Rebuttal to Sam Shamoun's article

Christian Analysis of Shabir Ally's Comments On:

JESUS IN CHRISTIANITY; JESUS IN ISLAM

 

By

 

Part one

 

 

In this rebuttal of mine I shall be responding to a response by Sam Shamoun to Islamic scholar Shabir Ally, Shamoun's response can be found here:  

 

http://./Responses/Shabir-Ally/realjesus.htm

 

For those interested in Shabir Ally's work and so on, visit this link which contains several great debates of him:

 

http://www.aswatalislam.net/DisplayFilesP.aspx?TitleID=50018&TitleName=Shabir_Ally

 

With all this said, we now proceed to Shamoun's article.

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Shabir:

Which Account is Historically Correct?

Muslims and Christians agree that Jesus was born of a virgin, that he performed mighty miracles, and that he is now alive. We believe that he was the Messiah, a prophet of God, and his righteous Servant.

But we also disagree on some things. Can a historical study help us to decide who has the true account of Jesus? I believe so.

 

Response:

Indeed it can. Once a historical study is made the conclusion is that the historical Jesus is actually the Jesus of biblical faith, not the Jesus of Islam.

 

 

My Response

 

Actually once a study of the first 4 Gospels are made, and them compare it with the Quran, one will see that the first Gospels and the Quran are in agreement, that Jesus is not God, that he is the Messiah/prophet, and was sent to the children of Israel. Jesus never preached he was God, this is a historical LIE that can never be proved by the first 4 Gospels unless they go and insert some fake verses into the Gospels, something quite common (1John 5:7)

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Shabir:

 

Christians believe that Jesus was the divine Son of God, that he is the second person of the Holy Trinity, and that he is our personal savior who died for the sins of the world. On these points Christianity diverges from Islam. But on these points Christianity also diverges from the true historical Jesus, as I will now demonstrate.

The four gospels in the Christian Bible are the primary materials available for a historical study of Jesus. When we compare the gospels one to another we can see how the stories about Jesus were changed to reflect a higher view of Jesus. You can conduct this type of study yourself if you have a cross-reference Bible. Refer to an episode in one gospel, then cross-reference it to another gospel where you will find the same episode. Note the similarities and the dissimilarities.

 

Response:

What Shabir has falsely assumed is that the Gospel writers must agree in every detail when reporting the same event. Shabir assumes that if the writers do not agree then this must mean they were simply fabricating or embellishing stories about Jesus. What Shabir has failed to realize is that during the time when the Gospels were written historians wrote accurate history in summarized fashion. This meant that a historian would at times rearrange his material and/or modify the wording of a given report. This was the standard method of historical reporting and was viewed as completely accurate.

 

 

 

My Response

 

What Shamoun fails to realize is that each Gospel book elevates the status of Jesus. We find stories in Mark that are evolved to look better in Matthew and Luke. We find stories in Mark and Matthew to look better in the Gospel of Luke, these are not mere small different account, and each account is changing to LOOK BETTER.

 

Off course we would find some minor details different in each Gospel, since they were 4 different eye-witnesses, so not every single detail will be exact, this is fair, and I have no problem with this. The problem is that the STORIES ARE EVOLVING TO LOOK BETTER. Shamoun himself knows this, so does every Christian scholar on the Bible, here are example of the evolution of the character of Jesus in the NT, you judge for yourself whether the story keeps on getting better, or they are just a bit different because they are written by different men. :

 

The Baptism of Jesus:

 

Mark 1:9-13

 

9 And it came to pass in those days, that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, and was baptized of John in Jordan. 10 And straightway coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens opened, and the Spirit like a dove descending upon him: 11 And there came a voice from heaven, saying, Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. 12 And immediately the spirit driveth him into the wilderness. 13 And he was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted of Satan; and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered unto him.


Let us now read how Matthew modified the story:

 

Matthew 3:13-17

 

13 Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him. 14 But John forbad him, saying, I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me? 15 And Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer it to be so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness. Then he suffered him. 16 And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him: 17 And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.

