It is NOT necessary to show plagiarism that we have the names of the person who did it. Anyone who compares objectively the Joseph story as found in the Bible and as found in the Qu'ran will conclude they are they same story and since the Biblical account is about 1,000 years older it must be the source. But here you stray into a fallacy because you seem to be asking me to prove "that the prophet couldn't have known" which of course is impossible because if it is true there would be no evidence so the question is an absurd one and unworthy of you. What we can do is show that the Prophet at least had, as one earlier post puts it '.. access to..": he was a merchant and travelled widely, he lived amongst Jewish and Christian communities, he lived on trade routes, he had as a wife a prominent Jewish woman, one of his servants was a Christian, etc etc and he speaks about the 'scriptures' so the weight of evidence favours that Prophet Mohammed did have access to Biblical knowledge.
It is very necessary when making an accusation to back it up with cold hard evidence and facts. Now, again, the style of the Quran in and of itself compared to the hadith (let alone previous scriptures) completely differs, for all 114 suras compared to the 9 volumes of sahih bukhari alone. Please don't appeal to my intellect. I am not going to dismiss systematic logic for your whims. I have already stated above, you have only two options either to account and prove what you have stated (surely the Jews of Arabia or else where) were there to take the challenge of the Quran (see previous post
on attempts modern and old) of those living in the region and outside and all have collectively failed. (do you read anything that is written or linked here so we are not repeating ourselves with every subsequent post?) your
failure to acknowledge known history, and an appeal to my emotionality on any level
isn't going to exempt you from doing some home work. Either prove your point or concede to the obvious!
Well that is fine but its simply your experience and the arrogance comes because you imply that everyone else is somewhat lacking - go and look at the things you say if you feel I am unkind here. No I have not studied the Qu'ran in a formal setting but I have studied it. But if I use your kind of logic I conclude that it has nothing to say but at least I am aware that that is only my opinion. Just for the record, what was your formal setting for studying the Bible so we get a context? You see you give yourself away all the time, I come with heresy and impure motive or vision but you of course do not - so who has the blinkers on?
A 'formal setting' includes but not limited to having to take a religion course three times a week in a christian school in the choice language of its adherents.. have you done the same with the Quran? Take lectures, Q&A and get tested on a two weekly basis just on the lowest common denominator. You prove yourself unlearned in the Quran, it really isn't my doing save to point out the obvious--
Can you see that that I can say also that YOUR religion is neither satisfactory to my heart or mind that that it is full of fable and nonsense about bridges into hell or Jinns or sofas in heaven? Until you can at least appreciate that others can think differentially to you then your mind is closed and you cannot ever appreciate what is good when you find it unless it matches up with your world view and that is a sad and hopeless stance. Incidentally, I note many times you talk about a 'self-immolating' good but I cannot work out what you are talking about? I presume you refer to Jesus and he did not commit suicide and was not burned.
How you feel about my religion is inconsequential. Jinn isn't what Islam is about, neither the high sofas (you can live a perfectly pious life not centered around either theme/ and not be punished for failure to focus on either).
God consummating with a woman and dying on the cross is in fact the very fulcrum upon which your beliefs-- You have given up every last tenet deeming them
for show to accept one anticlimactic moment when god allegedly died for your sins. Self-immolating is pretty self explanatory?.. do you deny that your god died after praying to himself not to be forsaken, yet went ahead and self-immolated the next day? how can a promise broken to self, reconcile with a promise to all mankind? Is this middle eastern god (who probably covered his head) worthy of trust?
You say you had three years of Bible study but here you do not understand the basics and I have no idea what you mean by 'eat my sins'. The Christian doctrine is that God as a gift gives us his righteousness and that is enabled through faith in the work of Jesus. If you want to think about that then just ask yourself how a holy and just God can forgive sins - a judge who sets the guilty free would be a wicked judge would he not so how does it work in Islam? (this may be for another thread)
Eating your sins is removing 'god as a self-immolating gift' of florid words indeed, your judge not only sets the wicked free, he seems to do it for the absurd reason of merely having believed not even in the work he did but that very moment when he died on the cross. So they give up most of his commandments (see previous discussion on the matter) for the moment where we are asked to give up all logical understanding even of math and concede that is that is all but need to be done that one is allowed entry to the pearly gates. This same god is somehow meant for all mankind yet neglectful of those do in fact live righteous lives and do righteous deeds as per all his previous commandments for not willing to accept that he was born, suckled, da*ned the earth and died and chose ineffectual apostles and then abrogated his commandments through his nemesis.. (you want to talk logic?)
God doesn't set the wicked free for even Muslims who are sinners aren't exempt from hell for the mere fact of being Muslims. Ones prayer and fast might not be accepted if there were no sincerity!
