The Trinity, Part 2

So now it's our privilege to welcome Dr. James White for the second part of our five -minute refocused statement.

I appreciate the opportunity to help us refocus once again on the primary issues we need to address this evening.

Specifically, remember when Abdullah quoted from the Old Testament in places like Hosea 11 .9

and Numbers 23 .19, God is not a man. A text that I use all the time in debating with my

Mormon friends, because I do not believe that God in his nature is a man.

God is the eternal creator of all things. But, since he is the creator of man, should he choose to enter into his own creation, he is free to do so, and that's what

John 1 .14 tells us, the eternal wagos became flesh and dwelt amongst us, and we beheld his glory, the glories of the only begotten father, full of grace and truth.

The gospel is not that men can become gods, but that God became a man in the person of Jesus Christ to provide perfect redemption for his people.

And so we believe those texts. Once again, what Abdullah is doing here is, in essence, postmodern deconstruction.

It's take a position that is built up based upon believing all that the word of God says, undercut the foundation by denying elements of that text, and then say, well,

I just don't think this makes sense, or this makes sense, by not allowing those people who wrote those books to define the terms themselves, or the early church.

He said, we need to get rid of Greek philosophy. Well, I don't think Greek philosophy was determining what

Isaiah wrote in Isaiah 9 .6, when he prophesied 700 years before Christ, that one would come who would be called

Avi Ad, eternal father, El Gabor, the mighty God, Sar Shalom, the prince of peace.

I don't think that had anything to do with Greek philosophy. But as the gospel is meant to go out into all the world, you have to engage the cultures where they are.

And as people began asking questions using that type of language, people had to answer those questions using that type of language.

That's all that's going on there. And certainly, you recognize that even in your own situation, as you attempt to explain how

Allah can be eternal, how Allah can be the creator of all things, you have to engage the people who are criticizing your faith as a

Muslim on the grounds where you can communicate with them. Does that somehow mean that you are abandoning what you believe at your most foundational level?

I would say that it's not. Now, there are some people who do that. I certainly am not doing that because I believe

I'm standing very firmly on the grounds of the word of God. And so, once again, we go back to the key issue.

What did the Christian scriptures, which according to Surah 5, 46 and following,

I am to judge by what they say, what did the Christian scriptures teach about who

Jesus Christ is and about the nature of God? And those Christian scriptures, taken as a whole, taken as they're originally written.

If you want to look at a specific text, if you want to say, well, you know, I don't think that the original writers actually included the current

Christian, Philippians 2, 5 through 11. Well, let's look at the text. We have the critical text sitting right on our desks.

Now, he has one too. We can look at both of them. We can look at any one of these texts and I can demonstrate to you that these teachings, this doctrine that God has revealed himself in a triune fashion, is the witness of the earliest

Christian writers. That's what they believe. Not just in the New Testament, but even go, not to origin, oh my goodness, go to Ignatius of Antioch, who dies in 107 to 108

A .D. He dies within a generation of the last of the apostles, a martyr, and at least 10 times, maybe as many as 14 times, he identifies

Jesus as his God. That's not Constantine down at the

Council of Nicaea at 325. That's within one generation of the apostles.

This has been the belief of Christians from the beginning. It is the testimony of the

New Testament. It's the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. And I can guarantee you one thing.

We can talk about Jewish monotheism all we wish. There are all sorts of texts in the Old Testament that are used in the

New Testament that reveal to us this one who's coming. Psalm 2, kiss the sad lest he be angry.

Who is this one in Psalm 22? My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And yet at the end of the psalm, he's victorious.

Who is this in Isaiah 53? It's not Israel. Look at these texts, and you will see for yourself that what we're talking about tonight is the consistent witness of all of the

Christian scriptures. Thank you. Well, there's some very interesting points that James White mentioned.

Now, I think the real focus is that, I don't think he understood my point. He said that, well, we can't question scripture.

You know, we just have to accept it. There's no mental, you know, checking of it. We don't, you know, subject it to our minds.

But why not? Because that's what the early church did when they started to select which Gospels, which Gospels made sense, which Gospels agreed with the kind of teachings that they thought should be done.

They used their minds to select the Gospels. In some cases to write the Gospels, to define the Gospels, to define the philosophies, to explain the

Gospels, they used their minds to do so. And it just seems like they've become more deified. But all these early, early church fathers, up until Ignatius, or rather, or even before that, they somehow now have these omniscient gods that know exactly that the

Holy Spirit, according to his blind faith, is working through them and producing accurate texts and accurate works.

Again, he has to answer the point as where is it in the Old Testament prophecies that Jesus is prophesied as being

Nazarene. It's not there. Why isn't he answering this? Did the

Holy Spirit make a mistake? Was it something that he just missed out? No, it's a human text. As soon as you reconcile yourself to that, then actually things become a bit more clear.

He said, secondly, if I get a text from the book which says night is not day, and then he wants to say, ah, but I've got a text that says day is night.