Note the difference between the two accounts. In the earlier account of Mark, Jesus simply comes to get baptized and does it. In Matthew's version we see Jesus coming to get baptized only this time John protests against it, because he thinks that Jesus does not need to be baptized, and that Jesus does not need to be baptized by John but it is John who needs to be baptized by Jesus.

 

This is an obvious modification to the story, Matthew modified the story to simply make it look better, and to make Jesus look better.

 

Jesus' death on the cross

 

Mark 15:33-41

33 And when the sixth hour was come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. 34 And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? 35 And some of them that stood by, when they heard it, said, Behold, he calleth Elias. 36 And one ran and filled a spunge full of vinegar, and put it on a reed, and gave him to drink, saying, Let alone; let us see whether Elias will come to take him down. 37 And Jesus cried with a loud voice, and gave up the ghost. 38 And the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom. 39 And when the centurion, which stood over against him, saw that he so cried out, and gave up the ghost, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God.

40 There were also women looking on afar off: among whom was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the less and of Joses, and Salome; 41 (Who also, when he was in Galilee, followed him, and ministered unto him;) and many other women which came up with him unto Jerusalem.


So basically Jesus dies, cries out to God, and the people who watched said truly he is the son of God. Let us now read Matthew's version:

Matthew 27:45-56

 

45 Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour. 46 And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? 47 Some of them that stood there, when they heard that, said, This man calleth for Elias. 48 And straightway one of them ran, and took a spunge, and filled it with vinegar, and put it on a reed, and gave him to drink. 49 The rest said, Let be, let us see whether Elias will come to save him.

50 Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost. 51 And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; 52 And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, 53 And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many. 54 Now when the centurion, and they that were with him, watching Jesus, saw the earthquake, and those things that were done, they feared greatly, saying, Truly this was the Son of God. 55 And many women were there beholding afar off, which followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto him: 56 Among which was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joses, and the mother of Zebedees children.

 

The lady who touched Jesus

 

Mark 5:28-34

 

28 For she said, If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole. 29 And straightway the fountain of her blood was dried up; and she felt in her body that she was healed of that plague. 30 And Jesus, immediately knowing in himself that virtue had gone out of him, turned him about in the press, and said, Who touched my clothes? 31 And his disciples said unto him, Thou seest the multitude thronging thee, and sayest thou, Who touched me? 32 And he looked round about to see her that had done this thing. 33 But the woman fearing and trembling, knowing what was done in her, came and fell down before him, and told him all the truth. 34 And he said unto her, Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy plague.

Matthew slightly modified this story which becomes obvious:

 

Matthew 9:20-22

 

20 And, behold, a woman, which was diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his garment: 21 For she said within herself, If I may but touch his garment, I shall be whole. 22 But Jesus turned him about, and when he saw her, he said, Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole.

Notice the difference between both accounts. In Matthews’s version he leaves the part about Jesus asking who touched him out. Matthew seems to have a problem with Jesus asking the people who had touched him; it obviously doesn’t look good for Matthew and later scribes who would want to make Jesus look divine. So Matthew or some scribe purposely left it out.

 

Notice how the stories change over time, the story becomes better in the later Gospels of Matthew, or the Gospel of Luke etc. These are not mere difference in a story, it is obvious to eye of the reader that the story is being purposely modified to look better; you would have to be willfully blind to deny it.

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Noted Evangelical Scholar Craig L. Blomberg notes:

 

"What then of the final question about the Gospel parallels? Regardless of the Gospel writers' interest or ability, how do we assess the similarities and differences among their finished products? Certainly there is substantial overlap and agreement on main points, with the type of diversity in details one would expect when different writers reflect on the same events from their unique perspectives. The German classical historian Hans Stier makes this observation even about the resurrection narratives: agreements over basic data, coupled with divergence of detail present for the historian for this very reason a criterion of extraordinary credibility. For if that were the fabrication of a congregation or of a similar group of people, then the tale would be consistently and obviously complete. For that reason every historian is especially sceptical at that moment when an extraordinary happening is only reported in accounts which are completely free of contradictions.

