NationStates Jolt Archive

This is the transcript of a talk given by Peter Saunders, Student Secretary of the UK Christian Medical Fellowship, at Manchester University on Tuesday 24th February 1998.

I didn't choose the title of this talk and you may think it strange even to ask the question 'wasn't Jesus a Muslim?' After all, Jesus Christ is the central figure in Christianity and the name Christian was first used to describe his followers (Acts 11:26).

But Jesus is a very important figure in Islam too. He's regarded as one of the greatest prophets, the forerunner of Muhammad and the one to whom God revealed the 'Injil' or Gospel.

In the broadest sense of the word Jesus was a Muslim because the word Muslim simply means 'one who submits to God'. Jesus certainly submitted to God and perhaps uniquely could ask 'who accuses me of sin?' and silence all his critics. In fact the world Islam simply means 'submission'.

But we're asking a far deeper question. We're asking whether or not Jesus embraced the same faith as Muhammad. Would he, for instance, have recognised Muhammad as 'the seal of the prophets'? Would he have believed that the Qur'an was the word of God? Would he have prayed towards Mecca, fasted at Ramadan, recited the Creed or indeed denied his own divinity?

If by saying 'wasn't Jesus a Muslim?' we're asking these far deeper questions then Muslims and Christians find themselves strongly at odds in their answers.

Both Christianity and Islam have been tremendously influential. About one quarter of the world's population at least nominally, would regard themselves as Christians. A fifth would call themselves Muslims. Yet for most of the last thirteen centuries the two religions have developed in parallel in separate parts of the world. Islam has mainly been centred in the Middle East, North Africa, Central Asia, Turkey, India and South East Asia (especially Indonesia and Malaysia). By contrast Christianity has been confined largely to Europe, North and South America, Africa and the former Soviet Union. And yet both have been, and still are, growing rapidly.

Now, perhaps for the first time in world history, Christians and Muslims can meet and talk in a way that they've never been able to before. This is especially possible in schools, university forums like this, and on the internet where Muslim Christian dialogue is taking place on an unprecedented scale.

In many ways Muslims and Christians find themselves as co-belligerents in a common battle against the modern world. The West is now not Christian but rather post-modernist. It's characterised by an obsession with media technology (consumerism and entertainment), a radical relativism which asserts that we can all have our own private truth, an ego-centrism (which looks after number one) and a religious pluralism which asserts all religions are the same. This way of thinking has led to escapism and cynicism in society generally.

By contrast both Christianity and Islam find themselves running against this ideology. They share a concern for community, service and absolute truth: involvement rather than escapism, hope as opposed to cynicism. While postmodern society holds that man is simply a clever monkey, the product of matter, chance and time in a Godless universe, Muslims and Christians are together in asserting that man was made to enjoy a relationship with God.

Similarities between Islam and Christianity

Before exploring the differences between Islam and Christianity its useful to map out our common ground. There are seven common strands that are clearly evident.

First, that Islam and Christianity share a common ethical code, one which underlies respect for marriage, a belief in the sanctity of life, and a respect for property. The Ten Commandments of the Old Testament are very similar to Islamic ethics and as Christian doctors we find ourselves agreeing with Muslims on many ethical issues. For example members of the Christian Medical Fellowship work together with members of the Islamic Medical Association within HOPE (Healthcare Opposed to Euthanasia).

Second, Christianity and Islam share a common geography and history. The two religions date back to the Middle East and in particular come together in the person of Abraham and his two sons, Ishmael and Isaac.

Third, we share a belief in one God. This may seem a surprise to Muslim listeners, but both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible assert God's oneness. 'The Lord is one' says Deuteronomy 6:4. 'There is One God...' says 1 Timothy 2:5.

Fourth, we share a belief in prophets - men throughout history chosen as God's mouthpiece who spoke God's Word. Many of these prophets are shared in both religious traditions. For example: Moses who brought us the Torah (Taurat), David who brought us the Psalms (Zabur), and of course Jesus who preached the Gospel (Injil). There are several other biblical prophets who are also mentioned in the Qur'an.

Fifth, we share a belief in angels: heavenly beings who are used as God's messengers throughout history. Gabriel in particular plays a prominent place in both religions. Muslims believe that Muhammad was visited by Gabriel and of course Christians believe that Gabriel appeared to Mary to announce the birth of Jesus Christ.

Sixth, we share a belief in Scriptural authority. We accept that God's revelations throughout history have been recorded in books, and while we may disagree about the degree of divine inspiration of the various books in our religious traditions, we nonetheless both share a profound respect of the authority of 'Scripture'.

Seventh and finally, we share a belief in the day of judgment. Both, Christians and Muslims, hold that on this day God will divide everyone who has lived on our planet into two groups; one group consigned to heaven and the other group consigned to hell. While we differ on the criteria by which that judgment will be made, we nevertheless concur on the fact that there are only two possible destinations for human beings after death.

Similarities between Muslim and Christian views of Christ

So, there are many similarities between the two religions, in fact even when we come to the person of Jesus Christ there are some common strands. There is very little in the Qur'an about Jesus. When we consider that the Qur'an is about the same length as the New Testament but only mentions Jesus in a few of its 114 chapters (whereas by contrast the whole of the New Testament of the Bible is about Christ) we can see that there is little balance in the quantity of material. However, what little there is in the Qur'an affirms a lot of what we know about Jesus from the Gospels.

This is particularly evident in three areas.

First with regard to his birth. The Qur'an deals with this in Sura 19:16-23, 29-33 and in Sura 3:42-47, 59. These verses affirm that an angel visits Mary (cf Luke 1:26,27), and indicates that God has chosen her and singled her out (cf Luke 1:28). She is said to be blessed among women (cf Luke 1:31-33) and great things are spoken of the son she will bare (cf Luke 1:31-33). The Qur'an in Sura 3:59 likens Jesus to Adam, (as does the New Testament in 1 Corinthians 5:22, 45-49 and Romans 5). Most importantly the Qur'an repeatedly affirms the fact of the virgin birth (Sura 19:20). Interestingly Jesus is the only one of the prophets mentioned in the Qur'an who is said to have had a virgin birth. When we consider that Jesus was male, and that he therefore had a Y chromosome, we see that the only explanation for its origin (since it could not have come from Mary herself) was that God must have created it afresh. This is probably what the Bible means when it affirms 'a body you have prepared for me' in the book of Hebrews. Certainly there is no suggestion in the Bible or in the Qur'an that God had intercourse with Mary or implication that even the X chromosome came from her. This creation of a body for Jesus was a unique act (although Jesus himself, we believe, was existing before time began).

Second, there are similarities in the Qur'an and the Bible with regard to the life of Christ. Like the New Testament, the Qur'an affirms that Jesus performed miracles: in particular that he restored sight to the blind, healed lepers and raised people from the dead (Sura 3:49, 5:11). The Qur'an also affirms that Jesus brought 'the message of the Gospel' and that he committed no sin (Sura 3:46).

Third, there are similarities between the titles given to Christ in the Qur'an and those in the Bible. The Qur'an calls Jesus 'the statement of truth' (Sura 17:24), a similar claim to Jesus calling himself 'the Way the Truth and the Life' in John 14:6. Similarly, the Qur'an calls Jesus the Word (Sura 10:19 cf John 1:1), the Apostle (Sura 19:31 cf Hebrews 3:1) and the servant or slave of God (Sura 4:172 and 19:31 cf Isaiah chapters 42, 49, 50 and 53). The servant of God was one of Jesus' favourite terms for himself and he clearly taught that he was the person talked about in the prophet Isaiah's 'Servant Songs' written many centuries before. Most remarkably, the Qur'an refers eleven times (for example Sura 3:45, 4:71, 5:19, 9:30) to Christ as the Messiah. This is particularly interesting because Messiah (or Christ in Greek) is the title repeatedly applied to Jesus throughout the Bible. In fact, much of the Old Testament is devoted to explaining the characteristics and qualities that the coming Messiah will have.

So we see that there are similarities between the person of Jesus as painted in the Qur'an and the Bible. But there are huge differences too.

Differences between Muslim and Christian Views of Jesus

Some stories we find in the Qur'an about Jesus are not in the Bible at all.