This is just ramblings and not perhaps part of this thread. The central tenet of the Bible is that God wants to redeem us and the whole of history is about just that. What central tenet do you have that can say more than that?
The Five pillars of Islam are its major tenets, and all the other ones are listed all through out the Quran. I'll let the words of a recent convert say it best with:
This Guidance found in the Holy Qur'an and the recorded words and deeds of the Holy Prophet Muhammad, upon whom be peace, is not only for foreign races in some far-away corner of the East, centuries ago. Here are to be found the solutions to all economic, social, moral and political problems which face us right here in the West today.
Furthermore, Islam is not cold, remote and impersonal. Muslims have complete faith in a very personal God who not only created, sustains and rules the universe but also loves and deeply cares about the fate of each of us. The Holy Qur'an tells us that God is nearer to every one of us than our jugular veins! Since the Holy Qur'an is divine revelation, it cannot and will never be changed. Because it is perfect, it cannot be improved, revised or reformed. Since Muhammad, peace be upon whom, is the final Prophet, his guidance can never be superseded by any other. The Qur'an and Sunnah are addressed to all peoples, in every country of the West as
well as the East. Since it is relevant for all times, in all places, it can never become obsolete or out-of-date.
http://www.theikhlaas.com/resources/downloads/www.theikhlaas.com%20-%20Revert%20Letter%20to%20Parents.pdf
I am puzzled as I don't recall much in the way of describing the Bible. Of course I like everyone else deal with things emotionally, one cannot evaluate anything in any other way. When I see this I begin to understand why you place such weight in criteria because you think it logical. For example, you say something is lyrical but it is not logic that tells you that is it? You say that a book, any book moves you deeply, but that is not logical is it? What you fail to see is that we might feel that our set of criteria is quite logically derived but when we evaluate each one its our emotional part that predominates. You defence mechanism is that you mistakenly believe that YOU are always quite logical.
This is gibberish, but it is fine.. if you take things on emotionality then you wouldn't mind praying to Ganesha the way you do to Jesus.. I mean why a middle eastern god instead of an indian one? if no logic is involved then I don't see a point--
you dance around and come to the point, thought I quote you articles and discuss the Quran at length, how can I conclude anything other than you allaying your own fears when discussing your religion, of which no two books agree on the same content to make the leap of whether the Quran rhyming is a big deal or not? I don't think your mind can wrap itself around the concept of a book defying imitation; matchless for that is a living miracle to people.. whether Jesus even existed or not there is no recorded history save for the bible and two very questionable historical accounts of his existence. We can't evaluate the miracles of Jesus let alone make the leap that he is divine, and yet we have here an existing miracle and a challenge for all the ages and you want to discuss emotionality and logic?
If you are unsatisfied for personal reasons, that is your prerogative but don't impose garbled nonsense that you dream with each subsequent post as the new criteria for what one should consider miraculous or the working of hazy scribes!
So your position is that unless its logical in your eyes it must be false. So are there really sofas in heaven on which the faithful will lie for eternity, is there really a bridge which we have to cross, did some men really stay in a cave for 300 years, did the Prophet have his heart removed and washed in snow etc etc - do you get the point about faith? I wonder why you can only quote from the more lurid history that the Bible records - why not just as an exercise show me that 1 Corinthians 13 is of no value whatever? For once be even handed.
Indeed the contents of a book that is deemed from God shouldn't be lurid..
Let's see if the matter of the men in the cave follows a logical pattern:
9 [AND SINCE the life of this world is but a test,]6 dost thou [really] think that [the parable of] the Men of the Cave and of [their devotion to] the scriptures could be deemed more wondrous than any [other] of Our messages?7
10 When those youths took refuge in the cave, they prayed: "O our Sustainer! Bestow on us grace from Thyself, and endow us, whatever our [outward] condition, with consciousness of what is right!"8
11 And thereupon We veiled their ears in the cave9 for many a year,
12 and then We awakened them:10 [and We did all this] so that We might mark out [to the world]11 which of the two points of view showed a better comprehension of the time-span during which they had remained in this state.12
13 [And now] We shall truly relate to thee their story:13 Behold, they were young men who had attained to faith in their Sustainer: and [so] We deepened their consciousness of the right way14
14 and endowed their hearts with strength, so that they stood up15 and said [to one another]: "Our Sustainer is the Sustainer of the heavens and the earth. Never shall we invoke any deity other than Him: [if we did,] we should indeed have uttered an enormity!
15 These people of ours have taken to worshipping [other] deities instead of Him, without being able to16 adduce any reasonable evidence in support of their beliefs;17 and who could be more wicked than he who invents a lie about God?18
16 Hence, now that you have withdrawn from them and from all that they worship instead of God, take refuge in that cave: God will spread His grace over you, and will endow you - whatever your [outward] condition - with all that your souls may need!"19
17 And [for many a year] thou might have seen the sun, on its rising, incline away from their cave on the right, and, on its setting, turn aside from them on the left, while they lived on in that spacious chamber,20 [bearing witness to] this of God's messages: He whom God guides, he alone has found the right way; whereas for him whom He lets go astray thou canst never find any protector who would point out the, right way.
