Salamun alaykum
John Gilchrist is not difficult, you have to become aquainted with his arguments and study your deen hard. Do not expect superman Muslim to come to your rescue.
I will give you a few examples of how to refute John Gilchrist.
Personal relationship with God:
John Gilchrist claims that the relationship with Allah and His servant is confined to a ball and a chain, and as the usual xtian argument goes, you can have a loving father and son relationship with the God of the Bible. By appealing to your emotions he attempts to disprove Allah and introduce Yahweh. But let us look at this for a moment.
Can Allahs love and Mercy be compared to that of a father? The answer is no. Islam elevates the concept of Gods mercy and his relationship with His servant to another level all together, when the Holy Prophet Muhammad (saw) expresses that Gods mercy is far greater than a mother for its child, which just so happens to be greater than a fathers love for his son:
Allaahs Messenger peace be upon him affirmed that Allah is More Merciful to His servants than a mother to her child (Tirmidhi 756)
Even more so the following hadith gives indication of how little a mother's mercy is compared to the Mercy of Allah:
Allah divided Mercy into one-hundred parts and He kept its ninety-nine parts with Him and sent down its one part on the earth, and because of that, its one single part, His creations are Merciful to each other, so that even the mare lifts up its hoofs away from its baby animal, lest it should trample on it. (Sahih Bukhari 8:29)
Therefore the father and son relationship becomes rather small and insignificant when faced with the infinite mercy of Allah .
The question still burns, can we have a personal relationship with God? Or is the Islamic view or a relationship with God confined to a ball and chain? A servant and a dictatorship?
Indeed one can have a personal relationship with his creator, it is narrated by Prophet Muhammad (saw) that Allah said
I am as My servant thinks I am. I am with him when he makes mention of Me. If he makes mention of Me to himself, I make mention of him to Myself; and if he makes mention of Me in an assembly, I make mention of him in an assemble better than it. And if he draws near to Me an arm's length, I draw near to him a fathom's length. And if he comes to Me walking, I go to him at speed. (Hadith Qudsi 15)
We see from this hadith that the relationship you desire with your Lord is all down to your effort in becoming close to Him, there should be no shame in being a servant of God, unfortunately many Christians have neglected the very worship of God which the Prophets demonstrated in the Bible. Jesus himself prostrated to God as we read in the New Testament:
Jesus went a little further and fell on his face and prayed… (Matthew 26 verse 39)
The Holy Qur'an states that Jesus was counted amongst those who are close to God (3:45) but yet the Qur'an also states that Jesus said 'Indeed I am a servant of God' (19.verse) Allaah makes it very clear in the Qur'aan concerning this point when He says:
The Messiah would never refuse to be a servant of God(Qur'an 172)
Yet we find Christian theologians strongly objecting to a personal relationship with God that promotes any servitude. As the Qur'an is not an authority for the Christians we therefore have to look to the Bible and see what it it to say on this issue and when we do we find that Jesus and many other Prophets are given the title servant of God
a. God calls Abraham "my servant" Gen 26:24
b. Moses the servant of God 1Ch 6:49 2Ch 24:9 Neh 10:29 Dan 9:11 Rev 15:3
c. David calls him self servant of God 1Sa 23:10
d. Matthew 12:18 Jesus is called servant.
e. Acts 3:13 Jesus is called servant but, yet in the KJV version of the Bible they have purposely mistranslated the greek word 'pais' which means 'servant' or 'slave' as 'Child' but if we look to the Gideons New Testament, The New English Bible, New international Version, Good News Edition they all honestly translate the word 'pais' as 'servant', the same word is used for David in Acts 4:25 but we find that they have translated the word 'pais' as servant for David.
f. Acts 3:26 Jesus is referred to as a servant but yet again translators have played on the greek word 'pais'.
g. Acts 4:27 - 30 Thy holy Servant Jesus, whom Thou didst anoint,..." again they have mistranslated the greek word 'pais' as 'child'
h. The Preacher and king of Christianity Paul is labeled a servant of God, and an apostle of Jesus Christ, Tts 1:1
This type of tampering with the religious scripture clearly demonstrates the falsehood and deceptiveness in the methodology of Christianity's preaching of the doctrine of Trinity by going to such extremes and exaggeration in their religion. The last and final Prophet said concerning this:
"Do not exaggerate me, as the Christians exaggerated about the son of Maryam. I am only a servant, so say 'the servant of Allaah and Messenger of Allaah" (Sahih Bukhari)
THE TRINITY
Since Gilchrist admits that most famous verse regarding the Trinity was origanally a marginal fottnote that later found its way into the text, we dont have to go far in a refutation. Rather, i would like to clear up one or two misconceptions that he promtes in his chapter on the doctrine of Trinity.
Firstly he claims that Muhammad saws got the Trinity confused, by adding mary, by using the ayah in surat ul maidah where Allah questions Jesus to the effect "did you teach men to worship you and your mother". Notice how trinty is not mentioned here. However, if trinity is implied as Gilchrist wants us to think, then Gilchrist really refutes himself by admitting that the Nestorians worshipped Mary.
Secondly, he claims again the Qur'an has it all twisted by quoting the vesre "indeed they disbelieve who say Allah is third of a three".
From here, Gilchrist builds a straw man arguemnt by saying to the effect of "we christians have always considered the father to be first, not third! the order in the bible is the father, the son and the Holy ghost, but in the Qur'an the order is reverse... The holy ghost, Jesus, then Allah! we christians have never considered the father to be third!"
Must admit, clever argument, however it does not stand. The way to refute this is to draw a circle with three segments. Thats how the Christians always potray the Trinity, as triune, not three seperate characters standing in a line. If what Gilchrist is saying is that the father is first, then this again is an argument against the Trinity, because then we are not dealing with one God consisting of three seperate personalities, but a pantheon!
We can easily notice that Allah in this verse is saying He is not a fraction in a Trinity, which also brings me to a minor point.
Gilchrist says that the word trinity does not appear in the Qur'an! but the word "three". This exposes Gilchrists ignorance of the greek language. The word fro three in Greek is "trio" and from that you get triune and trinity. Thus Gilchrist is in error when he says the word trinity is not found in the Qur'an.
I havent got the time to fully rebutt John Gilchrist, he is on my hitlist. I am dealing with Robert Morey at the moment, John Gilchrist is next, but i do read his works regular as Morey leans heavily on them.
I went through a period of fitnah when i first came across these claims which at first caused me trouble. But the more you read their claims and get to know their arguments, the stronger you come in response.
I advice you to pick up the relevant tools to defend your faith, and my box is always open for advice for people searching for answers. I may not be able to give you the answer, but i definatly through my expierence can give you good suggestions on where to look and what to study on certain issues.
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