What has he proven? Has he proven I'm wrong? Or has he proven his own Bible wrong? He's undermined his own

Bible, or Old New Testament, or this documentation of apostolic tradition, by showing the contradictions in the book.

We have the same criteria to our Quran. The Quran says that had this been from other than God, we would have found many contradictions in it.

So if there are contradictions in the Quran, then we would have to say that this Quran is not from God.

So we are consistent with this criteria. We apply it to our book. Are we going to apply it to another book? Then we encourage all human beings to apply it to all other books.

I think the question that we haven't asked ourselves is, why that for thousands of years

Jews were totally happy believing in one God doesn't come down as a man, that God is ineffable, he's beyond human being, beyond human limitation outside of time.

That's totally okay. But then, suddenly, oh, it's like new now. A new revelation about God.

God's internal nature. It's great. God even has an internal nature. Only created beings have an external or internal.

God does not have an external or internal. But now these philosophers are coming along saying, oh, God has an internal and external.

This new philosophy that God actually has or begets sons and sons through various definitions and so on, this is completely new.

A Jew wouldn't believe this. If I went back to the time of Moses, and I professed my faith, and so on, just to say that I believe in Moses and in one

God, they wouldn't have any problem with me. Likewise, when people go up to Jesus, and ask

Jesus, and they tell Jesus about their faith, that we worship one God, and then Jesus is totally fine with that. Jesus doesn't seem to be saying, you must believe that I am

God. You have to believe it, otherwise you won't be saved. Everything collapses. All that Jesus wants is that you say you believe in him. Well, I believe in Jesus.

I just don't believe he's God. But why Jesus hasn't asked for this? And that's why the Quran says, when

Allah asks Jesus, did you say worship me? And he didn't. But in the Old Testament, God, in the singular pronoun, not in the multiple persons, but the singular pronoun, a single person says,

I am God, worship me. You shall know all this before me. So God says that, but Jesus didn't say that. So can you see why confusion here?

Can you see the problem here? So, that's the issue. That's why I find it hugely conspicuous that I now have to believe that Jesus is

God, even though Jesus seemed happy with people who said that they believed in God. Jesus said, the father who you call your

God. The father who you call your God. Now, when James White said, the Quran doesn't understand our theology,

I had to answer this question. How do you put it to you? If I came from a Jewish sect, which believed that Moses, God, and an angel of God were all three in one, what would you say to me?

What would be your response? You would say to me, you've made Moses, an angel of God, partners to God.

You have communal idolatry. I'd say, no, no, no, but I meant they're like three persons in one

Godhead. He'd say, no, because we know that Moses is not God, even though he was called God in the

Old Testament. God said, I'll make you a God. I'll make him to the Pharaoh. I'll make you a God to the Pharaoh. But we know that Moses is not

God. So it's because of this that the Quran says that the Christians have made

Allah, the Father, one of three in derogation. So they've taken

Jesus in derogation to God. We should go straight to God, our Father who art in heaven. That is straight, that's a prayer, straight to God, not to Jesus.

Thank you. At this time, we're going to have 10 minutes each of cross -examination.

The last debate, we didn't have this, and James White and Abdullah agreed to this format, which allows them to speak a little more freely and openly to one another.

I think you will certainly appreciate any change that goes on at this time. So we're going to welcome

Dr. James White to begin the 10 minutes of cross -examination. Thank you very much.

In fact, let me say, I hope you take it as an honor that I think we can do this because I think we model for others how these types of dialogues need to take place.

I very much appreciate how we've done so far. You just made a very important statement.

You said, I believe in Jesus. I just don't believe in God. I hate that he's God. That didn't come out right.

I just don't believe in God. That wasn't the point. If you have a Bible there, in the eighth chapter of the

Gospel of John, when Jesus said to the Jews, you will die in your sins, for unless you believe that ego,

I am, you will die in your sins. How do you understand a text like that?

Do you feel that that has been corrupted? Or if it hasn't been corrupted, how do you understand what

Jesus is saying to those Jews who clearly believed he existed as a man, but they rejected that he was the

I am, and Jesus said, you will die in your sins. How do you understand a text like that? Sure. Well, if I was a

Christian, a humanitarian Christian, I would have to reconcile that text, that ambiguous text, what this

I am statement means, with explicit texts whereby Jesus is speaking to people and they are explaining their faith that I follow commands, and I believe in my

God, and I love God with all your heart, and so on. This is basically

Jesus saying, you are not far from the kingdom of God to these people, these people who have not confessed that Jesus is

God. And so Jesus is saying, you are not far from the kingdom of God. This is taken as acceptable doctrine from what

Jesus is saying to them. So, if I was a humanitarian Christian, I would have to reconcile that with that text, and I'm not a

Christian theologian, but I might say that he's saying to them, I am the Messiah, I am the prophet, all kinds of things.

But I would need to reconcile that. So, in essence, you just identified this as an ambiguous text.

