A Pre-Debate Message for Shadid Lewis

A Personal Message Ahead of the Debate with Shadid Lewis

It's been quite a while since I did a ScreenFlow video, and today I'm doing it almost as a personal message. I am doing this ScreenFlow video specifically for Shadid Lewis. Shadid Lewis is the U .S. director for MDI, the Muslim Debate Initiative, and I will be debating Shadid in just a matter of weeks on Long Island at New Hyde Park Baptist Church, which interestingly enough is pastored by Doug McMasters, who used to pastor the church in London, where I debated Sammy Zottery and others there, and hence was involved with MDI stuff at that time as well.

And so, I'm doing this because, well, I'm just going to speak to Shadid, I'm going to let Shadid know that I posted this, I'm going to direct him to it, so that he can watch this and it's sort of like a Skype call, except I want other people to view this and hopefully be able to help others in this area.

As you know, Shadid, I wrote to you a number of months ago about the topic of the debate, and I explained to you that what we've been trying to do is to raise the level of dialogue and debate between Muslims and Christians.

There is a lot of ignorance on both sides, and it concerns me that we are debating the same issues over and over again, and I realize there are fundamental problems, fundamental contradictions between Islam and Christianity that we will always have to be dealing with, but we can't just keep dealing with them on an extremely basic, simplistic level.

And so, we've been trying to, for example, in the debate that I did with Yusuf Ismail of IPCI down in the Jumu 'ah Masjid in Durban, right there in front of the Mimbar, in front of the Qibla, we did a debate where he presented his understanding of John's Christology and I responded to that, I presented my understanding of the Quran's Christology, he responded to that, and I think at least a couple people I've been able to convince that we really need to focus in much more tightly in our debates.

I want to debate a solid Muslim apologist on Isaiah 53, for example, or maybe we could get as focused as what I wanted to do with Yusuf was to actually debate solely the teaching of Surah 5 in regards to Christ, in regards to the Messiah.

That kind of thing, where we'd have plenty of time to really dig into the original languages and the context, and if we were looking at Quranic sources, we could look at Tafsir and Hadith commentaries and things like that.

But our topic is still a fairly broad one, and you pretty much insisted on the title, is Jesus God Almighty? And so what I try to do is I try to understand what my specific opponent believes in regards to a specific issue.

Now, you may remember, Shanita, I first met you back, I believe it was 2008 in Norfolk, Norfolk, Virginia, when you were debating, I think you, I'm not sure if you debated David. I know you had the convert conversation with Nabeel, and I think that may have been when I first heard you speak and give your journey.

And it really strikes me that there was something about your journey that's important about what I'm going to say here, and I'll get to that in a moment. But what I try to do is to understand where someone's coming from.

And you remember I moderated the debate you did with David, where you brought up a bunch of what I felt was really poor scholarship, Gnostic writings, stuff that's just way, way out in, you know, out of balance, basically.

And I talked to you a little bit about that after that debate. What I wanted to do, just yesterday, I said, you know, I need to listen to Shadid's most recent debates. You know, I've been told by some folks that you have really improved your debating, that you've done more study, and so I wanted to get up to speed.

So I tracked down on YouTube three recent debates that you did, one of them on PalTalk, specifically on this subject, a very same topic, very same thing. And very same thesis statement. And I didn't recognize it was a PalTalk debate, so I didn't recognize who you were debating.

And then you did a debate on whether the Trinity is polytheism. And then you did a debate on the reliability of the Muslim Jesus. Those were the three that I listened to on a ride this morning. And as soon as I got through even a portion of the first debate, and it was only confirmed by the last two, I knew I needed to do this video, because what I need to say to you is that in listening to almost four hours, I listened to it at high speed, but about four hours worth of debate, over four hours worth of debate, I never once heard you give an accurate understanding of the Trinity, an accurate definition of the Trinity, and hence I never heard you give one single accurate argument against the Trinity.

Not once, not once. It especially came out in the debate on whether the Trinity is polytheism. Very clearly, Shadeed, with all due respect, you were never truly a Christian. I know you went to a Christian church.

