Response to Sheikh Awal (Part 3)

Quranic Claims About Bible Corruption and Translation

Press forward then with our response to Shake a Wall, we had gotten to, we're still in his opening statement here, and we actually lost a little portion of my response, and so I'm going to sort of back up about one minute so I can have some continuity here.

He starts in on, again, a standard Acme DDOT thing in regards to 28 different Bibles. So if we have this set up, what's wrong? Something's wrong with this mic. That happens on Skype. Hopefully you have my computer queued up, and there we go.

They follow conjecture. Guess what? That's what happened. I think so. That's why you find contradiction. Today the question is, is the Bible the Word of God? I would have discussed that issue, but this is not the issue.

I would have proved 100 that the Bible has been mutilated,.

Mutilated beyond recognition. Yes, as I mentioned last time, that's a topic I would like to debate. I would prove 100 the Bible has been mutilated beyond recognition. What an amazing assertion, given the vast superiority of the New Testament manuscript tradition to that of the Quran.

But I am certain that he really does believe that. And I cannot know whether he would be willing to listen to the opposite case. But whether or not they listen or not, we have to be prepared to offer that opposite case.

It's been changed. I have 28 Bibles in my house. I have 28 Bibles in my house. None is the same. Billah al-Azim, none is the same. Different books. The New Testament version, the Revised Standard Version, the Mormon version, the Lutheran version.

You think it's the same,.

It's a holy book, but it is not the same by God. Now, of course, all of those are translations or perversions in the case of the Mormon version. I mean, seriously, would Sheikha Wall take some strange Islamic cult group, has some prophet that comes along, and says, you know, the Quran's been changed, and I'm going to restore it.

And so he inserts prophecies about himself into Surah 2. And he changes this, and he changes that, and he adds this, and he adds that. Would Sheikha Wall accept that as having anything to do with the actual historical accuracy of the transmission of the Quran?

Then why even look at Joseph Smith's material? Why even quote it? Why even think that it's relevant? It's not relevant. I mean, Joseph Smith comes farther after the writing of the New Testament than we can even draw a parallel to for the Quran, because it hasn't been enough time yet.

And so, if anyone did anything right now to the text of the Quran, would that actually have anything to do with what it originally said? Of course not. And yet, there you have that. And of course, to compare the NIV and the Revised Standard Version, English translations, there are many English translations of the Quran.

Does that mean the Quran has changed? There's at least a dozen. There's some in modern language. There's some that are sort of free-form paraphrases, which will probably get their authors killed in certain countries.

But the point is, they exist. Does that mean the Quran has been changed? No. If you want to know what the Quran says, you have to look at the Arabic. If you want to know what the Bible says, you have to look at the Hebrew and the Greek.

And so he's comparing apples and oranges. And it should be transparently the case. It will be in Detroit, but it should be transparently.

The case. He didn't look happy there. I think he really meant you should be ashamed of yourself.

He says they don't have the same Bible. What he means by that not is the text, in the sense that Rome uses the UBS NA -27 just as Protestants do in general. But he's referring to the canon and the issue of the Apocrypha, which of course we've addressed many, many times on this program and in our debates.

But that's hopefully what he's referring to there.

Jesus’ Death, the Resurrection, and the Gospel Accounts

So I want you to listen, keep the emotion to the end. This is a serious issue. My salvation is Jesus. If my salvation is on his cross, Jesus Christ has to make an explicit statement that,.

Look, I am coming to die for you. Which he did over and over and over and over again. And I'll try to find this later on if we're still during the, it's hard sometimes to find things in video during the program, but Jesus makes those explicit statements.

And when his specific prophecy concerning going to Jerusalem and dying and rising again the third day is brought to him during the question and answer period. That's where we got the, well, you know, you have Vaticanus and Sinaiticus and Alexandrinus and they're written in the 12th century.

And in those, Matthew only has three chapters. And so that wasn't even there. Utter silliness is presented. That's just not true. And one of the things I'm going to need to remember to bring with me when I go up to Detroit is I'm going to take that text and I'm going to provide the scan from Sinaiticus out of that.

So just to prove that, see, here it is in Matthew. And we can take a look at it and put it up on the screen and say, now, would you care to rephrase your argument at that point?

Don't make such a statement. It was written about him more than 300 years after him. Who wrote the book of Matthew? Are you asking? You say Matthew wrote it. Matthew did not write the book of Matthew, which you quoted from.

How do I know? The book of Matthew chapter 9, verse 9. Listen to what happened. It says, while he, Jesus, was going out on the way, he saw a man sitting on a taskmaster's table and Jesus said, follow him.

And Matthew rose and followed him. Did Matthew wrote this book? Matthew did not write this book. Someone else was writing. If Matthew wrote it, it would have been while Jesus Christ was walking on the way, he saw me sitting down and he said, follow me, and I rose and followed him.

