Quick Update on Old Dominion Debates

Update on the Old Dominion Debates

I thought I'd give you a quick update on the debates yesterday at Old Dominion. In the first debate, David Wood debated Sami Zatari. And in the second debate, Nabil Qureshi debated Shadid Lewis. And Nadir Ahmed was in attendance at both of the debates and very consistently with the night before.

However, in the first debate, he pops up to ask an audience question. And I realize, I guess Sami Zatari is a fairly young gentleman, a Palestinian gentleman. And he's not a really good speaker. He's an intelligent young man.

It was a good debate. He has some speaking issues. He was constantly pulling at his sleeves. It was a little distracting along those lines. And I'm sure that that will improve. I believe it may have been his first debate.

I'm not sure. I think that might have been said. But anyway, you know, he certainly did a far better job than anything Nadir Ahmed's ever done. So Nadir jumps up to the microphone. And in Nadir's world, Nadir is all that matters.

And so the first thing he does is he compliments the Muslim debater. And that's fine. But that was just simply to soften the blow because he then turns to David Wood. So why are you debating this 20-year-old kid when you should be debating me?

It seems from his perspective, all Islamic debates should be with him. But he's the only one. And he said this. He has claimed to be the best there is. He's the only one who knows how to defend the Quran, etc., etc.

Everybody else is a dummy in comparison to him. And so it was just amazing. Not only, again, the disrespect for the audience. We had only a very small amount of time for audience questions in that first debate.

And he just disrespects the audience to, again, bring up himself. He's the only important person in that. But then to throw the other Islamic debater under the bus in the process. Just amazing. And then after Nabil debated Shadid Lewis, I'm trying to find, I've been trying to arrange for a number of months now, a debate in November back here in this general area.

And I certainly did not agree with almost anything that Shadid had to say. And I really felt that a lot of the race issues he raised, well, in other debates wouldn't have come up. Because this was supposed to be, he is a convert from Christianity.

Nabil is a convert from Islam. And so they were basically sharing their stories and then debating the issues as a result. So I don't think that would necessarily come up in other contexts. But anyway, I certainly disagree with what he had to say.

But he's a very passionate speaker. He speaks with pace. He thinks through what he's saying. And so it made for a good debate. And so I want to get his permission to get his contact information from the other gentlemen who have been putting on this whole series so that we might have a discussion as to the possibility of that future debate in November.

Nadir Ahmed Interrupts the Conversation

Well, as soon as I start talking with him, and he's standing up on the stage and I'm standing down in front, who pops up but Nader Akhmed? And who literally gets between me and Mr. Lewis? But Nader Akhmed.

And so I'm doing my best to just ignore the man. What can you do with someone like this? It's like a yipping little dog that just wants to be in the middle of everything. Look at me, look at me, look at me.

The Muslims are embarrassed by this man's behavior. It's so obvious. It's amazing he doesn't see it. But anyway, so I am trying to talk to him. And as soon as he gets a chance, of course, Nader jumps in.

Why won't you debate me, James? You're a coward, this is obvious to him. You're a chump, James. And the Muslims are going, dude, chill out, calm down. It was truly amazing. I've never seen a meltdown on that level.

If anyone wants any final reason to never have anything to do with this man again, he has provided all the evidence that could be possibly needed over the course of this past period of time. In any case, I did want to present just a little clip here.

Shadid Lewis on the Trinity and the Shema

I took a couple of little videos. And this is just a little snippet of some of the presentation that Shadid Lewis was making. It's interesting. I wish I had kept it going. I was using that little camera again.

Because right after this, he raised 1 Corinthians 8 .6. And so I did ask a real audience question. It was actually about the topic of the debate at the end, where I read the rest of 1 Corinthians 8 .6 and pointed out, you can't understand this text outside of a Trinitarian concept and a Trinitarian context.

And that ended up leading to an opportunity to talk to other people afterwards, because I mentioned the original language text and things like that. But this will just give you a little bit of a taste of Shadid Lewis's presentation.

I'm sure that everyone's going to want to be watching act17 .net, which is David Wood and Nabil Qureshi's website, to watch the DVDs when they become available, because you're going to want to see these debates.

But here's just a quick clip.

Allah, the Shema, and John 17:3

Allah says, Surely they disbelieve who say Allah is the third of the three, but there is no god but one. I look and I see that, according to Mark, Jesus reiterated that. He was speaking to a Jewish audience, remember, so he couldn't have meant Trinity.

In Mark 12, verse 29, Jesus repeats that same doctrine of the Shema that goes back to Israel, the Israelites. Here on Israel, the Lord our God is one. You cannot show me that any historical ancient Israelites ever believed that God was a triune God.

I have not seen any such evidence for that. We see that in John 17, verse 3, it is said, according to John, that Jesus said, This is life eternal, that they might know you, not us, not we, that they might know you, the only true God.

Where's the Trinity at? You are the only true God, not us, not we, not me and you. You are. And who am I? I'm the one that you have sent. Well, Allah sends all the messages. God sends all the messages.

God sends all the messages.