Ali Ataie – Reading the Bible in the Context of the Qur’an
AI: Summary ©
AI: Transcript ©
Now that I've cast a spell over all
of you,
you begin now.
So time is very limited, as as we
know.
So
I'm gonna talk. I'm gonna give you a
little glimpse into Muslim Biblical
hermeneutics,
God
willing. So we're gonna look at Muhammad and
typologies in the bible, the foreshadowings of the
prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him. Now obviously,
this is an extremely vast
topic. Usually, when I lecture on this topic,
it's a 2 or 3 hour lecture.
So I'm trying to condense it down. I'm
sorry if I go a little fast,
but I'd like to hear more ideas or
responses or
fruit growing at me later during the q
and a session. Hopefully, you don't get fruit
growing.
So Justin Martyr was a 2nd century Christian
apologist and heresiologist.
He's one of the principal shapers of what's
known as logos Christology.
He has many treatises that he offered. One
of the most interesting one is called dialogue
with Trypho the Jew. So this is a
dialogue that he kind of invented a Jewish
interlocutor, and they go back and forth debating
whether Christ is actually the messiah.
And for Justin Martyr, the most cogent argument
that he can make,
to bolster his idea that Christ is actually
Mashiach, the Messiah, is not looking at what's
known as Mordechizat, not at miracles, but to
look at fulfillment of prophecy.
That's his strongest argument
with his Jewish,
interlocutor, is that Jesus fulfilled many messianic
expectations. Right? So one of the things and
this is a point of contention, a polemical
contention that goes by 100 and 100 of
years between Jews and Christians
is Isaiah chapter 7, for example,
where stated where it stated that,
a child will be born or a woman,
a young woman, a virgin. What does it
say? It's going to give birth to someone
called Emmanuel.
Right? God with us. And
Joseph Martyr would say, this is Jesus. And
then the the Jewish side would retort and
say, no. You're not looking at the context.
The context is Isaiah is talking to Ahaz,
and then
the son is born in Isaiah chapter 8.
That's what he's talking about. Justin would retort
and say, well, that's the exoteric element
of the prophecy.
So
for Justin Martyr and for Matthew as well,
Matthew the evangelist will quote this passage in
his gospel.
There's an exoteric element of scripture, and there's
an esoteric element.
There's an apparent element,
and there's an unapparent
element. And Imam Qazawi, who's one of the
greatest Muslim theologians
and philosophers in middle ages, highly influenced,
the likes of Saint Thomas Aquinas.
He says and he's quoting a hadith. He
says it's either hadith, the statement of the
prophet, or statement of Ali, the prophet's companion.
Or the prophet
and for the Quran, there is an outward
exoteric element, and there's also an esoteric element.
Right? So Matthew is quoting Isaiah chapter 7
and saying, yes, on the surface,
it's fulfilled in Isaiah chapter 8, king Ahaz
as a sun, so on and so forth.
But it's a Christological
typology,
and it's esoteric element.
It's a foreshadowing of the birth of the
Jewish messiah.
This is how Justin approaches scripture. This is
how origin approaches scripture. Origin of Alexandria, one
of the greatest most prolific pre Nicene early
church fathers,
was anathematized
eventually in 5 53 the common era, because
at the end of the day, he was
a subordinationist,
and that didn't fly obviously with the proto
orthodox
Christians, but he wrote over a 1,000 books.
Right? And
he said that scripture has indeed these multiple
levels of meaning.
So keep that in mind when we quote
some of these these passages,
that this is how Muslims read the scripture
as well. That there's an exoteric meaning. And
Imam Ghazali, he
he
condemns those who look at the apparent meaning
only and forget what's on
beneath the surface. They're He
calls them literalists.
Right? And then he also condemns those who
strictly look at the esoteric element but ignore
the apparent element. He calls these people the
the esotericism. And he says the successful combines
both.
Right? So keep that in mind for now.
So there is a,
prophecy that Muslims are quoting
will tend to quote,
from the book of Deuteronomy, the
book of Deuteronomy,
which God says to Moses,
is the Hebrew. I I'm only fluent in
English, by the way. I mean, because that's
the language I cuss in
and I dream in. A little bit of
other languages as well, but it's more of
an academic understanding. It's not like I can
get up and give a sermon in ancient
Greek or anything like that.