Is it your assertion that in the Gospel of John, this phrase, I am, is ambiguous? I mean, it's at the end of John chapter 8 the

Jews pick up stones to stone Jesus for saying before Abraham was, I am. And in John 18, when

Jesus says, I am to soldiers, they fall back on the ground. That's not exactly, I mean, that's, you know,

I say something to somebody, they fall back on the ground. It might mean something. Why do you say these are ambiguous texts?

Aren't you sort of setting up a standard there that sort of determines what the text is going to say rather than looking at the text first?

In John, what was the nationality of the soldiers? Those were probably part of the Jewish temple.

Sure, okay, but if they were Roman soldiers, then I would be very much amazed that they understand the nuances of Jewish theology.

But again, I would have to say that there are obviously a problem with that text and other texts such as Mark 10 and 18 where a person like Jesus said, good teacher, what must

I do to inherit eternal life? And then he asked, why do you call me good? For there is no one good except God alone.

And then the guy said, okay, teacher. And all these other, I kept the commandments since I was a boy and just looked at him and loved him, basically.

So he modified, he said, when Jesus rebukes him, he said, why do you call me good? God is good.

He said, okay, teacher then. And then Jesus looks at him and loves him. Jesus seems to be accepting this.

I would say it's a contradiction. If you wish to affirm the verse you quoted to me as attribution of divine divinity to Jesus, then this is a contradiction.

Your text must be used for its own meaning. Is it ever a possibility that you have considered that in Mark chapter 2,

Jesus' whole point was to get the young man to realize who he was talking to? Why do you call me good?

And so when he fell to the test, Jesus looked at him and loved him. Yes. The whole point was,

I can't say it because I'm supposed to ask him the question. So in other words, even Dr. Richard Balcom, one of the leading

New Testament scholars here in the United Kingdom, looks at Mark chapter 2 and says, people have just missed the obvious point here.

When you simply identify those as ambiguous, I guess my question is, are you saying that they are unclear in their teaching or are you saying that they were corrupted by later generations?

Is that what, did Paul write Philippians 2? I'm trying to figure out where, what about the original followers of Jesus?

Didn't they give a clear testimony as to Jesus as a mere prophet? I'm sort of confused as to what your standard is for saying that these texts, have they been corrupted, changed, or what?

Well, I mean, let's use modern days wrong. You have Haile Selassie, you know, king of Ethiopia. He kept saying that he's not

God, he's not God. Obviously, they call him the king of kings because that was the title for Ethiopian kings, king of kings.

And now there's a sect which believe he's God, despite the fact that he says it repeatedly that he's not God. Some people just don't get it.

You have Ali, the cousin of the prophet Muhammad, salallahu alayhi wa sallam. Three people approached him and said, you are our

God. Three people approached him and said, you are our God. And he goes, well, it's you, you know, I'm your God, I never said this, you know,

I'm far from this. And they kept on believing he's God, even though he turned them down to his face.

Some people just think that Jesus is too boring to just be the prophet or a messenger. He has to be something more exciting, something that can match the other pagan beliefs in the region that believe that God has sons, like Heraclius and other things like this.

Heraclius as well. And that's basically my take, that it happens like this.

But just to also point, in Matthew 19, 16 to 18, it has the same story, but in this,

Jesus' response is, why do you ask about what is good? Instead of saying, why do you call me good, why do you ask about what is good?

Could it be that Matthew is trying to realise the problem in this text and try to change it? I don't know. I didn't find out when you felt that these texts were corrupted.

It sounded like you were saying the authors themselves wrote untrue things.

Is that what you're saying? Or are you saying that the real disciples of Jesus wrote true things and later people changed them?

I'm saying that before the New Testament, there was the apostolic tradition, or whatever name you want to call it.

There was this idea that was coming through supposedly from the apostles, and all these teachings existed orally and were just ideas or just teachings and so on, and people started to collect them up in different locations and make gospels out of it.

Now, what I'm saying is we don't know who did this. We don't know what their theological bias was, what their perspective was.

We know that John heavily resembles Greek philosophy. Is it just, maybe

Plato and, oh, I forgot the other hand, Stoicism, maybe these people were, you know, advanced

Christians coming before, you know, a hundred years before Jesus, I don't know, but I would think not, and that's why

I take some reservations. You mentioned John 10, 34 when Jesus says you are gods, according to Psalm 82, 6, and you seemed to think that this was an argument against the deity of Christ, that Jesus was in some way saying that he was not.

Are you aware of what Psalm 82 is about? Yes. Since it's a judgment text against the leaders of Israel, and the very next words in Psalm 82, 7 says that you shall die like men and follow him like princes, wouldn't it be consistent to interpret

Jesus' application here as applying this to his accusers as false judges, and that they would be judged by God while he himself is the one who's been sent by the

Father and anointed by the Father. How does that deny the deity of Christ? I totally lost your application.

Sure. Well, I think in this verse it shows us the hermeneutical way. Don't, in a lot of the debates, we urge

Muslims to read the New Testament from a Muslim standpoint, from an Islamic standpoint, and the Quran was, in a way, the ruling language which was very clear, it was very black and white, to a polytheistic nation, a previous polytheistic nation.

