St. John of Damascus – The saint who wrote the first Christian treatise against Islam.
Ahmed Deedat is certainly the most influential muslim apologist in the last century. That doesn’t mean he’s the best as he certainly was not, but he’s the most influential and most popular. He talks in sound bites and relies on presentation as opposed to substance.
Deedat was born in 1918 in India, which was under British control at that time. He was an apologist for most of his life until he suffered a stroke in the 1990’s and was unable to continue in this profession. He died in 2005.
One of his favorite sayings was: “There is not a single unequivocal statement in the complete Bible where Jesus says ‘I am God’ or ‘Worship me’.” Because of Deedat’s popularity, these words are repeated worldwide by muslims, whether they are lay muslims or professional debaters. More often than not, the Christian is stumped at this point.
The approach in refuting this statement is to look at the presuppositions. This statement would imply that the only way Jesus could communicate his divinity is by those two statements. In other words, when Jesus affirms doubting Thomas’ confession “My Lord and my God” as a statement of belief, it carries no value. The same is true of Jesus telling his disciples to Baptize in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, which strictly implies that all three persons are equal in baptism. Other clear statements are rejected as well using this method.
The best response to this argument is to ask a question. That question is: “If Jesus never claimed to be God, who started this belief that he was God?” The answer you’ll get is either Peter, Paul, John, Ignatius, Constantine or some other early Christian. Let’s assume the muslim you’re dialoguing with goes with Paul. That’s when you say: “When did Paul say ‘Jesus is God’ or ‘Worship him’? In other words, the exact question only with pronouns changed. They won’t be able to give an answer since they know that Paul didn’t say that, though they fully admit that Paul taught the deity of Christ. I then tell them that Paul didn’t use those words any more than Jesus did but they still taught the exact same thing.
Another fallacy to expose in this argument is the fact that they are willing to take the unequivocal statements of Jesus at face value. Muslims say that Jesus didn’t die and rise from the dead. After you point this out, read them Mark 9:30. The verse reads:
“And he taught his disciples, and said to them: The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men, and they shall kill him; and after that he is killed, he shall rise again the third day.”
Ask them what they say about this unequivocal statement. It clearly lays out what Christ is going to do but they still reject his death and resurrection. Ask them if they now accept the death and resurrection of Christ. Once they answer no, simply point out to them that they don’t care one bit about the unequivocal statements made by Christ in the Bible so their challenge is fallacious.
This argument is bogus. It’s a sound bite that sounds impressive when said strongly and with authority but when looked at, it simply doesn’t carry weight. Sorry Mr. Deedat.
Islam is a confluence of the heresies that plagued and attacked the early church, including arianism, iconoclasm, nestorianism, manicheism and docetism. The arian heresy rejects the divinity of christ, iconoclasm the depiction of the sacred, and docetism the belief of the crucifixion of christ as an actual event. That’s why Pope Calixtus III and St John Christsotom regarded Islam as the religion of the anti-christ.
Any apologist worth his salt must confront the errors summed up in the religion called islam. I think you are this apologist!
Hey Bryan,
Thanks for the kind words. I think you were referring to St. John Damascene as opposed to St. John Chrysostom as Chrysostom was pre-Islam. I will certainly put more blog posts up in the future regarding this topic. Ahmed Deedat is the apologist that most people see on television and youtube. His arguments are well known but almost purely rhetorical. Muslims do have better apologists though who specialize in reading liberal ‘Christian’ scholarship that denies key doctrines of the Faith. They often use arguments, that if turned around will refute Islam. This needs to be pointed out to them.
Be very afraid: we’re still waiting for your answer to Deedat’s question. Set aside the double standards.
This is why I no longer attend weekly church, for the Christian doctrine makes no absolute sense. Zakir Hussain was right, by your definitions Jesus is a false Christ according to orthodox Judaism through the verses of the Tanakh and the Laws of Moses: Hanging on a tree outside Jerusalem, cursed.
Does Jesus Christ use those exact five words? No. I never said that He did. No Christian has ever said that. Can you now respond to my article?
“Zakir Hussain was right, by your definitions Jesus is a false Christ according to orthodox Judaism through the verses of the Tanakh and the Laws of Moses: Hanging on a tree outside Jerusalem, cursed.”
First of all, Orthodox Judaism didn’t exist at the time of Jesus Christ. It was invented by Jochanan ben Zakkai in the late first century so I don’t understand why they’re relevant. The don’t accept Muhammad as a prophet either so why are they the standard? If Jesus resurrected it makes His death irrelevant. Shabir Ally even admitted that.
Regarding what Hussain says Jesus dying outside of Jerusalem, I have shredded that argument.
http://allanruhl.com/luke-1333-refuting-a-bad-muslim-argument/
I have refuted a bunch of other arguments from Zakir Hussain.
http://allanruhl.com/paul-williams-and-zakir-hussain-exposed/
http://allanruhl.com/ahmed-deedat-zakir-hussain-and-the-sign-of-jonah/
http://allanruhl.com/refuting-zakir-hussain-on-hebrews-57/
Enjoy!
Thank you Carl for unknowingly allowing me to learn about this perfect argument by Allan (I was completely unaware of it until today, when I stumbled on it thanks to your comment which appeared in the recent comments list)
Hey Jonathan,
If there are any topics that you need surrounding Islam or church history, let me know. There is a good chance I’ve written about it and I’ll provide you the link.
God bless,
Allan
Thanks for your suggestion Allan.
Have you written anything about the Saint-Yves-d’Alveydre view of Papacy history ?
I have a friend who left Catholicism after reading “Missions des Souverains”.
All I found myself able to do was repeating equivalents of “Proof please” to my friend as he extracted claim after claim from the book. In retrospect I was rather unconvincing. If “Mission des Souverains” is a pack of lies, it is a well-told and elaborate one, and I have to admit that I’m not familiar enough with Church history to refute it with a counter-narrative rather than just demands of proof.
I have never heard of this work, which is weird because I’ve read about 10 books written by Protestants and EO’s against the Papacy, both modern and historic. I’d have to look into it.
So no, I haven’t written anything against it.