So this is a very interesting prophecy. Very,
very interesting.
A prophet I will raise up from their
brethren. So there's many elements of this prophecy.
Now the Quran,
interestingly enough, it says
that those who are given the previous scripture,
they know the prophet Muhammad, peace be upon
him. Like, they know one of their own
sons.
When the prophet came into Medina during the
Hijra, he made a migration, a major migration,
just like Moses made a major migration, which
will come into play when we talk about
this prophecy. But there's a similarity between the
two men. When he came into Medina, a
Jewish rabbi named Abdullah ibn Salam made a
very interesting comment. He said,
he said, I can tell just by looking
at his face that it wasn't the face
of a liar. So some of the exigence
of Hadith, they wonder why did he say
that? Is it because the prophet just had
an honest looking face?
Or perhaps he recognized
the prophet, the physical description of the prophet.
We'll talk about that later, as well.
Other verses in the Quran says that the
nabeer ummi,
which is translated as unlettered prophet, it can
be translated as gentile prophet,
the motherly prophet, the compassionate prophet. There's different
ways of translating.
He is mentioned or he is he is
mentioned by name in the Torah
or described in the Torah and in the
Injil. Al Injil means Iwan Gileon, the gospel.
So this prophecy is interesting because it says,
that this prophet is from their brethren. Who
are the brethren of the ancient Israelites? Other
Israelites. This is this is true. In Deuteronomy
chapter 17, the Israelites were commanded to pick
a king from your brethren, min Achaim. Right?
And they picked Saul from the tribe of
Benjamin.
But we also
hear that the Edomites
and the Edomites don't have a good reputation,
but we won't get into that. But the
Edomites were descendants of Esau, their brother Jacob.
What does God say about them in Deuteronomy
23:7?
Says, abhor not the Edomite, for he is
your. He is your brother.
Right? Well, he's your brother. So the Edomites,
who are Arabs,
are described as brethren of the Israelites. So
there's a general principle that's established here is
that the children of 2 brothers are brethren
to one another. So the brother of Ishmael
is Isaac, the prophet Muhammad, peace be upon
him,
is a descendant of Ishmael,
alayhis salam.
So their
progenies are brethren to one another. And then
it says,
Kamocha,
this prophet is going to be like you.
It's gonna be like Moses.
Right? Now I try to find these correspondences
between Moses and Mohammed, peace be upon him.
Interestingly enough,
as the story goes, when the prophet, peace
be upon him, was 40 years old, he
used to go to this cave in this
mountain called Jabal An Nur, the mountain of
light, for what's known as, or
in Hebrew, which is some sort of devotional
practice he would do in the cave. And
then he was visited by an angel. This
is a story that's given in Sira literature,
in Hadith literature.
The angel came to him and said,
and the prophet responded,
read, I cannot read. And this goes back
and forth, which is very interesting also because
we read in Isaiah 2912,
the book is 1 the book is given
to one who knoweth no letters.
The book is given to one who is
who
is unlettered,
and it shall be said to him in
Hebrew,
and
is the exact cognate of the Arabic.
It is exactly the same word. And he
shall answer,
I don't know the book. I am unlettered.
So there's a perfect prophecy of the prophet,
peace be upon him. Of course, you have
people who would say, operating under a hermeneutic
of suspicion. So the prophet knew it and
engineered it so. Right? And this goes back
to, like, Justin and his Jewish interlocutor debating.
Right? So why do you believe Jesus is
the Messiah? The Christian would say, look, in
the book of Zechariah, it says the king
of Zion sits on a donkey.
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Jesus came into
Jerusalem sitting on a donkey. And then the
Jewish interlocutor would say, why don't Jesus knew
that? And he engineered it. He self fulfilled
it. Right? A hermeneutic of suspicion.
Right? That's one way of looking at the
scripture. Anyway,
after this happens, the prophet goes to his
wife, Khadija, and he tells her what had
happened. And she's not a scholar, so she
said, let's go to a scholar, which is
a great lesson. That if you don't know
what the Quran says,
If you don't know, go to the people
of knowledge.
