Christian/Muslim Threadsa must readThere’s no question that the OT foretells the coming of Jesus the Messiah. Apart from that, all the passages you’ve shown regarding the Trinitarian conception of Jesus have solid alternative explanations by the Jews, especially when they claim that the OT in the Bible was translated with a bias to promote the Christian interpretations. Not at all friend. I have complete faith in God. That’s the first step. The second step is wanting to live by God’s word. Hundreds of religions CLAIM they hold God’s word, but you have to use your intellect to test these claims. Everyone wants to be a Prophet, but you have to test their signs, that’s why God always sends His Messengers with signs. Anyone who spends a lifetime following a book when they aren’t sure it’s from God are being dangerously negligent with their lives. The good mind has to first ask himself, where are these stories found? They are found in the Qur’an. Ask yourself what raises the Qur’an above all other Scriptures? The Qur’an is itself a sign from God, that’s why we know that it contains only Truth. That’s why its claims supercede those of lesser texts of questionable origin, and when it was revealed has no bearing on what it contains. The word of God is eternal and Truth, it will describe the origins of the Universe even if written billions of years later. I think you’re speaking in extremes now. Nobody is saying that someone took the Bible and completely rewrote it such that everything in it is false. A LOT of Jesus’ teachings remain, many prophecies remain in tact, people didn’t re-author the text and distort it this grossly. However, there is little doubt that extraneous beliefs crept into it after Jesus’ (pbuh) ascension because it was such a mysterious event. People began explaining by conjecture since Jesus was no longer there to explain it. Instead of living strictly by the teachings of Jesus while he was on earth for 30 some years, people took the events of his last few days and remodeled the religion. Believer, do you know how large and for how long the Unitarian Christian community lasted in the middle East? They were practically equal if not larger than the Trinitarian community, and they continued to preach the True Message of Jesus and his life. It shouldn’t surprise you at all that they would have recorded a similar story as that revealed in the Qur’an. These stories were labeled as “mythical” to the masses when the Church began collecting and withholding the texts from the public, that’s what “apocryphal” means, it means “hidden from the people” What haven’t I applied to my beliefs? I’m telling you that before we even examine what’s INSIDE our books, we need to study WHERE they came from. At least we know beyond a doubt that the Qur’an we have today is the one that the Prophet Muhammad spoke, memorized and oversaw transcribed. We know that the way the Prophet Muhammad lived his life is the way we currently live our lives. This is not something any Christian can say. People don’t know how Jesus prayed, how he ate, how he supplicated to God. They only recorded this after he had gone, after NOONE could verify whether what was being written was correct. They could NEVER be sure what they wrote was what Jesus would have approved. In addition, Jesus’ teachings ended obviously after the events of the crucifixion whereas the Bible’s teachings REVOLVE around this event which Jesus did not explain nor had the opportunity to correct deviant beliefs thereon. Did you know that at the time of Nicaea, roughly 50% of the Christian world was Unitarian? Half of the Christians believed in the Divine Unity and the Prophethood of Jesus the Messiah. Arius was defined as heretical AFTER the hegemony of the Trinitarian church re-evaluated all the claims of the debate of Nicaea. During the time, Christians were honestly debating what they did not clearly understand about Jesus’ mysterious nature and virgin birth. This is a myth. The Unitarian Christians of the middle east didn’t even NEED to be pressured. Look at the history, they converted IMMEDIATELY after hearing of Islam. It was almost instantaneous because they RECOGNIZED what they had always known. That God is One and Jesus is His Messiah and beloved Messenger. At the time of Islam, all of Northern Africa, Syria, Jordan, Iraq were practically 100% Christian. Years later, only small patches like the Armenians in the North remained because all the Unitarian Christians recognized the message. The Armenians were Trinitarian since Nicaea which is why they were not as influenced. Actually the Unitarians had been in equal numbers to the Trinitarians SINCE 33 AD. Their numbers began to dwindle only as they were massacred by the Trinitarian authorities over the centuries. Didn’t you always wonder why the Christians were fighting so brutally during the first half of the millennium? Did you think it