Ali Ataie – Debate Who Was Muhammad (Muslim) vs. David Wood (Christian)
AI: Summary ©
AI: Transcript ©
Enforcing the fire code. So that means if
there's no seats
and people start sitting in the outside, they'll
be asked to leave.
May God's peace,
blessings and His mercy be upon you all
this evening.
On behalf of the Muslim Students Association,
Campus Crusade for Christ, and College Life Christian
Fellowship, I would like to welcome you all
to tonight's debate.
Tonight's debate will focus on the Prophet of
Muhammad, peace be upon him, in the light
of Islamic and Christian views.
I understand that the word debate implies winning
and losing,
but let's not make tonight about that.
Let's use this debate as an avenue where
we can better understand each other.
Understand that debate of such nature shall perhaps
tell us more about our differences than similarities.
Remember,
Muslims and Christians alike have a lot and
a lot in common.
I understand
that we already come here with our biases,
and this debate tonight isn't for the faint
of heart.
It's for people who can listen.
People who can listen with open minds and
open hearts.
It's for people who are willing to change
the way they think. You know, think with
an open box. Think outside the box. You
know, we're here at UC Davis. We're critical
thinkers. You know? Listen to other people's opinions
and views.
Refrain from making any comments, any applause, and
any agreements or disagreements with the speakers till
this debate is over.
In light of what happened during our last
debate, most of you were there. We had
some ruckus. We had some some disturbances.
So this time around, we do have security.
That's just the sad reality of the situation.
I've been told that we had we were
gonna have 3 cameras, but as you can
see, we have 4 or 5 or 6
of them today.
So if you do create any disturbance, any
ruckus,
any intolerance,
you will be escorted outside and we will
inform student judicial affairs. So that's the big
threat for today.
So let's please conduct ourselves with discipline,
patience, and dignity.
The same discipline, the same patience, the same
dignity that's been preached to us by Adam,
Abraham, Moses,
Jesus Christ, and Muhammad peace be upon them
all.
With that, I'd like to introduce today's speakers.
We have Ali Atay representing the Muslims today,
and we have
David Wood representing the Christians tonight.
Atay, I quote,
is the founder and president of the Muslim
interfaith Council,
an organization dedicated to spreading and defending the
truth of Islam in America.
He received a bachelor's of science degree in
accounting from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
Since graduating in 2000,
Atai has been both a visiting assistant instructor
of religious studies at Cal Poly as well
as author of books entitled,
in defense of Islam Confronting Christians with Their
Own Scriptures and Injil Haq, the true gospel
of Jesus Christ.
What I quote is a former atheist who
converted to Christianity
because of the historical evidence for the resurrection
of Jesus Christ. I quote,
Wood has earned degrees in biology and philosophy.
He's currently pursuing a PhD in philosophy of
religion and is a member of the Society
of Christian Philosophers.
Our 2 speakers already know, but I like
to remind you people about today's format.
It has been decided that David Woods will
be opening today's debate. He'll be speaking for
30 minutes.
This will be followed by El Yatai coming
to the state, and he'll be speaking for
another 30 minutes.
This will be followed by a 15 minute
rebuttal
from mister Woods,
followed by which we'll have Elia Tay once
again take the podium and he'll have 15
minutes for his rebuttal.
This time around, in order to spice things
up a little bit, I don't know if
you would like it or not, but the
audience this time around does not have an
opportunity to ask questions.
What's gonna happen instead is the 2 speakers
can ask each of their 5 different questions.
You'll have a max of 3 minutes each
for each response.
After this session, q and a session,
David was gonna come up to the stage
and give his conclusion in 5 minutes. This
will be followed by another conclusion from Al
Yatai,
And that's that's how tonight is gonna be.
Once again, I remind you, you know, be
very patient today, be disciplined, come here with
dignity, respect each other around you, and open
up your minds. Look at things from a
different perspective. We're students here and the educators
amongst us, you know, this is a great
university. Now let's take something, you know, with
us when we go back. Thanks. Thank
you for your attention.
Good evening.
I'd like to thank the Muslim Student Association
and College Life and Campus Crusade For Christ
for sponsoring the debate tonight,
And I just say that I I think
it's great that out here in Davis, California,
Muslims
can get together with a Christian group that
has crusade as part of its name, and,
everyone gets along. That's, some good stuff. It
may have taken us a 1000 years, but
we're all here, and, and that's what counts.
I'd also like to thank Ali for his
willingness to debate such a sensitive issue. I
have always been impressed by people who are
willing to lay their beliefs on the table
and say,
go ahead. Take your best shot. And Ali
is one of those people. In fact, Ali
is the one who chose our topic tonight.
He was ready to put his faith in
Mohammed to the test in public,
and that sort of confidence is admirable.
I do wanna warn everyone here, again, that,
this is not going to be pretty.
We're not here for an interfaith picnic. Interfaith
picnics are great, but this is a debate.
We're not here to affirm one another's faiths.
I'm saying that Ali is wrong about Muhammad,
and he's saying that I'm wrong about Muhammad.
I'm pointing this out because, for many Christians
and Muslims,
our beliefs are the most important thing in
the world. And when people start saying our
beliefs are false,
wow.
To be honest, I'd rather have someone say
something I don't like about my wife or
mother than about king Jesus.
But at the same time,
I recognize that people disagree with me, and
that it's important to understand the reasons for
disagreeing with me.
Now, if you're here tonight, I assume that
like me and like Ali, you are prepared
to have your beliefs challenged
and criticized.
And Ali and I will certainly do our
best to challenge you this evening. Just to
give you a little background as to where
I'm coming from, I converted from atheism to
Christianity
when I was 20 years old.
I was trying to prove that Christianity is
false by refuting the resurrection.
I came up with some theories to explain
away the evidence, but in the end I
looked at my theories and said, you know,
this just
doesn't fit the facts.
So I had a decision to make. I
could either ignore the facts and go on
with my life as an atheist,
or I can surrender to Jesus Christ
as Lord. It was the most difficult decision
I've ever had to make, but I decided
to submit to God and to give my
life to Jesus Christ.
About a year or 2 later, I met
a convert to Islam named Anthony. Anthony and
I became,
weightlifting partners, and as we lifted weights, we
would debate Islam versus Christianity. So there was
testosterone
all over the place.
But,
but Anthony and I didn't remain friends for
very long because we were both so eager
to win the argument that we ended up
getting pretty nasty at times. And we we
eventually got to the point where we weren't
even presenting evidence anymore, we were just making
fun of each other's religions. And and that
was both our faults. We were young.
But, I've always regretted that because for a
while, we were good friends.
Later, as I was studying philosophy as an
undergrad,
I focused on religious studies and I studied
Islam as part of my coursework. We had
to read modern works
on, Islam from people like the Islamic scholar,
John Esposito.
And when I read those modern sources and
I listened to the lectures of my Muslim
professor,
Mohammed sounded like a pretty good guy. In
fact, I once wrote a paper on what
an amazing job Mohammed did in Arabia. I
even gave a speech on that topic at
2 different universities.
But while I was in college, I met
a man named Nabil Qureshi.
One night we ended up sharing a hotel
room,
during a school trip.
That first night before we went to sleep,
I was reading my Bible and Nabil was
putting away his clothes, and all of a
sudden he said, so
are you a hardcore
Christian?
And I said, yes. And it was on.
And it was fun too because Nabeel is
one of the smartest people I've ever met.
Later that weekend, we stayed up all night
debating.
In the middle of it all, I stopped
Nabil and I said, look,
I know what you believe,
but if what you believe is wrong, if
what you've been taught all your life is
false,
do you really
want to know it?
And he said, yes and no. He said,
yes because I want to know the truth
about God,
and no,
because leaving Islam would destroy my life.
But then he said that his desire for
truth outweighs his desire for comfort in this
world.
Nabil and I became best friends, and we
still are, but we spent 4 years of
our lives arguing with one another.
We discussed Jesus
and Mohammed,
the Bible and the Quran, the trinity and
Tawhid.
We went to scholarly sources, we watched debates,
we talked to scholars, we read books, we
wrote down our arguments, so that other people
could examine them. And it was in the
course of that dialogue that I was able
to weigh the evidence for Islam,
and to examine my reasons for rejecting Muhammad
as a prophet.
So the case that I present to you
this evening is something that came out of
a careful dialogue
between best friends.
Tonight, I'll just be able to summarize why
I don't believe in Muhammad. That's that's the
downside of public debates. There's never enough time
to cover everything, but we should be able
to cover quite a bit. Just to give
you a quick outline, I'm going to begin
by talking briefly about why Christians are pretty
suspicious when it comes to Muhammad. The debate
tonight isn't about Christianity, we're focusing on Muhammad,
but there are a lot of Christians here.
And so, I'd like to take a few
minutes,
explaining why Christians disagree with Muslims on this
crucial issue.
After that I'll discuss 2 popular arguments for
Islam and I'll try to explain why these
arguments don't work.
And finally, I'll address the reliability of Mohammed
in terms of certain details of his life
that many people find objectionable.
So, first, why don't Christians believe that Muhammad
was a prophet?
Well, the most obvious answer would be that
Christians believe the gospel.
And the heart of the gospel according to
the New Testament is, it consists of three
things.
The divine Son of God
died on the cross for sins
and rose from the dead. So son of
god, death on a cross, resurrection.
Those are the three key elements
of the gospel according to the new testament.
But we're also told in the new testament
that false prophets would come and that they
would try to change the gospel.
Nearly 6 centuries later, Mohammed came along
and he said, you Christians believe in God?
Me too.
You believe Jesus was born of a virgin?
Me too.
You believe Jesus was the Messiah? Me too.
But there are just three things I'd like
to change.
1, Jesus wasn't the Son of God. 2,
he didn't die on the cross. And 3,
he didn't rise from the dead. Now when
a Christian hears that and alarm goes off,
hey, wait a minute. Those are the 3
most important things. He's changing the gospel just
like Jesus and the apostles said.
For those of you who are Muslims would
say, Muhammad didn't change the gospel.
Muhammad restored the gospel.
Christians
changed the words of Jesus. Muhammad just fixed
all the errors that Christians added over the
centuries.
But here we find a problem.
You see, when Muhammad preached in Arabia,
there weren't a lot of historians around.
People didn't have many writings from the 1st
2nd century.
What this means is that Muhammad
could pretty much say whatever he wanted to
say about Jesus and no one could prove
him wrong.
So Muhammad could say, as he does in
sort of 4157,
that Jesus was not killed nor was he
crucified.
Muhammad was free to say
that Jesus claimed to be nothing but a
prophet, and that Jesus' disciples
were Muslims. No one in Muhammad's time could
really show that these claims were false.
But the world has changed.
In addition to the biblical record, we now
have writings by the Jewish historian Josephus and
the Roman historian Tacitus.
We have writings by Mara Bar Serapian and
Lucian of Samu Sada.
We have, the Jewish Talmud and the works
of the early church fathers. We have an
unbroken chain of testimony going back to Jesus'
followers. And, of course, we have the historical
method and tools for textual criticism.
So now we have the ability to test
whether Muhammad's claims about Jesus line up with
history.
And when we apply the tools of textual
criticism and the historical method to the ancient
documents,
we find
that the Muslim view of Jesus as a
man who claimed to be,
nothing but a prophet, who was never killed,
who has never rose from the dead, and
whose followers were Muslims.
This view of Jesus just doesn't line up
with the historical evidence.
So this would be my first criticism of
Mohammed. We can test certain things he said
and when we do, we find that the
evidence just doesn't support some of his claims.
But I think the situation gets worse when,
Muslims try to reconcile history with the teachings
of Muhammad.
For instance, consider Muhammad's claim that Jesus wasn't
killed and wasn't crucified.
History shows that everyone in the 1st century
was convinced that Jesus died by crucifixion.
So how do Muslims respond?
Well, the most common answer
I hear
is that God took Jesus to himself
and disguised
Judas to make him look like Jesus.
Then Judas was crucified,
but God made everyone think
that it was Jesus.
Now, when I hear explanations like that, all
I can think is,
that's your story?
All of the available evidence tells us that
Jesus died because God did such a great
job tricking everyone?
God must have done a great job indeed
because even Jesus followers believed that he died
on the cross. Think about that for a
moment.
Where did Christians get the idea that Jesus
died on the cross?
Well, if the most common Muslim explanation is
correct, we apparently got this false idea from
God.
So God accidentally started Christianity
when he tricked everyone into believing that Jesus
died.
Now, explanations like this are hard to accept
if you're not a Muslim. But Muslims are
really forced into making these sorts of claims
because Mohammed said things that just don't line
up with the historical evidence.
And as we proceed through tonight's debate, you'll
come to see more and more what a
huge problem history is for Islam.
But I think a Muslim could respond to
some of this
by saying, yes, we do have to reinterpret
some of the historical data so that fits
our beliefs,
but we have a good reason for doing
so. We know that Muhammad was a prophet.
And since Muhammad was a prophet, we can
trust what he says about Jesus.
And actually, I would I would agree with
that reasoning to some extent. If we had
good evidence for the prophet of Muhammad,
then we would have a good reason
for reinterpreting certain things based on his words.
But does
the evidence show that Muhammad was a prophet?
Let's change gears here and take a look
at 2 common Muslim arguments.
1st, Muslims argue that Muhammad's miraculous scientific insights
are proof that his message was from God.
Some apologists,
point to certain claims in the Quran and
the Hadith. They give these claims a scientific
interpretation and then they ask, how could Mohammed
have known this?
Now based on the examples I've examined, I
can say that I've never seen anything that
looks like a miraculous
scientific insight in either the Quran or the
Hadith.
Though, I'm sure that Ali has some interesting
things to share with us.
But apart from this, there's a tremendous problem
with this argument.
What do you do with all the scientific
inaccuracies
in the Quran and the Hadith? I'll give
you a few examples. In Sahih al Bukhari,
Mohammed tells his followers, if a fly falls
into your drink,
dunk the fly in the drink
because one of the fly's wings has a
disease,
but the other wing has the cure for
the disease.
Is that scientifically correct?
No. Flies don't spread cures for diseases on
their wings.
According to both Sahih al Bukhari and Sahih
Muslim, Mohammed told his followers that Adam was
90 feet tall and that people have been
shrinking since the time of Adam.
Is that true?
No.
It's physically impossible for a human being to
be anywhere near that tall.
So we read things like that in the
hadith, but what about the Quran?
Well, sort of 18/86
tells us that Alexander the Great
traveled so far west,
he found the place where the sun sets.
According to the Quran, the sun sets in
a pool of murky water.
Do you know what stars are according to
the Quran?
Surah 675 in the Hadith tell us that
stars are missiles that god uses to shoot
demons when they try to sneak into heaven.
In In surah 27, ants talk to Solomon.
In surah 86, we learn that sperm are
produced between the ribs and the spine.
And according to several verses in the Quran,
humans come from a clot of blood.
All of these claims are scientifically false. Now
can Muslims reinterpret them? Yes.
And they do.
But why should non Muslims
reinterpret these passages? In other words, the argument
from scientific accuracy
is circular. We have to assume from the
beginning that Muhammad was a prophet. So that
when we get to the scientific errors, we
can reinterpret them based on our belief that
Muhammad was a prophet. Then, once we've reinterpreted
Muhammad's claims to bring them in line with
modern science, we can ask ourselves, how did
Muhammad get all of this right? He must
be a prophet. But that's what we had
to assume
at the beginning,
and that's just circular.
2nd, Mohammed's argument for Islam was not a
scientific argument.
I'm not really sure what it is. I
might call it an argument from literary excellence
or something to that effect.
But it's more of a challenge than an
argument.
We find the challenge in several places in
the Quran. Surah 223 says, if you are
in doubt as to that which we have
revealed to our servant, then produce a chapter
like it,
and call on your witnesses besides Allah if
you're truthful.
