Is Muhammad Prophesied in the Bible?, Part 2

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Responding to Claims of Contradiction in the Qur'an

Now to respond to some of the things that James brought up in his initial presentation, let me say this much. First of all, James had made a point in our previous segment about the Qur 'an being contradictory in two passages, and some people asked me during the break, why don't I respond to that?

Well, I didn't at the time because I couldn't. James was not very clear as to what he was saying is the contradiction, and I asked him about it during the break, and he said that Surah 7, verse number 16, contradicts the similar reference in Surah 38, because in Surah 7, it says that Satan was misled by God, and it doesn't say that Satan will mislead the people, but whereas in Chapter 38, it says that Satan will mislead the people.

So how is that a contradiction? I don't get it, because one verse says two things, and the other verse says one of the two things. Is that a contradiction? Or is it a contradiction when one verse says something and the other verse denies it?

As for example, take a staff, don't take a staff. Jesus crucified on the 14th Nisan, Jesus crucified on the 15th Nisan, obviously you cannot have it both ways. So I don't believe that James is actually consistent in what he was pointing out as an inconsistency on my part.

Furthermore, where the Quran now speaks about references to the Prophet Muhammad and whom be peace, in the Quran, as references that were there in the Bible previously, James mentioned two passages, Surah 7, verse 157 for example, but there, as James himself said, the verse says, they will fight.

It doesn't necessarily mean that factually there was something there. It means that they, in their perspective, will be able to read it such. If Jews and Christians were to read their Old and New Testament with the same kind of eye with which they look for predictions about Jesus and whom be peace, it is my contention that they will find the Prophet Muhammad in these passages.

The Paraclete as a Prophecy of a Prophet to Come

For example, we have looked at scholars who have said that the original reference to Paraclete was actually a person to come after Jesus. Let me, for example, read you in more detail what some of these scholars said.

John Ruman informs us of the opinion of one of these scholars, Herman Sass. Herman Sass, Ruman informs us, is known as a systematician of conservative stamp. He argued that the Paraclete was a human personality, one filled with the spirit, a prophet who would proclaim Christ and creatively continue his revelation, just what the author of the fourth gospel did.

In that case, the evangelist himself would be the Paraclete, even though the final version of the book identifies the Paraclete with the spirit. So these scholars will not imagine that Muhammad could be the reference.

In fact, if they believe that the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, was being referred to here, they would be Muslims. But they remain Christians, and I'm citing them as Christian scholars for the one fact that they admit that the Paraclete references are references to a prophet to come after Jesus.

Windisch writes, the Paraclete of the second and fifth sayings, meaning the second saying of chapter 14, the last saying of chapter 16. The Paraclete of the second and fifth sayings, on the other hand, deviates widely from his original function.

He does not deal with the salvation and the protection of individuals, but the main thing, the revelation of the teaching of Jesus. His task is teaching, maintaining, and completing the historical revelation in Jesus.

He has a definite message to deliver. He is bearer of a tradition already extant, and bearer of a new revelation, supplementing and completing it. He is didastalos and prophetes, teacher of tradition and prophet, in one and the same person.

That's in page 17 of a book recently published that compiles a couple of writings from Hand Windisch. So these scholars are admitting that the Paraclete was a reference to a teacher and prophet. Now most Christians who understand that they have the Holy Spirit in them will confess that the receiving of the Holy Spirit is a subjective phenomenon.

You don't have something objective to point to and say, this is the Holy Spirit. In the New Testament, we have it that the Holy Spirit did come, and everyone understands that this is in reference to Jesus saying that he's going to send the Paraclete.

So Acts chapter 2 has it that the Holy Spirit came down as tongues of fire into 120 believers gathered at one time. Well then, do we all see the Spirit coming into us like tongues of fire? Moreover, if these prophecies are that this Holy Spirit, or whoever is this Paraclete, will preach and tell you about the things that are to come.

Let's say about bearing witness. The Paraclete is going to bear witness. Acts chapter 5 verse 32 has Peter saying, not only do we bear witness, but the Paraclete also. How could that be two witnesses?