was just “True Christians” vs. the “heretics”? Heretics are usually fringe groups, not HALF of the entire population of Christianity. And remember that the entire Quran was memorized, a parallel system of complete memorization and transcription around the Muslim world ensured that no collusion could have taken place to corrupt the message. http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Text/Mss/ http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Text/ http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Contrad/ http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Miracle/ http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Sources/ Look at my signature as well as this hadith: Abu Huraira reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: There is none whose deeds alone would entitle him to get into Paradise. It was said to him: And, Allah's Messenger, not even you? Thereupon he said: Not even I, but that my Lord wraps me in Mercy. It is dangerously incorrect to believe that one’s deeds alone will get you to Heaven, this is what Apologetics claim to distort the issue of salvation of Islam. One’s good deeds testify FOR him on the day of Judgement, but belief is by far more important than a lifetime of good deeds. Look to the hadith for this yourself. How many stories are there of people who lived PURELY sinful lives, but before they died they repented sincerely, and are reported to have gone to Heaven. Deeds come into play when one has believed. You have stories of believers who reportedly went to Heaven for having Believed and done a single good deed in their life. Jews also repent directly to God. Neither were Adam or Eve. Remember that God can create whatever He wills, there is no need to use conjecture to invent explanations. Jesus (pbuh) had to consistently remind people not to worship him. As you yourself know, many people did not know how to interpret the virgin birth and tried to worship Jesus but Jesus himself corrected this association. No that’s obviously not true, but what I do know is that the Qur’an has infinitely more evidence of its authenticity than does any other Scripture. That’s not true shepherd, this is something that comes up every single time the Bible’s authenticity is questioned. All of a sudden people say “well at least I have a personal relationship with God”. Do you actually believe that Christians are the only one with this relationship? This monopolization is a form of arrogance. The biggest reason I believe in Islam is because God comforts me in my belief, it is rational and true and has worldly evidence to vouch for it. Other faiths, when questioned about their authenticity can only say “well at least I know God loves me” or “free your mind” (to ignore the disparity). But God has to comfort you in your heart AND intellect, that’s the difference between Islam and other faiths. You don’t have to “veil” your mind from doubt and questions of authenticity and rely solely on the comfort you feel. In fact, EVERY faith claims to have this comfort, from Hinduism through to Bhuddism. The only reason you believe Jesus to be the Savior is because you believe the Bible to be true. But you don’t know the Bible to be true, you only believe it to be so. How can you spend your life living by what you don’t both know AND believe to be true? What then distinguishes you from Joseph Smith, the authenticity of his scripture demands pure faith, since its story cannot stand on worldly proof at all. Well I won’t defend Joseph Smith because I see striking similarities between the demands of the Book of Mormon and those of the defenders of the Bible, blind faith. But I’ll tell you what I have noticed on this forum. Every Christian person has cursed or ridiculed the Qur’an and Muhammad (pbuh). I think one’s actions are a good indication of one’s internal condition and I know even by your beliefs Jesus (pbuh) did not curse other religions of the time, he didn’t need to. http://www.answering-islam.org.uk/Quran ... index.html Just read it. Stop batting everything away. Obviously you’re not sincere when you’re afraid to read what might affect you. Considering that not a single person could emulate the Qur’an in the literary peak of the area, it shouldn’t even matter to you that the Prophet was unlettered since even if he was the Qur’an is miraculous. However, even by your estimation, if the Prophet was just “playing” why then would he just take out a pen out of nowhere and start writing? First you make it out to be an elaborate scheme to make the Qur’an seem miraculous, then you claim that it was all messed up when he accidentally wrote something and everyone saw him. Don’t you think the people around him, especially the hypocrites and skeptics who were watching this would have made a bigger deal of it? Or do you think that 1500 years later you found this hadith and are proud that you caught