Gaze upon your look of hatred, how hideous it is.
Man is brother of man, O learned ones!
Where is the humanity and love? And where are you?
My last words I pray to the Lord of the worlds,
Jesus the Messiah, the Light of Clear Guidance:
Change their hearts and set right their discernment.
May he spread love among you, O Muslims.
Amen, amen. To my sister, Sara Fatima, I say this: You were a Christian for mere months, yet your faith is an example to us all. May your voice echo forever, and may we follow your example as an inspiration, even unto death. We are confident we will be with you soon, in the arms of Jesus.
NOTES
Chapter 5: The Islamic Inquisition
1. Along with Jesus’ deity and the Bible.
Chapter 6: Comparing Tawhid and the Trinity
1. We find out through verses like Philippians 2:10, where a reference to Yahweh in Isaiah 45:23 is substituted with “Jesus,” that the name they share is Yahweh.
2. There is something to be said for this common Muslim response. Christians excommunicated for heretical beliefs such as polytheism often did relocate to areas like Arabia, so this hypothesis is not implausible. However, I have found no actual evidence of such Christians living specifically in Muhammad’s context.
3. I do not use the word threat lightly, but the Arabic word for threat surrounds the verse in question, in 50.14 and 50.20.
4. Technically, Allahu-Akbar is in the comparative form, translating to “God is greater.” For more, see question 14 in my book Answering Jihad: A Better Way Forward (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2016).
Chapter 7: Questioning Complexity
1. John Polkinghorne, Quantum Theory: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2002), 21.
2. Ibid., 21–22.
3. To be clear, I am not saying that echad necessitates a compound unity, but it certainly allows for it. The word echad itself has many potential meanings.
4. Zohar, Bo, 2:43b; found in The Zohar, ed. M. Berg (New York: Kabbalah Centre International, 2003), 121.
5. Alan F. Segal, Two Powers in Heaven: Early Rabbinic Reports about Christianity and Gnosticism (Waco, TX: Baylor Univ. Press, 2012), 150.
6. Daniel Boyarin, Border Lines: The Partition of Judaeo-Christianity (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania, 2004), 89–111.
Chapter 8: Do Muslims and Christians Worship the Same God?
1. For a more thorough answer to this question, see question 13 in Answering Jihad: A Better Way Forward.
Chapter 9: The Council of Nicaea
1. Tacitus, Annals XV.44.
2. Tertullian, Apologeticum L.
Chapter 11: Questioning the God-Man
1. Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel (Sisters, OR: Multnomah, 2005), 107.
Chapter 12: Libya’s Best Friend
1. Anita Smith, “An Open Letter from the Widow of Ronnie Smith to the Libyan People,” December 12, 2013, http://www.RonnieSmithLibya.com.
Chapter 14: Comparing the Quran and the Bible
1. Of course, the analogy breaks down when we consider that there are many copies of the Quran and only one incarnate Jesus, but this is perhaps the closest approximation to describing the symbolic impact of burning the Quran.
2. Although a small number of scholars argue that portions were composed in orality, such as sections of Genesis and the book of Mark, this is strongly contested. And even if these portions were orally composed, the vast majority of the Bible was undoubtedly written.
3. Cf. 16.101.
4. I present here, of course, the Protestant position. There are more parallels between the Catholic and Muslim views of Scripture and authority.
Chapter 15: Questioning Texts
1. “Contradictions in the Qur’an,” http://www.answering-islam.org/Quran/Contra.
2. See chapter 34 for further discussion.
Chapter 16: The First Burning of the Quran
1. Included in those who testify to the inspiration of the Bible are, of course, Muhammad and the Quran.
Chapter 17: The First Crusade
1. See The First Crusade: The Chronicle of Fulcher of Chartres and Other Source Materials, ed. Edward Peters (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania, 1971), as well as Robert the Monk, The Historia Iherosolimitana of Robert the Monk, ed. D. Kempf and M. G. Bull (Woodbridge, UK: Boydell, 2013).
2. Select Documents of European History, 800–1492, ed. R. G. D. Laffan (New York: Henry Holt, 1929). Available as an ebook: https://archive.org/stream/selectdocumentso000965mbp/selectdocumentso000965mbp_djvu.txt.
3. “Daimbert, Godfrey and Raymond, Letter to the Pope (1099),” Hanover College Department of History, October 1997, https://history.hanover.edu/texts/1stcru3.html.
