Jesus in the Bible and the Qur'an Part 3

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Response to Sheikh Awal (Part 4)

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If salvation through Jesus is the absolute truth, then why didn't the prophets before Jesus preach that, especially if the relationship between the

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Father and the Son was there since the beginning? Well, while the relationship between the

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Father and the Son was there from the beginning, it was not revealed until the Incarnation of Jesus Christ. The Trinity is primarily revealed in the coming of Christ in flesh, pouring out of the

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Holy Spirit amongst the people of God. And so, while we have some glimpses in the

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Old Testament, certainly that tremendous text in Isaiah 9, a child will be born to us.

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Those are the normal terms. The very same Arabic root found in the third ayah of Surah 112, a yelut. A child will be born to us.

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Normal kind of birth. He was born a man. But a son will be given to us.

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Psalm 2, kiss the son lest he be angry. There are these prophetic pronouncements, but they do not become clear until the

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Incarnation of Jesus Christ, until He actually appears in flesh. And so, what the prophets taught was belief in Yahweh and acceptance of His promises.

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And that those promises were found in the Scriptures. That God preserved His Word, which He did.

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We know what the Word of God was, what had been given to the people of God in the days of Jesus.

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And we know what was written at the time of the New Testament. Yes, the Gospels were written after Jesus.

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But far closer to the time of Jesus than anything the Sunni Muslims accept in regards to the Hadith.

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So, I'm not sure why the fact they are written later somehow means that they are, you know, unless it was an

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MP3 recording that it wouldn't have authority, obviously. Imam Saeed, a brief response to that question before I give you yours.

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So, if salvation is through Jesus, why didn't the prophets always preach the salvation through Jesus?

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I think the audience knows the answer that I'm going to give. So, it doesn't make any sense for me to keep repeating what

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I have said. That these are ideas that are not at all mentioned in the

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Qur 'an in any way. And the Qur 'an is very clear that this notion is not valid.

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That Jesus was God, He existed from the beginning and it was made clear at the time of incarnation.

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Of, you know, God's incarnation like Jesus.

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So, when we don't accept this very notion, I don't think that we have to respond to that.

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Imam Saeed, and then I think I hear we have to wrap up after this.

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Prophet David clearly describes the crucifixion of Jesus Christ in the psalm.

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So, Jesus is talked about, salvation through Jesus is talked about in the Old Testament. What do we have about Muhammad in the

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Old Testament? I'm sorry, I'm not clear about the question. It's related to the salvation question.

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The picture of salvation, if I'm reading this correctly, the picture of salvation presented by Jesus is mentioned in the

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Old Testament in Psalm 22. So, Jesus being crucified in Psalm 22. What is there about Muhammad in the

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Old Testament? I'm failing to understand what exactly...

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I think the problem is there are prophecies about Jesus in the

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Old Testament. Jesus coming to offer salvation. Are there prophecies about Muhammad coming with his message in the

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Old Testament? And it's slightly off topic, so if it's... I'm sorry,

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I still don't know what we have to do. Okay, let me... Okay, I'll give you each one last question in here.

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Kyle, search the question. In Isaiah 9 -6, it's said that a son would be born who would be a mighty

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God. So, a child is going to be born who is going to be a mighty God. If Jesus was not the fulfillment of this prophecy, who is?

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And should we be looking for another God -man? I just want to repeat what

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I said earlier. These are things that have been said in Bible or Gospels.

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And the Qur 'an takes a completely different position. So, I don't think that there is any way that we can accept this notion and respond to that.

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It's really not a relevant question. Great response,

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James. Well, and that is the issue before us this evening.

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It is my understanding that at least one ancient source records that Muhammad, when the

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Torah was brought in his presence, got up from the cushion he was on. And he had the

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Torah put on the cushion. He said, I believe everything in this book. We know what the

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Jews had in the 7th century that would have been placed upon that cushion. And it includes words of Isaiah 9 -6 that speaks of one who would come, who is called

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El -Gabor, the mighty God. And so, the question is, how can we accept that these books are from God as the

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Qur 'an says they were, and yet not accept what they themselves state in their text?

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All right. This is for you, Dr. White. It's another great response by Muhammad. This is the last question.

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Yes, last question, and then Moses here. Dr. White, you said that the

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Qur 'an reflects poor knowledge of the New Testament. However, the Qur 'an mentions many biblical stories,

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Joseph, Moses, Jesus' miracles. In fact, Moses is the most talked about prophet in the

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Qur 'an. The biblical stories of the Qur 'an and Judeo -Christian scripture match to a great extent.

