What Every Christian Should Know About the Qu'ran, Part 1

Today we're going to speak about what every Christian should know about the Quran and which has been criticized for its title. Yeah, let me just say Here's and here's why people say it's not what every Christian needs to know.

Only if you're really going to be dealing with Muslims they're like you went into too much depth. It's like well It really depends yeah, it really depends on whether you want to be prepared to Speak to your Muslim friend or not and so.

It's been criticized on that level. That's okay. I'll let that slide.

The Quran, Muhammad, and How Christians Should Approach Muslims

Let me allow for you to speak you right on page 12 something I think that is really the edifice of this book. You say I'm not attempting to write a book that is as its heart a refutation of the Quran and as far as I can tell when I read the book this was really just a Concern for the church to know who they are dealing with when they're looking at their Muslim neighbor and I thought it was brilliantly done.

But you start off the book very early with a The history of Muhammad in Mecca and the Quran itself. And maybe you can give us a bit of introduction to that and explain to us exactly what happened.

With this Prophet Muhammad. Well, that's obviously a really large large area of discussion and Today there's a lot of question as to Exactly how we should approach that. I I just last evening I was speaking a completely different subject and and someone asked me about my viewpoint on One of the many theories that are currently floating around.

That are alternate theories as to the history of Islam where it came from. This was the story about how it wasn't Mecca. It was Petra.

Dan Gibbons, right? So there's.

There's all sorts of competing Narratives in regards to the history of Islam and I'm not trying to deal with any of those in in the book at all. Because I want a Muslim to be able to read the book and to come away saying here was a Christian who accurately Represented what we believed and yet raised all sorts of questions that are valid questions that are meaningful questions and so There's a there's a place for debating the issues in regards to the historicity of all of the narratives concerning Muhammad there are people who do not believe Muhammad existed that he's a fictional character.

The the problem is if you start there That's about as far as you're going to get in any conversation with a Muslim with but with most believing Muslims though there there are westernized Muslims that There are many nominal Muslims in the world that are Muslim primarily in in name only there.

We don't really have a strong commitment to the faith. They're not saying the daily prayers and so on and so forth. You have to find out what kind of a person you're talking to because they're especially once you leave heavily Islamic areas get into Areas where Muslims are very much in the minority.

I find an incredibly wide variety of people that you encounter. And if you want to find out about talking to Muslims get an uber or a cab every single person that I have ridden with for the past three years that just could just be a miracle of the Lord, I suppose but long conversations on the subject of Islam and in those Conversations wide varieties of views and what they'll accept and what they'll not accept but in general If you're not starting with their narrative as to who Muhammad was.

You're not gonna get to anything else because you're just gonna be stuck on that one subject so if you want to get past that if there's certain things you want to communicate in a brief amount of time to a Muslim individual that you hope will cause them to Hear and to listen and to think and to expand their their Interaction with what you as a Christian believe because many of them think they know what Christians believe but very often have a very skewed perspective just as the vast majority of Christians, and I know have almost no meaningful knowledge of Real Islam or Islamic theology or they don't know what tauheed is and nothing like that.

So Unfortunately, our communities don't know each other very well. Almost almost no Christians. I know if you've ever read the Quran even though it's it's only 14 the length of the Bible. It's just a little over half the length of the New Testament.

So it wouldn't take a lot long to do. And unfortunately, it's about the same percentages when you ask Muslims What they've read of the Christian scriptures. So we're our two communities are just talking right past each other so with all that said It just seems to me that if your goal is to communicate gospel truth Rather than engage in comparative religious studies Then the best thing to do is to just simply Go with the Muslim narrative in regards to Mohammed was when he lived when he died issues like that don't Don't bother getting into all the other stuff utilize that narrative and Then from that basis once you have the fact they're hearing you.

