- 00:00
- words spoken to the Christians of Muhammad's day, and we know exactly what they possessed in the day that Muhammad said those words, if you believe
- 00:08
- Muhammad wrote those things. And so who said it was inspired? Interestingly enough, Muhammad did. Now, we're then told that there was a canon process.
- 00:18
- In other words, the Bible did not come down with a golden index attached to it. There had been a canon process in the
- 00:24
- Old Testament, there was a canon process in the New Testament as well. But there was a difference in the
- 00:29
- Quran too. Have you heard of Ibn Khan? Have you heard of Abdullah ibn Masud? Have you heard of the fact that they had different readings in their
- 00:35
- Quran? Listen to the debate. I'm looking forward to when it comes out. Listen to the debate that we have when we go into these things more fully.
- 00:41
- I simply say to you, if you use the same standards, these arguments will not carry any weight.
- 00:48
- I would also ask all of you to consider the difference between the Quran, which is written at one time with one author, and a multi -authored book that is written over decades or even over centuries as you have in the
- 01:01
- Old Testament, and the fact that the Quran is considerably smaller, it's only about 57 % the size of the
- 01:06
- New Testament, even less than the Old Testament, so you have much less material to deal with, and it's much younger.
- 01:12
- It's easy to say, oh look, we can know exactly who did this, that, and the other thing. It's a much younger and smaller work.
- 01:19
- I would say it's much more interesting to recognize the unity that you find in a book like the
- 01:25
- New Testament, which is written by multiple authors over multiple years, from multiple locations, in multiple different situations.
- 01:32
- You better have unity in a book that's written by one guy at one time. You better have unity in a situation like that.
- 01:40
- Now, we've had a shot taken at poor John Calvin. Let me just for a moment point out the fact that John Calvin, and I don't know if Adnan is aware of this, but John Calvin did prosecute
- 01:57
- Miguel Cervantes. Cervantes had been condemned by the Inquisition, escaped the night before he was to be burned, and went straight to Geneva, tried to get
- 02:05
- Calvin in trouble in Geneva, tried to get Calvin imprisoned and burned, and that didn't work out too well for him, obviously, and Calvin, as the chief pastor of the church under the governmental situation at that time, had to prosecute
- 02:19
- Cervantes. He did, and then he and the ministers asked that he not be burned alive, that he be executed first and then burned if that was what they had to do, because that's what the law said.
- 02:30
- But you might want to sort of figure that in. Now, do I think that the church should have been involved in government?
- 02:36
- No, I do not, not in that sense. And in fact, I would have been in danger in Geneva, because I am a
- 02:43
- Baptist, and the Baptists, the Anabaptists especially, were driven out of Geneva. But that means that I have to look at him and analyze him in the context he was in, and let me tell you something.
- 02:54
- It was just pointed out how gracious, for example, very often I hear people say, well, remember the
- 03:01
- Christians of Najran came and had a dialogue with Muhammad, and we don't know that. The Christian sources don't verify that, but let's say it happened, and they were allowed to leave in peace.
- 03:11
- Yes, they were. Within a few decades, they were removed from their homes and kicked out of their homes and driven into exile.
- 03:17
- That little part sort of gets skipped over, because folks, we can have this debate here. This debate could not happen in that.
- 03:26
- Keep that in mind when you consider these types of things. But I simply, you know, there are things in the
- 03:33
- Bible you may not like, he points to Leviticus. I don't like Sura 98 -6, which says Jews and Christians are the worst of all creatures.
- 03:41
- The worst of all creatures. I don't like that. But you have to believe there's a Muslim. What do you think that means?
- 03:48
- I have many brothers and sisters being persecuted by Islamic majorities around the world today. I don't find
- 03:54
- Christians who take seriously the Bible imprisoning Muslims around the world today. Sorry, the reference again, please?
- 04:00
- I'm sorry? The reference again? Uh, Sura 98 -6. Uh, Jews and Christians are the worst of all creatures.
- 04:07
- Yeah, Sura 98 -6. 98 -6. Yes. Now, let me just summarize after giving that, let me give, let me give a high five or two seconds.
- 04:17
- Who gave you, what were you given? From my perspective, Adnan said,
- 04:23
- Islam establishes law and that leads to prosperity. The mere existence of law, my friends, cannot change your heart, and you know that.
- 04:34
- Everyone in this room knows that. What I'm saying to you is what God has done in Jesus Christ provides the means of changing the hearts of people in any societal situation, and that's what can bring peace and harmony amongst men and women.
- 04:50
- Thank you very much. Thank you,
- 05:12
- James. I'd still like to point out a point. Would you like to add a time limit?
- 05:20
- No, no, I guess I won't be adding a time limit. You can use mine. Thank you. Okay, the verse quoted by James is chapter 98, verse 6, and it reads,
- 05:33
- Indeed, they who disbelieved among the people of the scripture and the polytheists will be in the fire of hell abiding eternally therein.
- 05:44
- Those are the worst of creatures. So, where does the Quran say that the
- 05:49
- Christians and Jews are the worst of creatures? It simply says, those who disbelieved among the people of scriptures, wait, wait, wait.
- 05:58
- Those who disbelieved among the people of scriptures and polytheists, those who disbelieved, the ones who disbelieved, the ones who disbelieved are the ones being addressed here.
- 06:10
- Those who believed, there's no problem. So, the Christians believe in hellfire and paradise, don't they?
- 06:17
- They do. So, I'm a disbeliever. I don't believe in the crucifixion. I don't believe in the Bible. I don't believe in Christian religion.
- 06:25
- Am I a disbeliever? Yes, I am. And if I die in this state, where do I go?
- 06:30
- To hellfire. So, where's the difference? Where's the difference? So, please, when you do make points about the
- 06:36
- Quran and our religion, try your best to be accurate. Mistakes can be made. Of course,
- 06:41
- I do appreciate that. And I can make mistakes. But did I make mistakes when I talked about contradictions in the
- 06:47
- Bible and all those problems? No, I didn't. Let me give you some contradictions in the Bible.
