Help me to answer Muslim Apologetics!

[Hodos]

They say that Jesus was created. They cite Revelation 3:14.

The word used here in greek is arche, which has both the meaning of beginning and of chief or ruler. The word is being used here in a double fashion in the manner of use as we see in Colossians 1 where it speaks of Christ being the first-born of all creation. If we stipulate that it was in fact John that wrote Revelation, the same John who wrote the gospel which bears his name, we have very clear testimony from John’s own hand that In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. If we continue to verse three of John’s prologue we see that all things were created through the word and without the word was created not one thing that has been created. John’s usage seems to be in line with Paul’s verbiage in Colossians that Jesus, who pre-existed as a distinct individual in the Godhead was made incarnate through the Holy Spirit, and is now the preeminent son over all created things. This is in line with further statements in Revelation where Christ is called out separate from all created beings which bow down to him, yet still obedient to his Father, and ruling from his Father’s throne.

Jesus was not under the earth for 72 hours as he prophesied citing the example of Jonah three nights and days in the belly of fish.

This is a weak contradiction when you realize how first century Jews reckoned days as any part of a day in legal documents of the time.

 

[UglierThanThou]

It is irrelevant whether the begetting of the Son from the Father is sensible, imaginable, or intelligible. The fact remains, that Christians believe that Jesus (A) is the Son of God in the real sense, this is not something figurative for them, and this is what we Muslims reject.

I am my father’s child in the real sense, in that he copulated with my mother. There is nothing figurative about that. However, you say Christians believe Jesus is the Father’s Son in the real sense, and yet, Christians do not believe the Father ever copulated with Mary, nor could ever. You reject something which Christians do not actually believe.

Jesus is the literal Son of God in a figurative sense.

 

[UglierThanThou]

This isn’t true. It seems to me that only non Muslims support this largely (if not completely) unsubstantiated theory, not even Shiah Muslims support this theory, and they have more reason to do so (maligning Uthman’s character for example). The truth is that in the expanded empire of Uthman, there were a lot more dialects of Arabic, and this brought confusion over which dialect of Arabic is to be recited for liturgical use; and so Uthman compiled a standard recension for the Qur’an.

Do you have proof to back that up?

 

[Chaldean]

They (some Muslims) accuse Jesus of committing a sin; Jesus called the Canaanite woman a dog. Therefore he is not divine.

In the Quran it says that Jesus and Mary were not touched by Satan. Which means that Jesus and Mary did not commit sin. If he’s believes that Jesus committed a sin, it means he’s contradicting his own Quran.

Quran says Jesus did not die. Hebrews 5:7 says “In the days when he was in the flesh, he offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to the one who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence.” They say that his prayers answered means he did not die on the cross.

The Quran says that “Another was made to resemble him” The Quran gives no further details. Who was the “another” God replaced Jesus with? Was it a Roman soldier that looked like Jesus? Did God make people Hallucinate and see something that did not exist? Or maybe there was a hologram? If Jesus was not Crucified, then what happened to him? Where and how did Jesus live the rest of his life? Our faith is based on Jesus dying on the cross for our sins. Yet the Quran wants to deny this fact with one verse that lacks evidence and details.

They say that Jesus was created. They cite Revelation 3:14.

Yet the Quran calls Jesus “The Spirit of God” and “The Word of God.”
John: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Does your Muslim friend believe that God existed without the Word? I am sure this is a fact he cannot deny. Therefore this is proof from the Quran that Jesus was not created.

 

[Reuben_J]

1. I don’t believe the Book of Revelation to be authentic or inspired, regardless of the contents.

That is what Muslims would say. Of course, this is no argument at all. It is like we saying that the Quran is not authentic or inspired, so no argument.

Arguing with Muslims would be kind of stupid because there is no argument.