I know you made probably a profession of faith in your black Baptist church. But as you yourself said, when the pastor of that church broke out a saxophone and started jamming with the band, you knew that that wasn't how God is to be worshipped.

You were right. The problem is, Shadeed, that you have confused cultural Christianity and false Christianity. You said you were raised within the Roman community with biblical Christianity. And as a result, clearly, you were never taught what the doctrine of the Trinity was.

And clearly, now doing dawah as a Muslim, you still don't know what the doctrine of the Trinity actually is. And you know I've tried. I sent you my entire book, and I cannot tell you how many times I've heard you saying things in these three debates that I addressed fully and in depth and demonstrated just the fundamental misunderstanding.

We're not talking about areas of disagreement here. We're talking about fundamental area, fundamental misstatements on the level of my saying that Muhammad is a divine person in Islamic theology, or saying that the Qur 'an just represents Muhammad's understanding.

I mean, I realize these are not Muslim understandings, because I've listened to what the Muslims believe. And when I talk about issues such as Tawhid and shirk, I know that there's major shirk and minor shirk, and there's different areas of Tawhid.

You've got Tawhid of lordship, and the names and attributes of God, and worship, and all the rest of that kind of stuff. I've taken the time to listen and try to understand what Muslims believe from a Muslim perspective.

And Shadid, you have not done that. I'm sorry, but in the debate on whether the Trinity is polytheistic, you would go back and forth between being in person, being in person. Clearly there are three persons, there's two persons here, there are three beings here, etc., etc.

And there are so many times, Shadid, that you said, clearly this text shows that the father is not the son, that there's two persons here. And every Christian in the audience is going, yeah, that's what we believe.

And so I just really have to ask you, why do you do Dawah? Do you do it for Muslims? Do you do it for yourself? Or do you do it for the people that you're trying to reach? And if you're trying to reach, what kind of Christians are you trying to reach?

If you're only trying to reach Christians that are just completely unfamiliar with their faith and hence are easily confused, well, okay. But I would think that you would want to reach the best Christians who know their faith the best.

And hence you must have an accurate understanding and presentation of what we believe. You don't want to be standing in front of an audience of Christians, railing away what you think the doctrine of the Trinity is, and all the Christians are sitting there going, you have no idea what we believe, do you?

You just proved that the father is not the son, and since we don't believe that the father is the son, then you really don't know what we believe, do you? You don't want to be doing that. That does not promote, it does not advance the conversation between our communions, does it?

Between our two communities? So, the first thing you need to understand, Shadid, and this was all discussed long before Muhammad came along, okay? All before, this was pretty much a settled issue. Oh, I get that, there's Unitarians and Modalists.

Your argument is primarily, by the way, with Modalists. You seem to think that we are Modalists, that we are saying the father is the son, the son is the father, and so when you demonstrate that they're not, you assume Unitarianism all the way through, never try to prove it, you just assume it.

A very common problem, but you don't seem to understand the difference between being and person. Now, you function on the difference between being and person all the time. You recognize that you are surrounded by fellow human beings.

Now, their being is limited to time and space. Human beings are creatures, they're created beings, and so my being cannot be shared by anyone else, at least not in any natural sense. But you recognize that things have being that are not personal.

You know, I have one of these nice little paper weights, also helps to keep books open, filled with lead, this thing's got some... But if I chucked this at you, and it hits you, you would know it has being.

It exists, it's there. But I can sit here and say, you're such a beautiful green leather paperweight, and it doesn't care. Or I can insult it, you're a stupid green leather paperweight. It doesn't care either, because it's not personal.

It has being, it exists, but it's not personal. Being and person, we recognize are different things. We recognize that every day. Our language, our experience is predicated upon it. Now, when we talk about human beings, we know that a human being is a living being, and that the being there is not just simply the physical body, but there's something more than that.

That the human being is a living creature, and we recognize that the human being is personal. You insult a human being and he's hurt, or he might get angry. But the point is, we can also distinguish between persons.