For example the Qur'an tells us that a palm tree provides anguish for Mary after Jesus' birth (Sura 19:22-26). We are told that Jesus created pigeons from clay and then threw them into the air whereupon they turned into real birds and flew away (Sura 3:49 and 5:11). The baby Jesus is alleged to have talked from the crib (19:29-33) and perhaps most surprising of all we are told that God, Mary and Jesus together constitute the Christian trinity (Sura 5:116).

These ideas to Christians sound quite bizarre, but now with the benefit of archaeology we have some idea as to what their sources may have been. At the time of Muhammad the New Testament had not yet been translated into Arabic and so he didn't have access to the New Testament manuscripts when recording the Qur'an. However, we know that he was in contact with a number of groups who, although calling themselves Christian, had quite bizarre beliefs. Some people suggest that Muhammad may have been influenced by this and simply incorporated 'heresy' into the text of the Qur'an and there is, in fact, very good support for this view. The story of the palm tree is found in an apocryphal document called 'The Lost Books of the Bible'. Similarly the story of the pigeons comes from 'Thomas' Gospel of the infancy of Jesus Christ'. The story of baby Jesus talking is remarkably similar to that found in an Arabic apocryphal fable from Egypt named 'The First Gospel in the Infancy of Jesus Christ' and the false belief about God, Mary and Jesus making up the trinity was also peddled by a heretical sect called the Choloridians which had been banished to Arabia at the time.

So there are similarities but also differences.

If we want to know more details about the life of Christ, then we need to look at sources other than the Qur'an. The Qur'an was not written down until at least 600 years after the death of Jesus but the New Testament was recorded by eye-witnesses within a few years of his death. Not surprisingly we can also learn a reasonable amount about Jesus from late first and early second century documents written by non-Christian Jewish and Roman historians. Let us look at some of these latter documents first because they predate the Qur'an by at least 400 years.

Early non Christian sources about Christ

First there is Tacitus. Tacitus is of particular interest to us in England because he was the son-in-law of Julius Agricola, who was once the Roman Governor of Britain. In approximately 110 AD Tacitus, one of Rome's most famous historians, recorded this about Christ:

'Therefore to dispel rumour, Nero substituted his culprits and treated with the most extreme punishments some people, popularly known as Christians whose disgraceful activities were notorious. The originator of that name Christus had been executed when Tiberias was Emperor by order of the procurator Pontius Pilatus. But the deadly cult, though checked for a time, was now breaking out again not only in Judea, the birth place of this evil, but even throughout Rome where all the nasty and disgusting ideas from all over the world pour in and find a ready following.
Tacitus was by no means a follower of Christ but he did nonetheless record and confirm the basic facts about his life and death.

Similarly Josephus, a Jewish historian who lived from AD 37 to 90, wrote the following in his 'Antiquities of the Jews'.

'And there arose about this time a source of new trouble, one Jesus. He was a doerof marvellous deeds. This man was the so-called Christ and when Pilate had condemned him to the Cross, those who had loved him did not cease - for he appeared to them, as they said, on the third day alive again.'

There was also Lucian of Samosata, a Satirist - a 'John Cleese' of the early second century who referred to Christ as 'the man who was crucified in Palestine because he introduced a new cult into the world'. Seutonius refers to Christians as being 'given over to a new and mischievous superstition'. Pliny the Younger gives advice to Trajan about killing Christians and Thallus and Phlegon are two first-century historians who debate the cause of the darkness in the middle of the day which occurred at Christ's crucifixion.
This brief excursion into Jewish and Roman history is simply to show that the consensus among non-Christian writers was that Jesus existed, performed miracles, was crucified under Pilate when Tiberius was Emperor, and was believed by his followers to have risen from the dead. If we're wanting more detailed evidence then it is to the Gospels in the New Testament that we must turn.

The Gospels in the New Testament

The New Testament consists of 27 books all of which were almost certainly written before the fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD. The New Testament is all about Jesus and as mentioned is about the same length as the Qur'an. Therefore we have a tremendous amount of material to examine.

The first four books in the New Testament are four biographies written by two of Jesus' twelve disciples (Matthew and John), another man (Mark) who was a close follower of Jesus and one of the leaders in the early church, and a Greek doctor (Luke) who although he never met Christ personally interviewed the eye-witnesses and became an early Christian leader himself.

Their parallel accounts, although recording different details, show a remarkable degree of consistency. There was clearly no change in the story through a chain of oral tradition, simply because there wasn't such a chain. It was eye-witnesses who recorded these events. Also, the fact that we have very early manuscripts and fragments of New Testament mean that we can be confident that what we have today is what the original authors first wrote . The earliest fragments that exist include the John Ryland fragment in the John Ryland Library in Manchester which dates from 125 AD, and the Magdalen fragments which date from about 65 - 70 AD and are housed in the Magdalen College Library in Oxford.

What is remarkable is that these date from either the life-time of the Apostles (in the case of the Magdalen fragment) or from the life-time of those who knew the Apostles personally. This is despite the fact that they were written on papyrus which easily disintegrates.

There are also complete manuscripts of the New Testament from the first three centuries after Christ including the Codex Alexandrinus and Codex Sinaiticus in the British Library and the Codex Vaticanus in the Vatican Library in Rome. In fact there are over 230 New Testament manuscripts and fragments of the New Testament (in about eight different languages) which pre-date the time of Muhammad. In addition to this there are 88,000 quotes from the New Testament in the writings of the 'church fathers', 32,000 of which date from before the Council of Nicea in 325 AD.

We find nothing like the documentary evidence for the New Testament in any other literature from antiquity. For example, we know of Julius Caesar only from ten documents, the earliest of which is a copy written 1,000 years after his life-time. Apart from the New Testament the best documented literature in antiquity is Homer's Iliad of which have only 643 copies, the earliest written 500 years after the original.

Clearly, the New Testament manuscript evidence is extremely reliable.

Has the New Testament been changed?

It is often said by Muslims that the Bible has been changed, but when could it have been changed in relation to the writing of the Qur'an? It cannot have been after the Qur'an was written since we have New Testament manuscripts pre-dating the Qur'an as I have already said.

Equally, it cannot have been changed before the Qur'an was written because otherwise the Qur'an would say so. Interestingly the Qur'an does not say that the Bible has been changed at any point. In fact, to the contrary, the Qur'an encourages its readers to compare its own teaching with the Old and New Testaments of the Bible in order to confirm the truth of the message. This makes sense when we understand that the New Testament was not translated into Arabic until after the Qur'an was written. Therefore there was no opportunity for Muslims to realise that there was any clash between the teaching of the two books. This explains why Muhammad used to refer to the Bible for guidance (Sura 5:43, 46 and 6:34 and 10:64).

Most importantly how could God have allowed the Bible to be changed when Jesus himself said that 'Scripture cannot be broken' (John 10:35). Why would anyone have dared to try and change it when faced with the truth of the warnings of the consequences of doing so in the Bible itself.

It is significant that the early Muslim commentators Bukhari (Al-Razi) were all agreed that the Bible could not be changed since it was God's Word and several centuries passed before Muslims claimed that it had been changed. Surely if the Qur'an was indeed written by God, as Muslims claim, it would record the plain fact that the Qur'an and New Testament disagree. Instead - the Qur'an affirms the Bible.

Jesus Christ in the New Testament

What then do the New Testament documents tell us about the person of Christ? As mentioned, they agree with some of what the Qur'an teaches but provide much more detailed eye-witness accounts of Jesus' teaching, miraculous deeds and claims about himself. For example, the Sermon on the Mount which makes up three chapters of the Gospel of Matthew consists entirely of Christ's direct teaching on a multiplicity of different subjects. Many miracles showing Christ's mastery over diseases and natural phenomena are described in all four Gospels and the Apostle John tells us that Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of his disciples which were not recorded. John's comment on this is to say that 'if everyone of them were written down I suppose that even the whole world would not have had room for the books that would be written' (John 21:25).

The New Testament confirms that Christ gave wonderful teaching and performed many miraculous deeds. In stark contrast to the Qur'an it claims that Christ was crucified by the Roman authorities.

Probably the most remarkable thing recorded about Christ in the New Testament is the claims that he made. He claimed that he was the only way to God (John 14:6) and this claim was confirmed by the Apostles - in particular both Peter (Acts 4:12) and Paul (1 Tim 2:5). More than this, when asked to reveal God the Father to the disciples he simply asked them 'have I been with you so long and you don't know me?' (John 14:9) He followed this up by saying that anyone who had seen him had seen the Father. It was this astounding teaching that Jesus and God were one that marked him out as unique.

