Where Islam and Christianity Agree and Differ
rj...@mailandnews.com
nice chapter on it at http://al-islam.org/inquiries/ chapter 7
David / Amicus
assert that Jesus was hung on the cross briefly and then taken down
alive because does not the Qu'ran say "They crucified him not"?
Moataz H. Emam
> alive because does not the Qu'ran say "They crucified him not"?
Quite right, but I also seem to recall that Ahmed Deedat argued that he
might have been hung for a while then taken down before dying. I do not
recall his argument, but it was in his book "Crucifixion or
CruciFiction?". Does anyone recall how it went?
--
Moataz H. Emam
Denis Giron
> I also seem to recall that Ahmed Deedat argued that he
> Does anyone recall how it went?
Apparently this view by Deedat was capitalized on by John Gilchrist. I
remember Jochen Katz posted the article "Deedat in the Balance" in
September of 1996. The article was, according to Katz, a Muslim
criticism of Deedat. At one point it notes how Deedat's embarrassingly
(or allegedly) un-Qur'anic view of what happened to Jesus on the cross
was exploited by Gilchrist. The text of the article is here:
http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=5118vd%242gn%40usenet.srv.cis.pitt.edu
David / Amicus
down alive and recovered may have originated with the Ahmadiyyas. I
think that is their belief.
CooolBreeeze
but I also seem to recall that Ahmed Deedat argued that he
> might have been hung for a while then taken down before dying. I do not
> recall his argument, but it was in his book "Crucifixion or
> CruciFiction?". Does anyone recall how it went?
Well, crucify means to kill by death upon tree or cross, usually
nailed, speared or impaled. Jesus was NOT killed according to Quran
or to Jesus himself in the NT.
Quran says that they killed him not. Further it says that the
Christians are in doubt about it. As well they should be in doubt.
(1) Mark, the youth, writes that they "ALL" forsook Jesus and fled in
the 14th chapter. If ALL means ALL then they were NO witnesses.
Hence, no one of repute was there to witness. (2) Also they took the
Jesus down in a few hours after being put up, that is, before the
sundown of Sabbath. They didn't break Jesus' legs as was the custom
after the usual 2 or 3 days up on the tree or cross. (3) Jesus spent
2 nights (Friday and Saturday) and one day (Saturday) RECUPERATING in
the roomy and airy sepulcher. On Sunday morning Jesus was up and
gone. He pretended to be the gardner Mary spoke to, until he said the
word "Mary," then she knew it was Jesus, the Prophet of Allah.
(4) Jesus went from the sepulcher to the upper room where some of the
disciples were. He had body pain from the wound when they touched it
and was hungry. Jesus ate a fish and a honeycomb. This act ALONE
contradicts what Jesus said Dead people would act like. He said that
the dead become spiritualized and have no need of food, rest, or other
bodily acts. We know this from Jesus OWN mouth when the jews taunting
him asked about the widow and the 7 brothers: Which in death would
have her? Jesus said none, for the dead are like angels and are not
given in marriage. (5) While he remained on earth Jesus hid in fear
from the jews, ate food, slept, wore clothes, and never again came out
except to believers. The gospels are not unified on how long he
remained: one has it at 40 days and another at many months.
Lastly, Jesus said that his bona fides was like that of Jonah. Jesus
said that Jonah was 3 days and 3 nights in the belly of the whale as
he, the son of Man, would be. Well, Jesus spent 1 day and 2 nights
in the sepulcher. The sameness with Jonah was NOT the time factor but
the fact that (a) if you are tossed over into a raging sea, you are
expected to die. (b) if you are swallowed by a big fish you are
expected to die. (c) If one is 3 days in the stomach of a big fish
you are expected to die.
THAT YOU DON'T DIE IS THE MIRACLE WHICH JESUS MATCHED WITH JONAH.
Jesus' prophecy realized. Islam has realized Jesus' prophecy while
christendom has failed to realize it altogether.
David / Amicus
Christians are in doubt about it. As well they should be in doubt.
(1) Mark, the youth, writes that they "ALL" forsook Jesus and fled in
the 14th chapter. If ALL means ALL then they were NO witnesses.
Hence, no one of repute was there to witness.>>
>From a Muslim perspective I have a difficult time accepting that Jesus
was hung on a cross at all.