We share a common humanity, but we distinguish between persons. For instance, my limited finite being is shared by one person, me, myself. That's what distinguishes me from others. And so we function on this basis.

The doctrine of the Trinity, which is derived from, not from Council of Nicaea and all the rest of this other kind of stuff down the road, but which is fundamentally derived from the data that is presented to us by Scripture.

By what we find in the Old and the New Testaments, taking them as a whole, not just bits and pieces, but taking them as a whole, we are forced to deal with three Biblical truths. A, there is only one true God, Yahweh.

Yahweh is the Creator God, the one true God, Yahweh is personal, Yahweh speaks, we are made in the image of Yahweh, one true God. But then we have this amazing revelation that takes place between the Old and New Testaments in that intertestamental period where you have this man who is born in Bethlehem and he's Jesus.

And you have to look at all that the Scripture says about this man, and when you do, you discover that he says things, he's described in ways that simply cannot be limited to a mere human being. In fact, the writers of the New Testament use the very name Yahweh for him, not just as a representative, but identify him as Yahweh.

Apply passages to him that could be applied to no one else but Yahweh. The spirit? Spirit of Yahweh. They are differentiated from one another. The son speaks to the father, the father speaks to the son, the father and the son send the Holy Spirit, clearly differentiated from one another, and yet clearly their equality in sharing that one divine essence, that one divine being, that one divine name is put forward as well.

And so we can't just throw this out, throw that out, throw this out, throw that out. We have to bring all of this together just as you have to deal with the essence of the Quran and you can't say, well, you know what, I don't like what it says in Surah 6, so I'm going to get rid of that.

I like Surah 5. That's not how you interpret the Quran. That's how you interpret the Bible, but that's not how you interpret the Quran. We have to take all of this together, and when we do, we have the doctrine of the Trinity.

One God, three persons, full equality of the persons. Not identity of the persons. The father is not the son. The son is not the spirit. The spirit is not the father. But you keep confusing being in person as if they're the same thing.

You don't function that way. You don't live that way. But in the debates you just kept, well, being person, just back and forth, not recognizing that we differentiate between these terms. They mean different things.

And so it's perfectly correct for us to recognize that Jesus is not the father, has taken different roles than the father. It wasn't the father who became incarnate. It wasn't the spirit who became incarnate.

It was the son who became incarnate. We recognize all these things, but it doesn't change the fact that each one fully shares the one being that is God. Each one is identified as Yahweh. Only one God.

We're not polytheists. The only way you can prove polytheism is to redefine the Trinity. Now, I recognize from the way you describe the Trinity that you were never taught it properly. I got that. What's worse is now you're in a religious system where I have no evidence that the author of the Quran ever understood it either.

And in fact, one of the main issues is the arguments of the Quran against the Trinity do not show any meaningful understanding of the doctrine either. And that's a problem. It's one thing to say, well, yeah, you expect a Muhammad to have an accurate understanding of the Trinity?

Come on. Look at where he lived. Look at what time he lived. The Bible hadn't been translated into Arabic yet, except to say, yeah, but the problem is I think you're a Sunni Muslim, and therefore, no, that's relevant to you.

Because the Quran doesn't represent Muhammad's understanding. And in 632 A .D., Allah knew what the Trinity was. You can say Allah rejected it, but the fact of the matter is Allah knew what the Trinity was in 632 A .D., so the question is, why doesn't he accurately represent it in the Quran?

Well, that's one of the ongoing issues that needs to be discussed. And so, if you would just take the time to understand that over and over again in those debates you thought you were arguing against the Trinity when you were affirming what we believe if you just understood the Trinity.

What? There's clearly two persons there. And we go, yeah, yeah, that's right. But then you go, that means there's two gods, and we go, nope. And that's because we differentiate between two terms. You may not want to differentiate between those terms, but you live in that way, and you have to deal with the fact that if you're going to make meaningful arguments as one doing dawah for Islam, you've got to get, you've got to be accurate in what you're saying.

And I never once heard you accurately define the doctrine of the Trinity. Not once. You clearly, clearly do not understand it. Now, just a couple other things really quickly that were very common in your argumentation.