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Why is this? Well, I think it's excellent. And sadly, most of the

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Christians here have already asked me, if you've read the Qur 'an, you would say you have not. And probably for most of the Muslims who have read the

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Bible, you have not either. It seems to be one of the problems that we have. But when you look at the stories that they are narrated in the

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Qur 'an, you discover that they very much bear the mark of oral tradition. That is what you would hear as people were talking about their religious faith, especially when

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Muhammad was a young person. But you do not have textual reliance upon the Old Testament text.

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And what you do have are changes of the story that reflect an overriding idea that prophets have to be particularly holy.

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They do not represent the picture of the prophets that the Old Testament itself gives in regards to the sinfulness of men, the fact that God works with sinful men.

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And so the changes that are introduced into those chronic stories, 600 years after the time of the

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Old Testament, thousands of years after the actual writing of the historical narratives of the prophets in many cases, reflect a concern that, well, no, it would never do something like that.

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Solomon would never have all those wives. Actually, that then indicates an editing process that has gone on in the thinking of the person who is relating these things, which

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I do not think actually reflects history itself. Imam Saeed, isn't there a lot of agreement between the

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Bible and the Qur 'anic stories about the prophets? The way the

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Qur 'an represents itself has to be understood very clearly. The Qur 'an is, according to the

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Muslims, the Word of God. It is not the writing of Muhammad.

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Whether it is the Word of God or not, that each person who is going to look at the

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Qur 'an will have to decide. You are not going to take the Word for granted.

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And that has been the challenge of the Qur 'an, both during the time of the prophets and since then.

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The prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, made it very clear that I am not saying it from me,

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I don't know. This is the Word of God that has been given to me and I am giving it to you.

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So you look at it, you decide for yourself whether what this

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Word is saying is reasonable and acceptable. We are not at all talking about whether Muhammad took information from the

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Old Testament and the New Testament or the things that were presented. This has to be very, very clear.

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Alright, sorry again if we didn't get to your question. I still have a big pile up there. I'm sure there were some, in fact I know there were some good questions in there.

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But we got a bit of a late start so we're going to have to go to conclusions now. However, both gentlemen might be able to stay around a few minutes afterwards to answer any of your questions.

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And so we're going to begin the final statements. Dr. White will have seven minutes and will be followed by seven minutes with Imam Zaid.

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Well first of all, let me thank you very, very much for being here this evening. You've been a very attentive crowd.

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I know that sometimes location is difficult to get to, especially those of you who drive in the city a lot.

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And so for you to come this direction, I'm very, very thankful for that. And thank the Church for once again giving us this wonderful location where we can have this very important and meaningful dialogue.

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And especially I thank the Imam for taking his time and for doing so on such quick notice.

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And I'm really desirous to see more of these kinds of dialogues take place because I think it's vitally important that we show respect for truth.

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That this does illustrate we live in a land starved for a love of truth.

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Many people are very apathetic about truth today, especially when it comes to the existence of God and his promises to us.

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What we have heard this evening has been a comparison of two different positions.

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And they are very different positions. And we have not in any way, shape, or form whitewashed those differences. We have seen a consistent testimony from the text of the

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New Testament in regards to who Jesus is. And while we have agreed that Jesus was a man, he was a prophet, he was virgin born, that he worked miracles, that he had a special relationship with God, all those things we agree upon.

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What we disagree upon is the consistent testimony, not only of the prophetic utterances of the

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Old Testament, but likewise the consistent testimony of all the

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New Testament to the fact that Jesus is the Son of God. That Jesus has eternally existed.

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That Jesus came specifically to give his life as a ransom for sinners. This was the message of the original followers of Jesus, which interestingly the

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Quran says, Allah would make to be victorious over their enemies until the day of judgment. And yet, everything that comes from the first century, those first hundred years after the

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Christ event, speaks of the crucifixion of Jesus. The first people who come along and say anything against that are called

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Gnostics. And they deny Jesus died on the cross because they didn't believe Jesus had a physical body in the first place.

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So they're hardly the people that our Muslim friends should be looking to. The reality is, all of the evidence that comes to us, that has any meaningful connection to Jesus, to Jerusalem, to the period, to the area of Israel, etc.,

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etc., anything that comes from that time period, anything that comes from that area, tells us that the early

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Christians all taught the same thing. That Jesus was the son of God, and that he died upon Calvary Street.

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That is the historical foundation. That is what history tells us. There is historical evidence of these things.