But if you read the New Testament and the Old Testament, it's very interesting because being called God in the

Old Testament doesn't actually mean you're God. Moses, as I said before, was called Elohim.

A whole bunch of entities, including angels and someone called Elohim. Elohim was used to describe adults or one of the previous writers coming out from the graves and Elohim.

The word Elohim was used. Now, I know you might say that this doesn't always mean God. Exactly. I would concur.

Likewise, I think Jesus is telling us that in the Old Testament when it said be your gods, it's not literal.

So why is he using an allegorical verse to explain a statement which you want to take literally?

So you reject that this is actually a judgment verse? Do you know what, there are many, in terms of the book,

Psalm 82 .6, in terms of Psalm 82 .6, regardless of the application of that verse, the

New Testament is not a verse to using Old Testament out of a quoted out context to justify some of the esoteric and ambiguous prophecy of Jesus.

For example, you said, you know, Jesus, a prophecy in Psalm would be he'd be called the Prince of Peace and I was the way of the

Eternal Father or Dervish called Jesus the Eternal Father even committing a patch of passionless heresy, but we won't go there.

But in Psalms, it was a prophecy, it wasn't a prophecy, it was stating a fact in the present tense that was hesitating.

Yeah, Prince of Peace. Yeah, the one that's actually for the

Prince of Peace and he's the Eternal Father isn't it? It's actually for Isaiah 9 rather. Hezekiah, son of Ahaz, Hezekiah, the son of Ahaz was being born and he shall be called the

Prince of Peace. It was this grand title given to such kings in the Old Testament and this actually

I got from this Bible's commentary, the New Jerusalem Bible, which gave that commentary on why these grandiose names were typical pharaonic kings and Vikings.

Thank you. That concludes the first part of our cross -examination now.

Abdullah has 10 minutes in which to cross -examine James White. You know,

I almost have no questions for James. Next one. Okay. Firstly, I would like to,

I don't think you want people to answer the prophecy saying in the

New Testament where it says that the King Saul would be Nazarene. What is your explanation for the fact that it does not come in the

Old Testament? There are a couple of explanations that have been offered, for example, by Gleason Archer. I would recommend people look at the possibilities that are offered, but the most common one is to look at the term

Nazarene that is used there and tie it with the branch of Judah from the prophet

Jeremiah. And if I recall correctly off the top of my head there was a fair amount of intertestamental

Jewish speculation to the nature of the Messiah that was focused upon the branch and the

Netzer concept and that would be understandable to them. So, in many situations, especially when we're talking about original language things, we miss plays on words that come out of Hebrew frequently because we translate them into English very liberally rather than seeing how they were word plays.

That's probably what Matthew's doing there is utilizing that branch of Jesse prophecy as a fulfillment of Jesus.

Right. Do you not see that when you kind of chastise or take this as a task for trying to look for the word

Mohammed in the Old Testament and we find one from Mohammedim well that sounds like Mohammed it must be that and you say ah but the context of that verse does not apply to Mohammed it means altogether lovely and that's what the word means so it can't be the same it can't be the it's not same it can't be the same it can't be the about an anointed one, it's talking about one who would come from the loins of David.

And we know in the New Testament that Jesus, in his dialogues with the Jews, specifically focuses upon his identity as the son of David, going to Psalm 110 .1,

saying, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand, establishing his authority.

So there is a foundation to that, not only in the text, but also in the intertestamental Jewish literature about becoming a messiah, which is one of the key issues in interpreting that.

Sure, but we don't want to dwell too much on this because we don't have time to speak. But just last point, do you not see it perhaps a very stretched interpretation of that prophecy when in Matthew 2, 23, it quotes what the prophecy says.

The prophecy that the old prophet said was he will be called a Nazarene. Now, in the

Old Testament, it doesn't say he will be called a branch. So how would you explain that?

Well, again, the only way I can understand Matthew's application is that he's recognizing the connection between that branch, the relationship to the family of David and Jesse, and Jesus' fulfillment.

He's talking about the lineage of Jesus. He's talking about his birth, and that becomes a fulfillment.

When you say, well, that's a stretch. Well, it's a stretch if we are ignorant of Matthew's context, which for the vast majority of us, we are.

It's the same reason that the book of Hebrews is so difficult for people to understand. It requires a tremendous knowledge of the

Old Testament in its original languages, and there are very few Christians these days that actually have that kind of knowledge.

I could go farther, but I will not expand on that right now. Okay. Well, I'm gonna talk a bit, because we discussed a bit too much about branch.

Let's go into other aspects. The branch and its other elements. Yeah, exactly. Right. Okay, do you acknowledge that at the time of the development of the

New Testament, the writing of the New Testament, and so on, that there was a high level of influence in the context and society of Hellenistic philosophy,

Stoicism, and Platonism? Well, you have to define which side you're talking about.

If you're talking about the Roman Empire in general, yes, less in the confines of the nation of Israel, more in a place like Alexandria, or something like that.

