Muhammad in the Bible
Question:-
Muslims
claim that the coming of the Prophet Muhammad was predicted in the Bible.
According to the Quran:-
"Those
who follow the Messenger - the unlettered Prophet - whom they find mentioned in
their own Law and Gospel." 7:157
"And
when Jesus son of Mary said: O children of Israel! Surely I am the messenger
of Allah to you, verifying that which is before me in the Torah and giving the
Good News (Gospel) of a Messenger who will come after me, his name being Ahmad.
But when he came to them with clear arguments they said: This is clear
sorcery." 61:6
Is there
any justification for this in the Old and New Testaments?
Answer:-
Some of
the confirming evidence for the signs of the Prophet Muhammad in the Bible is
as follows:-
"(Jesus asked the Pharisees) Saying, what
think ye of Christ: Whose son is he? They said unto him: The Son of David. He
saith unto them: How then doth David in spirit call him Lord, saying: The Lord
said unto my Lord, sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool?
If David then call him Lord, how is he his son? And no man was able to answer
him, neither durst any man from that day forth ask him any more
questions." Matthew 22:41-46. See also Mark 12:36 and Luke 20:42.
The two
names are usually rendered as "The Lord said unto my Lord." So, it is
argued in Christianity that if the first Lord is God, the second Lord is also
God. But what David said (Psalms 110:1) was:-
"Yahwah said to my Adon: Sit at my right
until I place Thine enemies a footstool under thy feet."
Whereas
Yahwah refers to God, the word Adon refers to a commander. It cannot refer to
Christ as Christians claim, but is a denial by Jesus that he is the one. The
fact is that the one expected would not be a descendant of David at all. It is noteworthy
that David received this information in spirit. The Prophecy fits Muhammad.
We read in
the last book of the Old Testament, Malachi:-
"Behold, I send My Messenger, and he shall
prepare the way before Me; and suddenly shall come to his temple the Adon whom
ye are seeking, and the Messenger of the Covenant whom ye desire. Behold, he
cometh, says the Lord of Hosts" Malachi 3:1
Christians suppose
that this establishes that two personages were to be expected - John the Baptist and Jesus, but the verse
refers to God and His Messenger of the Covenant. It is much more likely to be
Muhammad. John the Baptist was like Elias (Matthew 3:3).
[Note: The
two Prophets are also mentioned in the last book of the New Testament,
Revelations 11:3-12.]
In John
1:19-25, John the Baptist is being questioned whether he was Christ, Elias or
"that Prophet". He denied all this though Jesus thought he was Elias
(Matthew 11:13-15, 17:12-13). Obviously the Jews were expecting two prophets to
be sent by God. But John did not recognise Jesus as the Prophet about whom he
said:
"I indeed baptize you with water unto
repentance: but he that comes after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not
worthy to bear, he shall baptise you with the Spirit and with fire"
Matthew 3:11. See also Mark 1:7-8, and Luke 3:15-17.
John was a
contemporary of Jesus, his cousin (Matthew 1:18-25). He baptised Jesus with
water (Matthew 3:13-16) and Jesus and his disciples are reported to have
continued to baptise with water in John 3:26. And Christians still baptise with
water. John 16:7 and 13 assure us that the Spirit would come only after the
departure of Jesus. He did not, therefore, baptise with the spirit and with
fire. Nor did John submit to Jesus. However, in the original Gospel of St Mark
which is the oldest of the Gospels, the verses16: 9-20 do not exist and have
been omitted from modern translations. It is these that speak of preaching the
gospel to "every creature" and baptism of believers. There is no
mention of baptising in the name of the Father and Son and Holy Ghost even in
the King James version. In Matthew 28:19 the three are mentioned but not as
three gods. Acts 8:14-17 and 19:2-7 tells us that Baptism had not led to the
reception of the Holy Spirit, but that only when the Apostles "laid their
hands on them" then they received the spirit. But this would make them
greater than Jesus! It is evident that the Acts are mainly about Paul and Luke
was his disciple. However, John 20:22 does tell us that Jesus breathed on his
disciples and said unto them “receive ye the Holy Ghost”.
