Harmony between the Bible and the Qur'an

جوري · May 3, 2009

^^ ;D don't you love how the middle eastern 'god' has none but recessive traits?
I am through rebutting to that guy..

Grace Seeker · May 3, 2009

GreyKode said:
@Follower
Christians are the ones who keep "defining" GOD as they like (astaghfarullah).

God has yellow hair and white skin.

Who said that?

GreyKode · May 3, 2009

Grace Seeker said:
Who said that?

The movie "Passion of the christ".(Technically brown hair).
There's nothing wrong with him looking human since HE(pbuh) WAS A MAN.
But you see what this has done, the african christians depict him as black, the middle easterns say he looks middle eastern and ofcourse the europeans have their own version, since everyone wants "GOD" to look like them.
Not to mention how women are ******* because GOD was a man.
(Astaghfirullah).

malayloveislam · May 4, 2009

GreyKode said:
@Follower
God died for your sins.
God has yellow hair and white skin.

God has nationalistic/racial background connotation?

Grace Seeker · May 4, 2009

GreyKode said:
The movie "Passion of the christ".(Technically brown hair).
There's nothing wrong with him looking human since HE(pbuh) WAS A MAN.
But you see what this has done, the african christians depict him as black, the middle easterns say he looks middle eastern and ofcourse the europeans have their own version, since everyone wants "GOD" to look like them.
Not to mention how women are ******* because GOD was a man.
(Astaghfirullah).

I'm amazed on several levels.

1) One that movie never says any such thing. At best (or in this case worst) you inferred it for reasons wholly your own and not found in the movie itself.

2) That you would get your theology from a movie, or even some medieval painting, rather than the Bible.

3) That you would make a ridiculous comment about Christians claiming God looks such and such a way, when even you admit that in the movie you used to base that absurd comment, the actor playing Jesus don't actually look that way. Blonde and brown are hardly the same.

4) You then actually provide your own rebuttal saying that each different group of people portray Jesus in their own manner. If this is so, we obviously don't as a group say that God has any particular color of skin or hair.

5) Have you not noticed that in American films American actors play roles of all sorts of different nationalities? I once saw a movie in which Marlan Brando played a chinese character, that doesn't mean that anyone really thinks that chinese people look like fat Italian-Americans. And having an Italian-American playing the role of Jesus doesn't mean that we think he looks that way either. I'm not saying that no one has ever been so confused, but to say that Christians define God such, or we really think God has yellow hair and white skin, just isn't true. And to do it based on a movie simply shows your own prejudices against anything Christian for you aren't even taking the time to think rationally with regard to what is and isn't being portrayed by it.

If by such a statment you aren't really suggesting that Christians perceive God this way and are just being too subtle for me to understand, then speak clearer, please. For your present comment, were it not so outlandish as to be insulting, I might actually find funny.

GreyKode · May 4, 2009

1) One that movie never says any such thing. At best (or in this case worst) you inferred it for reasons wholly your own and not found in the movie itself.

What do you mean wholly my own? How do you explain all the paintings of Jesus(pbuh) with the very same features that I mentioned?
I want to ask you this Grace, Do you have a mental of perception of him as a man with certain physical features or not? And if so, how does he look like?

2) That you would get your theology from a movie, or even some medieval painting, rather than the Bible.

It isn't my theology, my theology and my beliefs are that he(pbuh) was a man and so it wouldn't really matter how he looked like. I was talking about how this anthromorphic identity imposed on God forced people to think of him in such a way(everybody wants God to look like them).

Finally you just contradicted youself

4) You then actually provide your own rebuttal saying that each different group of people portray Jesus in their own manner. If this is so, we obviously don't as a group say that God has any particular color of skin or hair.

Do you believe that God came down as a man or not? Did his disciples see him in so many different versions or did he have certain destinct features? Otherwise how would they recognize him?