That this is what he was claiming is very clear from the New Testament where his divinity is directly stated in at least eight passages (John 1:1,2; John 1:18; John 20:28; Acts 20:28; Romans 9:5; Titus 2:13; Hebrews 1:8; 2 Peter 1:1) and strongly implied in others (Matt 1:23; John 17:3,5; Col 2:2; 2 Thess 1:12; 1 Tim 1:17).

His claims to be one with God were further confirmed by the fact that he called himself 'I Am' (John 8:58) a title which God used in the Old Testament to describe only himself (Ex 3:14). He accepted the title Lord (Hebrew Yahweh ' Greek Kyrios) and accepted worship (John 9:38) while being intimately aware of the Old Testament laws about idolatry. He claimed to have the power to forgive sins (Mark 2:5), which only God can do and also to be the Judge on the Day of Judgement (John 5:22). On top of this he affirmed that he existed even before the world was made (John 17:5).

If we have any doubts about what Jesus said we can tell from the reactions people had to him that they knew what he was claiming. They either worshipped him (Matt 4:33) or accused him of blasphemy (John 10:33). He was crucified simply because he claimed at his trial to be 'the Son of God'. From Psalm 2, the Jews at the time knew this to be an implicit claim to Divinity. Their response was to say 'you have heard the blasphemy' and then to condemn him as worthy of death.

Mad, Bad or God?

What should we think of someone who claims to be God? There are only three alternatives. If the claim is false and the person making the claim does not know it to be false then we would have to say that they are suffering under a delusion and probably psychotic. On the other hand, if the claim is false and the person making it knows it to be false, then we would have to say that they are a deceiver trying to lead people astray. On the other hand, if the claim is true then we should recognise that person as both God and act accordingly. Would it be possible for God to become a man? If God can do anything then it must be. Why would he want to? Jesus said that he came to save the lost. In other words his visit to our planet had a purpose. He was both revealing his true identity and also dying on the Cross in order to make it possible for our broken relationship with God to be restored. The central message of Christianity is that the only way we can be put right with God and forgiven of our sins is by accepting that Jesus Christ has taken the punishment for our sins on our behalf. If we put our faith in him he will then grant us forgiveness and give us a new life so that we can approach the Day of Judgement with confidence.

Is it possible that Christ could have been psychotic or an evil deceiver? Certainly Muslims believe neither of these possibilities. How could he be mad when he gave such profound teaching? Similarly, how could someone who lived a life of virtue be evil?

He must have been God

Let us turn the question around. If it were possible for God to become a man, what sort of man would we expect him to be? We would expect him to have an unusual entry to life and both Qur'an and Bible confirm his virgin birth. We would expect him to be morally perfect and to perform extraordinary deeds, again facts confirmed in both Qur'an and Bible. We would expect him to speak the greatest words ever spoken and for him to have a profound effect on people. Furthermore we'd expect his influence to be universal and lasting and for his life to fulfil in minute detail the prophecies of the Messiah in the Old Testament of the Bible. This is exactly what we find. Finally we would expect him to exercise power over death and again this is confirmed by the eye-witnesses through his resurrection and rising from the dead.

We simply have to look at the evidence and come to our own conclusions. To return to our original question of 'Was Jesus a Muslim?' - we would again say 'Yes he was' if we simply mean by this that he was submitted to God. If however, we mean would he have denied his divinity and claims as recorded in the New Testament, then Jesus clearly was not a Muslim.

Despite the similarities between the two religions we are left at the end with them being completely irreconcilable with regard to their beliefs about Christ. The greatest sin in Islam is to associate anything with God. To do this is a certain route to judgement and everlasting hell.

By complete contrast in Christianity unbelief in Christ's divinity and resurrection is the path to judgement and hell.

Clearly both religions cannot be equally true. Despite the similarities the answer must turn on the identity of the person of Christ. You can compare Islam and Christianity to two bank-notes, both similar, but one of which is a valueless counterfeit. In deciding which one is counterfeit we need to ask which gives the true picture of Jesus. Ultimately this means that we either accept the testimony of the eye-witnesses who knew him, or accept that a 'revelation' received by someone 600 years after the events of the first century is more accurate. I simply leave you with a quote from St Paul: 'even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we have preached to you, let him be eternally condemned' (Gal 1:8). I am being deliberately provocative here, but you can see that I have no choice but to be. Either Christianity is a counterfeit or Islam is, and we must make our decision on the evidence available and act accordingly. I challenge you as one who has read the Qur'an and yet chosen in favour of the Bible. I pray that if you are a Muslim you will take up my challenge and read the New Testament Gospels with an open mind, praying that God will show you whether Christianity or Islam is true. Thank you.


Does anyone else believe this?

Why can't they both be counterfeit? The author is ignoring the possibility that a third way exists that is more true than either Christianity or Islam.

Queh?

:upyours:Queh?

great first post dude

tl;dr

Jesus was a Jew. Islam didn't exist until 7th century CE. Jesus was before then, by 6 years. Therefore, Jesus was not a muslim. The end.

Actually both books are more or less right in a way, depending on your POV.
2/3s of the Qur'an is partly a version of the Bible.

Jesus?

That creep can roll. I'll say that. :p

tl;dr

Which is why you missed the point in your answer ;)


I found the article a bit meh, I got about a third the way down and then just skimmed the rest.

Showing that two Abrahamic faiths are similar is not interesting to me. Though I suppose the question of "How would Jesus view Islam?" has its merits.

Silly me, I've always thought that Jesus (Yeoshua?) of Nazareth was a Jew. And a rabbi, very likely.

How can you be a member of a religion that only came about after you had died?

:upyours:

great first post dude

On the evidence of this, you being well equipped to comment of course?

So what was Mohammed before he started Islam - a Scientologist?

How can you be a member of a religion that only came about after you had died?

Ahh questions, the Achilles Heel of religion

Ahh questions, the Achilles Heel of religion

More like the big red self-destruct button on the evil overlord's mothership.

Toooo muuuuch teeeeext :headbang:

So what was Mohammed before he started Islam - a Scientologist?

ROFL, Rambhutan!:D

OP:
http://www.strongfans.com/upload/sf_gallery/Huttah/Jesus_n00b_LOL.png
Whoever's saying that seriously has no idea what he/she's talking about. The sources on Jesus's life (the Bible not necessarily being the most accurate) all agree in one simple fact, that he was from Judea, meaning, he was Hebrew. But then again, let us hear the nonesense pour forth.:D

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus

Does it matter? Does anyone care anymore? Any new realisations about this Jesus characters life are not going to stop christians hating muslims, muslims hating buddhists, and everyone hating jews! Seriously, religions is so over done, well... let me put it in culinary terms:

The other night I cooked a pork roast for the first time right. I had this awesome idea that I'd get it crackling, so I rub in oil and salt into the skin. Sure enough after cooking it for and hour and a half, it was still not crackling, despite teh roast starting to burn, so I had the brilliant idea of throwing the skin (after cutting it off) into the griller 'cause grillers can make things crunchy' (try it with bread sometime). Anyway , i chuck it in, and check every 2 minutes:
t=0: Not crackled. Just out of oven. rubbery
t=2: Still not crackled, griller has warmed up though
t=4: hmm... I think it could be getting closer, lets chuck a bit more salt and oil on...
At this point, I had to go and make use of the toilet due to my experimentation the night before making a curry
t=12: I come out still with a bit of toilet paper stuck in my crack and pants around the ankles to the fire alarms and the house filled with smoke, running onto the kitchen, my crackling is on fire!

So, moral of the story: You can keep on trying to have (cook) this debate (pork roast crackling), but ultimately it's going to end up in flames (flames) without your pants on.

End Thread


edit: On a side note, does anyone know how to cook crackling without starting a fire? plz msg...

The utter naivety of this text is epitomised in this paragraph.

Third, we share a belief in one God. This may seem a surprise to Muslim listeners, but both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible assert God's oneness. 'The Lord is one' says Deuteronomy 6:4. 'There is One God...' says 1 Timothy 2:5.

May come as a surprise to Muslims? The religion that counts Jesus and Abraham as prophets?

I'd say Muslims are infinitely more aware that they share the same God compared to most Christians, many of whom are surprised to learn Jesus wasn't born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

There's plenty others but I'd have to re-read something that's already caused my head to ache.

