Topic
Islam and the Gospel
If you are Muslim, these pages start from what the Qur'an says about Jesus and about the Torah and Gospel, and compare it with the historical record.
Claims
- “Islam gives assurance through deeds and mercy”Islam grounds hope in mercy, but for ordinary believers it stops short of certainty. Christians ground assurance in what they believe God has already done in Jesus' death.Read the answer
- “Jesus did not know the day or hour”Mark 13:32 is real and hard, but it targets a belief Christians reject. They teach Jesus was fully human too, and the same passage ranks the Son above the angels.Read the answer
- “Jesus never claimed to be God”The earliest records show Jesus claiming God's own authority, and his followers worshiping him within decades, long before the Council of Nicaea.Read the answer
- “Jesus was a Muslim”Jesus submitted wholly to God, but the earliest records show a Jewish teacher who spoke of himself and his death in ways the Qur'an later denies.Read the answer
- “Jesus was not crucified”Jesus' crucifixion is recorded within years by his followers and later by hostile Roman and Jewish writers; no historical record before the Qur'an says otherwise.Read the answer
- “Muhammad is the best example”Islam offers Muhammad as a pattern for all ages, which makes his example a fair question. Christians compare him with Jesus, not with modern Western values.Read the answer
- “Muhammad was foretold in the Bible”Read in context, Moses' promised prophet comes from Israel, and the Advocate Jesus promised is the Holy Spirit, sent to his own disciples soon after Jesus left them.Read the answer
- “The Bible is corrupted”The manuscripts differ in small ways, but the Gospel Christians held in Muhammad's day, which the Qur'an tells them to judge by, survives and can be read today.Read the answer
- “The Qur'an is inimitable”The Qur'an's eloquence is real, but beauty is judged by taste and language, not truth. The Christian claim rests instead on a public event open to historical inquiry.Read the answer
- “The Trinity is shirk”The Trinity is not three gods, but that is not the heart of the charge. The question is whether persons within the one God fit his oneness, and who Jesus is.Read the answer
Reasons
- Biblical monotheismIsaiah denies that any god was formed before or after the LORD. That rules out a family of gods and gods who were once creatures, and it sets the test for every later claim.
- Jesus is GodThe New Testament places Jesus inside the identity of Israel's one God, the Creator, while still distinguishing him from the Father.
- Public revelation and prophetic testsThe Torah and the apostles give public tests for anyone who claims to speak for God: agreement with earlier revelation, loyalty to the one God, and predictions that come true.
- The apostolic gospel is finalPaul and Jude describe the apostles' message as a trust to guard. So any later revelation can be tested by one question: does it preach the same gospel?
- The reliability of the BibleVariants in the manuscripts are real and openly catalogued. They show a text copied many times in many places, which is why its earliest wording can be recovered.
- The reliability of the New TestamentPaul's letters preserve a summary of belief from within a few years of Jesus' death, the Gospels were written within living memory, and the text can be recovered with confidence.
- The Trinity is monotheismThe Bible says there is one God, distinguishes the Father, Son, and Spirit from one another, and treats each as that one God. The Trinity is the summary that keeps all three.