The Gospels relate that on other occassions (by a miracle) that he was
able to pass through crowds unnoticed. Maybe this happened too sometime
along the way?
On the night before the hijira Muhammad had Ali take his place and
Muhammad wraped his cloaked around himself and chanted verses from the
Qu'ran and passed unnoticed by the youths who were waiting outside to
kill him.
Maybe Judas or Simon who carried the cross substituted for Jesus?
Not-easily-duped
> I would think that from a Muslim perspective it would not be possible to
> assert that Jesus was hung on the cross briefly and then taken down
> alive because does not the Qu'ran say "They crucified him not"?
The Jews have never said that they crucified the Messiah.
For the jews Jesus was not the Messiah and the Messiah has not
come yet.
Yet the Quranic texts imply that the Jews crucified the Messiah
as they boast about it.
This is a clue to tell you that the author of the Qur'an whoever
he might be was not interested in history but theology.
I am sure you have also noticed that Jesus would have been
stoned not crucified if it was up to the Jews legal system.
Once again what we read in the Qur'an is a theological response to what
Paul wrote to the Galiteans: if it is through the Law that we are
JUSTIFIED then Christ died for nothing.Galatian
Of course for those who think that the Law gives life, it is no wonder
to have a different view on the crucifixion. That is theology and
not history
Denis Giron
> nailed, speared or impaled. Jesus was NOT killed according to Quran
> or to Jesus himself in the NT.
I have to say that I found this post a bit shocking. It made me
understand why some Islamic purists are hostile to what they see as a
gross collective body of misinformation among the ummah. CooolBreeze,
I know you have been a Muslim for a while; you've at least been mixed
up in these usenet discussions for a few years. Despite this, your
interpretation of the Qur'an was based on your understanding of a
specific English word (not the Arabic) and the Bible. You seem to have
fallen into the same trap Deedat fell into (see my other post in this
thread where I link to "Deedat in the Balance").
First of all, it is not clear that "crucify" necessarily means to
kill. Josephus mentions at least one Jew who survived his crucifixion
(he was pulled down before he suffocated or bled to death). In the
most literal sense, the word simply means "affix to a cross" (but of
course the intention was to execute the person).
More importantly, who cares what the English word "crucify" means. The
verse in Soorat an-Nisaa' is in Arabic, not English. In Arabic there
is a difference between the qaf-taa-lam (QTL) root on the one hand,
and the sad-lam-baa (SLB) root on the other. With that in mind, see
the Arabic of Soorat an-Nisaa' 4:157 here:
http://www.unn.ac.uk/societies/islamic/quran/noble/nobae004.htm#157
The key part is where it says roughly "wa maa qataloohu wa maa
salaboohu," which translates to "and they did not kill [QLT] him nor
did they crucify [SLB] him". So there is a distinction in Arabic
between qalata and salaba. The verse is saying not only did they not
kill him, but more importantly they did not even crucify him. If we
treat the proposition in this verse as axiomatic, this would seem to
negate the possibility that he was nailed to the cross but survived.
I know Deedat put a great amount of emphasis on the book of Jonah (I
remember him waving a single page he ripped out the Bible during his
debate with Robert Douglas), but the Qur'an makes no mention of this
book with regard to the crucifixion. It seems that you have been
deeply influenced by the Bible (and Deedat's approach) in
subconsciously using the Christian corpora as a tool for understanding
what the Qur'an means. This is what Gilchrist capitalized on.
-Denis Giron
Moataz H. Emam
> Maybe Judas or Simon who carried the cross substituted for Jesus?
When I was young I was told by a teacher that there is a strong Islamic
argument that it was indeed Judas that God has chosen to substitute for
Jesus. I have not read the argument though, anyone?
--
Moataz H. Emam
Zuiko Azumazi
<rj...@mailandnews.com> wrote in message
news:3E037358...@mailandnews.com...Comment:-
For me, the essential difference is that Muslims worship God [Allah] and God
[Allah] alone, whereas Christians don't. What else is there to say or
discuss? The comparison of Apostles of God [Allah], in this context, is
therefore somewhat meaningless.
Peace
--
Zuiko Azumazi.
--
Zuiko Azumazi.