- 06:53
- Now, James has brought this topic up. Let's see what contradictions actually mean. Contradictions mean this.
- 07:00
- Who incited David to count the fighting men of Israel? God did, according to 2 Samuel 24 1.
- 07:07
- According to 1 Chronicles 21 verse 1, it was
- 07:12
- Satan who did that. In that count, how many fighting men were found in Israel?
- 07:19
- According to 2 Samuel 24 verse 9, 800 ,000 men. According to 1
- 07:25
- Chronicles 21 5, 1 ,100 ,000 men. This is what you call a contradiction.
- 07:32
- How many fighting men were found in Judah? 500 ,000 according to 2 Samuel 24 verse 9.
- 07:38
- According to 1 Chronicles 21 verse 5, 470 ,000. God sent
- 07:44
- His prophet to threaten David with how many years of famine? Seven according to 2
- 07:50
- Samuel 24 verse 13. Three according to 1 Chronicles 21 verse 12.
- 07:56
- And there are 101 contradictions I have in front of me. Mathematical contradictions. This cannot be from God.
- 08:03
- There are many more. I'll simply need an hour to go through all of them. There are many more in the Bible.
- 08:09
- Quite a contradiction like that in the Qur 'an. The Qur 'an doesn't have any contradictions. Just like James quoted from chapter 19 verse 6 to suggest that Christians and Jews are the worst of preachers.
- 08:21
- Just like that, maybe we'll find some contradictions singular to that point. So, ladies and gentlemen, the point is that crucifixion doesn't add solutions to your problems.
- 08:33
- God's religion, God's revealed word does. The Bible, as I was telling you earlier, is not from God.
- 08:42
- The biblical canon has no history or it doesn't share any history to the history of the
- 08:48
- Qur 'an. It has no similarity whatsoever. The Qur 'an was established to be the word of God and when it was uttered from the mouth of the prophet, those who are hearing the
- 09:00
- Qur 'an knew this is the Qur 'an. There were no debates between Ubaid bin Ka 'b and Abdullah bin
- 09:05
- Mas 'ud and Abu Musa al -Ashari and other narrators of the Qur 'an about the contents of the
- 09:11
- Qur 'an. There was no dispute. I challenge James to point one report which suggests that there was a debate about the contents of the
- 09:21
- Qur 'an that a certain verse is going, a companion came and he said that a certain verse was added later on by someone else.
- 09:30
- Okay, I'll make it simple for James today. Okay, I challenge all the
- 09:37
- Christian scholarship on the planet to produce one verse or one word from this book which doesn't come from Muhammad, which cannot be traced back to Muhammad.
- 09:47
- Listen to my challenge carefully and pay attention to it. One word from this book, the
- 09:52
- Qur 'an in Arabic language, which doesn't come from Muhammad peace be upon him. Okay, I asked
- 09:59
- James to put the same challenge to me on the Bible. I dare him. Note, ladies and gentlemen, note, when he comes back he will never put that challenge to me.
- 10:10
- He won't. I know that. And if he does, he loses the debate.
- 10:17
- He loses the debate. Because I will find so many passages in the Bible, in the
- 10:23
- New Testament, which don't actually come even from the authors, let alone from God.
- 10:29
- There are passages in the Gospel of John, an entire chunk which was added later on.
- 10:35
- The Gospel of John chapter 7 verse 53 to 8 -11, the entire chunk was added later on by someone else and James knows about it.
- 10:45
- The Gospel of Mark chapter 20 verse 9 -20, the entire chunk added later on. 1
- 10:52
- John 5 -7 added later on and now thrown away from the Bible. But you still find the
- 10:58
- Gospel of John chapter 7 -53 -8 -11 in the Bible today as the Word of God.
- 11:03
- The Christians are still reading it as the Word of God. Why? Why are the Christians still reading the
- 11:09
- Gospel of Mark chapter 20 verse 9 -20, chapter 16 verse 9 -20? Why are they still reading this passage of this chunk as the
- 11:17
- Word of God while they know it is not from Mark, let alone from God Himself? These things cannot be ignored, ladies and gentlemen.
- 11:25
- I'm not here to spread hatred or express hatred. I love Christians. Believe you me, ladies and gentlemen,
- 11:31
- I have nothing against Christians. This is not my hatred speaking. This is my concern and my compassion and my love for Christians speaking.
- 11:39
- I really care about the people. I want you to know the truth so that you can see from your own eyes that the solution we are proposing is indeed from God.
- 11:49
- The Quran is not corrupted. The Quran was never changed. The Quran we have today, every single word of it comes from Muhammad.
- 11:57
- Listen to my words very carefully. Every single word of the Quran can be traced back to the Prophet Muhammad, confirmed by non -Muslim scholars, non -Muslim authorities such as Angelika Neuwirth, Montgomery Watt who was a
- 12:10
- Christian from the University of Edinburgh, and many more, many more. So the point is, if the book is from God and it definitely contains information which could not be known by a man living in the middle of the 7th century
- 12:27
- Arabian desert, then it cannot be from Him. It is divine revelation.
- 12:33
- And if that is the case, that is what the solution is. And when we do apply these solutions to our problems, we come to realise that we have harmony and peace, which we don't find in the
- 12:44
- Christian history unfortunately. So, when we go back to our presentation, we will see that this is what the
- 12:56
- Christians have to say. A Christian who went to Jerusalem in the 9th century and he saw peace there which he had never seen before.
- 13:04
- He said that if you were to leave your luggage in one place and depart and come back, you would find your luggage unmolested because of the law of Islam.
- 13:15
- Then Patriarch Theodosius, the Christian Patriarch of the city of Jerusalem, this is what he had to say in the year, age 69
- 13:22
- CE. The Saracens, i .e. the Muslims, show us great goodwill. They allow us to build our churches and to observe our own customs without hindrance.
- 13:31
- James asks me, can we have this debate in Mecca? No, you can't. You know why? Because Mecca is a place of worship.
- 13:39
- You can have this debate in Jeddah if you want. You can have this debate in Dubai. Did you know there were debates in Dubai?