Even when they quote the Bible, they would already state their premise and not on the actual/correct understanding of the said verses or passages. Example, If he were divine why did he pray 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? (Mt 27:46) Thus Jesus cannot be divine because he said such a sentence. There is no attempt even to read further into the chapter. To them every sentence/verse stands on its own.

And if the find they cannot rebut any verse of the Bible, yes, they will say that verse is not authentic or inspired or a corruption. What they do is simply to win the argument and to be seemingly right.

Usually it is about who will out-talk who, like who will have the last word.

 

[SalamKhan]

However, you say Christians believe Jesus is the Father’s Son in the real sense, and yet, Christians do not believe the Father ever copulated with Mary, nor could ever. You reject something which Christians do not actually believe.

Allow me to repeat myself:

It is irrelevant whether the begetting of the Son from the Father is sensible, imaginable, or intelligible.

Of course, Christians believe the begetting was intelligible.

Jesus is the literal Son of God in a figurative sense

What?

 

[SalamKhan]

Do you have proof to back that up?

Here is one such proof from the Jami of Imam Bukhari, Volume 6, Book 61, Number 510:

Narrated Anas bin Malik:

Hudhaifa bin Al-Yaman came to Uthman at the time when the people of Sham and the people of Iraq were Waging war to conquer Arminya and Adharbijan. Hudhaifa was afraid of their (the people of Sham and Iraq) differences in the recitation of the Qur’an, so he said to 'Uthman, “O chief of the Believers! Save this nation before they differ about the Book (Quran) as Jews and the Christians did before.” So 'Uthman sent a message to Hafsa saying, “Send us the manuscripts of the Qur’an so that we may compile the Qur’anic materials in perfect copies and return the manuscripts to you.” Hafsa sent it to 'Uthman. 'Uthman then ordered Zaid bin Thabit, 'Abdullah bin AzZubair, Said bin Al-As and 'AbdurRahman bin Harith bin Hisham to rewrite the manuscripts in perfect copies. 'Uthman said to the three Quraishi men, “In case you disagree with Zaid bin Thabit on any point in the Qur’an, then write it in the dialect of Quraish, the Qur’an was revealed in their tongue.” They did so, and when they had written many copies, 'Uthman returned the original manuscripts to Hafsa. 'Uthman sent to every Muslim province one copy of what they had copied, and ordered that all the other Qur’anic materials, whether written in fragmentary manuscripts or whole copies, be burnt. Said bin Thabit added, "A Verse from Surat Ahzab was missed by me when we copied the Qur’an and I used to hear Allah’s Apostle reciting it. So we searched for it and found it with Khuzaima bin Thabit Al-Ansari. (That Verse was): ‘Among the Believers are men who have been true in their covenant with Allah.’ (33.23)

 

[SalamKhan]

That is what Muslims would say. Of course, this is no argument at all.

The book of Revelation, has shaky foundations at best. Christians historically have disputed over its canonicity. If I as a Muslim were to accept the Bible, then I will only accept the books in which there is agreement upon.

And if the find they cannot rebut any verse of the Bible, yes, they will say that verse is not authentic or inspired or a corruption. What they do is simply to win the argument and to be seemingly right.

My view is that what the Prophets taught, was the same or similar in meaning, but they differed in expression, and the literal meaning of the writings (generally penned by their followers, not by them) reflect this.

 

[UglierThanThou]

I am unsure as to what point you are making by repeating yourself. Perhaps you would like to elaborate on that.

What I mean by saying, “Jesus is the literal son of God, in the figurative sense,” is that: Jesus is literally an extension of God himself (he is God), but figuratively God’s son. I can understand why you would think that God literally fathered Jesus, according to Christian belief, since that is what the Quran states. “They say: ‘God has fathered a child.’ Glory be to Him!”

 

[SalamKhan]

I am unsure as to what point you are making by repeating yourself. Perhaps you would like to elaborate on that.

I am aware that Christians do not believe that the begetting of the Son from the Father was sensible, but rather they believe it is intelligible; but this is still irrelevant. Because we deny that God could beget a Son in the real sense, whether it is sensible, imaginable, or intelligible.