4. Robert Louis Wilken, “Rescuers, Not Invaders,” Wall Street Journal, March 13, 2010, http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703915204575103791369415182.
5. Joseph Michaud, History of the Crusades, vol. 3, trans. W. Robson (London: George Routledge and Co., 1852), 17–18. Please note that I have modernized the language.
6. The one exception was the Umayyads, who were still in the process of systematizing the use of slave warriors. See Daniel Pipes, “Military Slaves: A Uniquely Muslin Phenomenon” (presentation, conference on “The Arming of Slaves from the Ancient World to the American Civil War,” New Haven, CT, November 16–18, 2000). Full text available at http://www.danielpipes.org/448/military-slaves-a-uniquely-muslim-phenomenon.
7. Felix Fabri testifies to Christian mamluks in the fifteenth century.
8. John, Bishop of Nikiu, The Chronicle of John (c. 690 A.D.), Coptic Bishop of Nikiu (Amsterdam: Philo, 1916), chapter CXVI.12.
9. Ibid., chapter CXVIII 4–10.
10. Thomas F. Madden, “Crusade Propaganda: The Abuse of Christianity’s Holy Wars,” National Review, November 2, 2001, http://www.nationalreview.com/article/220747/crusade-propaganda-thomas-f-madden.
11. Found in Katharine J. Lualdi, Source of the Making of the West, Volume I: To 1740: Peoples and Cultures (Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2009), 196.
12. Jonathan Simon Christopher Riley-Smith, The Crusades, Christianity, and Islam (New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 2011), 69.
13. Christopher Tyerman, The Crusades: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2005), 59.
14. Riley-Smith, The Crusades, Christianity, and Islam, 71.
Chapter 18: Comparing the Traditions of the Founders
1. “SAW” represents the common Muslim prayer recited whenever Muslims say the name of Muhammad: “May peace and blessings be upon him.” It is inserted here because my friend said the prayer immediately after saying Muhammad’s name.
2. Sahih Bukhari, Book 84 (or 88, depending on the numbering system), is the Book of Apostates. In it are found hadith like, “Whoever changes his Islamic religion, kill him” (9.84.57).
3. “Attempts to rewrite history occur solely in Western-authored presentations of jihad, or those with Western audiences as the primary focus . . . Perhaps because early Muslim history is heavily emphasized in the Islamic educational curriculum, those who write in Arabic or other Muslim majority languages realize that it is pointless to present jihad as anything other than militant warfare.” David Cook, Understanding Jihad (Berkeley: Univ. of California, 2005), 43.
4. Tafsir al-Qurtubi, the commentary of a thirteenth century imam, comments on 2.256 with a detailed list of the various views of the abrogation of this verse.
5. Tafsir ibn Kathir, though this entry appears inconsistently in printings I have seen. Consider also consulting Qurtubi’s commentary.
6. See Sahih Muslim 3432, 3371; Sunan Abi Dawud 11.2150; and Sahih Bukhari 3.46.718.
7. “Open Letter to Al-Baghdadi,” Letter to Baghdadi, September 14, 2014, http://www.lettertobaghdadi.com.
8. Sunan Abi Dawud 39.4390.
9. Guibert of Nogent, quoted in Riley-Smith, The Crusades: A History, 13–14, emphasis added.
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10. Sahih Bukhari 4.56.2924.
11. Sahih Bukhari 4.52.50.
12. Sahih Bukhari 4.52.44.
13. For more, see Answering Jihad: A Better Way Forward, question 17. Alternatively, see Jonathan Riley-Smith’s The Crusades, Christianity, and Islam.
Chapter 19: Questioning Christian Peacefulness
1. Notice the martial terms in which this word is used: “Repent therefore! Otherwise, I will soon come to you and will fight against them with the sword [rhomphaia] of my mouth” (Rev. 2:16 NIV). Also see Revelation 6:8.
2. Luke 22:35–38 NIV: “Then Jesus asked them, ‘When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?’ ‘Nothing,’ they answered. He said to them, ‘But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. It is written: “And he was numbered with the transgressors”; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment.’ The disciples said, ‘See, Lord, here are two swords.’ ‘That’s enough!’ he replied.”
