Preparing to Visit an Islamic Presentation

Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona. This is the dividing line

The Apostle Peter commanded Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us Yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence

Our host is dr. James white director of Alpha Omega ministries and an elder at the Phoenix reformed

Baptist Church This is a live program and we invite your participation if you'd like to talk with dr.

White call now It's 602 nine seven three four six zero two or toll -free across the

United States. It's one eight seven seven seven five three three three four one And now with today's topic here is

James white And welcome to the dividing line on a Thursday afternoon big day out in the political landscape

I'm not even gonna say a word about If that but hey,

I tell you interesting stuff Actually, I'm sort of looking over here at the phone thing and I thought somebody was calling today remember this morning got a phone call and someone said they were gonna be calling in at the beginning of the program remember and I'm all queued up with stuff to talk about in response to the person's question and there's no person on the phone line

So I'm not sure I guess I'll sort of go with You're completely lost as to what

I'm talking about, aren't you? Rich that was really not that long ago and I'm normally one who does the absent -minded thing and he talked to you and He's going to a

Muslim thing and wanted a good question. There you go Oh Boy here

I've got some amp right here Got a little just hook me up a direct

IV line. There you go a little a little taurine and guarana and ginseng and B vitamins and all that stuff and Yeah, there we go

Okay Well, here's here's what the phone call was supposed to be about.

I'll just pretend that we have the phone call here but we have had a call from Florida and there's going to be a

Islamic presentation why the Quran is the final revelation of God I'm going secondhand on this

Okay, so I'm going from rich. So given that rich couldn't you remember the phone call?

I'm not We'll go with it anyways and So Christian wants to attend and wants to know what question to ask and one of the reasons

I found it ironic and useful Was the fact that I've been going back and forth with a

Muslim who's outside the United States? About some of the things that came up in my discussion with another

Ahmed And what I'm discovering, of course, is that? As to be expected

Muslims have developed their own forms of apologetics for some of the more so shall we say difficult elements of their

Own historical records and if you remember the phone call with another we discussed a little bit concerning a section from sahih al -bukhari those of you who watching on the webcam here is

One of the volumes I believe it's eight volumes or is it nine volumes one of the two?

It's any other room, but I grabbed the relevant volume from sahih al -bukhari And this is volume 6 ahadith 4474 to 5062

I have discovered that the the notation system for the hadith is not standardized

Sometimes this particular hadith in this edition is 4986 in electronic edition

I have it was 40 4127 I think I I don't remember but completely different sometimes you have to do searches

It's sometimes very very frustrating to track these things down but you'll recall that we had a discussion about This particular hadith.

Let me let me read it to you Narrated Zaid bin Thabit Abu Bakr asidic sent for me when the people of your mama had been killed

I e a number of the prophets companions who fought against Muslim muslimi Moose I Lima I went to him and found umar bin al -khattab sitting with him

Abu Bakr Then said to me now listen. Here's where we go sometimes. You know what I'm discovering sometimes when you start Mentioning names and because they're not

Bob or Bill or Tom but they're Abu Bakr and You mentioned your mama, and they go hey your mama

It's like okay folks all you're demonstrating. There is that you're from the u .s.. And you think anything outside the u .s..

Is weird And people just tune out don't tune out. Don't let those things get in the way

Sometimes that's why people don't read the Old Testament very well comes from the same general area of the world you know what I mean anyway

Abu Bakr now Abu Bakr big name okay big big name Why is that important you'll see a second he said to me umar has come to me and said here casualties were heavy among the qurra of The Quran who are the qurra those who knew the

Quran by heart, and I'm just reading from Abukar here now

This does not mean the people who carried around their own personal copy and handwritten form of the

Quran these are people who memorized the Quran all right and casualties were heavy among the qurra

Some sources say Abu Abukar he does not say this, but some sources say 70 had died on the day of the

Battle of Yamama and I now here's what Abu Bakr said and this is what I haven't gotten a chance to respond to my

Correspondent yet to his last email mainly because all he's doing is cutting and pasting pre -written Stuff to me back anyways, and I'm spending time actually interacting with him, but but Here's what

I'm not getting responses to from my Muslim friends Here's what

Abu Bakr said I am afraid that more heavy casualties may take place among the qurra on other battlefields whereby a large part of the

Quran may be lost a large part

I Look over next to this and there is the Arabic And I look at the

Arabic, and I see the word Kathirun Large one of the first vocabulary words.

I learned when I started learning Arabic is Kathirun large and Then we have

Mina part of from it sort of uses a partitive type concept and then we have the

Quran a Large poor part of the Quran might be lost the hub the hub hmm now

How could that be if in point of fact the Quran is that put this point exists in manuscript form?

It doesn't make any sense and yet the modern Apologetic that's been developed for this has been well.