Abdelkarim Benoit Evans
kaa...@godisdead.com (Denis Giron) wrote:
> fortk...@hotmail.com (CooolBreeeze) wrote in message
> news:<57e3df21.02122...@posting.google.com>...
> > Well, crucify means to kill by death upon tree or cross, usually
> > nailed, speared or impaled. Jesus was NOT killed according to Quran
> > or to Jesus himself in the NT.
>
[...]
> First of all, it is not clear that "crucify" necessarily means to
> kill. Josephus mentions at least one Jew who survived his crucifixion
> (he was pulled down before he suffocated or bled to death). In the
> most literal sense, the word simply means "affix to a cross" (but of
> course the intention was to execute the person).
In Arabic, as in English, "to crucify" Means to PUT TO DEATH by means of
hanging on a cross. Semantically, this is like "to hang", "to behead",
to "drown" and "to electocute". I'm not sure anyone has ever survived an
attempted beheading, but there are people are survived failed attemps to
hang or electrocute them. When a person goes under water lives to tell
about it, he doesn't say "I drowned", he says "I almost drowned" because
drowning is more than being submerged; it is death as a result of being
submerged.
Josephus is probably correct that someone survived an attempted
crucifixion. Those survivals are rare exceptions that change nothing
about the meaning of the word (both in Arabic and in English). If I say
"they crucified someone" (in Arabic or in English) the meaning, unless
further elucicated by the context, is always "they killed someone by
hanging him on a cross."
> The key part is where it says roughly "wa maa qataloohu wa maa
> salaboohu," which translates to "and they did not kill [QLT] him nor
> did they crucify [SLB] him". So there is a distinction in Arabic
> between qalata and salaba. The verse is saying not only did they not
> kill him, but more importantly they did not even crucify him. If we
> treat the proposition in this verse as axiomatic, this would seem to
> negate the possibility that he was nailed to the cross but survived.
See above; in Arabic Salaba means to kill by hanging on a cross. The use
of both the general term, qatala and the specific term, Salaba, is
probably a literary device used for emphasis. In Arabic as well as in
English, repetition is sometimes used for emphasis.
Someone wrongly accused of beheading a person would vigorously claim
innocence and might well use such repetition, saying, "No! I did not
kill him. I did not chop his head off." There is nothing in that
sentence to allow supposing that "chop his head off" means less than
"kill".
The question of exactly what took place when Jesus (God's grace and
peace be on him) was condemned to death by crucifixion has been answered
in many ways by Islamic scholars.
The Qur'an does not provide much in the way of details, except to point
out that those who wanted to have Jesus killed ultimately failed and
Jesus was raised up by God. For Muslims the exact moment of that raising
is not stated; for Christians, it occured later, at the Ascension (and
following a ressurection from the dead.
In addition to telling us that the ennemies of Jesus failed, the Qur'an
also tells us that they wrongly thought that they had succeeded.
wa maa qataluuhu But they killed him not
wa maa Salabuuhu Nor crucified him
walaakin shubbiha lahum But it appeared so to them
They saw something and what they saw made them believe that they had
indeed crucified Jesus. The Qur'an tells us that those appearances were
deceiving.
According to Tabari, Ibn Athir and others, Jesus was never even hung on
the cross and Allah made someone else look like Jesus and the lookalike
was crucifed. Depending on the source, the lookalike was not identified,
was the betrayer (Judas), was a servant of the chief priest of the Jews,
was one of Jesus's own disciples who volunteered to replace Jesus or was
a Jew named Joshua.
Baydawi, dans _Anwaar altanzil wa'asraar al-ta' wiil, supposes that the
physical envelope was crucified but that the divine spirit (the "ruH"
from God mentioned in Q. 4:171) was raised up. A similar view is held by
Razi and Ya'qubi.
Some compare the Qur'anic account with another passage in the Qur'an
where it is said of martyrs:
"Say not of those who are killed in Allah's path, 'They are dead.' No,
they are alive but you cannot perceive it." (2:154 see also 3:169)
Allah has not seen fit to inform us fully about what happened to Jesus.
He tells us that he lifted Jesus up to him and that is sufficient for
me. The rest is pious speculation.
--
Abdelkarim Benoit Evans
hasan schiers
It is from (perhaps other sources as well) the Gospel of Barnabus.
