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The real issue, I think, this evening, for us, is are we going to be consistent as Christians and Muslims? If you believe in the books, plural, the books that were netzal, set down, then that means, even from the Islamic perspective, that in the first century there was an act of revelation.
A book was set down that was light and guidance, and people are called to believe in what's in those books. And if this evening, Mr. Achmed said, well, you know what? What we have today is what was originally written down.
Well, then why don't you believe it? You have to come up with the assertion that's been changed. You have to come up with the argumentation that's been changed, even though that was not the original argumentation of the first generation of Islamic apologists and interpreters.
That accusation of the corruption of the New Testament, the actual text of the New Testament, comes long after the original establishment of the Islamic faith. And so, since Muslims and Christians together believe that God has made revelation, the Quran talks about the Taraf, talks about the Injil, then the question that we have to ask is, upon what consistent basis would a person reject that the followers of Jesus wrote books?
Mark did. John did. And that in those early years, there were converts who likewise were used of God to bring guidance to the Church in the form of Scripture, such as the Apostle Paul. We would expect that if that were not the case, that we would have lots of books from those brave first followers of Jesus.
Unless we're going to assume that Jesus picked really bad people. People who were just going to be unfaithful to his message. Then we would expect that those first followers would react strongly against any corruption coming from the Apostle Paul.
But that's not what we have. And in point of fact, what we see is perfectly consistent with the Gospel. That message from the most primitive periods of time in the New Testament. Indeed, when the Apostle Paul records for us the tradition that was handed on to him from 1 Corinthians, in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, he received what had been handed on to him, how that Jesus Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and he was buried, and he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.
He was seen more than 500 brethren. This was an ancient tradition that preceded him. He himself had received this, and this is what joined all of these churches together, was their common confession of faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, the crucified and risen Messiah.
The Apostle Paul did not invent this. He did not create this. And the only way to make that kind of assertion is to, in essence, have to try to argue the total corruption of the text, or to assert the Apostle Paul just made these things up out of whole cloth during the lifetime of the eyewitnesses.
And they, the entire first generations of Christians, of real Christians, the real followers of Jesus, the ones mentioned in the Koran, you would have to accuse them of abject corruption. Upon what evidence?
Upon what basis? If we believe that the Old Testament was sent down, then does it not make sense that when the Messiah himself comes, that there's going to be explication of his mission and his purpose?
I know that it is very, very common for Muslims to believe that Jesus was only sent to the Jews. They quote one little text out of Matthew and Mark, where Jesus talks about being sent to the lost house, the sheep of the lost house of Israel.
They don't recognize that the rest of that gospel expands that out after the crucifixion to the entirety of the world. And so if that is the case, if that's the understanding, then would not these churches, especially the churches that come into existence outside of Palestine, need direct teaching and guidance?
And who better to provide it than one who knows the Old Testament scriptures so well, and who is then able to teach in a language that people can understand what the message of Jesus truly is. And so we have been asked three things.
The disciples of Jesus, the prophethood of Paul, whatever that means. I would assume that means his conversion and his calling, his apostleship. And that the disciples verified Paul as an apostle. If we believe anything that Luke has to say, if we believe anything that Peter has to say, if we believe anything that John has to say, the fact of the matter is that Paul has interaction with, discussion with these leaders.
He is given the right hand of fellowship to go to the Gentiles. Peter says he goes to the Jews. And that's exactly what they do. And that's the origination of the Pauline corpus, but not the entirety of the New Testament.
And it's not the creation of a Pauline church or anything else. The quote-unquote Pauline church is just nothing more than the New Testament church that is consistent with the Old Testament teaching that there's one true God who created all things.
All these other alleged gospels, sources, groups, and everything else violate the Old Testament norms. They violate the Old Testament teaching. They could not have come out of first-century Palestine.
They could not have come out of that Jewish context in any way, shape, or form. And therefore they are not relevant to our discussion this evening. Now, Mr. Achmed referred to blind faith. Well, if what you mean by blind faith is believing without evidence, that simply isn't the case.
The New Testament gives us plenty of evidence. It gives us plenty to work on. If by blind faith you mean there are certain theological presuppositions that underlie theism that are absolute in their meaning and cannot refer to something else to prove them, well, every theist and every atheist has those presuppositional foundations in their thought.
But it is not blind faith to believe the consistency of the New Testament. That's what the evidence points you to. It is only when we start taking sources that existed, that came into existence, hundreds of years after the time of Christ, and begin to use that as the lens through which we look back, that's when we have problems.
Back in May of 2006, I debated a man by the name of Shabir Ali at Biola University. And I asked Mr. Ali, can you tell us how we can identify what in the New Testament is still inspired and what isn't?
And he gave a consistent answer for a Muslim. He said, well, that which agrees with the Quran is inspired and that which doesn't isn't. Well, that's very convenient to look back upon the New Testament through that lens, to look back upon something over the course of 600 years and use as your ultimate basis a text that was written by someone who did not have access to the New Testament's original language, did not have access to the Old Testament in its original language, did not have access to either of them in his own language, allegedly, if he was illiterate.
So he's writing in a different language at a different time without knowledge of the originals. How can that then become the standard by which the New Testament is to be analyzed? How can that become the standard without, in fact, engaging in true blind faith in the inspiration of that later standard?
Logically, folks, logically. If the claim of the Quran is to be a continuation that you have one God who has spoken and Muhammad speaks in line with him, shouldn't it be the other direction? Shouldn't we be able to see a consistency in the message of the Quran with that which we see in the Old Testament and New Testament?
If we don't see that, is that the problem of the New Testament? Logically, I would suggest to you, he who comes 600 years later needs to be able to build his case very, very strongly.