They're they're recognizing that you are showing them the respect of having done some study and some thought as to what they believe. Then you're going to be able to present those areas of Christian truth that are the most important to communicate with real clarity to a Muslim so You will notice as you well know you have attended made the debates that I've done here in South Africa on the subject of Islam I've lost track of how many there have been there's been there've been a few in mosques and in From from Anglican churches to mosques and I'm very aware everywhere in between Universities and buildings to get burned down at universities and everything else from what I understand so You have heard that one of the ways I attempt to lower the temperature of the discussion is that when I have to make a statement concerning the Quran's author I'll refer to him as the author of the Quran.

Yeah, I rarely say Mohammed and That's not a trick. It's just simply there are questions as to whether this volume and this is. The one I have with me today is the study Quran. That's why it's so big.

It's the first Quran I've ever seen that has more notes on the page than text that's why it's as thick as it is the Quran is not that long of a book, but the author of. There are some people believe that there there are multiple authors of this.

There's some that believe that there was an initial author and then later redactors there are all sorts of theories and the reality is that when it comes to the study of the Early sources of the Quran We're still in the infancy in comparison to New Testament studies.

Yeah, sure. There's there is considerably less despite the fact. This is 600 years closer to us in history. There we're still in the infancy of the study of these things in comparison to New Testament studies.

So part of it is just simply to be Scholarly and accurate and saying the author of the Quran said this the author of the Quran seemed to have this understanding. But there's a real practical reason and and the practical reason is That there is a strong sensitivity on the part of the vast majority of Muslims regarding the person of Muhammad there is a Assumption that there is going to be some type of a desire to show disrespect toward Muhammad As they call him the Prophet.

And so why not just bypass that? Yeah, sure. And if you have to say it seems like the author of the Quran understood that Christians believed this but was in error about that. When you're when you state it that way I think it's just a it's just a practical thing that I think is is useful for folks, but fundamentally I Remember one of my favorite debates one of my favorite debaters from the Muslim perspective.

Was I was really taken aback by the fact that? When we were talking about Prophets, you know, he really took the position that that prophets are pretty much sinless individuals. If there's any sin, it's very very very minor so there is a there is a one of the fundamental differences that needs to be understood between Christians and Muslims is Islam.

There is a much higher focus Upon the moral and ethical character of the ones through which the message comes. Then you have in regards to Christians and their scriptures. Yeah, for sure, we can have a donkey giving the Word of God and it's okay.

We can clearly recognize That Jonah Was not filled with love for the inhabitants of Nineveh and We recognize Very clearly what Peter said he said men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

So yes men spoke. They use human language. They speak from the context in which they are living. But they are being carried along by the Holy Spirit so that what the result is what comes from God that is not the Islamic understanding of.

Where this comes from? The Islamic understanding is that the Sunni? Understanding the historic Orthodox Sunni understanding is that this book is uncreated that it was that it has Eternally been written on a heavenly tablet and That it was sent down in One at one instance in the month of Ramadan.

It was called Laila tal qadr the night of power to the angel Jabril and Then it was delivered to the Prophet over the course of a couple of decades as Need arose for that particular portion to be given to him until traditionally the last portions of surah 9 Were delivered to him and that was the final giving of the Quran which was then memorized and recited and and so on so forth and so The whole concept of how scripture is given what we rather Inappropriately describe as inspiration Which is not the best word.

Inspiration means to breathe into something and that's not what that's that's the Latin the the Greek is much more expressive Theano stars, but technically the idea of the communication of divine revelation Much more nuanced in Christian thought and it's plainly evident to me the author of the Quran Had never heard of The understanding of that process that is prevalent amongst Christians even in his day and clearly By by his death in 632 the the traditional date of his of his demise there were Tremendous Christian works in existence that that had that nuanced understanding of how it is that God gave the scriptures.

There's no evidence that that he or anyone around him had any knowledge of anything like that. So it's a I find it to be a significantly simplistic understanding of basically an angel coming and said Say this here it is.

And and really the the the traditional Orthodox understand this is very important, by the way. And I know I'm not getting to a lot of Muhammad, but this is very important. The The the traditional Islamic understanding is that there is not a fingerprint of Muhammad on the Quran.