- 13:45
- Why don't we talk about Dubai, Egypt, Marrakesh, Pakistan? I just had debates in Pakistan.
- 13:53
- I know people who had debates in Dubai. Mecca is a place of worship. And only the
- 13:58
- Muslims are allowed there. You know why? Even some Muslims are not allowed there. Every year, millions of Muslims apply in order for them to go to Mecca for pilgrimage.
- 14:08
- Their visas get refused. You know why? Because there's not enough space in Mecca to take all of them.
- 14:13
- So imagine if we allowed Christians and Jews with their cameras and their holiday luggage to go to Mecca and enjoy a holiday in Mecca.
- 14:22
- No, it's not going to be possible. In the Muslim world, ladies and gentlemen, in our history, we had debates taking place in the 9th century in Baghdad, where Christians, Jews, and atheists, and agnostics, and all kinds of people were debating each other.
- 14:34
- We have testimonies written by Christians. Sidney H. Griffith is a scholar, and he has written a book titled
- 14:43
- Church Under the Mosque, in this book, and an article written by him for Cambridge History of Christianity.
- 14:53
- He states that there were debates taking place in Baghdad in the 9th century.
- 14:58
- There were debates in the Prophet's mosque. There were debates all over the Muslim world in the
- 15:04
- Muslim history. You show me a place apart from Mecca, because Mecca is a place of worship.
- 15:10
- You simply can't go there and have debates in the mosque while people are trying to worship. So, Mecca is an exception.
- 15:17
- The rest of the Muslim world is open to you to go and debate and do what you like. Thank you very much for listening.
- 15:47
- Okay, ladies and gentlemen, now we will have a crossfire between myself and James.
- 16:04
- And this is probably one of the most important parts of the debate, where we both get to ask questions.
- 16:11
- So, James, do you want to go first, or should I go first? For five minutes, James is asking questions, and I will respond.
- 16:18
- You can keep the same order with the notes. Okay, you go first, please. Okay, um, real quickly, um, in, uh,
- 16:27
- Jannat Termini, Hadith number 3104, reads, Oh, you Muslim people, avoid copying Mus 'haq's recitations of this man.
- 16:32
- By Allah, when I accepted Islam, he was but the moins of a disbelieving man, and he was able to top it. And it was regarding this that Abdullah bin
- 16:39
- Mas 'ud said, Well, people of Al -Araq, keep the Mus 'haqs that you have with you and conceal them. How would that not fit the challenge that you gave me, uh, where you said that there was no disagreement amongst these men concerning, uh, the text?
- 16:53
- Show me one authentic report where Abdullah bin Mas 'ud, the man you are referring to, actually contested the contents.
- 17:01
- So, would you accept this as a Sahih Hadith? I don't know, but here, even in this report, he's not contesting the contents.
- 17:10
- Okay, so, so why would you think that he would be telling people to hide, to keep the
- 17:15
- Mus 'haqs that he's given them and conceal them in light of Uthman's, uh, burnings of the, uh, of the other...
- 17:22
- Very quickly, when Uthman, um, gathered all the companions of the Prophet, peace be upon him, and he discussed this point, this issue of, uh, people reciting the
- 17:32
- Qur 'an in a different fashion, not the contents of the Qur 'an, the way they were reciting the Qur 'an, there were tribal differences in the language which were facilitated just before the standardization of the text, and Uthman got his companions together and he, uh, asked them for their opinion, and they said, okay, let's put the
- 17:48
- Qur 'an in one dialect, the Qurayshi dialect, which is very clear in Sahih Al -Bukhari, and I'm sure you're aware of the report, and he told
- 17:55
- Zayd bin Thabit, who was a young man at the time, who learned the Qur 'an directly from the
- 18:00
- Prophet for, in the last, in the final year of the Prophet, to put down the Qur 'an in the Qurayshi dialect, and it was done, uh, in that fashion.
- 18:09
- Now, Abdullah bin Mas 'ud was one of the elders, and he had learned 70 chapters of the Qur 'an out of, uh, 114, uh, we know today.
- 18:18
- He had learned 70 of those from the Prophet directly, and his contention was purely, uh, about position.
- 18:25
- He, his, his view was that he should have been consulted before that young man, Zayd, and when
- 18:30
- Zayd was, uh, in the womb, or maybe in the, in the, in the loins of his disability father, uh,
- 18:37
- I was learning the Qur 'an from the Prophet. So, there's nothing about the contents of the Qur 'an. There is a, a dispute about his status and his position.
- 18:45
- So, his view was that he should have been chosen over Zayd, um, you know, as a lady, because Zayd was a young man.
- 18:50
- Very, very quickly, uh, are you familiar with the early Tafsir literature that actually lists numerous razan differences, uh, attributable to bin
- 18:59
- Mas 'ud? Because you seem to be saying none of that information actually exists. Are you familiar with those, those sources?
- 19:04
- Okay, just like you have Apocrypha in Christianity. I am, I am familiar with those sources. Uh, you have a lot of, uh,
- 19:11
- Apocryphal documents attributed to Jesus Christ, for example. There are so many different Gospels which are very late.
- 19:19
- There's no doubt about that. The earliest Gospels we do find, uh, or do find are the four
- 19:24
- Gospels, and then we have another document called the Gospel of Thomas, which some scholars assert is as early as the, uh, the
- 19:32
- Gospel of Mark. But this is, it's a point debated, and James doesn't agree with that.
- 19:37
- But likewise, we have documents, or we have reports attributed to the Prophet and his companions which are simple lies and fabrications.
- 19:46
- People fabricated information on a massive scale, just like they did about Jesus Christ in the first three centuries.
- 19:52
- So, we have, um, um, a system of determining what may be true and what may not be true, and those reports, most of those reports are known to be fabricated.
