Islam

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Time to use snopes.com

"Reporter Greg Kearney, writing for the Lee News Service, traced the story to a correctional facility in Fulton, Missouri, and came away with a decidedly different version of events from Missouri state officials.
According to Tim Kniest, Public Information Officer for the Missouri Department of Corrections, the event described was a training program for prison volunteers, for which ministers from several faiths were invited to give presentations in order to acquaint prison volunteers with the varied religious beliefs of the inmate population. The man who gave the presentation about Islam was not a Muslim minister; he was an inmate pressed into service to present a short film on Islam and answer some questions when the prison's Volunteer Coordinator was "unable to find an Imam to speak."
Moreover, reported Mr. Kniest, the prison's Volunteer Coordinator said that "The inmate did a good job," adding, "He was asked a few questions that were beyond his ability to answer. But he was not asked anything like that question [in the editorial]":

. . . the Volunteer Coordinator at the prison said that no such exchange as the editorial reported ever took place. "He certainly did not 'Hang his head in shame'," according to Kniest. In fact, the inmate was thanked by the assembly before being escorted back to his quarters. Furthermore, the coordinator does not recall any questions dealing with jihad [Holy war] against the infidels of the world as reported in the editorial.
In the editorial the inmate is presented as an Imam, or Islamic minister, which he clearly was not.

Whatever may have transpired at the prison training session referred to above, the notion expressed by this piece is inaccurate. Islam is not a monolithic religion in which unanimity of belief and action is coordinated from a central authority. Islam has an estimated two billion adherents in countries all over the world who belong to any one of a number of different sects with varying beliefs, traditions, and interpretations of scripture. (As well, some religious groups identify themselves as Islamic but are not recognized as such by the vast majority of Muslims.) No one Muslim (especially one who wasn't even a cleric) could speak to what all of Islam believes, any more than a single member of a Methodist congregation could speak for every denomination and follower of Christianity. Many, many Muslims reject the idea that "all followers of Allah have been commanded to kill everyone who is not of their faith," or even the suggestion that such an interpretation has ever been a valid tenet of Islam. We sent this piece to several Muslim groups and invited them to offer comments; they provided somewhat different explanations about the concept of jihad, how Muslims regard non-Muslims, and other related topics, but they all agreed that the editorial presented a grossly distorted version of their beliefs. "
http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/allah.asp

 

That's apples and oranges. Kinda like saying "God or Moses". I'm not defending Islam, but the question is not one of comparable figures. The story, which is not factual btw, was simply written so someone could make a commentary. Their commentary makes a good point, but it's a commentary, and should be treated as such.

And no, "God" and "Jesus" are not interchangeable either.

 

the Qur-ran has huge scientific mistakes throughout it, if it was God's Holy Word then its corrupt, and these are factual scientific errors, and besides Paul wrote in Romans 3:3-5 - "For what if some did not believe? shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect? God forbid: yea, let God be true, but every man a liar; as it is written, That thou mightest be justified in thy sayings, and mightest overcome when thou art judged."

 

How many Islamic "terrorists" have Islamic leaders in the US "caught"??

How many Islamic "terrorist" have the Jordanians, syrians, Iranians, Palestinians "caught"??

Hint -- less than 1.

How often do you see Islamic leaders and people rise up in protest the way they did when some of their Islamic bretheren were captured and threatened by terrorists in Iraq?

Notice that the contrast between "REAL" level of complaint that we saw then - and the "face of pretense" that we saw in all other cases was glaringly obvious.

And a careful reading of the Koran DOES show instructions to kill on a "Sermon on the mount" basis NOT in a one-off context of a local war. So the terrorist DO have sound support for some of their actions from their holy book - no question about it.

The problem is huge.

In Christ,

Bob

 

johnv said- And no, "God" and "Jesus" are not interchangeable either.

that is not true God the father God the son and God the holy spirit are one

explain this-1Jo 5:7 For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.