There's no there's there's none of this is his Interpretation his understanding what for example what he understood of Christian theology to you and me is incredibly important. Yeah, for sure, and there's the the Later event in his life where he meets with the Christians from the shran Which ends up being the background of portions of surah 3?

To you and me that's absolutely Central important stuff. What did he understand? Did he have a misunderstanding? What about the Christians he had encountered the encounter unorthodox Christians that communicated an unorthodox view of Jesus?

These are vitally important questions that are irrelevant to the Tafsir literature. Tafsir literature is the commentary literature. Where commentaries are written on the subject of the Quran, so it's called Tafsir.

Irrelevant because what Muhammad knew doesn't matter. Because it is a mechanical what we would say today MP3 recording device. That's all he is. He is a he is a mechanical device. Information in information out no interpretation no alteration boom there it is now I think most Christians Recognize that's not we believe there are some Christians that sometimes have a rather mechanical understanding of inspiration almost almost automatic writing style.

Which Was not held by by early church fathers shouldn't be held by us today because we can recognize when when I teach Greek. The first book we read is first John. Why. Because on a scale of 1 to 10 first John's at about level 2 vocabulary syntax grammar.

It's simplistic if I wanted to destroy my students and make sure they never continued their Greek studies I'd have them read Hebrews. Because they're gonna give up because it's level 10 out of 10. It's a high level vocabulary incredibly difficult syntax.

Obviously John and whoever wrote Hebrews which I think was a sermon made by Paul that was written down by Luke, but anyway Whoever wrote that did. We're not the same person. Completely different styles completely different ways of speaking so the idea of automatic writing just you know Does not make any does make any sense as to how the New Testament came into existence.

So we have a much more nuanced I think much deeper much higher in my opinion view of how that that that took plate, but the Orthodox Sunni and you'll encounter non-orthodox Sunnis especially outside of majority Muslim countries but the majority the Orthodox Sunni understanding is that this is an exact Representation of what's on that heavenly tablet, which is uncreated.

Okay, which means even the Arabic language In essence has an eternal characteristic to it and as you know You cannot have a conversation on the subject of Islamic theology without utilization of Arabic.

Oh, absolutely can't be done. The the fundamental definitions of all of that faith are found in the Arabic language. I remember I was speaking in Boulder, Colorado. I was I made some comments about the centrality of Arabic and this one Muslim came up to me afterwards.

And he said I'm not really so sure that that's I'm not sure that you're really right on about that half hour later. We've been talking about a bunch of stuff. And I stopped him and said how many Arabic terms have you and I used in the past half hour?

That only you and I understood and no one around us understood and yet they were central to our conversation. He sort of looked down said Okay point taken. It was it was obvious. It's absolutely central.

So even even the language of which it was written Is something that has to an event a divine aspect to it. So everything we can talk about. Regarding Muhammad the fact that they assert that he was illiterate.

Which is highly unlikely given the amount of caravan trading is involved in there's documents to be signed and things like that. But let's say he was at least not a literate man in the sense of having read much of the world's literature and stuff like That which seems clear.

What's very plain? What's very plain? Whoever wrote this only had an oral Familiarity with the contents of the Christian scriptures official. Historically, we do not have any manuscripts in Arabic of the Old and New Testaments that would have been in that area during his lifetime.

So it does not appear that Either the Old and New Testaments had been translated into Arabic during his lifetime in actual fact doc. Let me just intervene there and say.

Gnostic Texts, the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, and Oral Dependence on the Bible

Do we find any of the Gnostic texts that were written in Arabic because one of the accusations? So one of the schools of thought today is that what have been introduced into the Quran very early on and into the mindset of Specifically the Prophet himself was that he encountered Gnostic Christianity.

Which in actual fact if you look at some of the narratives even in the Quran.

