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FireFromHeaven
Guest
Hey Rc apologist. It’s not hard to figure out who I am. 
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SavedByTheCross
Guest
Another idea that may shut him up 
Ask where the outside evidence for their isnad is (either for leaders or for scholars). By outside, I mean a non-Islamic historian from the 7th or 8th century that proves Muslims aren’t just making up the people in the chain of transmission. Obviously if people back then were in the habit of lying so atrociously about from whom they learned their religion, then the problem must not be limited to the Church, right? And they’ve already shown they believe that members of a particular religion cannot be considered reliable in reporting how they learned things, due to the widespread deception that apparently took place back then. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander…
Just a quick thought that occurred to me. It may or may not work
Ask where the outside evidence for their isnad is (either for leaders or for scholars). By outside, I mean a non-Islamic historian from the 7th or 8th century that proves Muslims aren’t just making up the people in the chain of transmission. Obviously if people back then were in the habit of lying so atrociously about from whom they learned their religion, then the problem must not be limited to the Church, right? And they’ve already shown they believe that members of a particular religion cannot be considered reliable in reporting how they learned things, due to the widespread deception that apparently took place back then. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander…
Just a quick thought that occurred to me. It may or may not work
Hi,
I’ve been chatting with this Muslim myself on the Islamic forum and it’s clear his Islamic belief presupposes the Catholic Church is “guilty until proven innocent”. One of the strengths of Islam is that they have an unbroken chain of narrations dealing with the Quran etc. This person is using this strength as a strategy against us. His strategy is if you can’t present an unbroken clear concise list of the apostles by worthy witnesses then you can’t prove there is an apostolic succession. Random Early Church Father writings are not a worthy source because even they conflict with the papal succession.
He affirms all we have is a Church that claims she descends from the apostles with no real hard evidence. The math fails if there was fraud rigjht from the start (so he says!).
Hey FireFromHeaven It’s RC Apologist from the Islamic forum!
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SavedByTheCross
Guest
Also, have you read Not Peace But a Sword? I haven’t so I don’t know if it helps at all but I heard a brief part of an interview with the author and he apparently is claiming that Muhammad never existed. Not sure if I’d believe that (too farfetched IMO, but like I said, I haven’t read it yet), but there may be info in the book that shows illegitimacy of the chain of transmission in the early days of Islam.
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DavidFilmer
Guest
Ask him why he considers this a strength. If there were some disaster, and all of their historic records were lost except the Quran itself, how would this affect Islam? Would Islam cease to be valid, in his opinion?
It seems mighty shaky to have a church based on accurate historical records. If Islam is dependent on accurate history books, it seems to be on very poor footing. I would not consider this a strength in any way, but a vulnerability. In ten thousand years, will Muslims be sure their history books are correct?
If the Catholic Church ever lost every single document except the Bible, it would not matter one bit. Even if we lost the writings of every Early Church Father. Of every Ecumenical Council. Of every Pope. Of every Doctor of the Church. It would not matter.
Because, at one time, the Church did not have any of those things, and yet it was still the Church. The Church has no need of these documents and records. If we lost all of those things, it would be like starting over. A very unfortunate thing, and a great setback, but the Church would still be the Church.
The authority and validity of the Church does not come from history books. Are you telling me that the Muslim church cannot say the same thing?
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Augustine3
Guest
Thanks mate I really appreciate your (name removed by moderator)ut; I’m learning immensely from you!
God bless you.I’ll be in touch soon with his answers…stay tuned!
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Augustine3
Guest
He just came back with this repply:
"Well I think this discussion has come to an end due to the obvious reason that we are not discussing evidence anymore, but I will quickly comment the above post.
As the person says, Christian bishops do not know who their link to the past. That is what I and other Muslims have said all along.
The fact is the person is not discussing evidence. He is just theorizing how things ought to have happened. How things ought to have happened is not how they usually happen. For example, he claims that nobody would have claimed to be a bishop before 313 because there was no motive for deception. That’s just an assumption. I have heard this type of argument used by Christians many times before on this forum. “Would they have died, or put their lives at risk, for a lie?” The answer is, yes, that is entirely possibly. Were you to ask, “Ought they have put their lives at risk for a lie?”, the answer would be, no. However, what ought to have happened is usually quite different from what actually happened. The fact that people are willing to die for a lie is because of utter zeal mixed with ignorance. This has happened throughout history. That’s how false religions start. In Christianity’s case, it is quite evident that people were not keen on preserving the link to the past.