So the the the claim is is pretty
simple. If you want to prove that the
Quran is not the word of God, just
try to produce something like it.
In case you've never heard a chapter of
the Quran, I'll give you an example here,
surah 105.
Have you not considered how your Lord dealt
with the possessors of the elephant?
Did he not cause their war to win
in confusion and send down to prey upon
them birds and flocks, casting against them stones
of baked clay so he rendered them like
straw eaten up?
That's a surah. It's one of the short
ones, some are much longer. But, the question
is, are the words I just recited so
amazing that they could only come from God?
Now, obviously not. So at this point, Muslims
usually say, well, it only works in Arabic.
But I think this only adds another problem
to an already weak argument.
Here's why.
There are nearly 7,000 known languages in the
world.
The evidence for God's existence works in any
one of them. Look at the world. Look
at life. Search your heart. God exists.
The evidence for Christianity works in any language.
Jesus rose from the dead, so listen to
him.
But all of a sudden we get to
the Quran, and we get an argument
that can only be examined if you're lucky
enough to speak Arabic.
Fortunately, however, those of us who are linguistically
disadvantaged can investigate this claim because we can
go to history
and we can see how
people who speak Arabic, but aren't Muslims, have
answered this challenge
historically.
And when we do this, we find that
Mohammed's challenge has been met over
and over and over again for nearly 14
centuries.
Now those of you who are Muslims, are
thinking no. Challenge is always. No one's been
out ever been able to meet the challenge.
But according to who? To Muslims?
This isn't a challenge for Muslims. This is
a challenge for unbelievers. Supposedly,
when a person tries to write something like
a chapter of the Quran, he'll realize that
it just can't be done and he'll feel
ashamed.
But that's not what happens
and we know this from early Muslim sources.
In the early Muslim records, we read about
a man named Al Nadir.
When Muhammad was preaching in Mecca, Al Nader
used to follow him around. And when Muhammad
would recite a passage from the Quran, Al
Nader would say, I can tell a better
story than that.
And then he would recite some verses.
And he would ask the listeners and say,
in what way is Muhammad's story better than
mine?
What was he doing?
He was doing exactly what the Quran says
unbelievers can't do.
And later, when Muhammad was more powerful,
Al Nader was captured by Muslims
and executed.
Apparently, that was all they could do in
response to his verses.
Now, as far as I can tell, these
are the 2 strongest arguments for the prophet
Muhammad, the scientific argument and the argument from
literary excellence.
And if Ali knows some better ones, I
hope we'll share them.
In the meantime, I would say that we
don't have any good reasons for believing that
Muhammad was a prophet.
But it gets worse because not only is
there no good evidence for the prophet of
Muhammad,
there's also good evidence
against the prophethood of Muhammad.
Let's turn now to the reliability
of the prophet of Islam.
As I said earlier, when I was an
undergrad studying modern works on Mohammed,
I thought that he was a pretty amazing
person.
While I was studying Islam with my friend
Nabil, I did something
that changed my opinion to Mohammed quite a
bit.
Instead of reading
books written in the 20th century, I started
reading the early Muslim sources,
Ibn Ishaq, Sahih al Bukari, Sahih Muslim,
Al Tabari.
I was pretty surprised at what I found.
I'll share a few of the issues that
bother me.
First, there's the question of Mohammed's
spiritual reliability. Pastor Jerry Vines is famous for
saying that Muhammad was demon possessed. I'll go
on record as saying,
one, that I don't think the evidence proves
that conclusion, and 2, that we should probably
be more careful when we make claims of
that nature.
But at the same time, there are some
troubling passages in the early Muslim literature.
And I think that a debate is a
place to examine them so that people can
hear both sides of the story. Now we
know from Muslim records that when Muhammad began
receiving his revelations,
his first impression
was that he was demon possessed. We
also know that,
after he left the cave,
he became suicidal and tried to hurl himself
off a cliff.
We know that it was his wife Khadija
and her cousin Baraka
who persuaded him that he wasn't
possessed. He was a prophet of God.
Now
what happened to Mohammed
in that cave when the Quran started coming
to him? I don't know.
But I know this, when Mohammed ran out
of that cave,
terrified,
depressed,
and suicidal, he was convinced that he had
seen a demon, and that's a problem.
But it's not the only problem.
Think about the satanic verses.
The verses that Muhammad really revealed to his
followers and later claimed were from Satan.
Here's what happened.
When Muhammad was preaching in Mecca, he didn't
win very many followers,
but he wanted his countrymen to convert to
Islam,
and he was hoping to receive a revelation
that would help them.
Then one day he got the revelation he
was looking for and said,
have you not heard of Allat and Allusa
and Manat the third the other?
These are the exalted cranes whose intercession is
to be hoped for.
That's what Surah 53 originally said. It said
that in addition to Allah, there are 3
goddesses that Muslims can pray to, Allat, Allusa,
and Manat.
Muhammad delivered these revelations to his followers. He
bowed down in honor of them, and then
his followers bowed down with him.
But a little later, Muhammad came back and
said that these verses, which he had delivered
as part of the Quran,
weren't really from God.
They were from Satan.
So when you read Surah 53, keep in
mind the fact that it originally promoted polytheism
and
that Mohammed couldn't tell the difference between a
revelation from God
and a revelation from Satan.
Those
are problems.
It's also interest interesting to note that at
one point late in life, Muhammad was the
victim of a magic spell that lasted about
a year.
According to several passages in al Bukhari, one
of the Jews stole Mohammed's hairbrush and used
it to cast a spell on him.
Ibn Ishaq tells us that Mohammed was bewitched
during this time, and al Bukhari adds that
the spell made him delusional.
So according to Muslim sources,
God's greatest prophet was under a spell
for a year.
And so we look at the historical records
and we find, 1, that Muhammad originally thought
that he was demon possessed. 2, that he
became suicidal
when he started receiving his revelations. 3, that
he delivered verses from Satan.
And 4, that people could cast spells on
him.
Muslims look at all of this and say,
no big deal.
I look at it and say,
maybe there's something wrong here.
2nd, Muslims claim fairly regularly that Mohammed was
a man of peace.
I have absolutely no clue what sources they're
reading when they say this. The early Muslim
records are filled with acts of extreme brutality
by Mohammed and his followers, assassinations,
executions,
beheadings,
torture.
We find people we find Mohammed ordering people
to,
assassinate people for writing poetry against Islam. We
find Mohammed ordering his * ordering people to
assassinate
people for insulting him.
I'll give you a few examples.
Kaab bin al Ashraf was a Jewish merchant.
He never physically attacked Mohammed or his followers,
but he did write some pretty harsh poetry.
So one day Mohammed ordered his men to
assassinate Kab and they did. They cut him
from his stomach down to his groin over
poetry.
According to Muslim sources, a man named Abu
Afaq, who was more than a 100 years
old, wrote a poem criticizing the Muslims.
Mohammed said, who will deal with this rascal
for me?
Salim agreed to do it. He waited until
Abu Afaq was asleep, and he stabbed him
through the liver
over poetry.
When when a woman named Asma heard that
Muhammad had murdered an old man for writing
a poem, she wrote a poem in retaliation.
She called on people around her to stand
up to Mohammed.
When Mohammed heard about it,
he said, who will rid me of Marlon's
daughter?
Umair agreed to do
it. He went into her room,
found her with her 5 children, one of
whom she was breastfeeding,
and he stabbed her to death
over poetry.
When one of Muhammad's followers heard a man
say that he would never accept Islam, the
Muslim took a bow and drove it through
the man's eyeball, through his brain, and out
the back of his head.
Muhammad blessed his follower for his dedication.
Muhammad once told his men to execute a
slave girl who wrote a song making fun
of him, and they did.
A man named Al Huayrif was was executed
for insulting Mohammed. A woman named Sarah was
trampled to death by a horse for insulting
Mohammed.
One day after conquering a city,
Muhammad ordered his followers to torture a man
named Kanana
because he was hiding money and the Muslims
wanted it.
Muhammad told him to light a fire on
Kanana's chest until he told them where the
money was,
then they cut off his head.
As Muslims in the room know, the Quran
allows men to have * with their slave
girls and female captives, those whom your right
hands possess.
To give you an example of how this
practice was carried out, when the Muslims conquered
Banu al Mustalik,
Muhammad allowed his men to have * with
the women they captured even though these women
were about to be sold into slavery.
It's also important to note that the families
of these women had just been slaughtered by
Muslims, and yet it was perfectly acceptable for
Muslims to have * with these grieving women
who are about to become
slaves. Now that's just a sample of the
details we find in the early Muslim literature.
There must there's much more we could talk
about. Mohammed winning converts by robbing caravans,
Mohammed beheading hundreds of Jews who tried to
defend themselves when they realized they were being
eliminated,
and so on.
But you get the picture.
3rd, let's talk about Muhammad's wives.
Surah 4:3 says that, Muslims can marry up
to 4 women.
But we know from history that Mohammed had
a lot more than 4 wives.
So why did Mohammed get more? Al Tabari
puts the number at 15. We know from
references in in al Bukhari that Mohammed had
at least 9 wives at one time.
So why did Mohammed get more?
The answer is found in Surah 3350,
which says that Mohammed and only Mohammed could
have as many wives as he wanted.
So the Quran lays down a rule for
Muslims saying they can have up to 4
wives,
but Mohammed receives another revelation giving him and
him alone special moral privileges, namely lots of
women.
If you believe in the Quran, there's no
problem here. God just wanted Muhammad to have
more
wives than his followers could have.
But for those of us
who aren't Muslims, I have to say this
looks awfully suspicious
when a prophet receives revelations and those revelations
give
him more sexual partners
than other people.
Another concern I'll point out here is Muhammad's
relationship with Aisha.
It's a historical fact that Muhammad had *
with his 9 year old wife,
Aisha. The question is, what do we do
with it?
Now,
I think that we do need to understand
that this was a different culture and a
different time,
and that we need to consider this when
we when we try to make judgments. But
at the same time,
Mohammed is supposed to be the greatest man
who's ever lived, an example for all mankind
for all time.
And I think that many people in this
room would agree with me when I say
that history's greatest man
probably shouldn't be having * with a girl
who, according to Muslim records,
was still playing with dolls.
Now please don't misunderstand me when I raise
these criticisms. I'm not trying to convey the
idea that Mohammed was a completely horrible person.
I don't think he was. Mohammed had many
good qualities. He was dedicated to prayer, to
fasting,
to helping orphans.
He was courageous, and there were times when
he was merciful.
But this doesn't make him a prophet.
And when we go to history and we
try to let history give us a more
complete picture of Muhammad, we find that the
prophet, the amazing prophet we hear about from
Muslims today,
is very different
from the man who lived in Arabia 14
centuries ago.
So how do Muslims respond
to these historical criticisms? Well, there are 2
basic approaches.
First, some Muslims simply reject anything they don't
like. If they find an embarrassing story in
the early sources, they throw it out and
pretend it never happened.
Some Muslims have made an art form out
of rejecting material from our earliest records of
the life of Muhammad. If you're wondering why
Muslims would want to throw out historical material
about Muhammad, the reason is simple. When we
go to the earliest sources, we find things
like the satanic verses,
assassinations.
And some Muslims don't want to deal with
this, and so it's easier to sweep all
of this under the rug.
Unfortunately for Ali, everything I've said so far
is very well attested historically. So he's got
some explaining to do.
2nd, when people criticize Muhammad, the most common
approach I see among Muslims is to say,
well, other religions have problems too.
As if this makes Muhammad's problems go away.
For instance, if you ask a Muslim about
Muhammad's relationship with Aisha, he'll probably say, well,
in the Bible, Mary may have been young
when she was married to Joseph.
Or if you bring up Muhammad's assassinations, you'll
hear, well, there's violence in the Old Testament
too.
But I have to say that these aren't
answers.
In fact, in logic this approach is And
I say, well, you've lied too. You see
the problem?
And I say, well you've lied too.
See the problem?
Even if it's true that you've lied, it
wouldn't change the fact that I lied. And
so that's why this is a fallacy. Similarly,
if the historical records tell us that Mohammed
ordered his followers to torture man for money,
Muslims can't simply say,
but there are bad things in the Bible.
It's not an answer.
It's true that there are some tough tough
tough passages in the Bible, and Christians need
to be able to give answers for these
passages.
But,
the point remains we're not here to talk
about Christianity.
We're here to talk about Muhammad. We're here
to see whether Muslims
can show that the things they say about
their prophet are true.
Now what I'd like to know from Ali
is,
how does Islam respond to these issues without
committing the 2 quokwe fallacy,
without denying the evidence? How does Islam answer
the objections I've raised?
That's the question tonight.
But I'll confess here as I close
that in my experience I found that Muslims
don't have any real answers
for the problems I've raised.
I learned this while I was debating my
friend Nabeel. Nabeel,
looked at these criticisms,
and he traveled the world looking for answers.
He couldn't find any. In the end, he
poured out his heart before god,
and God gave him guidance.
Less than 2 years ago, Nabeel became my
brother in Christ.
By the way, Ali, Nabeel says he would
love to debate you.
That's the impact that careful investigation of the
evidence can have on a person.
Now, Ali is familiar with just about all
of the criticisms I've raised, and he's had
plenty of time to prepare.
So we can expect to hear the best
answers Islam has to offer. I I haven't
kept this in a closet. He knows what
I was going to say, and I'm certainly
looking forward to his response.
Please refrain from any clog. I understand it's
kinda natural for us to clap our hands.
Speak at least, but, you know, let's carry
ourselves some discipline.
I'm sorry.
It's not me. It's them.
I'll leave you on the floor for 30
minutes.
I bear witness that Muhammad the son of
Abdullah of Arabia
peace and blessings of God be upon him,
is the messenger of God.
The God of Abraham,
not the moon God or the Arab God
or the God of the Middle East. No.
The Lord of the heavens and the earth.
Adonai Elohim. Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. When Jesus
Christ, peace be upon him, prostrated himself on
the Mount of Olives and worshiped
God, that is the same God we believe
who sent Muhammad, peace be upon him, 6
centuries later. I believe the prophet was who
he claimed to be. He said, I am
the master of the children of Adam and
I do not boast. He said,
I am the best of creation.
I bear witness that Muhammad, the son of
Abdullah of Arabia
peace and blessings of God be upon him,
is the messenger of God.
The God of Abraham,
not the moon God or the Arab God
or the God of the Middle East.
No. The Lord of the heavens and the
earth. Adonai Elohim.
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. When Jesus Christ, peace
be upon him, prostrated himself on the Mount
of Olives and worshiped God, that is the
same God we believe who sent Muhammad, peace
be upon him, 6 centuries later. I believe
the prophet was who he claimed to be.
He said,
I
am the master of the children of Adam
and I do not boast.
He said,
I
am the best of creation. We believe that
he's better than the Kaaba in Mecca. He's
better than the angels. He's better than the
temple of Solomon. He's better than paradise. You
see when the prophet was preaching in Mecca,
his tribe the Quraish, they would send messengers
to the outlying borders of the city to
intercept visitors
to spread lies and slanders about him. Right?
And then these same people, right, they will
say, stay away from this man, Mohammed. He's
a sahar. He's a sorcerer. He's going to
bewitch you.
These same people would seek out the prophet,
actually listen to what he says,
you know, listen to him
and they would convert to Islam on the
spot. You see, they met the prophet's enemies
before they had met him. The vast majority
of Americans
have never really met the holy prophet Muhammad
peace be upon him. They've only heard what
his
enemies have said about him and you can
never rely
on your enemy to give you an objective
unprejudiced
disinterested account of anything. Mister Wood's criticisms and
polemics
are nothing new. The Western orientalists have vilified
the holy prophet for 100 of years. Montgomery
Watts says, of all the world's great men,
none has been so much maligned as Muhammad,
end quote. Yet the Prophet's message continues to
resonate in the hearts of the faithful and
Islam continues to grow. How? Because God tells
the prophet in the Quran,
and God will defend and protect you from
the violence and slanders of men. The prophet's
defense counsel is God himself. The skeptic like
mister Wood cannot possibly entertain such a notion.
