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 IslamiCity Forum - Islamic Discussion Forum : Religion - Islam : Islam for non-Muslims |
 Topic: Questions by Thomas, while studying Qur'a |
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thomasd
Groupie 
Joined: 13 July 2008 Online Status: Offline Posts: 43 |
   Posted: 10 February 2009 at 8:21pm |
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ok. so. I have a question for all of you.
Genesis 10 and 11 have the genealogies of Nimrod and Abraham, and according to this, they lived approximately 7 generations apart. Much later Jewish tradition developed tales of conflicts between Nimrod and Abraham, but these are more in the vein of what would be considered folktales juxtaposing two well known historical characters, rather than authentic historical record. Nonetheless, the Qur'an mirrors the later narrative, rather than the former, and I'm curious as to what the accepted explanation for this is, or how many of you have come across this particular information before. Naturally, it seems implausible to me that two men, living 7 generations apart would come in direct conflict with each other. |
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seekshidayath
Female Islam Senior Member 
Joined: 26 March 2006 Location: India Online Status: Offline Posts: 3337 |
Posted: 11 February 2009 at 5:45pm |
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Hello Thomas,
Glad to see you active.
 Yes, Qur'an mirrors only the later narrative you mentioned. We don't have any genealogy of Namrud and Abraham {Peace be on him}.
I guess abt living seven generations apart,must be a logical error at Genesis. You said, you don't read old testament, else i would have shown you such errors in it.
We will look at one such error from Mathews
"So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; and from David until the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations; and from the carrying away into Babylon unto Christ are fourteen generations." [Matt. 1:17]
It is obviously not correct, because since the first group from Abraham to David, includes David in it, he must be excluded from the second group as he cannot be counted twice. The second group should start with Solomon and end with Jeconias, thus excluding him from the third group. The third group should start from Salathiel, which leaves only 13 generations in the last group.
Now to an other error
Paul reported God's word regarding the prominence of Jesus over the angels in his letter to the Hebrews [Heb. 1:5]: "I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son." Christian scholars have claimed that this is a reference to the verses in 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles . This claim is not acceptable for several reasons.
1. The text of Chronicles is unambiguous saying that the son's name will be Solomon.
2. Both the texts say that he would build a house in the name of God. This can only be applied to Solomon who built the house of God, as promised. Jesus, on the other hand was born one thousand and three years after the construction of this house and used to talk of its destruction.
3. Both predictions foretold that he would be a king, where as Jesus was not a king, on the contrary he was a poor man as he himself said:
"And Jesus saith unto him, The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the son of man hath not where to lay his head." [Matt. 8:20]
4. It is clearly stated in the first prediction that:
"If he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men."
This implies that he will be a man of iniquitous nature. According to the Christians – and they are far from the truthSolomon was a man of that nature and gave up the prophethood and became an apostate in his last days, indulging in idol worship, building temples for the idols, and committing himself to heathenism. Whereas Jesus was absolutely innocent, and could not commit a sin of any kind.
5. In the text of Chronicles it says clearly:
"Who shall be a man of rest, and I will give him rest from all his enemies round about."
However, Jesus, according to the Christians, was never in peace right from his early days up to the time of the crucifixion. He lived in constant fear of the Jews and left one place for another until he was arrested by them and, they say, killed. Solomon, on the other hand, fulfilled the condition of living in rest from his enemies.
6. In the prediction of Chronicles the Israelites are promised:
"I will give peace and quieteness unto Israel in his days."
Whereas it is historically known to everyone that the Jews were servile to and dominated by the Romans in the time of Jesus.
7. The Prophet Solomon, himself has claimed that the prediction was made about him. This is clear from 2 Chronicles.
Although the Christians agree that these tidings were for Solomon, they say that it was in fact for Jesus too, as he was a descendant of Solomon. We contend that this is a false claim because the attributes of the predicted son must coincide with the description of the prophecy. We have already shown that Jesus does not fulfill the requirements of the prediction.
Apart from this, Jesus cannot be the subject of this prediction, even according to the Christian scholars. In order to remove the contradiction between the genealogical descriptions of Jesus in Mathew and Luke, they have said that Matthew described the genealogy of Joseph of Nazareth, while Luke described the genealogy of Mary. However, Jesus was not the son of Joseph, but rather the son of Mary, and according to her genealogy Jesus is the descendant of Nathan, son of David, and not the son of Solomon. Hope you agree with it.