That relates directly to some of the Gnostic texts because there are a number of references in the Quran To stories that are found only in what's called the infancy infancy gospel of Thomas and the Arabic Infancy gospel as well, which we know were written No earlier than 200 years after Christ and the Arabic one was probably about 500 years after Christ.

And so would those have been now the Arabic infancy gospel would be Arabic. But its origin and sources would go pre-arabic and the infancy gospel Thomas the very Nate the very way in which those stories are told and Every other reference there's almost no references whatsoever to the New Testament.

Almost not at all. There's there's there is a if you take this and then you put the New Testament here. And you put the Tanakh the Old Testament here. The New Testament is filled with direct citations of this intimate relationship.

There is a chasm here Absolute chasm here now this assumes That its reader Knows both of these absolutely absolutely assumes it and that would refer to the Torah and in jail and the Zaboor the they When when for example the story of lot Sodom Gamorrah is told four different places sort of seven twenty six twenty seven twenty nine In different words interestingly enough which raises all those sorts of other issues, but When that story is told the author is clearly assuming that whoever is reading this where he knows has already known these.

But the point is Not so much that they've read these but that they've heard the stories absolutely and the way in which the story about Jesus and the clay birds the speaking from the cradle. All of that could be transmitted orally.

It's it's not a site it's never says and it is written somewhere quote that that's not what you have. Yes, it's remember that it was said and you've got these paraphrases and stuff like that. So it this this book reflects an author Who has had?

Interaction with Christians and Jews more Jews than Christians. But you don't have literary dependence you have you have oral Dependence not literary dependence. No question about it. So so Muhammad is He illiterate well He's had conversations.

He allegedly is Married to Khadijah and again, this is the Muslim story and he becomes deeply concerned about Idolatry you have to recognize whoever wrote it was completely there was consumed initially on the subject of polytheism and idolatry this is a person who recognizes the foolishness of multiple gods and That is a that is a true Insight there is the he's not the first one not the last one.

But there's no question about it and I think it's really important and I know I'm going all over the place I apologize, but If you read this book Do not Start at the front and read it to the back. You will be so confused.

You won't know which end is up was never meant to be read that way. No for sure now. It is an interesting question as to why it's organized the way that it is because it's very confusing. It's organized by size you have a certain fatiha the opening seven Verse prayer basically and then beginning with surah al-baqarah surah to the cow.

It's the longest it's a book unto itself hundreds of hundreds of verses are called ayat. And then surah three is a little bit shorter surah four is a little bit shorter. It's not actually word wise exactly spot-on but Generally, you have decreasing size until you get down to the last few surahs, which is are just a few verses long and So if you read it straight through which which I with some humor recall very clearly after September 11th in the United States the attacks on the World Trade Centers I Remember reporters running into Barnes Noble bookstores.

It's back when we still had bookstores. Most bookstores don't exist anymore in the United States. Thanks to consolidation under the internet, but anyway, and they're buying copies of the Quran and Flipping through trying to find something to add to their reporting to make it because they don't have a clue what's going on.

And they can't make heads or tails out of it and you can't make heads or tails out of it. If you try to read it straight through You must remember that chronologically. It's written in a completely different order and so the point the reason I I bring this up at this point is that When you read it in the best chronological guess that we can give and there's a there's a there's a chart in in the book That gives you the best Chronological guess that we can come up with it's in the toward the beginning somewhere in the 40s.

There it is right there. Yeah, there's the there's a chart if you read it that way at least you are walking through Muhammad's life and Hence when you know something about his life at least from the from the Muslim perspective.

His years after his initial calling in 610 By the angel Jabril which interestingly enough he responds to by wine to commit suicide. Which I think is very very relevant and important may not be able to develop it, but it's there but from 610 There is a period of time where he is a Minority prophet in Mecca and he is hated he is abused he is mistreated.

There is a story told he's in prayer Prostrate in prayer and some of his enemies come along and and and lay camel entrails intestines on him and his little daughter has to come along and take them off of his back and You know he's being protected by his uncle Abu Talib.