Jesus may have been 'muslim' in the pure literal meaning of the word, but him belonging to a faith that didn't even exist in his lifetime is nonsense. Furthermore, what the big deal about drawing paralells between Christianity and Islam, no shit they're similar, they both stemmed from Abraham.

A long read with very little to offer in the way of substance.

The utter naivety of this text is epitomised in this paragraph.



May come as a surprise to Muslims? The religion that counts Jesus and Abraham as prophets?

I'd say Muslims are infinitely more aware that they share the same God compared to most Christians, many of whom are surprised to learn Jesus wasn't born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

There's plenty others but I'd have to re-read something that's already caused my head to ache.
I think that paragraph means both religions are monotheistic even though some Muslims think Christianity is polytheistic with 3 major and several minor gods due to confusion over the trinity (which is not even mentioned in the Bible) and over why Catholics pray to saints (a practice not mentioned in the Bible either).

The article in general just repeats the obvious that the Abrahamic religions are very similar but not the same.

Jesus was Jewish, not Christian, (definitely not Catholic, to my confused Roman friends). Islam didn't spark until about six hundred years after Jesus DIED. What's worse is Muslims claim guys like Abraham and Moses were Muslims, they claim people alive THOUSANDS of years before Islam existed were Muslims.

As a Buddhist I find it abhorrent to insult another man, or group of people's intelligence. So I'll leave that to you guys.

May come as a surprise to Muslims? The religion that counts Jesus and Abraham as prophets?

I'd say Muslims are infinitely more aware that they share the same God compared to most Christians, many of whom are surprised to learn Jesus wasn't born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.


Come on, this is a group that thinks Lewis's Trillema is a compelling arguement for religion. Cut them some slack :)

The question of Jesus submitting to god and using the word Muslim to make the conversation more interesting is just semantics. It's the same thing as Allah vs God, Crusade vs Jihad, etc. etc.

If what we hear about Jesus is true (and I have my doubts, but w/e) then he obviously was subservient to god. Were he alive when god/allah supposedly revealed Himself to Mohammed, Jesus probably would have made his own decision on whether or not the revelation was legitimate, just like some Jews decided that Jesus was legitimate and the majority did not.

Religion is just a cycle of thought- it's kind of like playing telephone. Great example: The story of the birth of Christ is the same as the story of the birth of the Egyptian sun god, Horace. Obviously the Egyptian story of the birth of Horace predates Jesus by some huge margin. Yet, they are the same story; only the names have changed. I'm not saying that religion is unnecessary; it's a moral compass. I'm just saying we oughtta be more tolerant towards all religions, because they're all obviously one adaption of an original somewhere- the original form of structured religion. Horace was the Sun God, because he was God's son (sun) Jesus was God's son (sun)- somewhere in time, probably before the Egyptians, man took it to worship the sun, which would make sense because it controlled much more of your life then than it does now. Over time it adapted, and these adaptions branched out and mixed with other social and cultural beliefs in new areas that it moved to, and hence all the different religions there are now. Does it matter if you call Jesus a Jew or a Muslim or a Christian? I think as long as you call him a good person.

Jesus was Jewish, not Christian, (definitely not Catholic, to my confused Roman friends). Islam didn't spark until about six hundred years after Jesus DIED. What's worse is Muslims claim guys like Abraham and Moses were Muslims, they claim people alive THOUSANDS of years before Islam existed were Muslims.

As a Buddhist I find it abhorrent to insult another man, or group of people's intelligence. So I'll leave that to you guys.

I don't think (or let me rephrase it), I'm not sure the Qu'ran ever states that Jesus and Moses were Muslim. I do know the book recognizes the two as prophets, just as it recognizes Mary (Miriam) as a good woman and as a example for women to follow but going as far as saying that these 3 are Muslim, nope. Of course, if anyone else has proof of this, by all means, present it.

Religion is just a cycle of thought- it's kind of like playing telephone. Great example: The story of the birth of Christ is the same as the story of the birth of the Egyptian sun god, Horace. Obviously the Egyptian story of the birth of Horace predates Jesus by some huge margin. Yet, they are the same story; only the names have changed. I'm not saying that religion is unnecessary; it's a moral compass. I'm just saying we oughtta be more tolerant towards all religions, because they're all obviously one adaption of an original somewhere- the original form of structured religion. Horace was the Sun God, because he was God's son (sun) Jesus was God's son (sun)- somewhere in time, probably before the Egyptians, man took it to worship the sun, which would make sense because it controlled much more of your life then than it does now. Over time it adapted, and these adaptions branched out and mixed with other social and cultural beliefs in new areas that it moved to, and hence all the different religions there are now. Does it matter if you call Jesus a Jew or a Muslim or a Christian? I think as long as you call him a good person.


And you have proof for all this, yes?



(I especially like the idea that ancient civilisation were mindful of homonyms that would exist in an alien language millenia before said language existed)

OK, I think we get it -- Christianity and Islam are similar in many respects.

Now I'd like to know: Why did the author of the article feel the need to tell us this?

At the top of the piece, he is identified as the "Student Secretary" of his organization, and he opens by stating that he didn't pick the title of the talk. Does that mean this was a student exercise assigned by a teacher, akin to a presentation on "Our Friend the Beaver"? If so, then the OP wasted our time by making us read it.

If not, then, as one who is neither Christian nor Muslim, I wonder just what the hell this long-winded student-bore is getting at.

OK, I think we get it -- Christianity and Islam are similar in many respects.

Now I'd like to know: Why did the author of the article feel the need to tell us this?

At the top of the piece, he is identified as the "Student Secretary" of his organization, and he opens by stating that he didn't pick the title of the talk. Does that mean this was a student exercise assigned by a teacher, akin to a presentation on "Our Friend the Beaver"? If so, then the OP wasted our time by making us read it.

If not, then, as one who is neither Christian nor Muslim, I wonder just what the hell this long-winded student-bore is getting at.

Except that's not what he's saying - he's actually saying that there's particular differences and if one is true then the other must be false. He then proves Christianity to be true and thus prays that Muslims might read the New Testament so they can be saved.

The entire thing is naive, disrespectful, ignorant and quite stupid.

Does anyone else believe this?

Ok, Islam is really a sect of Judeaism, just like Christianity. This being the case, why are you all trying to kill each other?

Jesus was a jew, and a rabbi. So sorry, he wasn't Muslim.

Ok, Islam is really a sect of Judeaism, just like Christianity. This being the case, why are you all trying to kill each other?

I'm not sure that's the case - the idea is that there's one God, where many of the OT prophets were messengers of that one God, something accepted by both Muslims, Jews and Christians.

The difference lies in interpretation of that God, who Jesus Christ actually was, these are different interpretations is all.

It's not really correct to say Islam is a sect of Judaism, it's not an offshoot - it's a new interpretation of God is all, rather than born of Judaism.

word play in a fiery situation.
from what muslim means, we can say that nearly everyone who believes in god is muslim, but to be a muslim, you need to follow the islamic religion.
so no, jesus wasnt a muslim.

Except that's not what he's saying - he's actually saying that there's particular differences and if one is true then the other must be false. He then proves Christianity to be true and thus prays that Muslims might read the New Testament so they can be saved.

The entire thing is naive, disrespectful, ignorant and quite stupid.

You obviously read it far more carefully than I did because I admit I merely skimmed the parts that were full of Bible/Quran citations, which accounts for quite a lot of it. I picked up on the naive, ignorant and stupid parts but missed the disrespectful aspect. Now that I see that, it answer my question of what his point was. Clearly, the point of giving this talk was to reinforce the general condition of inter-religious conflict and distrust.

word play in a fiery situation.
from what muslim means, we can say that nearly everyone who believes in god is muslim, but to be a muslim, you need to follow the islamic religion.
so no, jesus wasnt a muslim.

Yes, I'd agree with this - I'd go further to say that there's three types of religion in this world, those of ME origin, those of Indian origin and then the remnants - Muravyets might disagree here, quite fairly - of ancient religions.

Hinduism might be considered an ancient religion - Taoism and Confucianism, reasonably considered as religions, from China, were born more of philosophies, though nodding to the natural order of the universe, which implies something greater than us.

ME religions are naturally related, Christianity and Jewish most closely, but Muslim religion was born of Mohammad's desire to emulate those religions - we can quibble over politically - to some extent. They certainly recognise the OT prophets as messengers of God.