No you see It was all written down and all this collation

It takes place under Uthman was just of written sources, and they verified things and people have memorized it but it was all of written sources and Any differences were just pronunciation if it wasn't a big deal etc etc because you see the problem

They have is when you continue on here You you discover that there is an assertion made and that is that surah 9 128 to 129

According to Zayed bin Thabit and he was one of those who Used to as it says you are a wise young man

And we do not have any suspicions about you, and you used to write the divine revelation for Allah's messenger

Then it says at the end. This is what Zayed says he says And also from wet men who knew it by heart till I found the last verse of Surat al -taba repentance with a because I'm answering and I did not find it with anybody other than him and Again, I've taken the time is there is there something

I'm missing in the English So I've looked at the Arabic the Arabic says exactly what the English says

That Zayed did not find those two ayah Surah 9 128 129 the very end of the

Quran with anyone But this one source, and this is the guy who used to write it down for what was written down anyways for Muhammad he didn't know about it.

He found a way with one person. They're saying no no no no no What it what it was and they what they do is centuries after this

Generations after this people started going. Yeah, that doesn't sound real good That there were sections of the

Quran that were only known by one person Especially when a bunch of people had already died because that leaves open this big door that Might there be stuff that didn't get written down see and we can't have that so these later people start coming up with all these ideas about how well it has to all been written down and Actually, it's it's and and though they started writing these things, and that's what's being thrown out.

It's all anachronistic It's all being thrown back at us, but it doesn't explain Abu Bakr's concern

Why was Abu Bakr concerned? Why would he think that a large part of the

Quran could be lost if? Any more of the Qura died because the Qura only had it memorized it was all written down textually that wouldn't be an issue and that's not what

I'm getting any answers to so I noticed that our caller has called now and So let's just go ahead and pop poor

Mike on who now has the answer to all of his questions. No he doesn't hi Mike How are you sir? I'm doing pretty good, so you're going to a an

Islamic Sponsored get -together tell us about it. Okay, basically what happened is there's a fellow by the name of Muslim I'll just Arnie who is a local

Imam, okay? Yeah, you started to cut out there just a little bit. Could you repeat the name a little bit more slowly?

Yeah, there's a local fellow here who considers himself a Muslim activist his name is

Muhammad al Dastani Okay, and he's he has the title of an imam and Back in oh seven and now again in oh wait.

They're doing a public Presentation on Islam And it's open to of course

Muslims and the public alike, and that's for I think seven or eight weeks

Matter of fact he just sent me the schedule today And I was late in getting it and he and I were chatting yesterday about it because I had not heard from him

But at any rate tonight's session is on the Quran it's entitled

God's last revelation mm -hmm, and so it's a two -hour session and Near the end

I can open up the field for questions. Is it is this at the at the Masjid? It's at the

Islamic Center. Okay. Yep. We have now three of them. We start off with one here locally, but now we're up to three

They are growing yeah, and he in fact he he and I have developed some other rapport mm -hmm and I'm going very very well

Just trying to get him to set aside some more time so I can have them see those see some of your

DVD debates with Malik and Sure there you bet absolutely

But the big thing that I was trying to key in on Obviously as it pertains the question and answer session.

I think I'm going to have at least one question Maybe two that I'll be able to ask as it relates to the

Quran I don't know what's going to be covered, but I was wondering if you could help me perhaps design a question mm -hmm relating to that issue

Now what I have done just to give you a little bit of background. I have gone through some of Ron Rhoades book

Particularly this chapter on a Christian critique of the Quran And also a little booklet that you contributed to answering

Islam right that was put up a cool ridge So I put a couple of thoughts together But I really want to obviously you know zero in on something that I will leave them

You know long on thought and hopefully provoke a little more I Guess contemplation and in terms of you know you know the whole issue of hey really is it the final revelation right right?

well, yeah, and it's It is very very difficult when you are standing at a microphone that someone else controls

To get a whole lot said if there is a rapport if you carry yourself with a certain level of respect you might be able to get more said than you would in another context, but I've been watching a lot of Islamic videos online and in fact if you want to drop drop me a line

I could send you the URL to this one that I happen to have queued up on my screen right now And you can take a look at it just to sort of give you a sense of I Would hope that things would go better in the

United States And they went here in India in this particular video that I'll play a section of but the reason

I found Your call today to to rich so interesting was

I had stumbled across this video this morning and had looked at it You were asking almost identical a question and obviously here we have a an

Indian Christian asking a Question of an imam an

Islamic speaker in front of a group about 10 ,000 in this content and the responses

Are almost pre -programmed which might mean that this isn't the kind of question you want to ask

But it's sort of hard to avoid Some of these specific issues One of the I was giving some of the background because I'm gonna play this

And you know the audio works just as well as video. It's just videos more interesting to watch The gentleman tries to raise the issue of the

Uthmanic revision of the Quran and he that's that's

Sahih al -bukhari 6509 through 514 or so five one on five ten of the two

Specific ones and those are all available online for anybody who wants to be able to you know

Have the actual text printed out and things like that all that kind of information is available online my Islamic books marks section has been

Exploding recently, but anyway He tries to get the question out.