You're in court, and you're giving witness. Do you say, I and the Paraclete also give witness? I bear two witnesses? Or do you have to have another individual, another person to bear witness with you?

Certainly the latter. So the Holy Spirit does not really fulfill that objective. Moreover, the description that this Paraclete is going to tell you about things to come, these scholars rightly admit, must refer to another person, like Jesus, who would be a teacher and a prophet.

But because they're interpreting this within Christian parameters, they look for some prophet that could qualify as a Christian, and everything remains the same. To them, John himself, or the evangelist, the writer of the fourth gospel, is really the prophet.

So now all things are back to square one. But their admission that this Paraclete was to be another one to come after Jesus, I believe is an important indication that that one was to be the prophet Muhammad.

John 14–16, the Holy Spirit, and the Fourth Gospel

James referred to the Quran in chapter 61 verse number 6, where Jesus spoke of one to come after him according to the Quran. And he asks, where are these words? Well, the Quran does not say in this passage that those words that Jesus uttered are in the Bible.

And we know that not all of the words that Jesus uttered are in the Bible. John chapter 20 actually ends by saying that Jesus said and did many things, which if we were to write down all of them, the books of the world would not be able to contain all of these.

So the gospels did not record everything that Jesus said. But we're not arguing from silence. We have shown definite evidence that Jesus spoke about the Paraclete to come after him. And obviously that Paraclete is a prophet.

But the author or the editor or the redactor of the fourth gospel has actually changed these sayings, tacked on little additions to them in order to make them appear to be references to the Holy Spirit.

And the scholars I'm referring to who are Christian scholars and have no Muslim acts to grind have admitted, like Della Foss for example, not only that John 14 verse 26 includes the extraneous, the holy, whereas it simply once referred to the spirit, but also there are other passages, other little additions to the other Paraclete sayings that will turn the meaning of the Paraclete from a person to the Holy Spirit.

So once we see that, then we realize that Jesus was speaking about a prophet to come after him. Spida thought that these Paraclete sayings initially referred to Elijah, who was to come again. But the fourth gospel turned it to refer to the Holy Spirit.

Windisch himself thinks that these Paraclete sayings was a reference to another person to come after Jesus, such that you have a tripartite sort of situation that is similar to some of the bipartite situations we know from the Old Testament.

So Moses is followed by Joshua, Elijah is followed by Elisha, and here we have it that Jesus is followed by the Paraclete. When Jesus spoke about another Paraclete in the first of these Paraclete sayings in John chapter 14, so Jesus is addressing the crowd or his disciples, and he says another Paraclete will come.

If you're using the term for the first time, you have to explain the term. That means the people already understood what Jesus was saying, and they already understood that Jesus is one such Paraclete, and there's going to be another one to come after him.

What was Jesus? All historical investigations about the life and teachings of Jesus point to the fact that he was a prophet, and he was known to his immediate followers as a prophet, a man of God who spoke the truth that he received from God.

Jesus is not known through historical studies to be the son of God, the one who takes away the sin of the world. He's known to be a wisdom teacher, a prophet like the prophets of the Old Testament. Since that is established, when Jesus spoke to his disciples, they saw him as a prophet.

In fact, Luke's Gospel bears testimony to this, because when Jesus met the two on the road to Emmaus, they said that Jesus was a mighty prophet who was raised among us. That was the final conclusion from all of what Jesus had said and done at the time.

So when Jesus spoke about another Paraclete, obviously to his hearers, it would mean another such prophet like Jesus. In fact, Windisch even adds that the Paraclete sayings are such that they indicate that the one who was to come after Jesus would be greater than Jesus.

But again, they have been so modified for inclusion in the fourth Gospel that the writers and editors have taken pains to remove that indication or to blunt the edge of that indication, which shows that the one to come after Jesus would be greater than Jesus.

John the Baptist, Elizabeth, and the Question of the Holy Spirit

We have spoken about some baby stories, and let me add here what has been done with the Gospel in reference to the story of John the Baptist. Didn't I use as one of my arguments the fact that John the Baptist said that there's going to be one coming after him who would be greater than John the Baptist?