And my hope is that you will listen to this video, you'll go back to the forgotten Trinity, you'll read it with open eyes and ears, and attempt to dialogue with me on what Christians actually believe about the Trinity, not misapprehensions and false definitions and all the rest of that kind of stuff.

What does that accomplish? That accomplishes nothing. You really like John chapter 8, verse 40, but I really think you need to rethink your use of it. Over and over again, I've heard you say, well, look, John chapter 8, verse 40, I've got it on the screen here.

But now you seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. See, he's a man, he's, he's an anthropos, it's anthropon there, but that's just the accusative form, because it's the direct object of kill.

Anthropos, from which you get anthropology. Anthropos. I'm a man, see, Jesus is a man. And all the Christians in the audience just go, really? We didn't know that. Seriously, Shadid? That'd be like me arguing, look, Muhammad was a man.

And all the Muslims go, yeah, we know that. Because, see, well, that means he can't be God. That'd be like me arguing, well, look, Muhammad was a man, so he can't be a prophet. You mean a man can't be a prophet?

See, you assume many things. You assume Unitarianism. And if you continue doing that, you're always going to be arguing a circle. You're just never, ever going to make a meaningful argument against our position, as long as you just assume your conclusion.

But you don't seem to understand that these people thought he was a prophet. Well, those people thought he was a man. Oh, so he was a man and a prophet. That's right. Man, word became flesh, John 1, 14.

Prophet, you better believe it. High priest, sacrifice, king, Messiah, son of man, Daniel chapter 7, son of God, deity, Yahweh. All are true. Jesus is a whole lot bigger than you allow him to be, Shabby.

A whole lot bigger. But just simply go, see, it says a man. You get, well, that means man can't be God. Well, you're assuming the conclusion of the debate as your primary argument. It makes absolutely no sense.

Not only that, but it's really painfully obvious. You've chosen to use a text out of John 8. Even one of your favorite people to quote, Bart Ehrman, recognizes that the Gospel of John presents deity of Christ.

Even the skeptic recognizes that. And John chapter 8 is, John 8, 24, just a few sentences earlier, unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins. Few sentences later, John 8, 58, put in Abraham Genesai, before Abraham was, they go, I meet, I am.

They pick up stones to stone him. They clearly recognize he's drawing from the Hebrew on a who, from Isaiah, places like that. Named for Yahweh in the Old Testament. They recognize what's going on. Not good to pick a verse out of the middle of one of the chapters of the Gospel of John that is the clearest in the presentation of the deity of Christ.

And yet, that's what you've done. That is called eisegesis. That is called, that's not exegesis, that's not handling the text fairly or properly. That is called eisegesis. Reading into it a meaning that you're not deriving from the actual text itself.

Very, very clear. And what you say is, well, you know, anthropos can't, you can't be God if you're anthropos. You need to recognize that you make a lot of category errors on a philosophical level. When we say that God became man, we are not saying he ceased being God.

You assume that. You assume that there, you assume that there cannot be an incarnation. That's why I'm so thankful that I had the opportunity of debating Abdullah Kunda on this very issue. We actually debated and Abdullah understands what the issue is.

He doesn't argue like you argue. He's actually taking the time to understand what Christians believe and hence to try to mount a defense based upon that. But you assume that when we say God became man, he ceases being God.

No, he's taking on, Philippians chapter 2, he's taking on a human nature. He's not ceasing to be God. His essential essence does not change in that activity. He freely chooses to do this. And since that's sinful nature, this is where Abdullah and I disagreed.

That's not a sinful nature. It's just a human nature. God created human nature. Adam was not sinful when he was created. And that was one of the main things where Abdullah and I disagreed is basically, he said, well, human nature is always imperfect because it's not deity.

And that was, I think, one of the main problems with the defense that he offered. But at least we were actually discussing the real issue. The real issue that, unfortunately, we don't get to discuss very often with Muslims.

