Category Archives: Muslim and Non-Muslim Dialogue

Why Does Allah Want Muslims to Pray Only in Arabic?

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This is a very funny question by the Christian faithful, and it’s a question that they try to imply that our God is ignorant of any other language and only knows Arabic, for example they say to us – doesn’t Allaah know English, why does He only want you to pray in Arabic?

The response to this is pretty simple, and is common knowledge among the Muslims, but I’m publishing this article in the event that there is a Muslim who may need some support in answering such a claim. To begin with, a distinction needs to be made. Muslims can pray in any language they want, a prayer is what we refer to as a du’a in Arabic. You can make a du’a at anytime, you can glorify God, praise Him, ask for things, whenever, wherever, however.

Worship (Salaah) however, is something different to du’a. Salaah is a meeting between the worshiper and one who is worshiped. Due to this, we must ask the Christian a very important question, does the worshiper meet God on his terms or does the worshiper meet God on God’s terms? Let’s say that you have an invitation to a business meeting, you’d have a shower, wear your finest clothes, prepare yourself to go, arrive early, speak in a professional manner with the businessmen, etc. You don’t show up dirty, wearing clothes you’d wear to the beach, show up an hour late and speak in an unprofessional manner! The same goes for worship, you meet God on His terms, you show Him respect by cleaning yourself before your meeting with Him (wudhu, ghusl), you wear proper clothing – clean clothing, you arrive for the prayer early and you pray to God, using His words, not your words or the words of men.

If we can show humans this level of respect, then why can’t we show the same or more respect to God? Therefore, when the Christian asks, why do we worship God only in Arabic, it isn’t because God doesn’t know any other language – but it is because we respect God and we value His words (scripture) to us, we do not find it appropriate to worship God using the words of men (translations) or under our terms, we show God what He deserves – respect. The Christian through this explanation may then understand the true value of worship in Islam, it is not done for the sake of men, but for the love of God and because of this, we pray in Arabic using His words, under His terms and conditions and not under our terms or by using the words of men. God is much more deserving of our respect, than men are.

and Allaah knows best.

Criticism of CL Edwards’ Debate Methodology versus Br. Shadid Lewis

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Br. Shadid Lewis and CL Edwards recently had a debate entitled, “Can We Trust the Islamic Jesus“, this is not a review of the debate (the review shall be published soon), but this is a criticism of CL Edward’s methodology of which he employed during the debate. I base my informed criticism about CL, on my experience as a debater who has also previously engaged with him in a recorded debate and on my past rebuttals to him.

The Scope and Delimitations of the Debate

It’s all in the title. When two debaters sit down to discuss a topic, they are agreeing to leave off all other discussions and to focus on what the subject of the debate is. So for example, if I sit down with an opponent, and we agree to debate oranges, we are agreeing to discuss nothing but oranges, we will not discuss any other fruit such as an apple, or a banana. This therefore is what we refer to as the scope (depth) and the delimitations (boundaries of the debate). The scope of the debate, is that we have agreed to discuss everything about oranges, as much as we can. The delimitations (or boundaries) of the debate, mean that we limit ourselves to the discussion of oranges. CL would have to explain if he did not agree to debate this topic, to atleast release himself from the criticism against him.

What’s in the Title?

The title of the debate was and up to the start of the debate, declared to be, “Can We Trust the Islamic Jesus“. Let’s break the title up to understand what the scope and delimitations of the debate was:

  • Can we trust
  • the Islamic Jesus

Who is being referred to as, ‘we‘, here? Well, let the evidence show that the we, includes solely Christians and Muslims. Why do I say this? Well for one, the organization which CL Edwards represented was a Christian organization, the Center for Religious Debate. The audience was a Christian audience. The debate was held inside of a Church and the debate began and ended with Christian prayers.

Secondly, they were debating the Islamic Jesus, not the sources of the Islamic Jesus, but whether or not Christians, can trust the Islamic Jesus, not the Islamic faith, the Islamic scriptures, the Islamic Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), but the Islamic Jesus.

What was Shadid’s Methodology?

Since this was a Christian opponent, and a Christian audience and given the scope and delimitations of the debate title, Br. Shadid’s methodology was quite simple. It can be demonstrated in set notation:

Let Set M represent the attributes of Islamic Jesus:

  • Set M = {Man, Prophet, Sent by God, Did Miracles, Virgin Birth, Messiah}.