- 20:03
- Do you think that Ezekiel was the Prophet? I don't know. I can't say. I don't, because biblical
- 20:09
- Prophets, I don't know who the Prophet is and who's not. Okay, but how about Jeremiah? As I said,
- 20:15
- I can't, I can't. I mean, we look at, when we look at their writings, if anything that conforms to the
- 20:21
- Qur 'an and is not asserted, for example, what we find in the Book of Samuel, uh, is, is it 2
- 20:27
- Samuel? Oh, yeah. You're familiar with the narration of when, uh, the
- 20:33
- Torah was brought into Muhammad's presence, and he got up and he had the Torah placed upon a cushion, and he said, I believe what is in this book.
- 20:39
- Yeah. Do you find that to be something relevant to the finding of the Qur 'an? Absolutely, and he never said that I believe in every single word, because the
- 20:47
- Qur 'an, very clearly, chapter 79, verse 2 states that the books of the Jews have been tempered with, they have been changed, they have been altered.
- 20:56
- So, this is a very clearly, uh, established point in our literature. So, when he says,
- 21:01
- I believe in what's there in the book, that doesn't mean that he believes in all of it. Okay, in Arabic language, when you don't actually consider exceptions, you, you consider, uh, the mass, the norm.
- 21:15
- For example, we have an example like this in the Qur 'an, where Iblis is considered to be one of the
- 21:20
- Mala 'ik. For example, isbunna lil -mala 'ika tisjunu li -adna wa -fa -shakadu illa Iblis, aba -fas -taqwa wa -qadamu lil -kaafireen.
- 21:28
- That we asked angels to bow to Adam, and all of them bowed, except Iblis. Now, we know for a fact that Iblis was not one of the angels, but he was addressed as one of the angels, because he was part of the crowd.
- 21:39
- Likewise, we have this issue in Arabic language, when, uh, people talk about generality, about general things, they ignore the exceptions.
- 21:50
- Okay? It's my time now. So, so, okay, thank you. Thank you for that.
- 21:55
- So, James, my, my question stands, again, that if the biblical canon is manual, which in my view it is, uh, then how can it, how can it have solutions?
- 22:07
- Well, obviously, we view the canon completely differently, and I, I honestly would recommend numerous works of biblical scholarship to, to help you to understand the actual process, but I think you're comparing apples and oranges.
- 22:18
- You're, you're, you're comparing a single authored book that is very small and relatively late, with works that were, were written by multiple authors at multiple times.
- 22:28
- And the Lord Jesus himself recognized the canon process in the Old Testament and verified that God had been a part of it.
- 22:35
- How can that not be the paradigm that I should use Okay. Uh, I, I don't see where Jesus actually said that every single word in the
- 22:42
- Old Testament is accurate and must be followed. He seemed to refer to them all. Well, I have to respond.
- 22:49
- Where did he never correct the Old Testament text? Well, there are, there are misquotes in the
- 22:55
- New Testament. Well, where did Jesus ever say, you have heard it read, but that is incorrect. He should have read this.
- 23:01
- Is the Old Testament misquoted in the New Testament? No, it's misquoted. You have quotations from the
- 23:06
- Greek Septuagint. How can one word, how can one word of God misquote another word of God? I just said it's not a misquotation.
- 23:13
- You have multiple streams of transmission of the Old Testament text. Some of the Masoretic text, some of the Greek Septuagint, some of the
- 23:19
- Aramaic. Right. And every time you have a citation, we've been able to find, it was common to make that accusation before we discovered these other sources, but there was a source that was being used.
- 23:31
- How could it be otherwise? If these people are trying to reach the Jews, if I was trying to reach you, and I came up to you with some completely fabricated translation of the
- 23:41
- Quran, would I expect you to find that in precedent? No. So, how could the Christians, I'm rhetorically answering the question, how could the
- 23:49
- Christians misquote the Old Testament while they're trying to reach the Jews, when the Jews know that they're going to be doing it?
- 23:54
- Well, this is a big debate. There are misquotes in the New Testament. Of course, it's another debate altogether, which we can have another time.
- 24:03
- The point here is, again, James, when was the first time when these four
- 24:08
- Gospels were mentioned together by a Christian writer? Well, that depends on how you understand the four
- 24:14
- Gospels and how they're identified. I mean, there are sources before Tertullian that quote from all four
- 24:19
- Gospels, but the idea of the collation of them, that took time. But they also quote from other sources, right?
- 24:27
- They can. Yes. So, that doesn't actually imply that the Gospels were all taken to be one canon. No. But my point is, it was in the year...
- 24:34
- So, remember, there weren't any fax machines back then. Yes. I mean, things had to be transmitted over time.
- 24:40
- You might have a church that only has one Gospel and three letters of Paul. Sure. Because they're in Spain.
- 24:46
- And then you have a church in Egypt that doesn't have those but has something different because it takes time.
- 24:51
- We live in a digital age. That was not a digital age. You had to get on a boat and go across oceans. That's a fair point.
- 24:58
- Now, we have two situations. We have one community which has one book, which you call a smaller book.
- 25:05
- You would admit that, right? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's a far smaller book than the Bible. And that's not a good point.
- 25:11
- That actually goes against the Bible because the way the Bible has been preserved, the reason why the history is so messy and there are so many varying readings and so many canon debates is because of the size of the
- 25:24
- Bible. Because it's so huge. The reason why God chose the Qur 'an to be so concise and so small is for it to be preserved effectively and which it was, in my opinion.
- 25:34
- So, the point... I want to come back to that. Okay, sure, sure. We may not have time. Sure. Well, it just seems to me, in Surah 5, let's talk about the
- 25:45
- Qur 'an here for a moment. In Surah 5, he sends
- 25:53
- Jesus, who confirms the Torah, and he gives him the
- 25:58
- Injil. And then Muhammad comes and he's given the Qur 'an, which is a guardian over the preceding revelations.
- 26:10
- So, you have a chain. Moses, Torah, Jesus, Gospel. So, in light of what you just said, you were just saying, yeah, the problem with the
- 26:19
- Bible is it's so big. But certainly in the days of Muhammad, he knew that it was big.
- 26:24
- That's a very good point. At the same time, when the Qur 'an mentions Torah, it doesn't say the oldest rule.
