If Jesus Never Called Himself God, How Did He Become One?
npr.org
npr.org
* OT prophecies refer to Jesus as "God with us" and "mighty God" [1][2]
* He said "I am in the Father and the Father is in me ..." [3]
* He said "If you had known me, you would have known my Father also." [3]
* He said "I and the Father are one." and immediately afterwards, jews attempted to stone him, citing "because you, being a man, make yourself God." [4]
[1] http://www.esvbible.org/Isaiah+7/ (verse 14) [2] http://www.esvbible.org/Isaiah+9/ (verse 6) [3] http://www.esvbible.org/John+14/ (verse 11, 7) [4] http://www.esvbible.org/John+10/ (verse 29-33)
Note: no desire to debate these points (too busy atm). Just wanted to point out where some get their stance on the topic.
It's interesting he raises that point because in Islam Jesus is considered a prophet and explicitly not God and in doing so tries to establish the argument that Judaism, Christianity and Islam are all the same religion from the same source but that the differences are a result of changes (human error or addition) over time. Hence, while being the most recent of the monotheistic religions, Muslims argue that its a return to the 'original' religion of Abraham, Moses, Jesus etc.
On a side note, there exists at least one sect of Christianity that does not believe in Jesus as God.
It's interesting to note that Muhammad also taught that a lot of other historical figures were prophets too, e.g. Alexander the Great.
Citation needed. This is a fallacy that has been spread unfortunately.
Furthermore, note that even what is mentioned on that page is speculation from certain Islamic scholars. There is absolutely no authentic Hadith (or even non-authentic as far as I know) that mentions Alexander by name. All that is mentioned in the Quran is the "Two-Horned One", which could be Cyrus as mentioned on the wikipedia page, or it could be someone else completely.
One last point, the person in question here was never declared to be a prophet in the Quran as you claimed, but just a righteous king and person.
Online society's attitude to Wikipedia seems to have settled into two camps; those who refer to it as an authority and those whose avoid it due to negative experiences with inaccuracies or politics.
I'm trying to move from the second group to a third; patch-up articles for the benefit of other people.
I will take your advice into consideration and attempt to amend that page. I don't know what the monitoring procedures are on wikipedia, and if they will allow such changes to persist.
If you question, for example, the diametrically opposite positions of Jesus and muhammad (one of these guys fought his followers to prevent them from defending his own life, the other massacred at least 10000 people, assembled armies and basically fought wars, and fought wars, and fought wars, until he died in a military encampment (google "Khaybar" for example), so they don't agree on much).
Here is an example that does not really need further explanation to illustrate that they were VERY different :
Abdullah b. 'Umar reported that a Jew and a Jewess were brought to Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) who had committed
adultery. Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) came to the Jews and said: What do you find in Torah for one who commits
adultery? They said: We darken their faces and make them ride on the donkey with their faces turned to the opposite direction (and
their backs touching each other), and then they are taken round (the city). He said: Bring Torah if you are truthful. They brought
it and recited it until when they came to the verse pertaining to stoning, the person who was reading placed his hand on the verse
pertaining to stoning, and read (only that which was) between his hands and what was subsequent to that. Abdullah b. Salim who was
at that time with the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) said: Command him (the reciter) to lift his hand. He lifted it and
there was, underneath that, the verse pertaining to stoning. Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) pronounced judgment about
both of them and they were stoned. Abdullah b. 'Umar said: I was one of those who stoned them, and I saw him (the Jew) protecting
her (the Jewess) with his body.
(incidentally can a muslim here answer me one question : who is the morally better person in the above story ? the prophet ? Or the Jew ? Because we all know the answer to that question)
Jesus made the exact same judgement, only the story differs a LOT :
Jesus returned to the Mount of Olives, but early the next morning he was back again at the Temple. A crowd soon gathered, and he sat
down and taught them. As he was speaking, the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in the
act of adultery. They put her in front of the crowd. “Teacher,” they said to Jesus, “this woman was caught in the act of adultery.