So he concludes that Muslims must not know
the so called truth about Mohammed.
No. We know the truth. It's no secret.
It's no Karen Armstrong says, we know more
about Mohammed than about about the founder of
any other major religion. He's the only historical
prophet. Now, the only The the most important
thing tonight
is to be objective and balanced in our
critical methodology.
You see the typical Christian critique
of the prophet of Islam is extremely superficial,
surface level, and one dimensional. Things are looked
at purely at face value and then the
worst possible motives
are ascribed to them, which in reality is
only a reflection
of the mental depravity of the criticizers.
If a psychiatrist shows you an inkblot and
all you see is * and violence,
the problem is you.
Deaf, dumb and blind. They have no sense
but it's not your fault. I understand. You
are what you read. The Bible is an
anthology
of * and violence. So that, you know,
a man with hepatitis,
he doesn't go on blaming other people because
they look yellow. He has a disease in
his eyes. He is the problem. He perceives
the world through his own diseases.
So, mister Woods mister Woods analysis is not
surprising. This is a man, the holy prophet,
peace be upon him, who is widely regarded
by many scholars of Western academia
as the most influential human being to ever
step foot on the Earth for all of
the earthly work of all of the previous
prophets put together does not equal to what
this one man achieved. Dee Brown, a Christian
missionary says, by any standard,
Muhammad's achievements were little short of miraculous. Will
we just dismiss him on a superficial level?
R. B. Smith says that the prophet was
absolutely unique in history. That's a Christian missionary
talking. His life is based on history,
not mythology
or conjecture. And it's not enough to say
he was a great genius, he was a
good statesman, he was a military hero. There's
a lot more to this man. Alphonse de
la Martine says, in the history of Turkey,
quote, that is Mohammed
as regards
all standards by which human greatness may be
measured. We may well ask, is there any
man greater than he?
God reminds the prophet of this very fact
in the Quran.
Have we not raised high
the esteem in which thou art held? Doctor
William Montgomery Watt, who died last year at
age 97,
widely regarded
as the last of the great Western orientalist.
In an interview conducted in 1999,
in his 90th year,
he finally conceded quote, I believe that Muhammad
like the earlier prophets had genuine religious experiences.
As such, I believe that the Quran came
from God. End quote.
In his book, Muhammad at Mecca, he says,
to suppose Muhammad an imposter
creates more problems
than it solves. And finally, Annie Besant, a
non Muslim
and author of the book, The Life and
Teachings of Mohammed concludes, it is impossible
for anyone who studies the life and character
of the great prophet of Arabia, who knows
how he taught and how he lived, to
feel anything but reverence for that mighty prophet,
one of the greatest messengers
of the supreme. When the prophet was 12
years old, it was a Christian in Syria
who first noticed signs of prophecy in him.
Bahirah the monk. When he was 40 years
old, the first man that testified to his
messengership
was a Christian scribe, Barakah Ben Nofa. Look
at the irony.
Mister Wood says in one of his,
articles online that in the Meccan period, the
prophet Muhammad was quote, humble, devout, obedient,
faithful, peaceful and an outstanding moral example, end
quote.
You see, the vast majority of the Christian
criticisms
against the holy prophet originate from the Medina
period of the prophet's life. In other words,
the last 9 or 10 years of his
life. And these primarily revolve around two issues.
His marriages
and the application of sacred law. The fundamental
Christian questions are, how does Muhammad, peace be
upon him, go from a suffering preacher prophet
in Mecca to a sword wielding warrior
in Medina? How does he go from a
passively resistant
monogamist
to an actively resistant polygamist?
The Muslim follow-up question is, did the prophet
change or did the external circumstances change? You
see in Mecca, the prophet was a persecuted
man, a hunted man, a man with no
earthly dominion. Very much like Jesus Christ in
Galilee.
Revelations describing societal
and political laws were not yet revealed until
much later in Medina. Why? Because the prophet
is in no position to enforce political or
societal laws in Mecca. He's just a citizen
of the city. But in Medina, he was
the king, the president, the Sultan of the
city recognized and legitimate state authority and it
is the responsibility
of the state to enforce laws and exact
justice. Read Romans chapter 13. Paul says almost
the same thing verbatim.
So the prophet in Medina
resembled Moses which is a fulfillment of prophecy.
God tells Moses in Deuteronomy 1818 in Hebrew.
I shall raise them up a prophet from
amongst their brethren like unto thee, like you.
And I shall put my words into his
mouth and he shall speak unto them all
that I shall command him.
All 6 canonical books of hadith tell us
that the prophet never sought revenge
for a personal wrong or injury. But when
the laws of God and the rights of
man had been breached, he was unflinching
and justifiably
authoritative.
That was his job in Medina. He's the
head of state. The Jews of Medina would
seek out his judgment
in their cases, in their grievances
because they knew he was the epitome
of justice and generosity. The pre Islamic Arabs
gave him the title, Asadikul Amin. The spirit
of truth and trustworthiness.
Martin Ling said, he was too full of
truth to deceive and too full of wisdom
to be self deceived. We believe that the
prophet Muhammad peace be upon him is the
apocalyptic Barnasha.
The son of man of Daniel chapter 7,
who we proved the world of sin, justice
and righteousness.
But at the same time, and this is
the greatness of the holy prophet peace be
upon him. He was meek and humble and
lowly and forbearing
and merciful. And his and his enemies used
to make fun of him because of that.
They used to call him effeminate.
Why? Because he never raised his voice. He
would weep frequently.
He was compassionate and nurturing. He loved children.
Once while he was kissing his grandsons,
a tough, Bedouin chief came to him and
he said, you kiss your you kiss your
children?
I have 10 sons and I've never kissed
a single one of them. He said, then
there is nothing in my religion for those
who have no compassion
in their hearts. He never returned an evil
for an evil. He embodied the Quranic injunction.
Repel
evil with beauty.
Now
during the battle of Uhud in the 3rd
year of the Hijra which is prophesized in
Isaiah chapter 21,
the Meccans, the unbelievers of Quraish, they sent
an army of 3,000 to pillage and plunder
the city of Medina. The prophet dispatched an
army of 700 men himself included to defend
the city. During this battle,
the prophet suffered
a series of tragic events. He witnessed in
front of his own eyes the slaughter of
his blessed companions.
The slaughter of his family members. Sayid Al
Hamza radhiallahu anhu, the prophet's uncle and more
like his brother. They're very close in age.
He was killed, his body mutilated.
His nose and ears cut from his body.
His internal organs removed and cannibalized on the
battlefield.
Could I get some water? I'm sorry. Brother
took her off.
Thank you.
The prophet himself suffered multiple injuries to his
blessed face. Blood was pouring down the face
of the messenger of God, peace be upon
him. You know what he was doing? He
was trying to catch the blood with his
hands like this and absorb the blood with
his sleeves. And then he told his companions
in the vicinity. He said, if one drop
of this blood should spill upon the earth,
a terrible chastising punishment
will immediately descend upon the Quraysh. His enemies,
his companions said, oh messenger of God, let
the blood flow and let the punishment come.
He said, I was sent as a mercy
not to curse. And then they saw him
a short time later with his hands raised
in supplication
that he finally cursed his enemies. You know
what he
said?
Oh God, guide my people for they don't
know.
Even in such circumstances, he refused to curse
his enemies but only prayed for their guidance.
And you know what? The leaders of the
unbelievers on that day,
And, Washi, the man who killed Hamza in
Hinda bint Uthba, the woman who cannibalized his
body. They all became Muslim within a few
years.
Within a few weeks because the prophet did
not give up on them. He did not
return an evil for an evil. God describes
him in the Quran.
It grieves him in his very soul that
you should perish or be lost. Deeply concerned
is he about you.
It is part of the mercy of God
that you deal gently with them. He was
a gentle soul. He said, love is my
foundation.
Reason is my guide. He said,
love for humanity,
which you would love for yourself. Not love
your enemies and the Gentiles or dogs and
pigs as Matthew says. No. Love humanity. He
said,
None of you will enter paradise until you
truly believe.
And none of you will truly believe until
you love one another. Shall I tell you
something that will increase your love? They said,
yes. He said,
spread peace amongst yourselves. And this applies to
everyone. The prophet is the universal messenger. He's
a
mercy sent into all creation. But there are
some people in the world who don't want
peace.
They want death and destruction,
and sometimes tempered violence
is necessary to create peace. In pre Islamic
Arabia,
tribal warfare was the order of the day.
This was the harshest environment in the world.
But when there is war, we have rules
of engagement. According to Sharia, according to sacred
law, we cannot poison wells. We cannot kill
livestock. We cannot cut down green trees. We
cannot harm the elderly. We cannot harm women
and children. This is a mutawatir hadith, a
multiple attested hadith. A hadith transmitted to multiple
chains of narration.
Undeniably,
undoubtedly the words of the holy prophet Muhammad
peace be upon him. We do not harm
women and children in warfare. We cannot We
can't even attack people while they're sleeping. This
is Islamic law. They say the prophet was
a violent man. It's just a smoke screen.
It's a magic trick. Someone's trying to pull
the wool over your eyes. Thomas Carlyle said,
the lies,
the well meaning zeal heaped around this man
Mohammed are disgraceful to ourselves only. And that
was a Christian. I can make a similar
statement.
What if I said, you know, Jesus Christ
advocated violence.
You would say, what are you talking about?
He's the prince of he's the prince of
peace. Now keep in mind, Christians believe that
Jesus is the God of the old testament.
Right? Now Jesus in the Old Testament commands
the Israelites under Moses and Joshua
to exterminate
entire populations
of men, women, children, animals, and trees. Jesus
inspires Moses
to stone a man, simply because he picked
up wood on the Sabbath. Jesus reveals in
the Torah that if a man rapes an
unbetrothed
virgin
outside the city limits, the * must give
his victim's father 50 shekels of silver, and
he must marry his victim. You have to
marry your *, and they're never allowed to
get a divorce.
Jesus in the new testament calls for a
sword, and when the Pharisees criticize his disciples
for not washing their hands before they ate,
He criticizes them for not killing their rebellious
children. As the law expressly states,
the penalty for filial recalcitrance is death, according
to the Old and New Testaments. Jesus in
Luke chapter 19, after giving us the parable
of the king, he concludes by saying, but
those enemies who do not accept me as
their king, bring them hither and slay them
before me. Right? And then he leads an
armed siege of the Temple of Solomon. You
see, everything I just said is true but
it doesn't make my premise true that Jesus
was violent because he wasn't. It's just a
smokescreen.
Right? It's rhetoric at its finest. I can
do the same thing, but I'm not a
spin doctor. See, the prophet ordered executions. Yes.
So did our current president when he was
the governor of Texas. So does Arnold the
governor. So did Moses. So did David.
Right?
Mister Wood relates the story of, you know,
Asma bint Marwan and many other similar stories
in his online writings. Almost all of these
stories mister Wood has taken from Guillaume's translation
of the Sira of Ibn Ishaq. What he
doesn't realize however, is that most Muslim scholars,
the vast majority
consider this biography of the prophet to be
only somewhat reliable
at best. He wrote it over a 120
years after the death of the prophet, and
it is common knowledge that he took many
of these stories from Jewish sources and traditions.
If I borrowed a story about Jesus from
the Talmud, what would you expect it to
say? Yet go to any one of mister
Wood's online writings about Islam and you notice
the first footnote. Sirat Rasulullah
by ibn Ishaq and then
ibid ibid ibid ibid. Same as above. Same
as above. Same as above. That's all he's
got. This story is totally spurious.
It's apocryphal.
Where is it in the Muwata
or Kitab al Afab? Books written by imminent
scholars of hadith that predate Ibn Ishaq. You
see, Ibn Ishaq is a biographer.
He's a reporter. He's not a Muhadid. He's
not a scholar of hadith. He's not verifying
authenticity or chains of transmission. He's relating as
much material as possible. There's no senate for
this story. There's no chain of transmission.
It's apocryphal.
If I said that Jesus was violent as
a child because he killed his schoolmates
and one of his teachers, you would say,
what are you talking about you stupid Muslim?
That's from this that's from the infancy gospel
of Thomas from the 2nd century. That's apocryphal.
That's spurious.
That's pseudonymous.
Exactly.
Again, we have to be objective in our
critical methodology.
Same standards apply to both religions.
According to Islamic law, we can't even attack
people while they're sleeping. Now, in Iraq, not
too long ago,
2,000 pound bombs were dropped on civilian populations
of Muslims fast asleep in their beds. In
the 4 years since the American invasion, some
have
surmised that 400,000
civilians have been killed in 4 years. How
long was the prophet Muhammad's ministry?
23 years long. If you were to count
up all of the casualties and all of
the battles of the holy prophet Muhammad peace
be upon him, during his entire life,
Muslim and enemy casualties. How many do you
think you get? 400,000?
200,000?
50,000?
20,000?
5000?
2000?
About 1500.
1500. You know, according to, the Bible at
Exodus 32, when Moses descended Sinai, he saw
his people worshiping the golden calf. He ordered
the instigators killed. 3000 men fell on one
day by order of Moses.
Right? 3000,
twice the number of all the people killed
and all of the battles of the holy
prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, during his
entire 23 year ministry. And you wanna call
someone violent?
At the conquest of Mecca, when when the
prophet entered the holy city with 10,000 companions,
the people of Mecca knew that he was
well within his rights to punish all of
them. These are the same people who had
killed and tortured his family members and companions
for over 20 years. But when he came
into the city, he had his head down
like this, in humility before God like a
servant. Not like these kings who bang on
their drums, standing on their saddles with women
orbiting around them. His head was down like
this. They say his beard was touching the
back of his riding beast. And then he
came into the city and he said, today
is a day of mercy, the exaltation of
the Quraysh. A day of mercy. And then
he came into the Kaaba, the shrine of
Abraham. And he said,
Truth has come and falsehood has perished.
And then he climbed to Mount Safa, where
20 years earlier he was jeered and insulted
and stoned. And he called everyone out of
their houses where they were hiding, and out
of the Haram, out of the sanctuary. And
they all gathered around him, thousands of them.
And he stood up and he said,
This day there was no blemish upon you.
God has forgiven all of you. The prophet
was magnanimous.
Magnanimous. He forgave people when in a position
of power. If someone's about to kill you
and you say I forgive you, that shows
a lot of character. Right? Imagine someone's been
trying to kill you for over 20 years
and has been killing your family members and
companions
for over 20 years. And now you're in
a position to kill them, but you forgive
them. That's magnanimous.
So the fact that the prophet wielded a
sword to defend his people does not invalidate
him as a prophet of the God of
Abraham. Moses, Joshua, Isaiah and David did the
same according to the Bible. The fact that
the prophet practiced polygamy does not invalidate him
as a prophet of the God of Abraham.
Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Solomon, who had over 700
wives according to the Bible did the same
thing. The Jews at the time of Jesus
practice polygamy, and there isn't a single word
of reproach uttered against this by Christ in
the canonical gospels. In fact, Islam did not
invent polygamy. It restricted and regulated it. The
prophet was not possessed. He never attempted suicide.
He never raised his hand to a woman,
a child or a servant.
He never allowed * or torture or spousal
abuse. He did not commit genocide
upon the Jews of Medina. He did not
steal his adopted son's wife. He was not
immoral. And the satanic story, satanic verses story
is a straight up fabrication. And I and
I challenge anyone who says otherwise. We're just
getting warmed up. I have answers for all
of this stuff.