So they go to who? A Christian scribe
named Waraqa bin Nafar.
And what does Waraqa say?
There has come unto you the great nomos.
Namos is the Greek word for the Torah.
It's called Pentateuch
or the law of God.
Right? There has come unto you the law
of God.
Just like it came, and this article is
interesting because That's exactly what's used in Deuteronomy
18 18. Kamaha,
like you. This will be like you.
The great law has come unto you just
as it came to Moses. This is what
Waratah Ben Nofa tells the prophet Muhammad, peace
be upon him. The prophet Muhammad, he said
to his cousin, Adi,
Adi,
He said, are you not pleased that you
are to me as Aaron was to Moses?
So he has that correspondence.
The biggest the most important correspondence, I think,
between Moses and Mohammed, peace be upon both
of them, is that both were given sharia,
halakhah,
a system of law, divine law.
God revealed a complete system of law, sacred
law in its outward and inward aspects.
And the Quran says
in many places
that there is a similarity between the 2
men.
We gave Moses the book of the law.
So don't be in doubt about it reaching
you.
Right? You're going to also receive
this law, this great law of God, the
nomos,
the,
the namos al aqbar. So there's a similarity
there. Another verse in the Quran says,
Verily we have sent a messenger
to be a witness over you just as
we had sent a messenger unto the pharaoh.
Again, this oracle of comparison is used. So
the Hebrews
said,
from their brethren, this prophet will be like
you.
I will put my words into his mouth.
I will put my words into his mouth.
And he will speak unto them everything that
I command him. He does not speak except
by the command of God. Right?
The Quran says the prophet does not speak
from his Hawa.
He does not speak from his own caprice,
his own desire. It is no less an
inspiration sent down to him. And some Muslims
will say that this prophecy in 18/18
finds
further description
in the descriptions of the Yohannian gospels Para
Platos, the paraclete of the gospel of John,
which many Christian exegetes
will say that, for example, Raymond Brown, in
the anger bible will say later on, it
was ascribed to the Holy Spirit, but it
could have been a different type of salvific
figure that was later infused with the Holy
Spirit. But that's a different topic altogether. Now
this prophet of 18 18 Deuteronomy,
it's carried into the New Testament.
So we are told from the gospel of
John, which was written around 90 of the
common era, a 10110 of the common era,
that's the dominant opinion of biblical scholars, New
Testament scholars.
That the Jews in that during that time
were
expecting the coming of 3 great luminaries.
Three great luminaries.
Right? So it says here this is the
passage I have on the sheet there. It's
it's in the Koine Greek. So, basically, it
says, and this is a witness of John.
When Jews from Jerusalem
sent priests and Levites to John in order
to ask him,
who are you?
And he confessed and did not deny. He
and he confessed,
I am not the Messiah.
So this is the first person that the
children of Israel were waiting for at the
time of the gospel of John, according to
the gospel of John.
They're waiting for the Christ. And then they
say,
Are you Elijah?
According to the book of 2nd Kings, Elijah
was carried up into a chariot of fire
into the heavens, and there was a dominant
belief amongst Jewish elements in the 1st century,
2nd century that he's going to precede the
coming of the Messiah.
And he says what? He says, no.
I am not. And then they say,
Are you the prophet?
Right? So they're not asking him, are you
a prophet?
Right? It's not it's not indefinite.
Is a definite article in point 8 Greek.
Are you the prophet?
Right? And he says, oh, which means no.
Right? So these are the 3 people that
they were waiting for, these great luminaries that
were supposed to come. Elias or Elijah, Elias,
Ariza, Eliyahu,
and Mashiach, the Messiah, the Christ,
and
who? And Nabi,
the prophet. Nabi Hakim Lahemica, the prophet that's
like Moses.
So as according to Stephen l Harris, these
two people are different. The Christ and the
prophet are 2 different, separate, and distinct people.
We cannot conflate the 2. And the evidence
of this is found also in the gospel
of John. When we read John chapter 7,
it's also something I've produced here. It's the
verse under that.
