Edited By Sam Shamoun
Before reading this, for a fairly simple introduction and basic outline to this subject I recommend Anthony Rogers latest post
(Written in March 2013, bear in mind I copied this directly from MS Word, so the format is not perfect when entered into blogger)
Bassam Zawadi has recently written a “response” here
to Dr. James White’s critique (found here)
of Zawadi’s inadequate explanation of Quran, Chapter 5:47 which says:
Let the people of the
Gospel judge by what God hath revealed therein.
If any do fail to judge by (the light of) what God hath revealed, they are (no
better than) those who rebel. 5:47 Y. Ali
I recommend reading Dr
White and Zawadi’s posts to understand the full context of this discussion.
Rather than addressing
Zawadi point by point, I will try and summarize his position and address the
main points.
First lets discuss methodology. Zawadi in his article says:
I
am not equivocating as I have just said, rather what I ask people to do is to read
the entirety of Islamic scriptural references on this given topic and ALLOW
THEM to communicate the stance Islam has taken on this matter in it's PROPER
CONTEXT.
Firstly
it is quite apparent that Zawadi needs a lesson in the Islamic science of
Tafseer:
The
Qur'ân explained by the Qur'ân: The interpretation of
the Qur'ân by the Qur'ân is the
highest source of tafsîr.
Many of the questions which may arise out of a certain passage of the Qur'ân
have their explanation in other parts of the very same book, and often there is no need to turn to
any sources other than the word of Allah, which in itself contains tafsîr.
To seek to explain an aya from the Qur'ân by referring to another ayâ
from the Qur'ân is the first and foremost duty of the mufassir. Only if this does not suffice, he will
refer to other sources of tafsîr.
(source)
Zawadi
had to appeal to sources outside the Quran, because his view is not in the
Quran. But what about the passages he refers to in the Quran, does any passage
instruct the people of the Gospel to judge the Gospel by the Quran? Absolutely not (see below on 5:47). And since
there are no other passages giving a different tafseer of the Quran by the
Quran we must give the Quran precedence here and reject any possible tafseer
that would contradict the direct word of God. This means then, that Dr. James
White original exegesis still stands:
“The essence of Bassam's interpretation of Surah
5:47 is that the text, though it specifically says وَلْيَحْكُمْ أَهْلُ الْإِنجِيلِ
بِمَا أَنزَلَ اللَّهُ فِيهِ, that is, judge by what Allah has revealed therein,
where the ONLY possible antecedent
in Arabic is the Gospel, actually means not to judge by the Gospel, but by the
Qur'an!”
Next, why are
non-believers in Islam obligated to allow all of the Islamic sources to be
harmonized or consistent, does Zawadi provide Christians the same courteousy
and charity? Does Zawadi expect infidels to start off with Islamic
presuppositions, that Islam must be true and infallible? Or does he expect us
to at least be neutral and start off as objective as possible, like a historian
and honest exegete. We are not Muslim Quranic commentators we do not need to
reconcile the mess of Islamic history that Sunni Muslims self admittedly agree
is a shambles until a few saviors like Imam Bukhari and Muslim came along.
Secondly it is rather
obvious Zawadi merely begs the question since he assumes Dr. White is not
allowing the proper context yet has not demonstrated Dr. White’s unfamiliarity
with Zawadi’s hadith citations, in other words Dr. White’s lack of background
knowledge is not established by Zawadi. Maybe Dr. White is familiar with the
citations provided by Zawadi, but he does not presuppose these citations mean
the author of the Quran rejected the gospels. Maybe he does not reason like
Zawadi because he has no obligation to provide ad hoc explanations and
primitive reinterpretations of such transparent verses and hadith like Zawadi and
his sources?
Having said this, I
don’t believe the majority of Islamic sources are contradictory on the matter
of the previous Scripture. The vast majority of the sources including the Quran
and so-called authentic hadith attest to the incorrupability and textual
veracity and tenacity of the Torah and Injeel. It is thus Zawadi who does not
allow the proper context to speak for itself, this isn’t the first time Zawadi
since he tries to interpret the entire Quran in alignment with a few passages
he believes are referring to textual corruption (2:79;4:157) proof of this is
evident in his article here.
As an example the following verse says:
When
it is said to them, "Believe in what God Hath sent down," they say,
"We believe in what was sent down to us:" yet they reject all besides, even if it be Truth confirming what is with them.
Say: "Why then have ye slain the prophets of God in times gone by, if ye
did indeed believe?" 2:91
Zawadi explains this as
follows:
“The
Qur'an claims to be a confirmation, protector and touchstone of the Truth
contained in the Torah and
Gospel. (Az-Zamakhshari, op. cit.,
vol.2, p.575, cited here)
…However, he wanted to clarify what
is meant by the Quran's confirmation and that is that it confirms the truth in the
Torah and Gospel, which indicates that the Torah and Gospel
contain falsehood. Thus, az-Zamakhshari makes it clear that he believes
that
the Torah and Gospels were textually distorted.
…Thus,
Christian missionaries who like to misinterpret what the verses are actually
saying would need to do better and provide objective evidence that the verses
they are posing do intend to communicate what they claim it is. If
they cannot, then we must harmonize these verses with the Islamic teachings
that make it clear that the previous scriptures have been textually corrupted.”
It is very clear then
Zawadi is anything but objective, a scholarly approach is absent in his
reasoning, a scholar does not proceed with: “If we don’t know the meaning of
the verse since the Christians cannot substantiate their meaning, we must
reconcile all verses like these with with Islamic teachings”.