David/Amicus, you ought to read it. While the entire text cannot be said to
be accurate and many from various positions have criticized it, the Shaikh
(ral.) whom I studied with, said the story of Jesus (a.s.) supposed
crucifixion as depicted in this work was correct. That is to say, Judas was
the substitute, and the wording as I recall from the Gospel of Barnabus
said,
(Judas on the cross, complains:)
"....the malefactor hath escaped and I die unjustly."
According to Judas, Jesus (a.s.) was the "malefactor".
The point being Allah's (swt) Justice was that the one who attempted to
betray Isa (a.s.) to a fate of crucifixion, was in fact, transformed to
suffer the precise fate that he had intended for one of Allah's (swt) most
exalted Prophets.
Again, everyone who wants to can argue about this or that authenticity. I'm
making no claims, other than the one isolated statement that my Shaikh
(ral.) made.
I recommend reading the Gospel of Barnabus to you David/Amicus, because it
was most interesting, if nothing else. Knowing it contained at least one
important historical accuracy, possibly mixed in with other significant
errors, allows for a very cautious reading. You can then see how the stories
fit with your own existing understanding. Certainly there is a possibility
of your personal growth by taking what you can. You seem to be a curious
sort, and a ravenous reader. This one won't take all that long, but I bet it
sets your intellectual curiosity buzzing <grin>.
When it come to authenticating ....I don't think you'll find much for it. It
has true things in it, but from the best of my sources it also has errors.
Let the buyer beware....but it is interesting and certainly no more
significantly flawed than other unreliably transmitted information, whether
they be alleged scripture or hadith. I haven't stopped reading hadith
collections simply because there are obvious bizarre statements in some of
them. I just set them aside and move on, learning more as I go. That is how
I would advise anyone who is interested, approach Barnabus. For muslims, as
I consider myself, we have the good fortune to have the Qur'an as our SOLE
CRITERION. If something doesn't stand up to Qur'anic values, then either I
don't understand what I read (and it is authentic), or it is simply in error
itself. I don't much care either way. I learn from what I read, but the Book
of Allah (swt) is the best authenticator.
One last point....people describe the Qur'an as the Criterion. It certainly
is to me. However, we should not forget that whatever we read IN ANY
LANGUAGE goes through the filter of our own wisdom, biases and everything
else. Just because someone can read Arabic is no guarantee whatever they
take as their or someone else's interpretation of what they read is the
"only interpretation" or even a correct interpretation. It is impossible to
get past one's own limitations when attempting to absorb information. Allah
(swt) must help us. The danger is when we "think" we know it all, or that
some scholar "knew it all", and that somehow we can sit in a position of
inerrance. As soon as we get involved, some doubt or caution is in order.
Quoting from the Qur'an or a scholar doesn't avoid the problem that we are
still limited by our own ability to understand and/or interpret even the
Scholar's words. We just can't safely assume we "completely" comprehend.
Caution is always in order and there are things that generally help, but I'm
not going into depth regarding them at this point.
I am reminded of the saying attributed to our Prophet (sal.),
My community will never agree on error.
So, Moataz and Kavalec, please continue to disagree with our strident
contributor Al-H......I can't bring myself to use the screen name. It's too
uncomfortable for me to put the kind of bad qualities I see advocated next
to one of the Beautiful Names of Allah (swt)
The disagreement between us, gives me hope for the Ummah.
...hasan
"Moataz H. Emam" <em...@physics.umass.NOSPAM.edu> wrote in message
news:3E072D0E...@physics.umass.NOSPAM.edu...
David / Amicus
heard of it but not read it. I've just ordered it and look forward to
getting it. It had mixed reviews over at amazon dot com.
David / Amicus
Muslim perspective that anyone can recommend?
CooolBreeeze
> fortk...@hotmail.com (CooolBreeeze) wrote in message news:<57e3df21.02122...@posting.google.com>...
> > Well, crucify means to kill by death upon tree or cross, usually
> > nailed, speared or impaled. Jesus was NOT killed according to Quran
> > or to Jesus himself in the NT.
Dennis,
I didn't say Jesus the Prophet of Allah was crucified. I only defined
the word crucify. I proceeded to prove that Jesus was not crucified
by the Quran and the words from Jesus' own mouth in the NT.