Jesus is in Galilee. He's performing all of
these miracles.
Right? And people don't really know what to
make of him.
So it says here that some of the
people said
This truly is the prophet.
This is the prophet.
Right? Referring to what? Deuteronomy 18/18. This is
the prophet likened to Moses.
And then it says others said
others
said,
This is the Christ. And there was a
schisma between them. There's a difference of opinion.
Is this the Christ or is this the
prophecy? They're 2 separate and distinct people. They're
not 1 and the same.
Right?
So Muslims will say that this is indeed
a prophecy of the holy prophet Muhammad, peace
and blessings of God be upon him. Now
something else I wanted to talk about,
another passage
which
No. I'm going very fast here.
This is an interesting passage. This is from
the Song of Solomon.
So the Song of Solomon is called Shirah
Hashirim
in Hebrew, which is a way of making
the superlative in the Hebrew. You repeat the
word and you make it plural,
like the best king is who? The king
of kings. The best book is the book
of books. The best shir, the best poem,
or the best song is a shir Hasinim,
the Song of Psalms. So traditionally, this was
believed to have been offered by Solomon's 3000
years ago. Now what's interesting is
on the surface, right, the exoteric element suggests
that this is simply a dialogue between a
lover and a beloved, and we should make
nothing more of that. That's what it is.
But Jewish exigence and Christian exigence, they have
different ways of reading the scripture.
So many Jewish exigence will say that this
is actually at the esoteric level,
depicting God's relationship with Israel,
the lover and the beloved.
Christian exegetes will say this is depicting at
its esoteric level, its unapparent level,
the relationship between Christ and the church.
Roger Aylesworth, who's the president of the Illinois
Baptist Association, he actually wrote a book called
He is Altogether Lovely, Finding Christ in the
Song of Solomon.
That's how he reads the scripture. There's an
exoteric element. There's an esoteric element. So let's
look at this description. It's really interesting. I'm
going to be quoting from chapter 5 starting
in verse 10 from the Shirah Hashem.
It says here,
My beloved
is white and red, chief amongst 10,000.
So Muslims immediately recognized. Right? Right when we
read that word, Dhodi, we say, oh, this
is a title of the prophet Muhammad, peace
be upon him. Because
Islamic
prophetology,
is Habibullah, the beloved of God. He has
the station of Mahapa,
the station of love, which is the highest
station.
Now
doctor Nafi, he quoted the verse.
We don't make distinctions between prophets.
Right. We don't do that.
This is first person, common, singular, plural. We
don't make distinctions, but we believe as Muslims
that God has them a different
That some prophets are above others. They have
a higher station
than others. This is what the Quran says.
And we believe that the prophet Muhammad is.
He is the best of creation.
He is creation. He's a human being. He's
a human being, but he's the best human
being. Right? So our position regarding the prophet
is analogous to Arius's position regarding Christ represented
at the Synod of Nicaea 325 of the
Common Era, when Arius said that Christ is.
He's the best of creation, but he's
not.
He doesn't share an essence with God, because
he considered that to be idolatry.
Right? So Muslims believe that, but he's the
best human being. Like the poet said,
He said, Muhammad, peace be upon him, is
a human being, but he's not like other
human beings.
He's a diamond or a ruby and everyone
else is a stone.
A a diamond is still a stone.
Essentially, it's the same as any other stone.
It's a stone. Right?
But it's the greatest stone, possibly. I don't
know. What's better than a diamond?
Anyway, so it says my beloved is white
and red.
And if you look at descriptions of the
prophet, peace be upon him, there's a whole
genre of literature called Shamal literature.
Shamal
literature.
This is literature that's dedicated to describing the
physical attributes of the prophet.
His physicality
as well as his comportment,
His and his, his outward and inward, his
and,
aspects.
So interestingly,
Imam Ali, he describes the prophet in the
Shamayil of Abu'i Saidi Midi. This is probably
the most famous book of Shamayil
written
by a scholar. He says, His
complexion
was a white with redness.
A white with redness. That was his complexion.
My beloved is white and red.
Chief amongst 10,000.