It's always good to be able to ask your question succinctly I've noticed that people who don't do that tend to get cut off and Then the other guys get to determine how they're going to answer the question that they decide they're going to assign to you in essence, so he takes a little bit too long, but he still gets cut off and The first Half of the answer is just pure rhetoric.

It has nothing to do with what the man was saying at all It was amazing to listen to it We'll play it and then the answer that actually is given is far far far removed from the truth

It's it's and that's one of the problems when someone else controls a microphone Is that their answer may quite simply be completely fallacious, but there really isn't any way for the person who's just asking the question

To actually you know do any type of interaction any redirection any correction anything like that at all and that's sometimes frustrating

But so that might indicate this isn't the direction to go I mean, you know before I play this the first thought that I have for you is obviously

The if you want to try to leave folks with you know Contemplative as you said if you want to leave them with something to think about And I don't know how to succinctly do this, but let's just throw some of these things out the problem the main problem that Muslims have in hearing what we are saying is

Contextualizing their relationship to Christianity they I've so many times talked about this when

I've responded to Shabir Ali into other people Islamic anachronistic Eisegesis they're looking backwards

At least 600 years removed from the time of Christ they're looking backwards, but they still have these big thick

Quranic glasses on and They don't seem to see that that that really is not a rational way of dealing with things if in point of fact the

Quran is the If God sent down the

Torah and he sent down the Injil and he sends down the Quran Then there should be consistency between what we know

The Torah was and what we know the Injil was and what we know the

Quran is But they can't they can't establish that and so what they have to try to do is say well in reality the the

Torah and the gospel have been corrupted and they've been destroyed and all we have left is is the

Quran and so one possible direction to go Would be using surah 5 46 to 48

And establishing the fact that in that text it seems very clear to me that Muhammad is making the argument for his own prophethood based upon him standing in this line of prophets of Moses with the

Torah and Jesus the Injil and each one of them was was what this was sent down to them and they were a guarantee a protector of the the truth these things and and Now the final word has come with Muhammad.

Well that presents an idea of consistency and It is the

Inconsistencies that exist between what is found in the Quran and what is found in the New Testament? That led later generations of Muslims to adopt the idea that the

New Testament had been corrupted But the problem is once you adopt that now the whole argument for Muhammad's prophethood falls apart as well

Because that's not a part of what's said in surah 5 46 47 48 in fact We are told to be able to judge on the basis of what

God had sent down in the Injil if it's gone We can't do that any longer and so there are all sorts of issues like that and how to very succinctly by citing the

Quran Cause people to think is a bit of a challenge in the situation you're looking at but anyway

Let me let me at least play this this Encounter here, and you'll you'll see

I'll probably start and stop because I can't possibly let it go on without challenging But hopefully you'll be able to hear this clearly as well

I'm sure rich will do what he can to make sure that it's clear to you, but let's let's listen to this this clip My name is

Robin there. I am working as a marketing executive brother insulting is very easy brother, but With love you should tell the truth that is the teaching of the

Bible my question is You know very well Bukhari sahih value number six or this number five hundred and nine and five hundred and ten there who the if I came to Uthman he says to the

Uthman Oh chief of the believers save this nation before they differ about the

Quran then so actually who the if I saw the people of Shama that is a

Syrian people and the Iraq people Reciting the Quran in different ways, then he comes to the

Uthman then he says then Uthman sent a letter to Hafsa the original copy of the

Muhammad's Quran with Hafsa and He brought many other people who?

I know what you are going to ask please make your question. My question is if The problem is only with pronunciation on the recitation

What is the necessity to rewrite the Quran number one number two if already written material?

That is Quran is correct Why they were burnt out if they burnt out it means the problem was with the material

But not the recitation now. Let me just stop right there. This is 510

In my particular edition here, let's see, what's the specific

Right here is number 4987 and Uthman ordered that gentlemen copy the original manuscript perfectly

There is a difference of readings in regards to the Quraishi tribe They did so and when they had written many copies

Uthman returned the original manuscripts to Hafsa Uthman sent to every Muslim province one copy of what they had copied in order that all the other chronic materials whether written in fragmentary manuscripts or whole copies be

Burnt and this is this is actually a separate story from the original

Collation of materials that I was reading from earlier. That's 509 and then the burning of those materials is 510

So he's basically asking the question because the standard response is well, it was just a matter of pronunciation

People were pronouncing things differently, that's all it was it had nothing to do with the actual

Consonantal text of the Quran it was just pronunciations and as he's pointing out Well, why rewrite it if it's pronounced the if it's an issue of pronunciation because the original the the earliest manuscripts we have do not have

Vowel markings in them so that wouldn't have fixed the pronunciation anyways And in fact, there are seven different ways according to the hadith that you could even read