So, Dennis, at kaa...@godisdead.com, you are wrong again as is your
email address.
CooolBreeeze
> Ami...@webtv.net (David / Amicus) wrote in message news:<13083-3E...@storefull-2136.public.lawson.webtv.net>...
> > I would think that from a Muslim perspective it would not be possible to
> > assert that Jesus was hung on the cross briefly and then taken down
> > alive because does not the Qu'ran say "They crucified him not"?
>
>
> The Jews have never said that they crucified the Messiah.
COMMENT:
How exactly do you know that the jews NEVER ever said such a thing.
You don't. As a result your statement is disqualified. You certainly
aren't a witness. What evidence do you bring to say it never
happened.
> For the jews Jesus was not the Messiah and the Messiah has not
> come yet.
> Yet the Quranic texts imply that the Jews crucified the Messiah
> as they boast about it.
> This is a clue to tell you that the author of the Qur'an whoever
> he might be was not interested in history but theology.
COMMENT:
Again you are mistaken. The bible itself said that they mocked Jesus
as King of the jews, and messiah -- according to Luke 23. That is
factly presented in the NT. By deduction, since the Romans had no
argument as announced by both Pilate and Herod with Jesus, the mocking
was apparently done by the jews alone.
Certainly the Spaniard, Gauls, or British hordes had no beef with him,
it was the jews who instituted and prosecuted Jesus in the forum of
Roman law.
> I am sure you have also noticed that Jesus would have been
> stoned not crucified if it was up to the Jews legal system.
COMMENT:
It was not up to the jews as you well know. They HAD to go to the
Romans for justice and they did. They took the punishment the Romans
allowed for them. Your issue here is a red herring.
> Once again what we read in the Qur'an is a theological response to what
> Paul wrote to the Galiteans: if it is through the Law that we are
> JUSTIFIED then Christ died for nothing.Galatian
> Of course for those who think that the Law gives life, it is no wonder
> to have a different view on the crucifixion. That is theology and
> not history
COMMENT:
Your view is pure theology, can you see that? You are biting on the
gospel of Paul. But that gospel is separate and distinct from what
Jesus said. Jesus said about the law and the commandments: For
eternal life, keep the law and commandments (Matt 19:16) Is Jesus
lying? Also, Jesus in the Lord's Prayer said if you want salvation
and eternal life, forgive your debtor, forgive your trespasser, and
God will forgive you. That is so Islamic I must pause and reflect on
the muslimhood of Jesus. Jesus said nothing about dying for sins or
sacrifice. Paul may have said but Jesus said keep and law and
commandments for eternal life.
Abdelkarim Benoit Evans
"Zuiko Azumazi" <azu...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> For me, the essential difference is that Muslims worship God [Allah] and God
> [Allah] alone, whereas Christians don't. What else is there to say or
> discuss? The comparison of Apostles of God [Allah], in this context, is
> therefore somewhat meaningless.
I am glad you prefaced your remark with "for me". Your opinion is not in
accordance with either the doctrine of Christians themselves or the
teachings of the Qur'an. As People of the Book, Christians share with
Jews, Muslims and Sabians the worship of Allah, the God of Abraham
(peace be on him).
The major credal declaration of Christians begins "We believe in One God
the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth and of all things
visible and invisible..." Even though they make the error of associating
Jesus with God or, more accurately, mistakenly believing that the
Eternal Godhead is made manifest in Jesus (peace be on him), yet it is
obvious that in spite of their confusion and error, they ardently
worship the God of Abraham, whose Godhead is considered to be One. Many
of the prayers of the liturgical Christian communities begin by invoking
God and end with the formula "...through Jesus Christ our Lord, who
lives with You and the Holy Spirit, ever One God, world without end.
Amen."
In the Qur'an, God says:
"Some of them [Christians and Jews] are on the right path but many of
them follow an evil way. ...Those who believe in the Qur'an, those who
follow the Jewish scriptures and the Sabians and the
Christians--everyone who believes in Allah and the Last Day and who do
works of righteousness--on them shall be no fear nor shall they
grieve." (Qur'an 5:66,69)
In the Qur'an, God tells believing men to marry believing women. Muslim
men cannot marry idolators or atheists. However God gives explicit
permission to Muslim men to marry Christian and Jewish woman. Why?