So many Muslim scholars would would say that
this is probably a reference to the conquest
of Mecca, when the prophet, peace be upon
him, came into the city of Mecca with
10,000 companions
and took control of the city without any,
one getting killed. There was no vengeance. He
parted the city, declared a general amnesty.
He climbed he climbed
a little hill called Abu Qubeis,
and he said,
God has, there is no blemish upon you
today. God has forgiven you. And sometimes we
forget this at this aspect of the prophet.
The prophet's
magnanimous character,
his gentleness. The prophet
peace be upon him.
His wife said and nobody knows better no
one no one knows the man better than
the wife. Trust me. No one knows the
man better than the wife. What did she
say? Aisha. She said,
The Prophet never struck anything. Not a woman,
a a boy, a woman, a servant, never
struck anyone with his hand.
He never struck anyone with his this is
what his wife said, who grew up in
his household. This is what Adi also said,
who grew up in his household. You know,
the prophet at the Battle of Uhfud,
there was a battle called Hazwad Uhfud. And
the prophet was wounded in his blessed face,
and there was blood streaming down his face.
And he was seen trying to
catch the blood with his hands.
Right? And his companions said, what are you
doing? And he said, help me,
catch the blood. And he was absorbing the
blood with his sleeves and trying to catch
it. I said, why do you wanna do
that? He said, if one drop of this
blood should strike the earth,
then immediately
immediately our enemies, the people we're fighting right
now, will be struck, annihilated, obliterated by angels
immediately.
So his companion said,
that's good.
Isn't that good?
Let it flow.
So a short time later, he was seen
with his hands up in the air supplicating,
and the companion said,
now it's over. Game over for our enemies.
So they heard him and he said,
Mhmm. Oh, god, guide my people for they
don't
know. You know, we're told that when Jesus
is on the cross of course, Christians don't
believe I'm sorry. Muslims don't believe that Jesus
was crucified.
Major difference.
But according to Luke and by the way,
the vast majority of biblical scholars, new testament
textual critics do not believe Jesus actually said
this. So they put it in brackets, and
it's in brackets in critical editions of the
new testament. Anyway, it's there in brackets. Jesus
is on the cross and he says,
father forgive them for they know not what
they do. We hear that all the time.
Every Jesus movie I've ever seen.
But he didn't really say that according to
the vast majority of Christian exigence. Now does
that mean that Jesus is not a merciful
person? Of course, he is. Of course, he's
a merciful person, But we never hear anything
like that ascribed to the prophet Muhammad. And
these are sound traditions that the prophet prayed
for his enemies with blood streaming down his
face. When he's in a position of power,
when he's in a position to exact vengeance,
he forgives them.
And this is because of the great prophetic
and Quranic imperative.
The Quran says, repel evil with beauty.
Repel evil with beauty.
Push back
evil with beauty. This is what the Quran
said. He never returned an evil for evil.
This is what his wife said. No one
knows the man better than his wife.
Don't ask my
wife. So then it says I can't read
this whole thing because it's too long. I'm
running out of time here. It says,
that his head is like gold. His locks
are wavy and black as a raven.
So going back to the Shamani literature of
Imam Ali, he describes the prophet's hair.
He says, The prophet's hair was not curly
nor straight, but something between that. It was
wavy and extremely black. Now what's very interesting,
the word
here in the Hebrew is usually trans is
always translated into English, every translation I've seen.
It's translated as raven,
black as a raven.
There was a Bible translation done by,
Fenton around 1920
called the Holy Bible in modern English. Because
this word,
it appears in another passage in the plural,
first Kings chapter 17 verse 4, where god,
Adonai Elohim, he commands Eliyahu, Elijah,
to go,
and
into the wilderness. And he says that
the the plural of are
going to feed you there.
So Fenton, he translated that as Arabs.
The Arabs are going to feed you there.
Why did he translate that as Arabs? Because
this word is also the word for Arab.
Or The
Arabs are going to feed you there. So
it's very, very interesting
that at possibly one of the esoteric levels
of meaning of the shiel Hasidim, his hair
is black and wavy,
as an Arab. And then it,
continues. I don't have time to go through
the entire thing. How much time do I
have left?
2 more hours. Go ahead. Two more hours?