Mohammad never claimed to be a son of God, only a messenger if not Seal, only Christianity claims a direct progeny of God. The argument is over how you follow, not necessarily who you follow.

You obviously read it far more carefully than I did because I admit I merely skimmed the parts that were full of Bible/Quran citations, which accounts for quite a lot of it. I picked up on the naive, ignorant and stupid parts but missed the disrespectful aspect. Now that I see that, it answer my question of what his point was. Clearly, the point of giving this talk was to reinforce the general condition of inter-religious conflict and distrust.

Exactly, it reeks of smug superiority.

i skimmed down to the bottom. he seems to conclude that while jesus advocates submission to the will of god (islam) that is not the crux of the problem.

for him the problem is that only one of the 2 religions can be true because one has jesus as god and one has him as a prophet. this creates a gulf too wide for acceptance of both beliefs.

Yes, I'd agree with this - I'd go further to say that there's three types of religion in this world, those of ME origin, those of Indian origin and then the remnants - Muravyets might disagree here, quite fairly - of ancient religions.
Just as an aside (because my name was mentioned), but not intending to pursue it and hijack the thread, my views on the relative ancientness of religions is this:

1) I tend to define "ancient" as 2000 years or more old. This is an extremely vague and flexible "standard" used by historians. So, going backwards, anything from now until about the Renaissance, I think, would be "modern history," anything from the Renaissance to roughly 2000 years ago would be "early modern history," anything from about 2000 years ago to the first appearance of written records (about 7500 years ago) would be "ancient history," and anything before that would be "prehistory."

2) With that in mind, I consider Christianity to be borderline ancient, Islam to be borderline modern, Judaism to be ancient, Hinduism to be ancient, and Buddhism to be somewhat borderline ancient.

3) When it comes to polytheist religions, the issue is a bit more complicated. The vast majority of polytheist religions today are actually solidly modern, if not brand-spanking new. This is for two reasons:

-- A) "Recreated" religions are actually new religions, in practical terms. I mean really, let's just be honest already. When you recreate an old religion from cultural remnants, you are really just taking the old names and stories and putting them onto new forms of rituals and spiritual theory. I see nothing wrong with that. By all means, let us create new cults for old gods, but let us not pretend we are worshipping them or relating to them as our ancestors did.

-- B) Polytheistic religions -- and especially those based in animism, which is what I practice -- are always changing themselves. Religions that worship an eternal god of everything can afford to have that god be a static constant. But religions that have gods of specific items in the world, have to keep changing who, what and how they worship, because as the world changes, so will the gods. So even in places that have practiced the same kind of religion for the entire historical period, people are not actually today worshipping the same way they did 5000 years ago -- or even 100 years ago.

Since I am animist polytheist, I find any and all arguments over which religion came first, or whether being older makes a religion more legitimate, or whose version of which paragraph of text is more accurate to the original to be rather nonsensical. Even the historically pegged religions I mentioned above are riddled with many rounds of modern revisions and spun-off sects. Approximately 40,000 modern sects in Christianity alone.

EDIT PS: As for the non-Indian and non-ME (which I assume means Middle Eastern) religion, I do take some exception to the use of the word "remnant." If all we are dealing with are mere remnants, then there are a shit-load of a lot of remnants cluttering up the world today, accounting for hundreds of millions of people, world-wide, who have nothing to do with either India or the Middle East. I refer to southern and central Africa, North America, South America, the Pacific regions, still practiced indigenous religions of Japan and Korea, as well as the Arctic regions. The incursions of Indian- and ME-influenced religions into those areas occurred so recently, and in such problematical contexts, that I do not believe it is accurate to say that their indigenous religions remain only as remnants at this time.

In deciding which one is counterfeit we need to ask which gives the true picture of Jesus. Ultimately this means that we either accept the testimony of the eye-witnesses who knew him, or accept that a 'revelation' received by someone 600 years after the events of the first century is more accurate. I simply leave you with a quote from St Paul: 'even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we have preached to you, let him be eternally condemned' (Gal 1:8).

haha, way to discount revelation in favor of eyewitnesses - i know that when i think of eyewitnesses to jesus, i immediately think of paul.

i skimmed down to the bottom. he seems to conclude that while jesus advocates submission to the will of god (islam) that is not the crux of the problem.

for him the problem is that only one of the 2 religions can be true because one has jesus as god and one has him as a prophet. this creates a gulf too wide for acceptance of both beliefs.
This is what I took from my initial light read of it, too, and that's why I wondered why he felt the need to point this out to us. Kind of the religious-debate equivalent of pointing at a horse and announcing, "Horse!"

Now if, as I suggest based on Barringtonia's reading of it, his point was to cop an attitude about how much better Christianity is than Islam, I'm still wondering why he bothered. His comments are so dull and old-hat, they hardly serve as a salvo in the fight, imo.

tl;dr

Jesus was a Jew. Islam didn't exist until 7th century CE. Jesus was before then, by 6 years. Therefore, Jesus was not a muslim. The end.

:confused:

"People wonder if Jesus was jewish. I say of course He was jewish! He was in his 30s, single, living at home... He worked in his father's business. His mother thought he was God's gift. He was jewish!" -Robin Williams

:D

I think whether Jesus was a jew or muslim or whatever, the author was just trying to point out that the figure of Jesus playing such a major part in both Christianity and Islam is an example of many of the similarities between the two religions. Although they differ in some beliefs concerning the act of worship, they are effectively worshipping the same God and sharing very similar ideals, and its just a case of where you happened to be born, e.g. the Middle East or Europe, affecting which particular faith you choose to worship. I don't see why they cannot learn from each other instead of fighting, I reckon its what Jesus would have wanted.

EDIT PS: As for the non-Indian and non-ME (which I assume means Middle Eastern) religion, I do take some exception to the use of the word "remnant." If all we are dealing with are mere remnants, then there are a shit-load of a lot of remnants cluttering up the world today, accounting for hundreds of millions of people, world-wide, who have nothing to do with either India or the Middle East. I refer to southern and central Africa, North America, South America, the Pacific regions, still practiced indigenous religions of Japan and Korea, as well as the Arctic regions. The incursions of Indian- and ME-influenced religions into those areas occurred so recently, and in such problematical contexts, that I do not believe it is accurate to say that their indigenous religions remain only as remnants at this time.

Absolutely and that's exactly where I thought 'remants' would be of issue, it implies it's dying where in fact it remains very present - actually, as an aside, this relates to one of my first debates on NSG, to which I still hold my side but I'm more fuzzy now.

For myself, possibly wrongly, my meaning in 'ancient' is a distinction of sorts. For me, ancient is the idea that every thing is a representation of an overall force, not created by one God as such - despite a creation force such as Chaos for example - but very separate aspects.

There's a fine line I suppose, I'd guess monotheism believes a singular God's presence is in everything, for me, ancient religion is of the belief that every thing makes up God.

I understand the timing issue, it's a fuzzy distinction for me - the difference may be in locality of belief - ancient - and entity of belief - modern.

EDIT: Rewrote

Just as an aside (because my name was mentioned), but not intending to pursue it and hijack the thread, my views on the relative ancientness of religions is this:

Given the relative worthlessness of the quoted speech, I think an extended discussion over the origins and definitions of different religions is both relevant and useful.

What if Islam didn't exist only 600 years after Jesus passed away? What if Islam was still alive when Jesus was still alive or even before that. Maybe Islam was still alive but it wasn't called Islam until that 600 years after Jesus' death.

Religion is just a cycle of thought- it's kind of like playing telephone. Great example: The story of the birth of Christ is the same as the story of the birth of the Egyptian sun god, Horace. Obviously the Egyptian story of the birth of Horace predates Jesus by some huge margin. Yet, they are the same story; only the names have changed. I'm not saying that religion is unnecessary; it's a moral compass. I'm just saying we oughtta be more tolerant towards all religions, because they're all obviously one adaption of an original somewhere- the original form of structured religion. Horace was the Sun God, because he was God's son (sun) Jesus was God's son (sun)- somewhere in time, probably before the Egyptians, man took it to worship the sun, which would make sense because it controlled much more of your life then than it does now. Over time it adapted, and these adaptions branched out and mixed with other social and cultural beliefs in new areas that it moved to, and hence all the different religions there are now. Does it matter if you call Jesus a Jew or a Muslim or a Christian? I think as long as you call him a good person.