Because they are Peope of the Book and they worship Allah.
To say that Christians have strayed from the teachings of Jesus and
fallen into gross error about the nature of the Eternal Godhead is
Islamic. But to say, as you did, that Christians do not worship Allah is
a vicious calumny and a terrible libel.
--
Peace to all who seek God's face.
Abdelkarim Benoit Evans
Altway
news:kevans-318391....@news.videotron.net...
> In addition to telling us that the ennemies of Jesus failed, the Qur'an
> also tells us that they wrongly thought that they had succeeded.
> wa maa qataluuhu But they killed him not
> wa maa Salabuuhu Nor crucified him
> walaakin shubbiha lahum But it appeared so to them
> They saw something and what they saw made them believe that they had
indeed crucified Jesus. The Qur'an tells us that those appearances were
deceiving.
Comment:-
If we look at the previous verses, then in 4:157 the Quran is
telling us that the Jews did not cricify or kill Jesus.
This is perfectly true even from the New Testament.
(Some people say that Jews never boasted of this. But it is clear that
some did (the priests) want Jesus dead and when they thought he had
been killed they could have congratulated themselves on manipulating this.)
In so far as Jesus was the Word of God, this could not be crucified or
killed.
But Jesus was taken up to heaven and on earth his teachings were corrupted.
Note that Jesus in the New Testament tells us:-
"Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I
might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself.
I have power to
lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I
received
of my Father." John 10:17
There is, therefore, no contradiction.
The truth is that Christians have taken the crucifixion,
the divinity of Jesus, the Trinity of God and vicarious atonement
to justify each other though none of these are teachings of Jesus.
It is only in these doctrines that Christianity differs from Islam.
Islam ignores the crucifixion as irrelevant to salvation
because Allah is the sufficient judge and judges by the deeds that
are based on correct faith, i.e faith based on truth.
--
Hamid S. Aziz
Understanding Islam
www.altway.freeuk.com
.
Moataz H. Emam
> So, Moataz and Kavalec, please continue to disagree with our strident
> contributor Al-H......I can't bring myself to use the screen name. It's too
> uncomfortable for me to put the kind of bad qualities I see advocated next
> to one of the Beautiful Names of Allah (swt)
Friend Hasan - that was a beautiful post. I agree wholeheartedly. And
you are right, the disagreements between Muslims are indeed a source of
strength not weakness. NonMuslims have criticized Islam as too
decentralized, i.e. we have no leading hierarchy or Pope. They fail to
see that this is exactly where our strength lies, and in the diversity
of opinion, ranging from the most moderate to the most fanatic, there is
hope for the future, because competing forces are exactly what allows
for mutation and evolution by natural selection.
--
Moataz H. Emam
Denis Giron
I must say that I that I was very pleased to see a response from the
erudite Abd al-Kareem Benoit Evans, whom I have come to admire greatly
simply from reading his posts over the last couple years or so. His
post from December 23rd can be found archived here:
http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=kevans-318391.17462023122002%40news.videotron.net
As I understand it, his post was an attempt to refute my attack on
CooolBreeze's Deedatesque interpretation of Soorat an-Nisaa' 4:157
(influenced by the New Testament). I would break Mr. Evans post into
two sections, one being a weak attempt at refutation based on
etymology, and the other being a rather powerful refutation based on
existing forms of exegesis.
(1) THE WEAK (LINGUISTIC) REFUTATION
> In Arabic, as in English, "to crucify" Means to PUT TO DEATH
> by means of hanging on a cross.
I would agree, yet also want to disagree with regard to clarity.
Indeed, when a man is crucified, as when a man is sent to the gas
chamber, or before a firing squad, the intention is to execute the
person, though the form of execution itself is not automatically
synonymous with the subject being killed. While it is hihgly unlikely,
a person may be sent before a firing squad and survive (even if the
intention was to kill him). So, this would mean that he was sent
before the firing squad, but not killed.
As for what the Arabic means, I am stuck on this. I tried to draw an
interpretation from words that share the sad-lam-baa root (like spine,
sinew, loin, backbone?), but that was more confusing than helpful,
save for saleeb ("cross"), as in "rasama ishaarata as-Saleeb"
("make/draw the sign of the cross," or maybe "consecrate [with] the
figure of the cross"?). Ultimately it does not seem a great deal
different from the English (or the Latin from which the English is
derived from... crucifigam?).