Because he's a member of the Quraish tribe which is which it's their primary income is from the idolatrous worship in the in the Kaaba so So he has to be protected and and and so on so forth and then in 622 you have the Hijra you have going from Mecca to Medina originally called you three, but eventually becomes the city of the Prophet and Then over the next number of years you have the battles taking place Uhud and the trench and so on so forth between the Medinans and the Meccans.

And then finally you have the the victory of Muhammad over the the Meccans and marching into Mecca and the beginnings of the consolidation that leads to that century of Islamic expansion between 632 and 732 where Islam spreads All across North Africa up into the holy lands Across the Straits of Gibraltar into Europe and finally has stopped the Battle of Tours in 732.

So for a hundred years just this massive expansion Into primarily Christian lands all across North Africa and places like that so Then you have all the stories of his of his wives you have the issue of Aisha you have the issue of Zainab bin Josh there's all sorts of things there and These are these end up in the text of the Quran which is fascinating.

Mm-hmm if Somehow it's been it's uncreated and written. Not even written it you can't even say it was written in eternity past because that would be a point of time in the past. Okay, so it's always been on this tablet.

Mm-hmm and yet, especially surah 33. And the story of Zainab bin Josh is Just in my opinion the most human story In the Quran by a long shot the the very idea that this is is eternal revelation where And I've mentioned it.

I don't know if you want me to go into it, but Where Muhammad had. Well, he had he had adopted a young man named Zaid. He was even known as Zaid bin Muhammad. Zaid the son of Muhammad and Muhammad had given his cousin Zainab to Zaid as wife and So at a point in time later Muhammad comes over to Zaid's house.

Zaid is not there. Zainab is there and according to al-qertubi and al-tabari. These are two very well-known Islamic Trusted Islamic sources. I'm not making these things up. She's Not fully dressed she's wearing something that's rather flimsy and Muhammad is just Stunned.

I'm not sure how he would be stunned but he's stunned by her beauty and By what he says Once Zaid gets home finds out about it Zaid realizes that Muhammad wants Zainab. So he goes to Muhammad says I'll divorce her well, here's a problem in Arabic culture you cannot marry the divorced wife of your your son or adopted son and so Muhammad says keep your wife.

Well once Zainab realizes that the Prophet wants her she doesn't want Zaid anymore, so so there is a divorce and So one day Muhammad goes into one of his revelational trances while Aisha is there and Once he comes out he smiles and says who is going to go tell?

Zainab that she's been given to me as wife and So you get this revelation this revelation comes down from the Quran that first destroys adoption mm-hmm. The right beginning of surah 33 verses I at 3 and 4.

You're no longer to call people after their adopted father's name you call them after their original this has this has deeply damaged adoption in Islamic lands. So that's the first thing that the revelation does is well Zaid isn't really Muhammad's son first of all and then later on In the in the surah.

Basically Allah rebukes Muhammad for hiding in his heart what he knew to be true, and that was that Allah was giving Zainab to him as wife and Aisha as soon as she heard it said oh, no She's gonna hold this over us because she's gonna be the only wife that was Specifically given to the Prophet in the Quran itself and she did.

And this also gave him more wives than the Quran allowed. Oh, yeah for sure so you had to have the basically saying well the prophets the Prophet. He gets to do stuff that everybody else doesn't get to do in essence.

It's such a Human story it's so centrally focused upon Muhammad fulfilling his own desires that the idea this was written you know In eternity past boggles boggles the mind. But it's helpful when reading the Quran to at least know where that happened what the context was where they were.

You know you can put it in some kind of a context in that fashion. And that's that's that's very very helpful, so anyways I didn't mean to go into all the detail on that. That's good.

I think I think for an introduction you already mentioned that's the man in the book, and I think it's good if we reflect on the the the very character of the man because a lot Of times Muslims won't have an issue if you speak about the Quran.