If the true meaning of
the verse was unknown, it would be, well, unknown,
end of story. If Christians could not substantiate the meaning, that does not
imply the meaning must be readjusted to be consistent with Islam. This would not be an excuse to force a
harmonization and reinterpretion the verse. Yet the true meaning of passages
like these is not unknown as he would
wish his readers to think. In fact the argument of the verse is transparent:
- People of the Book are to believe in what God has sent down
- People of the Book claim to believe what God has sent down to them
- God asserts they don’t believe in all revelation God has sent down since the Quran is the most recent revelation sent down
- God asserts the most recent revelation sent down is verifying what God has previously sent down
- Together all of these revelations God has sent down confirm one another
The Prophet returned to Khadija while his heart was beating rapidly. She took him to Waraqa bin Naufal who was a Christian convert and used to read the GOSPELS in Arabic... (Sahih Al-Bukhari, Volume 4, Book 55, Number 605)
Note all of these statements presuppose the Book possessed by the people of the Book is what God has sent down in total, and the line of thought would be absent and empty without this, so I wish to save the Quran from a non-sequitor imposed on it by an ad hoc interpretation given by Muslims. The author of the Quran in response to: “We believe what is sent down to us” rather than pointing out “Parts of what you possess are not sent down, therefore believe in the uncorrupt Revelation” responds by asserting: “The Quran is the truth verifying what is with you”. In typical language “what is with you” does not refer to parts of what is with you, it refers to whatever is with them, in other words all that is with you. That is unless of course Zawadi can invent a new rule of Arabic grammar which shows us that “what is with you” actually means “some of that which is with you”.
It is clear then that Muslims while attempting to redeem and rescue the
Quran have to distort the natural continuity, flow and structure of the
sentence. The appeal to latter sources to spin new interpretations, otherwise
known as Ad-Hoc, since none of their background assumptions are evidenced and
none of the interpretations directly derive from the text, and they explicitly
contradict the substance of the content and cogent argument being made by the
author.
Zawadi has to offer such bizarre unnatural interpretations for all of
the verses like these, here are a few examples:
And We sent, following in their footsteps, Jesus the
son of Mary, confirming the Torah that is between his hands
(musaddiqan lima bayna yadayhi mina al-tawrat) and We gave to
him the Gospel, wherein is guidance and light, and confirming the Torah
that is between his hands (musaddiqan lima bayna yadayhi mina al-tawrat),
as a guidance and an admonition unto the godfearing. S. 5:46
…
It is not a narrative which could be forged, but a confirmation of what
is BETWEEN ITS HANDS (tasdeeqa allathee bayna yadayhi) and a distinct
explanation of all things and a guide and a mercy to a people who believe. S.
12:111
And
this Quran is not such as could be forged by those besides Allah, but it
is a confirmation of that which is BETWEEN ITS HANDS (tasdeeqa allathee bayna
yadayhi) and a clear explanation of the book, there is no doubt in it,
from the Lord of the worlds. S. 10:37
And
that which We have revealed to you of the Book, that is the truth confirming
that which is BETWEEN ITS HANDS (musaddiqan lima bayna yadayhi); most
surely with respect to His servants Allah is Aware, Seeing. S. 35:31
And
He will teach him the Book, the Wisdom, the Torah, the Gospel… "And
confirming the Torah which is between my hands (Wa musaddiqan lima bayna
yadayya mina alttawrati), and to make lawful some of that which was forbidden
unto you. I come unto you with a sign from your Lord, so keep your duty
to Allah and obey me." S. 3:48, 50
And it seems like Zawad
pretends like we haven’t addressed his distortion of his own texts before, he
would be wrong, since we have clearly shown “confirm” does not conjoin in
meaning with “some falsehood and some truth”. Here are a few examples from the
Quran itself:
saying,
'What, shall we forsake our gods for a poet possessed?' No indeed; but he
brought the truth, and confirmed (wa saddaqa) the Envoys. S.
37:36-37
And
Mary, Imran's daughter, who guarded her virginity, so We breathed into her of
Our Spirit, and she confirmed (saddaqat) the
Words of her Lord and His Books, and became one of the obedient. S.
66:12
thou
hast confirmed (saddaqta) the vision; even so We recompense the
good-doers. S. 37:105
And
he who has come with the very truth and confirms (saddaqa) it,
those they are the godfearing. S. 39:33
upon
that day unto thy Lord shall be the driving. For he confirmed (saddaqa)
it not, and did not pray, but he cried it lies, and he turned away, S. 75:30-32
Unless Zawadi wants to render
his Quran obsolete of all objective meaning or cause it to become even more
incoherent then he must stop shamefully reinterpreting meanings of words,
phrases and sentences least he corrupts the understanding of the above passages
aswell. Sam Shamoun covers more on this here.
In his papers Zawadi seems to
suggest an original gospel was revealed directly
to Jesus in the same sense the Quran is directly
revealed to Mohammed. Zawadi argues
this is an explicit teaching of the Quran. He also points out the Muslims must
have known presumably the gospels possessed by Christian contemporaries of
Mohammed must have been about Jesus
and not revealed to Jesus, therefore the earliest Muslims knew the gospels were not
a pure revelation sent down from God. While Zawadi has no explicit evidence of
this he suggests it’s a logically valid deduction since the Muslims encountered
so many Christians they ought to have known through such trade, interaction and
such.