The prophet did, however,
reform and eventually abolished slavery and gave women
unprecedented rights even for the 20th century. Mister
Wood's presentation reminded me of the magicians of
pharaoh.
Right? They're trying to, you know, cast a
spell over the audience to create an illusion.
But then Moses showed up with the truth.
Remember the Quran says, the Quran, you will
hear much that will grieve you. From the
Jews and Christians.
But you need to show patience
and self restraint. Jesus told his disciples according
to Matthew,
blessed are you when men revile you and
persecute you and say all kinds of evil
against you falsely
falsely.
Rejoice
and be exceedingly glad for great is your
reward in Heaven, for they persecuted the prophets
who came before you. So the fact that
there are people in the world who love
the prophet so much that they're willing to
die for his cause, and at the same
time there are people in the world who
love the Holy Prophet so much, that would
that that hate the Prophet so much that
they're willing to die to suppress his cause,
is proof enough for me that Muhammad is
a prophet,
sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
Now Justin Martyr, who was a 2nd century
proto orthodox theologian, he wrote a book called
Dialogue with Triforce the Jew in which he
tries to,
advance the legitimacy of Jesus
by appealing to Old Testament prophecy. And again,
we're switching gears here. We want a balance
in our examination.
So are there any prophecies of of the
holy prophet Muhammad peace be upon him in
the Bible? Again, according to the earliest Christian
scholars, the greatest proof of legitimacy
is fulfillment of prophecy. Yes. There are many
prophecies and there are so many and so
succinct
that God says in the Quran, They
know him like they know one of their
own sons. Twice in the Tanakh,
in the old testament, he's mentioned by name.
By name.
Song of songs, Shirah Hasalim. I mentioned this
to Michael Cohen the last time. There was
no answer there. Chapter 5 verse 16. His
mouth is most sweet, he is altogether lovely.
Such is my beloved and he is my
friend, oh ye daughters of Jerusalem. In the
original Hebrew,
The last part of that. Again, he's mentioned
in the book of Haggai chapter 2 verse
7 in reference to the blessed night journey
and ascension of the holy prophet Muhammad, peace
be upon him, from Jerusalem.
Once again I shall shake the nations,
and Himda
of all nations shall come here. And the
glory of this latter house shall be greater
than the former. And in this place I
will give shalom or salaam.
Deen de shlama in Syria. Dinu Islam in
Arabic. The Hebrew Himda translated most desired is
etymologically
identical
to Ahmad. And Ahmad is the superlative form
of the name Muhammad, which means the most
praised, the most desired, the most coveted, the
most lovely, so on and so forth.
Now, I'm running out of time,
but when I come back, I'm gonna talk
about,
inshallah, God willing, the most famous Christian polemic
against Islam. The marriages of the holy prophet
peace be upon him. In particular,
his marriage to Ummul Mumineen Aisha Radiallahu Anha.
And we're also going to look at the
biblical criteria
for prophethood.
But I want to mention a, a few
last things here. Again, keeping in mind that
according to Christianity,
Jesus is the God of the Old Testament.
That's an established belief. In Numbers chapter 31,
Jesus tells Moses
to execute
all Midianite
men, boys,
married and divorced women,
and only the young girls
who have not known a man to keep
alive for yourselves. Now, how do they know
if a girl was a virgin or not?
By * them. This is the answer. It
then states that 32,000
young girls had been discovered.
Discovered
as not knowing men.
Right? And were taken and placed into the
custody
of the men of Israel. The exegesis
of Numbers chapter 31
in the Talmud, tana'im Midrash Sifre 157
states that girls as young as 3 years
and one day were forcefully consummated into marriage.
3 year old girls were raped by order
of Jesus Christ. This is Christian belief and
there's no way out of it for you.
There's no way out of it. You believe
Jesus is God? Yes. You believe the Old
Testament is the inerrant word of God? Yes.
So you are stuck in this quagmire
unless you're a Marcionite.
I doubt any Christian here
is a Marcionite. You believe that the God
of the Old Testament was an inferior God.
No. You believe that was Jesus.
What's your solution?
Change your theology.
Because God get sent his final messenger, his
holy apostle,
Muhammad al Mustafa sallallahu alaihi wasallam
to lift you out of this quagmire.
What
If you would but follow him that you
would be guided. Now I wanna answer to
You know all these stories
Abu Affaq, the singing girls, this and that,
that he brought up. None of these are
based on hadith.
Again, his primary source is the Sira of
Ibn Ishaq. There's no hadith source for these
stories. These are apocryphal stories. No Muslim takes
these stories seriously.
Right? Now in his online writings, mister Wood
also says that
finding scientific inaccuracy in hadith does not invalidate
the prophet as a prophet of God. That's
what he says in his on in his
online writings. That if there's scientific inaccuracies in
the Hadith, not in the Quran, in the
Hadith this does not invalidate. But today, tonight
he's quoted Hadith to us. Maybe he had
a a change of heart. You know, the
fly in the drink, you know,
read,
there's there's long been evidence of bacteriophages
that develop on flies. Right? I mean there's
many interpretations for these things, but this is
a sign I can I can quote the
scientific journal to you?
Right? What else did he say? Oh, satanic
verses. The prophet was possessed.
Or the prophet,
he,
he, was suicidal. Things like that. We have
to I have answers for all of this
stuff. Now, I wanna speak to one of
them,
saying that the prophet was possessed by a
demon. This is a very common charge amongst
the prophets of God. Jesus's own family thought
he was possessed by a demon. Mark chapter
3 verse 21.
When they went out to lay hold of
him, they said he's insane. He is mad.
He has a demon. He's much noon.
His own family thought Jesus was possessed by
a demon. Now the prophet's initial initial diagnosis
was this is true that he might have
been possessed. He's being very honest.
You see? He is a sadiqun ameen. He's
a spirit of truth and trustworthiness.
He's not huffing and puffing coming down the
mountain saying I'm the messenger of God with
his nose in the air. No, he's being
very honest.
He is sadiqul amin. He is honest. So
he goes to his wife and she reassures
him, but she was no expert. So who
do they go to? A Christian scribe.
They go to a Christian scribe and she
and he named Mordechai ben Naufal, he tells
him this is the Namus,
which is the Arabic for the Greek nomos.
The first five books also called the,
penitouch and the, Septuagint version of the Old
Testament is called nomos, meaning sacred law.
So Warakah says this is a sacred this
is a Christian talking. A Christian talking.
Now Jesus according to the Bible, he was,
he was tempted by Satan in the wilderness.
And it had an effect on him. It
had an effect.
Satan successfully
lured him to an exceedingly high mountain.
Right? Exceedingly
high. Apparently Matthew thought And you showed him
all the kingdoms of the world. Apparently, Matthew
thought that the world was flat in those
days because the higher the mountain
I hate rules myself. Boy, you gotta do
this today.
Mister Roy, he has 15 minutes for his
rebuttal.
Ready?
At the end of my opening statement, I
said that there are 2 basic approaches Muslims
can take when Mohammed is criticized. 1, they
can reject early historical material
and 2, they can commit what's called the
2 quoquy fallacy. Again, the 2 you say,
well, you've got that problem. For instance, if
my wife says, David, you're mean, and I
say, well, you've been mean too,
that's a fallacy. It's not it doesn't answer
the objection.
Now we've seen that Ali takes both of
these approaches. He says, he rejects embarrassing material
about Mohammed
and he repeatedly commits,
the 2 quokwe fallacy. Let me respond briefly
to his comments about, about the early sources.
Ali argues that Ibn Ishaq shouldn't be used
as a historical source. I find this pretty
interesting since Ibn Ishaq is our earliest detailed
biography of the life of Muhammad. But let's
look at Ali's reasons for rejecting it.
He says that it doesn't contain a reliableist
nod or chain of transmission. But this is
just a misunderstanding
on Ali's part. The chain of transmission didn't
really become important until the 9th century when,
these theological disputes arose and, people like Abu
Hari and Imam Muslim wanted to go back
and try and find, which,
collections were reliable. And so, they came up
with a method that you you go for
the chain of transmission.
But, ibn Asaq was written a a century
earlier before that became important. So Ali's criticism
is really that this material is so early
that it arose before the chain of transmission
became,
necessary.
Ali says that Ibn Ishaq incorporated material from
Jewish sources.
That's true, but there are four problems with
this response. 1, Ibn Isak incorporated material from
Jewish sources that he considered reliable.
2, Jews know how to write history
too. 3, if you wanna say that Muslims
shouldn't use Jewish material, you're contradicting Mohammed who
told his followers to gather reliable information from
the Jews. And, 4, the material I'm using
didn't come from Jewish sources. And so the
entire objection
is irrelevant.
Ali says that it's apocryphal. Well,
it's not canonical. Well, I'm not interested in
canonical. I'm interested in historical. And Ibn al
Saka is our earliest detailed source on Muhammad.
Ali asked, how would Christians like it if
he went to the the infancy gospel of
Thomas? Let's be clear here. Me going to
your earliest detailed biography of Muhammad is nothing
like you going to the last
worst
information about Jesus. Those those, those situations aren't
similar.
Let's move on to the satanic verses.
Ali has well, first, Ali has painted, a
beautiful picture of Muhammad with those, with, all
those references. The problem is Ali is very
selective in the details
that, that he shares. Some people call this
the Walt Disney version of, of Muhammad.
And,
well, it's not gonna work in a debate.
Here's why. Let's suppose I'm thinking of a
man named John Gacy.
He entertained children at birthday parties.
He held neighborhood barbecues
regularly.
He,
he he helped people. He helped he worked
with local charities.
He worked with youth organizations, like the JC's
and the Boy Scouts. He helped all kinds
of people. He helped young people find jobs
and I could list. I could go through
and show all these wonderful things about John
Gacy, but if I want to say he's
a great man, I can't leave out the
fact that he raped and killed 30 boys.
Those things are important. And if you want
the complete picture,
you have to go to all the details,
not just the good things. If we just
go to the good things, we can make
anyone in the entire world look good.
Now let's review some of the facts. The
satanic verses,
Hallease says that, it's only an Ibn Isaaq
and that it's a total fabrication. Let's look
at his,
let's look at his objections real quick. I
argued that the satanic verses cast doubt on
the reliability of Muhammad, since he couldn't tell
the difference between a revelation from God and
revelation from Satan.
Again, Ali
argued that it's a forgery.
Ali criticizes the count because it says that
there were Muslims in Abyssinia, but Ali is
just wrong here. In in the year 614
to 615,
a group of 11 male Muslims and four
female Muslims moved to Abyssinia to escape persecution.
This is a fact of history. Ali criticized
the account.
He says that because it has the the
phrase, have you not heard,
that, this can only refer to something bad,
the object. Well, I'll quote you the Quran.
Oh, my people,
have you not considered if I have a
clear proof from my lord? Have you not
considered? It's the same Arabic phrase and it
says clear proof from your lord. Is this
saying something derogatory
about clear proof from God? No. And I
could give you some other verses if you
want. So this objection just doesn't work. Now,
Ali has given his case against the satanic
verses and both of his objections are simply
wrong.
And also the objection that I'm only getting
this from Ibn Isak. Let me give you
my case for the satanic verses.
If you want sources,
we read about the satanic verses in
1, ibn Ishaq. 2, ibn Saad. 3, Al
Tabari.
4, ibn Abi Hatim. 5, ibn al Mundir.
6, ibn Mardoya.
7, Musa ibn Uqba. And 8, Abu Ma'shar.
According to Abu Ma'Shar, by the way, the
chain of transmission does establish
that this story is authentic.
Ali says that the satanic verses aren't mentioned
in the hadith. This is false. Sahih al
Bukhari volume
event. We don't get all the details, but
al Bukhari tells us that when Muhammad revealed
Sura 53,
all of the polytheists
bowed down in honor of the revelation. Now
why would polytheists
bow down in honor of Surah 53? Well,
the other sources tell us.
When Muhammad told people that praying to Allat,
Allusa, and Mana is okay, the polytheists bowed
down. That's in the sources and it fits
together perfectly. And let's not forget that a
couple verses of the Quran were a reaction
to this entire incident.
So, I think the the satanic verses is
pretty well established and I've given 8 sources
plus,
confirmation and al Bukhari, the Muslims most trusted,
material on the life of Mohammed. So if
Ali wants us to reject it, he's going
to have to present a better case against
it. And I've shown that his arguments so
far are wrong. But what about Muhammad's other
spiritual issues? I said that Muhammad's first impression
of his revelations was that he was demon
possessed. Ali admits that Muhammad originally thought that
he was demon possessed. He says that this
shows that Muhammad was humble.
Yeah. But it also shows that whatever Muhammad
saw in that cave,
he thought it was a demon. And how
am I supposed to have complete confidence
so many years later that this was really
the angel Gabriel when Muhammad's first impression was
that it was a demon.
Ali says that people thought Jesus was demon
possessed. Here we see the 2 quoquy fallacy
again. But, even so, it misses the point.
I'm not saying, hey, some people thought that
Muhammad was demon possessed. I'm saying that Muhammad
thought Muhammad was demon possessed, and there's a
difference there.
I said in my opening statement that Mohammed's
revelations made him depressed and suicidal. Ali says,
this never happened. Well, it's in Al Bukhari.
That's her most trusted collection.
It's also in Ibn Ishaq. That's our earliest
biography. And in Al Tabari. So, I don't
have any reason to reject this. I pointed
out that Mohammed was the victim of a
magic spell. The spell made Mohammed think that
he had had * with his wives when
he really hadn't.
I don't recall an answer. But if if
you did, I'll get to that later. So
the question of Mohammed's spiritual reliability is still
a huge problem. And and what are we
supposed to make of this? Ali expects us
to look at all the historical evidence and
say, yes, Mohammed thought he was demon possessed.
Yes. It looks like he became suicidal according
to evidence. Yes. The evidence says he delivered
revelations from Satan. Yes. People could cast spells
on him, but he's still completely reliable
and I'm not willing to make that move.
Next, I argued that Mohammed was not a
man of peace. I pointed 1 to Mohammed's
assassinations and executions, 2, to his torture of
Kanana, and 3, to the fact that Mohammed
allowed his men to have * with their
female captives, which in the modern world would
qualify,
as war crimes even though it's in the
Quran.
Ali says that this is just a smokescreen.
Really?
Muslims tell me that Muhammad was a gentle
prophet of peace. I go to your earliest
sources and it doesn't matter which sources you
go to, there's plenty of material there. I
go to ibn Ishaq because it's the earliest.
That's why I go there.
And I go there and I find, Muhammad
ordering his followers to assassinate men and women
who insulted him,
who wrote poetry against him. I find people
being brutally tortured. I find Muhammad telling his
followers that it's okay to have * with
female captives.
Ali says this never happened. Well, I've got,
4 pages of references here from the Quran,
from Sahih al Bukhari, from Sahih Muslim, and
from other,
of your most reliable sources saying, yes, it
did.
Ali says that Muhammad was violent because he
was head of state.
We need to be realistic here.
Mohammed was ordering his followers to sneak into
people's houses and assassinate them. Is that part
of his job description?
Mohammed was killing people during caravan raids.
What does this have to do with being
head of state?
Mohammed sent assassins to Mecca. He wasn't head
of state there.
When Mohammed took Mecca, several people were executed
for insulting him years earlier before he had
any political power at all. So they weren't
guilty of any crimes against the state. But
what do you do with the man who
was executed simply for saying that he would
never become a Muslim?
Halley says that Mohammed was was gentle.
That's probably the last word I'd I'd, I'd
apply to Mohammed for some of these things.
I'll give you an example. If you don't
like giving a sock,
here's one from, Al Bukhari. This is interesting
because Ali claims again, Muhammad was gentle. 8
men once came to Medina.
They converted to Islam, but they got sick.