Let Set C represent the attributes of the Christian Jesus:

  • Set C = {Man, Prophet, Sent by God, Did Miracles, Virgin Birth, Messiah, God}.

Set C represents what Christians trust about Jesus, therefore, Shadid’s methodology is to demonstrate the intersection of Islamic beliefs and Christians beliefs about Jesus, imply that they already believe what Muslims believe, and since they already trust their own beliefs about Christ, they then already trust the Islamic beliefs about Christ.

Let M ^ C be the intersection or what is commonly trusted among the beliefs of Muslims and Christians about Christ:

  • Set M ^ C = {Man, Prophet, Sent by God, Did Miracles, Virgin Birth, Messiah}.

The Muslim beliefs about Christ, are therefore declared to be a subset of the beliefs which Christians have about Jesus Christ. I’m using set logic, or set notation, since this is the easiest way to explain Br. Shadid’s methodology. I’m also using this form of explanation, since CL Edwards claims to have studied logic, or atleast attempted to explain (without reason), the definition of several logical fallacies during the debate. It is therefore the case, that CL clearly is an inane ignoramus, a sophomore (bookful blockhead), who although being a claimant of utilizing logic, he clearly did not understand the clear and consistent logic as used by Br. Shadid. My criticism against CL shows that he either intentionally misled himself into thinking he was a logician, or he fooled his audience by claiming to understand Br. Shadid’s methodology.

What was CL’s Methodology?

CL Edwards focused his argument on the following points:

  • The Qur’aan is not from the first century, thus it is not a reliable witness to the personhood of Christ.
  • The Qur’aan does not contain first person eyewitness reports, thus it cannot be trusted as to what it says about Christ.
  • The Qur’aan’s claim that Jesus had a scripture which has never been seen or proven to exist, proves that the Islamic Jesus cannot be trusted.

His methodology however, fails to live up to the scope and delimitations of the debate title, for which both speakers agreed upon. Let’s look at the first argument. The debate is not about the reliability of the Qur’aan, therefore the first argument of CL is outside the scope and delimitations of the debate, not to mention it contradicts his own beliefs as the New Testament itself is outside of the first century via empirical evidence (P52 dated to 125 CE), theoretically though it is dated to have existed in some form during the 70 – 80 CE, however there is no physical manuscript (for which CL argued for) which proves this.

His second argument, once again falls outside of the scope and delimitations of the title. The debate is not about the reliability of eyewitness reports. Br. Shadid during the debate also successfully demonstrated that the New Testament was written decades after Christ, by persons unknown to Christ, the names of the Gospels are mere attributions as handed down by tradition and not by fact.

Lastly, his final point, the existence of the Injeel also fails to be relevant to the title. The debate is not about whether the Injeel existed or not, or what the evidence for the Injeel is, therefore this argument of CL is highly irrelevant and clearly outside the scope and delimitations of the agreed debate title.

A Change of Scope and Delimitations

At some point during the debate, CL realised that if he were to argue against trusting the Islamic Jesus, he’d have to argue against what Christians already believe about Christ – since the Muslim beliefs about Christ are a subset of what Christians already do believe (this was demonstrated above). CL, realising this, decided to alter the scope of the debate, by asking Br. Shadid to assume he was an atheist, and therefore from this angle, challenged him to prove that the Islamic Jesus existed.

Once again, this only goes to demonstrate that CL is not a professional debater, nor is he educated. To begin with, if we are to discuss the topic that CL proposed, then we’d be discussing the origins of Christ, since atheists do not agree that Christ may have even existed at all. This is outside the scope of the debate, as the title does not indicate that either speaker was to prove Christ existed, but rather to show that Christians who already believed in a Jesus Christ, can also believe or trust in the Islamic Christ.

A Hypocrite of Unforeseen Proportions

During the debate CL Edwards found himself claiming several fallacies of Br. Shadid, to which he himself is victim of:

  1. Confirmation bias.
  2. Straw man argumentation.
  3. Cherry picking.

CL’s confirmation bias, was demonstrated when he declared that the Bible came from eyewitnesses during the first century. This is clearly a false notion and none of the NT texts have been transmitted as first person verbatim.

By pretending to be an atheist and asking Br. Shadid to prove that Christ existed at all and then condemning him when he chose not to – and to instead stick to the debate, this is in itself a straw man argument.