And so, many have seen, as the Gospel goes out, and Paul's writing the Romans, or the writer of Hebrews is very clearly familiar with Philo, and it's

Alexandria terminology there. As they're explaining the Gospel in those places, they use languages understandable to the people they're speaking, yes.

Now, would you say that the philosophy of understanding of theology from Platonic perspectives and Stoic perspectives bears a degree of similarity with Germanite theology?

No, I would not. The terminology is the same. The Logos, for example, is very easily recognizable as the ordering principle of Greek philosophy, but that's where the similarity ends, because in John 1, when it says, enarkein halogos, kaihalogos enprostum deon, kaitheos enhalogos, the

Logos there is said to not only be eternal, but then the Logos is said to be face -to -face with God, and the

Logos is as to his nature, deity. And so, the Logos is made personal. The Logos was not a personal principle.

That personal principle comes clearly, I think, from the wisdom literature of the Old Testament and the prophecies of the

Old Testament. So, while the language may borrow certain similarities, because, again, you're writing in Greek, as those terms can be there, what they're filled with is very much

Old Testament concepts and Old Testament fulfillment concepts, and especially since I do not believe that the

New Testament documents are being written at some late date, especially Gospels are going to be very much focused upon the people around Jerusalem.

It's only the later documents that are going to be having a lot of that influence of Greek language because of the people there,

I suppose. Sure. How would you respond to, again, a writer, which obviously,

I think, you look up to, which is J. M. B. Kelly, in his book, Early Christian Doctrines, when he explains the

Platonic thought as one of which is basically, he said, Plato postulated that God is a pure being, absolutely simple and self -sufficing, without quality, but, and then he said, the

Platonic solution was to interpose a hierarchy of divine beings between the supreme good or God and the material order, and to regard these as ruling or even creating the latter.

Among these intermediaries, the supreme and most supportable is the Logos, quote -unquote, the eldest and most akin to God.

Since the world exists in Platonic forms, we can see how, in contemplating the Logos, men can come to a knowledge of God.

Do you think that's dissimilar to John I theology? Well, again, the

Logos is uncreated in John I, so John immediately breaks the parameters at that point, and as he started reading that quotation,

I found it interesting in that if we just want to look for very shallow parallels, the first few words you read about God being the uncreated creator of all things, absolutely unique in his character, not only did

I immediately think of texts in Isaiah concerning the monotheism I believe in, but I immediately began thinking of Surah 112,

Al -Ikhlas, Qulat al -A 'ha, Fama, he is unique, he is not to be compared to anything in his creation, and so, could someone make a parallel there, just because there is some truth in Platonic teaching?

No, I don't think that would be a valid thing to do. In the same way, we have to allow John to fill the

Logos with what he says the

Logos is. He does not make the Logos an intermediate meaning. What he says in John 1, 1 denies exactly what you just read as to a nearly

Greek understanding of the Logos. So, I don't see that that's a I'm not sure what the question has to do with the

New Testament's understanding of this, because it clearly goes quite beyond a Greek perception. Sure, in Romans 1, 19 to 20, it explains that God is, we can know about God based on what he's created, we can look at this, which is kind of a rational principle which underpins all observation of the universe, that an atheist can look at the world and actually come to an understanding that God exists, but surely

I would say that the Platonic and Stoic philosophies are very specific that God creates a

Logos, this Logos is the means by which God caused everything to exist. But the question I want to ask you is, do you think this is quite similar to Justin Martyr's concept, where he said that the

Logos is God's offspring and child for all creatures, God begat him, giving him rational power out of himself, conditioned by and as a result of the

Father's will. The Logos is existing in the Father as his rationality and then by an act will be generated.

And he also describes the second God, anyway. Do you think that that is specifically similar to?

Well, the question unfortunately is based upon the idea that that somehow gives some type of special authority to early church fathers outside who witnessed what was going on historically.

Justin Martyr never quotes the Apostle Paul. Justin Martyr does not even have access to the very why.

Let me just go ahead and finish this question. He's asking a very wide canon in the New Testament. And so his statements on those matters do not become normative to the entirety of the church network.

Thank you. At this time, we're gonna ask them to bring their 10 minutes of concluding and closing remarks.

So we're gonna invite Dr. White to present his 10 minutes, please. Thank you. Once again, allow me to thank all of you for the honor of your being here this evening.

I do think that it says a lot, but there are so many of us who want to engage these issues and to do so in a attitude of mutual respect, but not an attitude of compromise about what we believe.

I'm afraid that this happens far too rarely in our society. And I think we have demonstrated yet once again, that this can be done in a way that is proper and honoring to the truth.

I would like to, once again, thank Abdullah. And I knew that Abdullah, at least, is one of the few people

I've debated who actually took the time to read something I had written, and I appreciated that. I knew that he should have this copy, but he doesn't have a signed one.

And so I do very much appreciate that.