The law of Moses says to stone her. What do you say?”. They were trying to trap him into saying something they could use against
him, but Jesus stooped down and wrote in the dust with his finger. They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said,
“All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!”. Then he stooped down again and wrote in the dust. When the
accusers heard this, they slipped away one by one, beginning with the oldest, until only Jesus was left in the middle of the crowd
with the woman. Then Jesus stood up again and said to the woman, “Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?”.
“No, Lord,” she said. And Jesus said, “Neither do I. Go and sin no more.”
Of course, this is objectively comparing religions, and sadly, like any other objective comparison, one of them clearly emerges as superior. This will likely get downvoted. Is this racist ? I don't know, I don't understand how it could possibly be racist, but most people seem to think it is.
Please keep in mind that muslims don't really believe in this stuff. What they do believe in is their group, their family and the consequences of saying anything different. It is childish and naive to expect an adherent of a religion that is not based on rationality to respond to this in any coherent way to stuff like this, and they won't. Please note that islam is based on rhetoric and conquest, not on rational argument.
Also I'm not trying to attack islam here (even though I will admit I do not like islam at all). It's obvious that in a Christian country with laws based on canon law, obviously Christianity is going to match common morals and other religions are not going to match "everyday" morality. That happens in a lot of cases. I'm attempting to illustrate an objective difference. If I wanted to do attack it, I'd use very different verses, illustrating how and when "allah's revelations" were sent down, like pointing out that allah "sent down" the verses allowing the prophet more wives 5 seconds after muhammad commented on the beauty of a woman, after one of his companions pointed out he already had 4 wives.
Please do; I'd be interested. Any good tips?
http://www.islamicity.com/mosque/sunnah/bukhari/060.sbt.html...
"I came to know that the Prophet had blamed some of his wives so I entered upon them and said, 'You should either stop (troubling the Prophet ) or else Allah will give His Apostle better wives than you.'"
Note what is being threatened here. Clearly allah's revelations are perfectly predictable if one merely takes the wishes of this paedophile prophet into account. His wife says as much :
http://www.islamicity.com/mosque/sunnah/bukhari/060.sbt.html...
(note that this is the very same book that prescribes muslim prayer and "halal" food).
Frankly, search that page, or the entire book, for the term "revealed", and much will be revealed to you.
But if you look at real early texts you will find no mention of God. So how do you arrive from the early books to God ? Well, easy : anything expressed in one of the passive tenses refers to God(s) (except where it really doesn't make sense). Meaning in the really old portions of the bible (we actually have old versions of the bible, in contrast to the quran), you will not find a sentence like "God made it rain", instead you will find "It was raining" and that is currently getting translated using God. There are other factors that make matters even more confusing.
Even in competing religions' texts you will find this. The Greek religions for example also do this. Until the late Roman republic you almost never find any reference to direct action of any of the Greek/Roman Gods. Rather you will find references that look a lot like today's "lady luck was smiling on him". In stories you will find that, for example, a king "felt inspired by Ares", which I'm sure you can translate for yourself. Or "Ares smiled on the king's forces", indicating he won (note that Greek/Roman Gods were not really part of a pantheon. They are more like "patron saints" of specific families or other groups of people. For example, when there's a battle between Sparta and Athens, either Ares "smiles" or Athena does, meaning this indicates which side won (extremely confusing the first time you read that. You read a story of a battle, with lots of descriptions of fights between generals, heroes, etc. Then suddenly "Ares smiled" and it starts describing logistics of returning the army to the Greek mainland. First time you'll be sitting there "wait, wasn't there a battle ? How did it end ?), and Greek/Roman gods were probably understood to be the personality of a particular city state (or states). The pantheon in Rome is simply meant to indicate an alliance between specific families/states).
Citation needed. I take it you have not read the Quran. The accounts of the Battles of Badr, Uhud, as well as others are sufficient to disprove this claim.
> The older qurans aren't even in Arabic, they're kufic (which is a dialect of Arameic, and "just happens" to be the dialect a significant part of the bible is written in.
