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Reuben_J
Guest
Yes.
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Mount_Carmel
Guest
Sufi and Tony - You perceive/claim all prophets to have been/be sinless, and yet we have numbers of references from Islamic sources to Muhammad having been a sinner, even [supposedly] from his own mouth. Even the Qur’an refers to his sinning.
In Mecca Muhammad ‘receives’ this command about HIS SIN/SINNING:
40:55 [Pickthall] - ‘Then have patience [O Muhammad]. Lo! the promise of Allah is true. And ask forgiveness of THY SIN {dh-n-b] and hymn the praise of thy Lord at fall of night and in the early hours’. {Morning and night prayers.]
The Arabic word ‘dhanaba’ {verb form] hails from the root dh-n-b and in the above verse together with other verses identifies the meaning being unambiguously meaning SIN.
Ergo sum, Muhammad sinned - therefore cannot be a prophet?
In Mecca Muhammad ‘receives’ this command about HIS SIN/SINNING:
40:55 [Pickthall] - ‘Then have patience [O Muhammad]. Lo! the promise of Allah is true. And ask forgiveness of THY SIN
The Arabic word ‘dhanaba’ {verb form] hails from the root dh-n-b and in the above verse together with other verses identifies the meaning being unambiguously meaning SIN.
Ergo sum, Muhammad sinned - therefore cannot be a prophet?
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Servant19
Guest
The unalterable foundation of Muhammad’s Revelation was to establish an ABSOLUTE understanding that God is one, and human beings are ALL His servants and are subservient, and submissive.
Think about that for a while and look at it in the context of the sacrificial selflessness that Muhammad modelled in His life and in His teachings…
Think about that for a while and look at it in the context of the sacrificial selflessness that Muhammad modelled in His life and in His teachings…
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TheSufi
Guest
I have a couple of books written by Jews refuting Jesus being God, and they don’t use Numbers 23:19, to refute it. But there are alot of verses in the bible that Jews don’t use that refute the idea that Jesus is God, simply because they don’t use a particular quote doesn’t mean it is not a proof against your incorrect beliefs.
God is omnipresent (Ps 139:7-10)… Jesus was not Omnipresent. Therefore Jesus is not God. Jews do not use this verse in the books that I have by Jews, but it is a proof that Jesus is not God.
I was scheming through one of the books that I have, and they (the Jews) use very few verses from the bible, and rely largely on logic, perhaps because Christianity is inherently a very illogical religion.
Jesus was crucified, died.
God was not crucified, did not die.
Therefore Jesus is not God.
God cannot die (Psalm 90:2; Malachi 3:6), thus God can never be offered as a true sacrifice, thus God cannot truly die for our sins.
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MartinJordan
Guest
Servant19, this not a competition about who God is. Christianity teaches God is one, It is more of an intimate relationship with God. Mohammed misses out on this.
MJ
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Servant19
Guest
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TheSufi
Guest
Well, there are several ways to address this issue.
- There is no verse in the Quran that says Prophets do not dhanaba (wrong actions). Therefore technically speaking there is no contradiction.
- dhanaba means wrong actions. There is a saying among the righteous scholars, the wrong actions of the Prophets, are the good deeds of the righteous, and the wrong actions of the righteous are the good deeds of the sinners.
- Obligatory (A reward for doing and punishment for not doing it.)
- Recommended (A reward for doing it, and no punishment for not doing it.)
- Permissible (No reward or punishment for doing it)
- Disliked (No punishment for doing it, but a reward for not doing it)
- Forbidden (A punishment for doing it, but a reward for not doing it)
Prophets do actions 1-4 and make repentance from actions 2-4.
Therefore there is no contradiction even in our understanding.
- There are two types of sins. Kaba’ir (Major sins) and Sayyi’aat (Minor Sins)
All Muslims agree that Prophets are protected from major sin (Kab’ir), Muslim scholars disagree whether Prophet commit minor sins (sayyi’at).
And God knows best.
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Judas_Thaddeus
Guest
Well first you have to realize that Christians don’t believe that only Jesus is God.