But this one, somebody else is.

Writing these books. Now, as I look at him, he really thinks this is an unanswerable statement. He really thinks that no author of antiquity ever narrated any event, especially when he's talking about somebody else, in the third person.

That every author of antiquity would have to have gone to first person. He saw me and he called me. Even if he was keeping himself out of it, which, oh, wait a minute. Matthew's a synonymous work. There's no, I'm sorry, not synonymous work.

Matthew is an anonymous work. There's no name attached at all. So why would he, if he doesn't insert his name, switch to the first person? In fact, that doesn't make any sense at all, does it? And yet Che Guevara really thinks it's an unanswerable question, an unanswerable argument.

Which again, demonstrates that this is not true 100 of the time, but in my experience, it's true 99 .98 of the time. And that is, right outside that door, around the corner, is an entire shelf filled with Islamic books written by Islamic authors.

Some of the sets were multiple hundreds of dollars. One set was about $600, I recall, just for the set. This is their writings, tafsir literature, commentary literature. We look at Ibn Kathir, we look at al-Qurtabi, we look at the Hadith, we look at that material before we make arguments in regards to certain texts.

For example, extremely important text, Surah 6, 101, says that God cannot have a son because he does not have a, unless he has a sabiha, a mate, a consort. Well, before I ever brought that up in public, I took the time to get out al-Qurtabi, I looked at Ibn Kathir, I looked the text up.

I want to know what the classical Islamic sources say about these particular texts. I don't find Muslims that do that. They just don't. They just read the Bible and there are shelves of incredible commentaries, consistent, in-depth, historical, exegetical commentaries on the Bible.

Do they look at them? Well, the ones who do are looking for things to just, you know, try to shred it. They much prefer the liberals who don't believe in the text. They don't really bother reading the commentaries by people who do believe in the text, which I find extremely inconsistent and rather sad, but that's the way it is.

So, this is not much of an argument. First of all, Matthew doesn't have a name attached to it, so it's not a hill to die on. But even beyond that, does this mean that this somehow is, well, that means it's much later removed and blah, blah, blah.

No, in no way, shape, or form. But he looks very pleased with that particular argument. And where did it come from?

It came from Akwadidna.

Now, he's sitting there saying, keep your emotions down, but he's raising the emotions. He's just said, shame on you. He says, bring your guru, your pastor, your big guy next time. I feel like I'm fighting with a kid.

So, he's the one raising the emotions here while telling other people to keep that down. I'm not sure that's really the way to go. Now, that one, Jeremiah chapter 8, it'd be good if we took a look at that one.

Sometimes, someday we're going to have a full scripture index to all of the videos on YouTube, someday. We really need it. Because I have addressed this in the videos on YouTube. And I did so because this is a very common text used by Islamic apologists to try to say that the Bible itself says it's been corrupted.

Now, this is an abuse of Jeremiah. It is a contextual, but it's there. So, let's, let's, and remember, Sheikhawal quotes Bible verses, but he doesn't quote them accurately. He may not know it. I'm not accusing him of purposeful dishonesty on the matter, but he very frequently does not quote them accurately.

Just as Dave Hunt can't seem to quote Matthew 23, 37 correctly, in the same way, Sheikhawal has problems with many of the texts that he, that he quotes as well. So, how can you say, Jeremiah 8, 8 says, how can you say we are wise and the law of Yahweh is with us?

But behold, the lying pen of the scribes has made it into a lie. Now, the reading that the Muslim uses at this point is to say that when the scribes say, we are wise, the law of Yahweh is with us. When it says the lying pen of the scribes has made into a lie, what he's saying is that they've actually perverted or changed the word of God.

Rather than accusation that it is the scribes who are lying, not the word of God has been changed. But when you continue reading the text, and by the way, Sam Shamoon has addressed this as well. It has some material in this, if you want to take a look at more depth.

But notice what it goes on to say, the wise men, shall we put to shame, they shall be dismayed and taken. Behold, they have rejected the word of Yahweh. So what wisdom is in them? Not they've perverted, not they've changed, not they've destroyed.

They have rejected the word of Yahweh. What was the word of Yahweh? Well, Jeremiah was bringing a message of destruction, that the religious leaders in Jerusalem were deceiving the people. When they're saying peace, peace, and there is no peace.

And so it says that they have rejected the word of the Lord. Therefore, I will give their wives to others in their fields to conquerors, because in the least of the greatest, everyone is greedy for unjust gain.

From prophet to priest, everyone deals falsely. Lying, the lying pens of the scribes, they're the ones that write. Now here you see the prophets, they deal falsely. They have healed the wound of my people, lightly saying, peace, peace, when there is no peace.