Okay.
Thank
you.
Just I don't want to go over the
time because I want to be fair to
everyone.
I think we're okay. Okay. So verse 15,
the second half of verse 15 that I
want to talk about. It says
His countenance is like Lebanon.
Bahur is a passive participle. Bahur means chosen
like the cedars. He's chosen.
Alright? So one of the titles again of
the prophet Muhammad
is al Mustafa,
al Muhtar, al Mujtabah. These are titles. The
chosen one, the elect one, the one separated
out,
the chosen one, things like that. And it's
also very interesting
because the chosen one of God is also
described
in the book of Isaiah
chapter 42,
the chosen one of God.
Right? Now
when Muslims read the gospel of Matthew, they're
very it's very interesting for me to read
Matthew. Because Matthew, according to Matthew,
all of these
expectations,
prophetological,
messianic expectations, all of them are fulfilled in
the person of Jesus Christ. And sometimes he'll
quote something, and he won't justify his reason
why. Why is this referring to Jesus? So
Matthew in chapter 12 or 13, I think
in chapter 13, he'll quote from Isaiah 42
and say, this is what Isaiah
said, that,
behold my chosen one whom my soul delights.
But he'll misquote the passage, actually.
He adds something. Is my beloved?
But the Septuagint doesn't actually say my beloved,
but he added that.
Right? And at times, he'll quote something from
the Nabiem,
the prophets, that are that is simply not
found anywhere in the Nabiim. For example,
Matthew chapter 2, he shall be called a
Nazarene.
That's nowhere to be found in any book
inside or outside the Hebrew scriptures in the
Old Testament or in the psalm of the
Apocrypha, wherever you look. So it's very interesting.
So Muslims will say, possibly as Yoda once
said, a a prophecy misapplied perhaps.
He uses very bad syntax, by the way.
By the way. Right? Is a Hebrew root
name.
Anyway.
So
anyway, Isaiah 42 is very interesting. I'll go
back to song of songs in a minute.
But it says
and it's a description of the
the slave of God.
Behold my servant whom I uphold,
my chosen one in whom my soul delights.
And it goes on to describe them.
He will not raise his voice in the
marketplace.
And this is exactly how Aisha, again, who
knows the man better than the wife, describes
the prophet. She says,
The prophet did not raise his voice in
the marketplace.
He was soft spoken. He never raised his
voice, let alone raise his hand.
So then it continues,
and I'll I'm gonna wrap it up here,
God willing.
My incoherent ramblings will end soon. I promise.
And then it says in verse 16, this
is an interesting verse. It says,
His mouth is sweet.
He is altogether lovely.
This is my beloved.
This
is my friend.
Oh, daughters of Jerusalem. So
one time. One more
time. So Mahamma
is the name of the prophet, peace be
upon him. So Muslims will say and this
is poetry. So poetry is very
seldom direct. It's indirect. It's elliptical. This is
the nature of poetry.
Right? So there's an echo. There's an actual
echo of the name
of this beloved given in the verse. It's
spelled exactly as the Arabic.
Right?
So this is very, very interesting.
Now Muslims will also say that other places
in the Hebrew bible,
they also contain
sort of an elliptical message. Muslims don't believe
that Jesus was crucified.
Right? And it used to be that,
you
know, when a Muslim or Christian would engage
in dialogue, people don't like word debate, so
I'm gonna avoid it. Linemical discourse. Right?
Lively talk.
Right?
The Christian would say to the Muslim, why
don't you believe Jesus was crucified? Matthew, Mark,
Luke, and John multiply attested. What's wrong with
you? And the Muslim would say, what? Well,
you know, it's the Quran.
There's
They didn't kill him. They didn't crucify him.
Right? So that's why I don't believe in
it.
Right? And that was before
1945 when non hamadi was discovered.
And now we have evidence that there were
Christian denominations
that predate the formation of the new testament
canon
that certainly did not believe that Jesus was
crucified. But at the time, Muslims don't know
this. Muslims also don't know Hebrew, so they
don't know what the book of Psalm says,
chapter 20 verse 6.
It says
what?
So David writes in the Psalms,
I know
I know.