 

"But what of all the places where the differences (a better word in this context than Stier's 'contradictions') seem greater than that? Can we look at the four Gospels as we now have them and avoid the charge of bona fide contradictions among parallel accounts? Again, I believe that answer is most certainly yes. None of the so-called contradictions among the Gospels is a discovery of modern scholarship. The church has been aware of them throughout its history and usually believed that there were plausible harmonizations. A survey of leading evangelical commentaries on any of the four Gospels will give a sampling of the most convincing harmonizations today. Space precludes all but a handful of examples.

 

Many of the seeming discrepancies vanish once we understand the literary convention for writing history or biography in the ancient world. Neither Greek or Hebrew had any symbol for our quotation marks, nor did people feel that a verbatim account of someone's speech was any more valuable or accurate than a reliable summary, paraphrase, or interpretation. The order of events described in a famous person's life was often arranged thematically rather than strictly chronologically. So we should not be surprised to find all kinds of minor variations in both sequence of episodes in Jesus' life from one Gospel to the next and in the actual words attributed to him on any given occasion." (Blomberg, Jesus Under Fire—Modern Scholarship Reinvents the Historical Jesus ed. Michael J. Wilkins & J. P. Moreland [Zondervan Publishin House; Grand Rapids, MI 1995], pp. 34-35; bold emphasis ours)

 

 

 

My Response

 

Non of that dis-proves the fact that the stories I showed have been evolved Again, the stories I showed are not simple small differences, the story is GETTING BETTER, it is evolving, so getting Christian scholars saying 'oh well there are 4 different writers and each writer wrote it according to how he saw things' is not good enough, because the stories are not just different, the authors purposely modified the stories to look better.

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Darrel L. Bock concurs:

 

"In asking how the ancients viewed the task of recounting historical events, we get help from the ancients themselves. A famous quotation that illustrates the problem of recording ancient speech in an ancient culture comes from Thucydides (History of the Peloponnesian War, 1.22.1), who is representative of Greco-Roman historians generally. This Greek historian of the fifth century B.C. is candid about the speeches he reports in his work: 'It was difficult for me to remember the exact substance of the speeches I myself heard and for others to remember those they heard elsewhere and told me of.' But that does not mean that he felt free to have his history say anything he wanted. He continues:

 

I have given speeches in the manner in which it seemed to me that each of the speakers would best express what needed to be said about the ever-prevailing situation, but I have kept as close as possible to the total opinion expressed by the actual words.

"In other words, the Greek standard of reporting speeches required a concern for accuracy in reporting the gist of what had been said, even if the exact words were not remembered or recorded. The ancients also recognized the author's right to summarize and bring out the contemporary force of a speaker's remarks. In other words, the historian sought to report and edify." (Ibid, pp. 78-79)

 

Bock continues:

 

"… Like Thucydides, Tacitus felt free to rearrange, condense, and summarize, but he still sensed a responsibility to present the speech's basic content. Charles Fornara, a modern historian, concludes: ‘The little evidence we posses indicates that he presented speeches responsibly, refused to invent them, and searched them out when it was possible to do so.’ This procedure sounds much like that cited by Luke in Luke 1:1-4. The Evangelists were able to search out what Jesus did and said because they had access to people and communities who had been exposed to Jesus or his intimate followers." (Ibid)

This method was true not only for the Greco-Roman world, but also for the Jews.

 

Blomberg states:

 

"… the ancient Jewish world (and to only a slightly lesser extent, the Greco-Roman world around it) was a culture that prized memorization skills highly. Rabbis were encouraged to memorize the entire Hebrew Bible (what we call the Old Testament), plus a sizable body of the oral laws that grew up around them. Elementary education, mandatory for many Jewish boys from ages five to twelve or thirteen, was entirely by rote memory; and only one topic was studied, the Bible.