I have debated so many people. I debated an atheist last year in the United States. He hadn't even

Googled my name, let alone had any concern whatsoever as to what I would have to say. And so it is an honor to have someone actually take some time to try to understand what it is

I'm saying. I hope that those of you who have seen some of the debates I've done in the past with Shabir Ali and Zulfikar Ali Shah and some others recognize that I do take this very seriously because I love the

Muslim people. And I hope you recognize that when I take the time to be listening, as I did for over a year, to everything

Shabir Ali had ever said on MP3, every lecture he'd ever given, even ones on Hadith studies to Muslims, so that I could understand what he was saying,

I did that so that I could have the best debate with him that I could where we would have the clearest communication because I truly believe that these opportunities, when we still have the freedom to do it, are vitally important and they're precious, and we need to take advantage of them.

There are a lot of nations on earth where we could not do what we've done this evening, and we need to be thankful for the freedoms that we have.

Now very, very quickly, I want to just address a couple of things that Abdullah said. He said that I had seemingly indicated, he heard me say that we have to accept it blindly in regards to the text of the

New Testament because it's the best, I never said that. If I believe in accepting the New Testament blindly,

I wouldn't have given him a critical edition of the New Testament. I wouldn't be studying textual critical issues.

I wouldn't have, when I went to Australia this past summer and debated a fine young man in Billikunda there at the

University of Sydney, I would not have taken the one free day I had in Sydney instead of going and seeing a sightseeing,

I went and saw a manuscript P91 in a poor university. I'm a freak, that's just the way it is. I take these things very, very seriously.

I'm not talking about accepting the New Testament blindly. I am differentiating between a methodology that picks and chooses which text of the

New Testament you're gonna wait to without even looking at what the textual evidence is. And the attitude that comes from that that allows you to quote this but dismiss that,

I am contrasting that with my position that accepts what the New Testament says, not uncritically.

I mean, I've written an entire book that's used as a textbook in the United States as an introduction to textual critical studies.

I don't do it uncritically, but I do accept everything that God has given and we can know what

God has given to us. The original readings have not passed away. They are still there. And so when we take all of that, what

Abdullah calls ambiguous texts are not ambiguous. I've only given you a couple of them, but just think about what happens.

In John eight, the I am text, when Jesus says to the soldiers, I am, they fall back upon the ground.

Why do soldiers fall back upon the ground? We say, I am. Isn't it clear what's going on there in John 13, 19?

Jesus quotes from Isaiah 43, 10, from which Jehovah's Witnesses get their name, ironically, a text about Yahweh, and he applies it to himself.

The writer of Hebrews identifies Jesus as Yahweh. At the end of the Gospel of John, what does

Thomas say to Jesus? Hakodias mechai hatheasum, my Lord and my God.

And Jesus does not rebuke him. I am but a rasool. He says, because you've seen me, you believe,

Thomas? Blessed are those who did not see and yet have believed. These are not ambiguous texts.

They are clear texts. I simply allow all the texts to stand. So when the young man asks

Jesus and calls him good master, now Luke has a different rendering of that.

That's an interesting synoptic issue, but doesn't change the fact that Jesus wants this young man to know who he is dealing with.

It's not a contradiction. If there's such a clear way of understanding it, why don't we allow that to stand?

Would you treat the Quran that way? How do you like it when people come to text the Quran? Well, I'm not gonna believe what's in Surah 2, but I'm gonna take a few texts from Surah 4, and I don't like Surah 7, but I like Surah 19.

No, you have to take it for all it says. And it's in fact in that context that I want to, again, direct your attention.

Now, Abdullah made some comments about this, but listen to these words in Surah 6, 101.

He is the originator of the heavens and the earth. How can he have a son when he has had no mate, consort, wife?

I took the time to look at Ibn Kathir and others to make sure I was not misinterpreting this, and they all say the same thing.

It's so clear. Allah cannot have a son because he could not have a spouse that would be equal to him.

What does that tell us the Quran is saying in Surah 5, in Surah 6?

It's presenting the idea that the trinity is Allah and Mary giving birth to Jesus.

I don't think Surah 2, 253 even comes close to actually being a discussion of the

Christian doctrine of trinity. I would challenge Abdullah, if he has this information, could he tell us if the early interpreters of Ibn Kathir, did they interpret it that way?

Did they see that as that text meaning that? I'd be interested to know, because I haven't looked at Surah 2, 253 in their commentary, and I will.

I'll put it on the list of things that need to be studied, and I'll take a look at it, but I have a feeling that's not what they're gonna say.

But I know what they say, because they did take the time to look at this text, and they understand this as being

Allah cannot have a son because he cannot have a wife. Well, that's not what we believe, and the

Athanasian Creed doesn't say God has a wife. Before it ever talks about begettal, it makes it something that is outside of time.

It's not something where God takes a wife and has a kid. Now, I'm appreciative of the fact that Abdullah at least tries to argue against the trinity in a little more meaningful fashion, but let's face it, folks.

I've listened to everything that Ahmed Didat said, too, and man, that's bad argumentation against the trinity.

That's exactly, I mean, how many times did Ahmed Didat say that this belief that Jesus is the son of God attributes sexuality to God?

