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What/who are ahlul kitab? Are Muslims a subset of ahlul kitab?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but: Ahlul kitab means "people of the book" in English. What is the "book" in this phrase, and what "people" are being referred to?

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Ahlu Al-Kitab literally means "people of the book." It refers to the Islamic belief that Allah (God) revealed (primarily) two major books prior to Islam: The Injeel (Gospel/Bible), and the Tawrah (Torah).

Hence, Ahlul-kitab is "the people of the (previous scriptures)," i.e. the Jews and Christians. It does not specifically refer to any particular sect within these two groups (eg. catholic vs. orthodox Christianity), but generally to both groups.

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Asalamu wa alaikum,

Ahlul Kitab usually refers to the Jews and Christians. And the Book is usually the Bible and the Torah.

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According to Quran (surah Alhaj), it refers to the followers of five religions: Islam, Jews, Christianity, Zoroastrianism and Sabians. The origin of the word is from the Hebrew "הספר" meaning people of the book which Jews used to use to refer to themselves.

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Can you link to evidence for including Zoroastrianism in Ahl Al-Kitab? – System Down Jun 24 '12 at 9:15
@SystemDown: In "al-Mizan fi tafsir al-Quran" it's said that by "مجوس" in Quran it's meant "Zoroastrianism ". – Gigili Jun 24 '12 at 20:37
Yeah I know "Magus" translates to "Zoroastrians", but what ayah or hadith refers to Magus as Ahl Al-Kitab? – System Down Jun 25 '12 at 2:37
@Gigili, Can you give the ayat here, so that we can read it. – Anwar Jun 30 '12 at 12:45
According to the Hebrew Wikipedia, it is the other way around - the expression "עם הספר" was borrowed from the Quran, rather than the other way around. However, no citation is given. You certainly can't find it in the bible or the Talmud. Judging from a search of benyehuda.org, the expression in Hebrew was probably invented in the 19th century, the period of nascent Jewish nationalism. – Yuval Filmus Jul 2 '12 at 0:32
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