- 26:31
- And when the Qur 'an mentions Injil, it doesn't mean the nearest rule. The Qur 'an doesn't even employ the fact that there are four
- 26:36
- Gospels. It simply says Injil, one Gospel, one good news, which was given to Jesus, with Jesus as a priest.
- 26:42
- Okay, and the time is up. So, the Qur 'an, when it says it's a Muhammad, or it's a guardian, it's a corrector.
- 26:49
- It's a confirmer of what was authentic. I would challenge you to show me what kind of had that meaning back then, but that's another issue.
- 26:55
- Okay. So, one of the things we forgot, I'm sorry, was we'd like to have some kind of closing statement, summary statement at some point.
- 27:04
- So, we need to know exactly how long we're going to have, okay, so we sort of forgot about it.
- 27:15
- Thank you. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, thanks for listening.
- 27:27
- We'll come to the Q &A session. We'll take three questions. We'll go alternate speakers, obviously.
- 27:35
- So, please keep your questions specific, as brief as possible, and obviously, if you're addressing either our speaker, just please do mention in that question.
- 27:48
- So, we'll start with the first round of questions. We are running short of time, so we will not take too many questions, so please be informed.
- 27:56
- So, what is our time? We want to finish the Q &A session. Is that good?
- 28:04
- Three questions, three minutes each. So, we have one hand up there, two, three.
- 28:12
- We'll take three questions first. So, one hand. Hi, my name is Dr. Saqib, and I'm a
- 28:17
- Muslim. I'm working in Ireland. Thanks for coming here. I know from my knowledge that one solution that the
- 28:23
- Qur 'an doesn't offer, and Bible does offer, is in Gospel of Mark, chapter 16, all right? I'm a doctor working on oncology.
- 28:29
- There are lots of sick people, and it's mentioned there, a sign of the real believers, that when they lay their hand on the sick, they'll be healed.
- 28:36
- So, my question from you is, what I'm doing in a Christian country, all right, and when a single person is good enough to lay their hand on the sick, they'll be healed.
- 28:44
- So, I invite any of the real believers to come and do this and speak a part for us, and we
- 28:51
- Muslim will leave the country. Okay, I'm not sure we referred to in Mark, chapter 16.
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- You're probably aware of the fact, I'm sorry. Chapter 16, verse 18. Well, you're probably aware of the fact that verses 9 through 20 are a later edition, and I've written entire books on this subject.
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- I have not mentioned John 17, 8, 11. Well aware of that. Discuss these things. I'm very glad that the modern editions of the
- 29:12
- New Testament discuss these things. I wish there was a similar type of Qur 'an that would discuss the variances in the
- 29:19
- Sa 'adah palimpsests, in Surah 2, or the Fajr palimpsests. There is not yet a critical edition of the
- 29:25
- Qur 'an. I think it's important for us to know whatever texts work, but outside of Mark, chapter 16, there are texts that talk about God healing people in accordance with His will.
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- And we pray that God would heal people. We pray that God would do it even supernaturally. But there are times, in the
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- Apostle Paul's life, for example, there is a man very dear to him named Paphroditus, and he said,
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- I am so thankful that God did not allow Paphroditus to die, or I wouldn't have had such grief. Well, here's an apostle.
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- He had actually miraculously healed people, but he couldn't heal Paphroditus. Why? Because when we talk about the power of God, it's always according to the will of God.
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- And you see, when I pray for someone, if I as a Christian am not aligned with the will of God, if I am only concerned about my well -being, if I'm not concerned about others, if I'm not concerned about being like Jesus, then
- 30:15
- I am self -willed. When I suffer, when I'm changed to conform to the image of Christ, my will is to conform to the image of God.
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- And so when I pray, there is really a coalescence between God's will and my will. So I pray,
- 30:27
- God, your will be done. I do pray that God would heal people supernaturally. We have people in our church that I have seen, but you know what?
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- It wasn't a decent thing. We had a lady in our church, she had an autoimmune disease. For years, we did not see her in our fellowship.
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- She's there regularly now. Now, the medicines? Did God use that? I think God uses means.
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- But the fact of the matter is, God has not said to us, all you have to do is command me, and I will do what you tell me to do.
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- That's not what praying in accordance with the will of God means. When we say, when Jesus said, speak to this mountain, and there will be cast in the sea, what does he also say?
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- In accordance with the will of God. And so it's not some blanket thing that says, well, there's going to be this type of thing.
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- Maybe in Mark chapter 16, if it's the one that's included with drinking poisons and so on and so forth, they need to realize that verses 9 -20 are a later edition.
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- And that's not something that's new to Christian scholarship. It's very frequently presented as if it is, and it's not.
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- And we didn't get into that in London, that particular chapter. I think we may have mentioned it, but if you want more information on that,
- 31:37
- I've written an entire book on that particular subject, if you want to go more in depth. It's not published anymore. This chapter is not published anymore in the books.
- 31:43
- Oh no, but it's published in a note. Is there anybody with an NASV, ESV, any modern translation, beginning at verse 9, there will be a note that says, these verses are not found in the oldest manuscripts of the
- 31:56
- New Testament. And my Greek New Testament has them double -bracketed off and gives you the evidence.
- 32:03
- Same thing with 753 -811, that one isn't even found until Codex D, Beze Kenpurgiensis in the 5th century.
- 32:11
- So we have many copies of the New Testament that predate its first appearance. We need to get you a bell or something.
- 32:28
- I'm encouraged as a follower of Jesus to read all of the prophets and to take them seriously, and I was delighted to find when
- 32:37
- I read the Quran, it seemed to tell me the same thing. And should we not, as all peoples, be reading these prophets as found in the scriptures, guarded by even the
- 32:51
- Jews, those things that the followers of Jesus and Christians couldn't have altered because they were across a larger span and guarded by the
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- Jews. Should we be reading them also? No, I don't think so. We can read them, they are interesting documents, but the reason why we cannot read them for belief or take belief from them is because they are corrupted.