Zawadi is wrong on both
counts. First lets look at his justification for believing a gospel was
revealed directly to Jesus in the
same sense the Quran was revealed to Mohammed. He uses Quran 5:46
And
in their footsteps, We sent 'Iesa (Jesus), son of Maryam (Mary) confirming the
Taurat (Torah) that had come before him, and We gave him the Injeel
(Gospel), in which was guidance and light and confirmation of the
Taurat (Torah) that had come before it, a guidance and an admonition for
Al-Muttaqun
In the first place, nothing
in the passage suggests that God giving Jesus the Gospel was suppose to mean
Jesus or a companion of his did not write a gospel down about Jesus. In fact
some Muslims take the view Jesus wrote his gospel and it was lost. Other
Muslims take the view his teachings were oral, and were lost. Whatever view you
take the verse never explicitly denies either of those views nor does it oppose
the view that a gospel given to Jesus cannot be transcribed by his apostles or
a companion of them.
Zawadi is therefore desperate in order to interpret this
passage to logically negate the four gospels, that’s a complete non-sequitor
and something far beyond the boundaries of the text itself.
Secondly it is quite obvious
to any honest exegete the text is not be taken in a vacuum. Altogether 5:41-49
are to be taken as a whole. Let us quote the immediate context:
And
in their footsteps We sent Jesus the son of Mary, confirming the Law that had
come before him: We sent him the Gospel: therein was
guidance and light, and confirmation of the Law that had come before
him: a guidance and an admonition to those who fear God. Let the people
of the Gospel judge by what God hath revealed therein. If any do fail to
judge by (the light of) what God hath revealed, they are (no better than) those
who rebel. 5:46-47
In my response
to a debate Shabir Ally had with James White, I address the same blunder Zawadi
is making by trying to disconnect the context of these two passages:
“Shabir ally mentions two verses in the Qur'an. 1)
The Injeel (gospel) being revealed to Issa(Jesus) 2) The Christians being
commanded to judge the Injeel by what Allah has revealed 'therein' in the time
of Mohammed.
However what he didn't tell his audience regarding
the two verses he mentions is that he forcibly gave the appearance as if
the Quran is referencing two different Injeels, in two different historical
contexts. If however the audience were to read the passages in
question, one could see something very important:
And in their footsteps
We sent Jesus the son of Mary, confirming the Law that had come before him: We
sent him the Gospel: therein was guidance and light, and
confirmation of the Law that had come before him: a guidance and an admonition
to those who fear God. Let the people of the Gospel judge by what
God hath revealed therein. If any do fail to judge by (the light of)
what God hath revealed, they are (no better than) those who rebel. 5:46-47
Yusof Ali
As you can see, what Shabir Ally has not told his
audience is that these passages are actually side by side and referencing the
same Injeel in the context, the Injeel of the past given to Jesus
is the same Injeel the Christians are to judge by in Mohammeds time, THE VERESS MAKE NO DISTINTION BETWEEN
THE TWO. God mentions what he
gave to Jesus and then tells the Christians to judge by this very Gospel that
he has given Jesus.
In fact it would be a huge blunder in the Quran if
what Ally is suggesting is true. The Quran had just said that the Gospel
contained guidance and light, and the Quran instructs Christians to judge by
what Allah has revealed in this Gospel. Yet
if God is telling the Christians to judge by a Gospel that is not identical to
the one given to Jesus then the Gospel they are using and judging by is the
Gospel without guidance and light from God.
The other problem is clearly if Ally's
interpretation is correct then the
Quran does a very poor job of distinguishing between the so called Gospel given
to Jesus and the one possessed by the Christians, as all through out the passage the text assumes the same Gospel is
in view. Mr Ally may come back and say, well verse chapter 5:47
resolves this confusion:
To thee We
sent the Scripture in truth, confirming the scripture that came before
it, and
guarding it in safety: so judge between them by what God hath revealed,
and follow not their vain desires, diverging from the Truth that hath come to
thee. To each among you have we prescribed a law and an open way. If God had so
willed, He would have made you a single people, but (His plan is) to test you
in what He hath given you: so strive as in a race in all virtues. The goal of you
all is to God; it is He that will show you the truth of the matters in which ye
dispute;
Mr Ally in other debates has rightfully noted that one possible translation of "and
guarding it in saftey" (in arabic: wamuhayminan) is "quality control/
safe guard". Mr Ally not only suggests that this term implies the Quran
supersedes the Gospel and is the final revelation and authority but that it
also detects the falsehood and the truth in the Gospel. Whatever agrees with
the Quran is true, whatever is contradicted is false. More on this in a minute.
Unfortunately Mr Ally there are four reasons to
disagree with you. The first two I've already stated. The context already
establishes that the Gospel in 5:46 is the gospel in 5:47. In fact God is
referencing the gospel in 5:46 attributed to Jesus in order to establish it's
foundation and validity to the Christians so that God could tell them to judge by it
in 5:47, otherwise it would be
obsolete to even mention it. Secondly the other problem is one
can simply not judge by a gospel that doesn't have the light and guidance
talked about in verse 5:46.
Third. It should also be noted that context
determines the correct meaning of "Muhayminan". One might say: and
guarding it in safety: so judge between them by what God hath revealed"
provides a context in which God is telling the Christians to use the current
scriptures sent down (the Quran) to judge what God has or has not revealed in
the Gospel. That would make complete sense and if that were the case "Muhayminan"
should certainly be translated as "safe guard/quality control".
However unfortunately for Mr Ally this is not the case, all anyone has to do is
read the context:
Let the people of the
Gospel judge by what God hath revealed therein. If any do fail to judge by (the
light of) what God hath revealed, THEY are (no better than) THOSE WHO rebel.
