A question to all my Christian friends

BMZ said:

"Jesus warned about false prophets who would come under the pretext of his name and teachings."

Yes, He certainly did warn of false prophets....and he warned us to stay away from them, all of them. 

Paul DID meet Jesus on the road to Damascus, and there were witnesses with him at the time.  We agreed to that earlier.  Remember?  No one knows the mind of God, BMZ.  It would be quite presumptous to state otherwise.  As such, it's God's decision to reveal the coming of the prophet St. Paul....or not.  He chose not to reveal Paul's upcoming conversion.  So why do you make such strained attempts to "disprove" the Bible, to say, "well, St. John should have said it this way, in the first person", or, "the Gospels should have been much bigger and more lengthy than they are", etc., etc.  This is not for you to say, BMZ.  It also says in the Bible "not to add to or take away one thing from this Book".......so you need to leave it as it is.  And it is correct.  I spent the morning with my priest yesterday, who is a great scholar.  He explained many things to me which make perfect sense.  I realize you can never believe the Bible, no matter what any Christian says, because to do so would be to deny your own faith in Islam.  So what's the purpose here?  Just for discussion, I suppose.  But I think we all know we're not going to change anyone's mind.  The one thing I do not do is attempt to bring to light things in the Qu'ran which I feel are not exactly proper, true, as they should have been, etc.  Because even though I don't agree with everything in the Qu'ran, I also at the same time respect your faith and beliefs.  To make an attempt to prove the Qu'ran wrong or deficient in some ways, would be very disrespectful to your religion.  I hope you understand what I'm trying to say, my dear friend.

God's Peace to All.

Hi covered,

You wrote,"A prophecy about Paul in particular? No?"

That was my main question because the Chrsitian scholars find out a prophecy for almost everything they want to be covered and justifed, even though it does not fall under any kind of a prophecy.

The way Paul took over the religion as taught by Jesus, he should have been covered by some kind of prophecy. He became a self-appointed apostle, which means a prophet also. Jesus warned about false prophets who would come under the pretext of his name and teachings.

I have not yet received a single correct answer to my post.

"The book of John states that if they were to record all that Jesus said and did there would not be enough room in the world to contain the books that would be written."

That is the problem. It suggests that all that Jesus said was not recorded and reported correctly and fully. If we extracted and condensed what Jesus said, according to the four gospels, we will hardly have one book the thickness of a single gospel and the rest would be the writers' account of what people told them or what they had heard from others.

"These men who wrote the gospels, which are Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, were inspired by the Holy Spirit, Who is God, because God is a spirit, to write certain things, for certain purposes."

If they had been really inspired by the Holy Spirit, their accounts would not have differed. For example, the Holy Spirit would have told the truth about the tomb story same to all. The writers were most likely not disciples at all. Even their surnames are unheard of and no one can really tell who they were.

Imagine "Jesus said to Matthew, 'Come with me'. Matthew went straightaway with him.'" If the disciple Matthew had written the gospel of Matthew himself, he would have written,"Jesus said to me,'Come with me', I went straightaway with him.'"

John, who is said to be the young disciple whom Jesus loved most, writes in his own gospel John 20:2-10 about the "other disciple" who outran Peter. If John were the "young" and "the other disciple whom Jesus loved", John would have written everything in the First Person, using I.

"For example, one book is written to establish the divinity of Christ, and another written to reach primarily jewish readers, and another to reach roman readers, and another to convince all gentiles of the truth of the things that were heard and seen of Jesus."

Q: Which book was written to establish the divinity of Christ? If it were the last book of John, why did it take so long?

Q. Did the other three books fail to mention and establish the divinty of Christ?

Q. If the divinity of Chrsist had been known and understood by the disciples, it would have been in all gospel accounts. Can we thus say that Matthew, Mark and Luke had no knowledge and proof of the divinity of Christ, as they had never heard of any such thing?

Thanks & Best Regards

BMZ

BMZ: There is no 'if' and no 'but' about that. God existed before creation. God used his Force, Power, knowledge, etc.
Me:  Good.  Earlier, you didn�t have an answer to give.  Now, you do.  Actually, you had it all along.  You just needed to dig deeper (think) to bring it to the surface so that you could give it.  You had, but had not.  It is your answer; I didn�t give it to you. Your newly acquired possession does not conflict with your belief that God existed before creation or that God used something to create.  It adds to what you had, rather than taking anything away.  It also agrees with scripture (the Bible and the Quran) that we can learn about God from his creation.