 

Jesus Christ is God.
Allah is not.
It depends what God John was referring to.
DHK

 

when he uses God with a cap G on a baptist network i assume he means the one true God

 

woodyR,

Jesus Christ is God in flesh. The only one God is the Father. The scriptures clearly explain this issue. You may want to look at the "Who is Jesus" topic.

 

In Islam, your sons and daughters blow themselves up in crowded streets, their lives being required of them by their god. In Christianity, God gave His Son to die for us.

Islam is fear based, Christianity is love based.

 

You assume correctly. When I say "God", I'm referring to Almighty God.

 

Which is that? You mean the Almighty God the Bible talks about or the Almighty God the Quran talks about?

 

Which is that? You mean the Almighty God the Bible talks about or the Almighty God the Quran talks about?

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You are a funny man.
The god Quran talks about can only talk about the little g.
it knows nothing about the Almighty God the Bible.

 

If the account above is so different from the real event, how can researchers be so sure that this is the even spoken of in the account above? Btw, that account must have been widely publicized, since I've read it twice so far.

As far as whether Allah is God or not, that is an important issue that needs to be discussed. Baptists here in Indonesia call God 'Allah.' That is the Indonesian word that corresponds with 'Theos' or 'Elohim' just as 'God' is the English word. Arabic speaking Christians call god 'Allah.' One of my professors, probably my Arabic professor, said that the Christians and Jews called God 'Allah' before Muhammad came around.

'Allah' is believed to be a contracted form of 'Al illah.' 'Al' means 'the' and 'illah' means 'god.' So 'Allah' means 'the God.'

Some Anti-Islamic Christian literature says that 'Allah' was the name of a Sabean pagan deity. One book showed the Islamic crescent moon and star (turned down) on a carving of an idol of this false gods chest. The Sabeans worshipped their 'Allah' as the moon, and has a goddess 'Alat' in their pantheon. Allat means 'the goddess.
But if there were Christians and Jews calling God 'Allah' during the same time period, we can't say 'Allah' is an illegitimate word for God based on Sabean usage. 'El' the Hebrew word for God was used for pagan concepts of God.

Allah, btw, is believed to be cognate with the Hebrew word 'el.' 'il' in 'illah' is believed to be cognate with Hebrew 'el.' I've heard that the word 'God' in English comes from the name of a pagan German false god. Should we through the word 'God' out?

The Hebrew word 'el' was used for pagan concepts of God. Melchezedek was priest of the most high God. Apparently there was some knowledge of God back then. Melchizedek served as a priest for someone or for some group, perhaps his city, Salem.

The records from the ancient Canaanite city of Ugarit show that the Ugarits had a pantheon of pagan deities. The head of their pantheon in their mythology was headed by 'El' or 'God.' Some would compare this to God and the sons of God in the Old Testament. But the Ugarit idea of God was paganized. Their 'El' in their mythology got drunk, and fell in his own excrement-- hardly the concept of God in the Bible. Later, pagan Canaanites would have their pantheon headed by a figure they called 'lord', that is 'Ba'al.'

In Judges, during a revolution related to Gideon's descendants, some inhabitants of a city sought refuge in the temple of El-Berith. Maybe this temple was built because of some interaction with Canaanites who still held to a form of El-worship.

Did the Canaanites worship the true God? In the time of Melchizedek, some of them probably did. There may have been some knowledge of God passed down from the time of Noah. But over time, they became more and more influenced by idolatry, which darkened their understanding, and they started believing in a figure called 'El' that bore little resemblance to the true God. Their use of the word 'El' did not negate the validity of the word when used in reference to the true God. So why should the Sabean use of 'Allah' make that name illegitimate?

Missionaries nowadays often realize it is important to use the local word for 'God.' A lot of cultures started out believing in one Supreme God, and added idolatry later on. They will have a word for the Most High God which missionaries can use for God when they share the Gospel. I spoke with a tribesman whose people had recieved the gospel a generation before. They had a word for the Almighty before the missionaries came.

I don't think we should say "Allah is not God" since Allah appears to be just as legitimate of a word for God as our English word 'God,' if not more so, since it is related to the Hebrew word.