To THEE
We sent the Scripture in truth, confirming the scripture that came before it,
and guarding it in safety: so judge between THEM by what God hath
revealed, and follow not THEIR vain desires, diverging from the Truth that hath
come to thee. To each among you have we prescribed a law and an open
way. If God had so willed, He would have made you a single people, but (His
plan is) to test you in what He hath given you: so strive as in a race in all
virtues. The goal of you all is to God; it is He that will show you the truth
of the matters in which ye dispute; 5:46-47 Yusof Ali
Unfortunately for Mr Ally the judgement between
"them" is not referring to the previous scriptures (the gospel) and
the current scriptures (the Quran), rather it is referring to the people with
vain desires. God is commanding Mohammed to judge between the people of the
Gospel, not to follow their vain desires, clearly not judgment between the two books but rather people. Therefore it is abundantly clear that Mr Ally's
suggested translation of Muhayminan is ruled out as the judgment and discerning
is between people giving falsehoods about what was revealed by Allah, not the
gospel itself. We should then be using another meaning for this word in this
context, and all of those possible meanings are provided here
and here thanks to Sam Shamoun.
There is one other point to mention. The fact that God is cautioning Mohammed
to be weary of Christian believers and don't accept everything they state as revelation
of God as being revelation since they follow vain desires is direct evidence against Mr Ally's view. Here God could have easily said the exact
opposite. It wasn't the believers who
shouldn't be trusted. But it was the Gospel itself! Or perhaps both!
So God is rebuking the act of following the
believers, and not the Gospel they
possess, this is death blow to Mr
Ally's position!
Finally, after coming to understand the Quran does
not say to judge by what Allah revealed in the gospel by the Quran but then why
doesn't the Quran just tell the Christians the truth of the matter? Why doesn't the Quran just say. Judge the
Gospel by using the Quran, use the Quran to determine what is false and true.
I mean that is a primary function of the Quran according to Mr Ally, but God in
his cosmic intelligence thought the better way would be to let the Christians
judge by partially corrupt scriptures when they have the final uncorrupt authentic revelation right in front of them? That's insulting to the big guy
upstairs no doubt. So much for the "best of planners".”
Therefore not only is Zawadi’s interpretation an
implausible interpretation, a far stretching of the text, if we read the text as a whole in
context, his interpretation is utterly absurd and not found anywhere! Since
I’ve already cited the papers in which we address 5:47 I hope Zawadi stops
avoiding these articles here at Answering Islam and stops trying to pretend we
haven’t addressed his distortions of 5:47. It is transparent, 5:47 in context
is clearly favorable to the book, and the warning of judgment and caution
applies to the people of the book.
In fact let me quote you Maududi on the meaning of
Muhamyin:
The Arabic word
Muhaimin is very comprehensive in meaning. It means one who safeguards, watches
over, stands witness,.preserves, and upholds.
The Qur'an safeguards "the Book," for it has preserved within it the teachings of all the former Books.
It watches over them in the sense
that it will not let go waste then true teachings. It supports and upholds
these Books in the sense that it corroborates the Word of God which has
remained intact in them. It
stands a witness because it bears testimony to the Word of God contained in
those Books and helps to sort it out from the interpretations and commentaries
of the people which were mixed with it; what is confirmed by the Qur'an
is the Word of God and what is against it is that of the people. (source)
Notice I have highlighted the
part of his commentary where he gives the plain lexical meaning of the word,
then I underline his commentary where he gives his own interpretation of how
each of these is applied. Note however his interpretation HAS NOTHING TO DO
WITH THE PLAIN LEXICAL MEANING, which is a SAFEGUARD, WATCHER, WITNESS, UPHOLD
AND PRESERVER.
On lexical, contextual,
syntactical and grammatical grounds, the absurd claim that Muhaymn is being use
as a quality control agent in this verse is not justified. Make sure to read
those two articles which thoroughly expose Zawadi and then read here as a
bonus because the Muhaymn is applied to Allah himself! See how we expose Zawadi
(and others) further.
Now that we have that
distortion out of the way, there is one last point to note on Zawadi’s citation
of 5:46 to appeal to a verse that says the GOSPEL WAS GIVEN TO JESUS. You see if Zawadi had any
consistency at all, he would have to interpret the following verses exactly the same:
When
it is said to them, "Believe in what God Hath sent down," they say,
"We believe in what was sent
down TO US:" yet they reject all besides, even if it be Truth
confirming what is with them. Say: "Why then have ye slain the prophets of
God in times gone by, if ye did indeed believe?" 2:91
God sent down a direct
revelation to Jewish/Christian contemporaries of Mohammed?
Of course he did using Zawadi’s reasoning.
Muslims like Zawadi like to
distinguish between God’s original revelation and the corrupted Revelation that
contains aspects of truth. Here is an example of a verse Muslims believe refers
to the original revelation:
Say:
"O people of the Book! Do ye disapprove of us for no other reason than
that we believe in God, and the revelation that hath come to us and
that which came before (us), and (perhaps) that most of you are
rebellious and disobedient?" 5:59
(Quick
question: Do you think the People of the Book would disapprove of Muslims if Muslims were saying the revelation
from before was “corrupt”? Of course! The question makes no sense only assuming God told them they had
corrupted their own scriptures!)
That which came before refers
to the revelations of purity and that which existed in pristine form, uncorrupt
revelations of God. Yet in the Quran it’s true that Allah does not make the
same distinction as Zawadi, since God can say Jews and Christians had a revelation
given to them currently:
And
lo! of the People of the Scripture there are some who believe in Allah and that which is revealed UNTO
YOU and that which was revealed
UNTO THEM, humbling themselves before Allah. They purchase not a
trifling gain at the price of the revelations of Allah. Verily their reward is
with their Lord. Lo! Allah is swift to take account. 3:199
Now either Allah was having a
bad day or we have two possible interpretations.
1) The people of the book were sent down direct revelations;
Christian contemporaries of Mohammed were really prophets like Mohammed.