So Muhammad told them to go drink some
camel's urine. And they did, and apparently, they
felt better. But then they left Islam and
they killed Muhammad's shepherd.
And,
guess what the the peaceful gentle prophet did
when he caught these men? Now, they were
guilty of murder. Okay. Guess what he did?
He tied them up. He had them tied
up. He had their hands and feet cut
off.
He burned their eyeballs out with hot nails,
and then he left them in the hot
sun to die of thirst.
Now, I I'm willing to lay this down
as a rule. If you burn out people's
eyeballs with hot nails, you're
not gentle.
You wanna know who's gentle? Mister Rogers was
gentle. Not not no burning people's eyes out.
Ali says, Mohammed never sought revenge. Well,
you can say that. I'm going to your
earliest sources and I see something different. He
says, Mohammed was just a king. His circumstances
change. Yes. He went from being in Mecca,
where he couldn't possibly have won a fight,
to going to Medina, where he could win
a fight.
So, you can't look at the Meccan period
and say, he was peaceful because he didn't
fight. That could just mean he's smart enough
to realize, hey, I better not fight because
I'm gonna lose. So, that's not very good
evidence that that he was peaceful. Next, I
pointed out that Surah 43 tells Muslims that
they can have
up to 4 wives,
but that Mohammed had a lot more than
4 wives.
Ali responded to,
the issue of polygamy. I didn't criticize Mohammed
for polygamy.
I criticized him here because he told his
followers that they were allowed to have 4
wives, and then he had more. So this
was really an inconsistency. And I said that
it looks pretty suspicious when he received the
revelation saying that he could have more.
As far as Aisha, I brought up the
issue of Mohammed's,
9 year old wife. Aisha, I said that
the greatest moral example in history
probably shouldn't be having * with a 9
year old girl.
Ali quoted the Jewish Talmud
written more than 2000 years
after the old testament. And then once he
built his argument saying, well, Jesus is the
God of the old testament.
Well, the Old Testament allowed men to have
* with girls as young as 3. That
doesn't come from the Old Testament. Show me
that one in the Old Testament. That comes
from the Talmud that was over 2000 years
later. No no Christian in the world believes
that Jesus inspired the Talmud.
As far as arguments for Islam,
I argued that there's no good evidence for
Islam. Ali responded to,
the criticisms I drew from the hadith. Most
of the ones I drew were from the
Quran.
Yes, in my writings, I do say it
doesn't rule out a prophet, but I'm not
using this material to rule out Muhammad as
a prophet. I'm not saying he said false
things. I wouldn't even, as far as I'm
concerned, I don't even care if there's something
in the Koran. I wouldn't rule him out
as a prophet because of this. I mean,
he's writing in the 7th century. I don't
think all prophets had to have modern scientific
views. I was using this material to respond
to the Muslim scientific argument. The argument that
says, we know Muhammad was a prophet because
of his scientific accuracy. And I'm saying, if
that's your argument, if you're making scientific accuracy
the criterion for truth,
then you've got a problem because you have
all these passages in the Hadith and all
these passages in the Quran. And I I
I already said that you can reinterpret them.
The point is,
non Muslims aren't going to reinterpret them if,
if, if the Quran says,
Alexander the Great got to the place where
the sun sets and it sets in a
pool of murky water. Or if it says
that stars are missiles that God uses to
hurl at demons. And when you see a
shooting star, it's because God hurled them hurled
a star at a demon. When we see
when we see things like this, again, you
can reinterpret them, but it makes it difficult
to accept the argument.
I argued, I responded to the argument from
literary excellence. Ali didn't respond.
Biblical prophecies.
He he points out that there are,
names and words that look like Muhammad. Well,
I mean, think about how this works. I
mean, my name is David Wood. If I
want, you know, think about an English Bible,
I can find David and Wood all over
the Bible.
You could find a prophecy of anyone. I
mean, think George Bush. Could you find a
prophecy about
god appeared to Moses in the burning bush?
This is a clear prophecy that that god's
mode of revelation to the world was through
a bush. So and who could this be?
It's a clear prophecy
of George Bush.
I don't think that's a good prophecy.
But actually the entire argument
the entire argument from biblical prophecies is pretty
easy to refute
because Ali believes that Deuteronomy Deuteronomy 18 predicts
the coming of a prophet after Moses. I
agree.
But by granting Deuteronomy 18,
Ali has just ruined his case for biblical
prophecies.
Verse 18 says that God will write raise
up a prophet like Moses. Unfortunately,
just 2 verses later, we read this.
But the prophet who speaks a word presumptuously
in my name, which I have not commanded
him to speak, or which he speaks in
the name of other gods, that prophet shall
die.
So we see 2 things here. 1, if
a prophet says something that I have not
commanded him to say,
Or 2, if he
speaks in the name of other gods, he's
not a prophet.
Muhammad did both when he revealed the satanic
verses. Ali says it never happened. I gave
8 sources plus al Bukhari's confirmation.
So according to history,
this really did happen. And according to this
passage, which Ali Grant is inspired by God,
Muhammad cannot possibly
be a prophet. And so, I would say
that that we're all amply,
justified
in rejecting Muhammad a prophet, especially if you
believe in the Bible. Time's up.
Thank you, mister Wood. We have time now.
Yeah. 15 minutes for rebuttals.
I did point out,
that the satanic verses story is mentioned by
Ibn Ishaq At Tabari. This is true but
why were they writing? You have to look
at their intention. At Tabari actually wrote an
introduction as to why he wrote. And he
basically says in there that he took as
many traditions as he could lay his hands
upon without expressing an opinion about the reliability
because these men are not scholars.
This is how this is how his history
was recorded by the early Muslim historians. They
took whatever information they could without without without,
deeming a a a a judgment upon them
because they didn't have the prerequisite knowledge. The
satanic verses story is not taken seriously by
any Muslim scholar of Hadith. It's not because
they're embarrassed by it.
No. It's because it's not reliable. It's not
reliable at all. He said the original part
of had
this thing about the satanic verses. Where is
that version of the Quran? Where is It's
gone. And in the story itself it says
it says in the satanic verses story that
the people from Abyssinia started to come back
into Mecca. That's what it says. This is
historically inaccurate. The Muslims were living under sanctions
at the time. This is a fact. Now
I want to talk about the the polygamy
issue here,
especially about the marriage with Aisha. Now you
have to understand when the Prophet was 25
years old, he married Khadija who was a
40 year old woman at the time. And
he stayed married to her and her alone
for the next 23 years until his death
3 or 4 years later. And then, he
married a series of 11 women,
in his when he was well into his
fifties and all from different tribes. Now I
ask you, is this the action of a
lust addict or a master strategist? In the
full bloom of his youth, he has one
wife and she's 15 years older than he
is. But in his old age, he has
many wives. They were all from different tribes.
He was able to peacefully reconcile the entire
Arabian Peninsula
based on his marriages. They had a common
relative now. It was a kinship between them.
We need to take our minds out of
the gutters. This is why he had more
than 4 wives. You see? Because
he is a prophet and the duty of
a prophet is to take the message to
the people. He's exceptional in many ways. He
had to pray 6 times a day. He
had to pray tahajjud. That's only for him.
Pray 6 Who wants to do another prayer?
But he did it out of raw out
of awe and reverence for his Lord. He
was not allowed to receive charity. That's only
for him.
This only for thee and not the believers
at large. He's exceptional in many ways. There's
no lust motive here. Again, Mr. Wood is
looking at things
with, through his own kind of
mentality of the Bible because the Bible goes
into these things and he looks at at
surface level, so on and so forth, you
know, raiding the caravan. Right?
When did this happen? In the early early
medinan period. Why? Because Abu Abu Sufyan who
was in Mecca, he was taking the Muslim
possessions in Mecca because the Muslims were kicked
out of Mecca. And the majority of their
possessions were left in Mecca. So he was
taking their possessions, going to Syria and trading
with them over there. Their own possessions.
And this was a time of war.
This was a time of war. This was
The the Muslims were now allowed to physically
defend themselves. These these were their own possessions.
Right? Now, as far as, what else did
he bring up here?
So okay. The marriage of Aisha. Now in
Semitic and Middle Eastern culture, even unto this
day, you know, forget 1400 years ago. My
own grandmother 60 years ago in Iran got
married at 13 years old. In this culture,
puberty is a sign of teenage rebellion.
Right? Is this progression? In 18/89 in this
state, California,
the legal age of consent was 10 years
old. In Hawaii in 2001,
it was 14. A man can go to
Hawaii, marry a girl. Right? A woman. And
then cross the Pacific into California, and suddenly
he's a *.
You see, American children today, 1 third are
obese
and they're addicted to television and internet *.
Mister,
Woods,
argument is completely anachronistic. Aisha was given away
by her parents
to the prophet, who married her lawfully and
consummated the marriage after she began her menstrual
cycle, a God given natural sign of adulthood.
And mister Wood likes to present Ayesha like
she's a secret. No one knows My own
daughter's name is Ayesha. One of the most
popular Muslim names in the world.
This was a saintly woman whose intellect and
maturity cannot be found in the world today.
You know, she was playing with dolls. No.
It actually says that after she gave up
playing with dolls, that's when she became an
adult. So what if she was playing with
dolls? My mother has a Beanie Baby collection.
She's she's the most she's the most intelligent
woman I know. I have baseball cards. I
have a Barry Bonds rookie. He was a
lot smaller back then.
So what?
What what what what's what's with this woman?
She was the only wife who had not
been married before. This does not fit the
psychological profile of a *.
Besides,
a girl or a person who a child
who is sexually molested, they become very introverted
and possibly self destructive later on in their
lives. Was Aisha like this? Certainly not. Why
did the prophet marry her? Because he knew
as a prophet, several decades after his death,
she would become an imminent teacher who expounded
firsthand knowledge of the prophet's life and example.
Thousands of Hadith come from her.
Thousands of Hadith. She was a genius. One
time an Iranian Christian asked me, an Iranian
Christian why did why did your prophet marry
such a young girl, a child bride? Right?
I said you know who else married a
child bride? Joseph the carpenter.
Joseph We we have to look at things
equally, balanced. Forget about what the christians are
saying, you know. Let's just see what Let's
just look at Islam for a minute here.
No. Read your own sources. How old was,
Mary when she was impregnated by the Holy
Ghost? 12 years old. She was married to
Joseph the Carpenter at the time. I mean,
look at the New Advent Encyclopedia.
The commentary of the Oxford Dictionary Bible. Read
the proto gospel of James. Matthew says before
they came together,
you know, before they came together, she was
found impregnated by the Holy Ghost. Right? Before
they came together to do what? Play Monopoly?
Play with dolls?
Before they came together sexually,
she was found impregnated by the Holy Ghost.
Why didn't Joseph consummate the marriage? Because she
was still a child at the time. You
have to wait till you reach puberty. But
as soon as she did, the annunciation of
Christ came. Now, mister Wood says in his
online writings, what do you think of a
prophet who has *
with a 9 year old girl? This is
an atheist argument. Mister Wood is coming from
the background of an atheist. This is not
a Christian argument. Because an atheist would also
say, what do you think of a God
who decides to enter into the world through
the birth canal of a 12 year old
virgin?
That sounds suspect. What kind of God is
that? Why would he do that?
I don't know about that religion.
If mister Wood is going to argue that
the Holy Prophet Muhammad was immoral, then he
has conceded
that the Holy Spirit was immoral, because he
impregnated Mary at 12 years old. And I
must remind mister Wood that according to his
own Gospels,
slander against the Holy Spirit is an unforgivable
sin.
Now, I want to I want to go
into the biblical criteria for prophethood,
but mister Wood has brought up so many
points here. I'm gonna bypass that.
Get into some of, what he was saying
here. You know, the the Quranic
scientifical errors. The sun was setting in a
spool of murky water. Right? What does that
the verse actually say? Dur Qurnayn, the man
with 2 horns. It doesn't mean the devil.
Right? If you look at ancient Macedonian coins,
Alexander the Great's likeness is shown with two
horns. His dominion over the east and the
west.
The the town of Lyknis
was annexed to Macedonia
during his time. This was the extreme west
of his empire. The verse says, he saw
the sun. He perceived the sun setting in
a in a pool of murky water.
Right? Now, in this town to the west
of the town is a huge lake, 170
square miles, fed by underground springs
through limestone rocks that issue extremely murky water.
Right? Looking at the looking at the lake
from the town,
the observer would seem to see the sun
setting in a pool of murky water. Right?
Now what does the Quran actually say though?
That was his perception.
Alexander the Great, Durkornay.
The Quran says,
regarding the planets.
All of the celestial bodies. Is in the
plural not in a duo. Plural. It's it's
not just talking about the sun and the
moon. Plural all of them. The stars, the
planets, all of them.
Falak means to coil or orbit. Means,
a motion from the from the object in
question. Swim is not a right word. Revolve
is the correct translation. According to doctor Maurice
Bucaille. Well, I have the book there. The
Bible, the Quran and Modern Science. This was
a man who studied the Bible and the
Quran objectively
and he converted to Islam in the process.
He says the Quran doesn't make a single
scientific blunder. What about the bible? Does it
make any scientific errors? It says in Genesis
chapter 30 that Jacob took took rods of
striped wood
and put it in a watering trough, and
had some some animals look at them while
they were mating. And then when their young
was born, they had striped fur. In other
words, whatever you're looking at
when you're during conception will determine the physical
characteristics characteristics of your offspring. So if a
man is having * with his wife and
he's watching Barney the big purple dinosaur,
his son will be born purple and have
a long tail. The Bible says that the
earth is 5,000
768 years old.
Look at the genealogy of Luke. He he
mentions all of the patriarchs from the creation
of Adam all the way to Jesus at
2,007 years. You get 5,768
years. And this is what Christians believed for
centuries. This is what they believed. And then
they found dinosaur bones and they performed radiocarbon
14 dating on them. And how old are
they? About 65000000 years old. I well, I
think we forgot to cut to carry the
one over. I think that we put the
decimal place. And there's actually Christian,
apologist like Jack cheat Chick who actually argue
that dinosaurs and human beings once lived in
perfect peace and harmony on the earth. That's
not science. That's called the Flintstones.
Now,
he says you can have, you know,
* with captives.
I want to quote you.
Let's see here.
Okay.
If you see a beautiful woman I'm gonna
quote you a verse from scripture. If you
see a beautiful woman amongst the captives,
take her home and shave her head. After
a month, you can have count conjugal
rights with her. That's what the verse says.
In Deuteronomy chapter 21. Again, this is Jesus,
the old God of the old testament, is
telling the Jews this law, but mister Wood
finds fault in it. Why? Why does he
find fault in it? Because, you know, it
doesn't make sense to our new enlightened society.
This was an ancient law. What he didn't
mention, this was a biblical time. This This
was actually good for them. Men and women
without men were sitting ducks from a water
from a rowders and gangs. They were sitting
ducks. Then he mentioned the story of Bani
al Mustariq. What he doesn't mention What he
didn't mention, however, is that when the prophet
defeated them, he married, and all of these
were defensive campaigns.
But he was constantly under attack in Medina,
constantly under attack. These were in the in
defense.
Now,
when he defeated them, he married, one of
their women.
He asked for her father in marriage. He
asked her father. And when the Sahaba, the
companions noticed that the Bani al Mustaliq were
now kin to the prophet, over 100 families
were released from captivity.
This was an a benevolent act on his
part. A benevolent act.
Now Shahriyan does allow a man to have
conjugal rights with his female captives if it
is consensual. This is an ancient law.
A
biblical law. It has no application in the
world today. You can't apply this today. This
is an ancient law. Now * however is
absolutely forbidden in any context. As a capital
offense, the Quran is very clear about that.
He also, let's see what else did he
What did he mention here?