I hope that you can see now, that I am not your enemy, trying to force my beliefs on you or scheming to trap you. Rather, I offered to walk with you along your path of understanding, confirming each step along the way.  When we came to a point where you could not see the next step, I stopped with you, offering to continue when you were ready.  The offer is still open. 

BMZ: It does not mean God ahs two legs, two hands, a body and a head like man.

I was not suggesting that it did.

You had said, that it was God who said, �Let there be light��  rather than �Let us�

The Quran teaches that God speaks, and it happens.

I was pointing out that the same was true with creation.  God said, �Let us make man�.� Then �So God created man�

BMZ: What makes you think that the Angels refused God's request? Angels never refuse God's Commands. The obey and do as they are told.  You said God was talking to the Angels (and possibly others) when he said, �Let us make man��   But, you said they didn�t work with him to create man.  But, then, the Quran says �we made you�.

BMZ: The We refers to the Lord Almighty God.

So you can see that God is a plurality.

bmzsp: God was not talking to own spirit and Jesus there or the trinity.

What is your reason for saying that? 

1.        You have evidence to eliminate that as a possibility?

2.        You can�t understand how that could be possible?

BMZ: Giving you various possibilities.

Possibilities are like hypotheses; they must be proven.  Opinions, without support, are simply preferred possibilities.  You have eliminated one possibility (the trlnity), apparently, based upon nothing more than your preferred opinion. 

I contend that you deny the trinity based upon a misunderstanding of Muhammed saying, �Say not three�.  You identify the �we� speaking in the Quran as  the one Lord Almighty God.  Compliance with Muhammed�s instruction is when, seeing the �we� of God, you do not refer to him as �they�.

BMZ: Please show me how it does. Compare it with trinity which has no mention and no place in the gospels or the Bible, had never been taught by Jesus and his disciples but was coined only after a few hundred years by a select few from the Church, who threw aside the teachings of Jesus and aligned Christianity towards pagan concepts.

It would be less confusing to use your words which we both have available rather than to bring something unfamiliar (my understanding of the trinity which you do not share) into the discussion.  If we use your words, you have the advantage, because you are more familiar with them.

1. The Quran teaches that God speaks and it happens.

2. You say that God said to the Angels, etc., �Let us make man��, but that didn�t happen because they did not work with God to create man. 

1. The Quran says, �we made you�

2. Although you say that the �we� is God, you say that God was not speaking to that �we� (himself) when he said, �Let us make man��  --but that the �us� God wanted to make man is not the �we� that ended up doing it.

1. The Quran teaches that there is none like God.

2. You say that, when God said, �Let us make man in OUR image, after OUR LIKENESS�� he was speaking to other beings. Therefore, the other beings to whom he was speaking are like him.     �because, for some reason, the one God who refers to Himself as �we� in the Quran cannot refer to Himself as �us� in the Bible.

BMZ: Read the various Creeds and tell me when were they written?  Arius was kicked out, Athanasius was in and later Athanasius was kicked out and the Creed was re-written. I am sure you are aware of all the councils under various Roman emperors, who threw away the theology taught by Jesus and brought pagan beliefs into the religion and successfully established the wrong!

Man has a tendency to reject what he does not understand.  You can see how men agreed to dismiss scripture in the past because they could not understand it.  Yet, you continue along the same course.  Instead of retrieving what they discarded, you discard the remnant that they kept.   Yes, you, too, have the counsel of other men who agree with you to keep this and discard that, based upon your understanding.  That is not the way that either the Quran or the Bible teach us to follow.  Both appeal to reason.  Everything that has been written began with a truth---the truth was either enhanced by sound reasoning or corrupted by unsound reasoning.  By investigating the source of a lie, instead of flippantly discarding it, you will uncover a truth.  It may very well be one that you had not recognized yet.  If so, it will increase the truth that you already have.

Although Muslims and a growing number of Christians dismiss Paul�s writings, he tells us to prove all things.  In other words, if you think it is wrong, prove it wrong--don�t just dismiss it because you don�t understand it and think it is wrong.  So you understand it to be wrong�validate your understanding rather than preferring your understanding to another.  If you think it is right, prove it is right; don�t just accept it.  

When we do not validate every step along the way, we run the risk of falling into a pit of error because we step where there is no reasoning to support or substantiate our stand.