Critical of the bible

[wisdomseeker]

Funny how you didn’t constructively criticize my post but resorted to hyperbole and the red herring of “There is only way to the Father, that is through faith in Christ”, as if my post mentioned anything contrary to that.

My original post still stands. When there is a free-for-all in interpretation to the Bible, you get Muslims adopting the same approach to criticize the Bible to advance their point of view that segments of it allegedly indicate the denial of Trinity, the coming of Muhammad, the rejection of the divinity of Jesus Christ and so forth. Now, had many of them understood the importance of authority, and probably patristics (although that would be asking for too much probably lol ), this wouldn’t be an issue, and they’ll find that the Bible is not contradicting itself. The gauntlet is now thrown down to you to explain why Muslims aren’t justified to make such conclusions when their own interpretation leads them to make such conclusion? When you get users saying there are “33,000+” Protestant denominations for this very reason, they’re wrong. They should have perhaps said “33,001+” to include what appears to be sola scriptura from the Muslims.

Another danger lies in biblical literalism, and it’s another reason why Muslims seem to be critical of Christianity. Muslims often argue that the Quran is inimitable and without a single error, but Christianity must necessarily be false because of different biblical translations (e.g. KJV, ESV, DRB, etc). This further advances their view that Christians and Jews (i.e. “the People of the Book”) received revelations from God that were corrupted over time, and it is only the Quran that has managed to be preserved from the influence of corruption. Again, seems to me more like criticism of Protestantism than Catholicism. How can Muslims explain that the Church has had consistent teachings over the course of it’s 2000+ years on Earth?

Not everyone is out on a Protestant witch hunt. It’s unfortunate you may have had some bad experiences with certain Catholics in your life, but not all Catholics are like that. Here are a just a couple of my recent opinions on Protestants (do I sound like I’m out to get you?):

Thread #1: forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=571678
Post 59: forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=8078264&postcount=59

Make your own conclusion.

I agree with you. Different enterpretations of the Bible is confusing to all. I also blame this issue in the deChristianization in the world. And it is also confusing many Catholics causing them to question the Church in many issues and bringing many pains to the Church.

 

[FabiusMaximus]

I believe many Muslims are critical about the Bible because they incorrectly believe that Protestantism is all of Christianity. As such, they make the mistake that all Christians adopt “sola scriptura” to biblical interpretation. And because of this, Muslims proceed to pick up bits and pieces to push forward their own point of view. For instance, Muslims would reject the idea of the Trinity on the grounds of “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one” (Deuteronomy 6:4).

The real crisis is not Muslims being critical of the Bible, but rather, that the Protestant way of interpreting the Bible has become the de facto standard of all Christian denominations, at the expense of Catholicism.

I actually personally believe that many Muslims would actually be devout Catholics if they understood that a) Catholics consider both Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture; b) that the Church’s teachings has not changed - not even once - over the course of 2000 years. The apparition of Our Lady at Fatima (the place bearing the name of Muhammaed’s daughter, coincidentally, if I’m not mistaken) indicates that God probably has a plan for Muslims, although we don’t know what. But that’s just me speculating .

No because Muslims accuse Catholicism of worshiping Mary all the time so no, it’s not about Protestantism thank you very much. They’re not “mislead”. In fact, because Catholicism is the largest branch of Christianity, they usually target the Roman Catholic Church.

Muslims believe that Christianity is in error because Muhammad told them so. If your argument about Catholicism was correct, then most of these Muslim countries would have converted en masse when the Catholic French colonized huge swaths of Muslim lands and build churches everywhere.

 

[wisdomseeker]

I respect your devotion to your faith but I must say that just about every point that you made in your post in based on the assumption that everything that is either written in the Bible or taught by the Church must be the truth and therefore anything in the Qur’an which contradicts the Biblical account must be false.

It is a situation which I often face when discussing with especially Christians on matters of faith and so I have to say that it would be pointless to engage in a discussion which is based entirely on circular logic with regard to which between the Bible and the Qur’an is the Truth.

My own view is that Muslims and Christians should not look too hard at differences between our faiths but to instead look at the things we share i.e. the love for Jesus Christ (pbuh) and the belief in the Commandments… hence my interest in the things that Jesus (pbuh) says in the New Testament.

And BTW, Muslims are not big fans of Paul and so we are not very interested in the things that he says in the NT.