Oh, the Jews. The killing of the Jews.
Now, he's saying, you know, that when the
prophet went to Medina,
he took it personal because the Jews didn't
accept his message. So he just started to
kill them.
If you
Nothing is further from the truth. The first
thing he did when he got to Medina,
the very first act he did was sign
a treaty, a peace treaty with all of
the Jews of the oasis. They all signed
the treaty in which he stipulated, and I'll
quote it to you. The Jews shall maintain
their own religion and the Muslim theirs. Loyalty
is a protection against treachery. All 3 Jewish
tribes signed the treaty. All 3 Jewish tribes
broke the treaty. The first two Jewish tribes
were exiled north, the Khaybar. The second Jewish
The third Jewish tribe, the Bani Qoreida,
they attempted several times to assassinate the prophet
and they broke their treaty. During the siege,
when 10,000 people stormed the oasis, they broke
their treaty with the prophet. They were guilty
of treason. They were guilty of treason. In
times of martial law in the civilized world,
if you commit treason, it they'll they'll kill
you. So these men, only the men, and
this is this is interesting because
the prophet judged them according to their own
law. Their own law says, quote, Deuteronomy 20.
It states that a far off city guilty
of treason will have its men executed
and women and children taken into captivity. But
if the city is of these nations
save alive nothing that breathes,
Deuteronomy chapter 20. Revealed by Jesus Christ according
to David Wood, the God of the Old
Testament.
Right? Now, suddenly in the in the New
Testament, he has a change of heart. Love
your enemy. Turn the other cheek. So on
and so forth. So, you know, Marcion had
a point about that. So according to their
own He judged them according to the according
to their own law, they deserve total annihilation.
But he judged he judged them by the
more merciful one and the chief of the
Bani Horeidah,
Qa'ib ibn Asad. He actually commented before he
was, executed, you Muslims were just with us.
You Muslims were just with us. I mean,
mister Wood again is is setting up a
smoke screen. He's ignoring he's ignoring the vast
majority of the Prophet's
existence in this world as a mercy onto
all mankind. You know,
99% of what people have said about him
is enemies included. And he's constraining us one
little percent of, you know, some some,
Jewish man said this. A hypocrite said that.
So on and so forth.
I mean it's it's not being balanced. Again,
we have a breach of balance. What else
did he say? Oh, a star. Oh, a
star is a shooting.
It's it's aimed at a demon. How does
mister Wood know this is not true? Can
you see demons and angels? You know what
it says in the book of Matthew? It
says the Magi, these Zoroastrian priests from my
country of Iran, they came into Bethlehem
following a star. It was hovering over a
over a stable. Do you know how big
a star is? How is this possible? But
that's perfectly scientifically acceptable to mister Wood. But
a a shooting star after a demon, I
can't accept that. A demon he can't even
see. Unless he can see demons. I don't
know.
But I'm running out of time here and
he said,
so,
so we have to look at sound sources.
Right? We have to look at sound sources.
Now, again, going back to the satanic verses
story. There is something about satanic verses in
Sahih Bukhari. It doesn't mention, however, that these
verses were revealed. It just says, like he
said, that the unbelievers, they they made sajda.
They prostrated
at the end of the recitation because they
were moved by the words of the Quran.
It doesn't mention at all that he he
was,
he made up these verses or he listened
to Satan or anything like that. There's no
details given in Sahih Bukhari. This is only
in Ibn Ishaq, a historical source that came
after these works like Kitab ul Athaaq.
The Muwata. I'm out of time. I'm sorry.
2.
Alright, Ali.
I have a quick question about,
methodology
because,
I think it relates tonight's debate to your
debate with Mike Lecona.
In your debate with Mike Lecona,
Mike was trying to defend the resurrection and
he immediately went to the earliest
possible source material,
which is found in first Corinthians. And he
built his case based solely upon the earliest
possible material that he'd find. Well, you went
to sources like the Gnostic Gospels which are
anywhere from a 120 to 250 years after
the material he was using.
And tonight, I've gone to our to our
earliest biography,
for information about Mohammed
and
you're acting like I was I'm just making
a huge mistake. And but I I I
wanna focus on on something specific.
You say that Mohammed,
never raised his hand
against a woman,
and that that that this shows that Mohammed,
was
well, this makes Mohammed good, but in in
Sahih Muslim, Aisha specifically says
that
Mohammed hit her in her chest and caused
her pain. And I'm just wondering as far
as methodology goes,
I see you sort of picking and choosing
your sources rather than just going for what
the sources say. And if a source like
Sahih Muslim says,
that Mohammed hit ice on her chest
and you say,
Muhammad never raised his hand to a
woman, who should I believe? Should I be
should I believe Sahi Sitta and Aisha or
should I believe you?
I'd have to see this alleged Hadith. You'd
have to quote it to me and show
it to me. I know of no such
Hadith.
Regarding,
my methodology,
if you recall my debate with, mister Lacona,
I did quote extra,
Biblical materials such as, you you know, Nag
Hammadi library and so on and so forth.
But according to many Christian scholars,
and objective scholars doctor Bart Ehrman, doctor Lang
Pagels, They say the gospel of Thomas predates
the gospel of John. That the gospel of
John is written as a reaction to the
gospel of Thomas.
Okay. I'll I'll deal with this in a
minute here.
But I also quoted stuff from the q
source document with Matt which Matthew and Luke
had access to. Right? And the gospel in
Galatia at the time. This is pre Pauline.
This is before Paul's letters.
Right? Now regarding the other things he's we
mentioned about the, earliest source material,
there's no
there are no pagan sources from the 1st
century that even mention Jesus.
There's one Jewish source that mentioned Jesus from
the 1st century. These are the earliest writings.
What are the earliest writings? The earliest writings
were done by Jews. They were done by
Jews.
And there's no Jewish Christian sources that are
left. They've all been lost. They've been destroyed
by Trinitarian Christians.
So regarding this hadith,
he struck me on the chest which caused
me pain.
Again, this is looking at this on a
surface level. Was that his intention? Did he
want to hurt his wife?
What does she say about him? This is
what she says in all 6 books of
hadith. He never returned evil for an evil.
He was never unjust. This is what she
says. Now he shows me a hadith where
he was struck, struck around the chest. One
time, another time, during the battle of Badr,
the prophet there was a man in the
first line, and he the prophet took an
arrow and just jabbed him in the chest
a little bit to move him back. And
the man said, You hurt me. And the
prophet said, That was not my intention.
Right? And the man said, I want my
requital. So the prophet spread his chest and
said, you can take it. And the man
jumped and he left and he he kissed
the the the chest of the prophet. And
he said, I just wanted to kiss you.
Right? We have to look at what was
his intention. Our scholars have looked at all
of these hadith. Just looking at something on
the surface level. I can do the same
thing with the Bible. I love this thing
with the surface level. I have come to
bring a sword. Right? Jesus, Matthew 10:34. What's
up with that sword? The Christian will say,
no, no, no. You stupid Muslim. This is
an allegory.
This isn't this is, you know, he's symbolical.
Just because it says sword, just because it
says strike, doesn't mean strike. Our scholars have
looked at these things in detail. They've looked
at the Arabic. They've done cross references with
thousands of other Hadith. They don't just say,
okay. It says this, so therefore that's what
it means. Right? So, again, this is mister
Wood just looking at things at a superficial
level, at a surface level, and drawing his
own erroneous conclusions
to them, I can do the very same
thing to his sources as well. Thank you.
Your turn for a question. Okay.
Now, I did mention,
Now the New Testament,
clearly states
that it is preferable
for men to castrate themselves, become eunuchs. Matthew
1912.
It also states that true Christians
can drink poison,
math Mark chapter 16, and not be harmed.
Finally, it states that women must pray with
their heads covered. 1st Corinthians chapter 11. And
that a woman speaking in church is shameful.
1st Corinthians
chapter 14.
My question is, why don't the vast majority
of Christians
follow these rules? And if they do, I
would like mister Wood I have a I
have a vial of white out liquid paper,
highly toxic.
I would like mister Wood
to swig this bottle of white out. If
he does not do it, then he does
not agree that this is the word of
God because he's a Christian and Jesus says
according to the gospel of Mark chapter 16,
that he can drink poison and survive.
If he does not do it, then he
is admitting this is not the word of
God. If he does if he does do
it and he survives, I am I am
willing to become a Christian tonight.
Did you say about a whiteout?
I might do that for you.
What were the what, I got I wrote
down poison and women in churches. What there
was something else?
Men, have to become eunuchs. It's preferable for
men to become eunuchs. Christian, you need poison.
A woman must pray with her head covered
according to first Corinthians 11. A woman speaking
in church is shameful according to first Corinthians
14. As far as the mark, that comes
from,
the end of mark, which practically every scholar,
every bible scholar
in the world says was not authentic,
that this was a later edition.
And so that's not in the early source
material as far as our earliest our earliest
records don't have that part about the, about
the poison.
As far as the men becoming eunuchs,
Jesus wasn't talking about physically castrating them in
themselves.
He didn't do that. This is this is
a spiritual this is a spiritual situation similar
to what the apostle Paul did where you
dedicate yourself
wholly to God
and you you you don't get married so
that you can dedicate your entire life to
God. And he doesn't he doesn't command them
to do this. He says, you know, those
who can accept this should. And Jesus did
this and of course the apostle Paul took
this route. And I think that was that
was especially fitting during that time of of
persecution by the Romans.
Why why would someone go out and get
married when you might get killed next year?
And so there there are reasons for these
things. And,
and even today, I would say, look, if
if if if you're a man and you
don't need a woman, or you're you're a
woman and you don't need a man, and
you wanna dedicate your life wholly to god,
that biblically, that that is a good route.
As far as women in churches,
I'd say there there there are several, interpretations
of this. One is is, that well, in
Corinth,
the only women who are allowed to speak
in public gatherings were were the temple prostitutes.
That's one possible. I'm not even saying that
isn't that is an interpretation.
Another is that,
the men already knew that they had to
keep quiet and that women were allowed to
come in and be taught for the first
time.
And that Paul lays this down. Hey. You
need you you need to be quiet too.
I'm not saying that's that's the correct interpretation
either, but I'd say worst case scenario, Paul
says,
you're not speaking in church.
And
okay. That would be, that would be that
would be something to think about. But the
bottom line is there are other interpretations
of these verses. So
well, as far as, I guess, my next
question.
There's a war,
in Iraq
and
lots of bad things have been done by
by both sides.
And I'd ask a question,
like this.
Suppose tomorrow on the news we hear that
American forces,
went into a village.
They
they killed the men. They took the women
captive. They had * with,
with their female captives before selling them into
slavery.
And then they tortured a man for money.
They they found a man that that had
some money and they tortured him until he
gave it to them.
I know that you don't believe that some
of these stories are true,
but, I mean, as far as, about,
Mohammed.
But I would say this, if you heard
that story on the news, would you say
that they were,
that American soldiers were wrong for doing all
all of this? And if so, do you
understand why I would be very bothered
why I'm very bothered when I go to
the early Muslim sources and see these things?
Of course, it would be bothersome. This is
an invading army in Iraq. They're they have
invaded this country and that's what they do.
Now, again,
we have to see,
again, we have to be balanced again. Again,
mister Wood has has breached
the the rule of being balanced.
What does what happens in the Bible? I
mean, he acts like the Bible isn't the
word of God. Why did the prophets send
these campaigns out against these tribes anyway? They
were planning on attacking Medina and they did.
Several several times, they attacked Medina. This was
the law. This is the ancient law of
the time. You see? Women and children are
not killed. Does mister Wood prefer that the
women were killed like the Bible
says? And kill the children as well? Save
a life nothing that breathes? Is that is
that a better law?
You know? So,
again, this is just this is just, you
know, for shock. You know, he wants to
shock you. This is a a culture of
shock. He has to add some some flavor
to things. You know, this is like the
trick of the media. We have to shock
people. What? This is what Islamic law says.
Wow. That's amazing. Again, just a surface level
of of understanding. We just want to shock
people in the in the I can do
the same thing. I'll do the very same
thing. You know, Jesus says,
you know, in Luke chapter 19, this is
this is when he's in he's at Bethany.
This is the context. He's camped at Bethany
with his disciples preparing for his entrance into
the holy city of Jerusalem to declare himself
the king of the Jews, HaMashiach.
He says, those enemies who do not accept
me as their king, bring them hither and
slay them before me. And then he reveals
in the old testament to Moses that apostates,
whether they're men, women or children, they must
be
killed. Those who do not worship the Lord
God of Israel must be murdered both old
and young, man and old. Now I'm gonna
ask,
this is not my question by the way.
What I'm telling mister Wood now that doesn't
that bother him from his own Bible? Doesn't
it bother him? Could that be my question?
No. Sorry.
Okay.
Here's my question.
Oh, it's it's actually similar.
If Jesus is the God who inspired the
old testament,
why did he command
Moses and Joshua
to kill women and children? Why did he
command that? And when is the killing of
children morally justifiable?
Well,
I think that's a good question. I'm not
sure I could answer it in 3 minutes,
and nor can I say that this is
the the official Christian position? I'll say I
can say what we're dealing with though.
As far as issues like this bothering me,
I think you and I are different. You
look at all of these issues I bring
up and you it's just a smokescreen. This
is just ridiculous. This is this is no
objection at all. And I'm looking at it
and going, woah. This is wild.
But I'm like that with the bible too.
I'm like that with the Bible. There I
will say right now, there are tons of
things in the Bibles that really, really bother
me. And the difference is I think that
Christianity
can actually
deal with these problems. I don't think that
Islam can. And and I I think people
have seen that tonight because you've had an
opportunity to answer and you keep pointing the
finger at Christianity.
As far as Jesus being the God of
the Old Testament,
here's here's here's the data we have. 1,
lots of really bad things in the Old
Testament.
And then
2, Jesus coming along and saying, you have
heard that it was said eye for eye,
tooth for tooth, Old Testament.
But now I tell you,
love your neighbor, turn your other cheek, things
of things of this nature.
Pray for those who persecute you. So we
see yes. We do see a huge change,
and the the question is, why this change?
And
I would say, and this is this is
this is my personal theology,
I think that,
human beings,
I do need the fall here,
human beings have are in rebellion against god.
And I believe that God,
during the Old Testament,
said something along these lines,
if you'd like a world,
where you can do what you want, that's
your choice, but I have to be separate
from you. And so God withdraws.
God withdraws from humankind,
not completely, I think that would kill us,
but God withdraws.
And then we have human beings, sort of
not not having god there to to guide
them in all things. And so we get
the law. And I think that part of
the point of the law, there are lots
of purposes of the law, I think part
of that purpose,
is to show,
do you really want to live this way
apart from God and just be living by
law?
These very harsh laws.
I think part of that was to was
to show us you don't want to live
like this. And now, what do we have?
With the incarnation, we have Jesus
returning to the world, God coming back to
live among us, and then saying, look,
now you see a different way. Now you
see what life is like when I am
among you. And he heals everyone, and he
preaches peace and saying this is how life
this is how life should be. And so,
well,
I mean, the bottom line, whether whether that
view is is correct or not,
Christianity and Islam
aren't in the same boat here. Our greatest
revelation, said, turn the other cheek.
Our greatest revelation never had any slaves,
didn't have multiple wives,
didn't have a 9 year old wife.
And this goes for Jesus and and and
people like Paul. It was it's a completely
different picture. And so going to the old
testament,
it's, it's just not the best approach for
the Christian. Because if you say, hey, look
at the old testament. Isn't that wrong?
Jesus said that was wrong.
Don't live like that. That's what Jesus said.
As far as my question,
this would relate to to some of the
things I just said about about, I think
that we are somewhat different in that
I see I again, I see lots of
things in the Bible as as great difficulties,
but I think that Christianity,
is not in the same position and that
Christianity can deal with these issues.