 

On the other hand, transmission of important traditions not written down in Sacred Scripture often involved a substantial amount of flexibility in retelling stories, in the inclusion or omission of certain incidental details, in the arrangement and sequence of episodes, and in paraphrasing and interpreting a person's teaching, so long as the major events of the narrative and their significance were not altered ... In other words, it is likely that a substantial amount of similarities and differences among the Synoptic Gospels can be explained by assuming that the disciples and those whom they in turn instructed had committed to memory a sizable body of material about what Jesus did and said. Nevertheless, they felt free to recount this information in various forms, even while preserving the significance of Jesus' original teachings and deeds. (Ibid, p. 32; bold emphasis ours)

 

In light of the preceding factors, Bock rightly concludes:

 

"One can present history accurately whether one quotes or summarizes teaching, or even mixes the two together. To have accurate summaries of Jesus' teaching is just as historical as to have his actual words; they are just two different perspectives to give us the same thing. All that is required is that the summaries be trustworthy—a factor made likely not only by the character of the writers and the nature of their religious convictions, but also by the presence of opponents and eyewitnesses who one way or the other could challenge a fabricated report." (Ibid, p. 88)

 

 

 

My Response

 

Useless quotes, very useless quotes, let me say it again, EACH STORY IS GETTING BETTER, and the argument is not that the stories are a bit different, but that the stories are getting better over time!

 

Matthew made some stories in Mark look better than they really were, Luke took stories from Matthew and Mark and made them look better than they were, John took stories from all the 3 Gospels and made them completely look different than they were. Each Gospel over time made the story look better, why is that? AND AGAIN, THE STORIES ARENT JUST DIFFERENT, THE STORIES ARE GETTING BETTER OVER TIME.

 

Imagine this, the earliest Gospel is Mark, and after Mark is Matthew, then comes Luke, then comes John. Now imagine that you find a story from Mark in the Gospel of Matthew, and remember Mark came before Matthew, now when you look at that story you find the story has gotten BETTER, not just different. What would you think? You would tell yourself that this NEWER text obviously modified the story, because it comes AFTER the first one, and now looks better.

 

Had the first 4 Gospels come out together that would be better for the Christian, but no, the Gospels came out in order, starting from Mark to John, they did not come out at the same time. So each later Gospel writer borrowed from Mark, and simply made his stories better, they did not write things according to their own eye-witness views, if they did why would they need to borrow from Mark! In fact all Luke did was collect saying and stories of Jesus, nothing in the Gospel of Luke is an eye-witness account of what he saw since he did not even see Jesus! What Luke did is like what Bukhari and Muslim did in collecting hadiths, they collecting sayings of the prophet and companions and compiled them into a book, this is exactly what Luke did. This by far refutes the Christian position that each Gospel writer wrote things to how his own eyes saw it, since Luke saw nothing and simply collected sayings of Jesus, who knows maybe Luke left some things out, can we be sure he didn't? No, we cannot.

 

Here is information regarding the Gospel of Luke:

 

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

 

The evangelist does not claim to have been an eyewitness of Jesus's life, but to have investigated everything carefully and to have written an orderly narrative of the facts (Luke 1:1-4).

 

Continuing

 

Date of composition The date of this gospel's composition is uncertain. Estimates range from ca 80 to ca 130 AD.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gospel_of_Luke&action=edit&section=3]

 

Traditional views of the date Traditionally, Christians believe that Luke wrote under the direction, if not at the dictation, of Paul. This would place it as having been written before the Acts >, the date of composition of which is generally fixed at about ADor 64 Consequently the tradition is that this Gospel was written about 60 or 63 , when Luke may have been at Caesarea in attendance on Paul, who was then a prisoner. If the alternate conjecture is correct, that it was written at Rome during Paul's imprisonment there, then it would date earlier, Evangelical Christians tend to favor this view, in keeping with the tradition to date the gospels very early.

 

Luke addressed his gospel to "most excellent Theophilus." Theophilus, which in Greek means "Friend of God", may just be a literary expression.

Unfortunately, nowhere in Luke or Acts does it say that the author is Luke, the companion of Paul; this ascription is late second century. Furthermore, the text itself reveals hints that it was not written as a dictation of a single author, but made use of multiple sources.