Were they ashamed when they committed abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed. They did not know how to blush. Therefore, they shall fall among the fallen. When I punish them, they shall be overthrown, says Yahweh.

When I would gather them, declares Yahweh, there are no grapes in the vine, nor figs in the fig tree. Even the leaves are withered, and what I gave them has passed away from them. Why do we sit still, gathered together?

Let us go into the fortified cities and perish there. For the Lord our God has doomed us to perish, and has given us poison water to drink, because we have sinned against the Lord. We looked for peace, but no good came.

For a time of healing did behold terror. And so he is bringing a message of judgment upon the people. But Jeremiah will go on and repeatedly hold the people accountable to the very word of the Lord, which would be impossible if the interpretation they are giving of Jeremiah 8 .8 is the correct interpretation,.

Which, of course, it is not. This lies in your book. Jeremiah chapter 8, verse 8, I repeat. Jeremiah 24, 24. Jeremiah 8 .8. The new, the national version said, think not that we have the law of Moses and the prophet in our hands still.

Behold, the pen of the scrab have turned.

The Bible in vain. That is not what it says. They turned it in vain. That is just not what it says. Jeremiah, he said, Jeremiah 24 .10, and I will send sword, famine, and pestilence upon them until they shall be utterly destroyed from the land that I gave to their fathers.

Was it Jeremiah 24 .10? Is that what he said? It sounded like it. Maybe it is 24 .24. There is no 24 .24. There is only 24 .10. Well, hard to respond to one when there is no 24 .24. The only way I could find that out is to see if I can back it up a little bit here.

Let's see if I got far enough back. It says, do you think that we have the law of Moses in our hand? No. The pen of those who write the Bible have turned it into a lie. I didn't say this. I said it twice in your book.

Jeremiah 24 .24. He said Jeremiah 24 .24. There are only 10 verses.

In Jeremiah 24. Again, it is very impressive to an audience, do anything by memory, if your memory is good, but this simply isn't what either Jeremiah 8 or Jeremiah 24 actually said.

The New International Version said, think not that we have the law of Moses and the prophet in our hand still. Behold, the pen of the scrap have turned the Bible in vain. That's just not.

What Jeremiah says. That's not even close to what Jeremiah says. So we have a need to check citations and check them quickly during debates to be sure. They turn it in vain. And the Quran.

Confirms.

But that's not the application the Quran actually makes in that text to the Torah or the Injil. In fact, if you're going to interpret that text that way, then the entire argument for the prophet of Muhammad in Surah 5, beginning about verse 45, is turned on its head.

So that sounds real good, but in my experience, most Muslims just don't actually interpret the Quran in any consistent fashion. They just use it as a textbook, as a book filled with different texts that they can use in their own way.

And we point out that that has nothing to do with Jesus' death, because it is Jesus' death that actually fulfills the prophecies of the law and the prophets and fulfills the law itself. So only by misrepresenting what the authors themselves intended in those texts can you make that kind of argument.

And the reason for the citation of this is what? I mean, that's not even a meaningful interpretation. No interpretation was given. I guess you're still going to get out there to try to hope that people interpret it in a way that's amenable to your position, but try providing some contextual exegesis.

Okay, what does that mean? What did it mean in the days of Jeremiah? What was the proverb about the fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children's teeth have been set on edge? What about the fact that they use that as a reason to not repent, etc., etc., etc.?

So you can't just throw texts out and not deal with the context. That's not appropriate for anybody to do. That's not appropriate for Christians to have the Quran. It's not appropriate for Muslims to do it about the Bible either.

The father shall not bear the iniquity of the son, neither the son bear the iniquity of the father. The wickedness of the wickedness shall be upon him, and the righteousness of the righteousness shall be upon him.

But if the wicked turn around and do which is good, I, God Almighty, I will blot his sin, and I will never remember it. This is Islam. No, that's not Islam.

That, again, completely ignores the issue in Jeremiah chapter 18. I would direct you to the Wednesday evening devotional that I gave about a month and a half ago now, it is on YouTube, where I went through Jeremiah 18.

I did it by actually looking at the text, not just by quoting portions of it, and gave the context regarding the proverb that the people were using as a means of avoiding God's call to repentance. Well, there's no reason for us to repent.

God has already doomed us, and this is why, and it's not really our sin. It's the sin of our fathers, and so on and so forth. That is not Islam, because that ignores the prophecies of the book of Jeremiah, of the coming branch, and how forgiveness is wrought, etc., etc.

Again, it's just removing things from their context, throwing them out there, and putting them in a new context in hopes that people go, ah, yes, that fits what I believe. So there you go. There's no federal headship.