By the way, it is quite false to say that nobody would have had motivate to do so back in the day. When religious zeal is mixed with ignorance, there is no telling what type of motives people will have.
I cannot say to have known that Timothy and Titus were ordained bishops by Paul, but I can safely say that it comes as no surprise at this point that no present day bishop has a link to them.
In summary, all I can say is that a lot of things are taken at face value in Christianity. There is no indication that the early Christians were scholarly when it comes to preserving their traditional link to the past. The theory of Apostolic Succession is just that, a theory, a nice concept that is not really based on evidence.
I have now come to the conclusion that Christians will accept Apostolic Succession if the concept sounds nice, irrespective of the fact whether the theory is backed by actual evidence, or refuted by it."
"Well I think this discussion has come to an end due to the obvious reason that we are not discussing evidence anymore, but I will quickly comment the above post.
As the person says, Christian bishops do not know who their link to the past. That is what I and other Muslims have said all along.
The fact is the person is not discussing evidence. He is just theorizing how things ought to have happened. How things ought to have happened is not how they usually happen. For example, he claims that nobody would have claimed to be a bishop before 313 because there was no motive for deception. That’s just an assumption. I have heard this type of argument used by Christians many times before on this forum. “Would they have died, or put their lives at risk, for a lie?” The answer is, yes, that is entirely possibly. Were you to ask, “Ought they have put their lives at risk for a lie?”, the answer would be, no. However, what ought to have happened is usually quite different from what actually happened. The fact that people are willing to die for a lie is because of utter zeal mixed with ignorance. This has happened throughout history. That’s how false religions start. In Christianity’s case, it is quite evident that people were not keen on preserving the link to the past.
By the way, it is quite false to say that nobody would have had motivate to do so back in the day. When religious zeal is mixed with ignorance, there is no telling what type of motives people will have.
I cannot say to have known that Timothy and Titus were ordained bishops by Paul, but I can safely say that it comes as no surprise at this point that no present day bishop has a link to them.
In summary, all I can say is that a lot of things are taken at face value in Christianity. There is no indication that the early Christians were scholarly when it comes to preserving their traditional link to the past. The theory of Apostolic Succession is just that, a theory, a nice concept that is not really based on evidence.
I have now come to the conclusion that Christians will accept Apostolic Succession if the concept sounds nice, irrespective of the fact whether the theory is backed by actual evidence, or refuted by it."
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Augustine3
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Here is a further reply from him:
"He asks would Islam be valid if all historical documents except the Qur’an got destroyed. I will go even further. Would Islam be valid if all historical Islamic documents, including the Qur’an, got destroyed? The answer is yes. How so you might ask. The answer is because we have scholars who know the Qur’an by heart. The scholars have chains of narrations for the Qur’an going all the way back to the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). Thus they would be able to reproduce the Qur’an and still have a link to the past. In addition, the scholars continue to memorize works such as Sahih al-Bukhari and Muslim, and other Hadith (narration/tradition in English) compilations. This includes the chain of narrators, i.e. they do not merely memorize the content of a narration, they also memorize who were the transmitters. As a matter of fact, once a scholar has memorized a narration and taught it to a student, the chain of narrators continues to grow because the student becomes a part of the chain of transmission. But if all historical documents got destroyed, it would be a major, major, major (can’t repeat this often enough) setback. However, Muslims would still have a link to the past.
I think there is some confusion here. Islam is not merely based on books. It is based on the oral chain of narrators as well. Muslims have an ongoing process of transmission going on. As I said, there are still people who have chains of narrators memorized, so it is not all just based on books. Christians do not have this since apparently no bishop would be able to trace his scholarly lineage back to an Apostle. All a bishop is able to do is to assume that he comes from a pure line of Apostolic Succession. That’s not good enough.
As for how things will be in ten thousand years, I do not know. Only God knows. However, the Prophet (pbuh) has narrated that knowledge will eventually disappear before the Last Hour.
“Before the Day of Judgement, there will be a time (or ‘days’) in which Ignorance will be sent down, and Knowledge will be raised up.”