Again, citation needed. I speak, read, and write Arabic fluently, and this is the first time I ever hear such claim. Quran 12:2 and 39:28 are enough to disprove that. Not to mention all the manuscripts.
My comment was written today, yet talks about things older than 2 centuries. How exactly does mentioning historical events prove the age (aside from maximum age ?).
> Again, citation needed. I speak, read, and write Arabic fluently, and this is the first time I ever hear such claim. Quran 12:2 and 39:28 are enough to disprove that. Not to mention all the manuscripts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kufic is a good basic introduction. Please note that obviously the quran itself is not a valid source on the origin of the quran, for obvious reasons.
Your arguments are about as solid as claiming Star Wars was written in a galaxy far, far away.
The way the Quran uses language is very intricate. It would not be possible to achieve the same effect by translating from one language (Aramaic) to another (Arabic) as you are claiming. If you were to listen to recitation of the Quran that might deliver a clearer picture, even if you do not have a command over the language. I'm talking about how certain Ayat ("verses") sound (phonetically) -- this effect is hard to preserve across languages for a small body of text, let alone an entire book. (Example: http://tanzil.net/#100:1)
That's what muslims claim. Actually reading the thing does not at all give that impression. It truly is a massive effort, reading it. I admire anyone who's gotten through it because it's so incredibly obtuse and confusing (yes I know about the chapter and sentence ordering, what moron came up with that ?). Except of course, if you assume any word you don't immediately recognize is greek it becomes a lot easier. Of course then you start saying "wait ... this translation is wrong". Try it.
When it comes to recitation, this is actually a tradition of the ancient world, and all texts from those eras were written like that, always. You can recite rhythmically pretty much any ancient text (meaning from the ancient era : 1000 BC to 500 AD or so, and then the renaissance texts of course). You should listen to a few Roman recitations :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGH8QKeHnpQ
In other words, I see your recitation as further proof that the quran is just a text that fits perfectly within it's timeframe, which is of course a very strong argument against that it is anything special. The bible is more interesting, as it has pieces from different eras that follow different styles, but when God speaks (not often, grant you) there is never any local style applied. Stories are styled, including in verses to enable recitation.
As for the language of the Quran, have you ever googled "Christopher Luxenberg" ?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Syro-Aramaic_Reading_of_the...
Here's his central argument : rewrite the quran in arameic(/greek), letter-by-letter and it makes sense, both in a historical context, the grammar is suddenly correct (no longer "intricate"), and it is obviously based on the New Testament. Whereas in arabic it cannot be read by itself, it just does not make sense. As you say "The way the Quran uses language is very intricate". It's not intricate, however, it's wrong.
Oh and there is even an Arameic word for "Songbook" (meaning an extract of the New Testament, with most text put into verses to be sung, as you can find today in every church on the planet). Know what that word is ? "Koran" ... This word is at least 300 years older than islam ... Coincidence ? Not really.
Keep in mind that Arabic is not in fact that far removed from Greek, because it is based on Hebrew, a late dialect of Hebrew was heavily influenced by Greek. It is like Doric text. Doric text will sort-of make sense to an English reader, he will probably think it's ancient English. But of course it's not. But only an Doric speaker will know that. The same is true for the quran. It is incredibly obtuse language in arabic, but it's perfectly clear and normal language in Arameic.
Example:
GIN I was God, sitting up there abeen,
Weariet nae doot noo an my darg was deen,
Deaved wih the harps an hymns oonending ringing,
Tired of the flocking angels hairse wih singing,
Looks like English, doesn't it ? Looks "intricate", perhaps ? But you see wrong grammar (e.g. the form of "to be" in "weariet nae doot noo" (it translates to 'there was no doubt')), you see recognizable, but misspelled words. But they're not wrong. It's simply a different language.
Did you read it in Arabic? Do you even speak the language?
> don't immediately recognize is greek it becomes a lot easier.
One really nice thing about Arabic is that you can reduce practically every word to 3 or 4 letter roots. This really makes it clear where a derivative of a word came from (including the word "Quraan" incidentally).