3. The only potential challenge to this is the temple cleansing, so this deserves some attention. All four gospels describe the event (Matt. 21:12–17; Mark 11:15–19; Luke 19:45–48; and John 2:13–17), but the only account that appears violent is John’s. It describes Jesus seeing cattle sellers, dove sellers, and moneylenders, and then making a whip and driving out all from the temple. But a careful reading of the Greek shows that Jesus expelled all three of these groups differently, none with violence against people. First, he only struck the sheep and oxen: He “drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle” (NIV). The cattle having been driven out, their sellers followed. Jesus then turned over the tables of the money changers, causing them to leave. Finally, Jesus did not release the doves as this would amount to stealing them, but he told their sellers in his zeal to depart. So Jesus systematically purged the temple, having struck no man and not in a blind rage.
4. Ibn Kathir, tafsir.
5. Sahih Muslim 1767a.
6. See Suyuti’s Itqan fi Ulum al-Quran.
7. Sahih Muslim 1910; 33.226; 20.4696; Book on Government #47.
Section: Question 2
1. A Muslim might object, saying that “Jesus is Lord” might simply mean “Jesus is a lord” or “Jesus is a prophet,” but the context of Romans precludes this interpretation. Not only does such a reading usually impose an anachronistic Islamic understanding of lordship and prophets on the text, but also verse 13 clarifies which Lord is in mind. It quotes Joel 2:32 NIV: “Everyone who calls on the name of the LORD will be saved,” where LORD is a rendering of the divine name, Yahweh. In its context, Romans 10:9 is saying Jesus is the LORD Yahweh, the God who saves. It is also insightful to remember that this is the exact meaning of the name “Jesus”: “God saves.”
2. This is most clearly found in Matthew 12:39–40.
3. An objection here may be that “Allah” refers to a generic concept of God, not a specific one, and the shahada just proclaims monotheism. This is a common rhetorical move, but the answer is apparent upon consideration: The message of Muhammad teaches specific doctrines about God (e.g., he is not a Father, he is not a Son, he helped Muslims in the Battle of Badr, he chose Muhammad as a prophet, etc.). Together, the message of Muhammad forms a notion of God that is implicit in the word Allah. Therefore in the shahada, “Allah” refers to the God that Muhammad preached, the God of Islam.
4. Quran 2.23; 10.37–38; 11.13; 17.88; 52.33–34.
5. Acts 1:22; 2:24, 29–32; 3:15; 5:29–32; 10:39–41; 13:26–37; 17:30–32; 23:6; 24:15–21; 26:6–8, 23.
Chapter 21: The Positive Case
1. Gerd Lüdemann, “The Decline of Academic Theology at Göttingen,” Religion 32, no. 2 (2002), 87–94.
2. Gerd Lüdemann, What Really Happened to Jesus: A Historical Approach to the Resurrection, trans. John Bowden (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1995), 17.
3. Paula Fredriksen, Jesus of Nazareth: King of the Jews (New York: Vintage, 1999), emphasis mine.
4. John Dominic Crossan, The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1991), 375.
5. John Dominic Crossan, Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1991), 145.
6. I must point out here, though, that unlike the other scholars to whom I referred, Reza Aslan is not a scholar of New Testament or historical Jesus studies but a scholar in sociology of religion and a professor of creative writing.
7. Interview with Lauren Green.
8. In fact, some scholars say that this teaching was formulated less than a year after Jesus’ death: “This tradition, we can be entirely confident, was formulated as tradition within months of Jesus’ death.” James D. G. Dunn, Jesus Remembered (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), 855.
9. It should be understood here, though, that the implications of “converting” or becoming a Christian from a Jewish background at this point in Christian history are not fully known, and the term Christian when juxtaposed with Jew or even non-Christian is unavoidably problematic. But terminology aside, the point stands: They were not simply defending what they already believed.
10. Matthew 28:12–15.
11. Marcus Tullius Cicero, Pro Lege Manilia. Pro Caecina. Pro Cluentio. Pro Rabirio Perduellionos, trans. H. Grose Hodge (Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press, 1990), 467.
12. Seneca, Epistles 93–127, trans. Richard M. Gummere (Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press, 1925), 167.
13. Josephus, Antiquities 12.256.
14. Martin Hengel, Crucifixion in the Ancient World and the Folly of the Message of the Cross (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), 31–32.