> When a person goes under water lives to tell
> about it, he doesn't say "I drowned", he says "I almost drowned" because
> drowning is more than being submerged; it is death as a result of being
> submerged.
I felt this analogy, much like the analogy of the beheading, was
unfair. For an example that might paint a different view, note how in
the Qur'an (exempli gratia: al-A'raaf 7:123-124, TaaHaa 20:71,
ash-Shu'araa 26:49), the Pharaoh threatens to crucify the Egyptian
magicians who converted to the faith of Moses after witnessing the
power of his Lord. I'm not familiar with the extra-Quranic material on
this incident, but I do know that the Qur'an itself is unclear as to
whether the Pharaoh actually made good on his threat. Suppose that the
magicians were crucified, but the followers of Moses pulled them down.
Would they not say, looking back, something like "Fir'awn crucified
me, but my brothers pulled me down before I died, alhamdulillaah..."?
They were certainly affixed to a cross...
> The use of both the general term, qatala and the specific term,
> Salaba, is probably a literary device used for emphasis. In Arabic
> as well as in English, repetition is sometimes used for emphasis.
>
> Someone wrongly accused of beheading a person would vigorously claim
> innocence and might well use such repetition, saying, "No! I did not
> kill him. I did not chop his head off."
It is certainly possible, I will concede, that this may have been a
literary device, but I still think that the structure of the language
is in my favor. Note that "ma qataloohu wa ma salaboohu" more
literally translates to "they did not kill him and they did not
crucify him." Your analogy above ignores the logical structure of the
proposition, and instead unfairly (in my opinion) moves the reader to
identifying with your point due to the fact that it is impossible to
survive a successful beheading. Let us use another analogy that is
closer to the actual language...
With qatala and salaba, I would offer an analogy of four sects who
claim to follow Jesus that all disagree with one another with regard
to what happened. The first sect says that he was killed and
crucified. The second sect says they [the Romans or the Jews]
crucified him, but he survived. The third sect says they did kill him,
but not by crucifiction (rather he was stoned). Finally, the fourth
sect states that he was neither killed nor crucified (which is what I
believe the Qur'an states).
If we let Q stand for "they killed Jesus," and S stand for "they
crucified Jesus," the logical structure of the verse in Soorat
an-Nisaa 4:157 (and the tenet of the fourth hypothetical sect
mentioned above) can be expressed one way, and the beliefs of the
other three sect can be expressed in a rather different way.
Translating the four positions into a formal language, we get:
Sect 1: Q & S
Sect 2: ~Q & S
Sect 3: Q & ~S
Sect 4: ~Q & ~S
The fourth proposition is the most accurate translation of the verse
in Soorat an-Nisaa. If one is to say that Jesus was actually nailed to
a cross, then I would make an appeal to the following conditional
proposition:
S --> ~(~Q & ~S)
In other words, if it is true that they crucified him, then it follows
that it is also true that it is not the case that he was not killed
and not crucified, ergo the claim made in Soorat an-Nisaa' 4:157 is
false.
No here Mr. Evans may claim I have erected a strawman, as his
interpretation of "crucify" entails the subject being killed. So, if
he was crucified, he was killed, and the contraposition if he was not
killed, he was not crucified...
S --> Q
~Q --> ~S
My objection is that Mr. Evans' analogy did not demonstrate this.
Suppose Mr. Evans is accused of murdering a man by shooting him in the
head. If a witness testifies that "Abd al-Kareem did not kill him and
did not shoot him in the head," this does not imply that he shot him
in the head, but the guy survived. Nor, for that matter does it mean
he killed the guy, but not with a gun. Both conjuncts have to be true
for the statement to be true. So too, if it turns out this was a bad
mistake (based on shoddy police work), and the witness says "the guy
was not killed and he was not shot in the head," that means he was not
shot in the head!
(2) THE STRONG (HERMENEUTIC) REFUTATION
> The question of exactly what took place when Jesus (God's grace and
> peace be on him) was condemned to death by crucifixion has been answered
> in many ways by Islamic scholars.