I wasn't there, so I can't be held responsible. And again, that is Islam. Islam has a very different view of sin than does the Bible, and you need to understand that, and you need to be prepared to defend the concept of federal headship, even though most Christians are not prepared to do that in any way, shape, or form, but that is something that is necessary.

Now, that's just pure mockery, especially watching it, and again, that's not helpful for any kind of meaningful dialogue, especially when Sheikha Wall has demonstrated such gross ignorance of the text that he has manhandled thus far.

And I, again, would just simply call upon everyone involved in this kind of encounter that truth is worth investment in and energy devoted toward, and so the idea of engaging in mockery, especially when the arguments you're using, you've never actually done the research that you need to do to find out if they're really true or not, is really not something that should be done.

And I would call upon all Christians to not do that in regards to Islam, whether the Muslims do it to us is really up to them. See, as soon as I hear someone say that, who claims to have been doing all this studying, and claims to have been doing all this work, I immediately have clear evidence that this person does not understand the position that he's criticizing.

As soon as you hear someone say that when Jesus died, who was controlling the universe? God was. But you said Jesus was God, and he died. Two problems. Problem number one, you don't even believe that death is non-existence.

Even you believe that when someone dies, their spirit continues to exist and goes to either heaven or hell. Think logically here, just for a moment. Why would you think that when Jesus died, he ceases to exist?

I've never had anyone answer that. Who would raise this objection? Secondly, we don't believe that it was the Father who became flesh. We don't believe it was the Holy Spirit who became flesh. It was the Son who became flesh.

So even if death meant non-existence, which it doesn't, for either one of our religions, but even if it did, the Father didn't die and the Spirit didn't die. So the argument is as bogus as a day is long.

I mean, it's difficult to even come up with a parallel bogus argument in regards to Muhammad or the Quran. It's just, this is a bad argument, and it's embarrassing to make bad arguments. But it's a very, very commonly made bad bogus argument.

Yeah, the logic would require that you actually accurately represent the religion that you're denying and that you are, in fact, at this point, mocking. And if you're not accurately representing it, then the logic would be that you're the one who should be ashamed of yourself for raising that kind of argument, because it's that bad.

It really is that bad.

Shalom Aleichem and the Resurrection Appearance in Luke 24

Logic would never accept this. So Christ did not die on the cross. Why did I say that? If you look at the book of Mark, book of Luke 24 -36, when the disciples ran away, they didn't know what happened.

They didn't know where Jesus went. What happened to him, they don't know. They went to the upper room. So Jesus walked in the upper room, Luke 24 -36, and Jesus walked in the upper room and he said to the disciples, please be unto you.

And the disciples were terrified and afraid because they thought they have seen a ghost. What did he say? He said, please be unto you, to the disciples. That's what the Bible said, Luke 24 -36. Check it out.

Luke 24 -36, Jesus walked in the upper room and the disciples, and he said, please be unto you. I'm asking, did Jesus say, please be unto you? Did he say, please be unto you in English? What language did he speak?

Hebrew or, you know, Aramaic. In Aramaic, how do you say, please be unto you? Please be unto you in Hebrew and Aramaic is shalom aleichem, which is what we say, shalom aleichem. Have you ever said shalom aleichem to your friend?

No. We follow Jesus. We say shalom aleichem to us. So when he came...

So if you use a particular greeting, you can reject everything Jesus taught. You can reject everything he taught about his death. You can reject everything about what he taught about his person. You can reject all of that stuff.

But if you use two words, peace to you, then you're following Jesus. It's, it truly is amazing. But there are people going, ah, that, that, see, we're following Jesus because, you know, he bows down once in prayer.

Other times he doesn't, but he bows down once in prayer and he says, peace to you. So we're the followers of Jesus, even though we reject everything else Jesus taught and even go so far as to say, we heard him say that these are all things written down 300 years later and blah, blah, blah, which of course they were not.

But you know, that's, that's the argument. He said shalom aleichem.

And they said wa aleichem shalom. Instead of saying wa aleichem shalom, they said, and they were terrified and afraid because they thought they have seen the ghost. Why are they thinking that is a ghost?

Because they thought he was on the cross. They didn't see him.

So Jesus Christ want to assure them. He said, now I remember, uh, Peter has followed Jesus to the trial. John is at the cross. Um, but he's skipping that part. That part's inconvenient. He wants to promote the idea that they all just ran away and that was it.

They went to the upper room, they hid there and they never came out and Peter didn't do the denials and he didn't go to the trial. And, and, uh, John wasn't at the foot of the cross with Mary and none of that happens.

So you just, you just chop it up and get rid of the inconvenient part and then create a whole new thing and say, well, this is what your own book says. Well, sure. And of course we could do that to Quran and turn it into a mishmash of self contradictory silliness if we wanted to do that, but that doesn't accomplish anything.