THE QURAN FAILS BASIC TESTS OF AUTHENTICITY
1). INTRODUCTION
When Muslims say “The Quran is revealed knowledge from God”, they’re just making a claim that is unwitnessed, unheralded and uncorroborated. These supposed revelations and “prophet” do not pass even basic tests for authenticity of the sort which uphold the divine inspiration for the Bible. Consider the following:
▪︎ No record of prophetic fulfilment.
▪︎ No witness testimony.
▪︎ No miraculous healing.
▪︎ No historical support.
# There is for example not a shred of evidence for the Muslim Isa; the very name Isa is corrupt as this Post demonstrates:
□ CORRUPTION OF THE NAME JESUS IN THE QURAN 23 May 2021
www.facebook.com/100063590342443/posts/167701865359491/
# There is no Covenant theology in the Quran as this post shows:
□ DIVINE COVENANTS PROVE THE BIBLE AND EXPOSE THE QURAN 27 Aug 2021
www.facebook.com/100063590342443/posts/237362678393409/
# There is not a shred of evidence for a lost “gospel of Jesus”
# There is not a shred of evidence for an uncrucified Messiah as this post shows:
□ ISLAM’S NEMESIS: THE HERESY OF SURAH 4:157 30 Aug 2021
m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=240035528126124&id=100063590342443
# The Quran is rife with errors of fact. For example it claims the Psalms (Zabur) were “given” to David, which is factually wrong on numerous grounds as this post shows:
□ HOW MANY QURAN ERRORS DO YOU NEED PROOF OF MUSLIMS? 17 Oct 2021
m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=273757028087307&id=100063590342443
Again historically awry, the Quran claims the Promised Land is Egypt, see this Post for the proof:
□ THE QURAN AND ITS ERRORS: ISRAEL’S PROMISED LAND IS EGYPT!? 1 January 2021
www.facebook.com/100063590342443/posts/326836136112729/
The claim for ‘nazil’ revelation of the Quran, comes from one source alone, the man to which it was supposedly revealed, Muhammad.
There are no outside witnesses, heralding in advance or at the time who can corroborate Muhammad’s testimony; nor are miracles provided to substantiate his claims.
In fact, the evidences for the authority of God’s revelation, which the Bible emphatically produces are completely absent in the Quran, such as:
▪︎ That the revelation of God must speak in the name of God, Yahweh not in the name of a foreign god as Allah is.
▪︎ That the message must go out from Zion as Isaiah says: “For instruction will go out of Zion and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem” (Isaiah 2:3b); “Out of Zion” appears at least 17 times in the Bible. No mention of anything Islamic in the Bible, including then non existent Mecca.
▪︎ The message must conform to revelation which has gone before.
▪︎ That it must make predictions which are verifiable.
▪︎ That the revelation must be accompanied by signs and wonders in order to give it authority as having come from God.
Because all these are missing in the case of the Muhammad and the Quran, for those of us who are Christians, it is obviously the Quran and not as Muslims claim, the Bible, which turns out to be the most humanly flawed and corrupt of documents.
2). QURAN FAILS BIBLICAL STANDARDS FOR WITNESS TESTIMONY
A knockout blow against Islam is the fact it does not and cannot be substantiated by basic rules of witness testimony which the Bible enshrines.
Indeed, the Bible instructs everyone to withhold judgement unless there is sufficient corroborative evidence. We can observe this biblical principle in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. We have come to call this the principle of “the testimony of two or more witnesses.”
In Deuteronomy 13:1-5, God tells the Jews that they are not to believe someone who claims to be a prophet unless he comes with the correct knowledge of God as God had been revealed to them through the Prophet Moses, whose claim to represent God was affirmed by the miracles he performed before them and the Egyptians. (See, for example, Exodus 4:1-9.) Deuteronomy goes on to say that someone who claims to be a prophet must be right 100% of the time he prophecies – if anything he says is going to come to pass does not come to pass, he is not to be believed (Deuteronomy 18:18-22). If this principle were applied today, no one would believe a newspaper’s horoscope column, a psychic hotline “friend,” a fortune teller, Nostradamus, or anyone else whose track record is not 100%. The biblical prophet, then, should not be believed merely because he proclaims his prophetic gift, but only if that claim is substantiated by at least two witnesses: its correspondence to what God told Moses and its 100% track record.
In the very next chapter of Deuteronomy, a general principle is given affirming the two witness idea that is to govern all the civil and criminal courts of the Jews.
