The Christian and Islamic Scriptures which the Quran tells Muslims to believe in
How much of the Bible does the Quran confirm? I used to say quite a bit but I’ve since modified my answer. My answer is now all of it. There is no verse in the entire Quran that says that the Bible is corrupt, not one. We have Surah 2:79 but this doesn’t refer to all people as Surah 3:199 shows. Now, let’s start off with the Torah and the Gospel.
Say, “O People of the Scripture! You have no basis until you uphold the Torah, and the Gospel, and what is revealed to you from your Lord.” But what is revealed to you from your Lord will increase many of them in rebellion and disbelief, so do not be sorry for the disbelieving people.
– Surah 5:68
Allah is telling Muhammad to tell the people of the scripture to uphold the Torah and the Gospel. Obviously the only Torah and Gospel they knew was what they had with them, therefore the Torah and Gospel in the Bible today are considered scripture and fully authoritative.
Now, this is only 9 books out of 73. We’ve still got a long way to go. Let’s move onto the rest of the Old Testament. We see in the Quran that Jesus Christ, his disciples, John the Baptist and the blessed virgin are praised as holy people. Well, they all historically believed in the entire Old Testament, not just the Torah. The Quran never endorses any Sadducees so Muslims are now stuck with the entire Old Testament. It’s a long book Muslims, better start reading it.
What about the non-Gospel portions of the New Testament such as Acts, the epistles and Revelation? Well, Muslims must believe in these books as Scripture as well. Let’s look at a verse in the Quran.
O you who believe! Be supporters of God, as Jesus son of Mary said to the disciples, “Who are my supporters towards God?” The disciples said, “We are God’s supporters.” So a group of the Children of Israel believed, while another group disbelieved. We supported those who believed against their foe, so they became dominant.
– Surah 61:14
The Christians who became dominant over the Jews were known as Pauline Christians. They believed in the death, resurrection, and deity of Jesus Christ. They also endorsed the 27 book canon of the New Testament. Before Islam we have three councils that produced canons of scripture. I’m of course talking about Rome, Hippo, and Carthage in the late fourth and early fifth century. This is the group that became dominant over the Jews. These councils are also before the rise of Islam.
We see that there is no way out for the Muslim. They must now do two things. First, they must study and cherish the Bible just as much as they study and cherish the Quran. The second is that they must never fault Christians for using the Bible as authoritative. If they do, they’re contradicting the Quran.
Dear Mr Ruhl
On the Subject if Biblical interpretation, what is your opinion of this quote from a decidedly liberal Priest of the Anglican Church. For some, I could not say why, it seems very popular with our dear friend Paul Williams:
‘Much of what the Gospels tell us about Jesus, his teaching, healings and other miracles, are not mentioned in Irenaeus’ rule of faith and would not be mentioned in later creeds either. Rudolf Bultmann claimed that in John’s gospel, ‘the Proclaimer became the Proclaimed’, in other words that Jesus went from being the one who spoke of the coming kingdom of God, and taught people how to live in its light, to being himself the content of the Christian proclamation. Instead of a gospel preached by Jesus, Christians came to believe in a gospel about Jesus. This development had certainly advanced even further by the time of Irenaeus (born 130 AD), whose rule of faith sees Jesus as the person the Christian message is about.’
Your and any other views would be most welcome.
Yours In Christ
Tobias