something that people witnessing the alleged event didn’t even notice? Not all muslims have memorized the Qur’an, but there are schools around the world that still facilitate this. That’s right, tens of thousands have memorized the 600 page text. The proof is in the oral traditions of transmission and in the differences in recitation of the Qur’an. There are variant ways in which it is pronounced which date back to the approved ways of the Prophet (pbuh): http://www.iol.ie/~afifi/BICNews/Sabeel/sabeel3.htm http://www.iiie.net/Articles/AuthenticQuran.html I’m glad that this is such a sticking point for you. At least it shows how intensely you realize that the Qur’an could not have been written by an unlettered man. But neither could it even be EMULATED by the literary scholars and poets of the time. http://www.ymofmd.com/books/prophethood ... _intro.htm The critical point is this: The Prophet was an illiterate, knowing neither how to read or write, before the Glorious Qur’an started to be revealed to him. Only after the Quran’s revelation does it become a debated issue, but at that point, it becomes even more irrelevant. http://www.islamonline.net/fatwa/englis ... waID=90849 What do you mean? That verse was a command to the Jews to not sell God’s word for a paltry gain, it does not refer to Muhammad (pbuh). Bro, this is an EXCELLENT question, I can tell now you are thinking. Here is some important background on what constitutes “hadith” http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Hadith/Ulum/ Read this especially, it’s a good summary: http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Hadith ... ences.html And here’s a rough explanation: When scholars like Muslim and Bukhary were collecting the words and actions of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) they went around asking people what they knew. When someone claimed to have known something, they had say what they knew, and say who told them, and then who told THEM, and who told THEM, all the way back to someone who was actually present when Muhammad (pbuh) said it. Now if someone can’t do that, if he says “Someone told me that the Prophet said this” but can’t name all the names back to the source, it’s not credible. Also, if someone says that so-and-so told me, and “so-and-so” is someone of questionable repute, the hadith is considered questionable. Remember that at the time there were many enemies of Islam who want to just spread slander. If someone was known to have been a hypocrite at the time, how reliable could his testimony have been? Anyway, so the more reliable people you had at each level in the chain of transmission, the more reliable was the hadith. So not ALL the hadiths are untrue, they have variable integrities. We know which ones are true by the way they were transmitted and by WHOM they were transmitted. Sometimes senile men could’t remember where they had heard something or seen something, sometimes people couldn’t remember just one name in the transmission. These were all reasons to doubt the authenticity of a hadith. It’s a very meticulous matter to insure that slander and falsity didn’t creep into the words and life of the Prophet. Obviously the transmission of the Qur’an is higher than any hadith in authenticity. Hundreds of companions had written and memorized it and their followers and their followers’ followers were named and known each generation. But that’s not what the verse says. It was talking about how the mammary glands are nourished, how the milk itself is formed, not that it comes out of the breast which anyone can see in front of them. It was a question of HOW the milk is formed. Any lay person could not tell you how the milk is formed, especially not 1400 years ago. Also, this is just one of MANY scientific miracles. Not all water has a pH of exactly 7. Water can be slightly acidic or basic depending on its molarity i.e. ~6.5 or ~7.5 You mean that oil is non-polar and water is polar. That’s why they don’t mix. Acids and bases mix to form heat and water. It’s polar and non-polar substances that don’t mix in solution. Acid can mix with water but so can bases, man! Basic solutions are MIXED in water, as are acidic aqueous solutions. In fact, dropping an alkaline earth metal in water is one way to form basic solutions. The Mediterranean is connected to the GIGANTIC Atlantic Ocean. Didn’t you ever wonder why they have two distinct water properties? If you have a plate full of one type of water, and pour a little of another type of water into its side, then measure the water. It’s a weighted average of their two properties, the solutions mix. This doesn’t happen with the rivers and oceans. You only think the Qur’an is corrupted because you base that belief on the Bible. The Qur’an is better preserved than the Bible, it was preserved for longer, it was written and recorded and memorized BEFORE its messenger disappeared. It