2) The Quran does not distinguish between what was sent
down to Jesus and what the People of the Book still possess e.g. “was revealed
UNTO THEM” it presupposes the exact same revelation Jesus possessed was
possessed still by his Christian followers, which is why the Quran appeals to
it.
Notice the statement “that
which was revealed unto them” cannot only refer to prophecies of Mohammed as
Zawadi might think since the phrase
before “that which was revealed to you” is applied to the full Quran being
revealed to Mohammed, the exactly same terminology is applied to both, thus
it’s revelation as a whole in both cases. Now using Zawadi’s reasoning, does
this mean the Quran was corrupted aswell?
Was Allah really speaking about these
books as being corrupted, or does he refer to both as complete authentic
revelations of God? Say Zawadi wanted to disjoint the text, and say the first
half of the text means “the complete revelation, total pure from God” the next
part is “only the valid revelation still in the Torah and Injeel” then we have
a grammatical shambles and perversion of the Arabic. So I hope he really wants
to explain how his Quran could not convey a message (even though it’s perfectly
clear and detailed haha) even if Mohammed’s life depended on it!
The absolute
disjointed, mess of an interpretation offered by Zawadi, will always be
hilarious to laugh at if he ever
responds. The last option is he could confess Allah as the Lord of deception is
trying to entice Christians into believing in Islam through a confusion of
language and equivocation. If Allah really want to distinguish between the pure
words of the most recent revelation and the corrupted revelation he would not
be making claims like “we believe in what was revealed to you”, it would
obviously be absolute chaos, if Islam actually asserted this was the sense in
which it’s prophet operates! Yet God supposedly does this frequently:
Shall
I then seek a judge other than Allah? And He it is Who has revealed to you the Book (which
is) made plain; and
those whom We have given the Book know that it is revealed
by your Lord with truth, therefore you should not be of the disputers.
6:114
If we took Zawadi’s
exegetical approach, this means that the People of the Book who allegedly were
meant to know the Quran is truth, were the very people God gave the book to
directly! Of course that’s an absurd interpretation.
Note this carefully: Jewish
and Christian contemporaries of Mohammed (who the Quran says know the Quran is
true) were the very people given the
book (the Torah and Injeel) by God.
Obviously Zawadi needs to
rethink his poor reasoning skills. Once he has done that he would know that the
reason why God in the Quran can say he has given contemporary Jews and
Christians the Scripture, is because the very author of the Quran held the view
that they possessed the Scripture! Not because God gave them the Scripture
directly, but because God is ultimately responsible for giving all his people
the Scripture, in this sense he has given them direct access to his uncorrupt
word. Obviously the sentence “Those whom we have given the Book” would not make
sense if the Torah and Injeel here refer to the “Original Torah and Injeel” or
the “Corrupt Torah and Injeel” from Zawadi’s perspective. Is Allah directly
claiming responsibly for giving them a corrupted Book? Or is he claiming
responsibility for giving them a true revelation? What a dilemma for Zawadi!
It can no longer be
demonstrated then on the basis of 5:46 that early Muslims originally thought of
a Gospel given or sent to Jesus in a literal sense, and I challenge Zawadi to
give us a shred of evidence that this was their belief. This is merely the language
of the Quran in saying each messenger and prophet has a revelation, this does
not mean the four gospels are therefore not sanctioned by God or never thought
of or taken into account in the Quran. This is not at all then conclusive proof
of Zawadi’s position, nor is it sound in any sense. On contraire the texts all
presuppose and affirm Biblical credulity.
What is also clear is as Dr.
James White asserts the Quran does not display even a bare minimum knowledge of
the Gospel. Is the author even aware of the Gospel or Gospels? The best
explanation is the Christian usage of Gospel is what the Quran refers to in the
historical context. Rather than deeming the gospels in plural, Christians speak
of the Gospel as a single and as a singular message, the four gospels as a
single unit providing the world with the Gospel
of Jesus Christ. This is corroborated early on in Christian history:
“At
a very early date it appears that the four Gospels were united in one
collection. They must have been brought together very soon after the writing of
the Gospel according to John. This fourfold collection was known originally
as ‘The Gospel’ singular, not ‘The Gospels’ in the plural; there was only one
Gospel, narrated in four records, distinguished as ‘according to Matthew’,
‘according to Mark’, and so on. About A.D. 115 Ignatius, bishop, of Antioch,
refers to ‘The Gospel’ as an authoritative writing, and as he knew more than
one of the four ‘Gospels’ it may well be that by ‘The Gospel’ sans phrase
he means the fourfold collection which went by that name.” (Bruce, The
New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable? [Intervarsity Press; Downers
Grove Il., rpt. 1992], CHAPTER III - THE CANON OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, p.
23; bold emphasis ours)
For more sources and evidence
showing the Christian use of Gospel
from early periods read here (second
half).
Zawadi asks several
questions:
“How
could White even begin to propose that such a scenario is plausible, let alone
possible? Is White trying to convince us that Muslims who were living in
Abyssinia after escaping persecution in Mecca under the protection of the
Christian King were in no way, shape or form exposed to the fact that
Christians believed in four gospels written about Jesus (peace
be upon him)? How about the Prophet's relationship with Mariyah the Coptic and
his interactions with Waraqa bin Nawfal, Bahira the Monk, the Najran Christians,
etc.???
Notice,
that I am not arguing that these encounters constitute explicit evidence that
the Muslims knew the contents of the New Testament as well as White hoped, but
rather I am pointing out the implausibility that Muslims, despite all these
interactions couldn't have known the very basic and popular fact that
Christians held in their possession four gospels WRITTEN ABOUT Jesus
(peace be upon him).”