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- I have given you a few examples that they have, there are clear -cut contradictions in the Bible, mathematical contradictions, that means they have been changed, somehow, someway, by someone, okay?
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- And there are details we simply cannot accept. For example, Lot was, he was drunk and he had sex with his daughters,
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- Noah's nakedness was seen by his sons, and then we have
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- David trying to deceive someone in order to get his wife, and he saw her having a bath, and then he was aroused by that and things.
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- Details like this we simply cannot accept about people who are supposed to be representing God. And if these are the people who represent
- 33:58
- God, then what's going to happen to you and I? You know, you and I, it's going to be a big problem.
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- We're going to, okay, if David can do it, I can go and open someone's bathroom and look at, he will have a bath, you know?
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- If Lot can get drunk and sleep with his daughter, what's the problem with me having incest? So, these are things we cannot,
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- God resting on the seventh day, God rest, is God so fragile and gets tired?
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- God rests with Jacob, okay? God comes on the cross and dies?
- 34:29
- Come on. God dies? God dies and what happens then? If I die, okay, you know, what happens to my family?
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- So, these are the things, God, of course, if I die, God takes care of my family.
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- If God dies, who takes care of the world, the universe? So, these are the things we simply cannot accept.
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- Yet, we can accept those passages from the Bible which conform to the Qur 'an because with Qur 'an, we can definitely establish it to be the word of God.
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- There's no doubt in my mind that the Qur 'an is definitely divine and Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, was not a liar. So, I invite all of you to study his life carefully and with an open heart and an open mind and you will see exactly what
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- I'm talking about. Yet, if you have a closed mind and you don't want to know what the man has to say or what my Qur 'an has to say, then good luck.
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- Thank you. Jesus is quoting the 22nd
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- Psalm. Look up Psalm 22 .1. Read all of the 22nd Psalm. I challenge every
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- Muslim in this room. Find the Bible. You're in college. You can find them. Find the
- 36:15
- Bible. Read Psalm 22. It's a prophecy of the Messiah and his crucifixion.
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- And Jesus, that's the songbook of the early Jews. And so, he is quoting. It would be like me saying, amazing grace, how sweet the sound.
- 36:29
- I don't have to finish the rest of it for my fellow Christians because they all know the hymn. And every Jew knew that by Jesus saying,
- 36:36
- Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani, that he was quoting the 22nd Psalm. And when you read it, it talks about his suffering and his eventual vindication.
- 36:45
- But you ask the question, who is he referring to? Well, who does Jesus, who is he speaking to on the cross when he says,
- 36:52
- Father, in my hands I commit my spirit? The doctrine of the Trinity is not that Jesus is the
- 36:58
- Father. The doctrine of the Trinity is that there is one God, Yahweh, who is eternally existent in three divine persons, the
- 37:05
- Father, the Son, and the Spirit. It was the Son who became flesh, not the Father and not the Spirit. And so, when Jesus dies, it's the
- 37:11
- God -man who gives his life, but it's not understood. So, who's running the universe? You all, even you don't believe death means extinction.
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- And we don't believe that either. The God -man gave his perfect life as an atonement for sin.
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- He didn't cease to exist. That's the reason that the hypostatic union takes place between God and man, so that that perfect life can be given as a sacrifice for sins.
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- But God doesn't cease to exist. The Father wasn't on the cross. The Spirit wasn't on the cross.
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- It was only the Son. And obviously, the Son did not cease to exist or anything like that. Instead, you have the great condescension of God in that union of God and man, that perfect life.
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- Jesus had obeyed every commandment. He had loved God perfectly every moment of the day for all those 33 years, if that's how long he lived.
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- You see, my friends, we need something more than just having our sins forgiven, because you and I have all been commanded to love
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- God perfectly. How many people here today have loved God perfectly with everything you did and said? So, if that's the commandment, how are we supposed to fulfill that?
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- I need to have that perfect righteousness to stand before a holy God. And it's because of what Jesus Christ does on the cross at Calvary that I can have that righteousness, not by purchasing it, but because by faith it is imputed to me as my present gift.
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- That's why I have peace with God. Shalom. The basis of Romans 5 .1, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God.
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- So, who is he addressing? The Father. He's quoting Psalm 22. It's a Messianic Psalm. Beautiful. Thank you for asking that question.
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- As a Christian, we are believing that if we die, we will be with the God. And we will spend some time with him.
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- Why? Not because we are good. Because if the God is good and we take our sin away and we wash it with the blood, what is that in the view of Islam?
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- We know that for the man, if they die, he's in a paradise awaiting the woman, virgin woman with the swollen breast.
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- What is waiting for the woman in the paradise of Islam? A man in a big breast.
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- Because what you have to understand is this is again a very beautiful question.
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- Thank you very much for asking this question. There are so many misconceptions about this. The Muslims will have an orgy in paradise.
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- Yes. There's no orgy in paradise, for Muslim men. This is a misconception.
- 40:08
- Paradise is a place of pleasure because the test is over. The test is over.
- 40:15
- So, paradise would be a different place altogether. Here we are being tested. We believe, we the believers and humans in general are being tested.
- 40:25
- This is a test. And I know Christians also believe that this is a test. Now, when we die and we go to paradise, inshallah,
- 40:33
- I hope I do, even though I don't believe in the description, I hope I do, we will have a good time because there is no test period.
- 40:41
- No big, no menstruation, no hijab, no jitab, nothing. Happy palaces, enjoy your life.
- 40:49
- But that enjoyment won't constitute the enjoyment we have here, cocaine sniffing, drinking and getting drunk and having hangovers and having sex with a lot of women or a lot of men for that matter.
- 41:02
- So, there is enjoyment in paradise but it is pure enjoyment. It won't bring harm to you.
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- There is no cocaine in paradise, to my knowledge. There is no hashish or there is no cannabis in paradise.
- 41:16
- So, the sexual relations we will have in paradise will be pure. What's wrong with that?
- 41:22
- What's the problem? If Solomon can have 100 wives and he can be a man of God and if Abraham can have 3 wives and be a man of God, why can
- 41:31
- I not have a few more wives in paradise and be a man of God? So, in paradise, reward from men and women is exactly the same and they will get what they desire.
