> Why God's Book Cannot Contain Error

[Yanal]

Silver the Quran is not some original it is full original. How are you getting these sources? That quran is not fully written,it contains error etc...

[SilverLJ]

Originally Posted by Abu Sayyad

Silver the Quran is not some original it is full original. How are you getting these sources? That quran is not fully written,it contains error etc...

I have no idea where you get you information from either. If you say it is fully original what do you mean? Can something be half-original? Do you mean you are sure it is God's word, do you mean you can prove it to be God's word, do you mean you have copy exactly as it was in the days of the prophet, do you mean it's original in the sense that any book has an original - what do you mean? Show me the original - surely you must know that the script YOUR Qu'ran is written in for example was not even used in the time of the prophet.

I suggest you start doing some research and find out about the transmission of the of the Qu'ran such as chapter 5 in Farid Esack's book 'the Qu'ran' and see how many accounts there are of transmission and the real difficulties of the claim to originality.

[SilverLJ]

Originally Posted by Acid

This is a silly argument as I said earlier. Either way be it heresy or hearsay, its inconsistent with the argument which you put which was that it was personal.

As I earlier said that this means that Jesus doctrine is also hearsay as no one else was there the whole of the revelation except Jesus and God and the Holy Ghost (so called). No men ever saw angels teaching a Prophet. It is even kiddish to assume it. a Prophet is not a student who needs to sit in a class and wait for his Angel teachers to come and give him classes infront of masses.

I don't know why you find it so hard to follow the argument but I will state it once again and show that Biblical inspiration is far stronger. The argument is

Let us suppose that something has been revealed to a certain person (eg. prophet Mohamed), and not revealed to any other person, [so] it is a revelation only to that person. [It follows it is] hearsay to every other person, and consequently they are not obliged to believe. Put simply the case for the Qu'ran being a revelation from God is weak.

So whilst I agree with you that the revelation of individual Biblical prophets might be regarded as hearsay the whole point is that Christians and Jews have more that ONE prophet and those prophets agree or in terms of the argument they confirm each other's revelations and message though separated by space and time and nothing else is needed outside what we find in the Bible.

If I in contrast turn to the Bible then quoting professor F.F Bruce, if we enquire Into the circumstances under which various Biblical documents were written, we find that they were written at intervals over a space of nearly 1400-1600 years. The writers wrote in various lands, from Italy in the west to Mesopotamia and possibly Persia in the east. The writers themselves were a hetero-geneous number of people, not only separated from each other by hundreds of years and hundreds of miles, but belonging to the most diverse walks of life. In their ranks we have kings, herdsmen, soldiers, legislators, fishermen, statesmen, courtiers, priests and prophets, a tent making Rabbi and a Gentile physician, not to speak of others of whom we know nothing apart from the writings they they have left us.

The writings themselves belong to a great variety of literary types. They include history, law (civil, criminal, ethical, ritual, sanitary), religious poetry, didactic treatises, lyric poetry, parable and allegory, biography, personal correspondence, personal memoirs and diaries, in addition to the distinctively Biblical types of prophecy and apocalyptic.

For all that, the Bible is not simply an anthology; there is a unity which binds the whole together. An anthology is compiled by an anthologist, but no anthologist compiled the Bible. Somehow or other it grew in the course of these many centuries until at length it attained full stature as the Bible which we know today. The Unifying principle which makes the Bible a living whole is Christ Himself the Bringer of salvation.

Thus Christians have a host of witnesses to God's revelation and that is why we must trust in it's truths.

[SilverLJ]

Originally Posted by Acid

You have again not answered how many Prophets bought bible with them while bible was only inspired to its authors years after Jesus Ascension.

Yes of course original bible does not exist today and If that does not exist so that does not mean that we should start believing in a corrupt bible when a Latest revelation has come from God to His Final Messenger (PBUH). As for the message, the message is bible is totally inconsistent with message of all other prophets. No Prophet preached Trinity. The OT is totally monothestic than the Christianity. So you fail to the test. The original bible is lost and because it is lost, you started believeing in the false one rather then the Latest Revelation from God ie. Quran.

I cannot be blamed for simple ignorance on your part about the Bible and you do not even seem to know that the Bible is traditionally divided into two parts: the Old and New Testaments. Whilst the NT was inspired after Jesus death (it could hardly be before could it) and it's list of books was 'closed' by the council of Carthage in AD 397 though all they did was agree what had been common ground from about AD 130 (again it could hardly have been much earlier)

The OT existed long before Jesus was even born and its cannon is more complicated to explain but probably goes back to 250 BC where we have the Septuagent or the OT in Greek so books in Hebrew pre-date that.

You say the 'original' Bible is lost but your ignorance surfaces again because until about 250BC the OT did not exist as complete and the OT was not completed until AD 130 so how could it have been lost?