He understood it the same way that Ibn Kathir understood 6 -1 -0 -1.

How many Muslims misunderstand it that way? But the real question is, isn't that what the

Quran says? Isn't that why they misunderstand it? If this is an uncreated text, written in eternity, then wouldn't it be absolutely true in everything it says, including how it represents the faith that it then condemns the followers of to the eternal flames?

There's very few things more important than that. And so once again this evening, my exhortation to all of us,

Christian and Muslim alike, is we have to think about what we believe and why we believe it. What God are we going to worship?

Has God revealed himself as being unitarian? We all agree, monotheism.

But has he revealed himself to be unitarian? Can you take the words that Jesus says and put them in the mouth of a mere

Rasul? Does a mere Rasul, did Moses, Abraham, David, any of these ever say,

I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but by me. Not by my teachings, but by me, personally.

Did any mere Rasul say, if any of you are weary, come unto me, all you who are weary and heavy laden.

I will give you rest. Did any mere Rasul say, unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins.

My friends, you don't want to die in your sins. That sounds awful final to me. And those

Jews who stood in front of Jesus when he said those words, they would have accepted him as a Messiah. He fed 5 ,000 people.

Miraculously, they would have accepted him as a Messiah. They would have accepted him as a prophet. But what they could not accept him as was what he revealed himself to be.

The very eternal Son of God that Thomas, when he sees the resurrected Lord, bows in humble adoration and says, my

Lord and my God. That's what I do today. And that's the

Jesus I proclaim and present to you this evening. Thank you very much. It's our privilege now to invite

Abdullah to come and present his concluding and closing remarks. Thank you, Abdullah. Firstly, I'd like to thank everyone for coming today and seeing this kind of debate.

This is my last statement, so I just wanted to thank you before going to questions and answers. I want to mention a few points.

I want to mention about the issue of the Qur 'an first before anything else. I mentioned that the Qur 'an stands as a trinity and I didn't have enough time to fully go through all the verses and I've got like 15 verses here with tafsir.

But I have a copy of the tafsir here of Ibn Kathir, Fakhr al -Din al -Razi, and Qurtubi.

They all say, they all say, apart from one of them, that the verse does not necessarily mean that it is

Mary who is the, it doesn't actually indicate that Mary is the third person of the trinity. In fact, it indicates more that she was taken later on after Jesus as an intercessor beside God and hence the

Christians are told to idolise this Mary, even though it doesn't necessarily mean that you literally worship because none of the verses of the

Qur 'an says when the polytheists say, oh, we don't worship these other idols, we just use them as intercessors and the

Qur 'an rebukes them for committing shirk, which is associating partners with God. It doesn't matter what you claim you're doing it for, what you are doing is taking other gods and again,

James White used the same polemic against Catholics. But maybe in his defence, he might say that Catholics are not

Christian, hence the Qur 'an is wrong when it should be of the Christians. Perhaps, I have to go with that one.

But anyway, the Qur 'an, verse sort of six, verse 101, which says, one before the origin of the heavens and earth, how can he have a son when he hath no consort?

According to Tafsir, it's actually referring to a polemic against certain pagans who say that God has sons.

Because also the pagan Arabs also said that God had sons and daughters. The Tafsir says this, but I could also say that it also applies to the trinity because why the use of masculine reproductive titles for an eternal configuration of God.

God's internal configuration is based on relationship of masculine reproductive human titles.

Why is that? It makes no sense. If that's what the Qur 'an is pointing out here, I'd like to think, according to, and I have some

Tafsir to back that up. Verse nine, sorry, surah nine, verse 31, the

Qur 'an does say that the Christians and Jews took as their priests and chariots as laws besides God, not by worshipping them, but by obeying them blindly without question.

So do I have time for 10 minutes? 10 minutes. 10 minutes. Okay. Now, I'll mention a few points about what

James White said. He said that we don't take the New Testament blindly. I'm very critical.

I look at different Greek variations. And supposedly, if a newer manuscript, or should we say an older manuscript came to light, he would take that over the current manuscripts available.

And that's fine, but he's missed my point entirely. You see, I'm not saying that he doesn't look at the critical text in different variations.

I'm saying, why is there variations? Variations based on which have theological implications.

And in the presence of the Christian belief that the Holy Spirit will preserve the text, you have

Christians believing false doctrines where the word trinity is put into the text for hundreds of years.

Why is this? Why isn't the trinity preventing such doctrines from being inserted into the

Bible? That's my point. The text is not divinely protected. That's my point. If the text is not divinely protected, then we have to question the text itself.

He said that we pick and choose the text in the Bible. I said, no. I didn't say, I haven't said that there is no text which back him up.

I said that I'll leave it to him to bring up some text that back his position up that Jesus is God. All I'm doing, and all

Muslim polytheists are doing, we just highlight the contradictions in the text. That's all. We're not saying that there's no text that can be implied through using the

Islamic hermeneutics that Jesus is God. No, we're saying that there's contradictions in the text. And if you read the

New Testament, not based on from a Quranic perspective, read the New Testament from an Old Testament hermeneutics,

Old Testament idiom. Why is God confusing us by, in the Old Testament, saying that so many of his chosen ones are the son of God?