I have known
that God saves his Messiah.
He shall he shall hear him from his
holy heaven with the saving power of his
right hand.
Yeshua.
It's on the form of a passive participle.
It's shortened form of Yehoshua.
Yeshua
means saved by God. That's what his name
means.
Oftentimes in the names of prophets
you have
a secret.
The name Mohammed means the most praised one,
which is very interesting
because
every second of every minute of every hour
of every day of every week of every
month of every year of every day of
every century,
every nanosecond,
24 hours a day to a day of
judgment, somebody is sending blessings of peace upon
the prophet Muhammad peace be upon him. It's
going on right now, because there's Muslims always
praying. And in our prayer, we do what?
We send salawat and the prophet, Mohammed, and
on the progeny of Muhammad, and on the
progeny of who else? Ibrahim alaihis salam,
the prophet Abraham, and his progeny. This is
going on 247,
around the clock until the day of judgment.
His name is Muhammad.
Right? So I always tell Muslims,
you know, nobody
nobody on earth
can ever
compromise that, can ever lessen the rank of
the prophet
by writing something or making some stupid movie
in a garage.
It's like the poet said, it's like dogs
barking at the moon.
Is the moon affected as it traverses the
majestic sky by dogs on earth barking at
it? It doesn't even hear it.
It's not affected by it
barking at the moon. And for us on
earth, it's just white noise.
It's just annoying.
And the Quran says
that,
You're going to hear much from other people
that's going to really bother you.
So what's our response?
This is the response the Quran gives. But
if you show patience
and self constraint, taqwa,
taqwa means consciousness of God,
and sabr, and and patience.
That is the determining factor in all affairs.
This is by order of the Quran.
The prophet, peace be upon him, they used
to make fun of him during his time.
They used to physically abuse him. They used
to revile him in their poetry.
The companions were
and these are desert Arabs. Right?
So they have a hot temperament.
So they said, we have to take vengeance.
And he said, you know, because, you know,
they they made up a name for the
prophet. They used the opposite of his name.
Instead of Muhammad, he called them.
Right? The least praiseworthy.
And they told this to the prophet.
They said, this is what they're saying about
you. And the prophet said, man.
Who is?
I am Mohammed.
And he kind of laughed it off, and
they started laughing with him.
Who cares what people are saying? The Quran
says,
The Quran says, God himself is sending blessings
of peace on the prophet Muhammad. God himself.
God. Forget about what we're doing 247.
Who is God? The
sustainer of the heavens and the earth, Allah.
Allah himself sends blessings of peace upon the
prophet. Who is Allah? The God of Abraham.
Jesus says according to the Peshitta translation of
the new testament in Matthew
59, blessed are those who make peace. They
shall be called the children of Allah.
This is what it says in the Syria.
Children in the sense, not in the literal
sense. Muslims don't get
it. It not in the literal sense.
Jesus, he teaches them the
Lord's. Our father who art in heaven.
What does that mean? It means he's our
here, he's our lord. He's our sustainer, he's
our cherisher.
Right?
So the Quran says that God himself is
sending blessings of peace upon the prophet Muhammad.
If this is true and if we really
believe that as Muslims,
what can some fool do by making some
video or drawing a cartoon?
Nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
Right?
Thank you.
This is a bit controversial, but sometimes some
controversial questions can shed some light. How does
Islam how does Islamic faith define infidels?
Are other people of the book, Jews, Christians,
considered infidels?
So,
should I have a question?
Yeah. Yeah. Actually, that was a Latin word
created by the Roman Catholics.
Sure.
Although that is true.
So
the word in Arabic is kafir,
and kafir literally means a farmer.
What does that have to do with farm?
What does infidelity have to do with farming?
You see, the farmer takes a seed and
he covers it over.
Alright? He hides it.
So the Quran describes
a true kafir,
a true
infidel or a non believer.
It says,
do not clothe the truth with falsehood
nor distort the truth while you have knowledge
of the truth.
Right? While you have knowledge of the truth.
So someone who's a we have to be
very careful
as Muslims when we throw terminology around.