The Quran and then later people said actually there's seven different ways of each of the sevens there's 49 and and all the rest of these things and there's all these different ways of reading it because it's just a

Consonantal text just like the Hebrew Testament was as far as consonants But not providing the vowels and so that's the the question that he has answered now

Here's going to be the response given and moreover according to Bukhari sahih value six. Thank you very much

No, yeah, just you are voting to not one next no, no, no 514 Okay, yeah, mama says

Quran is revealed in seven different ways of recitation According to this with man has did wrong who have given the authority to with man to do that now that was actually a good question there too is he points out the

Seven different ways and he says who gives the authority to us man? Because if Muhammad is the last the prophets you have a real hard time coming up with the idea of somebody being inspired after him

To do shall we say an inspired recension in essence, but now the response that is given is quite interesting brother has asked a question and He said insulting is easy and you think you are respecting

See giving those statements boss. It's very easy.

Don't give those statements. Ask your question directly a debate means an argument Everything as long as it doesn't contradict

Quran and Hadith as long as it doesn't contradict the Constitution of India There is no problem.

So if you come don't insert I feel inserted when somebody says Quran is it has been burned It is interpolated.

So should I cry with you now? You said the message of the Bible is peace now

First why he says should I be insulted? He says I'm I am offended when someone says that parts of the

Quran were burnt. Well, it's your books and say it brother You know, come on. I'm not sure why they're you know

These days you what what Muslims will be offended by is is very broad Indeed as some people call the the religion of perpetual outrage because they're just they're looking for a reason to be offended

It truly is amazing. But then Now watch this watch this complete red herring watch this

Straw man jump up here. You said the Christianity was a religion of peace. I didn't hear him say that He never said anything about it all but throw it out there and now listen to this

Gospel of Matthew chapter number 10 verse number 34. Do you know about it? Gospel of Matthew chapter number 10 verse number 34

See the Christians believe Jesus Christ my peace be upon him to be very peace -loving He said I have come to love peace

That is the message in the Bible in the direct speech of Jesus gospel of Matthew chapter number 10 verse number 34

Christ says Think not that I am come to spread peace on earth.

I am NOT come to spread peace, but a sword See I was respecting

I didn't insult Till now but now the way you did it I have to enforced

And that's all he says. He doesn't give a context. He doesn't explain what Jesus is talking about there. What is the sword?

It is the division between family members between those who accept the gospel and those who do not because those who do not will hate the gospel

But you know, he just throws that one out there for and then it only gets worse from there I say the gospel of Luke chapter 19 verse number 27

Whoever does not believe in me bring him in front of me slay him kill him Allah said in the

Quran La ikra hafidh deen there is no compulsion in religion. If he doesn't believe no problem

La qum deena qum wa liya deen your religion is with you. Mine is with you Now it amazes me that people are clapping at that because there has to be enough people in that audience

Who actually know the Quran they understand issues such as abrogation? To see right through this rather fallacious response

First of all look 1927 is the end of a long parable where there had been servants who wrote to their

King when he left and said we no longer want you to reign over us at the end of Luke of the story

Luke 1927 but these enemies of mine who did not want me to reign over them bring them here and slay them in my presence

This is the King speaking talking about God's judgment on the people of Israel This little thing of context doesn't really seem to Help these folks at all and then it's whenever you hear somebody going to surah 2.

There's no compulsion religion without then balancing that with for example surah 9

Which it came much later It's the last of the surahs surah 9 29 fight those who believe not in Allah nor the last day

Nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and his apostles nor acknowledge the religion of truth

Even if they are of the people of the book until they pay the jizya with willing submission and feel themselves subdued or humiliated that comes later

Surah 2 is earlier surah 9's about the last one and almost last one and that's much more representative of Of Islam so -and -so so amazing a type of response is given here and evidently by people

Giving the responses because they know that they cannot be contradicted within this context But still they would have to know that the people sitting in the audience would know the

Quran well enough to see through that I will not slay you Coming to your main question

He has quoted a common Christian allegation that at the time of Allah and who and he quoted ahadith from You said that if recitation is the problem.

Why did Usman? burn the copies of the Quran Now when you see this you will notice that there was an edit there.

You can hear it in the soundtrack just barely I don't know if he gave the wrong Wrong reference to sahih al -bukhari.

I can't tell they switched to an audience shot, so you couldn't see him But there's a clear edit there

And I I'm sorry But I can't give the guy the benefit of the doubt given what he just did in misrepresenting the text of the

Quran brother the history of it is After the demise of Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.

There was a battle fought in That battle at the time of Abu Bakr Siddiq. May Allah be pleased with him in that battle 70 who father

Quran Memorizers of the Quran they were martyred. They were killed in that battle Omar it may have top of Proposes a suggestion to Abu Bakr Siddiq, and he says yeah,

I'm a little more meaning or you leader of the believers Let us bring all the copies on which the

Sahaba The companions of the Prophet used to write it down when the Prophet spoke it to them and let us put it in one place as a compilation

Now He says what he's done. Here is he is inserted the idea that These people had written it down.