I can say to you the original Qu'ran is lost because YOU cannot produce it for anyone to see. You argue it was recited but ask any qurra and you will find there are many ways to recite and ask any Muslim scholar and you will find there are dozens of traditions as to how the Qu'ran got written down. Wake up from your ignorance and start doing some real research. I have read the Qu'ran a number of times but I am certain you have not read the Bible even once or even one book of the Bible - try Mark's gospel start there.

[SilverLJ]

Originally Posted by salman

no, I didn't say that they heard Jabreel (peace be upon him) and we believe that no one can see Angels in their original form; however, the companions (may Allah be pleased with them) did see Jabreel (peace be upon him) when he came to Messenger of Allah (sal-allahu 'alayhi wa salam) in the form of man and he asked Prophet (peace be upon him) some questions. I said at times the revelation came while they were with him (sal-allahu 'alayhi wa salam). So, it is not completely private from that perspective.

Again, as I've already pointed out, the message in the Qur'an is consistent with the basic and common message of previous Prophets (peace be upon them), we don't need the original Bible to verify it as the basic message is still found in the corrupted Bible. If original Bible were to be still around, why would we have a new book from Allah Ta'ala, the Qur'an?

No you are MISSING the point. NO OTHER prophet confirmed Mohammed's revelation. It is inconsistent with the Bible in many respects and that is presumably why you invent this frankly ludicrous story about the Bible being corrupted and if we could only get at some mythical original all would be well.

Now you admit the Bible is good enough because the message is still there. And then we descend into farcical logic about the Qu'ran. If Allah is so great why did He not make sure the 'original Bible' was kept safe just as you argue He has done so for the Qu'ran? This is not even straw man its stubble man.

[SilverLJ]

Originally Posted by salman. Right and you think this is a great logical argument in your favour not realizing that it is a straw man. It is straw man because we believe that Islam is only religion from God, which was revealed to mankind from Adam to Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon them), and we believe in the books revealed to other Prophets, obviously in the original form. All the Prophets preached the same message except that Shar'eeh rulings differed. Unlike the bible, the Qur'an is consistent with what the Prophets (peace be upon them) before the Messenger of Allah (sal-allahu 'alayhi wa salam) preached. If a certain Shar'eeh ruling is found in the Qur'an but not in the books before it, it doesn't mean it is hearsay or inconsistent because we find the similar pattern in other books before the Qur'an.

So tell me, which Prophet before Prophet Jesus ('alayhi as-salam - peace be upon him) preached that God has a son, God is 3 in one and He will die for mankinds' sins? Why were the ten commandments revealed to Moses ('alayhi as-salam) if they were already preached by other prophets before him?

There are many things here and I will use a few posts to talk about them. Let's start with Moses. I don't know why God revealed the 10 commandments and the law to Moses but I guess it was because by that time they had become a great people and nation. The only ones before Moses were Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and then a very long gap until Moses appeared. All we know about those before Moses is who they are and how God dealt with them and they did not or were not given any teachings to write down but they all entered into a covenant with God even though none were perfect and the Bible records grievous sins for all of them. Hence I have no idea what you are talking about and you seem to be ignorant of simple Bible history and I suggest you at least read Genesis and Exodus.

[Assad]

Originally Posted by SilverLJ

I have no idea where you get you information from either. If you say it is fully original what do you mean? Can something be half-original? Do you mean you are sure it is God's word, do you mean you can prove it to be God's word, do you mean you have copy exactly as it was in the days of the prophet, do you mean it's original in the sense that any book has an original - what do you mean? Show me the original - surely you must know that the script YOUR Qu'ran is written in for example was not even used in the time of the prophet.

The answer is : yes , yes , yes , yes.

The copy of Quran which we have today is exactly the same which was during the Prophets time. It was written in the time of Prophet and was also fully memorised by thousands of Muslims. They all passed down the Quran to us through generations without any discripencies.

Script of Quran today is the same as the time of Prophet. You make claims without any proof or sources and funny enough that you accuse others of plagarism. Why didnt you provide any proof for what you said ?

[SilverLJ]

Originally Posted by Acid

The answer is : yes , yes , yes , yes.

The copy of Quran which we have today is exactly the same which was during the Prophets time. It was written in the time of Prophet and was also fully memorised by thousands of Muslims. They all passed down the Quran to us through generations without any discripencies.

Script of Quran today is the same as the time of Prophet. You make claims without any proof or sources and funny enough that you accuse others of plagarism. Why didnt you provide any proof for what you said ?

This is just absurd, you tell me I give no proof but where is YOUR proof? If you persist in your ignorance of basic facts then we have no grounds on which to debate.

