ALLAH - AUTHOR OF HISTORICAL ERRORS The Quran contains historical errors which implies that Allah is not an Omniscient Being, since an all-knowing Being would be able to accurately recall historical events. Below is a list of just some of the many problems we find in the Quran. In S. 17:1 we are told that Muhammad was taken to the farthest Mosque, Masjid al-Aqsa. The problem with this is that the Aqsa Mosque had not been erected since Abd al-Malik only built it in AD 691. It cannot be referring to the Temple in Jerusalem since that was destroyed by the armies of the Roman general Titus in AD 70. S. 18:9-26 alludes to several men and their dog who slept for approximately 309 years only to be awakened in perfect condition. According to S. 18:83-98, Alexander the Great called Zhul Qarnain, the Two Horned One, was a Muslim who traveled till he found the Sun literally setting in a muddy spring. When we keep in mind that the title the Two Horned One was a title given to Alexander in pre-Islamic times, the Muslim attempts of trying to deny this fact utterly fails. According to S. 4:157 the unbelieving Jews boasted by saying, We killed the Messiah Jesus the son of Mary, the apostle of Allah. The only problem with this is that the unbelieving Jews never admitted that Jesus was Messiah and would not have killed him if they had believed that he was their long-awaited Messianic Deliverer. The unbelieving Jews had Jesus killed because they believed he was a false Messiah: And they began to accuse him, saying, ‘We have found this man subverting our nation. He opposes payment of taxes to Caesar and CLAIMS to be Christ a king.’ Luke 23:2 NIV Christians are accused of worshiping Mary and Jesus as two gods apart from the true God: And behold! Allah will say: O Jesus the son of Mary! Didst thou say unto men, Worship me and my mother ... S. 5:116 Christ the son of Mary was no more than an apostle- many were the apostles that passed away before him. His mother was a woman of truth. They had both to eat their (daily) food. See how Allah doth make His Signs clear to them ... S. 5:75 In blasphemy indeed are those that say that Allah is Christ the son of Mary. Say: Who then hath the least power against Allah, if His Will were to destroy Christ the son of Mary, his mother, and all - every one that is on the earth... S. 5:17 This presumes that since Mary ate food and could be destroyed by Allah she could not possibly be divine. This gives the misleading impression that Christians believe that she is more than simply human. In fact, the Quran proceeds to accuse Christians of worshiping three gods: They do blaspheme who say: Allah is the third of three (inallaaha thaalithu thalaatha) S. 5:73 ... so believe in Allah and His apostles. Say not three (thalaatha): desist: It will be better for you: for Allah is one Allah ... S. 4:171 According to Muslim biographer Ibn Ishaq in his work, Sirat Rasulullah, a Christian deputation from Najran came to debate Muhammad on the person of Jesus. Accordingly, these Christians allegedly believed that Jesus, is God; and He is the son of God; and He is the third Person of the Trinity, which is the doctrine of Christianity. (Alfred Guilliame trans., The Life of Muhammad [Oxford University Press, Karachi], p. 271) He goes on to say, They argue that he is the third of three in that God says: We have done, We have commanded, We have created and We have decreed, and they say, If He were one He would have said I have done, I have created, and so on, but He is He and Jesus and Mary. Concerning all these assertions the Quran came down. (Ibid., pp. 271-272) The errors in the Quranic teaching on what Christians believe becomes apparent to anyone familiar with the basics of Christian doctrine. Firstly, Christians have never taken Mary as a goddess alongside God. Secondly, Christians have never said God is three or the third of three which is tritheism, three separate gods forming a unity; as opposed to Trinity, ONE God who exists in Three distinct yet inseparable Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Thirdly, Christianity has never taught as part of its doctrine that Jesus is the third Person of the Trinity. Rather, he is the Second Person, with the Holy Spirit being the third Person of the Godhead. Matthew 28:19 Fourthly, Muslims believe that Allah of the Quran is the same as God the Father of the Holy