Let's bring all this together and put it in one location That's not what Bukhari said and that is not consistent with what

Bukhari says Because Bukhari says it was the Qura those who had memorized not written down but memorized the

Quran who died and Abu Bakr was afraid that if more of them died a large portion of the

Quran would be lost now what he's presenting You might find people way down the road someplace developing these ideas

But this is called reading stuff back into history To save yourself the embarrassment of having to admit that this is the earliest mechanism by which the

Quran was gathered but he's presenting it as if it is history on an equal level and it just isn't and This work of compilation collecting all the copies.

How was it written down at that time? There was no printing press at That time there were no papers like we have a four size a three size

How was it written down on parches on the bones of the hips of the camels?

It was written down What Abu Bakr Siddiq did is he asked them to collect all that material and bring it in one place

Once it was brought to him What Abu Bakr did is he made an official copy of it and said let it be preserved with Hafsa Now according to sahih al -bukhari.

It wasn't just written material. It was memorized material and Since it was memorized material to ayah of surah 9 once 128 129 were found with one person and It seems very clearly in the memory of that one person.

Oh you have to read into it No, no, no, no, he had it written down someplace. No It was in his memory.

Nobody else remembered it now later There is a reference to surah 33

Where there is a reference I used to hear Allah's Apostle recite this someone then remembered that but they even missed something in the first run

Of putting this stuff together They they that what was put together even then was not the final edition of the

Quran all of this points to the fact That there are meaningful Proper questions that need to be asked concerning this particular methodology of gathering this stuff together

It was preserved with Hafsa You need to know a little of Islamic history

It's not your problem That is what you have been taught all these years in the churches or wherever you learned it from whatever books you learned it

If you read the Islamic history the history that goes on to the second video at this point and I were already halfway through the program and haven't even gotten to suggestions for your questions, but that kind of response

It seems to me that in many of these contexts now I'm actually looking at the freeze frame here and there's there is about 10 ,000 people there

That kind of response Is really meant to protect your own and to and to promote your interest.

It's not really a truthful response and unless There was some reason why

I think there was a Christian here Couldn't respond to this in a meaningful fashion, and I suppose that does happen unfortunately

I really don't understand the the the mindset that goes into that kind of Reply being given to people but it is what

I am hearing. Like I said, I'm corresponding with a fellow and The first thing he writes to me is

I would like to write to you and talk to you about how you're misrepresenting Islam And I go I write back and go what do you mean misrepresenting?

Well this this and this and they weren't not a one of them was a misrepresentation. It was a place where they disagree

With what we're saying and yet they will very easily mix the category of if you disagree with me you are

Misrepresenting rather than being able to back up. You're saying you're actually misrepresenting what we say and there's a there's a fine line between those two, but there is a line between those two and So I'm not sure what kind of response you you would be getting.

But anyway, so having given you all of that Information which may be much more than you're actually looking for Like I said and since this is this evening

Basically, you know if I was given just a brief opportunity like that I would

I would probably I'd go one or two directions since I have spent so much time with the

Sahih al -Bukhari. At least I would feel comfortable Attempting to to raise the issue and probably asking it within a context that would cut through all of the

Pre -made apologetic responses. Well, they're just gonna repeat them or not. I don't know. I have had that happen

Where you just you just it's a pre -memorized speech. You just give it and hope hope for the best,

I guess but My question if I was going to go the historical route would be

Abu Bakr said he was afraid that if more of the Qura died in battles

Shortly, this was this was only You know 20 years after Muhammad's death if more of the

Qura die in battles that a large portion of the Quran could be lost And in that very same hadith

It is said that that two ayah of the Quran or what we would call verses of the

Quran Were found in with only one person If that is the case

Isn't there a a major difference between how the Quran Was gathered so that you have to have a tremendous amount of I guess belief in the almost

Inspiration of Uthman and the committee that he assigned to do this work Whereas in the

New Testament because you have multiple authors and here's where you might be able to sort of say something

That might get some thought going you said you wanted them to be somewhat contemplative. Here's how you do it. Here's how you do it

They've been taught this is sort of an aside here, but they've been taught that the fact that you have multiple authors over periods of time

That's the great weakness of the New Testament They love to contrast Paul versus you know

Matthew or Matthew Mark Luke versus John and so on and so forth They love to do that kind of stuff and from their perspective.

It's a great advantage to have one author Minimal amount of time and you've got boom put on you don't have to worry about Multiple people recording the same stories and having details different and stuff like that see but the problem is that's actually it's great fatal weakness and that is

The New Testament is written over a period of time from different places When Paul writes letters, he's writing from Rome to Philippi.

He's writing to Colossi The letters are passed around the Lycus River Valley He's writing to Titus on Crete and to Timothy and Ephesus and and the

Gospels are going all over the place They're going down to Egypt and they're going up into into Italy into Greece And in other words, they're going all over the place

So that there is no need for a Christian Uthman.