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That's an attestment teaching. We go 600 years down the road. We travel 700 miles away.

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We change language and culture. And we come to someone that we all admit was not even literate in the sense of a man of letters and learning and things like that.

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And we have a book that is given to us. And this book contradicts what has come before.

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Now, I don't think that the author of that book thought he was contradicting what came before. But he didn't know the book.

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And if we read backwards, if we put lenses on and look backwards and make that the filter through everything, now we have to accuse all those writers of either completely misrepresenting

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Jesus or not knowing the truth about Jesus, or we have to make allegations of corruptions of their scriptures.

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All sorts of things like that. From the Christian perspective, you see the consistency of the prophecies, the fulfillment of the

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New Testament, and anything that comes after that that does not speak in accordance with that truth is to be rejected.

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In fact, I would argue that actually is the argument of Surah 5 beginning around verse 40 or so.

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Because the author thought he was being consistent. But he was not. And so we have to look at that, my friends.

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We have to look at what the evidence presents to us. We can't just simply say, well, the

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Quran is right. Can you not go beyond that? Can you not say it's right and here's the evidence?

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And can you be consistent when you make that argumentation? One of the saddest things that I've experienced in my encounters with my

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Muslim friends over the past number of years has been how many of them are willing to grab a hold of the writings of people that come from a completely different worldview.

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Atheists and naturalists, people like Bart Ehrman, or people promoting the Gnostic myths and things like that, just to attack the

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New Testament. They'll never use that worldview when analyzing the Quran. They'll use one standard for the

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Quran, another standard for the New Testament. I say to you, use the same standard. Test them both. And when you do, you'll find one to be consistent.

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And that's why I believe what I believe. I mentioned earlier, I consider myself a student of Islam.

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I don't think that at my age I could ever become an expert in this life. But I have taken the time to try to the best of my abilities to understand.

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And I learn from others. I learn from all those that I have these dialogues with. But I have attempted as best

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I can to accurately represent the best of the other side. The best the other side has to present.

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And I have obtained materials on the ancient Quran and manuscripts and things like that because I want to make sure that I'm being accurate and that I'm not applying a different set of standards to Islam that I'm applying to my own faith.

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And I simply ask any one of you here this evening who hold to any form of the

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Islamic faith as you analyze what I have said this evening please recognize that you need to do the same thing if you are going to be a lover of truth.

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You cannot use one standard in rejecting what Paul wrote in Philippians chapter 2 and then a different standard to believe whatever

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Muhammad wrote 600 years later. You can't do that. If you are going to believe in Prophets and Revelation then be consistent.

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That's all I ask of you. Listen to what we have said this evening and examine it with an open mind.

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Thank you very much for being here. Thank you sir. I join

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Dr. White to express my thanks and gratitude for the hospitality that the church has extended to us and your sacrifice of coming here to know what we have to say.

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And I want to take it from there. I have come to share with you whatever little

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I have learned through my life. And you have come here to share with us in terms of the way you have asked questions.

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And from both sides we need to know very clearly that we are on the path of seeking the truth.

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And this search for seeking the truth never ends. And that's where what we need to acknowledge that our mindset has to be a mindset of willing to look at all the information, all the evidence that's going to be presented to us.

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And after listening to Dr. White, I can say one thing very clearly that in the case of Jesus, whether it is his divinity or his crucifixion,

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I have failed to see any evidence that will tell me that Jesus was divine or his crucifixion did happen.

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And that crucifixion is the way to find salvation.

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What I'm going to say, based on the reference that you had in the beginning, the

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Qur 'an is very clear that all the prophets, including

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Jesus, they came to share their understanding of their absolute

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God with their people. And they did their best to enable whoever joined with them to show them how they can grow and develop further.

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And we know very clearly that during the time of Jesus, there were people who clearly rejected him.

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They rejected him as a valid person.

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They rejected his faith. We cannot assume that Jesus, when he was born and when he was performing his mission, everybody accepted him.

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There were people who rejected him. And they rejected him very vehemently.

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So I beg to draw your attention again to one very critical question.

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Are we going to continue to find, with whatever resources we have, the path and the way to connect with our

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God and serve him to the best of our ability? The Qur 'an laid out a path for them.

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And as Dr. White pointed out, the Old and the New Testaments laid out a path for them.

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So it's up to each one of us to decide which is the path we consider best for us and seek our final salvation through that path.

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And may our theatre guide us to the path that's correct.

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And may we bless our efforts in a way that we are going to find the salvation at the end.