> As for the language of the Quran, have you ever googled "Christopher Luxenberg" ?
I have heard of him, yes. His argument is painfully laughable that it's unbearable to answer with a straight face. Without going into much detail, it is clear that he is selecting whatever supports his so called analysis, and discarding (or he is perhaps ignorant of) everything else. A beginner in Islamic studies would be able to refute him blind folded so to speak.
> Here's his central argument : rewrite the quran in arameic(/greek), letter-by-letter and it makes sense, both in a historical context, the grammar is suddenly correct
Umm, no. I have looked into Aramaic as well as Hebrew (I developed an interest in these languages after watching Passion of the Christ and recognizing a bunch of words in the movie). My knowledge of Arabic gives me an advantage in that I am able to easily make out similarities in syntax and pronunciation (incidentally, a lot of (most?) modern Hebrew speakers really twist the language, and it sounds nothing like it would have sounded back in the day -- many letters are dropped or merged, pronounced incorrectly, etc). The key point being: there is no one-to-one mapping of Arabic letters to Aramaic or Hebrew letters. There is a very large overlap; however, there exist letters in Arabic not present in Aramaic/Hebrew, as well as as the other way around (such as 'p' and 'v').
I concur that there are some words shared between these languages (e.g. "house", "bird", "eye", "them", "one"). However, the grammatical constructs, transformation of words, usage, plurals, pronunciation, etc are all quite different. Arabic grammar and conjugation is much more rich and complex than Aramaic or Hebrew. As a tiny example, "house" => "bayt" in Arabic/Aramaic/Hebrew -- a place of resting. Now, "yabeet" (only in Arabic) means to spend the night at a house; but in this example, you can see that they both have the same root of (ba-ya-ta). I have not seen this behavior in Aramaic or Hebrew. Aramaic is closer to Hebrew than Arabic.
That being said, it is impossible to have a letter-by-letter re-write from Arabic to Aramaic by definition. It's illogical and impossible.
> Oh and there is even an Arameic word for "Songbook" (meaning an extract of the New Testament, with most text put into verses to be sung, as you can find today in every church on the planet). Know what that word is ? "Koran"
Wrong again. The Aramaic (Syriac actually) word you are looking for is "Kriyana" ('reading the scriptures' or 'lesson'). The three-letter root of Qur'aan is (Qa-Ra-'a) -- to read/recite. So, while they sound similar (not surprising given what I mentioned about similar roots above), or even have somewhat similar meanings, they are not the same word as you were trying to make it out to be. If anything, the Arabic word "Kira'a" (reading/recitation) is closer in meaning (it's a gerund) to the Aramaic version than Qur'aan (a proper noun). Also, the Quraan has multiple names too, such as Al-Furqan, Al-Thikr, Al-Huda, etc, but that doesn't really relate to this discussion. Just something for your information.
> Keep in mind that Arabic is not in fact that far removed from Greek, because it is based on Hebrew
According to Wikipedia, Greek is Indo-European, whereas Arabic and Hebrew are Semitic (deriving from Afro-Asiatic). I re-iterate that I am completely fluent in Arabic, and I have Greek colleagues. The languages are not similar (if at all) as what you're trying to point out. Are you sure you're not just re-iterating things you heard before from someone and trying to pass one on me?
Hebrew is a Northwest Semitic language (like Aramaic), both deriving from a Central Semitic language family. Arabic is also derived from a Central Semitic language family. This makes Arabic and Aramaic/Hebrew more like uncle/nephew instead of siblings or even descendents (like how Hebrew descended from Aramaic).
The analogy you are trying to make with the poem does not hold. The Quraan's Arabic is not obtuse like that at all. This just reinforces the fact that you don't seem to speak the language at all, yet you try to make a statement based on false claims. For your information, the Quraan and Hadith (moreso the former) are used as references for the Arabic language to know what is proper grammar from improper -- which yet again makes the poem analogy ridiculous.
> That being said, it is impossible to have a letter-by-letter re-write from Arabic to Aramaic by definition. It's illogical and impossible.