The Father is also God, as well as the Holy Spirit, One God. Second, you must
also consider the Temple, where God dwelt. King Solomon said,“But will God really dwell on earth? The heavens,
even the Heaven of heavens, cannot contain you.
How much less this temple I have built?!”
-(1 Kings 8:27)
But that’s what happened, for God indeed can be in one single place AND
everywhere all at eh same time. The Temple, by the way, prefigures Jesus.
What is dying? You say that God is incapable of creating a human body that can be killed
that he may indwell within it? You would probably agree with me in that NOBODY TAKES
GOD’S LIFE, but remember what Jesus said,“This is why the Father loves me, because I lay down my life
in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay
it down on my own. I have power to lay it down, and power to
take it up again. This command I have received from my Father.”
-(John 10:17-18)
If Jesus was never crucified, he might have gone one living forever, but we must also remember that
God is not only Jesus, as the Father and the Holy Spirit are also the One God. The body of Jesus
died, yes, but his spirit did not, but even if you won’t buy that, the Father and Holy Spirit still lived,
so therefore God did not die, but got to experience a human death.
I’m glad also you brought up Malachi, because a Unitarian God such as seen in
Judaism and Islam requires that he CHANGES, but God says, “For I am YHWH,
and I CHANGE NOT !” (Malachi 3:6) This is where the Trinity makes sense.
This is where reading ALL of Scripture comes
in handy, not just using Scripture top disprove
Christianity.
P.S.
I don’t think the Epistle
of Barnabas has been
addressed yet.
I don’t think the Epistle
of Barnabas has been
addressed yet.
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Mount_Carmel
Guest
Sufi - Jesus was/is omnipresent in His divineness and in His oneness with The Father and the Holy Spirit.
“I and [my] Father are one” - John 10:30
Jesus said unto them, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am”. - John 8:58
“I and [my] Father are one” - John 10:30
Jesus said unto them, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am”. - John 8:58
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IgnatianPhilo
Guest
I had this detailed and laid out argument as to why that is a reprehensibly bad way of reading any text but then I realised that doesn’t work with bahai. Look at what this implies of your enemies, the Chrsitians or anyone who dissagrees with bahai for that matter. They misunderstand and misinterpret the scripture their sources, the bible, the new testament the old testament, the quran, the hindu scriptures, everyone has systamatically failed to interpret them in the correct “Bahai way.” So what can you conclude from this? They are not reading it solely upon their “Pure heart,” “chastity of soul” and “freedom of spirit.” They are reading it on other motivations which must be evil of some kind, maybe a bit minor but evil nontheless.
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dronald
Guest
Thank you for a well informed and logical reply. Although I disagree with these particular arguments they are far better than your Numbers interpretation.
All I’m trying to do, TheSufi is get you to use real arguments like the ones you have posted the Jews have used for centuries. Your poor interpretation of Numbers is a deceitful one, however these arguments are better.
First, Jesus was omnipresent even though His body remained in one location. He knew what others were thinking and doing (the disciple praying under the tree and Jesus knowing others thoughts) you may seek to reject this as truth but it is the Christian belief and completely in line with the Jewish understanding of how God would be if He visited earth as a man. Just like God did in the bush in all three of our Religions!
My favourite thing you said is Christianity being illogical. It reminds me of a quote by C.S. Lewis:
“Reality, in fact, is usually something you could not have guessed. That is one of the reasons I believe Christianity. It is a religion you could not have guessed. If it offered us just the kind of universe we had always expected, I should feel we were making it up. But, in fact, it is not the sort of thing anyone would have made up. It has just that queer twist about it that real things have.”
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Contarini
Guest
I’d like to see your argument for why this is a bad way to read any text. It seems pretty clear to me that it’s the traditional Christian way of reading the Bible
And I don’t think the Bahai position commits them to saying that the rest of us lack purity of heart, etc. I think they would say that insofar as we read our Scriptures and come to know and love God we do have that purity of heart.