[Note:
However, John 1:15-18 and 25-34 tells us that John did recognised Jesus as the
one he was speaking about, but that is the opinion of the author of John's
Gospel and is contradicted by the other Gospels. John sends his disciple to ask
Jesus: "Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?"
Jesus simply points to his works.(Matthew 11:3-5)
[In Islam
the physical baptism is replaced by the Ablutions that precede prayer and is
performed by each person and not by a priest and not just once in a life time.
The spiritual baptism consists of understanding and faith and inner
purification. This is referred to in:-
"(We take our) dye of Allah (Our Religion
is the Baptism of Allah)! And who is better than Allah at dyeing? And we are
worshippers of Him." 2:138]
In the Old
Testament we find the prediction that a Prophet like Moses would be sent by God
among the brethren of the Israelites:-
"I will raise them up a Prophet from among
their brethren, like unto thee, and will put my words in his mouth; and he
shall speak unto them all that I shall command him." Deuteronomy 18:18
This is
taken by the Christians to refer to Jesus who also spoke as he heard (John
8:28, 7:16, 18, 6:38). Though the prediction fits Jesus in that respect, it
does not fit him as someone like Moses. Jesus did not take the faithful out of
the land where they were persecuted and did not create a nation with laws. But
Jesus also predicted that he would be followed by someone who would also speak
as he heard (John 16:13). Both predictions fit the Prophet Muhammad.
Deuteronomy
33:2 states: "The Lord came from
Sinai, and rose up from Seir unto them; he shined forth from mount Paran,
and he came with ten thousands of saints; from his right hand went a fiery law
for them."
Habakkuk
3:3 states "God came from Teman,
and the Holy One from mount
Paran. Selah, His glory
covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise."
Paran, a mountain of Mecca, is the place where Hagar and her
son Ishmael lived (Genesis 21:21). It has nothing to do with the Israelites or
Jesus. Arabs and the Prophet Muhammad are descendants of Ishmael's son, Kedar
(see Genesis 25:13 and Isaiah 16:9-17). Kedar is also mentioned in Isaiah
42:1-14 and Isaiah 60:1-7 onwards which can be seen as a good fit for the
prophet Muhammad.
We also
read:-
"The Sceptre shall not depart from Judah,
and the Lawgiver from between his feet, until the coming of Shiloh,
And to him belongs the obedience of peoples." Genesis 49:10
This
predicts that the Jewish reign over the spiritual realm comes to the end with
the coming of Shiloh. It did not end with
Jesus because Jesus adhered to the Jewish law (Matthew 5:17-19) and he came
only to the children of Israel
(Matthew 15:24-27)
The
meaning of Shiloh is given in the Pshitta
version is "he to whom it belongs", which means "the owner of
the sceptre and the law," or "he who possesses the sovereign and
legislative authority, and his is the obedience of nations." This
Legislator cannot be Moses, because he organized the Israelites, and there was
no king or prophet before him in Judah. It was not David, because he
was the first king and prophet who descended from Judah. Nor could it be Jesus
Christ, because he denied that the Messiah whom Israel was expecting was a son of
David (Matthew 22:44-45; Mark 12:35-37; Luke 20:41-44).
It is
obvious that Christian doctrines such as the Trinity depart from the Jewish
doctrines about God but appear to be based on St John's gospel where the Greek Platonic
concept of Logos, the Word, exists. It is not found in the ideas of Jesus who
was most certainly a Jew. The Quran rectifies the error in this concept: In
monotheism it is God's word, not a separate person, another god. In Luke 11:13
the Holy Spirit is a gift from God. In 1 Corinthians 6:19 the worshipers of God
are called "the temple of the Holy Spirit which they received from
God." In Romans 8:9 it lives within believers, and in Romans 8:14 it leads
the believers, thereby making them "sons of God".