One last thing really quick, and that is your fascination with this text, I'll scroll back to it, John 8, 28, well, it's interesting. When you talk about Jesus saying that, I don't do anything of myself, from myself, and that's, you believe, a denial of his deity.

Because you seem to think that if Jesus is God, then you've got two different gods and they've got to be in competition with one another. And you like to go back to John chapter 5 as well. The son does nothing of himself.

You need to understand what's actually happening in both of these texts. First of all, I don't even know why you'd ever quote John 8, 28. You don't believe Jesus said any of this stuff. He's always calling himself son of God.

He's referring to the father. You don't, as a Muslim, believe he said any of these things. But Jesus said to them, when you have lifted up the son of man, you don't even believe that happened. Based on 40 Arabic words, 600 years later, and so on and so forth.

We've gone over that before. Then you will know that ego-ai-mi, I am, and that I do nothing on my own authority, but speak just as the father taught me. Here you have perfect balance. Jesus is not denying his deity, but he is denying that he's some god out doing his own thing separate from the father.

He does nothing of himself that is alone, separate from the father. There's perfect unity between them. That's the same point that Jesus is making in John chapter 5. When the Jews say, you're making God your own father, you're making yourself equal to God, they were right.

And Jesus doesn't say, oh, no, no, no, you're wrong, you're wrong, you're wrong. What he does in the rest of John chapter 5 is to talk about that perfect unity that exists between the father and the son.

When he says the son does nothing of himself, what that means is, he does nothing separate from the father, in opposition to the father, outside of perfect union with the father. That's the only way that Yahweh could remain one God.

Your understanding would split all that up, but it does not flow from the text of the New Testament at all. At all. So, why put this video up? Because I want it to be a good debate, and I want it to be a debate on the issues.

When I say Jesus is God Almighty, what I'm saying is, Jesus is truly God, he fully shares the one being that is God, he is identified as Yahweh by his earliest followers. By his earliest followers. But that does not mean that he is the father.

And so, if you spend your time demonstrating that Jesus is someone other than the father, wasted time. And every, and the people that you want, I would hope you would want to reach, the people in that audience, who know their faith, are going to be looking at you going, yeah, we know Jesus is the father.

Let's go on, let's move on to something that's actually relevant. You don't want to be standing up there misrepresenting the doctrine of the Trinity. You really don't. And so, having listened to those three debates, I just kept hearing the same errors over and over and over.

And your opponents pointed them out. The Paltalk debate, your opponent was saying, you're assuming Unitarianism, everything you're saying is based upon Unitarianism, you need to prove it, not just assume it.

In the second debate, you were presented with clear evidence, Genesis 18, Fulfillment in John chapter 8, never touched any of that. So your opponents, all of them, did try to explain these things. But maybe a fourth voice will help, I don't know.

I hope you hear that my desire is for us to have a good debate, but it needs to be a debate not on something other than what Christians believe. Or, well, I met a Christian once that believed that, I met Muslims that believed all sorts of wacky things, I would never hold you accountable for that.

In fact, the funny thing is, the third debate I listened to, you were debating with a guy who was a former Muslim. And whenever he would say anything that you interpret as being even slightly off, I can't believe you would say that, you're a former Muslim.

Okay, so, you claim to be a former Christian, wouldn't that mean that you need to be extremely accurate in what you're saying about Christianity? Doesn't matter how many people you've encountered, well, I bet somebody would believe that.

If you want to go debate a one that's Pentecostal, who believes Jesus is the Father, I can put you in touch with some folks. Go online, see my debates with one that's Pentecostal, I've debated them before, it was a real good long debate down in Brisbane, might help you out a lot to see what the differences are.

Roger Perkins was his name, I hope it's on YouTube, look for it, I think it is. Might help you to see what the differences really are. But you're debating an orthodox, historic Trinitarian, and so let's actually debate what we believe, not a caricature of what we believe.

I would never want you to defend a caricature of Muhammad, so how about we make sure that we do this in a way that's honouring to the truth, honouring to each one of our faiths, and honouring to the audience, and hopefully this will help us to do that.

So I hope that helps, and I'm looking forward to the debate, thanks a lot.