And didn't I say that there are ways in which story after story, the message has been rewarded in order to show that Jesus is greater than John the Baptist. So we have another baby story here. When Mary is pregnant with Jesus and she visits her cousin Elizabeth, immediately Elizabeth's womb is filled with the Holy Spirit.

She's already carrying John and she's six months into her pregnancy. Now how does anyone know at this point that her womb is filled with the Holy Spirit? Again, we notice that having the Holy Spirit is a subjective matter.

Nobody knows when it comes and when it goes. Does any ultrasound ever show that anyone has got the Holy Spirit in her tummy? Moreover, Elizabeth reports that the very moment when Mary greeted her, the baby in her womb leaped for joy.

Okay, I know a lot of moms report that they're feeling a few kicks down there. But does anyone know that the baby is leaping for joy? Obviously, what we're dealing with here is not fact, but story. The story is told in order to show that Jesus is greater than John the Baptist, when everyone knows that the real fact is that there was a competition between the followers of John and the followers of Jesus.

In Acts chapter 18, the people of Ephesus were still baptizing according to John's baptism and they knew nothing of the Holy Spirit. In fact, when one reads the New Testament, one sees that there is no clear and consistent message about what the Holy Spirit is and what it will do.

For example, John chapter 7 verse 39 says that the Holy Spirit was not yet. There was no such thing as the Holy Spirit and it wouldn't be until Jesus is first glorified. Whereas we know from the other Gospels, especially the Gospel according to Luke, that the Holy Spirit was ever present.

The Holy Spirit was there in Zachariah before Jesus even began to preach and the Holy Spirit seemed to be always around. So how could John say the Holy Spirit was not yet? Didn't the paraclete saying say that the Holy Spirit will come on the disciples, Jesus will send them?

Well, John's Gospel in chapter 20 verse 22 has Jesus himself breathing out the Holy Spirit onto his disciples. So they already got it. How could Luke's Gospel say that Jesus said to them, stay on the city until you receive the promise from on high?

Are they going to receive the Holy Spirit twice or is it that these authors are not consistent with their story? The stories are being told by word of mouth for many decades until eventually the Gospels are written.

The Gospel according to John is the last of the four to be written, written in its final form around the year 100. This is widely accepted by many biblical scholars today. So when we look at these ways in which the stories have been reworded and remolded, refashioned in order to bring out particular points of interest of the writers and editors themselves, such as to prove that Jesus is superior to John the Baptist, we see the validity of my point.

John the Baptist spoke of one to come after him who would be greater than John the Baptist. The writers tried to prove that this was Jesus, but we know now the true story. I didn't make reference to periclutus, so James was actually answering something that I didn't raise here tonight.

Nor did I mention anything about the Song of Solomon tonight, so that is just a really wasted argumentation and I will not follow that argumentation now, but perhaps we can deal with them some other time.

The Gospel of John, Redaction, and Critical Scholarship

As for the Quran and the Orientalists, James is right, we should look for actual evidence and real indications before we make conclusions and agree with critical scholars. But critical scholars, while they do not have any other Gospel of John prior to what we now have in our texts, they do see certain indications which would necessitate the belief that the Gospel according to John was edited and re-edited.

For example, the last chapter of the Gospel according to John follows from what we already said, a closing at the end of chapter 20, so chapter 21 is an obvious addition to the already finished and closed Gospel.

The prologue to the Gospel of John is suspected by many scholars to be also a later addition put in by the same redactor, Raymond Brown would argue, as the one who tacked on chapter 21. Chapters 15 and 17 of the Gospel according to John, chapters 15 to 17, are thought to be a later insertion into an already finished Gospel.

Why? Because in chapter 14, verse number 31, Jesus ends his speech by saying, let us be going. But then chapter 15 has him speaking a long speech all over again that occupies chapters 15, 16, and 17, the longest speech in the Bible.

So we have it there that the Gospel has obviously been re-edited. Thank you.