Jesus
says:- "And I will ask the Father,
and he shall give you another Paraclete , that he may stay with you for
ever" (John 14:16,26; 15:7 and 16:7-14). But "paraclete" is
a Greek word and Jesus spoke Aramaic. The original word "Periqlytos"
meant "The Praised One" which is the same as the meaning of the
Arabic word "Ahmad", a name of Muhammad. But "Periqlytos"
has been corrupted to Paraklytos, and given the meaning of comforter or
advocate as also in 1 John 2:1 where it applies to Jesus. But that is not the
original meaning.
Matthew
5:48 tells us: "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in
heaven is perfect". In Luke 6:40 states: "The disciple is not above
his master, but every one that is perfected shall be as his master."
But the
original word translated as "perfected" is "mushlam" which
in the Arabic version is "Islam".
A parable
(Matthew 21:33-44) by Jesus also tells us that after sending servants, God
sends His Son, and when he is persecuted he comes Himself. This can be
interpreted as referring to the Quran, brought through the Prophet Muhammad,
where God speaks directly.
One verse
tells us about another comforter like himself. That refers to a person. Another
verse tells us that he would be sent after Jesus was gone. The Holy Spirit was
always with Jesus. Why then would it have been necessary for him to go away
before the Holy Spirit would come. Another verse tells us that he would bring
them all truth. That is not just comforting. It tells us he would not speak of
himself but say what he heard. This is exactly what Jesus said about himself
and it applies to Prophets and to the one predicted in the Old Testament,
Deuteronomy 18:18. In addition he would confirm the mission of Jesus and
"he will reprove the world of sin".
[The
Trinity is a doctrine created under the Roman Emperor Constantine. He
persecuted those Christians who, like the Jews, believed in the absolute
Oneness of God. More than a thousand Christian priests were summoned to the
General Council at Nicea, but only three hundred and eighteen persons agreed to
the decisions of the Council. The Ministers of the Arian Creed were deposed or
banished, their religious books suppressed, and their churches seized and
handed over to the Trinitarian bishops and priests. The merciless legions in
every province were placed at the disposal of the ecclesiastical authorities.
The regime of terror and war against the Unitarians, lasted for three centuries
and a half in the East.]
In the Prophecy in
the OT, the Book of Daniel chapter 7, the four beasts that came out of the sea
refer to the Babylonian, Persian, Greek and Roman Empires. The same four
Empires are referred to in Daniel chapter 2 as the golden head, silver chest,
brass belly and iron legs of a Statue. These worldly empires were destroyed by
a stone was destroyed by "The Son of Man" (BAR NASHA). As Constantine can be regarded as the
13th horn (one of the four little horns who defeated the other three rivals to
the Roman Empire), then "The
Son of Man" can be seen as referring to a Prophet and fits Muhammad and
Islam.
Jesus also
refers to Daniels prophecy in Daniel 8:13 when he spoke about the Last Days and
the return of the "Son of Man" in Matthew 24, particularly verse.
After the departure of Jesus, the Temple in Jerusalem was to be
destroyed and desecrated and later cleansed. As predicted it was destroyed by
the Romans in 70 AD, and Jerusalem
was re-conquered by Muslim forces - i.e. monotheism returned.
Jesus
mentions the phrase "Son of Man" (Barnasha) 83 times. It has been
assumed that it refers to Jesus, especially when he supposedly predicts his
return in Matthew 24:30. Jesus always used the phrase in the third person and
never said "I am the son of man", though some of the contexts in
which he uses the phrase does fit him. He was called the Son of God (Matthew
8:29), a phrase that refers to one who is led by the Spirit of God (John 1:12,
Romans 8:14). Jesus predicted the coming of the Son of Man in Matthew 25:31-34.