And:
Seeing that Islamic tradition didn't shy away from
mentioning Christian inquiries and objections to Islam, why then didn't they
(similar to Adi bin Hatim) ask why the Qur'an denies the crucifixion, despite
the four gospels attesting to it, if in fact the Qur'an was attesting the
textual incorruptibility of the four gospels just as White asserts?
Zawadi of course has made the
mistaken assumption that all Christians believe the Quran denies the
crucifixion. In fact it is the Muslims themselves like Shabir Ally who
subscribe to the apparent death theory e.g. Jesus was crucified and passed out.
It is clear then that even many Muslims like Ahmed Deedat and Shabir Ally who
believe Jesus was indeed crucified. And here at Answering Islam many of us
believe it is quite obvious the Quran teaches the death of Jesus. We have also documented how some Muslims could believe the Quran is
authentic and still affirm the Gospel despite the crucifixion over here.
In fact here is several early
Muslim adherents who accepted the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ
despite what the Quran and Gospels say:
"According
to Ibn Humayd- Salamah- Ibn Ishaq- 'Umar b. 'Abdullah b. Urwah b. al-Zubayr-
Ibn Sulaym al-Ansari al-Zuraqi: One of our women was under a vow to appear on
al-Jamma', a mountain in 'Aqiq near Madinah, and I went with her. We stood on
the mountain and, lo and behold, there was a huge grave with two huge stone
slabs over it- one at the head, one at the feet. On them was an inscription in
the ancient script (musnad) which I could not decipher. I carried the
slabs with me halfway down the mountain, they proved too heavy, however, so I
threw one (down) and descended with the other. I showed it to readers of Syriac
(to determine) whether they knew its script; but they did not. I showed it to
psalm (zabur) copyists from the Yaman and those versed in reading the musnad
script; but they did not recognize it, either.
As
I found nobody who recognized it, I threw it under a coffer we had, and there
it lay for years. Then people from Mah in Persia cam to us looking for pearls,
and I said to them, ' Do you have a script?' 'Yes,' they said. I brought out
the stone for them and lo and behold, they read it. It was in their script, 'This
is the tomb of Jesus, son of Mary, God's messenger to the people of this land.'
They were its people at that time. Among them HE DIED, SO THEY BURIED HIM ON
THE MOUNTAINTOP.
According
to Ibn Humyad- Salamah- Ibn Ishaq: The rest of the apostles were assaulted,
viciously exposed to the sun, tortured, and dishonorably paraded. The Roman
king, who ruled over them and who was an idol-worshiper, heard this. He was
told that a man among the Israelites, subject to his rule, WAS ASSAULTED AND
SLAIN. The man had announced to them that he was God's messenger. He performed
miracles, revived the dead and healed the sick. He created a bird of clay,
breathed into it, and it flew, by God's permission. He told them of hidden
things. The king exclaimed, 'But why did you not mention this to me, about
him and them? By God, had I known, I would not have let them have a free hand
against him!' Then he sent for the apostles and snatched them from the hands of
the Israelites. He asked the apostles about the faith of Jesus and about his
fate. They told him, whereupon he embraced their faith. The king released
Sergius, and concealed him. He took THE WOODEN CROSS WHICH JESUS HAD BEEN
CRUCIFIED, AND HE HONORED AND PRESERVED IT BECAUSE JESUS HAD TOUCHED IT.
The king became thus became an enemy of the Israelites, and killed many of
them. From this arose Christianity in Rome." (Tabari, pp. 123-124;
bold and capital emphasis ours) (more here)
All the previous articles
also document the ridiculous explanations provided by Muslims, and point out there is not a
single authentic tradition from Mohammed or one of his companions explaining
the precise meaning of 4:157-159 which is why for example Yusuf Ali says
regarding even 4:159:
There
is not one of the People of the Scripture but will believe in him before his
death, and on the Day of Resurrection he will be a witness against them –
Ali explains this as follows:
Before his death: Interpreters are not agreed as to the exact
meaning. Those who hold that Jesus did not die refer the pronoun
"his" to Jesus. They say that Jesus is still living in the body and
that he will appear just before the Final Day, after the coming of the Mahdi,
when the world will be purified of sin and unbelief. There will be a final
death before the final Resurrection, but all will have believed before that
final death. Others think that "his" is better referred to "none
of the People of the Book", and that the emphatic form "must
believe" (la-yu` minanna) denotes more a question of duty than of
fact. (more here)
But Zawadi’s main objection that Muslims would have
known about Christian scriptures and what they teach, and so would have
rejected the gospels about Jesus is also undermined by his own sources, not
implicitly, but rather explicitly:
Al-Tabari cites
Matthew's Gospel, more specifically Matthew 2:1-15, as an accurate depiction of
historical events that transpired in Jesus' life:
"Some historians mentioned that Jesus was
born forty-two years after Augustus had become emperor. Augustus continued to
live on, and his reign lasted fifty-six years; some add a few days. The Jews
assaulted Christ. The sovereign in Jerusalem at the time was Caesar, and it was
on his behalf that Herod the Great reigned in Jerusalem. Messengers
of the king of Persia came to him. Sent to Christ, they came to
Herod by mistake. They informed Herod that the king of Persia had sent
them to offer Christ the gifts they carried, gifts of gold, myrrh and
frankincense. They told him that they had observed that Christ's star had
risen - they had learned this from computation. They offered him the
gifts at Bethlehem in Palestine. When Herod learned about them, he
plotted against Christ, and looked for him in order to slay him. God
commanded an angel to tell Joseph, who was with Mary at the sanctuary, that
Herod intended to slay the child, and to instruct him to flee to Egypt
with the child and its mother.