Right? Use the word haram, this is forbidden,
this person's a kafat, so on and so
forth. You see that the difference between someone
who's a kafar as a legal distinction
or a state distinction in a Muslim country,
you're a Muslim or you're not. Right? That's
in the legal sense. But the faith sense,
that's ultimately only known by Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala. That's known by God. So many of
our theologians
the dominant opinion of most of our theologians
is not so much black and white.
Right? I use Imam Ghazabi again as my,
kind of my model, as my kind of
core theologian,
who says that in order for infidelity to
be established,
a person must have, must be
4 criteria.
He says a person must be an adult.
They must have sound intellect.
They must have sound senses.
You know, sight and hearing.
And the prophetic summons
reach that person in a good form,
and then they reject it. A prophetic summons,
either from Jesus or Moses or Mohammed, peace
be upon, all of them. Right?
So for example,
what if you were born in Nottingham
in the 4th century,
and
all you know about is well, I guess
it'll be after that because
Christianity didn't come until a little bit later.
But anyway, let's say 11th century. And all
you know about Muslims is there are infidels
who have taken the holy land, and they're
slaughtering babies in the streets of Jerusalem, and
that's all you know about Muslims.
Then many Muslim theologians will say, well, the
prophetic summons, the true essence of the prophetic
message did not reach that person in a
good form. So you cannot call people.
Right? We have to be very very careful.
The Muslim does not have a personal guarantee
of paradise.
I've been condemned to * many times by
people of different religions, by the way. Many
of them say, you're going to *. You
know that about me? I know for certain.
You're burning *. Really?
Wow. That's amazing. Judge not lest ye be
judged.
Right?
It's John.
So we don't have a personal guarantee. The
Quran, the prophet, peace be upon him,
says.
Whoever
witnesses to that declaration of faith will enter
paradise. It doesn't say,
It say, Adi from San Ramon
is going to go to Jannah. I don't
have a personal guarantee. Because when you have
personal guarantees,
then what happens? We start to act irresponsibly.
I have 2 girls. I tell one of
my girls,
if you're good, we're gonna go to Disneyland
in December.
Oh, yes.
Let me get it. So she tries. She
strives. But if I tell the other one
and I say,
we're gonna go to Disneyland and
do do it everyone.
Yeah. That guarantee. Go do whatever you want.
Then probably she'll be a little lax on
her. So we don't have a personal guarantee.
So the prophet, peace be upon him, he
said, be between hope and faith. Wear the
2 sandals of hope and faith. Don't be
so hopeful in God that you start to
delude yourself and become judgmental.
And don't be so,
no.
I'm sorry. Open faith. Hope and what's the
other word?
Yes. Fear. Open fear. And don't be so
fearful of God
that you start going into despair.
The Quran says in an imperative,
you are not allowed to despair of the
mercy of God. It is is haram. It
is as forbidden as eating pork and drinking
alcohol and committing pilferi.
To be in despair, oh, how can God
forgive me? I'm a terrible person.
God forgives.
God forgives if you make teshuva, you make
tovah, there's a beautiful, happy the prophet, peace
be upon him. After one of the military
expeditions, there was, you know, there was a
battle, and this woman was running around frantic.
She had lost her infant son. Little toddler
could barely crawl around. Right? And,
and this was in front of the some
of the companions. And then the prophets and
then the woman, she saw her son. She
picked him up and started to hug him
and breastfeed him.
And the prophet said, do you see that
woman?
And they said, yes. And the prophet said,
can you imagine
that she would take her child and throw
him in a fire?
Can you imagine
her doing that?
And they said, Allah, Allah, by God, no.
Than this woman is to her son. God
is more merciful. Rahma. Right? Doctor Ijaz,
he said,
These are God's attributes in the Quran. He
is Rahman and Rahim, the most merciful. The
root word here is,
which is a Hebrew word also, which means
the womb of a mother
where the fetus is enclosed.
There's a beautiful analogy here. God is more
merciful to his servants than
the purest type of love on earth, which
is the level of a mother for
her son. I think
I've exhausted the times, but, again,
it's not black and white. It's not cathodeism.
We're not allowed to judge. Right? But be
careful we throw these terms around. God is
the ultimate judge.