- 41:43
- They will get what they desire in a pure form. In a pure form. And why is it not written for the women?
- 41:51
- It's written in the Quran. Every time the Quran talks about reward and punishment, both men and women are addressed equally.
- 41:59
- Did you know that? It's there in many verses in the Quran. You haven't read the
- 42:05
- Quran. You've asked your question, let him answer. You haven't read the Quran, seriously. Okay, next question for Daniel. I've heard your speech.
- 42:19
- Just one question. At the beginning of the talk, you have a very nice PowerPoint listing all these negative attributes of man, that man is rebellious, that man is an idolater, etc.,
- 42:29
- etc. Do you remember that? Yes. Okay. Now, you claim that Jesus, the biggest of the apostles, is fully man and fully
- 42:36
- God. To be fully man, he would have to be a rebel, he would have to be an idolater. Then he's not a man.
- 42:42
- Because the attributes of a man are those things. And the man has to have the sin of Adam, according to you guys.
- 42:50
- Okay? Jesus didn't have that, therefore he cannot be fully man. Alright. Well, that's why
- 42:55
- Jesus is virgin -born. And that's why the comparison is between Adam and Jesus.
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- Adam is the first Adam, Jesus is the second Adam. The New Testament is explicitly clear that while he is fully man, that he is utterly untouched by sin, he is not a rebel.
- 43:13
- The Qur 'an says the same thing. The Qur 'an does not accuse Jesus of any sin. In fact, in a very famous hadith, that I'm sure
- 43:20
- Adnan will verify I'm accurately stating it, in a very famous hadith, in the end times, when people come on the
- 43:28
- Judgment Day, they go to Adam, then to Moses, and to Abraham, and finally they come to Jesus.
- 43:34
- And all these other people who said, don't come to us, we did this thing, we did that thing. When they come to Jesus, no accusation of sin in any version of the hadith is ever made against Jesus.
- 43:43
- Exactly. And so, even from the Islamic perspective, there's no accusation of sin against Jesus. So the
- 43:48
- New Testament doesn't say that. Nowhere did I indicate that those descriptions of man are the way
- 43:54
- God made Adam. Adam fell, and therefore in his skull, his progeny, since we fell in him, we can only inherit from him what he can give to us, which is a corrupt nature.
- 44:06
- But when we are in Christ, we can receive from him the new creation and his nature, which is not a fallen or corrupted nature.
- 44:15
- And that's why we need to be in him, that's why the centrality of the cross, etc., etc. But when
- 44:20
- I listed those things, I was not saying that's how God made Adam. That's what has happened with all of Adam's progeny.
- 44:28
- We're talking about what's the way forward from today. There are no Adams today. There is no one who has not fallen in Adam.
- 44:35
- So that's the difference between us. And of course, that's one of the reasons for the virgin birth, is that Jesus doesn't have that fallen, corrupted nature.
- 44:43
- Which again, is something to be agreed upon. I'm sorry, it's a virgin birth. You and I have desires.
- 44:49
- You and I have fallen. Actually, last question. I'm not connected to you. If you want to get to a question now, if you'd be a gentleman in the white shirt.
- 44:59
- For Adam and Agnes, you said a couple of times that the biblical canon is entirely man -made.
- 45:06
- You went on to say the biblical canon is not from God. And then you went on to quote a
- 45:15
- Well, how can you say on one hand, it's entirely man -made, it's not from God, and then on the other side of your mouth say, as Jesus said, or do you really believe
- 45:28
- Jesus said that, or how do you know he even said that, if it's entirely man -made?
- 45:34
- Thank you very much for that question. I said the canon is man -made. Canon means the choice of books, or the list of books is man -made.
- 45:44
- Not the text in its entirety is man -made. I've never said that. The text I believe definitely contains the word of God in meaning, not in word.
- 45:53
- Please pay attention to my words. The text of the Bible definitely contains the word of God in meaning, not in word.
- 46:00
- And definitely contains falsifications and lies and fabrications. But how do you know which one that is the word of God?
- 46:06
- That's a good question. I was coming to that point now. The yardstick we have is the Qur 'an. The Qur 'an, we know for a fact, as a
- 46:13
- Muslim, I believe, to be from God. It is definitely the word of God in word as well as meaning.
- 46:20
- So, the Qur 'an is the yardstick. Because it's the word of God, that is the only yardstick we can use to determine what may be truth and what may not be truth in the
- 46:29
- Bible. Now, there are statements in the Bible, for example, in the Old Testament. In chapter 44, verse 6, we are told,
- 46:38
- God Almighty speaks to the Israelites, that I am the first, I am the last, there is no one else beside me.
- 46:45
- This is exactly from God. I believe this is definitely from God. Then, James made a point that Yahweh is the
- 46:52
- God of the Israelites. And that Yahweh consists of three persons. The Father, the
- 46:58
- Son and the Spirit. But that Yahweh didn't actually reveal himself as three persons in the Old Testament.
- 47:03
- When we go to the Old Testament, we read in the book of Isaiah, again, chapter 63, verse 16, that Father, with capital
- 47:11
- F, is the God of the Israelites. If that is true, that Father, the
- 47:16
- Israelites, as far as they are concerned, they are reading that scripture and thinking that Father is the only God.
- 47:22
- And the only person. Why? Because in 44, verse 6, that same Father, same God, tells them,
- 47:28
- I am the first, I am the last, there is no one else beside me. Why must these Jews then believe in a message which tells them, which teaches them that there are two more now, the
- 47:39
- Son and the Spirit. It doesn't make sense. Let me finish my point.
- 47:46
- You're going on a bit longer. I think it's important that if Islam believes, let me just finish this point.