Edited by seekshidayath - 11 February 2009 at 5:50pm |
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Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: “All the descendants of Adam are sinners, and the best of sinners are those who repent."
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thomasd
Groupie
Joined: 13 July 2008 Online Status: Offline Posts: 43 |
Posted: 12 February 2009 at 6:47pm |
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Originally posted by seekshidayath Hello Thomas, Glad to see you active.
Yes, Qur'an mirrors only the later narrative you mentioned. We don't have any genealogy of Namrud and Abraham {Peace be on him}.
I guess abt living seven generations apart,must be a logical error at Genesis. You said, you don't read old testament, else i would have shown you such errors in it. I do read the Old Testament, however our covenant with God is the covenant of the Jesus's sacrifice in the New Testament. Nimrod: 1 This is the account of Shem, Ham and Japheth, Noah's sons, who themselves had sons after the flood. The Japhethites2 The sons [a] of Japheth:Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech and Tiras. 3 The sons of Gomer: 4 The sons of Javan: The Hamites6 The sons of Ham:Cush, Mizraim, [c] Put and Canaan. 7 The sons of Cush: 8 Cush was the father [d] of Nimrod, who grew to be a mighty warrior on the earth. 9 He was a mighty hunter before the LORD; that is why it is said, "Like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the LORD." 10 The first centers of his kingdom were Babylon, Erech, Akkad and Calneh, in [e] Shinar. [f] 11 From that land he went to Assyria, where he built Nineveh, Rehoboth Ir, [g] Calah 12 and Resen, which is between Nineveh and Calah; that is the great city. Abraham (or rather Abram, as this is before God changed his name)
10 This is the account of Shem. Two years after the flood, when Shem was 100 years old, he became the father [d] of Arphaxad. 11 And after he became the father of Arphaxad, Shem lived 500 years and had other sons and daughters. 12 When Arphaxad had lived 35 years, he became the father of Shelah. 13 And after he became the father of Shelah, Arphaxad lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters. [e] 14 When Shelah had lived 30 years, he became the father of Eber. 15 And after he became the father of Eber, Shelah lived 403 years and had other sons and daughters. 16 When Eber had lived 34 years, he became the father of Peleg. 17 And after he became the father of Peleg, Eber lived 430 years and had other sons and daughters. 18 When Peleg had lived 30 years, he became the father of Reu. 19 And after he became the father of Reu, Peleg lived 209 years and had other sons and daughters. 20 When Reu had lived 32 years, he became the father of Serug. 21 And after he became the father of Serug, Reu lived 207 years and had other sons and daughters. 22 When Serug had lived 30 years, he became the father of Nahor. 23 And after he became the father of Nahor, Serug lived 200 years and had other sons and daughters. 24 When Nahor had lived 29 years, he became the father of Terah. 25 And after he became the father of Terah, Nahor lived 119 years and had other sons and daughters. 26 After Terah had lived 70 years, he became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran. 27 This is the account of Terah. 31 Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Haran, they settled there. 32 Terah lived 205 years, and he died in Haran. It is obviously not correct, because since the first group from Abraham to David, includes David in it, he must be excluded from the second group as he cannot be counted twice. The second group should start with Solomon and end with Jeconias, thus excluding him from the third group. The third group should start from Salathiel, which leaves only 13 generations in the last group. It doesn't matter if David is counted twice, as it never claims there were 42 generations, it just relates how many generations there were from Abraham - David and David - exile Before I rebutt the rest of your post, I agree that the particular prophesy you are talking about was referring to Solomon, however the specifics of your argument in favor of that are incorrect. Both the texts say that he would build a house in the name of God. This can only be applied to Solomon who built the house of God, as promised. Jesus, on the other hand was born one thousand and three years after the construction of this house and used to talk of its destruction. And that he would be rebuild it in three days, this being a metaphor for his own resurrection, for after he rose from the dead, we no longer needed to offer sacrifices through priests to speak to God, we could do it directly, and so HE took the place of the temple as the way by which we speak with God. Indeed, at the moment of his death the current separating the Holy of Holies (where it was beleived that God dwelt) from the rest of the temple ripped in half. Both predictions foretold that he would be a king, where as Jesus was not a king, on the contrary he was a poor man as he himself said 1Then the whole assembly rose and led him off to Pilate. 2And they began to accuse him, saying, "We have found this man subverting our nation. He opposes payment of taxes to Caesar and claims to be Christ,[a] a king." 3So Pilate asked Jesus, "Are you the king of the Jews?" If he is a direct descendant of David (interestingly enough, both Mary and Joseph were descendants of David) then he was certainly of the royal bloodline of Israel, and if he was truly God-incarnate as I believe, then he is the king above all kings. However, Jesus, according to the Christians, was never in peace right from his early days up to the time of the crucifixion. He lived in constant fear of the Jews and left one place for another until he was arrested by them and, they say, killed. Solomon, on the other hand, fulfilled the condition of living in rest from his enemies. How could he possibly have been in fear of "the Jews"? He was one, and for that matter most of the people adored him. 36Then Jesus