Someone watch zeitgeist! i am sorry to say but watch it again, then think about what there saying! If you got half a brain you should see thorough it.

I think whether Jesus was a jew or muslim or whatever, the author was just trying to point out that the figure of Jesus playing such a major part in both Christianity and Islam is an example of many of the similarities between the two religions. Although they differ in some beliefs concerning the act of worship, they are effectively worshipping the same God and sharing very similar ideals, and its just a case of where you happened to be born, e.g. the Middle East or Europe, affecting which particular faith you choose to worship. I don't see why they cannot learn from each other instead of fighting, I reckon its what Jesus would have wanted.

thats what it SHOULD have been. all abrahamic religions are "islamic" in that they structure their religions around submission to the will of god. the differences between them reflect different understandings of what the will of god IS.

this guy, however, couldnt quite do that. in the end he had to be an advocate for jesus (perhaps because thats what he thinks jesus would want?). it spoiled his point.

copy/paste spam, and where's the commentary? Where's the OPs input? Jesus is talked about too much. I still haven't seen a thread on ageism yet. maybe i'll start one on that at some point.
adios amigos!

edit: On a side note, does anyone know how to cook crackling without starting a fire? plz msg...

Probably not disappearing for eight minutes would be a good idea.

Jesus was Jewish Friend, and he was from the Middle East, so, although he would have looked like most muslims from the area today (not white, or black) Islam hadnt quite come into existence yet, so Jesus couldnt possibly be a Muslim...

Does anyone else believe this?

I ignored the parts which didn't interest me:

Early non Christian sources about Christ

First there is Tacitus. Tacitus is of particular interest to us in England because he was the son-in-law of Julius Agricola, who was once the Roman Governor of Britain. In approximately 110 AD Tacitus, one of Rome's most famous historians, recorded this about Christ:

'Therefore to dispel rumour, Nero substituted his culprits and treated with the most extreme punishments some people, popularly known as Christians whose disgraceful activities were notorious. The originator of that name Christus had been executed when Tiberias was Emperor by order of the procurator Pontius Pilatus. But the deadly cult, though checked for a time, was now breaking out again not only in Judea, the birth place of this evil, but even throughout Rome where all the nasty and disgusting ideas from all over the world pour in and find a ready following.
Tacitus was by no means a follower of Christ but he did nonetheless record and confirm the basic facts about his life and death.

Similarly Josephus, a Jewish historian who lived from AD 37 to 90, wrote the following in his 'Antiquities of the Jews'.

'And there arose about this time a source of new trouble, one Jesus. He was a doerof marvellous deeds. This man was the so-called Christ and when Pilate had condemned him to the Cross, those who had loved him did not cease - for he appeared to them, as they said, on the third day alive again.'

There was also Lucian of Samosata, a Satirist - a 'John Cleese' of the early second century who referred to Christ as 'the man who was crucified in Palestine because he introduced a new cult into the world'. Seutonius refers to Christians as being 'given over to a new and mischievous superstition'. Pliny the Younger gives advice to Trajan about killing Christians and Thallus and Phlegon are two first-century historians who debate the cause of the darkness in the middle of the day which occurred at Christ's crucifixion.
This brief excursion into Jewish and Roman history is simply to show that the consensus among non-Christian writers was that Jesus existed, performed miracles, was crucified under Pilate when Tiberius was Emperor, and was believed by his followers to have risen from the dead. If we're wanting more detailed evidence then it is to the Gospels in the New Testament that we must turn.

This is a combination of ignorance and rhetorical slight of hand: only one of those sources mentions Jesus performing miracles (Josephus), and the relevant parts of that passage are almost unanimously held to be a later interpolation (probably by Eusebius). To claim 'consensus' from one source is bad enough, to claim it from none at all is bizarre.

EDIT: it's also worth noting that most of those sources don't even mention Jesus, except in the context of the beliefs of Christians.

The Gospels in the New Testament

The New Testament consists of 27 books all of which were almost certainly written before the fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD.

Rubbish. The Gospels were all almost certainly written after 70AD.

The New Testament is all about Jesus and as mentioned is about the same length as the Qur'an. Therefore we have a tremendous amount of material to examine.

The first four books in the New Testament are four biographies written by two of Jesus' twelve disciples (Matthew and John), another man (Mark) who was a close follower of Jesus and one of the leaders in the early church, and a Greek doctor (Luke) who although he never met Christ personally interviewed the eye-witnesses and became an early Christian leader himself.

It's worth noting here that not only is the speaker going against almost all modern scholarship (with the possible exception of Luke, which well might have been written by a companion of Paul), but that there's precious little evidence for any of these assertions. The Gospels were anonymous works, and our source for claims of their authorship is largely tradition. Neither were they 'biography': they were primarily theological and political works, based around the life of a man.

Their parallel accounts, although recording different details, show a remarkable degree of consistency. There was clearly no change in the story through a chain of oral tradition, simply because there wasn't such a chain. It was eye-witnesses who recorded these events.

Again, this claim is dubious in the extreme.

Also, the fact that we have very early manuscripts and fragments of New Testament mean that we can be confident that what we have today is what the original authors first wrote . The earliest fragments that exist include the John Ryland fragment in the John Ryland Library in Manchester which dates from 125 AD, and the Magdalen fragments which date from about 65 - 70 AD and are housed in the Magdalen College Library in Oxford.

He doesn't mention that the earliest manuscripts miss out the ending of Mark and the Johannine Comma (the only explicit reference to the Trinity in the Bible)...

It's also worth noting that the early dating of the Magdalen fragment is the work of a lone wingnut: he first published his claims in a respectable journal, and they were torn apart in the very next issue. This is the same guy who claims that the Dead Sea Scrolls contain a fragment of the gospel of Mark: to present his claims as if they're established, rather than being fragile in the extreme, is quite frankly dishonest.

What is remarkable is that these date from either the life-time of the Apostles (in the case of the Magdalen fragment) or from the life-time of those who knew the Apostles personally. This is despite the fact that they were written on papyrus which easily disintegrates.

There are also complete manuscripts of the New Testament from the first three centuries after Christ including the Codex Alexandrinus and Codex Sinaiticus in the British Library and the Codex Vaticanus in the Vatican Library in Rome. In fact there are over 230 New Testament manuscripts and fragments of the New Testament (in about eight different languages) which pre-date the time of Muhammad. In addition to this there are 88,000 quotes from the New Testament in the writings of the 'church fathers', 32,000 of which date from before the Council of Nicea in 325 AD.

We find nothing like the documentary evidence for the New Testament in any other literature from antiquity. For example, we know of Julius Caesar only from ten documents, the earliest of which is a copy written 1,000 years after his life-time.

...but one of the sources was written by him. We also know about Julius from coins and architecture.

Apart from the New Testament the best documented literature in antiquity is Homer's Iliad of which have only 643 copies, the earliest written 500 years after the original.

Clearly, the New Testament manuscript evidence is extremely reliable.

No, it's extremely prolific. There is a difference.

-snip-
Most importantly how could God have allowed the Bible to be changed when Jesus himself said that 'Scripture cannot be broken' (John 10:35). Why would anyone have dared to try and change it when faced with the truth of the warnings of the consequences of doing so in the Bible itself.

Begging the question much?

-snip-
Similarly, how could someone who lived a life of virtue be evil?

Hypothetical question: suppose that civilisation in the future has no knowledge of Tony Blair and George Bush beyond what was written by four of their most devoted fans, fifty years after the pair died. Would we be in a position to make any serious judgements about their moral character?

Discuss.


I sincerely hope that this guy is a better doctor than he is a historian, and some of his claims border on dishonesty.

It is in fact an interesting question... "if Jesus were alive today, which religion would he pick ?"

Would he stay with Christianity ? Would he consider the teachings of Muhammed superior ? Or perhaps convert to Buddhism, Hinduism or even the flying Spaghetti Monster ?

Different times, different morals, more knowledge about the universe and psychology... how would all that influence him ?

Yeshua was a retarded fundamentalist who wanted complete submission under the fabricated Jewish god with no exceptions. In that way he could well be considered a Muslim.

To those saying it's too long to read, here's a summary:

-most of the talk is only relevant to Muslims anyway, so the logic doesn't follow if you're an atheist.
-he refers to about eight sources, one of which (a forgery) says that Jesus performed miracles. he takes this to show that there was a consensus in the classical world that Jesus was a miracle worker.
-he presents a lot of nutty, fringe positions regarding the New Testament as established fact.