We read that one witness is not enough to convict a man accused of any crime or offense he may have committed. A matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.
Jesus upheld the same principle (Matthew 18:16).
Paul likewise: “This is the third time I am coming to you. Every fact must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses” (2 Corinthians 13:1)
The Quran absolutely fails these tests.
3). THE QURAN’S PLAGIARIZED SOURCES (see Footnote ¹ for a comprehensive list)
In addition to its drawing heavily from Old Testament Biblical narrative and recasting of the Patriarchs as Muslim, the Quran is a book of copied myths, fables and fairy tales.It contains a revised counterfeit of 6th century polytheism, composed of previously existing pagan beliefs, practices and fairy tales. Many of these legends are repeated many times.
# Example:
Probably the most notorious example of plagiarism is Surah 5.32. Here is the original saying from hundreds of years before the Quran:
“For this reason was man created alone, to teach thee that whosever destroys a single soul of Israel [of Israel is absent in some texts], scripture imputes (guilt) to him as though he had Destroyed a Complete World; and whosever preserves a single soul of Israel, scripture ascribes (merit) to him as though he had Preserved a Complete World [since all mankind originated from one man].”
Source: Babylonian Talmud, Mishnah Sanhedrin 37a
That’s only for starters. It gets worse.
5:32 is the most ripped-out-of-context verse of the Quran by Western commentators. Muslims (and even news organizations) often refer to this verse in order to show that Islam teaches murder is wrong and saving lives is the prescribed action for all people. President Obama notoriously gave it credence by partially quoting it in his first overseas presidential address in Cairo in 2009.
But this is absolutely not what this verse says. In fact, it says almost the exact opposite: that Muslims can kill those who are their enemies! The only way you can conclude, as Muslim apologists have, is to ignore the verses that immediately follow 5:32, as well as to ignore part of the verse itself.
Here is Surah 5:32 in its context, with all words included:
“On that account: We ordained for the Children of Israel that if any one slew a person – unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land – it would be as if he slew the whole people: and if any one saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of the whole people. Then although there came to them Our apostles with clear signs, yet, even after that, many of them continued to commit excesses in the land.”
Salient points:
(i). It explicitly states that this was a commandment to the Children of Israel, i.e. the Jews! This is not a commandment to all people, and it certainly should not be misused as if this is Allah’s command to Muhammad’s people.
(ii). Even if this were a command to the Muslims, there’s still an escape clause: “unless it be for murder or spreading mischief in the land.” If someone is “spreading mischief”, he can still be killed. Now let’s think for a moment. The would-be Times Square bomber considers Americans to be spreading mischief in Palestine and around the world (practically all Muslims I know think this, even the ones who are American citizens). Accordingly, even if this verse were to apply to someone like Faisal Shahzad, he would still be justified in his slaughter.
As if this weren’t obvious enough from the verse itself, the Quran further expounds this point in the very next verse. Surah 5:33 says:
“The punishment of those who wage war against God and His Apostle, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is:execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter.”
This verse is referring to the Muslims, not the Jews anymore, as we can tell in the shift from past tense to present tense. And here, the punishment for mischief is clearly prescribed: execution, crucifixion, mutilation, or at the least, exile. This is the command given to the Muslims. Quite clearly, it does not teach what the Muslims proclaim it teaches; in fact, it teaches almost the exact opposite.
For a supposedly divinely authored and inspired “holy” book, don’t you find it a little strange Muslims that Muhammad is pulling stuff from historic uninspired manmade sources and passing it off as “Revelatory” and “Holy”?
Muslims need to ask themselves why so much of Islamic scripture and ritual is borrowed from pre-existing sources. There is virtually nothing original in Islam and certainly nothing worthy of being labelled “Revelation.” Furthermore, something which in its original form is from non canonical gnostic, not sacred sources, cannot magically be transformed into Holy Writ. This is fallacious special pleading at its worst.
4). CONCLUSIONS
A book that is 95% unoriginal can never be a miracle. A book that plagiarized all bar 5 of the characters it contains can never be called a revelation. A book that is drawn from uninspired non Canonical sources can never be elevated to holy writ.
On these 3 basic grounds alone the Quran fails the attributes Muslims claim for it.
The Quran cannot be the Word of God.