The ‘raising up of Knowledge’ has been interpreted by the Prophet (saws) himself to mean the death of scholars. The Prophet (saws) said,
‘Allaah does not snatch away knowledge from the chests of His servants, but He takes away knowledge by the death of scholars, until, when there are no more scholars remaining, the people take ignorant leaders (i.e., as scholars). And these leaders will be asked (by the people), and they will respond without any knowledge, and they will be misguided, and misguide others.”
“Islam will disappear just like the colours of a dress fade away, until people will not even know what fasting, prayer, the rites (of Hajj and charity are. And the Book of Allaah will be lifted up one night, so that not even one verse will remain. And a group of old people will remain, who will say, ‘We found our forefathers on this kalimah: Laa ilaaha ila Allaah, so we too say it.”
I have to point out that Christians still do not have chains of narrations for the Gospels that go back to their authors. This is a major problem from an Islamic perspective. However, I am sure that it would not bother Christians if all documents except the Bible got destroyed. Just look at the Protestants. It does not matter whether they have Apostolic Succession or not. In effect, you have proven that Catholicism is really no different from Protestantism, as it apparently does not matter if we can prove that there is a link to the past or not."
"He asks would Islam be valid if all historical documents except the Qur’an got destroyed. I will go even further. Would Islam be valid if all historical Islamic documents, including the Qur’an, got destroyed? The answer is yes. How so you might ask. The answer is because we have scholars who know the Qur’an by heart. The scholars have chains of narrations for the Qur’an going all the way back to the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). Thus they would be able to reproduce the Qur’an and still have a link to the past. In addition, the scholars continue to memorize works such as Sahih al-Bukhari and Muslim, and other Hadith (narration/tradition in English) compilations. This includes the chain of narrators, i.e. they do not merely memorize the content of a narration, they also memorize who were the transmitters. As a matter of fact, once a scholar has memorized a narration and taught it to a student, the chain of narrators continues to grow because the student becomes a part of the chain of transmission. But if all historical documents got destroyed, it would be a major, major, major (can’t repeat this often enough) setback. However, Muslims would still have a link to the past.
I think there is some confusion here. Islam is not merely based on books. It is based on the oral chain of narrators as well. Muslims have an ongoing process of transmission going on. As I said, there are still people who have chains of narrators memorized, so it is not all just based on books. Christians do not have this since apparently no bishop would be able to trace his scholarly lineage back to an Apostle. All a bishop is able to do is to assume that he comes from a pure line of Apostolic Succession. That’s not good enough.
As for how things will be in ten thousand years, I do not know. Only God knows. However, the Prophet (pbuh) has narrated that knowledge will eventually disappear before the Last Hour.
“Before the Day of Judgement, there will be a time (or ‘days’) in which Ignorance will be sent down, and Knowledge will be raised up.”
The ‘raising up of Knowledge’ has been interpreted by the Prophet (saws) himself to mean the death of scholars. The Prophet (saws) said,
‘Allaah does not snatch away knowledge from the chests of His servants, but He takes away knowledge by the death of scholars, until, when there are no more scholars remaining, the people take ignorant leaders (i.e., as scholars). And these leaders will be asked (by the people), and they will respond without any knowledge, and they will be misguided, and misguide others.”
“Islam will disappear just like the colours of a dress fade away, until people will not even know what fasting, prayer, the rites (of Hajj and charity are. And the Book of Allaah will be lifted up one night, so that not even one verse will remain. And a group of old people will remain, who will say, ‘We found our forefathers on this kalimah: Laa ilaaha ila Allaah, so we too say it.”
I have to point out that Christians still do not have chains of narrations for the Gospels that go back to their authors. This is a major problem from an Islamic perspective. However, I am sure that it would not bother Christians if all documents except the Bible got destroyed. Just look at the Protestants. It does not matter whether they have Apostolic Succession or not. In effect, you have proven that Catholicism is really no different from Protestantism, as it apparently does not matter if we can prove that there is a link to the past or not."
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FireFromHeaven
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:
:tiphat:
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DavidFilmer
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It is an assumption for anyone who is not insane. I will grant that insane people exist, and some may have pretended to be Christian bishops prior to 313. Thus, I have stipulated that, by 325, one in twenty Bishops might have been invalid. I have even shown that it would not matter (today) if HALF of Christian Bishops in AD 325 were invalid. The break-even point is if TWO THIRDS of Christian Bishops were invalid in 325. Even this ratio would be quickly overcome if Episcopal Ordinations were occasionally celebrated by more than three Consecrators, as has been the custom for many centuries.