So You see in the second quote, you crticized me for suggesting that all christians think he looked like the way I described him, and that biblically christians agree on the way he looks and but its different from my description. [He has distinct physical features].
which to me it makes sense since he was only a man, that's what we muslims believe.

In your third quote the bold part, suggests that christians do not claim any specific features for him, a varying version from one person to another. [He has no distinct physical features ].

Grace Seeker · May 4, 2009

GreyKode said:
What do you mean wholly my own? How do you explain all the paintings of Jesus(pbuh) with the very same features that I mentioned?

They aren't in the movie you mentioned!!! That's why I said that if you have that image your inferred it for reasons wholly your own -- such an image is not found in the movie, you had to have found it elsewhere.

Finally you just contradicted youself

How? I prefaced my comment by saying that if your presentation is true, then ...... If there is any contradition it is in that you in one place say that Christians present Jesus has having yellow hair and white skin (I ask for evidence, you name a movie where he has brown hair), you then go on to say that Africans and Chinese don't see him this way. That is evidence, from your own words, that Christians see him many different ways, not one particular way, i.e. as you initially claimed with yellow hair and white skin.

So, do you wish to revise your original statement? Or do you still maintain:

Christians are the ones who keep "defining" GOD as they like (astaghfarullah).

God has yellow hair and white skin.

Pehaps you didn't really mean this. Perhaps you meant something else? For instance, maybe your main point wasn't what you actually said, but what you just said above:

I was talking about how this anthromorphic identity imposed on God forced people to think of him in such a way(everybody wants God to look like them).

That's why I said that perhaps you were being too subtle by this reference and I didn't understand. So, either speak clearly and continue with what you have just said and we can have a rational discussion about it, OR retract your previous statement about yellow hair and white skin, for it is certainly ridiculous to claim that Christians actually imagine Jesus as having yellow hair and white skin. Not even the places you have cited portray him that way.

GreyKode · May 4, 2009

Grace, don't take me out of context.
My statement

Christians are the ones who keep "defining" GOD as they like (astaghfarullah).

God has yellow hair and white skin.

was in response to Follower when he said that Islam tends to define God and put him in a box and so on..

Anyway, I take the "yellow hair and white skin" description back, since it was only meant to be an example of one of the forms, of what I believe backed by evidence(several paintings), how christians perceive God .

why are you putting too much emphasis on my example about the movie. I just chose a random example.

But still you have to answer this question?
Did he or did he not have distinct human features from the christian perspective?

Grace Seeker · May 5, 2009

GreyKode said:
Grace, don't take me out of context.
My statement

was in response to Follower when he said that Islam tends to define God and put him in a box and so on..

Anyway, I take the "yellow hair and white skin" description back, since it was only meant to be an example of one of the forms, of what I believe backed by evidence(several paintings), how christians perceive God .

why are you putting too much emphasis on my example about the movie. I just chose a random example.

But still you have to answer this question?
Did he or did he not have distinct human features from the christian perspective?

And my apologies for not understanding that you were just using that as an example. I can be dense sometimes.

As to what I understnad is your large question, did Jesus have distinct human features? From the Christian perspective, most certainly. I don't know what those were, my guess is dark brown, perhaps even coarse black hair. Probably fairly brown skin, not black but certainly not white. Short, at least by our standards today. I say these things not because I know, but because they are generally descriptive of Jews of his day and region. I suppose he could have been tall, with long blonde hair, black skin, slanted eyes, and a round face.

But I also don't think it is important what he looked like, except to say that he looked like a human being. And as far as him being male, I don't even think that is especially important. I figure that there was a 50/50 chance of it, but 100% chance that he would be either male or female.

There is no doubt that both Islam and Christianity define God to a certain extent. We have different ways of defining God, but we both say he is like this and not like that. Just our "this" and "that" are different, but both still do define what is and is not true about the one they call God --or, at least we believe that God tells us who he is and then we share that which we believe to be true about him with others.