As long as you do so respectfully they won't even bother if you speak on Allah. But the moment you speak about Muhammad you need to be very wary as to what you're saying. Where you go with this and you started off and you mentioned that there is the Nominal understanding from Islam that the prophets need to be perfect or even sinless.

And even though when we look at the life of Mohammed we can see quite clearly in some of the earlier sources that there's a lot of things that are taking place which in actual fact is not to be Contributed or even attributed to somebody of great stature or even of impeccable character.

Do you think it is important to to focus on that and and to in our witness to Muslims? I find whenever I speak to Muslims the moment the question of Muhammad comes up. And I ask these questions that there is somewhat of a resistance to go any further.

There is and I think I think it's always best to Get into that this area if you need to get into this area only after establishing some type of relationship. I agree, you know if you're standing on a street corner someplace.

You've never met this person before this is probably something you don't want to get into at this point in time. That's why I you and I both know people who think that it's actually the best thing to do Is to the first thing you just start attacking Muhammad.

Yeah, sure, but they think witnessing is offending Muslims not actually communicating with Muslims. There's a difference between the two so I would say that if There is an attachment on The part of the Muslim to Muhammad in such a way that it's keeping them from hearing the gospel message.

Well, then you're gonna have to deal with that. But it does need to be done in the context of a relationship and I would say it needs to be done with you already having Made it very plain that you are a sinner saved by grace.

And that you that anyone Who is not? Clinging to Jesus Christ abides under the wrath of God in the first place. So that would be helpful. That's there isn't any way to completely defuse that particular topic but if it's done With a willingness to place him in the context in which he actually lived.

Which we have to do whenever we're dealing with if you have to deal with David. You've got a place you got a place in the context in which he lived not in the modern context. That's a that's a failure that we we engage in all the time.

The best thing you can do is just to be as fair as you can and then to come to the conclusion. Here was someone who engaged in this activity and this activity and and these activities Are relevant to his claims to be the final prophet absolutely.

And then what I would do instead of just then stopping and saying so what do you say about that? To sort of move back to a gospel issue would be to Address for example one of now this is a whole other area so stop me if you don't want to go here.

But this is this is the core in the Quran. But as you and I both know this is not big enough to produce Islamic theology and law there's something called the hadith literature which are the the sayings and actions of Muhammad is his companions that were collected over the next three four hundred years and.

And Huge area of discussion there are and you know you can get doctoral degrees in Minute little areas of this study in in in Egypt and other places in Saudi Arabia Al-Azhar and places like that so huge disabuse amongst Muslims as to what is a sahih hadith that is a sound hadith and.

And and things like that we won't go into that though. I did cite many many Hadith sources in in the book you have to to be able to explain things, but there is a particular hadith. And I did take the time over the past number of years I Converted the two largest collections sahih al-bukhari and sahih Muslim to mp3 format and Listen to all of it While riding my bike.

That's when I that's when I do things like that. I spent a lot of time on a bike and. So you You you find it a tremendous amount of fascinating material in in the hadith collections. They're very very large, but you find a story in the hadith About how on the final day of judgment, and this is called a mutah water hadith.

That's a it's a hadith that is universally accepted Because of its background because it's being included in multiple collections so on and so forth. But you have the hadith on the on the final day of judgment all mankind is gonna be very frightened in front of Allah and they Come to Adam, and they ask Adam to intercede for them and Adam says I I cannot this is not for me to do.

I was a sinner and so you need to go to and then they direct to the next person in the major chain of People so you've got Moses you've got Abraham Down through the prophets and eventually they come to and each one says this is not for me to do I sinned and such-and-such thing then they come to Jesus and Jesus says this is not for me to do, but he does not say it's because of sin.

Mm-hmm. That's one important aspect of it that that needs to be kept in mind. But what Jesus does and this is why it's relevant to the character of Muhammad. What Jesus does is he says go to Muhammad?