My friend, I have said twice by now that I am aware that Christians believe the begetting is intelligible, so why do you assert that I think Christians believe the begetting was sensible? Yes, the Qur’an denies a sensible begetting, but that is because the masses are generally only familiar with sense and imagination; the learned understand that the Qur’an also denies an intelligible begetting despite not stating so, because divine wisdom deemed it unfit to teach the masses that which is beyond their capacity to learn:

They will question thee concerning the Spirit. Say: ‘The Spirit is of the bidding of my Lord. You have been given of knowledge nothing except a little.’

• Surah 17:85

 

[Roguish]

I believe the popular view that Prophet Jesus (A) was not crucified must be challenged, the Ismaili Shiahs already have a better view on this, and so does contemporary Sunni Muslim scholar Sheikh Imran Hosein.

It is very courageous of you to allow for the possibility of reconciliation on this point, because in my opinion it is the only significant point of contention between Christianity and Islam. So I really appreciate it. And I lament some of the more bigoted responses in this thread. I’m tempted to write a castigating response, but it wouldn’t do any good.

Thanks for joining in.

 

[UglierThanThou]

The verse you quoted concerns God’s Spirit and does not apply to other points of concern. It seems like a stretch, to use that verse to justify your interpretation, of the scope of begetting in the Quran. The reason why I kept mentioning what I had, is because, I was confused by how you assert what the Quran does not. As you say, “the learned understand;” but I believe that, that is merely your personal belief. Again, the Quran only ever points to the literal act of begetting, as in flesh-to-flesh; to my knowledge, there is no verse which implicitly rejects a spirit-to-flesh sense of begetting. But perhaps I am mistaken.

I should also add: John’s Apocalypse (Book of Revelation) is my favorite book in the Bible, and a fitting end. It is about the Christian captivity in Rome (akin to the Jewish captivity in Babylon) and God’s promise to free them. Just consider the fact that Rome fell and the Christians were freed, all because of the gentle martyrs, soldiering in Christ. The army without swords toppled what other armies with swords could not. What a prophecy.

 

[SalamKhan]

The verse you quoted concerns God’s Spirit and does not apply to other points of concern. It seems like a stretch, to use that verse to justify your interpretation, of the scope of begetting in the Quran. The reason why I kept mentioning what I had, is because, I was confused by how you assert what the Quran does not. As you say, “the learned understand;” but I believe that, that is merely your personal belief.

This isn’t my original interpretation of the verse. I am repeating what theologians/philosophers of the past have said concerning this verse.

Again, the Quran only ever points to the literal act of begetting, as in flesh-to-flesh; to my knowledge, there is no verse which implicitly rejects a spirit-to-flesh sense of begetting. But perhaps I am mistaken.

Once again, the masses are generally only familiar with sense and imagination. Elsewhere in the Qur’an for example, concerning the assertion of the pagan Arabs that God has daughters, rather than argue for God’s simplicity and immutability, the Qur’an instead points out their double standards in how they react when they receive news of having daughters and how they commit infanticide. In other words, they attribute to God that which they hate. The Qur’an is not a book of theology or philosophy, because the vast majority of mankind are neither theologians nor philosophers.

 

[Pattylt]

Discussions of how accurately the Quran has been transmitted is a relatively recent development of critical scholarship. There are very few critical scholars of the Quran and it is in its infancy. They have, however, found that there are problems with the Muslim insistence that there aren’t changes, omissions and revisions. Scraps of very old copies have more recently been uncovered and dated. One even proves that the Quran was indeed written very early but studies on it have been hampered especially when differences were noted.
I found this piece of wiki information interesting:

“The Arabic script as we know it today was unknown in Muhammad’s time (as Arabic writing styles have progressed through time) and the Quran was preserved through memorization and written references on different materials. As Arab society started to evolve into using writing more regularly, writing skills evolved accordingly. Early Quranic Arabic lacked precision because distinguishing between consonants was impossible due to the absence of diacritical marks ( a’jam ). Vowelling marks ( tashkil ) to indicate prolongation or vowels were absent as well. Due to this there were endless possibilities for the mispronunciation of the word. The Arabic script as we know it today, the scripta plena , which has pointed texts and is fully vowelled was not perfected until the middle of the 9th century.”