There is no need For that kind of revision or us having to trust that Uthman was somehow inspired

Because the copies the New Testament go all over the place right from the beginning now, they say well that just means that it could all been incorrupted the problem is and I did do a

Video about this about a week and a half ago in response to a Muslim It came to our chat channel The problem is when the

New Testament when we start documenting the existence in the New Testament with manuscripts like p46 and p66 and p72

And p75 and so on so forth Those manuscripts come gather manuscripts from all over you can tell for example p46 collection of all of Paul's writings

Well that had to come from different places and yet the texts of like the

Gospel of John coming from different areas and different authors they read the same and What that proves is if there was this corruption, which

I like to talk about where is the evidence for it? Where are the manuscripts that have all the corrupted text in it?

If it just doesn't the person who wants to make the argument That there were these massively different texts is left making an argument out of utter and abject silence without any explanation

Other than you know a Da Vinci code type explanation well Oh, you know there were these you know monks

You know and they had a k -47s back then and you know they tracked down They had satellite technology and they're able to track down New Testament manuscripts

I mean, it's about the only way you come up with something like this if you don't get into odd weird conspiracy theories

And you actually try to be serious. There is no explanation as to why those

Totally varying manuscripts which the Muslims would have to assume Represented the original Jesus rather than the

Son of God Jesus that the corrupted manuscripts represent where'd they go? Where'd they disappear to where the original were the original disciples such wimps such cowards that they could not produce the truth and could

Not protect the truth over time Was Paul such a mighty man that he was able to completely destroy this entire religion that quickly doesn't make any sense at all and So they've been taught that this is a problem so going back to the question

I would say something along the lines of in comparison to the New Testament which you have multiple authors writing to multiple different places so that when we have

New Testament manuscripts They're coming from all over the known world and yet They agree with one another and the fact that they agree with one another demonstrates

There's only one text being distributed and since it's written in Greek Which is a much more specific language than Arabic is it is is a language that has both consonants and vowels

You can't you can't have the problems in Pronunciation with the Greek text that you have with a continental text in the

Arabic. It's not possible So the New Testament then comes to us in in one manuscript tradition from all over the known world

We don't have to have a Christian with model We don't have to have that kind of editing and so why would

God in essence have used this wonderful methodology with the New Testament? And then go backwards With this final revelation that ends up having all these questionable aspects in its original gathering

That is probably the toughest question that you could ask As far as getting a meaningful answer from it

But that's certainly one direction to go now That's like I said since I feel somewhat familiar with the text that's basically direction

I would go you could probably avoid some of that issue and just basically say you know my understanding of the study of the

New Testament is that because it was written by many authors in different places and we have very early manuscripts of the

New Testament some as early as as 125 AD of the Gospel of John for example a section of the

Gospel of John That this is This is what was in existence at the time that Muhammad began his ministry in Mecca do you have any reason to believe that Muhammad had access to that New Testament and If he didn't then why should

I as a Christian? Accept what the Quran has to say when it contradicts what the

New Testament has to say when Muhammad did not know what was in the New Testament to begin with and Then you might want to follow up with something like surah 5 where Do you have a

Quran? I do yes Which which translation is it? Muhammad got the guys for this something

Muhammad Ali picked all It's not Okay, I asked this guy

Muhammad al -dastani if that was a good Version to have you know it's very good.

Okay as long as he accepts it. That's that's great Go with it, but I would

I would look this up beforehand, so you'd be you'd be familiar with with the reading of it Look at surah 5 47

Okay, and I have use of Ali here in front of me Let the people of the gospel judge by what

God hath revealed Therein and I can tell you I have sat with my

Arabic tutor and asked the specific questions Working through this text in Arabic to make sure that I'm not missing anything here when it says what by what

God hath revealed Therein the therein the only possible reference is the gospel the people the gospel

It's what God's judge therein if they do fail to judge by the light of what God hath revealed that is sent down literally

They are no better than those who rebel how? knowing Knowing that we can determine without a question the state of the

New Testament text 300 years before the time of Muhammad and We know exactly what looked like when

Muhammad would have said surah 5 47 When I judged by what's revealed therein

I find that Muhammad did not understand What was revealed in the Injil in the gospel?

How am I supposed to believe that this is the final word from God? now footnote

Little thing you put down at the bottom if they say if they want us if they want to say well Where did where did

Muhammad? contradict What is found in the New Testament I would say well in that very same sir

Oh, my does what's called surah 5 at the very end if you go to verse 116? I'm putting up a video right now.

In fact. It may have already uploaded if you want to check my youtube page It may be the most recent video if it's processed by now.