So Here is a situation where you have The very thing that the Christian scriptures say Jesus does do which is intercede for his people before the father. The hadith is saying Jesus says that's not for me to do that's that's Muhammad's job absolutely and so My just sort of basic suggestion would be If you have to deal with the character of Muhammad at least connect it to something like this where you can say You know there's no evidence that the writer of the Quran Had ever read these words and you can go to Hebrews chapter 7 you can go to Hebrews chapter 9 you can go to Romans chapter 8.

The one who who died yea rather who was raised from the dead who who intercedes for us you introduce them to some of the because they're vast majority of Muslims I've ever met Have never read Hebrews.

Yeah for sure have have never read Romans, and so it gives you an opportunity of Providing a contrast that then what you're hoping is the Spirit of God will utilize that that type of an opportunity so Yeah, the character of of Muhammad needs to be analyzed fairly, and I'm afraid that very often people consider it a Compromise of their Christian faith for sure to extend fairness to someone they consider to be a false prophet.

I simply say if I'm the follower of Jesus Jesus is the way the truth in life, so I have to be truthful. Which means that if I Attempt as best I can to be completely fair and truthful in what I say then my actual criticism Will carry more weight and be more effective Than if I'm just trying to throw everything including the kitchen sink Yeah at Muhammad and see I this is this is this is something I learned decades before my first debate with a Muslim.

Because there's an amazing number of parallels between Muhammad and a man by the name of Joseph Smith jr. Oh, yes, and my my first area of ministry and study was on the subject of Mormonism and I wrote a book again.

This would be this this this book came out in 2014 so I wrote a book that came out 20 a quarter of a century before this. Where I addressed false prophecies and issues in the character of Joseph Smith.

Mm-hmm, but I recognized even back then focus upon what you can absolutely document to the hilt be absolutely fair and Don't go into stuff. That is highly controversial in the sense of well. He might have done this he might not have done that.

We're not really sure. Because that ends up blunting. The real criticisms that you need to make of Joseph Smith. I think it's exactly the same. Exactly the same thing when you're dealing with Muhammad.

Be fair be balanced. And then run for the gospel as soon as you can which you can do using something like that Hadith story. Where you can you can introduce the Muslim to something they've probably never heard before.

And really hope that in hearing what Jesus does he's he's you know that that beautiful text in Hebrews chapter 6. Where he is he is that anchor for the soul he's gone into the holy place. Where he is he is our forerunner?

These are things they've never they've never heard and so It I'd much rather be talking about Jesus as my forerunner in the heavenly places then Spending a whole bunch of time talking about the various character flaws of Mohammed.

Qur'anic Origins, Doubts, and the Seven Readings

Yeah, I think something that is a positive.

Conversation that you can have with Muslims is you touched upon this earlier is when you speak about the origins of the Quran. You can speak for instance about his doubts. In actual fact you just mentioned that when Mohammed received the revelation his first initial reaction was I'm possessed.

I I the gen the gen has taken me.

So the other thing which I also want to talk about because Christians don't really know it and you didn't go into great depths With this in your book is the different readings or the seven are roof, which is also mentioned and.

What I find is some Muslims don't even know that this really is an issue. So what that's a that's a completely other area. Because that drags us off into the entire Which I did mention briefly earlier when I said we are we are in The infancy stage of any kind of critical analysis of the text of the Quran.

The Quran the Arabic Quran that The Muslim carries about in most parts of the world. Anyways is the 1924 Egyptian edition came out of Cairo. Yeah, and that was simply produced because the schools there wanted a standardized version.

This was not this was not let's get together All our best manuscripts our best scholars. Nothing like that at all. This is the most uncritical text you could possibly have and yet it has become the So standardized so standardized.

Is that Arabic text? That you I remember one particular Islamic speaker Ghasr Qadhi. Mm-hmm who has memorized all the Quran in Arabic. He was lecturing and he had one of those Senior moments when he's not all that senior where you just couldn't get something To come out, right and he couldn't quote the one text you wanted to quote.