I want to come up quickly so you can still hear the echo of Shabir's words. The Gospel has obviously been edited on the basis of what? German critical scholars who don't believe in inspiration and they can just chop up any text they want.

Well then, obviously the Quran has been edited and had multiple authors because the very same scholars say the same thing, right? That's the consistency, right? By the way, I was asked who was the professor that I mentioned earlier, the Muslim professor who now wonders if Muhammad existed.

Muhammad Sven Kalisch, Germany's first professor of Islamic theology at Munster University is the name. Shabir has said, we have explained why Deuteronomy 18, 18 reads the way it is. No, Shabir hasn't explained that.

He has presented to us a theory, a speculative theory that has no historical evidence, has no manuscript evidence. It's based upon the assumption that the text can't be what it says that it is. He assumes about the text of the Bible what he does not assume about the text of the Quran.

And until Shabir can see that and deal with that, he's not going to be really engaging the response that I am providing. He said that I said those two surahs contradict each other. I even said to him when I showed it to him, I said, I don't think this is a big deal.

The point is you have to engage in the very same kind of textual study of these two texts that I have to in the Synoptic Gospels, which you objected to two years ago at Biola University. That's the problem there.

I would invite you to read Surah 7, 157. It seems like Shabir's interpretation was whom they don't find in their scriptures or who they might speculate are in their scriptures. Is that really what that ayah is saying?

I invite you to look at it again. But I intend to win the debate right now. Right now. You ready? I am going to quote an authority that is going to blow Shabir Ali right out of the water. He cannot argue with this person because I'm going to quote Shabir Ali.

In 2005 in Glasgow, Shabir Ali said the following words to Ani Shorosh. I believe that Dr. Shorosh wants to prove by one way or another that the Prophet Muhammad learned from others. So he supposes. You can suppose a lot of things.

In the Da Vinci Code, it is supposed that Jesus went along with Mary and had a child and the bloodline survives in France or wherever. You can suppose a lot of things. But as the New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman puts it nicely in his book on this, one has to have real facts and evidence.

You cannot quote a 13th century book like Surah Al-Halabiya. You have to go to the original documents, Dr. Shorosh, and find out what was Waraqa Ibn Nawfal, not the suppositions of others that agree with your own suppositions.

And then earlier he said to Dr. Robert Morey in a debate, listen carefully. What surprises me, however, is that some Christians feel they can attack the Quran in this particular way. And they don't realize that it is shooting themselves in the foot when they use this method because the same method also disproves, and Shabir said the Quran, but I think he meant the Bible.

However, Dr. Morey, you have an interesting way of going about this because when Dr. Morey uses this particular method, Dr. Morey says that he is a Western scholar, but he forgets for the moment that he is also a Christian.

Does he wear two hats? One says a Western scholar and then is a Christian? I would like Dr. Morey to wear one hat so that we can pin him down and say, this is what you should believe in. If you say that this is your method, then believe neither in the Quran nor the Bible.

We have already seen too that Dr. Morey disparages the miracles, for example, camels coming out of a rock. No, that's foolish. But do we disparage the miracles that are mentioned in the Bible too? If we believe that miracles are true, then we should find some different way, some other way of denying that a certain miracle took place or not.

Not that we disparage a miracle. So we have to make up our minds. If we are believers in God, we cannot deny that these things are true and we cannot use that particular method by which Western scholars disbelieve in both the Quran and the Bible.

Then shortly after this, Shabir criticized Morey for using an argument used by atheists. Then a moment later, he criticized Morey for not reading the Quran in its full context. So allow me to take Shabir's own words and repeat them back to him.

Mr. Ali, you have an interesting way of going about this. For when you argue against the New Testament, you argue as a Western scholar. But you forget for the moment that you are also a Muslim. Do you wear two hats, one that says Western scholar and one that says Muslim?

I would like Shabir to wear one hat so we can pin him down and say, this is what you should believe in. If you say it the method of Crossan or Ehrman or Brown or any of the others quoted this evening, Bultman, whatever it might be, then believe neither in the Quran nor the Bible, just like them.