Messiah
(Christ) and Son of Man are sometimes thought to refer to the same thing. But
this does not seem to be the case. There is a distinction between the priestly
office that teaches and the governing office that judges and enforces. The
phrase also occurs in the Prophecy of Daniel (Daniel 7:13 and 8:17) which
relates to the destruction of the Roman domination. In Revelations 1:13-16, the
Son of Man is depicted as having a two-edged sword coming out of his mouth. In
Revelation 14:14-16 he has a sickle in his hand to reap the earth. This could
also refer to the rider of the white horse who had a sword coming out of his
mouth, went forth conquering, and judged righteously in Revelations 6:2 and
19:10-21. This could well refer to the Prophet Muhammad. The Jews were
certainly expecting a strong military leader, someone who would free them from
servitude to the Romans and restore the dominion of God's people. That
certainly did not fit Jesus who advised them to "render unto Caesar the
things that are Caesars" (Matthew 22:17-21). That is why most Jews did not
accept him. Later Jews accepted Muhammad instead.
It is a
mistake to suppose that God's people can be identified with a particular formal
or physical tribe, community or group of people, whether they be called Jew or
Christian etc, but should be understood as "Muslim" in the real
spiritual sense of the word, namely those who submit to Allah. Jesus is
reported to have said:
"And I say unto you, That many shall come
from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob,
in the kingdom of heaven. But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out
into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." In
Matthew 8:11
The phrase
"Son of Man" is more likely to represents what Muslims call
"Insan Kamil" a perfected spiritually superior descendant of man or a
major Prophet who brings about spiritual revival. It is likely that it refers
specifically to the Last Prophet. The title fits the Prophet Muhammad and is
likely to have been used as a prediction of the coming of Prophet Muhammad of
whom the following is true:-
"For the Son of man is come to save that
which was lost." Matthew 18:11
But it is
interesting to note that Jesus asked his disciples not to call him the Messiah
(Mark 8:29-33 and Luke 920-21). But the Quran affirms that he was the Messiah
(Christ). However, that title was not confined to Jesus. The title refers to
being anointed. Every Israelite King and High Priest was anointed with olive
oil mixed with spices (Lev. xxx. 23-33 ). Even the King of Persia is called
God's Christ: "Thus says the Lord to His Christ Cyrus," etc. (Isaiah
45:1-7).
There are
several web-site on the internet dealing with this subject. One, entitled
"Muhammad in the Bible", containing articles by Professor David
Benjamin Keldania, a Catholic Bishop who converted to Islam can be found at:-
http://muhammad.net/biblelp/index.htm.
Critic:-
Would you
recommend to someone who wanted to study the Quran to learn from a Muslim
apostate who reads the Quran only to make fun of it, or to make comments which
he knows will find favour in the ears of his new audience?
Comment:-
These
references to Muhammad (saw) in the Bible do not depend on the article by this
convert. Many were known to Muslims quite independently and he only gives
expression to them or elaborates on them.
An intelligent
person would read the article to determine whether it had good valid arguments
rather than false ones and would dismiss those which simply make fun based on
prejudices.
It is of
course obvious that a person who finds something false will abandon it and that
he will support what he finds to be true. It is then a question of whether he
has sufficient knowledge about either of these systems and has sufficiently
processed the information to discover what is self-consistent and
comprehensive.
Certainly
these arguments depend on a particular point of view, but I do not think Muslim
faith depends on those arguments. The reverse could be true - that the
arguments make sense when seen from the Islamic point of view.
Critic:-
I did read
the articles on the Internet site. But because its errors are subtle, I
wouldn't recommend it to someone who does not know Hebrew and the Bible well
enough to see them for what they are. That is why your comment here is
inadequate. Many of Mr. Dawud's readers will not have the knowledge required to
prevent them from being led astray by his half-truths. He would have been more
honest if he would have made statements like: "Christians/Jews explain
this verse this way ------, but that doesn't make sense because of ------,
therefore we Muslims explain it this way -----".
Comment:-
I take
your point.
I too have
read the articles you mention. I do see that different interpretations are
possible. Christians see the signs of Jesus in the Old Testament but Jews deny
that. The case about Muhammad in the Bible is similar. It is a question of
seeing whether something applies or not.
But it
does not invalidate what I said. The convert we are speaking about was not
ignorant of the Scriptures, Christianity or Islam, having been a Bishop in the
Christian Church. In order for conversion to happen he must have studied the
scriptures much more thoroughly than others.