This, actually, is a point from Mr. Evans that is far more powerful.
As he later wrote:
> According to Tabari, Ibn Athir and others, Jesus was never even hung on
> the cross and Allah made someone else look like Jesus and the lookalike
> was crucifed. Depending on the source, the lookalike was not identified,
> was the betrayer (Judas), was a servant of the chief priest of the Jews,
> was one of Jesus's own disciples who volunteered to replace Jesus or was
> a Jew named Joshua.
>
> Baydawi, dans _Anwaar altanzil wa'asraar al-ta' wiil, supposes that the
> physical envelope was crucified but that the divine spirit (the "ruH"
> from God mentioned in Q. 4:171) was raised up. A similar view is held by
> Razi and Ya'qubi.
This is quite significant, and it is here that I think Mr. Evans has
struck a heavy blow to my position. The first paragraph would be in
favor of my position, but the second one brings into question the
meaning of crucifixion. If only the body was crucified, but not the
soul (accepting a dualist position), does this mean Jesus was
crucified or not? I'm not sure.
A far more heavy blow may be drawn from the fact that the above may
imply that some prominent Muslims may have believed that he was
nailed to the cross. My position was essentially that the structure of
the ayat does not allow an interpretation where Jesus is nailed to the
cross. However, if a prominent Muslim scholar derived precisely that
interpretation from the text, then my strict reading is no longer so
obvious (by the way, I do not classify Deedat as "a prominent Muslim
scholar").
-Denis Giron
Denis Giron
> I didn't say Jesus the Prophet of Allah was crucified. I only defined
> the word crucify. I proceeded to prove that Jesus was not crucified
> by the Quran and the words from Jesus' own mouth in the NT.
Hmmm... maybe I jumped the gun a bit with my response. However, what I
was disputing was your Deedatesque interpretation of the Qur'an and
New Testament. I was disputing your interpretations. As I attempted to
demonstrate in my response to Abd al-Kareem Benoit Evans, the logical
structure of the verse seems to even negate the possibility that Jesus
was nailed to a cross (while your post implied that Jesus was nailed
to a cross). This is precisely the same problem Deedat ran into
against Gilchrist. Of course, in my response to Mr. Evans I also noted
the possibility of defering to his hermeneutic refutation.
> So, Dennis, at kaa...@godisdead.com, you are wrong again as is your
> email address.
Oh? Well, if "crucified" doesn't have to literally mean being afixed
to a cross, then so too "godisdead" does not really have to mean that
a deity has passed away. Some say that when Nietzsche said "god is
dead," he meant that none of the avowed pious live for God and
religion anymore (id est, the muttaqeen are all munafiqeen), not that
God was literally dead. For a contrapositive analogy, note also that
the famous Atheist Quentin Smith recently said God is alive and well,
and surely he did not mean that literally either. I lift the following
from Imran Aijaz' debate on the Secular Web:
"The predicament of naturalist philosophers is not just due to the
influx of talented theists, but is due to the lack of counter-activity
of naturalist philosophers themselves. God is not "dead" in academia;
he returned to life in the late 1960s and is now alive and well in his
last academic stronghold, philosophy departments."
Quentin Smith, The Metaphilosophy of Naturalism, Philo Online, Vol.
4., No. 2, as found here...
http://www.philoonline.org/library/smith_4_2.htm
...as cited in the second installment of Imran Aijaz' debate with Bill
Cooke:
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/bill_cooke/cooke-aijaz/aijaz2.html
Thought I'd share that...
-Denis Giron
Abdelkarim Benoit Evans
kaa...@godisdead.com (Denis Giron) wrote:
[A long and interesting reponse to my discussion of the meaning of the
Qur'anic verse about the (non)crucifixion of Jesus (peace be on him)]
I just wanted to add that while the question of whether Jesus was
actually hung on the cross or not is often seen by Muslims as a matter
of God's limits to the treatment allowed for one of his prophets (peace
be on them all).
The usual exegesis of the verse in question, which has Jesus replaced by
someone else, spares him the indignity of crucifixion, which, in any
case, has no soteriological significance for Muslims. Since the idea of
a vicarious sacrifice is rejected absolutely and salvation depends on
the direct mercy of God, there is no need for a crucifixion.