her family, the starving Maryam is rescued by the palm tree and its dates, which provide her with nourishment. The divine gift of the palm tree is a reward to the pain endured by physical or spiritual birth. The birth is always a painful separation without which man cannot achieve knowledge and true happiness. The mystical journey is in the image of the fate of Maryam ushered/initiated by submission to the divine will, the wrenching from her family and suffering.