Certainly
the references he quotes, as any others, can be interpreted in many ways
according to perception, motive and effort and there are endless arguments
about everything because people select facts and give them different weights.
The question is does a particular interpretation fit into a self-consistent
system of thought or not and how comprehensive that system is.
Some of
his arguments do seem weak or over-stretched to me but some of that may be
because I do not have the same amount of scholarship in the subject as he
appears to have. It is obviously not a sufficient reason that made him convert
to Islam. But people abandon or convert to various religions on the strength of
much less justification. The faith of Muslims is not based on such arguments,
but once a person is a Muslim such arguments can sound acceptable not as proof
but as evidence.
Critic:-
I'll give
you a few examples:-
He
mentions the 'rights' of the firstborn forgetting that the many exceptions,
each with an obvious or explicit reason, prove that this 'right' wasn't taken
for granted, at least not by the Biblical Patriarchs.
He says
that there is something wrong with the extant Bible if it says that the
Patriarchs didn't behave according to Moses' law, given centuries later, even
though the Bible gives no indication that the Patriarchs knew or were required
to obey that law.
He says
the "Shiloh" of Genesis 49:10 cannot refer to Jesus, "For Jesus
is a descendant of Judah
through Mary", as if he had never read a Biblical genealogy containing
only names of male ancestors. We may not like it, but the Bible doesn't
consider maternity when deciding on tribal affiliation.
He
translates, anachronistically, Hebrew "shalom" into
"Islam". This is a game anyone can play.
Comment:-
The
examples you give I could argue about all of them but I do not think that it
would be worth the effort because people tend to have their own preferred
position with which they identify and which they will defend to the end. It is,
for instance a Christian belief that Jesus had no earthly father and he could
not then be descended from David and he appears to have denied that he was. As
for the Hebrew word "shalom" it could well have been used in some
contexts in the same sense as "Islam".
Critic:-
I presume
your attitude is: "Why not learn Islam, it can't hurt".
For an
atheist or pagan, I would agree that Islam is a definite improvement and no
doubt God's purpose in having Muhammad promulgate it as part of his keeping his
promise to Abraham concerning Ishmael that he will be a great nation, but what
will a converted Jew say on the Last Day, when he is asked why he didn't
observe the Sabbath, or why he ate regular, leavened, bread during the holiday
of Passover, or failed in the observance of the many other commandments which
occur in Judaism and not in Islam?
Can he say
that he didn't bother reading the Law as given through Moses but rather a book
written for others, in a foreign language, by a non-Jew?
Comment:-
Jews have
to follow the Jewish Law. But they can convert to Islam and follow the Islamic
Law.
I have
read the Old Testament as well as the New Testament (and also Hindu and
Buddhist Scriptures). I see that there were a series of Prophets sent because
the Hebrews kept departing from the Divine
Way. I notice also that this Way, though it is
described by certain strict rules, these are modified from time to time as the
state and needs of the people varied over time. This is like adapting the
medicine according to the malady.
I conclude
that the Way is not to be defined by the strict rules but by the attitudes and
psychological conditions they are designed to create. This is like learning
mathematics for example. One learns to add certain figures by rote until one
grasps the notion of addition. This enables one to add any other numbers
together. Later one learns to manipulate numbers in many other ways. That is,
the particular is only an example of a more general principle. Religions vary
in particulars but have the same general principle.
There is
also an evolution over time such that new dispensations of religion must
replace the older ones not only because each religion has been corrupted by
adulteration, erosion and tiredness, but also because it has completed its task
of bringing mankind to a certain stage and the new dispensation has to produce
the next stage of human evolution.
A
spiritual impulse is like a pebble thrown into a pond. The ripples move
outwards in space and time bringing transformation, but weaken as they spread.
The energy introduced raises the level of the whole pond.
It is my
conviction based on my studies that the evolutionary transforming force in
Islam is far from exhausted. It is just that Muslims have gone to sleep and
perhaps others will discover and utilise and actualise its potentialities.
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