18 And thou wouldst have thought that they were awake, whereas they lay asleep. And We caused them, to turn over repeatedly, now to the right, now to the left; and their dog [lay] on the threshold, its forepaws outstretched. Hadst thou come upon them [unprepared], thou wouldst surely have turned away from them in flight, and wouldst surely have been filled with awe of them.21
19 And so, [in the course of time,] We awakened them;22 and they began to ask one another [as to what had happened to them].23 One of them asked: "How long have you remained thus?" [The others] answered: "We have remained thus a day, or part of a day."24 Said they [who were endowed with deeper insight]: "
Your Sustainer knows best how long you have thus remained.25 Let, then, one of you go with these silver coins to the town, and let him find out what food is purest there, and bring you thereof [some] provisions. But let him behave with great care and by no means make anyone aware of you:
20 for, behold, if they should come to know of you, they might stone you to death or force you back to their faith - in which case you would never attain to any good!"26
21 AND IN THIS way27 have We drawn [people's] attention to their story,28 so that they might know - whenever they debate among themselves as to what happened to those [Men of the Cave]29 - that God's promise [of resurrection] is true, and that there can be no doubt as to [the coming of] the Last Hour. And so, some [people] said: "Erect a building in their memory;30 God knows best what happened to them." Said they whose opinion prevailed in the end: "Indeed, we must surely raise a house of worship in their memory!"
22 [And in times to come] some will say,31 "[They were] three, the fourth of them being their dog," while others will say, "Five, with their dog as the sixth of them" -
idly guessing at something of which they can have no knowledge - and [so on, until] some will say, "[They were] seven, the eighth of them being their dog." Say: "My Sustainer knows best how may they were. None but a few have any [real] knowledge of them.
Hence, do not argue about them otherwise than by way of an obvious argument,32 and do not ask any of those [storytellers] to enlighten thee about them."
We see a few things accomplished by these verses, here firstly the very obvious sign that there are 9 extra lunar years in 300 solar years that people aren't aware of. (and that is actually quite a miracle given our dear departed member (Barney) couldn't understand the math behind it modern day.
2- the story is set as an allegory of death and resurrection and of the relativity of "time" as manifested in man's consciousness.
3- that the time spent in the cave and the number of men in the cave isn't the objective of the verse (though miraculous in its own right) as we are told in the verses (see above) not argue other than by way of an obvious argument and glean the proper moral, that those who live righteous lives are rewarded, and surely as we perish for an unknown period of time that we are resurrected anew to eternal life and that is the divine promise.
That to me is God answering every question that needs to be answered in a few short verses.
The prophet's heart being moved and washed isn't in the Quran, I challenge you to show me the verse so stating.. Don't confuse hadith with Quran and make them both an object of comparison with your bible. This just shows me that you are unable to do quality research.
further, I don't see why having sofas (though the term sofa isn't used in the Quran/ rather reclining on high thrones) is a problem of belief or disbelief, science or none science -- it is a description of the hereafter, what is classified as ''ghyeb'' Perhaps you might want to point out what the problem you have with that?
Again, jinn and high 'sofas' aren't the focus of Islam as a religion (see previous replies on the matter)
I haven't encountered anything lurid in the Quran, least of which as compares to the bible-- a book allegedly about god (from god?) and the men he sent!
I don't think I said the Qu'ran was plagiarised, the issue is not the Qu'ran as such but your claim that Prophet Mohammed could have had no access to Biblical stories and there is a very big difference. Here you express opinion, that Islam is the true religion as if the fact that you state it makes it true. Bit puzzled though by the line "always has been .." because there is no sign or mention of Islam in any civilization before the 6th century.
There is no account to mention that Abraham is a Jew or that those surrounding Jesus are christians .. Islam is to submit to God by definition and thus all those who followed the monotheistic path are so considered.. even to be called a yehudi (mann itaba3 alhouda) or a hebrew (al3abreen) for having crossed the red sea.. are terms used to describe the people not the path they follow. You want to get lost in semantics, it is your prerogative, and again if you say the prophet had access to Jewish/christian stories then prove it.. I am giving you ample room to go about this systematically not jump back and forth between content and history.. choose a path and stick with it until you clarify your points. I think any Jew or Christian at the time would have had a field trip taking claim for the noble Quran given how much they have conspired to kill the prophet, and going to their elders to see how they can dismiss this message (for which when they couldn't they claimed him a spellbinder/magician) You claim you have read the Quran cover to cover (and that I the arrogant have no knowledge of it) that is fine.. do you know the name of the man and his status in querysh the one to whom the verses in suret Al'modathir (74) are addressing?