In the New Testament, Jesus is called a chosen one as well. So why is

God confusing us by using a term which he's been using previously for all a bunch of human prophets, or human and so on, or angels, and then saying, oh no, but this son of God is actually even more special than the other created sons of God that I have.

It's called this confusion in the mind of a Jew listening to this. He says he's tota scriptura, tota of what?

Take the total scripture. Total scripture of what? What the, everything that's in the

Protestant Bible, currently, who selected that Bible for you? Why not Gospel of Thomas?

Why not Gospel of, there are other Gospels which are present, and so on.

I was gonna mention Gospel of Thessalonians, which is contemporary to Gospel of John, for example. Not the text, true, but contemporary to the

Gospel of John. And so why not take that text? Obviously, we don't have it, but why do the church fathers not preserve this, and so on, why?

Because they picked it, they chose it. And so it's as simple as this. So you're taking total scriptura of a text that was picked, because the

Bible didn't come with a content page. That's the truth. He said that John the Martyr doesn't quote

Paul. That's very interesting, a esteemed early church father not quoting Paul. I think that actually argues against him, that Paul's texts were not seminal, theological texts that informed all the church fathers' thinking.

Because at that time, there was no such thing as a New Testament. So where did they get their doctrines from? Where did they get it from?

Yeah, they picked and chose doctrines they thought was most likely, because there was no text. They just heard it.

And so these early church fathers have various different opinions of each other. He said that we wouldn't like it if a

Christian picked and chose a text from the Quran. No, go ahead. If you can show a contradiction, then we will leave our faith.

It's as simple as that, because we have a condition. As the Quran says, if it's the order from God, you will find many contradictions.

So bring a contradiction, and we won't try to, we won't say, oh, well, you're picking and choosing. No, we will say, fine, you just pick from the

Quran. We won't say, ah, but we've got a lot of those, let's do something else. No, we'll be sincere about this.

Now, I think I answered most of the points that he mentioned in this long one. So I just wanted to mention a few things that you might not, you might not have known.

Very interesting fact about, Justin spoke of, Justin Martyr spoke of the

Logos as a second God. Oregon, church father, he said, we're not afraid of it in one sense, to speak of two gods, in another sense, one

God, referring to Jesus and the Father. Again, he said, we should not pray to any general being, not even to Christ, only to God and the

Father of the universe. Oregon, early church father. I think he's quoted in his own book as well.

Creed of Serdica, that the three have one identical hypostasis. The three hypostases have one identical hypostasis.

You're just contradicting yourself. And of course, you know, Amphanesius said that, declared that the

Logos is God's offspring, and so on. So, all the Quran, everything the Quran has mentioned about offspring, about God having a son, is accurate.

And if I had more time, I would show you what the Quran even says, that if God wanted to have a son, he could choose anything in creation, showing that the

Quran understands the Old Testament concept, where having a son is meant to be the means to choose someone to be a special prophet or a blessed person.

Now, to conclude, I don't think he's under any irrational arguments against Trinity.

I think that the church fathers who weren't afraid of trying to use philosophy, I've demonstrated that the philosophies have failed to redress the contradictory interpretations in the

New Testament, which at one point, depicted as God, and at another point, depicted as not

God. Whether you take it as ambiguous or explicit texts, you can judge on it for yourself.

But I will say this. I, as a former Christian, who embraced Islam after much research and investigation into different religions, beliefs, and lack of beliefs, on becoming a

Muslim, I didn't give up my belief in Jesus. Rather, I discovered the real Jesus. All the ambiguities and the contradictions vanished about this

Jesus. I finally understood his mission. I understood his aims, his true personality, the true glory of Jesus, the noble, truthful, steadfast, wise, and loving person.

And all this from a man, from a mere man. And he had all these characteristics, and he's a mere man.

That's even more, I think, of better praise. If he was God, well, of course

God is perfect, but a man to have those qualities, now that is something to appreciate.

To this end, I would like to begin, I would like to end, I get all the, beginning of the end, rather, my summation with a testimony of faith.

That there is only one God of whom the Christians and Jews call the Father. And there is one

Messiah, Jesus, Son of Mary, the servant and messenger of God, a created human being, created in the manner all human beings are created, and possessing every limited attribute a human being possesses, both in knowledge and spirit.

And as the story of the Quran three and verse 64 says, O people of scripture, come to a common word between us that we shall worship none but God, and that we shall ascribe no partners unto him, and none of us shall take others for lords beside God.

Thank you. And lastly, in acknowledgement of James White's generosity,

I'd like to give him something, an Islamic book of doctrine called A Guide to Conclusive Proofs of Principles of Belief.

I'm sorry, it got kind of muddled on the bag on the way here. But it's by Imam Hanameh al -Juwayni, and it discusses holistically

Islamic theology, including a reputation of the Trinity and the Incarnation.