"When
Herod died the angel told Joseph, who was in Egypt, that Herod was dead and
that his son Archelaus reigned instead - the man who sought to slay the
child was no longer alive. Joseph took the child to Nazareth in
Palestine, to FULFILL the word of Isaiah the prophet, 'I called you out of
Egypt'..." (Tabari, The History of al-Tabari Volume IV - The
Ancient Kingdom, Moshe Perlman trans. [The State University of New York
Press; Albany, 1987], pp. 124-125)
The footnote reads:
"The
reference ascribed here to Isaiah is in Hosea 11:1." (Ibid, p. 125)
Ibn Ishaq quotes the
Gospel of John as the very same gospel given to Jesus:
"Among the things which have reached me
about what Jesus the Son of Mary stated in the Gospel which he received from
God for the followers of the Gospel, in applying a term to describe the apostle
of God, is the following. It is extracted FROM WHAT JOHN THE APOSTLE SET
DOWN FOR THEM WHEN HE WROTE THE GOSPEL FOR THEM FROM THE TESTAMENT OF JESUS SON
OF MARY: 'He that hateth me hateth the Lord. And if I had not done in their
presence works which none other before me did, they had not sin: but from now
they are puffed up with pride and think that they will overcome me and also the
Lord. But the word that is in the law must be fulfilled, 'They hated me without
a cause' (i.e. without reason). But when the Comforter has come whom God will
send to you from the Lord's presence, and the spirit of truth which will have
gone forth from the Lord's presence he (shall bear) witness of me and ye also,
because ye have been with me from the beginning. I have spoken unto you about
this that ye should not be in doubt. "The
Munahhemana (God bless and preserve him!) in Syriac is Muhammad; in
Greek he is the paraclete." (Ishaq, Life Of Muhammad, trans. Alfred
Guillaume, pp. 103-104)
The preceding Gospel
citation is taken from John 15:23-16:1. Ishaq never once hints that this
particular Gospel is inauthentic or corrupt. (more here)
We must ask Zawadi then using his own reasoning, if
the Muslims knew the gospels about
Jesus could not of been the gospel given
to Jesus, how then do these Muslims provide information showing the Gospel
(singular) is contained in Matthew and John? Thus Per Zawadi’s own reasoning
this kind of mistake could not have occurred.
Further more, how is it the Gospel(s) was able to be
written down in Arabic as sanctioned by God? And why are Muslims referring to
the Gospels as legitimate?
Khadija
then accompanied him to her cousin Waraqa bin Naufal bin Asad bin 'Abdul 'Uzza,
who, during the Pre-Islamic Period became a Christian and used to write the
writing with Hebrew letters. He would write from THE GOSPEL in Hebrew as
much AS ALLAH WISHED HIM TO WRITE ... (Sahih Al-Bukhari, Volume
1, Book 1, Number 3)
...
Khadija then took him to Waraqa bin Naufil, the son of Khadija's paternal
uncle. Waraqa had been converted to Christianity in the Pre-lslamic Period and
used to write Arabic and write of THE GOSPEL in Arabic as much AS
ALLAH WISHED HIM TO WRITE ... (Sahih Al-Bukhari, Volume 6, Book 60,
Number 478)
Narrated 'Aisha:
... Waraqa was the son of her paternal uncle, i.e., her father's brother, who during the Pre-Islamic Period became a Christian and used to write the Arabic writing and used to write of the GOSPELS in Arabic as much as Allah wished him to write... (Sahih Al-Bukhari, Volume 9, Book 87, Number 111)
The Prophet returned to Khadija while his heart was beating rapidly. She took him to Waraqa bin Naufal who was a Christian convert and used to read the GOSPELS in Arabic... (Sahih Al-Bukhari, Volume 4, Book 55, Number 605)Al-Tabari writes:
According
to Hisham (b. Muhammad al-Kalbi) - one of his colleagues - Amr b. Abi al-Miqdam
- Amr b. Ikrimah: We spent the morning of the day on which Husayn was killed in
Medina. One of our mawali told us,
"Yesterday
I heard a voice calling out:
O
men who have rashly killed Husayn, do expect torture and chastisement. All the
people of heaven, prophets, angels, and tribes prosecute you. You have been
cursed by the tongue of the son of David, and of Moses, AND OF THE BRINGER
OF THE GOSPELS."
According
to Hisham (b. Muhammad al-Kalbi) - Umar b. Hazum al-Kalbi said that his father
had heard that voice. (The History of Tabari, The Caliphate of Yazid B.
Mu-Awiyah, trans. I. K. A. Howard [State University of New York Press],
Volume 19, pp. 178-179)
And:
Ahmad
ibn 'Abd Allah ibn Salam [also] said:
I
have translated the beginning of this book, and the Torah, THE GOSPELS,
and THE BOOKS OF THE PROPHETS and disciples from Hebrew, Greek, and
Sabian, which are the languages of the people of each book, in Arabic, letter
for letter ... (Abu 'l-Faraj Muhammad ibn Ishaq al-Nadim, The Fihrist - A
10th Century AD Survey of Islamic Culture, edited and translated by Bayard
Dodge [Great Books of the Islamic World, Inc., Columbia University Press,
1970], p. 42; bold and capital emphasis ours)
Ultimately all of these citations are unnecessary as
it is Zawadi himself who affirms this article, according to his own website he
says:
The main problem
with Christians who put forth these arguments is that they fail to identify and
understand how the Qur'an uses the terms 'Torah' and 'Gospel' in the Qur'an.
When the Qur'an talks about the Torah and Gospel, ONE OF IT’S INTENTIONS is to
speak about the original revelations sent to Moses and Jesus peace be upon them
both respectively. SOMETIMES the Qur'an or authentic
hadith might appear to be speaking about the Torah and Gospel, which Jews
and Christians refer to.