St Paul? Well, this becomes a big issue for us. We can’t just concentrate in what things we share because then we would have to give up the Truth which is the mission of the Church. We believe that Jesus is the Son of the Living God and He is greater than a prophet. We must defend this Truth because it has been revealed to us from God. The Church was not sent to be friends with the world but to reveal to the world what God has done for us. Many have died doing that. Jesus said the world hated Him and so would hate us. We should expect nothing less from the world.
We certainly are not going to force no one to believe but the Church must continue to say that Jesus is the way, the life, and salvation for many.

 

[FabiusMaximus]

I do not understand why Christians should feel perplexed when Muslims are critical of the Bible since the obvious fact of the matter is that there is no Christian in the world who can answer the question of ‘Who wrote the Bible?’

100% faith in a book which is based on no tangible evidence whatsoever is not a good thing as far as Muslims are concerned.

The Qur’an that we have today is, after all, living proof of the existence of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) since all the reports from his companions that the Qur’an came from his lips alone and no one else is easily verifiable.

By comparison, can Christians honestly say that the Bible is indisputable proof of the existence of Jesus Christ (pbuh)?

There is proof of Muhammad, but no proof that he single-handedly wrote down the Qur’an. Many scholars will affirm that the Qur’an was written over time after Muhammad’s death.

 

[JenniferB]

I respect your devotion to your faith but I must say that just about every point that you made in your post in based on the assumption that everything that is either written in the Bible or taught by the Church must be the truth and therefore anything in the Qur’an which contradicts the Biblical account must be false.

My own view is that Muslims and Christians should not look too hard at differences between our faiths but to instead look at the things we share i.e. the love for Jesus Christ (pbuh) and the belief in the Commandments… hence my interest in the things that Jesus (pbuh) says in the New Testament.

.

THANK YOU, THANK YOU!

I get so frustrated when talking to other Christians and their sole basis for answers is that, “It says so in the Bible!.” But how can we be so sure that the Bible is inerrant? I don’t believe it is. How could it be when it was written by so many who had all different agendas they wanted to push? What about the gospels that were left out?

As a Christian, I do think in order to make this world a better place, we need to focus more on our similarities. Focusing on our differences has gotten us in some major trouble…trouble that I don’t think God is liking.

 

[JenniferB]

No one really knows which religion is the “correct” one if any. We choose for ourselves which one we believe to be right. It doesn’t matter how much evidence you see promoting your own faith because every other religion will see evidence promoting theirs. We just can’t know. So arguments and even friendly discussions about whose is better are pretty pointless.

AMEN to this! I think this is where faith comes in. I have faith in my God and they have faith in theirs. The sooner we learn to live with each other and celebrate our individuality, the sooner I think we make God happy.

 

[wisdomseeker]

AMEN to this! I think this is where faith comes in. I have faith in my God and they have faith in theirs. The sooner we learn to live with each other and celebrate our individuality, the sooner I think we make God happy.

Humm! I wonder now if Jesus had thought this way, what would have happened to Him.

 

[schaick]

I respect your devotion to your faith but I must say that just about every point that you made in your post in based on the assumption that everything that is either written in the Bible or taught by the Church must be the truth and therefore anything in the Qur’an which contradicts the Biblical account must be false.

It is a situation which I often face when discussing with especially Christians on matters of faith and so I have to say that it would be pointless to engage in a discussion which is based entirely on circular logic with regard to which between the Bible and the Qur’an is the Truth.

My own view is that Muslims and Christians should not look too hard at differences between our faiths but to instead look at the things we share i.e. the love for Jesus Christ (pbuh) and the belief in the Commandments… hence my interest in the things that Jesus (pbuh) says in the New Testament.

And BTW, Muslims are not big fans of Paul and so we are not very interested in the things that he says in the NT.

“look at the things we share”?

BUT Muslims believe Jesus was in on the trick that deceived so many by a fake crucifixion.

Of course Muslims are not fans of Paul. It is Paul that must be compared to Mohammad.

Mohammad and Paul

Quran/allah’s word and Jesus/ GOD’s Word

So Mohammad has no eyewitnesses- no one else saw Gabriel, no one else heard Gabriel. The only thing witnesses to Mohammad’s “visions” were what could be recognized as temporal lobe seizures.

Mohammad is a self proclaimed prophet.

Paul on the other hand had traveling companions and the outside witness of Ananais to prove that Jesus visited Paul on the road to Damascus.