And I like to I like to ask
a question.
I go to the I go to the
sources, and if you don't want Ibn Isak,
Ibn Isak's out.
We can go wait. We can go anywhere.
We can go out of Bukhari, Sahih Muslim,
any of these sources.
And wherever you go, I find things that
really, really bother me,
you know, especially spiritual issues and violence issues
and things of that nature, Aisha.
And I look and these things really bother
me,
but they don't bother you.
And some of these seem extremely relevant. And
you're saying, no. It's a smokescreen. It's a
smokescreen. And I would just ask,
what would a prophet have to do
before you would be willing to question whether
he's the greatest moral example ever In your
in your in your statement, you're saying, Mohammed
only killed 1500 people. What's that?
I mean, if he killed a1000000, would that
make a difference? I mean, what what's what
are the what are the numbers here? What
would Mohammed have what would the early sources
have to say before you will you'd be
willing to say,
wow.
Maybe this guy
isn't the greatest moral example for all mankind
for all time.
It would say something to the effect of
go into any city and slaughter their women
and children, Just like the Bible says.
By the standards of the Bible, I can't
accept that Moses was a prophet then. I
do not believe a prophet would kill women
and children. Never. Now mister Wood completely ignored
my question. He's saying that's what the old
testament said and then we have Jesus coming.
That was Jesus
according to Orthodox Christian orthodoxy.
Unless he's a Marcionite. Maybe he's a Marcionite.
Maybe he believes that God is a different
God. That was Jesus telling the Israelites. He
commands them. It's very clear. Arise
and attack the Midianites. Kill their
women. Only the young girls for yourselves. This
is this and this is according to the
Talmud, this is how the Jews took that
inspiration from Jesus to * 3 year old
girls, and there's no reproach in the Bible
about what they got. This is, no that's
not what I meant. You know. So he
has a lot of sophistry. You know, he's
a philosopher so he's dancing around the issue.
Now Mohammed killed 1500 people?
This was in defense. These were in wars.
These were in wars. He didn't go out,
okay, kill him. You you No. No. No.
No. No. People are attacking him, and he
sends he sends armies against them because they're
attacking him. What happened? He was always outnumbered.
The Battle of Badr, 3 3 to 1
odds. Battle of Uhud, 4 to 1 odds.
He's defending his community now. Now he's in
a position of power to defend.
You see? Now as far as,
you know, advocating
slavery, what does Jesus say about that,
you know, in the New Testament?
What did he say about that? Now, first
of all, it should be noted that the
prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, he reformed
this. He actually said in sound hadith
that,
your slaves are your brethren. Feed and clothe
them like you do your own brothers. And
then he eventually abolishes. Who when he said,
whoever frees a slave, God will free from
paradise. What does Jesus say in Luke 1247?
He says, the the servant who disobeys his
masters will flog him many times with many
lashes. Right? Now look at the prophet's family.
His adopted son, Zayd ibn Haritha, he was
described as having a flat nose and dark
skin. He is called,
the beloved of the messenger of God. He
was a black man. The first man to
do the adhan, they called the prayer, Bilal
ibn rebar, handpicked by the prophet himself. A
former Abyssinian slave that the prophet exalted
on top of the Kaaba to make the
call to prayer. This was a black man.
And this at time at the time to
the Quraysh was like, what's this man doing?
This is our slave. What is he doing
on top of the house of God?
Right? And then after the prophet's mother died,
the woman who took care of him, her
name was Barakah bin Talaba, also known as
Umayman. She was a woman of Abyssinian descent.
She was a black woman. The prophet said,
she is like my mother after my mother.
A black woman. So the the woman he
considered to be his mother, black woman. The
first man to do the adhan he appointed,
black man. His adopted son called the beloved
of the messenger of God described as a
black man. What does the Bible say about
these about these issues? The prophet says,
All of you are from Adam and Adam
is from dust.
Peter says, slaves must be submissives to their
masters, even in fear and trembling, even if
they're harsh. The Bible did
nothing
to help this problem in the world of
slavery.
I'm out of time. I guess it's time
for me to ask a question.
Okay.
Okay. Given the fact that the proto orthodox
church now let's switch some gears here. Get
away from the violence issue that mister Wood
likes to talk about a lot.
The proto orthodox church fathers place such a
high emphasis on the fulfillment of Old Testament
prophecy. Read the gospel of Matthew. He quotes
the Septuagint. He misapplies prophecies. He misquotes the
Septuagint.
And given the fact that I mentioned 2
prophecies that mentioned the prophet by name, they
mentioned him and this is just a fraction
of the prophecies. They mentioned him by name.
You say, oh, you know, George Bush is
prophesized in the bible as well, if his
name is Bush. Now,
where is Jesus Christ, peace be upon him?
Right? Now I believe Jesus was the Messiah
and he's a prophet, but my question is
very specific.
Where does it say in the Old Testament
that Jesus Christ
will be the Jewish Messiah? Where does it
say his name will be Jesus? Where does
it say that? I can show you a
verse in the Bible that calls the beloved
of God, Muhammad,
Uhimda, Ahmed. But mister Wood, I don't think
he can show us a verse that says,
the name of the Jewish Messiah is Jesus.
Yet he rides a donkey into Jerusalem, and
he's the Messiah. It doesn't it's it's not
good evidence.
Well, I'll say you you can't invent your
own criteria
of of what makes a true prophet. You
can't say, well,
if there's a word in the Old Testament
that sort of looks like Muhammad and you
know that this word is used in many
places in the Old Testament and that it
and that it never means Mohammed and that
most of the places you you if you
try to put Mohammed in there, it would
make no sense at all. And yet you
do it.
But besides this, I would say I've I've
already refuted the entire biblical case.
In Deuteronomy, it says if a prophet says
something that god has not revealed or 2,
says speaks in the name of other gods,
on ever, he cannot, under any circumstances,
be a prophet. And I offered 8 sources,
showing that Mohammed
did both,
and confirmed.
In al Bukhari, you said,
your response to the verse in Al Bukhari
where where, where the polytheists all bow down
in honor of this revelation was that, well,
maybe they just really like this verse. The
way it stands in the Quran now, it
condemned all of their gods and
and that just doesn't make any sense.
God condemned all their gods, and these people
bowed down.
Why in the world would they do that?
But if we put this if we put
this in context with all the other passages,
it's pretty clear. It fits perfectly. They bowed
down in honor of the satanic verses because
their gods were affirmed
by Mohammed. And if that's the case,
I don't care if you can go to
Song of Solomon, which, by the way,
most Muslims I talk to think that Song
of Solomon is is not inspired and that
it's a gross book because it's about *.
You go against the grain
and say, no. Right in the middle of
this book that's about a sexual relationship between
a husband and a wife, There's this word
that looks like Mohammed. I'm going to ignore
all the other places where this word occurs
and pretend that right here, this is a
clear prophecy about Mohammed.
And
I just don't think that this is a
good argument at all.
As far as,
I'll just return to slavery since since that
was my answer.
You talked about slavery. You said Mohammed was
was was great and that he wasn't a
racist.
Let's not forget, Mohammed enslaved thousands of people
and I can give you the references.
Read the sources. We find Mohammed
trading female slaves for weapons and we know
this from the sources that Mohammed had black
slaves. I've got the reference right here.
I got I got a reference where he
traded 2 black slaves for another slave.
But you try to show that Christianity is
the real oppressor and that Mohammed was the
real liberator. And I just want to say,
everyone, don't. Let's not Be careful when when
you listen to words because,
think about it. Mohammed traded slaves.
He captured people and made them slaves.
And Jesus never had any slaves. Paul never
had any slaves.
It was it was eventually Wilberforce, a Christian,
who who who ended the the slave trade.
And Ali sort of shifts it right around
and
Islam, which Mohammed, you know, bought and sold
slaves his entire life,
that's the good one. And Christianity, no. Pro
slavery. I'm sorry.
Oh, question.
Ali, you seem
to be against violence for the most part,
you know, unless it's a just war or
something like that, I I think. And I
commend I commend you for that.
In 1988, Salman Rushdie's book, The Satanic Verses,
came out. And there was a call for
Rushdie's death. The Japanese translator
was killed.
Several other people
were killed,
translators and so on,
were injured.
And right here in California, 2 bookstores were
firebombed
for selling the book.
And what I'd like to ask is would
you be willing to say, to all these
people
that,
that you don't believe this is the appropriate
path and that
it is morally wrong it is morally wrong
to react violently
if Mohammed is criticized.
Absolutely. Yes. It is morally wrong.
You know, it's it doesn't make
it doesn't make any sense, you know, that
I agree with Mr. Wood the Muslim reaction
like to the cartoon thing you know I'm
gonna prove my prophets not a terrorist by
breaking a window I mean that's that's counterintuitive.
It doesn't actually work like that. Now I
wanted to, again say that, you know, mister
Wood did not answer my last question. I
asked for a prophecy of Jesus by name
and he kind of danced around the issue
and then he said, well, Song of Solomon
is about * and this and that. Well,
Christians say that Isaiah chapter 7 is about
Emmanuel. Was the name of Jesus Emmanuel? No.
It was Jesus. Then if you read chapter
8, it says that Emmanuel was born to
King Ahaz. So
what's up with that? He was already born.
Well, Christians says, well, there are multiple levels
of prophecy. That's what Origen believed. There are
multiple levels of of of of prophecy to
texts, and this is an apparent context of
the birth of the Jewish Messiah. Exactly.
So, I don't understand, it doesn't look like
mister Wood is in in in agreement with
his scholars.
Now he says that only in this verse
as I said that the word Mohammedim is
in other places in the Bible. It does
not occur in any other verse in the
Bible, in the same form. I'll give you
the verses. 1st Kings 2016 26, it says,
Mahmad. And then another place it says, Muhammad
Daya. Muhammad Daya. Muhammad Daya. Muhammad Daya. Muhammad
Daya. Muhammad Daya. Muhammad. Muhammad. Muhammad Daya. Only
in 5 16 of Song of Songs it
says, Muhammadim.
Im is a plural of respect in Hebrew.
It says the beloved is Muhammad. Like Elohim.
It means literally God's. Christians believe that this
is
a proof text of the trinity. That they
don't understand semitic languages. That this is a
a plural of respect.
A plural of respect. Now the only time,
the only instance cited by mister Wood of
a poet being killed
for, by that is supported by sound narrations
was Ka'ib ibn Asra. But what did he
do? After the Battle of Badr, he went
to the Meccans in Quraysh, and he urged
them to raise an invincible army against the
prophet. Right? And then he came back to
Medina, and he wrote satirical poetry of the
prophet and the companions, and urged the aulad
kayla, the Aus and the Khazraj, the 2
tribes that were in Medina before the migration
of the prophet who had fought 3 previous
civil wars
to kill the prophet.
This is what he wrote. Kill the prophet.
Stand up for yourselves and kill this man.
This man was no he was no victim.
This man was an anarchist. This guy was
a scoundrel.
If I right now go to Iraq right
now and I incite citizens of Iraq, kill
any American on sight, what do you think
would happen to me when I got to
a back to America? One way plane ticket
to Gitmo Bay, where electric shock therapy and
* probings await me.
That's a fact.
So, you have to understand poetry was a
very powerful media. Remember, it was a man
on the radio urging the Hutus to slaughter
the Tutsis during the Burundi civil war. Over
300,000 people were killed with because of that.
It was a man on the radio, read
their testimonials.
They would write poetry urging the Jews and
the pagans would write poetry urging these Arabs
to kill each other and kill the prophet
and anarchy and this and that. This had
to do with the society. They didn't just
slander the prophet. One time a woman,
she poisoned the prophet, a Jewish woman, and
he forgave her.
Injuries against himself, he would forgive. But what
it had to do with the state, he
had to be just. This is his state.
This is his his his city.
Okay. I'm done.
Question.
Okay.
According to the Torah,
which Mr. Wood believes is inspired by Jesus
Christ,
false prophets
say things that do not come to pass.
Right?
And they can be hanged on trees. Deuteronomy
18 in chapter 21. According to the synoptic
Gospels,
Jesus said that the second coming would occur
in his lifetime. There are some standing here
who will not taste death until they see
the second come until they see the son
of man coming in great power. The present
generation will live to see it all.
These prophecies did not materialize. Now I want
to preface this by saying, I believe Jesus
was a true prophet. I'm looking at biblical
criteria.
This never happened. Christians also believe that Jesus
was hanged on a tree.
So
doesn't this make him a false prophet by
biblical standards?
If not, why not?
The verse in the old testament is says
cursed is every man who hangs on a
tree. So if you hang on if you're
if you're hanged on a tree, you are
you are cursed. But that's that's Christian theology.
That's we we believe that. We believe that
Jesus
took the curse
for us, and it it it goes like
this,
which is a problem, I think, which is
a problem as
as a philosopher that I find with Islam.
In Christianity, we believe that god is infinite
in all of his attributes.
God can't just let sin go at the
end of time because if god as you
as you believe, god will just forgive a
bunch of sin at the end of time,
That would mean that there's a bunch of
sin that is not punished, and that would
not be infinitely just, and therefore, god would
not be infinite in his attributes. As far
as Christianity is concerned,
we believe
that,
that Jesus Christ was cursed
for
for sins that god would forgive people of.
In other words, at the end of time,
you'll either take the price for your own
sins or you'll be forgiven. If you're forgiven,
your sins were placed upon Jesus Christ. And
so god
remains infinitely
just, but also infinitely merciful because he came
and sacrificed himself
for our sins. And so we believe that
that Jesus was, was under the curse,
of sin, not because of what he did,
but because of what we did.
As far
as the kingdom of God coming, there there
are there are some some various interpretations of
this.
One is,
well, they they saw Jesus at the transfiguration,
and they saw Jesus,
a couple of the apostles
saw Jesus in all his glory. And so
they saw him,
in his kingdom. Another another interpretation would be
that when the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost,
this was the kingdom of God coming.
And and there and there are some others,
but,
I don't I don't think this this would
be a a tremendous problem. And, well, besides
all that, we're here to talk about Mohammed.
Did you have any questions about Mohammed?
Oh.
Oh.
What?
As far as, I guess I I guess
I'll ask a last question. Oh, you said
you were talking about Kaab and he was
this horrible person.
Let me quote Abu Affleck. This is what
Abu Affleck, according to our earliest biography of
Muhammad, this is what he was killed for.
This is
justice. He wrote a poem saying this,
Long have I lived, but never have I
seen an assembly or collection of people more
faithful to their undertaking
and their allies when called upon than the
sons of Kayla when they assembled.
Men who overthrew mountains and never submitted. A
rider who came to them, split them in
2 saying, permitted,
forbidden of all sorts of things.
Had you believed in glory or kingship, you
would have followed Tubah.
Man was over a 100 years old
and was stabbed to death for writing that
poem. He basically says, you would be better
off following someone other than Mohammed.
And he was killed in his sleep for
that. And I'm not sure
that that that qualifies
as justice. You you I know you deny
the story, but it
wow. All the details that are included, Ibn
Ishaq seems like a
a a great historian to me.
I guess I'll I'll ask one last question.
The,
The spell on Mohammed. I just thought I'd
ask you what you thought of that.
I'm sure you'll have some things to say
about Christianity in the process. But, what do
you think about the spell on Mohammed?
That's a good question.
I want to first say that, mister Wood
just described, you know, the concept of justice,
you know, in Christianity that that God takes
an innocent man
and and puts all of our sins upon
him and then and then and then flogs
him until his bowels are laid open and
then, sends him to * after crucifying him
between 2 thieves. That's not just. That's murder.
That's called murder. These oh, this entire concept
of vicarious atonement compromises
God's mercy and justice and omnipotence. You can't
forgive sin. Why not? He's God. Who makes
the rules? God. He has to come down
in the form of a man. The the
Torah says Adam.