Let's see 444. Yeah, it should be up on surah 5 116 through 120

But that's where you have Allah Asking Jesus if he ever taught anyone to worship himself and his mother as gods in derogation of Allah And that is obviously not what

Christians have ever believed And if that's what Muhammad thought the Trinity was well, then it's pretty obvious that Muhammad was not a prophet because That's not what

Christians believe so there's a there's something you could look at there. Okay, very good

Next week they're going to be having a another session on whether or not Muhammad was a true prophet Interesting interesting.

Oh, that's next week. But thank you so very much for that valuable input and Obviously, I'm gonna have

Muhammad listen to this stuff as well. So that was good stuff. Excellent. All right. Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir All right Hey He didn't expect

We are a full -service ministry. Thank you very much. And that also means that Everybody else here is been waiting online for a long long time.

So let's talk with Dan in Virginia. Hi Dan Doing good excellent.

Hey, yeah, this question is uh, sorry, it's not really regarding Islam or the Quran or things but I'm in a class down here and in seminary in Virginia here and regarding conversation about the

New Testament hermeneutic and in regards to Luke 24 and I got an interesting response from a teacher from professor and when

I started to kind of go down this road of questioning about a literal hermeneutic versus anything up anything, but and the professor kind of started to chuckle as he started to see where I was going and He said well, you know you you don't really want to use the

New Testament writers hermeneutic in regards to the testament And he said and he started to laugh and he started to say well,

I'm not going to get into that because Well, I here at look here at Liberty.

We're exegetical historical literal hermeneutic believing Institution and I guess just wanted your take on that and let me back you up here a second.

So so You get the feeling that he Holds a position that maybe he wasn't really able to explain to you given the viewpoint of the school

I'm saying that his viewpoint that is is where the school stands in terms of literal exegetical and okay, so on but that What I was going through or what

I was trying to Understand in terms of pressure when Christ the refer time

Christ refers to That he must suffer and die and rise again.

And what scriptures specifically literally say that? Oh, I see and and when

I asked them, you know, what kind of hermeneutic could he be using considering? You can't literally say that with the suffering.

Yes, Isaiah 53, but they're rising again. You kind of have to go somewhere else Mm -hmm And so when

I mentioned, you know, well what kind of hermeneutic is he using here? and and should we want to use the the same hermeneutic

New Testament writers did and he Kind of sounded like he was saying no, okay

Yeah, well, that's a huge question in the sense that there's all sorts of discussions of that very issue

Going on in the quote -unquote Academy today and of course the whole idea of what is what is

Literality anyways, what does it mean to take the text literally? I mean obviously and sadly, this is lost in most of the conversations obviously the only meaningful

Way of using that term that that I understand is to take it Literally in the sense that the author intended it to be taken

Not literally in the sense that a early 21st century westernized

American would Contextualize and yeah that that means that I just blew a lot of eschatologies out of the water.

But anyway Just a little bit yeah, you know,

I mean it's like a sell me a whole lot of books I might be left behind in the Christian bookstore

Yeah, I mean that's that's what I thought I was getting the feeling like he he wouldn't even kind of go down that road of well, unless and I'm putting words in his mouth

I give him credit, but You know, I that if if a hermeneutic doesn't allow for one to end up with a pre mill pre trip fight fight fight type of understanding or conclusion

Then it then we can't especially when you have comes with like Ezekiel I'm thinking and things like that Millennial Kingdom and fix that sacrifices and so yeah,

I'm kind of going through this as a free agent in the eschatological realm, though,

I grew up pre mill pre trip and everything but Yeah Understand well

There's a there's a new book out I've had precious little time to to mine the gold that I'm sure it's in there, but there's a new book out

The DA Carson was involved with and some others. I think even Seyfried was involved with it, but it looks like it's

Really a goldmine of information again. Any book is to be used with with caution my own included but the

There's a huge encyclopedia now in essence It's been published on the New Testament's use of the

Old Testament How the New Testament writers? interpreted prophecy and and all sorts of things like that I Have it in my office.

I don't have it here in the studio right now, but You can probably find under Carson on on Amazon Probably an excellent resource.

There's going to be different writers of course because like I said, it's huge it's probably I don't know 7800 pages I forget how but it's very very large and That's going to give you a much more balanced perspective it is literally to me sad when you have

Professors or a school so wedded to a particular eschatological theory that you can't even really discuss

Important issues like Luke 24 because Luke 24 is Foundational to something significantly more important than eschatological theories and that is resurrection

And the the repeated demonstration of the Messiah ship of Jesus on the part of the

New Testament because clearly the argumentation that Jesus would be sharing with the With the disciples on the road to Emmaus is gonna be the same type of stuff that we're gonna be hearing in the synagogues in Asia Minor Found in Acts when the

Apostles, you know begin to preach the the resurrection of Jesus. I just was mentioning

Preaching two weeks ago, and I mentioned how Paul goes into the the Synagogue Thessalonica, and he he reasons with them for three weeks

From the scriptures demonstrating it was necessary for the Christ had to suffer and to die What took him three weeks to do that?