We have already seen Shabir Ali disparage the inspiration and consistency of the Bible. But if we believe that God has revealed the scriptures, then we should find some other way of denying the inspiration of the Bible.

So we have to make up our minds. If we are believers in God, we cannot deny that these things are true. And we cannot use that particular method by which Western scholars disbelieve in both the Quran and the Bible.

You must allow the Bible to speak as a whole. You cannot ignore its context and rip it apart just to fit your preconceived conclusions. One has to have real facts and evidence. You have to go to the original document, Shabir, not the suppositions of others that agree with your own suppositions.

I truly believe that what we have been listening to this evening, the constant reference to forum criticism, redaction criticism, scholars see this, scholars see that. When I challenge those scholars upon what basis, it is always, well, you know, I start with the assumption that, you know, that miracles did not take place.

And so when I read a text that talks about miracles, then it must be mistaken. It must be something other than that. Isn't that what they do with the Quran? Every single person he's relying on, every time his Christian scholarship tells us, he's not talking about Christian scholars that are actually consistent Christians, who actually believe in revelation, who actually believe there's such a thing as what Jesus taught in regards to the Word of God.

He can't quote them because they're not going to be supportive of his position. And so what have I been saying from the beginning? I'm looking for the consistent Muslim. Haven't found him. Haven't found him.

He says, well, we certainly see it. The Holy Spirit is a person. Yes, he is a person. The scriptures specifically teach that the Holy Spirit is a person. It doesn't mean a human being. Jesus was personal and he encouraged the disciples.

He guided the disciples. That's what the Holy Spirit will do. That does not make him a human. He says, well, then, of course, they were interpreting this within Christianity. No. When you look at John 14, 15, and 16, and you allow it to do together, it's exactly what Shabir says in his television program.

Let the Quran speak. We're just letting the New Testament speak. Why one standard for the New Testament and a completely different standard for the Quran? Why? Have I not asked that question loudly enough?

Why the different standards? The two standards are very, very clear now, indeed. We had Surah 61 that was cited to us. And he says, well, it never says those words in the Bible. I never said that it said those words in the Bible.

It says, in fact, the Quran it gave me says, remember when Jesus said this. Another translation I have over there says, call to mind when Jesus said this. If I say to you, call to mind something, am I not assuming that you know this thing already?

It still raises the issue. How do we know Jesus said these words? They're not historical words. They're not related to the words of Jesus, actually recorded by his followers. So how do we know these things?

That's the point that I was making. Parakletos does not mean prophetes. It does not mean prophet. There's a perfectly good word for prophet in the Greek language. And that's not what is used in John chapters 14, 15, or 16.

We are talking about one who encourages, one who comes alongside. You can ask lots of questions based upon saying, well, whatever the answer is, it can't be what Scripture says. We cannot allow Scripture to tell us who the Holy Spirit is.

Where, for example, we heard from Shabir, he keeps talking about these Parakletos sayings. Where are they? Where's the physical evidence? Where's the historical evidence? The documentary evidence that these things ever existed outside of the New Testament.

Where are they? I'm looking for evidence. I need to have some evidence here. We're assuming it. Why are we assuming it? If I start presenting to all the Muslims in this room all sorts of theories that cut the Quran up into little pieces, you'd go, excuse me, we'd like some evidence.

I'm just asking the same thing. We were told historical studies do not tell us Jesus was the son of God. Do you see what that means about Shabir? A historical study for him is a naturalistic, materialistic thing.

The manuscripts of the New Testament clearly identify Jesus as the son of God, do they not? So historical studies must be only those things that cannot allow for any type of supernatural revelation. What historical studies?

Historical studies that start with the assumption that the Bible is not what it claims to be. Okay, that's called circular reasoning. We were told that the story of Elizabeth, quote, is not a fact, but a story.

Why? Well, because babies just don't do that. How many sections of the Quran would you have to throw out if you were consistent at that point? Every miracle. Every miracle. Couldn't happen. What do you mean the angels don't come to people in caves?

Come on, it's just a story, right?