Bible since they do not believe in God the Son, Jesus Christ, nor in God the Holy Spirit who to Muslims is the angel Gabriel. This again causes a problem since if Allah is indeed the same Person as God the Father then the Quran is wrong in saying that Christians believe that the Father is the third of three. Christians teach that the Father is the First Person of the One True Godhead, not the third deity of three gods. And finally, Christians do not believe that Allah is the Messiah, or that God is the Messiah since this implies that Jesus is the entire Godhead, which would be modalism. The correct and biblical statement is that Jesus is God, since this suggests that although Jesus is fully God by nature he is not the only Person who shares the essence of Deity perfectly. The Bible also teaches that both the Father and the Holy Spirit are fully God. Mary the Mother of Jesus is confused with Mary the sister of Aaron and Moses, the daughter of Amram: Behold! The wife of Imran (i.e. Amram) said, O my Lord! I do dedicate unto thee what is in my womb... When she was delivered, she said: O my Lord! Behold! I am delivered of a female child ... I have named her Mary... S. 3:35, 36 And Mary the daughter of Imran, who guarded her chastity.. S. 66:12. ... They said: O Mary! Truly an amazing thing hast thou brought! O sister of Aaron! Thy father was not a man of evil, nor thy mother a woman unchaste. S. 19:27-28 Then Mary (Heb. Mariam), the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took the timbrel in her hand ... Exodus 15:20 The name of Amrams wife was Jochebed, the daughter of Levi, who was born to Levi in Egypt; and to Amram she bore Aaron and Moses and their sister Miriam. Numbers 26:59 This is an error of nearly 1400 years! How could Moses sister Mary be Jesus mother, making Moses his uncle? Muslims give two responses in trying to deal with this anachronism. First, it is stated that the expressions sister of Aaron and daughter of Amram refers to Marys lineage, i.e. that Mary was a descendant of Aaron and Amram of the tribe of Levi. Unfortunately for Muslims, this assertion cannot possibly be the case since Mary was a daughter of Judah and a descendant of David: Now Jesus Himself began his ministry at about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed the son of Joseph, the son of Heli ... the son of David ... the son of Judah. Luke 3:23, 31, 33 The words, as was supposed, are given to clarify the fact that it is Marys genealogy which is being presented, with Joseph acting as the male representative. This is supported by extrabiblical documents such as the Jewish tractate of the Talmud, Chagigah, where a certain person had a dream in which he saw the punishment of the damned. There, He saw Mary the daughter of Heli amongst the shades. ( John Lightfoot, Commentary On the New Testament from the Talmud and Hebraica [Oxford University Press, 1859; with a second printing from Hendrickson Publishers Inc., 1995], vol. 1, p. v; vol. 3, p.55) In the book of Hebrews we are told that, it is evident that our Lord ( Jesus ) arose from Judah, of which tribe Moses spoke nothing concerning priesthood Heb. 7:14. And, I ( Jesus ) am the Root and Offspring of David, the Bright Morning Star. Revelation 22:16 It is therefore impossible for Mary to be a descendant of Levi, since both the orthodox Jewish understanding and the biblical record agree that Messiah would arise out of Judah (c.f. Genesis 49:10-12; Matthew 22:42-45). Someone might interject at this point and suggest that the Bible calls Elizabeth a relation of Mary: Now, indeed, Elizabeth your relative also conceived a son in her old age... Luke 1:36 NKJV This seems to imply that Mary is of Levitical descent, since Elizabeth is addressed as one of Aarons descendants. (Cf. Luke 1:5) The term used for relative in the Greek is syngenes. Gerhard Kittel and Gerhard Friedrich define it as: a. The adjective refers to a person of common origin, i.e., belonging to the same family, race, tribe, or people. It can then mean related in disposition, corresponding, analogous, or similar. b. The noun means relationship by descent or disposition, then more broadly analogy (e.g. between deity and humanity, or ideas and the senses, or the stars and human destiny), whether in philosophy or popular belief. (Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, abridged in one volume