 

[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gospel_of_Luke&action=edit&section=4]

 

Critical views of the date In contrast to the traditional view, many contemporary scholars regard Markas a source text used by the author(s) of Luke. Since Mark was probably written after the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem <around 70 <Luke could not have been written before 70. The Sadducees are another point traditional scholars use to confirm a later date, contrasting Matthew's focus on the tax collecters and Jesus' rebuke of their actions against Luke's hardly mentioning them at all within his gospel, because after the destruction of the Temple, the Sadducees lost their power base. Based on this datum, scholars have suggested dates for Luke from 80 to as late as 150 and Acts shortly thereafter, also between 80 and 150. The de-emphasis of the Parousia > and the universalization of the message strongly suggest a much later date than the 60–70 given by the traditional view.

 

Debate continues among non-traditionalists about whether Luke was written before or after the end of the first century. Those who would date it later argue that it was written in response to hetrodoxical movements of the early second century. Those who would date it earlier point out both that Luke lacks knowledge of the episcopal system which had been developed in the second century, and that an earlier date preserves the traditional connection of the gospel with the Luke who was a follower of Paul

 

So as you can see, Luke witnessed NOTHING, so all those quotes Shamoun brings mean nothing and this alone refutes every quote he brought up.

 

V. SOURCES OF THE GOSPEL; SYNOPTIC PROBLEM

The best information as to his sources is given by St. Luke, in the beginning of his Gospel. As many had written accounts as they heard them from "eyewitnesses and ministers of the word", it seemed good to him also, having diligently attained to all things from the beginning, to write an ordered narrative. He had two sources of information, then, eyewitnesses (including Apostles) and written documents taken down from the words of eyewitnesses. The accuracy of these documents he was in a position to test by his knowledge of the character of the writers, and by comparing them with the actual words of the Apostles and other eyewitnesses.

 

Notice the similarity of this with that of how Bukhari and Muslim collected hadiths of the prophet and his companions, yet unlike Christians we do not call hadiths as inspired words of God, or revelations from him as the Christians do with the Gospel of Luke. Luke did not witness anything, he just heard the stories, borrowed from the Gospel of Mark, and modified some stories to suit his own purpose.

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Interestingly, the Quran itself reports the same event yet with conflicting and variant wording as we shall shortly demonstrate.

 

 

 

My Response

 

Your demonstration will go on deaf ears since this is a RED-HERRING and off topic which is not even related to a historical study of Jesus in the Bible and Jesus in the Quran. So this red-herring of yours shall not be posted or given anytime.

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Shabir:

When we compare Mark to Matthew, we can see how the later gospel changed individual reports to raise the view of Jesus in the following ways:

1. To have people call Jesus "Lord." For example, on the occasion when Jesus was transfigured, in Mark Peter called him "Rabbi"; in Matthew Peter called him "Lord." (Mark 9:5 cf. Matthew 17:4)

2. To have Jesus refer to himself as Lord. When Jesus directed his disciples to wait and watch for his imminent return, in Mark he called himself "the master of the house"; in Matthew he called himself "your Lord". (Mark 13:35 cf. Matthew 24:42)

 

Response:

The reason why Mark and Matthew use two different words in reporting the same event is due to the fact that the writers are translating Jesus' Aramaic words into Greek. Darrel Bock states:

 

"In examining the wording of Jesus' teaching in the Gospels, we must distinguish between the ipsissima verba of Jesus (‘his very words’) and the ipsissima vox (‘his very voice,’ i.e., the presence of his teaching summarized). One universally recognized reality makes the presence of the exact words of Jesus difficult and argues for the distinction between verba and vox. It is that Jesus probably gave most of his teaching in Aramaic, the dominant public language of first-century Palestine where Jesus ministered, whereas the Gospels were written in Greek, the dominant language of the larger first-century Greco-Roman world to which the Gospels were addressed. In other words, most of Jesus' teaching in the Gospels is already a translation." (Ibid, p. 77)

 

Hence, both writers used two acceptable terms to accurately translate Jesus and his followers' original words, i.e. "master", "Lord" in place of either Rabbi or the Aramaic Maran which can either mean Lord or Master.

 

 

 

My Response

 

Jesus' teaching are already a translation? How can we trust the translation? And why would it be translated? If Jesus spoke Aramaic, and taught in Aramaic, why did they write it in Greek instead?! Would it not make more sense to write the Gospels in Aramaic? The language that Jesus spoke, and then to write a complete seperate account in Greek, so at least we could compare the Greek translated text with the ORIGINAL words of Jesus.