If you are intersted in exploring that idea further, there is a very interesting and classic book on the subject by J.B. Phillips, Your God Is Too Small, here in pdf format. It recognizes what you are talking about that Christians often do put God in a box of their own construction and say that this is who God is. Many times those constructs represent one little bit about God, they certainly don't represent his entire revelation of himself to us. But more than that, I think that if we are honest with ourselves we have to recognize that even if we were able to state all that God has revealed about himself to us, that even that description would be too small to fully describe the nature and character of who God is. The God of the universe cannot be confined to some small representation that fits our human mind. I think that perhaps Muslims actually get this concept better than many Christians, for Islam does its best to avoid limiting God. And yet, I suspect that simply by virtue of putting our human minds to the task of trying to saying something about God that we all fall into the trap. For what we cannot conceive of with regard to God, we naturally assume must not be true of God. And in this way I suspect that Muslims are just as likely to fall into the pitfall of thinking of God in ways that are too small and not worthy of his character as Chistians are. Most likely, given that Christians and Muslims have different ideas as to some aspects of God's nature, I would suspect the boxes that we each put God in are different, but I think it is human nature that all of us in the end put God into some type of box of our own making. The Christians' box just might be that the only way to God is through Jesus, and the Muslims' just might be that it cannot be that way at all. Wouldn't it be ironic if, precisely because we had put those limitations on who/what God could or could not be, we were both wrong and the answer to who God is was really all of the above? No, I don't understand how that could be, it initially sounds illogical, but that itself might be only because of the limitations of my mind that cannot conceive otherwise.

Walter · May 5, 2009

Hi Everyone:

Now that we are discussing Jesus’ deity, let me propose the following.

1. There is general harmony between the Old and New Testaments, and between the Gospels and the letters of Paul, in how Jesus is described.

2. This harmony extends between the Bible and the Qur'an in how Jesus is viewed.

Perhaps we can limit our sources of evidence to the Qur'an and the Bible as we had previously agreed. Also, since we are aware that there is conflict between Christian and Islamic religious tradition in how Jesus is viewed, perhaps we can try to seek the truth, wherever it may lie, rather than try to defend our respective religious traditions, which we already know will end in conflict.

Let us start with where there is agreement (balancing the marble on the table). Then let us try to identify the point of divergence by choosing the least contentious interpretation without damaging the integrity of the evidence.

Can we initially agree that both the Bible and the Qur'an teach that Jesus is the Messiah? Let us not try to use our religious traditions to interpret what this means. Can we just agree that Jesus is the Messiah in order to get the marble balanced?

Regards,
Grenville

جوري · May 5, 2009

we can agree on Jesus being the Messiah, if you will agree to those other Messiahs (anointed) from the bible

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] by Ahmad Deedat

The word CHRIST is derived from the Hebrew word Messiah, Arabic-Masih. Root word m-a-s-a-h-a, meaning to rub, to massage, to anoint. Priests and kings were anointed when being consecrated to their offices. But in its translated, Grecian form "CHRIST", it seems unique:befitting Jesus only. The Christian has a knack of transmuting baser metals into shining gold. What he is wont to do is to translate names into his own language like "cephas" to Peter, "messiah" to Christ. How does he do that? Very easily MESSIAH in Hebrew means anointed. The Greek word for anointed is "christos". Just lop off the 'os' from christos and you are left with christ. Now change the little 'c' to a capital 'C', and "hey, presto!" he has created a unique (?) name! Christos means ANOINTED, and anointed means APPOINTED in its religious connotation. Jesus (pbuh) was appointed (anointed) at his baptism by John the Baptist, as God's Messenger.Every Prophet of God is so anointed or appointed. The Holy Bible is replete with the "anointed" ones. In the original Hebrew - made a "messiah". Let us keep to the English translation - "anointed." Not only were prophets and priests and kings anointed (christos-ed), but borns, and cherubs and lamp-posts also.
[/FONT] [FONT=Arial, Helvetica]

I am the God of Beth-el, where you ANOINTED a pillar.....