by George W. Bromiley [Eerdmans, 1985], p. 1097) Hence, Elizabeth and Mary were related in the sense of being of the same race of people, i.e. the Israelites. But this meaning seems to be unlikely since this could be said about any other Israelite womans relationship to Mary. It seems more likely that Elizabeth and Mary were blood relatives. This being the case, this still wouldnt prove that Mary was of the tribe of Aaron. All this would prove is that Elizabeth had Judean blood in her, since Levites were allowed to marry women from any of the twelve tribes: The woman he (the Levitical Priests) marries must be a virgin. He must not marry a widow, a divorced woman, or a woman defiled by prostitution, but only a virgin from his people. Leviticus 21:13-14 NIV Ezekiel, in his vision of a restored priesthood and temple, further clarifies this point: They shall not marry a widow or a divorced woman, but only virgins of the offspring OF THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL, or a widow who is the widow of a priest. Ezekiel 44:22 ESV The Holy Bible even provides an example of a priest who had married a woman from Judea, who was actually a descendant of king David: Now when Athaliah the mother of Ahaziah saw that her son was dead, she arose and destroyed all the royal family of the house of Judah. But Jehoshabeath, the daughter of the king, took Joash the son of Ahaziah and stole him away from among the kings sons who were about to be put to death, and she put him and his nurse in a bedroom. Thus Jehoshabeath, the daughter of King Jehoram and wife of Jehoiada the priest, because she was a sister of Ahaziah, hid him from Athaliah, so that she did not put him to death. 2 Chronicles 22:10-11 The foregoing demonstrates the plausibility of Elizabeths mother being from the line of David, from the tribe of Judah, accounting for her being related to Mary. Elizabeth could also be an aunt to Mary, see the entry on Luke 1:36 in the Bible Commentary section. Muslims are not to be blamed for taking the phrase brother of as a reference to Marys lineage since Muhammad also used a similar line of reasoning to cover up this error. In Sahih Muslim Mughirah ibn Shubah narrates: When I came to Najran, they (the Christians of Najran) asked me: You read ‘sister of Harun (i.e., Mary), in the Quran, whereas Moses was born well before Jesus. When I came back to Allahs Messenger I asked him about that, and he said: ‘The (people of old age) used to give names (to their persons) after the names of Apostles and pious persons who had gone before them. #5326 Again, Ibn Abi Ahaybah and Ahmad and Abdel Hameed and Muslim and At-Tirmidhi and An-NassaaI and Ibn Al-Mundhir and Ibn Abi Haatim and Ibn Hibbaan and At-Tabaraani and Ibn Mardaweih ans Al-Bayhaqi in ad-dalaail, narrated that Al-Mughirah Ibn Shubah said: The Prophet of God (PBUH) sent me to the people of Najran. They asked me: Do you see what you read? O sister of Harun while Moses precedes Jesus with such a long time? He (Al-Mughirah) said: So I went back to the Prophet and mentioned that to him. He told me: Would you tell them the folk used to be called after Prophets and pious people who preceded them? (Jalaaluddeen As-Suyuti, Ad-durr Al-Manthur) The only difficulty with Muhammads statement is that the Jews before and during the time of Christ never used this phrase in this manner at all. Not one single reference from the Bible, either Old or New Testaments, the Jewish literature before the birth of Christ, or even the Jewish Talmud and Targums after Christ can be found to support Muhammads assertion. This is simply a gross error which cannot be swept away. The second argument is actually a clarification of the first in that it is suggested that both the Bible and the Quran furnish further evidence for the term sister of being used to imply ancestry: His (Zechariah) wife was of the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. Luke 1:5 It is obvious that the term daughters is speaking of Elizabeths lineage and is not to be taken to literally mean that her father was actually Aaron the brother of Moses. Again it is unfortunate for Muslims that this argument does not help them, but actually serves to weaken their argument. Although the Bible does use the phrases son of, or daughter of to refer to ancestry, it never uses the terms brother of or sister of to indicate this