15. Josephus, Jewish War 6.304 and 2.612.
16. Seneca, Epistles, 167.
17. Hengel, Crucifixion in the Ancient World and the Folly of the Message of the Cross, 9.
18. The only possible exception is found in Josephus’s autobiography. He tells of seeing three personal acquaintances in the process of being crucified. Being a friend of the soon-to-be emperor, he tearfully told Titus about this. Titus “commanded immediately that they be taken down, and to have the greatest care taken of them that they might recover.” Two of the three died regardless, though one friend survived. That is the only recorded account of anyone in Roman history surviving crucifixion: a partial, interrupted crucifixion victim who was given an emperor’s best medical treatment. There is no one on record to whom the full punishment has been meted who has survived. Josephus, Life, 420–21.
19. Hengel, Crucifixion in the Ancient World and the Folly of the Message of the Cross, 3.
Chapter 22: The Islamic Response
1. It is important to know, while reading this verse, that the early Christians understood Jesus’ resurrection as being saved from death. See Acts 2:31–32.
Chapter 23: Assessing the Islamic Response
1. I do not think an “objective observer” is ipso facto a naturalist. Naturalism is itself a conclusion that entails its own biases. I think an objective observer must allow for the existence of God without asserting it.
2. I am not here arguing that this is a sufficient condition for concluding a miracle has occurred, but that it is a necessary condition. Many phenomena that are inexplicable for a time are later explained by additional knowledge. Further reason for believing a miracle has happened should be adduced. See chapter 25 for further discussion.
3. Josephus, Antiquities 18.85–88.
4. Josephus, Jewish War 2.175–177.
5. That is also the case in the other reference to this account, 3.49.
6. Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, eds., “The Arabic Gospel of the Infancy of the Saviour,” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers: Fathers of the Third and Fourth Centuries; The Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, the Clementina, Apocrypha, Decretals, Memoirs of Edessa and Syriac Documents, Remains of the First Ages, trans. Alexander Walker, vol. 8 (Buffalo: Christian Literatu
re Company, 1886), 405.
7. Thus K. Aland, W. Bauer, W. Foerster, G. May, E. Procter, and A. Gregory; for a fuller discussion on whether the book should be called a ‘gospel,’ see J. A. Kelhoffer, “Basilides’s Gospel and ‘Exegetica (Treatises)’ ” Vigiliae Christianae 59, no. 2 (2005), 115–34.
8. Irenaeus of Lyons, “Irenæus against Heresies,” in The Ante-Nicene Fathers: The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, ed. Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 1, (Buffalo: Christian Literature Company, 1885), 349.
9. Ibid., emphasis mine.
Chapter 24: Conclusion
1. This is true apart from the vindication of this message by the resurrection, of course—though the incredibility of the resurrection might compound the unappealing nature of the message in the eyes of some audiences, as well.
Chapter 25: The Positive Case
1. Acts 1:22; 2:24, 29–32; 3:15; 5:29–32; 10:39–41; 13:26–37; 17:30–31; 23:6; 24:15–21; 26:6–8, 23.
2. 1 Corinthians 15:19.
3. This debate can be watched online: ThomisticTheist (YouTube user), “Did Jesus Rise from the Dead? Michael Licona vs. Shabir Ally,” YouTube.com, uploaded August 19, 2013, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTyqQlBGX_4.
4. Of course, what mattered was not the scholarly consensus so much as the reason for the consensus: The evidence was so strong that virtually everyone who studied the matters agreed.
5. James D. G. Dunn, Jesus Remembered (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), 855.
6. It is striking that Peter’s verbiage begins in a manner very similar to the creed of 1 Corinthians 15:3–8.
7. A. J. M. Wedderburn, Beyond Resurrection (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1999), 13.
8. See 2 Corinthians 11:24–26 and Acts 14:19. The record of Paul’s execution is found in 1 Clement 5, a few short years after his death. Paul’s manner of execution is recorded in Eusebius’ Historia Ecclesiastica 2.25.5.
9. The four are: Josephus, Hegesippus, Clement of Alexandria, and Eusebius. Unfortunately, the accounts of Clement and Hegesippus are only preserved in Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History; the former in 2.1.3–5 as well as 2.23.3, the latter in 2.23.3–19. Eusebius’ account of Josephus is found immediately following, 2.23.20–25, though there are some discrepancies between his record and the record of our manuscripts of Josephus, which records the account beginning in Antiquities 20.200.
No God but One: Allah or Jesus?: A Former Muslim Investigates the Evidence for Islam and Christianity Page 27