God is not a man. Christianity is in
breach of this
concept of, this,
theological concept of the old testament. Therefore, it's
a different religion, a different theology.
Now Now regarding the magic spell, we have
to understand the prophet was a human being.
He was a human being. Okay. Now Paul
says in 2nd Corinthians 127 that a messenger
of Satan comes and beats him over the
head from time to time. 2nd Corinthians 127.
When I bring this up to Christians, they
said,
I say, what's up with that? They say,
you have to understand. He's a human being.
He's an apostle.
Right? Now,
a Jewish man, no Bani Naver, he did
put a spell on the prophet. You know,
he took a lock of his hair, so
on and so forth. It did not affect
his judgment. It did not affect the it
played with his memory a little bit. And
then he prayed to God and it was
gone. And I already quoted that Jesus was
lured by Satan. Jesus himself was God, which
is a contradiction in the Bible. James says
that God cannot be tempted with evil. Neither
tempted he any man. But Abraham was tempted
in Genesis 22.
Jesus was tempted who's who's God in the
flesh according to Christians. So you have major
contradictions here and people don't want to deal
with it. He doesn't want to deal with
what Christianity says because it's extremely troublesome for
a lot of Christian apologists. These types of
things. Again, double standards left and right.
I mentioned earlier that the Pharisees,
will when, you know, the demon regarding the
demon possession that the Pharisees, they said about
Jesus, he is mad and has a demon.
This is what the scholars of his day
surmised about Jesus. Now we don't know how
Jesus felt about himself because we don't have
the privilege of looking at,
you know, sources from his original disciples. We
have these 4 gospels that were written in
Greek at the end of the 1st century
by anonymous people that never identify themselves and
never claimed to be writing while inspired by
the Holy Ghost. And these are the 4
gospels of of of the of of Matthew
and Mark and Luke and John. No reputable
scholar today believes this. These books are pseudonymous.
They're forgeries.
They're for how did Jesus really feel about
himself? We don't have that information because we
have very little,
sources regarding Christianity.
But we have everything said about the holy
prophet Muhammad peace be upon. He doesn't like
Ibn Ishaq. Right? Ibn Ishaq is a is
a real good scholar.
No.
He he that's not what he says. The
vast majority of Muslim scholars do not believe
that he is reliable in many places. That's
our scholarship. And it's not because we're embarrassed
by it. There it is. You can read
it. You can read everything. But mister Wood
says he's a great scholar. I guess mister
Wood has more understanding than 1400 years of
Islamic, scholarship. I guess I guess he is
receiving divine revelation from the Holy Ghost or
someone.
I'm out of time.
Okay.
My last question.
In your article on your website called murdered
by Mohammed, God forbid.
You did not cite the books of hadith.
I'm not looking for Sira. I'm not looking
for At Tabari and Ibn Ishaq and Ibn
Hisham and even Sa'ed. I'm looking for books
of hadith. Canonized books of hadith for the
stories of Uqba ibn Abi Muayd, ibn Sunaina,
Abu Afaq, Mirba ibn Qazi, Asma Bismarwan or
the singing girls of Ibn Khattal. Where are
these Hadith, sir? If there's no Hadith, then
I don't know what to say. Well, as
you know, the the Hadith are focused on,
Mohammed's teachings and Mohammed ordering someone to go
get, you know, his followers to go kill
someone.
That's not that's that's not a lot about
his teachings.
What we find in Ibn Ishaq is that
he's actually trying to put together
a narrative of the life of Mohammed. And
so he includes,
all kinds of details that that wouldn't be
wouldn't be included in
in a book which is just trying to
gather together,
a number of sources without organizing them into
a detailed biography.
As far as its reliability, I mean, think
about what what the what the great Oxford
scholar Guillaume
said. He said that the the
the Surah Rasulullah,
contains practically everything that can be known about
the life of Mohammed.
Ton tons of non Muslim scholars go to
this. Now, you you know why this I'll
go ahead and say why Ibn Ishaq fell
out of favor with Muslims. Ibn Ishaq
favoured Ali
in the split, in the leadership split.
He favoured Ali. It wasn't because he did
bad history. It wasn't because people thought he
was unreliable. It's because he favored 1 leader
over the majority
and people discredit him from that time on.
It doesn't matter.
To me, I don't care about, these disputes.
I'm looking for what's our, what our earliest
source is. That's, that's just what I think
is the best method. If Ali can give
me a good reason
to reject this material, then fine. Give me
a good reason and I'll reject it. But
until you give me a good reason,
I'm going with the earliest material. And when
I go with the earliest material, that's Ibn
Isak. And when we go to Ibn Isak,
we find assassinations. We find satanic verses.
We find,
lots of, lots of important details, but even
if you wanna throw it in a sock
out, I mean, you still have Mohammed in
your most trusted collections, burning people's eyes out,
cutting people's arms and legs off. You still
have,
tons of instances of of
of the women being,
well, Mohammed taking female captives. You pointed out
the, the banal al Mustalik.
You said that, that Mohammed took away from
from among them. That that's true.
But I mean, think about it. You said,
no, the * was only consensual. It's only
if they wanted it. Think about it. These
women's families had just been annihilated.
Do you think anyone there wanted to have
*,
especially considering they were about to be sold
into slavery?
I I would say no.
And
so if we're,
well, it put it this way. I look
at your earliest sources, and we're we're talking
we're talking al Bukhari multiple times. We're talking,
Sahih Muslim multiple times that report these stories
That report the stories of Muhammad allowing his
followers to have * with these female captives
whose families had just been annihilated.
It says it over and over and over
again, and you say,
no, never happened. Mohammed married a woman, and
it was all peace and love. And that's
just not what history tells us.
Thank you, gentlemen.
I'd like to know
and invite mister Conner. It's my bad. I'm
sorry, mister Conner from last time.
Mister David would come on the stage and
deliver his closing statement.
You have 5 minutes, sir.
Ali says that that I like to shock
people and that I do this stuff for
shock value.
I don't think that's the case. I think
this material
is just shocking.
And especially when when Muslims go around, you
know Mohammed was a man of peace, he
was always gentle. And then we go to
the earliest sources,
whatever they are, Ibn al Saka, al Bukhari,
any of them, and we find lots of
lots of material that just doesn't line up
with that. I'll respond to a couple issues,
here before I close.
Ali
argues that the Jews, what they got got
what they deserved,
when Mohammed,
ran 2 of the tribes out of town
and killed the 3rd tribe,
the males.
He says they broke the treaty.
I I I have to defend the Jews
on this one because this is, think about
this.
Medina
was in constant warfare.
They were sick of it. They were sick
of fighting. Mohammed was called in as a
peacemaker.
He was called to bring peace, to end
the fighting. And what did Mohammed do? He
got there. Yes. I'm going to bring peace.
And he immediately starts picking a fight with
Mecca. He starts robbing their caravans. Now think
about it. Mohammed moved a 180 miles north.
He was free of Mecca. He didn't have
to have any dealings with Mecca ever again.
He had a chance for a new life.
And what does he do? He starts robbing
their caravans. Why? Because they persecuted him, because
they weren't letting him go to the Kaaba.
Now,
that I mean, if I'm I'm sure you
consider that a a a an important and
a very important event, But think about it.
If you are one of the Jewish tribes
in Medina, you bring Mohammed in as a
peacemaker, and he starts picking a fight with
Mecca, the last people in the world you
wanna fight, and the first tribe backed out
of the deal. That's true. But Mohammed didn't
live up to his end of the bargain.
He came to bring peace and brought them
war. So they backed out and they were
kicked out of town,
all their belongings taken.
The second group actually didn't do anything. Mohammed
got a revelation saying they were after him
and they had thrown him a feast and
he said no, they're they're actually trying to
get me. Now if you're the 3rd tribe
of Jews, what are you thinking? 1st tribe,
gone. 2nd tribe, gone.
What are you thinking? You're thinking where next?
And,
and Mohammed came in and they, they had
the battle.
And the Jews never actually fought but they
did try to form an alliance against Mohammed.
And Mohammed
had a chance to show that he was
merciful, to show that he was, the merciful
man that Muslims claimed him to be,
And every male who had reached the age
of puberty was beheaded,
the women and children sold into slavery.
And read your records,
the most beautiful woman was taken to Mohammed.
That's that's what we read in the early
sources.
I'll just confess, if I were one of
those if I were that last Jewish tribe
and I saw what was going on,
I probably
would try to defend myself too.
Ali,
I didn't get a chance to respond. He
said Aisha had reached puberty, and as long
as a woman reaches as long as a
girl reaches puberty,
it's okay. I would simply refer you,
to Sahil Bukhari,
volume 7, number 163,
and volume 8, number 151,
both of which specifically say that Aisha had
not reached puberty. It says that this was
the reason she was allowed to continue playing
with dolls.
So, if Ali says it's okay for a
man to have * with a 9 year
old girl as long as she's reached puberty,
These sources just condemn Mohammed because he apparently
had * with her without,
before she reached puberty.
Ali
said, he agreed that it is wrong to
react violently,
if Mohammed is criticized. Now here,
here's another problem. He says that it's wrong
to react violently if Mohammed is criticized.
When I go to the earliest source material,
Mohammed reacted violently when he was criticized.
People were killed. People were trampled to death,
for criticizing Mohammed. People who insulted him in
Mecca were killed,
years later.
And so Ali says, yes. This is this
is this is awful behavior. You should not
react violently. And then I go to the
earliest sources,
and I find that Mohammed himself
so I at reacted violently. And I would
say then that according to Ali's own words
tonight,
the Mohammed we read about in the earliest
sources
stands condemned. Now if the earliest sources had
it wrong,
then maybe we can, maybe we can do
something else. But as far as the earliest
material as it stands now,
again, Ali's own words both with Ayesha
and with, with violence, with reacting violently,
Mohammed
cannot be a prophet, and that's that's ignoring,
all of the other problems. And so, I
haven't argued I haven't argued for Christianity tonight,
but,
I'd say that Christianity definitely has some issues
to deal with. But I think Christianity can
deal with the issues. That would be a
different debate. But I think we've seen tonight
that Islam cannot answer these questions not without
just pointing the finger at Christianity and saying
Christianity, Christianity. Mister Wood, your time is up.
Thank
you.
Miss Badar, Mamarim.
Mister Wood likes to, add his own,
twist on certain event, events from the prophet's
biography.
The most beautiful girl of the Jews.
If you actually read the sources, this woman
is Sophia.
Her her father was the, the the the
chief of the Jews. She had a dream
2 nights before of the moon coming and
landing on her lap. And she told her
father that this is a a a dream
I'm having of the holy prophet, peace be
upon him, coming to this city. And he
and she was beat up for that by
her father. He said, no. You're doing this
and that. And he and he beat her
up and he abused her, almost killed her.
Right? So she sought asylum with the prophet.
She sought the asylum go out of them,
choose you and you and you. No. There's
nothing like that found in our sources. He
doesn't mister Wood is not looking at the
sources correctly. And he he said he's trying
to pick a fight with the Meccans. He
didn't pick a fight. He was under attack.
They attack he was outnumbered in every battle.
They had to dig a ditch around the
city to keep them out. This is his
this is historical fact. He was under attack.
He didn't pick a fight with anyone. The
Jews were well aware of this situation, and
they signed the treaty. Why did why did
why why did you say we're not gonna
sign the treaty? That's the first thing he
did
when he got to Medina. Now they're saying,
oh, okay. The Quran is
possibly in the Hadith or anti semitic or
this and that. Have you ever read what
the New Testament says about Jews? What Paul
says, First Corinthians, they're Christ killers. They please
not God. They're contrary to all men. Jesus
says in the book of Revelation, they're the
synagogue of Satan.
The synagogue of Satan. Then you have this,
you know, Judeo Christian it's a big oxymoron.
Judeo Christianity. They're just they're just using each
other. Right? It's just a big oxymoron. We're
using you for your evangelical dollars so we
can bake roll our apartheid state of Israel,
and we're gonna use you so we can,
you know, bring about these convoluted prophecies of
the book of Revelation of 7 beasts with
7 eyes, with 7 horns, with 7 legs,
so on and so forth. That has to
be, you know, the temple, so on and
so forth. Interesting.
So don't believe the hype. Don't believe the
hype. I have a book here. This is
by a a a Muslim scholar who recently
passed. His name is Martin Ling. He converted
to Islam. He studied all of the early
sources of Islam. All of the early sources.
All these early Siras, Ibn Hisham, At Tabari,
Ibn Ishaq. And he wrote this book taking
the most authentic of those traditions.
The most authentic that had chains of narration.
Right? Ibn Ishaq Sira
is very very relatively minuscule when compared to
the overwhelming hadith literature. It's minuscule. You think
ibn Hazq mentioned every single No, he doesn't.
Not in the least. It's miniscule.
You see? The hadith our sources are Quran
and hadith. They're not Quran, hadith, and ibn
his ibn Hizhaq's seerah of the prophet. No.
Those are not our sources. Our sources are
Quran and Hadith. These are sources.
So
you have to understand that there are many
powerful people in the world who directly benefit
from the denigration of Islam and its prophet.
So I have actually,
a list here, and I'm going to leave
it up here for you. These are these
are resources
to help you, discover the truth about the
holy prophet, peace be upon him. And this
book here is is on that on that
list.
So,
you know, you want to become a millionaire
overnight?
Know how you can do that? You can
either start your own church, or you can
pretend to be a Muslim apostate,
and write a book about your experiences. People
are out for money. That's all it is.
It's all out for money.
So we look at the look at this
man's life. He was orphaned at 6 years
old. He buried 6 of his own children.
Right?
He,
he lost his wife of 23 years. He
was constantly under attack. He's trying to survive.
Read I've listed on this on this, list
here books by Karen Armstrong. She's a non
Muslim. Read what she says about the holy
prophet, peace be upon him, and don't believe
the hype. Turn off CBN and Fox News,
and you know these these con men on
TV. You know, you have,
Pat Robertson and his magic milkshake. I can
leg press £2,000.
Okay.
Jimmy Swaggart and Ted Haggart, you know, people
like this who who, you know, Ibn Ishaq
says this and that. But what does a
Muslim scholar say about that? Why are you
ignoring 1400 years of Muslim scholarship? I'll grant
you the Bible. Okay. This is your source.
Let's look at the Bible. But mister Wood
is saying, no no forget about these hadith
and, you know, these these came later in
the Quran. Okay. Whatever. Let's look at this
Ibn Ishaq biography and look at all these
stories in here. This is not how research
is done. This is a smoke screen. That's
what it is. Let's look at the bible.
Let's look at the Quran. Look at the
sound hadith. He doesn't want to do that.
He wants to look at this Ibn Isha.
And by the way, the prophet peace be
upon him did wait until Aisha had reached
puberty. It's in all of our sources. I
have no idea what mister Wood is talking
about here. About he didn't he waited. It
says playing with dolls but didn't say he
consummated the marriage. Didn't say he consummated the
marriage. Nowhere does it say that before she
reached puberty, he he he consummated the marriage.
It says, you know, he tried to throw
that in as his last word to, you
know, take that one home with you. Yeah.
Right? So don't believe the hype.
People are intelligent. Use your mind. We're not
stupid people. Muslims are not we're not idiots.
We're not just following this man blindly because,
oh, forget about this and that. No. There's
1,200,000,000
Muslims. It's the largest denomination in the world.
It's more than any Christian denomination because the
Catholics and Christians are 2 different religions. Sorry.
Your time is not so hard.
Hello. Well, that pretty much concludes our debate
for tonight. Thanks a lot for joining us.
Thanks a lot for being so disciplined and
patient today.
I'd like to once again thank our 2
speakers,
David Wood and for joining us. Thank you.
Have a good night.