# God does not need to copy. The Quran is mostly plagiarism.
# God’s Word is coherent progressive and sequential. The Quran is an incoherent repetitive jumble without any chronology, narrative or sequence.
# God’s Word is supported by multiple witness testimony. For a start the Bible is not one book, but a collection of 66 books written by 40 authors over a period of 1,500 years. Yet the Bible has a consistent message from beginning to end: how to restore the relationship that man had with God in the creation. The Quran is one man’s unwitnessed and uncorroborated testimony. In fact it has zero evidence base of testimony, still less multiple witnesses, because it’s written at least half a millennium after the events which it purports to correct.
# God’s Word does not need to change its tone or it’s commands. The Quran is antithetical to the Bible on all core doctrines, and its abrogations over a few years reflect the changing circumstances of its fickle human origin.
# God’s Word is self attesting through fulfilled prophecies, the testimonies of changed lives and recorded history and archaeology. The Quran has no such qualities. It is without prophecies, is not merely historically inaccurate but has schoolboy howler errors of fact and contains the scientifically impossible which again prove it’s man made origin.
# The Word of God has the highest moral paradigm (the Ten Commandments as amplified by the Sermon on the Mount). The Ten Commandments are nowhere in the Quran and were broken systematically and comprehensively by its only supposed prophet and replaced by rules which can only be described as demonic.
# The Word of God is instruction, comfort, and inspiration for sound living, peace, love and eternal life. Its both a mirror of reflection on human weakness as much as a window of revelation on God’s plan of redemption. The Quran is a manual for totalitarianism enforced by war hate and death for apostasy.
Footnote:
¹ THE QURAN’S COPIED FAIRYTALES & FABLES
Pre-Islamic Sources for material in the Quran. While the devout Muslim believes with all of his heart that the rituals and doctrines of Islam are entirely heavenly in origin and thus cannot have any earthly sources,
Middle East scholars have demonstrated beyond all doubt that every ritual and belief in Islam can be traced back to pre-Islamic Arabian culture.
In other words Muhammad did not preach anything new. Everything he taught had been believed and practiced in Arabia long before he was ever born.
Even the idea of “only one God” was borrowed from the Jews and the Christians.
# ARABIAN SOURCES
• The Quran repeats fanciful Arabian fables as if they were true. • “Arabic legends about the fabulous jinns fill its pages” (G.G. Pfander, Balance of Truth, pp. 283). • “The story of the she-camel who leapt out of a rock and became a prophet was known long before Muhammad” (Surahs 7:73-77,85; 91:14; 54:29). • The story of an entire village of people who were turned into apes because they broke the sabbath by fishing was a popular legend in Muhammad’s day (Surahs 2:65; 7:163-166). • The gushing 12 springs story found in Surah 2:60 comes from pre-Islamic legends. •In what is called the “Rip Van Winkle” story, seven men and their animals slept for 309 years in a cave and then woke up perfectly fine (Surah 18:9-26)! This legend is found in Greek and Christian fables as well as Arabian lore. • The fable of the pieces of four dead, cut-up birds getting up and flying was well known in Muhammad’s time (Surah 2:260). • It is also clear that Muhammad used such pre-Islamic literature as the Saba Moallaqat of Imra’ul Cays in his composition of Surahs 21:96; 29:31,46; 37:59; 54:1, and 93:1.
# JEWISH SOURCES
Many of the stories in the Quran come from the Jewish Talmud, the Midrash, and many apocryphal works. This was pointed out by Abraham Geiger in 1833, and further documented by another Jewish scholar, Dr. Abraham Katsh, of New York University, in 1954 (The Concise Dictionary of Islam, p. 229; Jomier, The Bible and the Quran — Henry Regency Co., Chicago, 1959, 59ff; Sell, Studies, pp. 163ff.; Guillaume, Islam, p. 13).