 

 

So basically what we have as Shamoun shows is a translation of what Jesus said, we do not have his real language, which is very strange. It would be like if the Quran was written in Chinease! The prophet Muhammad revealed revelations in Arabic, taught in Arabic, then his companions write the revelations in Chinease! Would that make sense? No! So why did these Jews with Jesus write his words in Greek? This causes a big problem since we do not have the real ORIGINAL words of Jesus, we only have a translation, and how can we trust the translation?

 

So what we have is no ORIGINAL words of Jesus to compare the Greek text with.

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Shabir:

3. To have Jesus called "the Son of God". At a place called Caesarea Philippi, Jesus asked Peter who he thought Jesus was. In Mark Peter replied: "You are the Messiah." But in Matthew Peter replied: "You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God." Matthew has added the title "the Son of the Living God." (Mark 8:27-29 cf. Matthew 16:13-16)

 

Response:

It seemed to have never dawned on Shabir that Peter actually said what Matthew reports but Mark chose to summarize Peter's words. If Shabir cannot accept this possibility then he will also have to reject this same phenomena when it appears in the Quran. See below.

 

 

 

My Response

 

Actually, forget if there is an evolution in these verses, whether the title son of the living God is there or not does not really matter at all, because however way you read the verse you are still left with the fact that Jesus is not God. Note:

 

Matthew
Chapter 16

20

15 He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? 16 And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. 17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. 18 And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. 19 And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. 20 Then charged he his disciples that they should tell no man that he was Jesus the Christ.

 

Note Jesus asks his disciples WHO DO YOU SAY I AM? This would have been the perfect opportunity for the disciples to say that you Jesus are God! But what do they say instead? They say that he is the Messiah, and the son of God. Neither terms Messiah nor son of God mean God, and they never did and never will.

 

Secondly, notice how Jesus affirms their statement that he is the Messiah and the son of God, neither title makes him God. Also verse 20 makes things more better, note Jesus tells his disciples to tell no man that he is the MESSIAH, he did not tell his disciples to tell no man that he is GOD. Why not? This would have been Jesus' perfect oppurtunity to say he was God, instead he says tell no man that I am the Messiah.

 

Even better, let us read the previous verses 13-14 which state:

 

13-14

13 When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am? 14 And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets

 

Notice Jesus asks his disciples, who do the men say I am? Note the response, none of these believers thought he was God, they thought he was John the Baptist, Elias, or some other great prophet, or Jermias, none of these believing people believed that Jesus was God.

 

This in itself proves that the people living in Jesus' time did not believe he is God, hence as we see, the true historical Jesus was never believed to be God, why? Because he never preached he was God as the Quran rightly tells us.

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Shabir:

4. To have Jesus refer to God as his Father. When Jesus's mother and siblings came looking for him, in Mark he said: "Whoever does the will of God is my mother and brother and sister". But in Matthew he said: "Whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my mother and brother and sister." In Mark he called God God. But in Matthew he called God his father. (Mark 3:35 cf. Matthew 12:50)

 

Response:

Again, Jesus could have said all that the two writers attribute to him. For instance, combining the two stories together this is what Jesus could have actually said:

 

"Whoever does the will of God, my Father that is in heaven is my mother and brother and sister."

 

 

 

My Response

 

In fact which ever style of the verse you chose, you are still left with the conclusion that Jesus is a Muslim! The Muslim creed is to submit their will to the true and only God, as we see; this is exactly what Jesus taught as Shamoun just showed. Jesus did not say who ever does the will of me and my Father, he says whoever does the will of GOD is his true brother and mother, obviously he is referring to God as someone else.

 

This further proves the Quran is completly historically correct since it states:

 

002.136
YUSUFALI: Say ye: "We believe in Allah, and the revelation given to us, and to Abraham, Isma'il, Isaac, Jacob, and the Tribes, and that given to Moses and Jesus, and that given to (all) prophets from their Lord: We make no difference between one and another of them: And we bow to Allah (in Islam)."