Of course it's not. And the argument you're bringing up is laughably weak. Greek does not have the same letters as our latin script, yet transliterating is perfectly possible, it's how half our students do it half the time. Hell, ever read, shall we say "teenage" arabic/sms arabic as I've seen it referred to ?
Here's essentially why I believe Luxenberg. I've shown the early quran pages to Semitic scholars (not Jews in case you're wondering) at my university, and while they can't read them smoothly, they can read them. With appropriate books, so can I (very slowly, sure). They also said that Luxenberg is right. I've also taken the same early quran page copies to an islamic scholar, freshly imported into the university, and it was blatantly obvious that he doesn't even recognize them, or the writing, despite having over 20 years of study at Al Azhar. I had to actually TELL him what it was, yet it was the thing they've supposedly been studying for 20 years. Researching the matter, it turns out to be actually true : in islamic studies you will never get to see an early islamic manuscript ...
You can imagine who I believe.
> The Aramaic (Syriac actually) word you are looking for is "Kriyana" ('reading the scriptures' or 'lesson'). The three-letter root of Qur'aan is (Qa-Ra-'a) -- to read/recite
You must realize that vowels are not written in either language, and it is not actually known what vowels were used in the period, or where they went or didn't go. Sorry to poing out the obvious but K R N ("Kriyana" in your text) would be considered identical to K R N ("quran"). Hell they did that in greek and latin for the longest time as well.
Hey wow ! I just transliterated 4 languages and 3 different alphabets there, you say it's impossible, yet it was not particularly hard. Wait we even have a global standard for doing that ...
> The Quraan's Arabic is not obtuse like that at all
https://www.google.com/search?q=quran+grammar ... half of the sites here (as does our islamic studies colleague) teach a separate form of arabic grammar called "quranic grammar", claiming that it's not possible to understand even a few lines of the book without learning the entirely different way the sentences hold together ...
https://www.google.com/search?q=quran+hard+to+read results: 8,580,000 ...
That was a figure of speech/hyperbole. If by the "whole study field" you mean religion in general, then I would agree to some extent.
> Hell, ever read, shall we say "teenage" arabic/sms arabic as I've seen it referred to ?
Yes, I chat with my friends in "sms" style Arabic on IM so to speak. Hmm, so you're saying Quranic Arabic is like sms style Aramaic? That's something new! Of course, the proof is on the one making the claim. Incidentally, the Arabic words I do recognize from Aramaic/Hebrew (even present day Persian since it was influenced by Arabic) sounds like broken Arabic to me :) This is because the usage of such words does not conform to Arabic conjugation rules (it's like saying, "he good today" -- as a very primitive example). Just goes to say that Arabic is more complicated.
> You must realize that vowels are not written in either language
Wrong again. Vowels ARE part of both languages. I think you might be confusing this with "taskheel", which are the "mini-vowels". That is something else though. Now, if you mean if the vowels are not part of the root of the word, then you're also wrong. Some roots do have vowels. The root you are suggesting: Q-R-N (ق ر ن) (pronounced Qa-Ra-Na, with mini-vowels, perhaps that was the source of your confusion) is a root for a different group of words than Q-R-' (ق ر ء) (pronounced Qa-Ra-'a with a glottal stop). From the former, you can derive qiran (wedding or matrimony), aqran (peers), muqaranah (comparison) and so on. From Q-R-' you can derive reading or recitation (qira'ah), and Qur'aan. Note the glottal stop in both words, this is part of the root. Again, this shows your ignorance in the language.
Take another example: from the root H-M-D (pronounced Ha-Ma-Da) (ح م د) one can derive Hamdan (حمدان) which rhymes with Qur'aan. Note how in both words, the last letter "n" is not part of the roots for either word. I'm happy to give you many more examples that show this is the case.
> Here's essentially why I believe Luxenberg...