Here is a selection:
1. The source of Surah 3:35-37 is the fanciful book called The Protevangelion’s James the Lesser. 2. The source of Surah 87:19 is the Testament of Abraham. 3. The source of Surah 27:17-44 is the Second Targum of Esther. 4. The fantastic tale that God made a man “die for a hundred years” with no ill effects on his food, drink, or donkey was a Jewish fable (Surah 2:259ff.). 5. The idea that Moses was resurrected and other material came from the Jewish Talmud (Surahs 2:55, 56, 67). 6. The story in Surah 5:30,31 can also be found in pre-Islamic works from Pirke Rabbi Eleazer, the Targum of Jonathan ben Uzziah and the Targum of Jerusalem. 7. The tale of Abraham being delivered from Nimrod’s fire came from the Midrash Rabbah (see Surahs 21:51-71; 29:16, 17; 37:97,98). It must be also pointed out that Nimrod and Abraham did not live at the same time. Muhammad was always mixing people together in the Quran who did not live at the same time. 8. The non-biblical details of the visit of the Queen of Sheba (Saba) in Sura 27:20-44 came from the Second Targum of the Book of Esther. 9. The source of Surah 2:102 is no doubt the Midrash Yalkut (chapter 44). 10. The story found in Surah 7:171 of God lifting up Mount Sinai and holding it over the heads of the Jews as a threat to squash them if they rejected the law came from the Jewish book Abodah Sarah. 11. The story of the making of the golden calf in the wilderness, in which the image jumped out of the fire fully formed and actually mooed (Surahs 7:148; 20:88), came from Pirke Rabbi Eleazer. 12. The seven heavens and hells described in the Quran came from the Zohar and the Hagigah. 13. Muhammad utilized the Testament of Abraham to teach that a scale or balance will be used on the day of judgment to weigh good and bad deeds in order to determine whether one goes to heaven or hell (Suras 42:17; 101:6-9).
# HERETICAL “CHRISTIAN” SOURCES
One of the most documented and damaging facts about the Quran is that Muhammad used heretical “Christian” Gnostic gospels and their fables for material in the Quran.
Encyclopedia Britannica comments: “The gospel was known to him chiefly through apocryphal and heretical sources” (15:648). This has been demonstrated many times by various scholars (Richard Bell, Introduction to the Quran, pp. 163ff. See also: Bell, The Origin of Islam in Its Christian Environment, pp. 110ff, 139ff; Sell, Studies, pp. 216ff. See also Tisdall and Pfander). • For example, in Surah 3:49, the baby Isa speaks from the cradle! Later on, the Quran has Isa making clay birds come alive.
# ISA SPEAKING FROM THE CRADLE
“He shall preach to men in his cradle and in the prime of manhood, and shall lead a righteous life”. (Surah 3:46). Another reference to this is Surah 19:28-34: “O sister of Aaron! Thy father was not a wicked man nor was thy mother a harlot. Then she pointed to him. They said: How can we talk to one who is a child in the cradle? He said: “I am indeed a servant of Allah. He has given me the Book and has made me a prophet. And has made me blessed wheresoever I may be, and has enjoined upon me prayer and almsgiving so long as I remain alive, And (has made me) dutiful toward her who bore me, and hath not made me arrogant, unblest. Peace on me the day I was born, and the day I die, and the day I shall be raised alive! Such was Isa, son of Mary: (this is) a statement of the truth concerning which they doubt.”
This came from the Injilu’t Tufuliyyah better known as the Arabic “Gospel of the Infancy of Jesus Christ”. It is a 2nd century Arabic apocryphal fable from Egypt. This is the source for the referenced verse in the Quran.
Here is the similar passage from the Gospel of the Infancy of Jesus Christ: “… Jesus spake when he was in the cradle, and said to his mother: “Mary, I am Jesus the Son of God, the Word, which thou didst bring forth according to the declaration of the angel Gabriel, and My Father hath sent me for the salvation of the world.”
Comparing the two verses, it’s another obvious plagiarism of Muhammad’s. Muhammad revised what he had heard, to bring it into accord with his own beliefs and teachings.”
# ISA TURNING CLAY BIRDS INTO LIVING BIRDS
He will say: “I bring you a sign from your Lord. From clay I will make for you the likeness of a bird. I shall breath into it and, by God’s leave, it shall become a living bird.” (Surah 3:49)
Both of these events, the speaking in the cradle and the birds from clay are mentioned again in Surah 5:110:
“When Allah saith: O Isa, son of Mary! Remember My favour unto thee and unto thy mother; how I strengthened thee with the holy Spirit, so that thou spakest unto mankind in the cradle as in maturity; and how I taught thee the Scripture and Wisdom and the Torah and the Gospel; and how thou didst shape of clay as it were the likeness of a bird by My permission, and didst blow upon it and it was a bird by My permission, and thou didst heal him who was born blind and the leper by My permission; and how thou didst raise the dead by My permission; and how I restrained the Children of Israel from (harming) thee when thou camest unto them with clear proofs, and those of them who disbelieved exclaimed: This is naught else than mere magic”
This comes from “The Gospel of Thomas the Israelite” – A known and documented book of fables.