When we consider whether the Allah of Islam is the same as the Allah of Christianity, that is a more complicated question. On the one hand, the God of the Muslims is the creator God who created the heavens and earth, who also created Adam and Eve. Allah is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God who inspired the Torah and the Gospels. On the other hand the god of the Muslims, the Koran says, is the greatest deciever of them all. That is not true of the God of the Christians.

One relevant question is to ask whether the God of the Samaritans was the true God. Their Torah was only changed a little from the read version. They worshipped at the wrong temple. Jesus told the Samaritan woman 'ye worship ye know not what.' Of course we have to keep in mind that 'worship' means 'bow down' and prostrate, and they were prostrating in the wrong direction, toward the Samaritan temple rather than toward the Jerusalem one.

Something else to keep in mind is that Paul didn't seem to have a problem taking quotes from pagan literature about 'God' and applying them to the real God if the quotes were true, like 'in Him we live and breathe, and have our being.

We may believe that Muslims have wrong concepts about God, but I don't think it helps to say that Muslims worship a different God, and certainly not in the context of evangelism. I have a friend who was a Muslim. When she was learning about Christianity, she said that 'Allah' told her in prayer that Jesus is the Way. She became a Christian. Telling her that Allah was a different God didn't make sense to her. I don't think it will make any sense to Muslims wanting to learn about Jesus either. There is already so much common ground between Islam and Christianity already. For example, the Koran teaches that Jesus is the Messiah, born of a virgin, and the Messiah. It affirms that the books of the Torah and the Gospel are true. Muslims scholars, who no doubt later realized that the Bible doesn't agree, explained this away saying the Bible has been corrupted. Islam leaves a lot of Muslims realizing their sinfulness and inadequacy before God. It makes more sense to do as Paul did in Athens and find common ground to argue from than to tell Muslims that they worship a different God. They think they worship the God of Abraham.

I spoke with a m'nary here in Indonesia who pronounces God's name with an 'Islamic' accent like "Alloh" with a velarized 'l.' The Christians usually pronounce it a little different. He uses the Arabic name for Jesus 'Isa, rather than the local Christian word Yesus.

 

"If the account above is so different from the real event, how can researchers be so sure that this is the even spoken of in the account above?"
''
You should mail Snopes.com and ask them, there is no doubt that they are very certain that they've got the right event.

 

J.W.'s use the name "god."
Mormons use the name "god."
Hindus use the name "god."

Are we so naive that we cannot differentiate between the false god of another religion and the true God of Christianity. We do it all the time, even in our English language. When I talk to a Mormon I know that the god he worships is not the God of the Bible. If I talk to a Hindu, when he mentions god, I know that he is not referring to the God of the Bible.
Any Arabic Christian would know the same thing. Context is everything. Besides, there are other words one can use in the Arabic-based languages for God.

Allah, as referred to in Islam, is a demon inspired caricature of God. He is not the God of the Bible, but is diametrically opposed to the God of the Bible. Belief in the god of Allah leads people straight to the pit of Hell. Belief in the God of the Bible gives people eternal life. There is a world of difference.
It is anethema for a Muslim to approach Allah in a personal way, such as calling Him, "Father." To them, he is an impersonal god, afar off, unapproachable.
That is not the God of the Bible, who, for the Christian, is approachable, whom we do call Father, who we do establish a relationship with.

One god is inspired by Satan used to direct people to Hell.
The other is a God of love who loves you and desires you to accept his love and be with him in heaven.
DHK

 

Islam is simply painting "Another false picture of God" and then claiming to sit in the seat of God - instructing its followers in the reasons for killing and murdering non-Islamic peoples.

Notice how "little" concern Islamic people had for the 100's of thousands of slaughtered Islamic people in Iraq? They are not concerned to "find terrorists" or to police their own Islamic despots and tyrants. Their sole "riotous" concern is foamented over Israel and anyone that might enter a mosque to capture a murderer.

They show by their fruits the darkness in which they dwell. And these attributes are as plain for the world to see as is the inquisition of the dark ages. There is no way to put a "good face" on it - or to put "lipstick on the pig" as they say.

In Christ,

Bob