Consistency, folks. If you're going to contradict yourself, that means you don't have an argument. Inconsistency is a sign of a failed argument. That was the first thing I said to Shabir Ali in 2006. I sound like a broken record, I'm sorry.

But as long as he keeps using these types of double standards, well... John 7, 53. The Holy Spirit was not yet. Well, you'll notice that most translations say it was not yet given. And you go, well, but the literal rendering of the Greek, it could be not yet.

Yeah. But if you found a text in the Quran that was not overly clear, would you not say that if the rest of the Quran or even the rest of the surah itself very plainly explained the concept that it would be appropriate to translate it in that way, to give the text the benefit of the doubt?

The Gospel of John has already talked about the activity of the Holy Spirit long before John 7. And so what we have here is, once again, this mentality that says, okay, we can only look at John 7. We cannot give it the benefit of the doubt.

We cannot see it in the context. We cannot allow any writer to be consistent with himself. Everything has to be contradictory. Does Shabir Ali apply that methodology to the Quran? Yes or no? I think we all know the answer.

Therefore, if it is no, then that means another inconsistency has been presented. It just strikes me as so odd that to try to come up with prophecies of Muhammad, you would have to borrow from the most naturalistic argumentation over here.

You'd have to chop up the words of scripture. You'd have to assert over and over again that the Bible is contradictory and Jesus didn't fulfill this and Jesus didn't fulfill that, just to find some way of reading into some of these words something that might have a fulfillment 600 years later.

Doesn't anyone notice that that doesn't make a whole lot of sense? Why read into those words some kind of supernatural? I mean, to predict something that's 600 years down the road, hundreds of miles away in a completely different language, that's supernatural.

And so, you want to read into these words a supernatural prophecy of Muhammad 600 years later, and the only way you can do it is by chopping the words up and denying their supernatural nature to begin with.

It seems to me, in a basic reading of those two texts of the Quran, that when it says, remember, call to mind, that it's claiming that this was the common knowledge, people knew these things. Call to mind what Jesus said.

I challenge you to show me where Jesus ever said those things. A. B. If he did say those things, then it follows that we should be able to find this unlettered prophet in the Torah and the Injil. The prophet of Deuteronomy 18 was Jewish.

We've established that beyond all question. It's singular, not plural. The Hebrew is not even to be questioned there. I mentioned in my opening statement that Shabir, this evening, did not mention Song of Solomon 5, but he did in Glasgow.

And that's why I was prepared to respond to it. The Periclete text, we've seen the tremendous inconsistencies. You have to cut up the Gospel of John. And I simply say one thing. If you're going to believe all these theories about how John was put together, why am I not in perfect grounds to say to you, show me evidence?

Show me evidence. He says, oh, it's written around 100. Some theorize it could have been written before 70. The point is, it is the earliest documented text of the New Testament. Where is the time for all this editing?

Where is the evidence of it? Who did the editing? Why aren't there other manuscripts demonstrating the editing? Those are questions that I think, honestly, have to be answered by someone who is, remember, none of these scholars that Shabir has quoted have ever strung together all the things he's strung together into one chain, resulting in a prophecy of Muhammad.

Not one of them. And I submit to you that it is the inconsistency of that approach that demonstrates the fatal error of the system. Thank you very much.

The Cross-Examination on Christian and Muslim Presuppositions

So we now have ten minutes for Shabir to cross. Examine James before James crosses. Examine Shabir.

How do you feel about my saying that the Muslim call to Christians is not that you give up faith in God and in Jesus, but that you come to a true understanding of Jesus, which for Muslims means that Jesus was a prophet of God, a servant who performed many miracles, and that he preached a message which is similar to the message of the Old Testament prophets.

I fully understand that that is what you want us to do. The Qur 'an describes what we believe as a quote-unquote excess. But the fact of the matter is that what you actually want us to do is to not have a very hardened soul of our faith, because he who confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord, that he has come in flesh, that he has risen from the dead, these are all things that are absolutely definitional of the subject of the Christian faith.

We're going to need to stop my timer for a moment and give you a new battery, my friend.

Hopefully, was that sufficient?