Lastly, Br. Shadid, practised the Christian methodology of typology, in which they read from their own text/ scripture (the New Testament) about the Christ and then they return to the Old Testament to demonstrate that he was mentioned there, or that the Old Testament offers proofs about him. Br. Shadid applied this same methodology to the New Testament, he declared the Christ of the Qur’aan to be trustworthy and then using typology, demonstrated the Qur’aanic Christ from the New Testament. One of the strangest arguments from CL is that he asked, how could Br. Shadid seek for evidences of an Islamic Christ in a book he himself believe to be corrupted, when CL himself and many Christians believe that Jews corrupted the Torah to hide the truth about the Christ’s prophecies within them. He lowly can he go?

Very Low

In a last ditch attempt to salvage a debate in which the methodology of Br. Shadid flew over his head, in a debate to which he could not commit himself to be relevant, and to a crowd who was anxious – waiting for him to make a single valid point, CL went to the lowest low. He began to insult and use derogatory terms. How are these questions relevant to the trustworthiness of the Islamic Christ?

  • Does your God have a penis?
  • Your Prophet had sex with a child.

These have nothing to do with the debate, but rather these were low blows in attacking the faith of Br. Shadid, in order to escape the reality that CL cannot stand up and defend his faith, so he rather cast insults to make himself feel better. In contrast, doesn’t CL believe in a deity who is a man, and therefore does have genitals? We also pray that CL has taken a biology class or two, but again, his level of intelligence is yet to be established, therefore it is no wonder he has labelled a young adult as a child, he does not know that at the age of sexual maturation, a child can no longer be labeled as such.

The Reality of the Debate

If CL had to argue that the Islamic Jesus was not trustworthy, seeing as the Islamic beliefs about Christ, are a subset of Christian beliefs about Christ, he’d be relegated to arguing against his own religion. Therefore, for a majority of the debate, he focused on things outside of the scope and delimitation of the topic – the existence of the Injeel, the Qur’aanic claims about Christ, the eyewitnesses, God’s genitals, explaining the meanings of some logical fallacies, etc. CL did not have the courage to discuss the topic directly and therefore found himself fiddling around with largely irrelevant arguments, pretending to be atheist and mocking his opponent.

I’ve always held that the debate with Bob Siegel was the worst of the series, but to me, CL took the cake for this title. Bob was uninformed, inexperienced, but we cannot offer the same excuses for CL. He’s debated before, this is his field of interest, he’s a seminary student, he claims to be an ex-Muslim, he has no excuse for his lackluster performance, his shameful behaviour and his lack of mental fortitude to cope with the methodology and logic of Br. Shadid.

CL Can’t Change

I experienced the same with CL during my debate with him. Like any other dud, he tried to explain that Christ was God from evidences in the Bible, the debate however was titled, “Is Jesus God, man or both”?, it never asked according to the Qur’aan or Bible! I caught him out, demonstrated that his evidences and opening were useless, I used the secular historical method, never once quoting the New Testament or the Qur’aan. I’d presented an argument, with a methodology that he hadn’t prepared for, so his counter arguments were nuanced, he couldn’t salvage the debate because he didn’t prepare for it in the way I did.

Similarly, he wrongly assumed the arguments Br. Shadid would offer, so when Br. Shadid offered something logical, and clear, something CL didn’t think of – he had to go all out to not lose a second debate in a row. CL lost one debate, perhaps we could excuse him as it was his first, but to lose a second in a row because he was unprepared to deal with his opponent’s arguments – demonstrates that he is not a debater, he cannot hold his own and when he’s put to defend his religion, he can’t.

The Challenge

I know CL cannot debate me, I know that he’d try to mock me or insult my religion or cast aspersions about my character. Regardless of these things, he cannot hold his own in a debate, so here I am, challenging CL to debate me, let’s debate the topic Bob failed to impress on, “Is the NT Reliable“? Can you defend your religion against a person who’s not only significantly younger than you, but who’s unfazed by your theatrics? The challenge has been issued, all we need now is to see if CL can stand up and hold his own…? I’ve issued an email challenge to him, this is the message verbatim:

Good day Mr. Edwards,

Please see the following article assessing your performance, and also see the challenge towards the end:

https://callingchristians.com/2013/09/13/criticism-of-cl-edwards-debate-methodology-versus-br-shadid-lewis/

Can you hold your own?