“Here is the similar passage: The child Jesus, when 5 years of age, was playing on the road by a dirty stream of running water; and having brought it all together into ditches, immediately made it pure and clean; by saying a single word. Then having moistened some earth, he made of it twelve sparrows. And it was the Sabbath day when he did these things. There were many other children playing with him. Now a Jew, seeing what Jesus did, that he was playing on the Sabbath day, went his way to (Jesus’) father Joseph. He said, “Behold, your son is at the stream of dirty water, and having taken up some mud, has made of it twelve sparrows, thus desecrating the Sabbath. On this Joseph went to the spot, and cried out, “Why did you do these things on the Sabbath day which it is not lawful to do?” Jesus then clapped his hands at the sparrows and cried aloud to them, “Go off!” So they, clucking, flew away. The Jews seeing it were astonished, and went and told their rulers what they had seen Jesus do.”
Again, note the similarities. Another Heretical Christian fable, another story circulated by the people living in the Mideast. And, another fable that made it’s way into the Quran.”
# SABEAN SOURCES
Muhammad incorporated parts of the religion of the Sabeans into Islam (Encyclopedia of Islam (ed. Eliade), pp. 303ff.; International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, pp. 1:219ff.). He adopted such pagan rituals as: ▪︎The Haj pilgrimage and worshipping at the Kaaba with all its incidental rituals. ▪︎Praying five times a day towards Mecca (Muhammad chose five of the same times the Sabeans prayed, which incidentally is an example where Muhammad overrode the Quran which nowhere mentions 5 daily prayers; it is only found in the Hadith). ▪︎Fasting for part of a day for an entire month.
# EASTERN RELIGIOUS SOURCES
Muhammad derived some of his ideas from Eastern religions such as Zoroastrianism and Hinduism. All of these things were in existence long before Muhammad was born. The Quran records the following things which are ascribed to Muhammad but in reality were previously known stories now attributed to him for the first time (Sell, Studies, pp. 219ff.). ▪︎The story of a flying trip through seven heavens. ▪︎The Houris of paradise. ▪︎Azazil and other spirits coming up from Hades. ▪︎ The “light” of Muhammad. ▪︎The bridge of Sirat. ▪︎Paradise with its wine, women, and song (from the Persians). ▪︎The king of death. ▪︎The peacock story. ▪︎ Pilgrimage is found in both Hinduism and lslam, Hajj to Mecca in Islam, while Kumbh Mela and Tirtha Yatra in Hinduism. ▪︎ Muslims performs 7 circuits around the Kaaba during Hajj which is called Tawaf. Hindus also perform one or more circuits around the centre (Garbhagriha) of a Temple (one to twenty-one, which is called as Parikrama (known in Sanscrit as pradakśiṇā). Both rituals are commonly called circumambulation. ▪︎ In the Hindu marriage rite of Saptapadi, the married couple circumnavigate the fire seven times. ▪︎ In the Islamic ritual of Tawaf, Muslim circumnavigation of the Kaaba incorporates, religious phrases repeated during the circumambulation. Some of the rituals that Muslims follow during the Hajj are the same as the rites observed by Hindus in their worship of Shiva. Note these striking similarities:
(1) Both Hindu and Muslim male devotees are required to shave their heads during their pilgrimage.
(2) And similar to their Hindu counterparts, male Muslim pilgrims are also required to dress in a garment consisting of two sheets of white cloth. This type of garment is known as Dhoti in Hinduism.
(3) Just as the worshippers of Shiva observe a rite in which they walk around their object of reverence seven times, Muslim pilgrims also walk around the Kaaba seven times.
(4) Both their objects of reverence are Black Stones. In Hinduism, the Black Stone is known as Shiva lingam.
(5) While Hindus drink water from the Ganga River as part of the sacred rites in their worship of Shiva, Muslims drink from the Well of Zamzam during the Hajj.
(6) Additionally, the Crescent moon, which is associated with the Hindu deity Shiva, is also a symbol for Islam. In the Hindu portrayal of the Shiva symbol, the crescent moon is always painted across his forehead. Moreover, in every portrayal of Shiva, there is always a depiction of a snake curled around his neck. Weirdly, in pre-Islamic times, Allah is supposed to have sent a snake to guard the treasures of the Kaaba.
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