What evidence is there that the Koran is the word of God?

[A-ManESL]

Shiraz you just said the Quran talks about Islam to mean surrender to God. That isn't speaking of a religion. Neither is Muslim. Muhammad obviously meant something else by Muslim then modern Islamics do, because he said all the messengers had been Muslims, but we know they were mostly Jews.

Yes. That is a fundamental misconception about Islam. It is not a religion per se. In fact, Arabic does not even have a word which translates to religion in the modern sense. The Arabic word din in the Quran translated normally as religion in English differs from the modern understanding in many ways. I think a better sense of Islam would be captured by "way of life based on surrender/peace/harmony".

The comparative religion scholar Wilfred Cantwell Smith posited that Muhammad, above all others perhaps, would have been horrified to learn that (people would think that) he was starting a new religion.

Regards

 

[YmirGF]

The comparative religion scholar Wilfred Cantwell Smith posited that Muhammad, above all others perhaps, would have been horrified to learn that (people would think that) he was starting a new religion.

I'm unsure why one would need a scholar to point that out. If one reads about Islam, Muhammad's claim becomes pretty clear. In theory, Muhammad was the last or final prophet in a very long tradition. Though Islam was correcting errors, in theory, he didn't claim to be teaching anything new.

 

[Rainbow Mage]

A-Man yes, I have long felt Muhammad wasn't speaking of Islam as a religion in the Quran. It doesn't seem so. No doubt his teachings turned into a religion though, and honestly, it might have been the worst thing that could happen.

 

[A-ManESL]

A-Man yes, I have long felt Muhammad wasn't speaking of Islam as a religion in the Quran. It doesn't seem so. No doubt his teachings turned into a religion though, and honestly, it might have been the worst thing that could happen.

I have long felt this about all religions! Their respective founders never intended to start a religion. That resulted later as a product of identity politics.

 

[Rainbow Mage]

In fact the first time in the Quran Muhammad ever starts make a distinction between his followers and Jews is when he states that he invited Jews to accept his prophethood, and they rejected him.

 

[A-ManESL]

Muhammad(pbuh) did not say that Jews were non-believers. He said they are one community with the believers, (although) the Muslims have their way of life and the Jews have theirs. (Jonathan Berkey, The Formation of Islam: Religion and Society in the Near East, 600-1800, Cambridge University Press, p.64)

Similarly the Quran says so in verse 2:62 "Those who believe and those who are Jews, Christians and Sabeans,[in fact] anyone who believes in God and the Last Day, and acts honorably will receive their earnings from their Lord: no fear will lieupon them nor need they feel saddened."

The distinction you refer to has to be understood in the sense of the Jews of the society that Muhammad(pbuh) lived in, while the above verse in the universal sense. This is the correct understanding.

Regards

 

[Muffled]

In bible nowhere its written that Bible is free of mistakes
but In Quran on the first page its written That Quran is free of mistakes

This means Quran is a true book of GOD

This is not true. It presupposes that God would not allow errors. All one needs to do is read the news and one can see that errors (sin) abound and God allows them to continue (for now).

 

[Muffled]

Well, it's obviously right about everything else, so the claim to inspiration must be true.

Who will judge what is right? Only God is able to judge what is right.

 

[Rainbow Mage]

Can the Bible prove it is anymore the word of God then the Quran can- for all the Christian naysayers in the thread?

 

[Muffled]

Many Muslims justify the Qur'an because a) it corrects the teachings of Christianity, which has driven itself to worship Jesus as an incarnation literally of God... that God would send himself on a suicide mission. b) They will utilise scientific teachings to show that the Qur'an has revealed science long before their respective findings in the scientific community. c) The Qur'an in one sense, is universalistic, because it accepts, unlike Judaism and Christianity, that God has sent Messengers and Prophets in every age, in every culture, of the belief in monotheism, and that anyone who believes in one God, and in the angels, and the Last Day have nothing to grieve.

I actually like the Qur'an, and I do believe that Muhammad was verily a Messenger of God. Not the last one, and certainly not the first!

Muslims do not have the ability to justify anything. Only God can justify. This is similar to Angelous's question of what is right.

It certainly does not. If it did it would be proof that the Qu'ran wasn't the word of God.

Scientific accuracy does not gurantee that the information came from God.

A reference to previous writings does not automatically authenticate the Qu'ran.

 

[Muffled]

Can the Bible prove it is anymore the word of God then the Quran can- for all the Christian naysayers in the thread?

I do not believe that either text can prove it is the word of God. The only proof that any text is from God is His accreditation of it.

 

[Rainbow Mage]

I do not believe that either text can prove it is the word of God. The only proof that any text is from God is His accreditation of it.

How would you know god was accrediting it?

 

[Evandr]

I have said this in a previous thread but it applies here also.

I believe in God and in so doing I also believe that the spirit of God can be felt when reading scripture, the Bible, the BoM, the D&C, and the PoGP, or listening to the appointed prophets and apostles of God, I have felt it many times; there is something about true scripture that always comes through and can be felt in the soul, something that is unique to scripture; something that physically testifies by reading the words alone; a familiar spirit that no other books in the history of the world can claim and that includes the 'Quran. The word of God is always testified to by the spirit of God and that should be enough to start anyone on the path to real faith and understanding.