Let’s see what his next move is.

and Allaah knows best.

Debate Video Pulled! Br. Shadid Lewis vs Bob Siegel

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The now infamous and controversial debate video between MDI’s Br. Shadid Lewis and CRD’s Bob Siegel on the Reliability of the New Testament, has been mysteriously pulled from the YouTube Channel of the Church where the series of debates were held. A few days ago, I posted that the videos were uploaded for public viewing, however, earlier yesterday afternoon – the video was pulled without reason.

According to several insiders, the Church disliked the content of the video, given Bob’s antics which were seen as an embarrassment by the wider Christian community, therefore the Church’s technician who uploaded the videos, was told to take them down as the content was inappropriate for the Church’s Ministerial purposes. Luckily for us, my Brother in Islam, MuslimByChoice, had downloaded and re-uploaded the entire debate!

and Allaah knows best.

Christians Racially Abuse Br. Shadid Lewis

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It is no secret that the Answering Muslims Blog is operated by extremist right-wing American Christians, David Wood himself is a very active member of the anti-iimigration, anti-Muslim organization Act4America!, and several of their posts are very critical of the US President simply because of his ethnicity. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that the persons who often view their blog, think similarly to them. Unfortunately, they have no shame in what they say, despite claiming to be religious folk and a few of their members let their racism openly be known directly on the Answering Muslims Blog and via one of their friend’s Paltalk rooms of which Anthony Rogers (under the pseudonym, Charles Martel), frequently visits and supports:

shadid whip

Click to Enlarge

This particular Christian found it particularly pleasant to refer to Br. Shadid’s ‘fetish‘ for being whipped. It is quite well known that African slaves in America were punished via the whip, or lashes with whips as is described in violent beatings referred to as ‘lynchings’. Therefore, this person’s insinuation is that Br. Shadid is a black Muslim who like those before him, likes to be whipped by his Caucasian Christian superiors.

cc-2013-shadidracism1

This comment is a bit more direct and was featured prominently on the Answering Muslims blog. Here we can see a Caucasian Christian, insinuating that Br. Shadid was an angry black Muslim, who was very threatening to those in the West. Why would the color of his skin need to be mentioned, and why the adjective angry? It’s fairly common to see racists referring to Afro-Americans as ‘Angry Black Persons‘, in this case, Br. Shadid is rendered as an ‘Angry Black Muslim Man‘, who is ‘very threatening‘, and was ‘yelling‘ at his audience. Whereas Bob Siegel who debated Br. Shadid, was screaming and making strange noises on stage, but never once was he described as ‘loud‘, ‘yelling‘ or ‘angry‘.

Neither David Wood nor Anthony Rogers who commented on the same post on their blog, found it to be inappropriate that Br. Shadid’s color of skin was used as a criticism against him, which only goes to show that they agree with what this person wrote. As Muslims, we do not allow racism to be a part of our religion, even if we dislike a certain culture, we dislike the culture itself and not the persons, as it is easy to dislike a sin, but not to hate the sinner – as no one is devoid of God’s mercy and guidance.

We kindly ask Answering Muslims to issue an apology to the Muslim and African communities in regards to their racism and we hope to see that they shall take punitive measures to curb the racist culture which is bred amongst their fan base. I decided to send an e-mail to Anthony Rogers (smprparatus@aol.com), asking him to address the issue:

Good Day Mr. Rogers,
I am quite appalled to have seen several racist comments issued by your fan base in regards to Br. Shadid Lewis, including mentions of him liking to be whipped and that he was also an angry black man. I do not know if you condone, or if your faith allows you to pursue such views (viz a viz the curse of Ham), but as a Muslim I have found those remarks to be quite distasteful and abusive.

In this article I have screenshotted said comments issued by your fan base:

https://callingchristians.com/2013/09/13/christians-racially-abuse-br-shadid-lewis/

Will you be intending to address the racist culture bred amongst your fan base, or is this behaviour something you and your faith condones? Looking forward to a reply given the serious nature of this situation.

Br. Ijaz Ahmad
http://www.callingchristians.com

and Allaah knows best.