If I quote the respected Muslim Scholar Farid Esack to take one of your supposed facts "Arabic script as we know it today was unknown in the Prophet's time and the Qur'an was recorded in a scripts defectiva made up of simple lines and strokes. Early Qur'anic Arabic thus lacked precision because distinguishing between consonants was impossible given the absence of diacritical marks (a'jam) by which one recognizes these in modern Arabic. Furthermore, the vowelling marks (tashkil) to indicate prolongation or vowels were also absent. All of this made for endless possibilities in meanings and error in transcription. The Arabic script as we know it today, the scripta plena, with its pointed texts and being fully vowelled, was not perfected until the middle of the ninth century".(See his book 'The Qu'ran' ISBN 978-1-85168-624-7)

Professor Esack also show unequivocally that there were several Qu'ran variants citing early Muslim Scholars such as Al Ashtah, Ibn Dawud and and Ibn al-Anbari who all dealt with these variant codices. In Kufa for example, the version of 'Abd Hillah ibn Mas'ud remained in vogue for some time and there are indications that he refused Uthman's instructions to stop teaching his version and to destroy copies of it.

[salman]

Mr. Silver, before starting a new topic within a topic, why don't you answer the previous posts. I'm holding myself back and waiting for your replies. However, instead of answering the previous posts, you start new topic to divert people's attention. Let me remind you that the essence of a discussion or debate is to address previous points first or say "I don't know or don't have an answer". All of your responses are inconsistent with your own premises and hasty drawn conclusion with no basis whatsoever. I'll deal with rest later but I just wanted to remind you that I'm still waiting for answer to my previous posts. If you can't answer then please say you don't know so that we don't waste our time.

[SilverLJ]

Originally Posted by salman

(Post No 9) let's start from the basics: what does the word "Qur'an" mean? or what does it refer to? According to who, the oldest copy extant to 200 years later?

Qu'ran means literally 'recitation' though that does not seem to prove anything one way or another. But to you it is the very word of God and one supposes that Arabic in some mysterious way is special but as a language it was a very late comer and even its script is thought to have been defined by Christians before Mohammed's time. I might just give two views of it as a book

1. Muslims revere Koran with a reverence that borders on bibliolatry and superstition. It is as Guillaume remarked, "the holy of holies. It must never rest beneath other books, but always on top of them, one must never drink or smoke when it is being read aloud, and it must be listened to in silence. It is a talisman, against disease and disaster" For Muslims the Qur'an is alive and has a quasi-human personality. The supposed power of the Qur'an to Muslims is reflected in one ayah which says "Had We bestowed tills Qur'an from on high upon a mountain, you would indeed see it [the mountain] humbling itself, breaking asunder for awe of God" (59.21). Others have been less kind:

2. Gibbon said it was an "incoherent rhapsody of fable", Carlyle an "insupportable stupidity" while here is what the German scholar Salomon Reinach thought: "From the literary point of view, the Koran has little merit. Declamation, repetition, puerility, a lack of logic and coherence strike the unprepared reader at every turn. It is humiliating to the human intellect to think that this mediocre literature has been the subject of innumerable commentaries, and that millions of men are still wasting time absorbing it."

As I have said before there is only ONE witness to it, no one else heard the revelations and in terms of it's authenticity there are no written copies in existence from the time of the prophet. I have written extensively else where in this board about the Arabic script used and will say again Uthman's project to compile the Qur'an was clearly in response the proliferation of "unauthorized copies" during his time. As far as ancient copies go the two most cited Tashkent and one at Topkapi (one needs to be careful here as there are 1,600 old Qu'rans in Topkapi). Scholars differ of course but most think these are dated about 200 years after the prophet's death. For a fuller discussion read "Which Koran? : Variants, Manuscripts, & the Influence of Pre-Islamic Poetry by Ibn Warraq (ed) but quoting from the book:

The fact is that few Muslims realise there are several Korans in circulation in the Islamic world, with textual variations whose significance, extent, and meaning has never been properly examined. In a lengthy introduction, Warraq notes that historical and linguistic evidence suggests that there was considerable confusion regarding what should be included in the Koran in the early years of Muslim history. Although the caliph Uthman canonised a specific text some fifteen years after the death of Muhammad, variant readings of certain passages have persisted to the present.

This can be seen in discrepancies between the two main printed versions of the Koran available today (the Warsh transmission found in West and Northwest Africa and the Hafs transmission, stemming from Kufa, and widely available through the standard Egyptian edition of 1924). This, coupled with the fact that Muslim secondary literature (the Hadiths) discusses missing Koranic verses and even Muhammad's sometimes faulty memory, strongly indicate that the Koran cannot be considered an inert revelation.

As a visual aid, Warraq has compiled a unique and valuable chart of thirty-two Koranic variants found in Korans available in the Islamic world, along with remarks on their significance. Modern Islamic scholars focus on what the Qu'ran means and has to say for the everyday world we live in and to me that is right and wasting time with some vain attempt to justify the impossible. If the Qu'ran has any worth its because of what it teaches.