went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to
them, "Sit here while I go over there and pray." 37He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. 38Then he said to them, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me." 39Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will." 40Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. "Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour?" he asked Peter. 41"Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak." 42He went away a second time and prayed, "My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done." 43When he came back, he again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. 44So he left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing. 45Then he returned to the disciples and said to them, "Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour is near, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. 46Rise, let us go! Here comes my betrayer!" Jesus Arrested47While he was still speaking, Judas, one of the Twelve, arrived. With him was a large crowd armed with swords and clubs, sent from the chief priests and the elders of the people. 48Now the betrayer had arranged a signal with them: "The one I kiss is the man; arrest him." 49Going at once to Jesus, Judas said, "Greetings, Rabbi!" and kissed him.50Jesus replied, "Friend, do what you came for."[d] Then the men stepped forward, seized Jesus and arrested him. 51With that, one of Jesus' companions reached for his sword, drew it out and struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his ear. 52"Put your sword back in its place," Jesus said to him, "for all who draw the sword will die by the sword. 53Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels? 54But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say it must happen in this way?" 55At that time Jesus said to the crowd, "Am I leading a rebellion, that you have come out with swords and clubs to capture me? Every day I sat in the temple courts teaching, and you did not arrest me. 56But this has all taken place that the writings of the prophets might be fulfilled." Then all the disciples deserted him and fled. That isn't fear....it's submission. Edited by thomasd - 12 February 2009 at 6:48pm |
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seekshidayath
Female Islam Senior Member
Joined: 26 March 2006 Location: India Online Status: Offline Posts: 3337 |
Posted: 17 February 2009 at 6:08pm |
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Thanks for the genealogy. But thimas, what i as a muslim believe is, Quran contains many historical events. Some are narrated in details and some are not. Like genealogy as well as dialogue between Nimrod and Ibrahim {AS}. Qur'an discusses only the dialogue between them. When the Qur’an leaves out a matter, it means that it is of no importance to us. On the other hand, any information provided by the Qur’an has a useful purpose. In other words,we do not persist in the pursuit of information not provided by the Qur’an and concentrate on what it indicates clearly to see how we can benefit from it.
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Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: “All the descendants of Adam are sinners, and the best of sinners are those who repent."
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thomasd
Groupie
Joined: 13 July 2008 Online Status: Offline Posts: 43 |
Posted: 18 February 2009 at 7:40pm |
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Originally posted by seekshidayath Thanks for the genealogy. But thimas, what i as a muslim believe is, Quran contains many historical events. Some are narrated in details and some are not. Like genealogy as well as dialogue between Nimrod and Ibrahim {AS}. Qur'an discusses only the dialogue between them. When the Qur’an leaves out a matter, it means that it is of no importance to us. On the other hand, any information provided by the Qur’an has a useful purpose. In other words,we do not persist in the pursuit of information not provided by the Qur’an and concentrate on what it indicates clearly to see how we can benefit from it. My point is that they can't possibly have had dialogue if they lived that far apart, which leads me to question the accuracy of the Qur'an as a whole. |
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_ALI_
Male Islam Groupie
Joined: 17 February 2008 Online Status: Offline Posts: 76 |
Posted: 02 March 2009 at 3:39am |
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Salam thomasd
You said
ok. so. I have a question for all of you.
Genesis 10 and 11 have the genealogies of Nimrod and Abraham, and according to this, they lived approximately 7 generations apart. Much later Jewish tradition developed tales of conflicts between Nimrod and Abraham, but these are more in the vein of what would be considered folktales juxtaposing two well known historical characters, rather than authentic historical record. Nonetheless, the Qur'an mirrors the later narrative, rather than the former, and I'm curious as to what the accepted explanation for this is, or how many of you have come across this particular information before. Naturally, it seems implausible to me that two men, living 7 generations apart would come in direct conflict with each other. Now according to the Bible, there is a gap of 7 generations. Hence according to the Bible they couldn't have had the conversation. Quran says that they had that conversation.