The Commenting Situation

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Dear Visitors,

There’s a significant backlog of comments and a greater backlog is being created by persons commenting on why all of their comments are not being approved. This has been an issue since our inception, the original plan was to allow for comments to be posted on articles and for the author(s) to discuss with our readership, but the sheer quantity of comments and emails, not to mention our vast amount of  Facebook comments and inbox messages, makes it almost impossible to dedicate our free time to responding to each and every argument, especially those that continue for months without end.

A lot of you send really great points, rebuttals, even refutations against some of our more popular articles, and we do read them, but it’s difficult to reply to a 500 word refutation, and then another and another each night. I’m unsure as to whether or not I’ll temporarily disable commenting until we clear up the backlog. I apologize to those of you who enjoy commenting on a regular basis, but this is the situation as it is, and God willing, it will improve given the measures we plan to institute soon.

Thank you for your time.
and Allaah knows best.

Bob Siegel and the Center for Religious Debate

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Bob Siegel is a Muslim hero. After his debate with Br. Shadid Lewis, there can be no doubt that Bob secretly works for Muslims. I say this because Bob seemed to offend, almost insult and argue against Christianity in last night’s debate. Not only did he not defend the reliability of the New Testament (as was the topic of focus), but he successfully argued against it, while embarrassing himself in one of the most absurd displays of immaturity I have ever been privy to witness.

Unfortunately for Bob, I have a very strong feeling that he would now be the focus of many Muslim-Christian debates, because of his self refuting nature, it’s impossible that anyone debating him could actually lose. In a debate where Bob had to defend the reliability of the Christian New Testament, Bob said, in no uncertain terms:

one scribe writes something stupid and another scribe crosses it out

According to Bob Siegel, the hero of Muslims everywhere (Calling Christians is probably going to consider forwarding him a proposal to make him our spokesperson), during the writing of his scripture, people wrote stupid things in it, or a scribe copied stupid things that God said and other scribes crossed out what they felt was stupid. Now isn’t that funny, in a book that he’s supposed to be defending as reliable – he argues that arbitrary editing on the count of something being apparently stupid – was done. If that isn’t arguing against his own point, then I don’t know what to call it.

This however, wasn’t the worse thing that Bob did, at one point Bob decided to break out into song and dance – yes, singing and dancing during an academic discourse because he felt like it. Flailing arms, animated speaking, voice impersonations and more, Bob is a man of many talents, but what he is not is a professional debater, nor an academic. To be quite honest, I’d pay money to have Bob entertain me, he’s good at it, he’s very theatrical, a great singer, amazing dancer, his voice impersonations would make you laugh – it was a blast! Yet, this was neither the place nor the occasion for Bob to showcase his dramatic talents.

This was a debate, on behalf of the Center for Religious Debate. His arguments were poor, so poor that during his opening statement I successfully only counted one argument about the reliability of the New Testament. One, just a single stand alone argument. Other than that, Bob was largely a dud, nothing intelligent came out of his mouth and with each passing moment he seemed to slowly poison the well of Christian thought and belief. Besides negating the reliability of the New Testament and declaring the Bible to contain stupid man made writings, he happened to use awful analogies and at the very worse, emotional ranting.

Emotional Bob, this should be his stage name, and this is not meant to be insulting. Bob started his defense of the reliability of the New Testament by declaring that he spoke to God, he knows God and therefore nothing can be said to change his mind about the reliability of the New Testament. Isn’t that funny? For an academic discussion, you’d like to assume that one would provide evidences, maybe discuss or mention a theory or two, perhaps reference some famous scholarly works, but not Bob, he decided to throw thousands of years of Christian scholarship into a liberal trash can and figured his best plan of defending the reliability of the Bible is to declare that God literally, told him it was reliable.

Now, Bob wasn’t all that horrible, he did have some good, hard hitting points. His discussion on the cayaf (?, cayaph, kayaf, kayaph) was very insightful. Bob, what in the heck is a kayaf and what did it have to do with your debate last night? Apparently ‘kayaf’ is something Islamic that no Muslim knows about…

cc-2013-bobsiegelkayaf

Sorry Bob, but I just had to make you into a meme, did God also tell you I was going to do that? If not, maybe you should try to figure out what that voice in your head was, I’m thinking that it wasn’t God.