Interesting account, but still not sufficient. I would be interested though in hearing more about it (e.g. if you wrote a report or short document with references and citations). All that you mentioned is that you took some early Quranic manuscripts and you had someone read them. Now I don't know who that Islamic scholar is, a single data point does not mean anything, and you should know better. It is incorrect that in early Islamic studies you will never see an early manuscript of the Qur'aan. Let me tell you something, we have known this since we were kids (exposed to it in school): that early Arabic script did not have dotted letters -- this is the Kufic script to which you are referring. It is not some obscure piece of information that only a handful of people know. I presume you are referring to scripts such as [0], am I correct? In any case, I would be interested to take a look at the Quranic scripts you mentioned.
Unless you formally show me at least a handful of Ayat (verses) of the Quran transliterated to Aramaic, let alone a page, let alone the entire book, while still making complete sense in Aramaic, then Luxenberg's claim really does not carry any weight. You should know better than to accept something like this without solid proof. It even says on the Wikipedia page that "That idea is in serious disagreement with the views of both traditional Muslims and western scholars of Islam"!
The Google links you mentioned really don't mean anything if you want to be "scientific" Oh look what I found here [1] 84,500,000 results! 10 times the number you listed! Of course, I won't use that argument since it does not make sense.
It is possible to understand parts of the Quran with elementary knowledge of Arabic (and I know because we studied it in grade school, middle school, and high school). It does have intricate parts, sure. The language of the Quran did play a role in converting people back when it was revealed, because it was unique -- yet still understandable.
If you really want to continue the discussion, my email address is in my profile page. Though, I would appreciate if you were to lose the attitude, and be willing to look at things in a less biased way.
[0] http://www.quran-m.com/firas/ar_photo/1263930976161291c.jpeg
[1] https://www.google.com/search?q=quran+hard+to+read#q=bible++...
No I'm saying that sms arabic is a transliteration or arabic into latin script, despite very different alphabets. Obviously it's possible. I find it fascinating, because there's actually multiple styles of doing this. But I like the version where they use numbers to complete the set of letters. Reminds me of old French texts that also have a "3"-shaped letter lost in the middle of words instead of the modern letter, and those were some of the first non-mother-tongue texts I read. Fairy tales. I think I'm getting old.
> Wrong again. Vowels ARE part of both languages.
In modern arabic, sort-of (spoken, yes, written, not really, same as in hebrew really, which is to say, not at all (say different vowels and people will still understand you), but yes you can put little marks on the letters now indicating which vowel to use in "most" cases. I was told this is mainly done for children's first reads though, and not done in normal handwritten texts). In ancient (written) arabic, it is never done.
Obviously the arabs living in the 8th century still used vowels, just not in writing.
As for Luxenberg's thesis, buy his book and read it. It has chapters full of those verses.
> The language of the Quran did play a role in converting people back when it was revealed, because it was unique -- yet still understandable.
Doesn't that just further confirm this situation though ? It's "unique", is that perhaps a polite way of saying that it's very different from anything else you've ever read, with "weird" verb forms, words with wrong roots and the like ?
I guess I don't fully understand what you're saying. Either it's "unique" arabic, or it's not, right. I'm thinking that what you're calling unique arabic would be more accurately identified as "not quite" arabic.
I see your point. Though that still does not advance Luxemberg's claim.
> In modern arabic, sort-of (spoken, yes, written, not really, same as in hebrew really, which is to say, not at all...
I really don't understand this claim. What about the following letters since you say you can read Arabic: (و، ا، ي) Aren't they vowels? Did you take a look at the Kufic manuscript I linked in my previous post? Those letters exist there as well. Hebrew and Aramaic both have corresponding letters to those too.
> Obviously the arabs living in the 8th century still used vowels, just not in writing...
The Kufic script image I linked to proves otherwise.
I take it I got the point across with the root of the word Qur'aan (Qa-Ra-'a) :-)
> It's "unique", is that perhaps a polite way of saying that it's very different from anything else you've ever read, with "weird" verb forms, words with wrong roots and the like ?
Speculation on your part (when you say "perhaps"). I will try to go more into details about this topic in another post (if this thread remains open!)
It's very possible that sometime after Jesus reached puberty, God decided that he was the same thing as Jesus.