Now, you are aware that there are people who refer to themselves as Christians, and there have been over history, who do so. But at the same time, they do not believe that Jesus is literally the Son of God or a person in the Holy Trinity.

That's called a technical adjustment. So, in the case of those Christians, if you were to put up the same as in faith, at least in terms of the same senses that you just described, now, do you also understand, in my point, that the Christian call to the Muslim is really to abandon faith in Muhammad and the Qur 'an?

Well, obviously, because of the fact that the Christian believes that the central aspect of God's revelation is the coming of Jesus Christ in flesh, that he was the divine Son of God, who died upon the cross of Calvary and was raised again for our justification, then we see Islam coming after us as denying those core issues and going backwards, in essence, to a position of ignorance about the revelation that God has made himself in Jesus Christ.

And, of course, I would not identify as believers, as those who are true Christians, the people that you're referring to, whether you're referring to any Knights of Red Rose might be, surely you realize, Shabir, that there is a scholarly use of the term Christian that would be used of anyone who mentions Jesus, just as there is a scholarly use of Muslim that would refer to anyone who has any kind of connection to Muhammad and the Qur 'an.

I'm speaking as a theologian. As a theologian, the Bible defines what is and what is not a Christian. And a person who does not embrace Jesus Christ, as he himself said in John 8, 24, unless you believe that I am he, you will die of your sins.

Now, you do recognize that, just as you've used the term ignorance of the revelation that God gave through Jesus Christ, that if I were to listen to you, then I would be in a position where I would be in ignorance of the special revelation that God gave through Muhammad and the Qur 'an.

Of course, since that alleged revelation comes after the time of Jesus Christ, and itself claims to be consistent with the singular message of the prophets of old and Jesus Christ, and I think that's the argument that is being made in Surah 5, 44 through 49, then we are given a means of testing the claims of Muhammad and the teachings of Muhammad.

We're not coming six centuries later and saying that the Torah and the Injil were not solved, they were sent down, provides a standard by which we can test the claims of Muhammad. Otherwise, how could I claim, how could I test Muhammad?

How could I know? What is the means? Did he not give us a test? Is it just a fiat faith, just believe and that's it? I don't think that's even what he was arguing in the Qur 'an.

Now, you are aware that there are arguments for the existence of God, such as the far-right doctrine in Christ, but those arguments culminate with, and very importantly, depend on the fact of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead.

If I, as a Muslim, were to listen to your call, and find myself in that position of ignorance about the revelation which came through the prophet Muhammad, what would then, before I become a Christian, convince me to, what presuppositions do you think I would have, coming to examine the Christian faith for the first time?

Well, a couple of things. First of all, I do not argue for the existence of God with William Lane Craig. He is a Molinist evidentialist, and I am a Reformed presuppositionalist, so we couldn't really be too much farther apart as far as the approach that we have.

William Lane Craig says that the preponderance of the evidence points to the greater possibility of the existence of a God. I assert that without the existence of the Christian God, there is no explanation for human predication, human thought, or the fact that we are having a debate this evening, and that the existence of the Christian God is an absolute necessity, not a possible result of the greater preponderance of evidence.

So we approach that very, very differently. And so, as I was speaking to a Muslim, I say to the Muslim, you already believe that God has spoken, but you believe in a revelation that comes after He has spoken, and it does not show any first-hand knowledge of the content of that revelation.

As you know, the Koran only twice quotes from the Bible, and both could be very easily oral things, but memorize the lex talionis, eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth. I see no evidence that the writer of the Koran has first-hand knowledge of the actual text of the New Testament.

And so, my point to a Muslim would be, I'm not asking you to question the existence of God. I just simply believe that since we're made in the image of God, we know that God is consistent with Himself.

And therefore, if you find something, if you trace that revelation through, and He has revealed Himself to be like this, and 600 years later someone in ignorance comes along and says, oh no, no, no, it's not like that.

Why should I accept that? Why should I believe that? There is a beautiful consistency between the Old and the New Testament, if a person would just examine it, but most Muslims I know don't examine that consistency at all.