Does the Muslim really want to claim that more than 2/3 of the Bishops in 325 AD were the result of invalid ordination? C’mon. *That’s getting pretty darned ridiculous. * He cannot contest that the Church today possesses valid Apostolic Orders without contending that the Church in 325 AD had more than two thirds of bishops with invalid Orders (due to deceptions of their predecessors), and that subsequent Episcopal Ordinations were limited to (instead of required for) three Consecrators.
The Muslim never answered my proxy question. Does the validity of his faith depend on an accurate understanding of history, and accurate historical lists? If he has such historical lists, how does this present a “strength” for his faith? Would he care to present such lists (whatever they might constitute, which he has never stipulated) here for analysis? I want to know what “history” he claims to have that he claims that the Catholic Church does not have.
FWIW, the Catholic Church also has people who can cite many many historic documents by memory. When I asked about the destruction of such records, I meant to include all of these people as well. ALL records (written or memorized) were lost, EXCEPT the Bible.
All written AND personal knowledge is lost in this disaster. Would Islam survive? Catholicism would certainly survive.
Would Islam survive? I am very interested in the answer to this question.
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Augustine3
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I think the issue is this person is saying we Catholics claim we descend from apostolic succession yet we have no means to prove it apart from a messy list of popes and a handful of church father writings. To him the church claims her origin and he must believe it “because the church said so” without any hardcore evidence.
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FireFromHeaven
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Are the popes under episcopal ordination? If so that would prove the line was true post nicene. On him saying that the papal sucession is invalid, I found a list on new advent.
newadvent.org/cathen/12272b.htm
On Linus it is agreed he was the second pope. The confusion is on Anacletus/Cletus. He is pretty much saying that te entire line is invalid because we aren’t sure of the name of the second pope.The sources agree that he died a martyr which may explain the confusion.
It also seems that the main confusion is over either clement came before Anacletus and Cletus or they came before him.
newadvent.org/cathen/12272b.htm
On Linus it is agreed he was the second pope. The confusion is on Anacletus/Cletus. He is pretty much saying that te entire line is invalid because we aren’t sure of the name of the second pope.The sources agree that he died a martyr which may explain the confusion.
It also seems that the main confusion is over either clement came before Anacletus and Cletus or they came before him.
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DavidFilmer
Guest
“Episcopal” means Bishop. All Popes are Bishops (Bishop of Rome, to be specific), so all Popes have undergone episcopal Ordination (if he’s not already a Bishop when he is named Pope, he will be immediately ordained as a Bishop. This is rare).
There’s no such thing as Papal succession. Popes don’t appoint their successors (this may have happened in a few cases, but that’s pure speculation. We don’t have an actual example. We do not know for sure of any particular Pope who was appointed by his predecessor).
If Popes appointed their successors, and this was the only way that a Pope could be appointed, then the line of succession would be of great importance, and any uncertainty would be cause for great concern. But that’s not how it works. Popes don’t appoint their successors. There’s no such thing as Papal succession.
The Church does not even need a Pope! The Church could go *centuries *without a Pope. We could not go very long without any Bishops, but we don’t actually need a Pope.
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Augustine3
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His reply:
*I will only answer the question regarding Islamic chain of narrations. If you want a full chain of narrators, you will have to find an Islamic scholar, which is an easy thing in the modern age of technology. I can ask a scholar to present his full chain of transmission going back to the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). This is something that Christians don’t have.
However, if you do not want a full chain. I can tell you, for example, that Ibn Mas’ud who was a Companion of the Prophet established a school in Kufa. One his students was 'Alqamah who taught Ibrahim (rah) who taught Hammad (rah) who taught Imam Abu Hanifa. Many modern day scholars will trace their scholarly lineage through this chain.
Another such chain of transmission starts from Ibn 'Umar (ra) who was a companion of the Prophet (pbuh). Ibn ‘Umar taught his freed slave Nafi’ who in turn taught the famous Imam Malik ibn Anas. Malik ibn Anas had plenty of other teachers who could trace their scholarly lineage back to the Prophet (pbuh).