Now, Bob spoke largely about the Qur’aan and Islam, perhaps for 75% of the time he was speaking. This was a debate about the reliability of the New Testament, but I don’t think Bob got the memo that this was a debate or what the topic of the debate was. At one point, he asked the moderator how much time he had left and decided to forego 2 and 1/2 minutes of speaking time during his rebuttal period. Funnily enough, he later complained that he was not given enough time to speak.

Bob, you are the hero of Muslims everywhere. I pray that one day I do get to debate you, because you’d be the easiest person to debate. I’m hoping that you do more debates with Muslims, especially focusing on the topic of Christianity, perhaps you’d bring more Christians to Islam than is possible – you’re a great spokesperson for Islam and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

Debate Review: Is the Trinity Polytheism? Shadid Lewis vs Anthony Rogers

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Update: Sent this debate review to Anthony himself. If he responds or comments, I’ll post it here, if not, then his silence will speak volumes.

Update #2: As of 7:20 pm both his and my time, he viewed my message, no response as yet.

Opening Statements:

I’m not sure Anthony knew what debate he was showing up to, I sat with Sami Zataari and we took in Anthony’s opening together, our impressions were the same. Anthony most likely misunderstood the topic of the debate, this doesn’t mean that his contribution wasn’t meaningful, nor does it mean that he didn’t argue well, but what he did argue was largely irrelevant to the debate’s topic. I mean, if the debate topic was perhaps one of the few below, his points and evidences would have been relevant:

  • Is the Trinity in the Bible?
  • Are Christians Polytheists According to the Qur’aan?
  • Does the Islamic View of the Trinity Reconcile with that of the Bible’s?

Unfortunately for Mr. Rogers, the topic was not centered on what either the Qur’aan says, or what the Bible says, and this is key to both debaters’ arguments. I’ve debated Anthony before, and he suffers from the same weaknesses that he’s been unable to grow out of. He’s largely very verbose and his comments are usually irrelevant, it’s as if he’s puffing up his statements to get a few jabs in, but they’re largely not contributing to the topic. He also has a intellectual disability whereas, he’s unable to mature or think outside of his articles, for the greater portion of his opening sermon, you’d have bet he was reading from his, “The Trinity in the Old Testament” article which I cited in my recent article, here.

Positives for Anthony would be that he spoke with a lot of confidence, there’s no denying that he’s a talented orator, Shadid on the other hand not so much, but this doesn’t count for much beyond appearances, we’re looking at the arguments, the content and the logic presented.

Br. Shadid did something quite surprising, he didn’t take Anthony’s bait. In my recent debate review between him and Robert Spencer, I criticised him for furthering Spencer’s irrelevant arguments, arguing away from the topic. Not sure if he took my criticism to heart, or if he upped the ante in his debate with Anthony, but both Sami and I were quite pleased to see him stick to the topic, define the topic and to attack the topic from the get go. Whereas Anthony spent a lot of time focusing on what the Qur’aan considers the Christians to be, he spent almost 3/4 of his opening statement’s time on this, Br. Shadid went straight to the philosophical and rational theological reasons for why the Trinity is polytheistic in nature. He did mention a few Bible verses to support his claims, but for the better part of his opening statement, he focused on the logical and philosophical nature of the Trinity in light of general monotheism.

As mentioned previously, his speaking style leaves a lot to be desired, but that did not detract from his arguments. To my surprise, he stood his ground and waited for the rebuttal period to criticise his opponent’s deceits. He did not give in to Anthony’s emotional jabs and he kept his statements quite professional. I’d like to think that Anthony tried to get a rise out of Br. Shadid by mentioning that at the end of the debate he’d have to surrender his Qur’aan, kudos to Br. Shadid for disarming Anthony’s ridiculous emotional jab.

Rebuttals:

Anthony replied to all of Br. Shadid’s points, but it seems he still didn’t understand the topic well, or seem to realise this was the rebuttal period as he continued to speak on what the Qur’aan considers Christians to be. I hope that for the other debates he has with Shadid that he can atleast improve on sticking to the format of the debate, if I were supporting him, I’d be quite embarrassed to see a so-called Christian Apologist, lack any sense of relevance to the debate topic, while seeing him make crass and unprofessional statements about his opponent’s scripture. He did provide a lot of solid points against Br. Shadid’s arguments, but during this period, he still never actually conveyed how the Trinity is monotheistic, to be quite honest, I don’t think he spent any time at all discussing this point – which should have been his mainstay.