 

As we see, Jesus followed this exact creed and taught it to his people.

Also, as I have shown earlier, the Bible calls Jesus the Messiah, the Quran also is historically correct on this point:

 

004.171
YUSUFALI: O People of the Book! Commit no excesses in your religion: Nor say of Allah aught but the truth. Christ Jesus the son of Mary was (no more than) a messenger of Allah, and His Word, which He bestowed on Mary, and a spirit proceeding from Him: so believe in Allah and His messengers. Say not "Trinity" : desist: it will be better for you: for Allah is one Allah: Glory be to Him: (far exalted is He) above having a son. To Him belong all things in the heavens and on earth. And enough is Allah as a Disposer of affairs.

 

004.172
YUSUFALI: Christ disdaineth nor to serve and worship Allah, nor do the angels, those nearest (to Allah): those who disdain His worship and are arrogant,-He will gather them all together unto Himself to (answer).

 

003.045
YUSUFALI: Behold! the angels said: "O Mary! Allah giveth thee glad tidings of a Word from Him: his name will be Christ Jesus, the son of Mary, held in honour in this world and the Hereafter and of (the company of) those nearest to Allah;

 

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Shabir:

5. To have people pray to Jesus. While Jesus was asleep in a boat a storm rocked the boat. In Mark the disciples awoke Jesus with this mild rebuke:

"Teacher, do you not care if we drown?" But in Matthew they pray to him:

"Lord, save us! We are perishing." The rebuke was changed to a prayer.

(Mark 6:51-52 cf. 14:32-33)

 

Response:

This is perhaps the weakest example Shabir has given. The simple solution is that the disciples at first were angry at seeing Jesus asleep during the storm. Hence, their first response was to rebuke Jesus for what seemed to be his lack of concern, "Teacher, do you not care if we drown?" Yet, upon seeing the impending danger their anger quickly subsided and fear set in. Hence, the disciples cried out to their beloved Master to save them, "Lord, save us! We are perishing."

 

 

 

 

My Response

 

Shamoun's response shows how Matthew modifies the text again. If we are to take Shamoun's response as final, we are still left with a problem, why would Matthew leave the rebuke out when the disciples shout:

 

"Teacher, do you not care if we drown?"

 

Why would Matthew leave this rebuke out and just leave the prayer? Unlike Mark, Matthew isn’t in a hurry as Mark is, so he could’ve added all the information, the fact he left the rebuke out is to once again make Jesus look better than he is, because hey, how can you have the students shouting at the master right?

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Shabir:

 

Comparing Mark to Matthew in this way, we have seen how Matthew has reworked the material to bring out later Christian teachings.

 

Response:

All we have really seen is Shabir's presuppositions that disallow for a harmonization of the Gospels. Yet, Shabir's approach serves to discredit the Quran as well as we will shortly document.

 

 

 

My Response

 

Even with your attempted harmonization you are still left with problems as I showed.

 

 

 

He Wrote

 

Shabir:

 

The difference is further pronounced as we go from Mark, the first gospel, to John, the last gospel. The image of Jesus in John is much larger than in Mark. Here Jesus takes on cosmic dimensions.

 

Response:

 

Shabir is actually arguing from silence. Shabir presumes the fact that since Mark does not portray Christ in the same exact fashion as John does, then Mark's Jesus is not the same as the Johannine Jesus. Again, Shabir does not allow for different writers to focus on different aspects of a particular individual's life. Shabir thinks that the writers must have held to different views seeing that they did not emphasize the same things about Christ. This is a clear fallacy.

 

 

 

My Response

 

Shamoun himself knows that the Gospel of Mark and John are completely different, yet Shamoun feels the need to argue this as if it’s not true when he knows it is.

 

However so even with that said, there is not ONE EXLICIT STATEMENT in the Gospel of John where Jesus says he is God, nor is there any verse where he hints it or gives the idea that he is. NOT ONCE.

 

This shall conclude part one, part two will certainly contain the 'MEAT' of

Shamoun's article as he quotes several passages from the Gospel of Mark to show that Jesus is divine, however as we shall see, he fails. :)