For example, when I
debate the topic 'Did Jesus Claim Divinity' with Christians, I usually issue
this challenge 'Show me where Jesus claimed divinity in the Gospel'. Now, my intention here is that I am
referring to THE GOSPEL referred to by Christians and that is the COMBINED FOUR
GOSPELS of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. However, my intention is not
to state that this is the actual Gospel that God revealed to Jesus peace be
upon him. So the word is used in
different contexts and Christians fail to identify this when it comes to studying the Qur'an and authentic hadith.
(source)
It is clear then, according to Zawadi not every
usage of “Gospel” in the Quran refers to the Gospel given to Jesus, but refers
to the “Gospel” (four canonical gospels) as possessed by the Christians. Thus
gospel in the singular can refer to the collection of gospels collected by the Christians.
We further have proof that these Gospel(s) were being translated with the
direct explicit approval of Allah. We have proof that Gospel and Gospels are
used interchangeably. We have further proof Muslims appealed to the Gospel to
vindicate Mohammed as a prophet and to describe accurate history. Furthermore
there is no contesting from the early Muslims about any of the authors or
apostles! Also what is clear is we have direct evidence early Muslims approved
of the Gospel, but no evidence early Muslims believed a distinct Gospel (apart
from the ones in the Christian New Testament) was given to Issa that was later
corrupted. Per our challenge above, we challenge Zawadi to provide evidence of
such an anachronism!
Further more Zawadi states:
Islam states
that one of the ways to follow the Injeel is to believe that it predicts the
Prophet (peace be upon him).
Yet according to
Zawadi since the “original Injeel” given to Issa, did not exist, the Quran
demands the Christians to judge by the Injeel that did exist in his time, which
Zawadi says is:
The Injeel was not totally lost.
Nowhere does the Qur'an refer to the Injeel revealed to Jesus (peace be upon
him) as some sort of documented book. Rather, they were the teachings (revealed
of course) of Jesus (peace be upon him) of which some of them could have found
their way to the four gospels and possibly even other documents unknown to us
today…
As
I have argued earlier in the article, such a burden would lie on White to
demonstrate that the Muslims couldn't have known such a very basic fact such as
Christians possessing four different gospels. We are not even
discussing the contents of the New Testament here, rather the focus here is on
the very public, popular and rudimentary fact that Christians possess four different
gospels.
Since Zawadi concedes the Injeel possessed by the
Christians at the time of Mohammed was the four gospels and unknown sources,
why does Zawadi then disobey Islam and the Quran?
Zawadi who asserts that Islam says
Christians are commanded to judge the Injeel that contains prophecies of
Mohammed by using the Quran but he has failed to carry out Allah’s command in
his apologetics:
I found this
"Muhammad in the Bible" argument to be effective with the Jews and
Christians of the Prophet Muhammad's time since many of them still knew the true
teachings of the Torah and Gospel despite its textual corruption. These
people are not here today and that is why I personally do not use the
"Muhammad in the Bible" argument. (source)
Zawadi has thus broken the command
of Islam, and elevated his own desires above the command of God! Islam calls this
shirk and claims Zawadi has made
himself into a Lord. (9:31)
Further more Zawadi explains why he
gave up this argument:
How is there any contradiction between me saying that the
prediction of Muhammad (peace be upon him) to come is there in the current
Bible, yet they are vague when looked at along with the other verses that are
corrupted?
For example, I believe that when Jesus referred to the
Comforter to come in the New Testament he is actually referring to Muhammad
(peace be upon him). However, it is not clear because of the
false verses surrounding it.
What is so difficult to understand regarding this position
of mine? I never said that the predictions in fullness have remained preserved
in the Bible. (here)
Note Zawadi’s absurd reasoning for giving up this argument.
He claims many Jews and Christians still knew the true teachings of the Torah and Injeel at the time of Mohammed
while simultaneously claiming they had the exact gospels as the Christians
today with the exception of a few unknown sources. We must ask Zawadi how they
knew the true teachings of the Torah and Injeel? Without having uncorrupt
copies of these revelations? This is obviously an absurd unjustifiable reason
for replacing your own whim over Allah’s command! Unless Zawadi is confessing
the original Torah and Injeel existed in the time of Mohammed thus exposing
Zawadi’s own fallacious response to Dr. White.
Conclussion
We would personally like to thank Zawadi for providing
further support that his adhoc explanations and arbitrary anachronistic
assertions can never be justified by Islam or reason or even the science of
tafsir. His exegesis is as “shoddy”
as it gets, and to end this article, we will quote the words of Dr. James White
which still hold to be true:
“To
establish his interpretation, Bassam would have to derive it not
from later tafsir, but from the
text itself. I would go into the text more
fully here to elucidate the problems Bassam's interpretation has, but as I said
above, brevity is of necessity this evening. Suffice it to say that if you
attempt to make this nothing more than a "believe in the Qur'an not the
Injeel because the Injeel has been corrupted and lost"
assertion, you leave the text without meaning…
Now,
the anachronistic nature of Bassam Zawadi's reading of the text is illustrated
by the included element of the alleged prophetic testimony to Muhammad, surely
one of the weakest elements of modern Islam's apologetic framework.
Some Salafi interpreters do, in fact, see such a theme behind this text, as
well as Surah 10:94, though it is hard to prove this from the
text itself. The
only way to really derive such an interpretation is to do so by reading the
Qur'an in the light of another source,
i.e., the hadith, and many are willing to do this (though few consider the
epistemological problem this creates for their claims regarding the nature of
the Qur'an in contrast with the nature of the ahadith).
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