That's about it really, you're not missing much.

The utter naivety of this text is epitomised in this paragraph.

Third, we share a belief in one God. This may seem a surprise to Muslim listeners, but both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible assert God's oneness. 'The Lord is one' says Deuteronomy 6:4. 'There is One God...' says 1 Timothy 2:5.

May come as a surprise to Muslims? The religion that counts Jesus and Abraham as prophets?

I'd say Muslims are infinitely more aware that they share the same God compared to most Christians, many of whom are surprised to learn Jesus wasn't born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

There's plenty others but I'd have to re-read something that's already caused my head to ache.

I'm guessing the emphasis is meant to be put on the "one" rather than the "share[d] belief": one criticism made of Christianity by some Muslims is that the trinity is a polytheistic concept since God is indivisible.

Does anyone else believe this?

Incidentally, believe what? There are a lot of claims in that post, which ones are you referring to?

...I sincerely hope that this guy is a better doctor than he is a historian, and some of his claims border on dishonesty.

All of your counter claims to his article, from dating of the gospels to after 70AD and to claiming that the gospels are primarily theological and political works, and not biographical works, are opinions that you hold, not statements of fact. There are many published opinions that are contrary to yours, and from past conversations with you I know that you are fully aware of them even if you don't agree with them. But here you attack that writer personally instead of simply refuting his conclusions and by so doing you show a disregard for honesty on your part, not his.

Should I post a list of books, or is one enough (http://www.bib-arch.org/bswb_BAR/bswbba_WR_Eyewitnesses.html), published which agree with his assertions and disagree with your opinions, shall we agree to disagree? In the end, his opinion seems to be as well founded in scholarship as yours is.

So what was Mohammed before he started Islam - a Scientologist?
Bored, I'd imagine.



Anyway, err wut?

He was a Juif, no?

So what was Mohammed before he started Islam - a Scientologist?

My thinking? A Noachide. Likes Judaism, agrees with its central teachings, but doesn't want to go the full nine yards and convert (which is completely understandable).

He then plagiarized Judaism, and only got off because the Jews hadn't bothered to copyright the Torah. If we had, we could have SO bankrupted him. He'd probably settle for giving us some land.

Hey, there's an idea! Go back in time, copyright the Torah, sue Mohammed, and settle for Israel.

Silly people thinking in your closed minded ideals. Stop approaching Islam like you do Christianity. In Christianity one is Christian who follows Jesus Christ. In Islam you are Muslim if you follow God. Thus, anyone who follows the Abrahamic god, from the Jews on up, is a Muslim. Not nessecarily a Qur'an reading, pray five times a day one, but still submits to the one true god. Thus, unless you want to continue stupid arguments about Mohammed not being around for 700 years, because they are completely irrelevant, Jesus was indeed a Muslim. He was also a Jew, and I believe a Roman subject as well. Islam is not measured by the appearance of Mohammed, it is measured by devotion to the one god of Abraham. Unlike Christianity, which is measured by the appearance of Jesus.

All of your counter claims to his article, from dating of the gospels to after 70AD and to claiming that the gospels are primarily theological and political works, and not biographical works, are opinions that you hold, not statements of fact. There are many published opinions that are contrary to yours, and from past conversations with you I know that you are fully aware of them even if you don't agree with them. But here you attack that writer personally instead of simply refuting his conclusions and by so doing you show a disregard for honesty on your part, not his.

Should I post a list of books, or is one enough (http://www.bib-arch.org/bswb_BAR/bswbba_WR_Eyewitnesses.html), published which agree with his assertions and disagree with your opinions, shall we agree to disagree? In the end, his opinion seems to be as well founded in scholarship as yours is.

Actually if you reread my post you'll see that my only accusation of dishonesty came when he presented an extremely fringe idea, the dating of the Magdelan Fragments to 70AD, as established fact:

The earliest fragments that exist include the John Ryland fragment in the John Ryland Library in Manchester which dates from 125 AD, and the Magdalen fragments which date from about 65 - 70 AD and are housed in the Magdalen College Library in Oxford.

It's be rather like giving a talk on Elizabeth I in front of a group of laymen, and supporting your thesis that she was an extremely intelligent woman by pointing out that she was the real author of all of Shakespeare's plays. Yes, you can find one or two people with degrees who'll support that claim, but most scholars would laugh at you for making such a bizarre statement. There's nothing wrong with sketching out an argument for Liz having been the pen behind Shakespeare in front of a lay audience, nor is there anything wrong with simply asserting it in front of an audience of historians who'll know that this is a dubious claim and not an established fact, but to present something like that as established fact in front of a lay audience is simply dishonest.

Since the OP was simply asking whether anyone 'believed this' I answered his question: no I don't, and neither do most scholars. That post took me long enough to write without providing the evidence behind the counter claims (and the author presented no arguments of his own to refute), time which I wasn't inclined to invest until I knew the OP was more than just a drive-by poster. :p

Ironically enough, the book you cite seems to support my position somewhat: he admits that this book goes against 'old form criticism' and 'classic-form criticism' (i.e. the mainstream) and he seems to reject the idea that all of the Gospels were written pre-70AD:

The period between the time of Jesus and the writing of the Gospels is relatively short (between 30 and 60-some years, depending on the Gospel)

Notice that I never said that no scholar endorsed those positions, only that mainstream scholarship oppose them.

I don't think it's too controversial to say that the Gospels were theology and political before they were biographical: given that John and Mark only cover the three years of Jesus' ministry, that Luke and Matthew give only a few contradictory remarks on Jesus' birth, and that we have no details at all on what Jesus was doing between the ages of about eight and thirty, this certainly doesn't fit any standard forms of biography, even in the ancient world. Compare it to Thucydides detailed hagiography of Pericles or Lucian's delightfully spiteful attack on 'Alexander the Quack Prophet'.

To give just two examples of theological and political considerations in the Gospels, consider Mark's barely concealed contempt for the disciples, and especially Peter, and compare this to the far more positive treatment they get in John. Alternatively, contrast the Beatitudes in Matthew and Luke to see the emphasis on spirituality and earthliness respectively:

Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
4Blessed are those who mourn,
for they will be comforted.
5Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.
6Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be filled.

with

20Blessed are you who are poor,
for yours is the kingdom of God.
21Blessed are you who hunger now,
for you will be satisfied.

Matthew spins Jesus' words into a spiritual sermon, while Luke presents it as as an earthly one filled with concern for the poor (a theme which permetes Luke). Which of their accounts is genuine? Who knows! I'm sure both authors thought that they were recording the truth, I'm just not convinced that their concept of truth was founded on the rationalistic definition of 'conformance to reality'. Remember that Jewish conception of 'truth' at the time was very much focussed on God, His goodness and the fulfilment of His covenent: that is what the authors were trying to present, not a dry account of Jesus' life.

Was there a historical figure behind the Biblical Jesus? Almost certainly, but the Gospel writers were more interested in expanding on their theological message than on accurately describing his life, and I don't think it's hard to conceive of them either changing details or making them up to fit with their convictions on what he should have said and done.

Jesus was Jewish, not Christian, (definitely not Catholic, to my confused Roman friends).
Reminds me of an old joke.
A blonde goes to a lecture by a religious historian on "Jesus as a Jew". Afterwards, a friend asks what she thought of it.
She said, "I didn't know Jesus was Jewish! That must have been tough, what with his Mom being Catholic and all..."

To the original post: the fact that there are so many inconsistencies within the two texts with regards to each other does define them as different religions. On the other hand, anyone who has critically looked at judaism christianity and islam knows they are three similar religions on the same "religious continuum". They have the same basic commandments similar beliefs and relatively similar practices.

Does anyone else believe this?

No, I honestly cannot bring myself to believe how horribly long that quoted text was.

I can't even test it empirically because I'm too lazy to read that whole thing.

Without scientific proof and without faith, I remain without belief.

Silly people thinking in your closed minded ideals. Stop approaching Islam like you do Christianity. In Christianity one is Christian who follows Jesus Christ. In Islam you are Muslim if you follow God. Thus, anyone who follows the Abrahamic god, from the Jews on up, is a Muslim. Not nessecarily a Qur'an reading, pray five times a day one, but still submits to the one true god. Thus, unless you want to continue stupid arguments about Mohammed not being around for 700 years, because they are completely irrelevant, Jesus was indeed a Muslim. He was also a Jew, and I believe a Roman subject as well. Islam is not measured by the appearance of Mohammed, it is measured by devotion to the one god of Abraham. Unlike Christianity, which is measured by the appearance of Jesus.