 

[Rainbow Mage]

Like I said Evandr, because we all know your god's mouthpiece :yes:

 

[Evandr]

Like I said Evandr, because we all know your god's mouthpiece :yes:

Well...I guess somebody has to teach you a thing or two about religion. :yes: You seem to be lacking in any real responce to a comment other than mindless sarcasm.

 

[Rainbow Mage]

Evandr to answer you how I did in the other thread- You stated that the Quran cannot be the word of God because it doesn't ring true to your spirit, and that God-inspired books always ring true in your spirit. Sounds like whatever rings true to you is the standard in your mind. I said what you said in less words and didn't dress it up to sound nice.

 

[Gaura Priya]

Muslims do not have the ability to justify anything. Only God can justify. This is similar to Angelous's question of what is right.

It certainly does not. If it did it would be proof that the Qu'ran wasn't the word of God.

Scientific accuracy does not gurantee that the information came from God.

A reference to previous writings does not automatically authenticate the Qu'ran.

Christians do not have the ability to justify anything. Only GOD alone can justify.

Christian Scriptures seek to 'improve' upon Jewish Scriptures, as Jesus said, "I come not to abolish the Law, but to fulfill it." The Qur'an gives another form of the fullness of Revelation from God. It has brought universities, libraries, sciences and mathematics. From its Inspiration it brought about law, culture, architecture, study, art, music, and poetry.

Also from it brought violence and terrorism. And yet, such an interpretation of the Book is modern, compared to that which was enjoyed during the Islamic Golden Age.

You are seeking to authenticate that which perhaps is only a mystery of GOD.

After all, there is evidence also to reject the Gospels, Paul's Letters, the Gnostic Scriptures, the Book of Mormon, the Pearl of Great Price, Science and Health: With Key to the Scriptures, and other Christian Scriptures out there.

When I read the Qur'an, I see the spirit of Muhammad the Prophet seeking to destroy the old authoritarian government of stealing from orphans and widows, of harrassing the poor and women who before had no rights as persons and treated like chattle, and to destroy that which focussed on riches, of earthly plenties, and of gold and silver in the form of religious figures.

Fi'aman'u'llah, God protect you!

:islam:

 

[Rainbow Mage]

But Evandr as for me, to make MY stance on the Qur'an clear. I believe both the Bible and the Qur'an, as well as other holy text, Vedas etc., are all inspired, but not in the sense their followers usually mean, and I don't read them in the most literalist sense, but look for metaphor and symbol in them.

I will quote you what the Quran says: "Say: we believe all of it. It is all from our Lord, and those who dispute therein, surely God has no need of anything"

 

[Gaura Priya]

I have said this in a previous thread but it applies here also.

I believe in God and in so doing I also believe that the spirit of God can be felt when reading scripture, the Bible, the BoM, the D&C, and the PoGP, or listening to the appointed prophets and apostles of God, I have felt it many times; there is something about true scripture that always comes through and can be felt in the soul, something that is unique to scripture; something that physically testifies by reading the words alone; a familiar spirit that no other books in the history of the world can claim and that includes the 'Quran. The word of God is always testified to by the spirit of God and that should be enough to start anyone on the path to real faith and understanding.

I guess for me ultimately, it is like this:


"Say: O disbelievers!
I worship not that which ye worship;
Nor worship ye that which I worship.
And I shall not worship that which ye worship.
Nor will ye worship that which I worship.
Unto you your religion, and unto me my religion."

-- Qur'an, Al-Kafirun, 109


Although this verse refers to the polytheists, there are many cases where one can apply this chapter from the Qur'an. I believe in that which the Prophets of the past have said for the benefit of humanity: Jesus, Krishna, Zoroaster, Moses, Abraham, Muhammad and Baha'u'llah, that there is only One God whom we all must worship, One Divinity, One Unity and Essence.

Jesus is not to be worshipped. God is not Trinitarian, and Jesus is also not a god in any Divine form except metaphorically. I believe that such an interpretation has become an interpolation in their theological perspectives, away from what Judaism, Arian or Biblically Unitarian Christianity, and Islam have been preaching about: the Oneness of God.

The Spirit of the Qur'an is the same Spirit that inspired the great Prophets to speak of this One God of which every person has a relationship with. And that is why I believe in the Qur'an as a Revelation as much as I believe in the Bible, the Torah, and all the other Scriptures of God.

 

[Gaura Priya]

Here's another beautiful verse speaking of the Universality of God:


"And they say: None entereth paradise unless he be a Jew or a Christian. These are their own desires. Say: Bring your proof of what ye state if ye are truthful.

Nay, but whosoever surrendereth his purpose to God while doing good, his reward is with his Lord; and there shall no fear come upon them neither shall they grieve."

-- Qur'an, Al-Baqara, 2:112-113