fact. A few examples of the former usage include: So ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has bound- think of it - for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath? Luke 13:16 And Jesus said to him, Today salvation has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham. Luke 19:9 And behold, two blind men sitting by the road, when they heard that Jesus was passing by, cried out, saying, Have mercy on us, 0 Lord, Son of David. Matthew 20:30 Scripture never addresses a person as a brother of Abraham, or sister of David when wishing to imply lineage. Hence, the Muslim position cannot be defended biblically. The second example is from the Quran where Salih is called Thamuds brother: We sent ( aforetime ) to the Thamud, their brother Salih ... S. 27:45 The term brother here refers to kinsmen, not actual bloodbrothers, exemplifying the many different ways the term is used. Once again the problem is far from being resolved since the term brother is used to address Salihs contemporaries, not his ancestors. This implies that to call Mary Aarons sister meant that Mary and Aaron were contemporaries, living at the same time. Unlike the Quran, the Holy Bible contains no historical errors. Most attacks on the Bible stem from arguments from silence, i.e. the fact that no independent archeological research has been discovered in support of certain recorded biblical events. Yet, such arguments only prove that as of yet archeology has failed to furnish evidence against an event reported in the Bible. Other attacks center on the precise dating of certain archeological findings which some see as contradicting the Holy Bibles chronology. Again, one cannot say that the Holy Bible is in error when archeologists themselves are divided over the precise dating of certain discoveries. This is especially so when one realizes that there are certain archeologists who provide evidence which they feel proves that the data corresponds perfectly with the Bibles chronology of the events in question. This is far different from archeology providing evidence to show that certain events did not occur in the same manner in which the Bible says it did. In fact, not one archeological discovery has ever proven the Bible wrong; discovery after discovery has demonstrated the amazing historical accuracy of scripture. The following quotations from the worlds leading archeologists affirms this fact: Nowhere has archeological discovery refuted the Bible as history. ( John Elder, Prophets, Idols and Diggers [New York; Bobs Merrill, 1960], p. 16 ) Near Eastern archeology has demonstrated the historical and geographical reliability of the Bible in many important areas. By clarifying the objectivity and factual accuracy of biblical authors, archeology also helps correct the view that the Bible is avowedly partisan and subjective. It is now known, for instance, that, along with the Hittites, Hebrew scribes were the best historians in the entire ancient Near East, despite contrary propaganda that emerged from Assyria, Egypt, and elsewhere. (E. M. Blaiklock, editors preface, New International Dictionary of Biblical Archeology [Grand Rapids, MI; Regency Reference Library/ Zondervan, 1983], pp. vii-viii) The late William F. Albright, one of the worlds foremost archeologists, stated: There can be no doubt that archeology has confirmed the substantial historicity of Old Testament tradition. (J. A. Thompson, The Bible and Archeology [Grand Rapids, MI; Eerdmans, 1975], p. 5) Nelson Glueck, world renowned archeologist, concurs: As a matter of fact, however, it maybe clearly stated categorically that no archeological discovery has ever controverted a single biblical reference. Scores of archeological findings have been made which confirm in clear outline or exact detail historical statements in the Bible. ( Norman Geisler & Ron Brooks, When Skeptics Ask; A Handbook on Christian Evidences [Wheaton, IL; Victor, 1990], p. 179) It should be noted that both Albright and Glueck were not conservative Christians and did not believe in the inspiration of scripture. Their conclusions were based strictly on the archeological data, forcing them to make the above admissions. This cannot be said of the Quran with all of its historical and scientific mistakes.
Posted on: Sun, 20 Jul 2014 16:43:44 +0000
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