I thought "there is no God except Allah and Mohammed is his prophet" is one of the fundamental pillars of Islam ?
What if Jesus would consider Mohammed a false prophet and Allah a perverted version of JHWH ? Would he still be a muslim then ?

My thinking? A Noachide. Likes Judaism, agrees with its central teachings, but doesn't want to go the full nine yards and convert (which is completely understandable).

He then plagiarized Judaism, and only got off because the Jews hadn't bothered to copyright the Torah. If we had, we could have SO bankrupted him. He'd probably settle for giving us some land.

Hey, there's an idea! Go back in time, copyright the Torah, sue Mohammed, and settle for Israel.

Noachide? Noah was not a Jew and had nothing to do with the faked Jewish god of Muhammad.
And you speak of ancient Jews as "we"? You are a sick fuck, sir.

I thought "there is no God except Allah and Mohammed is his prophet" is one of the fundamental pillars of Islam ?
What if Jesus would consider Mohammed a false prophet and Allah a perverted version of JHWH ? Would he still be a muslim then ?YHVH was/is a perversion already. If something is wrong, making it wronger does not really change anything.

I thought "there is no God except Allah and Mohammed is his prophet" is one of the fundamental pillars of Islam ?
What if Jesus would consider Mohammed a false prophet and Allah a perverted version of JHWH ? Would he still be a muslim then ?

Every learned Muslim I have ever spoken to, meaning Shiekhs, have said the same thing to me. Recognition of mohammed as a prophet is important and essential today, but untill he was born it's a non issue. The primary and fundamental part of being a Muslim, is accecpting one god, the god of Abraham.

Actually if you reread my post you'll see that my only accusation of dishonesty came when he presented an extremely fringe idea, the dating of the Magdelan Fragments to 70AD, as established fact:



It's be rather like giving a talk on Elizabeth I in front of a group of laymen, and supporting your thesis that she was an extremely intelligent woman by pointing out that she was the real author of all of Shakespeare's plays. Yes, you can find one or two people with degrees who'll support that claim, but most scholars would laugh at you for making such a bizarre statement. There's nothing wrong with sketching out an argument for Liz having been the pen behind Shakespeare in front of a lay audience, nor is there anything wrong with simply asserting it in front of an audience of historians who'll know that this is a dubious claim and not an established fact, but to present something like that as established fact in front of a lay audience is simply dishonest.

Since the OP was simply asking whether anyone 'believed this' I answered his question: no I don't, and neither do most scholars. That post took me long enough to write without providing the evidence behind the counter claims (and the author presented no arguments of his own to refute), time which I wasn't inclined to invest until I knew the OP was more than just a drive-by poster. :p

Ironically enough, the book you cite seems to support my position somewhat: he admits that this book goes against 'old form criticism' and 'classic-form criticism' (i.e. the mainstream) and he seems to reject the idea that all of the Gospels were written pre-70AD:



Notice that I never said that no scholar endorsed those positions, only that mainstream scholarship oppose them.

I don't think it's too controversial to say that the Gospels were theology and political before they were biographical: given that John and Mark only cover the three years of Jesus' ministry, that Luke and Matthew give only a few contradictory remarks on Jesus' birth, and that we have no details at all on what Jesus was doing between the ages of about eight and thirty, this certainly doesn't fit any standard forms of biography, even in the ancient world. Compare it to Thucydides detailed hagiography of Pericles or Lucian's delightfully spiteful attack on 'Alexander the Quack Prophet'.

To give just two examples of theological and political considerations in the Gospels, consider Mark's barely concealed contempt for the disciples, and especially Peter, and compare this to the far more positive treatment they get in John. Alternatively, contrast the Beatitudes in Matthew and Luke to see the emphasis on spirituality and earthliness respectively:



with



Matthew spins Jesus' words into a spiritual sermon, while Luke presents it as as an earthly one filled with concern for the poor (a theme which permetes Luke). Which of their accounts is genuine? Who knows! I'm sure both authors thought that they were recording the truth, I'm just not convinced that their concept of truth was founded on the rationalistic definition of 'conformance to reality'. Remember that Jewish conception of 'truth' at the time was very much focussed on God, His goodness and the fulfilment of His covenent: that is what the authors were trying to present, not a dry account of Jesus' life.

Was there a historical figure behind the Biblical Jesus? Almost certainly, but the Gospel writers were more interested in expanding on their theological message than on accurately describing his life, and I don't think it's hard to conceive of them either changing details or making them up to fit with their convictions on what he should have said and done.

I always look forward to reading your posts, but i humbly (which isn't often) caution that Baldy may not give the respect of attention your posts merit.

all abrahamic religions are "islamic" in that they structure their religions around submission to the will of god.

Meh. How about the catholic liberum arbitrium dogma? The degrees of submission are quite different throughout the different abrahamic traditions.

Religion is just a cycle of thought- it's kind of like playing telephone. Great example: The story of the birth of Christ is the same as the story of the birth of the Egyptian sun god, Horace.

I find it difficult to listen to someone who mixes things up to the point of thinking that a Egyptian god had a latin-stemming english name (Horace, from Horatius).

IT'S HORUS FOR ISIS'S SAKE!

IT'S HORUS FOR ISIS'S SAKE!

You mean, it's Har for Is(e)t's sake!! :D

Eris is going to be pissed at you blasphemers.

Meh. How about the catholic liberum arbitrium dogma? The degrees of submission are quite different throughout the different abrahamic traditions.

duh

their understandings of the will of god are completely different.

Noachide? Noah was not a Jew and had nothing to do with the faked Jewish god of Muhammad.
And you speak of ancient Jews as "we"? You are a sick fuck, sir.

YHVH was/is a perversion already. If something is wrong, making it wronger does not really change anything.

do you believe that noah existed?

their understandings of the will of god are completely different.different?
only at a superficial glance.

different?
only at a superficial glance.

depends on the look eh?

depends on the look eh?not at all. the abrahamic religions all demand complete submission to the deity. and in all the single purpose of god is to be worshiped. don't forget that this god's name is "jealousy".

not at all. the abrahamic religions all demand complete submission to the deity. and in all the single purpose of god is to be worshiped. don't forget that this god's name is "jealousy".

yes that is the focus of abrahamic religions. but some might find the details of what that submission entails to be quite different when compariing ultra orthodox judaism to pentacostal christians to sufi muslims.

I always look forward to reading your posts, but i humbly (which isn't often) caution that Baldy may not give the respect of attention your posts merit.

That's not accurate. I always read his posts (in regards to this topic and others like it) very carefully. I didn't respond to the second post because it would lead to thread hi-jack... But suffice it to say that I disagree with his conclusions. The book I linked to posits that the gospels were/are biographical and choke full of eyewitness testimony written during the lifetimes of the eyewitnesses who testify through the authors.

As to the theological meanings and reasons for Mark (et-al) to 'dis' the apostles does not invalidate the traditional position that Mark is Peter's testimony of the gospel, (i.e., there is no reason to assume that Peter wouldn't 'dis' his own self in humble regret of his previous behaviors when talking about the events before the resurrection. e.g., IF the apostles had understood Jesus properly during his ministry years, then they wouldn't have been surprised by the events of the trial and crucifixion and resurrection, now would they?)

Agenda07 and I have gone around and around on this but I do not disregard his opinions and posts, nor fail to read them carefully, I disagree with his conclussions on a regular basis though. ;)

I always look forward to reading your posts,

*blushes* :)

but i humbly (which isn't often) caution that Baldy may not give the respect of attention your posts merit.

I don't think Balderdash71964 and I have any views in common (except for a shared desire to give Dan Brown a good slapping :p), but I enjoy my discussions with him because, even when we disagree, his arguments are usually interesting and they invariably make me think about the points in question in greater depth and from different perspectives.

Agenda07 and I have gone around and around on this but I do not disregard his opinions and posts, nor fail to read them carefully, I disagree with his conclussions on a regular basis though. ;)

I wouldn't have it any other way. :D

choke full of eyewitness testimony

Erm ... Freud? :D

Good point with Agenda07 though. :)