18 Behold, [when Our messages are conveyed to one who is bent on denying the truth,] he reflects and meditates [as to how to disprove them] -
19 and thus he destroys himself,9 the way he meditates:
20 yea, he destroys himself, the way he meditates!
21 and then he looks [around for new arguments],
22 and then he frowns and glares,10
23 and in the end he turns his back [on Our message], and glories in his arrogance,
24 and says, "All this is mere spellbinding eloquence handed down [from olden times]!12
25 This is nothing but the word of mortal man!"
The eloquent elders of the olden days are no different from you, are they?
You must stop pontificating. I have personally read the Bible about 40 times cover to cover to say nothing of the time spend in detailed study, in church itself, reading commentaries etc. Only last week I was at a public lecture at a prestigious University where a double Phd spoke about cosmology and Biblical faith so I think he might have noticed even if I had missed it that the Bible is as you say it is.
Reading the bible 40 times and listening to a lecture doesn't make the bible any more weighty or truthful.. There are lectures and books going on in atheist halls where self-congratulating men believe they too have given solid lectures that are proven true. (why do you mention something so ridiculous) as if some authority on the matter when you haven't even covered content to receive applause? .. the early interpretation of the bible should be the most correct? for they were closer to the men of old who allegedly had first hand experience with Jesus as he viewed the world. And I think history tells a different account that any excessively ornamented lectures of the 21st c. (and their clandestine content whatever they maybe) As for pontification, I think that is a good reflection you one who not only claims to have read the Quran (yet can't gauge it in an intelligent fashion, but goes so far to accuse me of not being learned of its contents.
This perhaps shows a difference in outlook and to Jews and Christians they don't look for proofs but do as Jeremiah said: Jeremiah 29:10-14 (NIV)
11. For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14. I will be found by you," ... "
Here again you just assume you are right, I need to do an honest assessment but you do not - this sounds like someone who is unsure and must bolster their faith by speaking loudly.
That is nice..What am I to glean from this pearl?
What exactly is a true argument and so far all I have done is comment on the legitimacy of the kind of arguments for say supposed scientific miracles in the Qu'ran. The fact that I think most of them are just wishful thinking does not mean I think the Qu'ran is useless because I have yet to see one of these so called miracles that helps in any way to explain what a verse actually means. I have read the Qu'ran cover to cover a number of times and of course I can only do it in English and what objective comparison did you have in mind given that for me none is possible. As far as I know I have used very few quotations in this thread and what is written is generally my own work. If there is any drowning going on then you are the culprit as some of you postings are longer that all mine put together.
For someone who has read it cover to cover, you often come empty, firstly you quote incorrectly to which I previously corrected you and you were kind to send me a 'Note' on the matter via PM.
2- you miss the meaning of verses, as noted above with sure al-kahf for surely the number of years spent in the cave isn't the moral of the story!
3-you intermingle Quran with hadith to hone in on a point which you continuously fail to elucidate
4- The Quran is a book of signs not of science and many scientists have subjected it to the test and found nothing in it to counter known science.. try to contrast that with the bible!
As far as logic goes I have tried to be as accurate and as clear as possible and indeed set out at the start of the thread by outlining what proof meant and some of the potholes in any kind of research - as far as I can recall no one queried (except a short comment from you) them or suggested they were in error. One final point - this thread is about various claims about the Qu'ran (as distinct from the Qu'ran itself) and if you wish to subject the Bible to various tests then another thread is needed.
You can't set the same criteria meant for drug safety to breast cancer trial on
BRCA2 genes. You can't set the criteria for long term effects of the Hiroshima, Nagasaki disasters to
effects of maternal
smoking during pregnancy!
Just because you know a thing about research doesn't mean it is one size fits all or that you can come here and dazzle the reader with your all too frequent ostentatious style to drown them in irrelevant jargon.
else we wouldn't have different style trials like
retrospective cohort study, Randomized controlled
trials, Nested case-control study, prospective cohort study, Anecdotal Reports, Case Series, Cross-Over Trial, Multiple Baseline Study etc etc.. surely you don't need me to list everyone in existence to make a point (but you can see that I will point out your folly when the time comes) this section is entitled comparative religion , it isn't a course in stats and epidemiology-- Do refrain from insulting everyone's intelligence including your own and setting up criteria that you HUGO deem objective and should be used books of history or theology.
the criteria for testing is already set, it is clear that anyone who has some semblance of common sense and a desire for honest research can undertake!
I ask that for your next post, that you not fill it with banalities that describe your own psyche in such an incriminating manner especially if they have been addressed repeatedly not only in this thread but in various others!..
all the best
saws