- 47:51
- If Islam believes that some of the Bible, let me just finish this point. If Islam believes that some of the
- 47:58
- Bible, that some of the Bible is the Word of God. Okay, can I finish my point please? Why does not Islam take what is the
- 48:05
- Word of God and give it to us? Okay, I'll finish my point very quickly. My point is, again, in the
- 48:12
- Gospel of Mark, chapter 12, verse 29, a Jew comes to Jesus Christ. A Jew comes to Jesus Christ, asking
- 48:19
- Him, Master, what is the first commandment? He tells them, hear O Israel, the Lord our
- 48:24
- God is one Lord. Okay, now he's speaking to a Jew. And this Jew doesn't believe in a triune
- 48:30
- God. He doesn't believe in a Trinity. This Jew believes in a Unitarian God. A God who is one, in person and in being.
- 48:40
- How do you know this? In the Gospel of John, chapter 8, verse 54, Jesus acknowledges that fact, that I do not glorify myself, it is my
- 48:48
- Father who glorifies me, of whom you say is your God. Okay, now I believe that passage is definitely from God, because it's a strictly monotheistic
- 48:56
- Bible. Why don't you take what is the Word of God and bring it together? Because you give lip service to the body.
- 49:04
- You only give lip service to the body. That's all. You can definitely meet up. There is a reception organized by the
- 49:12
- Christian Union. Definitely, you can meet up there. And, you know, stay there all night, no problem.
- 49:19
- At the end of the session, I'd like to give his final statements and follow up.
- 49:28
- Well, two minutes is very long.
- 49:35
- Let me just say, there's so much more that could be said. Let me just piggyback off of what was just said.
- 49:41
- Isaiah 44, 6 is one of my most favorite texts in all the Bible, of course, because the defense factor is only one, which is
- 49:46
- God. The wonderful thing is, those same New Testament writers took those very texts by Yahweh and applied them to Jesus.
- 49:54
- I'm the first and last, as Jesus described that in the book of Revelation. The first and last. Jesus used that phrase,
- 49:59
- Ego eimi, I am of Himself, which was used of Jehovah God in Isaiah 43, 10. He quoted
- 50:05
- Isaiah 43, 10 from the very same set of chapters that Adonai quoted. Jesus quoted that of Himself in John 13, 19.
- 50:13
- And when Jesus used those words, I am, in John 18, 5 -6, what happened to the soldiers that were coming to rescue Him?
- 50:18
- They fell back upon the ground. You see, the problem is, Adonai will hear, he says,
- 50:24
- I believe that's part of the Word of God. I believe John 8, 54 is part of the Word of God. Four verses later, Jesus says, before Abraham was,
- 50:31
- I am. And the Jews pick up stones to stone him. You see, it's easy to pick and choose.
- 50:36
- The problem is, what Adonai has not proven, is that the author of the Qur 'an understood what was in the
- 50:42
- New Testament. How can the Qur 'an be a guard and guide over previous revelations that it does not even understand?
- 50:49
- And you can't even give direct reference to the fact that it even quotes those texts. The author of the
- 50:55
- Qur 'an didn't know the Old and New Testaments. And therefore, the Qur 'an cannot correct those things. That's the problem.
- 51:01
- What is the way forward? In this dialogue, it's using the same standards in analyzing the
- 51:08
- Qur 'an and the New Testament. But what is the way forward for mankind? I said at the beginning. We need new hearts.
- 51:16
- We need to be changed. And the only message that changes, as the Apostle Paul said, the
- 51:22
- Gospel is the power of God. It's not found in societies or cultures.
- 51:29
- It's found in Jesus Christ. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for being patient, ladies and gentlemen.
- 51:43
- It's been a very exciting debate. And I thank James for attending, coming to Ireland from the
- 51:51
- US and participating in this debate. Thank you so much. Thank you very much, James. Now, the point is, ladies and gentlemen, where are solutions to our problems?
- 52:01
- Our problems are many, and solutions are few. Our problems are poverty, for example.
- 52:08
- Our problems are rape, crime, drug abuse.
- 52:13
- We have problems like flawed foreign policy. When we look at the Qur 'an and Islamic system, it gives solutions to all these problems.
- 52:23
- What is the solution to rape? Islamic penalties are very, very easy to be harsh.
- 52:29
- And any rapist wouldn't be allowed to go free unless the woman herself forgives him.
- 52:35
- How do we eradicate poverty? Islam makes it mandatory for every single
- 52:41
- Muslim to pay 2 .5 % of his or her wealth to the state for the eradication of poverty.
- 52:48
- There is a systemic or there is a systematic attempt to eradicate poverty, and it works.
- 52:54
- It works. There was an estimate recently that if all Saudis alone, Saudis alone were to give 2 .5
- 53:01
- % of their wealth every single year, there would be no poverty in the world. Okay? It's not happening because Islam, unfortunately, is missing from the main scene.
- 53:11
- So, there are many more problems. Foreign policy. The Islamic foreign policy is not as hypocritical as what we see in the
- 53:17
- West, or the US foreign policy, or the British foreign policy. When it comes to our benefit, we do what we want, we can commit any crime and get away with it.
- 53:25
- But Islamic policy is not like that. We cannot commit atrocities. We cannot even use nuclear bomb.
- 53:30
- Islamically speaking. Okay? We cannot even use nuclear bomb. You know why? Because innocent people die.
- 53:37
- Innocent people die. The only power to have used the nuclear bomb in the history of mankind is the
- 53:44
- United States of America, a very predominantly Christian country. The Senate is full of Christians, by the way.
- 53:49
- Thank you. I just wanted to thank you for being here, and I wanted to give you a gift.
- 53:58
- This is not a book on Islam. It's a book on the holiness of God. I think you'll find it very, very interesting.
- 54:03
- Thank you so much. Okay, well, we'll just ask the two speakers to come up to the stage again.
- 54:31
- I'll try to lose weight as well. I can guarantee you, if you continue debating, you'll definitely lose weight.
- 54:43
- The Christian Union has opened up some calories for you. So the
- 54:51
- Christian Union would like to invite you all to a reception. Hopefully, we can continue some of these conversations. G005 is right afterwards.
- 54:59
- Continue straight in the corridor. Take a right. There's a wheelchair ramp. It's just inside the chaplain's room.