Another chain starts with Ali ibn Abi Talib, Uthman, Ubay ibn Kab and Zaid ibn Thabit. These men were the companions of the Prophet (pbuh) and Abu 'Abd ar-Rahman as-Sulami learned from all of them. Abu 'Abd ar-Rahman in turn taught 'Asim of Kufa. 'Asim of Kufa learnt also from Zirr ibn Hubaish who had learnt from Ibn Mas’ud who is a Companion of the Prophet (pbuh) as was mentioned earlier. This is a chain of transmission for the recitation of the Qur’an.
I suggest you stop taking your knowledge from people who only want talk based on hypotheses as you your Catholic forum friend does. I answered his first question. However, he added more things to it and it is obvious he has not learnt from history. If all historical records, i.e. written books and people of knowledge (although I would not people records, but that’s the language your friend used), got destroyed except the Bible, it would be the end of Catholicism. How long would it take for another Arius to pop up if all the men of knowledge died and records were destroyed? Or how about people with even weirder beliefs like Marcion? How many denominations do you think Catholicism would fragment into (similar to what Catholics like to call Protestants on)? Think about it. Your friend likes to talk on a hypothetical level, not based on evidence. That’s why he asks these sorts of unrealistic questions and proposes theories that he tries to justify based on math while ignoring that the premises are flawed.*
I love how he turns his last paragraph around on Catholics; that’s a typical cop out. Either I didn’t do a very good job in explaining Sacred Tradition or he totally ignored it.
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FireFromHeaven
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Augustine tell him how popes are also espiscopslly ordained. Thus they have a certain chain to the apostles. Throw in David’s math and how thee would have to be two/thirds of the bishops being fake to hurt succession.
All I can say on episcopal ordination is
chirho.me/memes/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/482255_169784469837970_171378143_n.jpg
All I can say on episcopal ordination is
chirho.me/memes/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/482255_169784469837970_171378143_n.jpg
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DavidFilmer
Guest
I gather that Muslim teachers (?) are taught by other teachers, and this line of teaching goes back to Muhammad, and knowing who taught who is what gives these teachers authority to teach. Is this correct?
I’m trying to figure out why this guy thinks that knowing this line of succession is important. Is this method of teaching by lineage something that Muhammad instructed? Did Muhammad tell his followers to keep up with their lineage? Or is this something that came up afterward?
We humans love lists. There are people who can tell you who won every baseball World Series. We don’t need to know that in order to have a new World Series champion. Just because we DO know who won every World Series does not mean we NEED to know this. If we completely forgot which World Series the Houston Astros won, it would not matter.
So is this insistence on lists something that was commanded by Muhammad or something that later scholars think is nice to know?
Forgive my ignorance - I know little of Islam.
I’m trying to figure out why this guy thinks that knowing this line of succession is important. Is this method of teaching by lineage something that Muhammad instructed? Did Muhammad tell his followers to keep up with their lineage? Or is this something that came up afterward?
We humans love lists. There are people who can tell you who won every baseball World Series. We don’t need to know that in order to have a new World Series champion. Just because we DO know who won every World Series does not mean we NEED to know this. If we completely forgot which World Series the Houston Astros won, it would not matter.
So is this insistence on lists something that was commanded by Muhammad or something that later scholars think is nice to know?
Forgive my ignorance - I know little of Islam.
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SavedByTheCross
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It’s something that came generations later. As their version of heresies sprouted up, it became important to document whose teachings could be traced back to Muhammad and his companions. Nonetheless, there are still different beliefs and legal rulings by different scholars, despite the fact that they all have this alleged direct line back to Muhammad.
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DavidFilmer
Guest
If this is true, then it means Muslims have no better claim on their lineage than Catholics. The difference is that Catholics don’t care, as long as Apostolic succession is maintained. Nobody cares about the name of his Consecrator.
If this is true, then Islam had generations of teachers who were “assumed” to be valid (and, indeed, there is little reason to question this assumption). The Catholic Church is no different.
If this is true, then why does the Muslim ask the Catholic Church to provide what his own faith cannot provide, even though this requirement is not instructed by Allah or his Prophet? Who came up with this idea that named lineage is important? Why is this idea considered a strength for Islam? Why does a Muslim expect a Catholic to conform to this guy’s idea (whoever he was) of validity by named lineage?
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SavedByTheCross
Guest
Excellent questions.
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DavidFilmer
Guest
And yet no answers. Very disappointing. My questions might have been seen as argumentative, but I was really just trying to understand.Excellent questions.
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