contains miracles and prophecies to vouch for its authenticity. I don’t see how you are using a Scripture of weaker authenticity to claim that one of stronger authenticity is corrupted. Religion is COMPLETE belief. You have to be convinced with your heart AND mind. You have to be comforted in your heart and rationally convinced in your mind otherwise you will always harbor doubt. God is Truth, there can be no doubt regarding His commands. I’ve told you this before, but the Bhuddists think they are much more spiritual than the Christians, in fact they tell you to completely block out the mind…why would someone ask a believer to block out their mind? Only when the Scripture does not offer certainty with regard to its divine nature. Whenever there’s no proof, people are asked to believe blindly. Anyway, even though the QUr’an brings with it so many proofs, people like yourself still don’t believe, so obviously there is a strong factor of belief as well. The Bhuddist and Hindu would applaud you for this, they argue the same way. They don’t need proof because they feel “comfort”. But when you think about it, EVERYONE feels comfort in what they believe when they block out their reasoning capacity. Not at all. You should be willing to believe EVERYTHING that God reveals, right or not? If you know for sure you have the word of God, then there shouldn’t be a question of whether or not you should believe it. People don’t believe in the sacrifice of a “begotten” son not because it doesn’t make sense, but simply because there is no indication that God EVER commanded this. You didn’t wake up one morning and rationalize that God had sacrificed a son, you read this in the Bible. You base this entire belief on the Bible, so the logical question is, how do you know the Bible is the word of God? What signs does it bring to indicate this AND is there a Scripture with similar yet more evident signs? That’s good man. Sincere prayer is always answered and I don’t doubt that you entreated what you would call “the Father” with the most sincere of prayers and that’s why you were saved by Him. I don’t really condone the way all Muslims speak to Christians here. Both parties trade a lot of insults and it gets disgusting to be honest with you. Often it is a very ungodly forum running here. Bro do you know how ironic this statement is? Do you know who the people in sheep’s clothing are? They are the people who provide you INCORRECT information while claiming to be on your side and helping you defend the TRUTH! They defend falsity with falsity while claiming to be sincere worshippers. THESE are the wolves in sheep’s clothing because they are pretending to be your friends but they are only caging your heart. That’s why all you get is a constant bombardment of what Islam is NOT and your sources are damning you because they are not bringing authentic information to you. They are just constantly bombarding you with hateful and polemical discussions so your heart grows hard and hateful of Islam. I swear to you, if you really knew Islam and the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) you would not feel this way. Whenever you want to make a sincere effort to know Islam, let me know, otherwise you have chosen to live in darkness. It’s so sad that you think the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) is evil or that he used religion to his advantage when his life was filled with suffering, purity, and sacrifice. And why? All because you’ve based your life on recycled orientalist discourse written by colonialists in the 17th and 18th centuries who wanted to break the backbone of Islam by spreading falsity. When you follow Muhammad (pbuh) you ARE following Jesus because there is not a doubt in my mind that they brought the same exact message from God. Bro don’t be like this. Think clearly and thoroughly. Muslims know that Jesus, Moses, Muhammad, all the way back down to Abraham and Adam taught submission to the One God. That didn’t mean they all followed the same rites as these were added and changed with time and the testaments. Jesus returns to symbolically break the cross to show that this was not what he ever taught nor was he ever commanded to teach it. He symbolically “kills the swine” to show that he was sent as a messenger to UPHOLD the Mosaic laws that forbade swine, not to abrogate them. And most importantly, the life of Muhammad was not lascivious, this is what you’ve been taught. You’ve grown to hate polygyny while it was rampant with the prophets of the OT. Islam not only limited it to certain conditions (which I’m sure you don’t know) but it made those conditions so difficult to meet that a single spouse was intended to be the norm and preference anyway. Seriously don’t be misled, ask your questions so you can get a proper answer. Peace to you Bro |
🌈Pride🌈 goeth before Destruction
When 🌈Pride🌈 cometh, then cometh Shame