Edwin
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IgnatianPhilo
Guest
Well no, it hasn’t been the traditional way to read the bible, it might be now for us moderns but not throughout church history. In the second century one didn’t just pick up a bible and read it and become a Christian, trinitarian and etc ready to die for the faith, one was first and foremost exposed to a community, a community which had a sense of interpretation and teaching concerning these books you would eventually be able to see (assuming your church had a copy of any of the books since they weren’t codified like they are in our bibles today).I’d like to see your argument for why this is a bad way to read any text. It seems pretty clear to me that it’s the traditional Christian way of reading the Bible
And I don’t think the Bahai position commits them to saying that the rest of us lack purity of heart, etc. I think they would say that insofar as we read our Scriptures and come to know and love God we do have that purity of heart.
Edwin
No doubt those who did read them in these communties did so with pure hearts and diligent minds but behind them were the elders and the Bishops, telling them the correct interpretation. It was never just “me and the bible,” it was always the “Church and the bible,” or to get the point home the “assembly and bible.” There were those who read these books who would become gnostics, either because they ignored those who came before them or read them by themselves and didn’t have proper guidance but were heavily influenced under the greek philosophy of the time which resulted in their various ideologies and degrees of gnosticism.
Despite all of our pretexts today to read the bible objectively the truth is we don’t, none of us do and no one ever has. We live in a society which is deeply rooted in Chrisitanity and while thats fading fast there are traces of it everywhere, hence you are more likely to become a trinitarian catholic, protestant, anglican if you read the bible and feel convinced of it than you are to become an arrian of some sort and that is due to several ideas which are quite common “Jesus being God,” “Jesus saviour of all,” we have on some level basic concepts which are from the Christian worldview the modern west has sprung up out of and so we feel we actually understand this book when we read it, this book which was not written for us but was written for people of the time primarily.
Hence I am of the opinion while admitting our own biases and nature in reading the bible and trying to be as objective as possible we must examine the new testament firstly in the context of its time. It is useless to get the sense of what it means for paul to say to obey the government if we don’t understand that it was Ceaser’s empire he was talking about, Ceaser who professed himself basically a god, a son of god whose will could not be denied. What does it then mean for the Christian to obey and listen to the government? There are even deeper questions than that which could be brought up but which I would fail to even begin to ask.
Bottomline, simply the text and nothing but the text will only give you a wildly different interpretation from those before you.
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TheSufi
Guest
The Numbers argument is a very solid and sound argument. The fact that it was not used is not a weak rebuttal.
The only way to convince me otherwise, would be to find a Jewish scholar who knows Hebrew who would say it was not a good argument.
Until then, the Numbers argument is a solid and good argument, which no one has provided a solid refutation against. I will continue to use. God willing.
Numbers 23:19 is saying God is not a man.
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dronald
Guest
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Contarini
Guest
Absolutely. I’m sorry for misunderstanding your statement. I was not defending sola scriptura–quite the reverse. I understood the Bahai poster to be saying that all the great religious texts lead people to God if read with a pure heart, and I took you to be saying that this was too subjective and spiritualizing a way of reading a text. (It is, if done on a purely individual basis–hence the importance of a community of interpretation, as you noted.) I thought you were defending some kind of “objective” hermeneutic. We were talking past each other, and rereading the posts I see that it was my fault.
Edwin
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Contarini
Guest
Christians do not say that God is a man. That is to say, we do not say that the divine nature is limited and flawed in the ways that humans are.
What we say is that the divine Logos, the Word and Wisdom of God, took on human nature, so that the human being Jesus was at once the divine Logos and a human being.
Edwin
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jakasaki
Guest
I was just reading the actual passage from the Hebrew book Parshah Balak and here is what the verse actually states in Hebrew translated in English.
19-
God is not a man that He should lie, nor is He a mortal that He should relent. Would He say and not do, speak and not fulfill?
It is completely different from what you posted…
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TheSufi
Guest
Actually, the Hebrew could be translated both ways, if one is honest. When you are translate, you are actually interpreting the Hebrew verse.
**“God is not a man that He should Lie, nor the Son of man that He should repent.” **Numbers 23:19
This translation is from the King James Version.
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Reuben_J
Guest
Then according to this logic, then Allah of Islam is not God, as it lied by decieving people that Jesus was crucified.
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