Based on this, you cannot deduce that: Hence Quran is not authentic. You can only deduce: Hence, Quran contradicts with the Bible. You see, you are assuming Bible to be completely true. You might as well say: Bible says that Jesus is God (a debatable statement but let's assume it is true). Quran says Jesus is not God. Hence Quran is not authentic.
That wouldn't be right.
I'm not saying that all the historical data in the Bible is wrong. According to Muslims, some part of the Bible is true. Some part isn't. Some prophecies of the Bible were fulfilled. Some were not. Similarly, some historical data may be correct. Some may be incorrect.
Hence either you get an authentic source and prove that there was a gap of 7 generations or you prove that Bible is the truth/word of God.
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Akhe Abdullah
Male Islam Senior Member
Joined: 19 November 2008 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 1252 |
Posted: 02 March 2009 at 4:22am |
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Originally posted by abuzaid
Originally posted by thomasd As Salamu Alaikum Abuzaid.Mashallah"
I am referring more to the use of using reason to better understand and clarify the meaning of the guidance he has already given us, this should be a constant process of refining our understanding of him. As imperfect beings we will never have a perfect understanding of the God we serve, but we can always strive to better that understanding. I am not talking about understanding God!! Even after getting direct message from God we can't have complete understanding of God for the same reason you have mentioned (imperfect being!)
I was only talking about understanding of what God wants from us!! Your idea of using human intelligent may be good only if nobody have claimed to receieve message from God. If there are humans who claimed to have received message from God and indeed there are! should not we use our intelligent to verify their claims??
If God asks us, Why did you rejected messenger I chose? is not it better to keep an answer ready?
Originally posted by thomasd in the Old Testament, God actually gave criteria to the Jewish people by which they could evaluate whether or not people were actually prophets or not. if a single prediction made by someone claiming to be a prophet was shown to be false they were executed. Prophetic era of Israel is gone! for last 1400 years only two personalities in question are Jesus and Mohammed.. PBUH.
It is of no use to strive for general rulings.
If you have a reason to reject Prophethood of Jesus PBUH or accept divinity of Jesus PBUH, keep it ready we are all answerable to God.
In the same way if you have solid reason based on concrete criteria to reject Prophethood of Mohammed PBUH, you have to present it to Lord of heaven and earth.
We as muslim believe that any reason to reject Prophethood of Mohammed PBUH will be proved false on the day of judgement.
In Islam avoidance is a form rejection.
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Akhe Abdullah
Male Islam Senior Member
Joined: 19 November 2008 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 1252 |
Posted: 02 March 2009 at 4:29am |
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Originally posted by _ALI_ As Salamu Alaikum Ali.much later Jewish tradition deveolped tales,same as today as in the media/tabloids.
Salam thomasd You said
ok. so. I have a question for all of you. Genesis 10 and 11 have the genealogies of Nimrod and Abraham, and according to this, they lived approximately 7 generations apart. Much later Jewish tradition developed tales of conflicts between Nimrod and Abraham, but these are more in the vein of what would be considered folktales juxtaposing two well known historical characters, rather than authentic historical record. Nonetheless, the Qur'an mirrors the later narrative, rather than the former, and I'm curious as to what the accepted explanation for this is, or how many of you have come across this particular information before. Naturally, it seems implausible to me that two men, living 7 generations apart would come in direct conflict with each other.
Now according to the Bible, there is a gap of 7 generations. Hence according to the Bible they couldn't have had the conversation. Quran says that they had that conversation.
Based on this, you cannot deduce that: Hence Quran is not authentic. You can only deduce: Hence, Quran contradicts with the Bible. You see, you are assuming Bible to be completely true. You might as well say: Bible says that Jesus is God (a debatable statement but let's assume it is true). Quran says Jesus is not God. Hence Quran is not authentic.
That wouldn't be right.
I'm not saying that all the historical data in the Bible is wrong. According to Muslims, some part of the Bible is true. Some part isn't. Some prophecies of the Bible were fulfilled. Some were not. Similarly, some historical data may be correct. Some may be incorrect.
Hence either you get an authentic source and prove that there was a gap of 7 generations or you prove that Bible is the truth/word of God. |
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