I don't know hardly anybody today that could spend 30 minutes Doing that little home three weeks

So obviously there is a little bit more to it Then then a lot of us are really I think overly familiar with but that does raise all sorts of issues

You can't get into dealing with prophecy in the Old Testament and how it's seen as fulfilled anew without dealing with issues like like near and far fulfillment like Isaiah 7 and the

Virgin will be born and how there is a context and an immediate application But that's the whole point is that there's also a much greater application and what does that mean?

And and if that's the case, then yeah, you can't necessarily go to the book of Revelation and come up with helicopters in certain chapters

But hey, you know the first things first is what you really gotta do. So, you know, yeah.

Well, thank you I really appreciate it. And I'm going to a book Graham Goldsworthy's according to plan and That's the it's tremendous.

I mean it's going to a different reading the Bible from right to left in an awful thing from right to left

Sort of the way he explains it I'm not familiar with I can't comment on that one Thanks for hanging on for so long man, yeah, thank you.

All right. Thanks. God bless Let's get our last caller in here real quick with just a few minutes left.

Talk with Adam. Hi Adam Hey, dr. White. Thanks for hanging on so long. Hey, no problem

Hey, I had a question for you and it's okay if you want him to somewhat of an Old Testament question but it relates to the deity of Christ and someone

The the the text just first time I saw it seemed really innocent. No, no, no, no, they don't need but there is a discussion in a

Walt he's grammar on the meaning of Laid -on -knee and he discusses the honorific plural and so forth and he notes that the long a why ending that you'd normally see is not used in reference to persons the suffix is always used in reference to persons and then he makes the argument that there is the

Ugaritic data to support the idea that the long a why ending or a formative

Has an emphatic or intensifying sense and to make matters worse

He also says that the suffix and doesn't translate out on a Korea smooth as the suffix and translates it here but rather curious

All of this is just sort of like a blow -by -blow, but I mean we have to Deal with it and the problem is if you take the knee ending you say well

That's that's not actually the way we understood it Now you're going against the stuff agent and the

Masoretic tradition and you're ignoring cognate data that suggests that it's probably Original.

Well, I'm not I'm not sure what what you're asking here You Lost me it's it's how courteous to Koryu mu in the in in the septuagint, right?

The courteous move is translating out of me here. Mm -hmm My lord what it was saying and what what he is saying is is that Korea?

Who always does not translate add on a which would be the term that's normally used for God?

Uh -huh. And what he's saying is here we here. And so now we have septuagint rendering us suggest that I don't know

Or that Adam II is probably the original meaning here And we also have on top of that eugaritic material suggesting that the the comet

Yod ending is probably an intensifying ending So you have cognate material saying is that this type of form existed at this time?

You have the septuagint translating this a certain way and I'm sort of lost as to how we can say

This is Jesus because Jesus used it up himself. I had a New Testament friend of mine say well Jesus was both

God and man. So if this says he's the man I said, but this was written long before the incarnate I'm sorry.

You're completely losing me I the only the only argument that I know about this is by Unitarians who try to say that because it's not it's at a knee

Instead of at an eye at an eye is used of God at a knee is use of men but of course we all know that the

Vowel pointing is a Masoretic invention and that the vowel pointing would not be different in the consonantal text in the ancient

Inconsonantal form and we certainly know the Masoretic rejected the deity of Christ and the Masoretic themselves would have been a familiar

With the Christian utilization of this in fact didn't like the septuagint because of the

Christian utilization of it. So What's that doesn't sound like what you're talking about though?

well, what what's been suggested is that the Masoretic are passing along a tradition of pronunciation and That therefore the reason why this is brought up is because they're saying this tradition goes back before the writing of the

New Testament That well brought in and that's that's the problem that I'm coming up against Well, I don't see how any of this is relevant to the

New Testament usage of this I mean, it still says Yahweh said to my

Lord who is David's Lord Right. It would be

Jesus as the New Testament. Right so I don't so the vowel pointing of it to me you know other than when when certain people like Fell by a blizzard or buzzard or whatever his name is and I've talked about this before Tries to say ah see this

Demonstrates that the deity of Christ that the Bible is not teaching the deity of Christ and that's based upon the vowel pointing which is not a part of The text that exists in the day that Jesus would be citing this then

We have Hercules to Korea Kurio in in the

Septuagint and The only point that's being made is since these words are spoken to David's Lord that that means that David's Lord had to have pre -existed the days in which

Jesus was speaking and That's the messianic application. So I'm not sure

What the problem is? Well, is it did I miss something or what? Well, it just has to do with it.

Did that understanding exist prior to? Prior to Christ and that's what they're arguing that the pronunciation itself

Existed prior to Christ's coming by the fact of the way the Septuagint translates the different Pronunciations found in the south.

Yeah. Well, that's I don't see how toe toe Corio move would impact that at all

But we're at time. Thanks to the phone calls. Thanks everybody listening today. We'll see you on the next edition of the dividing line.

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