If the Christian texts have problems, so does the Quran.

 

[Chaldean]

This is my interpretation but I may be wrong, In Aramaic back then, calling someone son of also meant “from.” Like saying Son of the Nile. Which means the person is from Egypt. It doesn’t mean that the Nile married Cairo and produced a human. It is just a figure of speech used back then. So by Saying Son of God, I believe it meant that Jesus was from God and has the divine nature of God.

There is a verse in the Quran that mentions God appearing to Moses in the burning bush. I would like to ask my fellow Muslims, who is more Holy, Jesus or a bush? If God was able to appear in a burning Bush, then why do you find it difficult to accept the fact that God became man in Jesus Christ?

 

[UltimateChikorita]

Muslims don’t like St. Paul, because according to them, he perverted Christ’s teachings Literally all of the NT authors except St. James affirmed St. Paul or someone who affirmed St. Paul in the books they wrote. Therefore any Muslim apologetics using the New Testament are obsolete.

 

[SalamKhan]

There is a verse in the Quran that mentions God appearing to Moses in the burning bush. I would like to ask my fellow Muslims, who is more Holy, Jesus or a bush? If God was able to appear in a burning Bush, then why do you find it difficult to accept the fact that God became man in Jesus Christ?

Muslims don’t believe God appeared in the burning bush, and I didn’t think Catholics did either because it would contradict the doctrine of Divine simplicity. Eastern Orthodox may believe that due to their theory of theophanies. But the Bible is clarifies that it was an Angel (Exodus 3:2).

Hasn’t the nature of man been corrupted due to original sin, according to Catholic doctrine? Are you not attributing to God, that which is detestable and damnable, by asserting He added to Himself the nature of man? It doesn’t seem very consistent to me, making Mary and Jesus the exceptions to this corruption.

 

[UglierThanThou]

Hasn’t the nature of man been corrupted due to original sin, according to Catholic doctrine? Are you not attributing to God, that which is detestable and damnable, by asserting He added to Himself the nature of man? It doesn’t seem very consistent to me, making Mary and Jesus the exceptions to this corruption.

Yes, man’s nature has been corrupted with sin. If you have children, you can plainly see this. Recognize how your children unconsciously mimic your imperfect nature - a nature which you yourself cannot help; it is original to you: it is original to them. This pattern goes back to Adam.

I would not say there is inconsistency insofar as what Catholics choose to believe. Jesus and Mary are removed from sin because they are; it is a matter of fact, just as children happen to mimic their parents’ nature is a matter of fact. It just happens to be the case. Jesus mimicked his mother and father, acquiring their perfect, loving nature.

God did not add to himself the nature of man, for the nature of God is man. “God created mankind in his image; in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” However, God is not a child of Adam; his nature is not subject to sin.

 

[Masihi]

The word We is usually used to indicate plurality in the kingdom, as for why God would use the royal we in regards to himself would make no sense unless he does exist in plurality.

 

[Masihi]

Very nice job taking the verses of the Bible out of context to show that God didn’t speak to Moses, the next verse shows that it was God talking to Moses in the form of an Angel or speaking through the Angel:

Exodus 3:2

And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.

Exodus 3:3-4

Then Moses said, “I will now turn aside and see this great sight, why the bush does not burn.” So when the Lord saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush and said, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.”

And no it’s not detestable and damnable for God to give up his own majesty and adopt a human nature for us, rather to Christians its the ultimate expression of love which the Islamic god lacks,