As for Br. Shadid, he did provide convincing rebuttals to Anthony’s filibustering, their counter-arguments seemed to be on par, but Br. Shadid did seem to have the stronger outcome here, as he stuck to the topic and focused on his premises, how can Jesus Christ have a God, how can Jesus pray to God, how can Paul claim to see Jesus sitting to the right hand of God – then who is Jesus in this case, etc. Anthony did not provide a response to these points, but focused on Br. Shadid’s quotes, largely ignoring the theological/ Christological components of Shadid’s points and instead focused on their exegetical applications – showing once again that Anthony clearly missed the mark and that he failed to grasp the topic of the debate fully.

Conclusions:

I was quite insulted by Anthony’s closing statements, as it failed to be relevant at all to the debate topic and I must congratulate Br. Shadid on labeling it as an unwanted sermon. It seemed more like preaching, than a discussion on Br. Shadid’s points. Closing statements are not meant to be sermons, it is not meant to be a time to preach to the audience, and I was greatly turned off by his indecency, to me it felt as if Anthony was not prepared for, or he did not care about this debate and used it as a stage to stroke his ego and to preach to Christians, as opposed to have an academic discussion on the theological implications of the Trinity.

For me, this is where Br. Shadid clearly won, he didn’t give us a Khutbah – Islamic sermon, he honed in his points, qualified his premises and criticised Anthony’s improper, indecent and unqualified sermon, as opposed to doing a closing statement, as should have been given. He capped off his arguments and asked the audience to decide for themselves what the truth about the Trinity was. This debate by Br. Shadid was much better, much more classier and professional than his debate with Spencer. As for Anthony on the other hand, he did not seem prepared, and he chose to ignore the topic, I actually feel quite sorry for him given the mess that he caused – perhaps in this way he’s enlightened many Christians and drove them to doubt the Trinity, atleast that is what I conclude from his behaviour on that night.

and Allaah knows best.

Is (Trinitarian) Christianity Monotheistic?

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Introduction

Christianity inherits monotheism from the Jewish faith, as Christianity primarily is – Messianic Judaism. Therefore, before we begin our quest in solving the title’s question, we must ask another important question. Is Judaism monotheistic? The answer for our purposes is yes. Both Muslims and Jews can agree on the Shema Yisrael which is found in Deuteronomy 6:4, it reads:

Sh’ma Yis’ra’eil Adonai Eloheinu Adonai echad.
Hear, Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.

This is essentially the same as what is presented to us in Surat al Ikhlas (Ch. 112) in the Qur’aan:

Say: He is Allaah the One.

If we are to be honest and if we wish to examine Christianity as the post-Christ Judaic faith of which it presents itself as, then our understanding of monotheism must be based on the Shema Yisrael. The problem therefore is, does Christianity adhere to the Shema Yisrael?

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Church of England Invests Millions in Weapons Firm

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The Independent (UK) reports:

The Church of England has invested up to £10m in one of the world’s major arms firms, which supplies systems and technology for unmanned drones and jets to conflicts around the world. The discovery, on the eve of what is set to be the biggest day of protests against DSEi – the UK’s leading arms fair – in Docklands, London, tomorrow, has led worshippers to accuse church leaders of profiting from conflict.

The Church Commissioners and Church of England Pensions Board are both shareholders in General Electric (GE), with shareholdings up to £10m. Yesterday, the Church defended the investment, claiming less than 3 per cent of GE’s business was based in arms sales.

But the firm, along with its key subsidiary General Aviation, is a leading supplier of “integrated systems and technologies” for combat aircraft, military transport, helicopters, land vehicles and unmanned aerial vehicles – better known as drones.

It is the 20th-highest-ranking firm in the world when it comes to defence sales, which accounted for almost 3 per cent of its total revenue last year – an estimated £4bn.

While the Church of England is not breaching its own rules by investing in the firm – investments in companies that derive less than 10 per cent of turnover from strategic military sales are allowed – some church members reacted angrily to the news.

Keith Hebden, an Anglican priest who was arrested earlier this year for breaking into RAF Waddington – from where drones used in Afghanistan are remotely controlled – said the Church of England’s policy was wrong. He explained: “We’re going to end up with problems. This means we have a stake in wanting there to be war.”

Read the full article here. I wonder how Christian apologists (read: it means those who defend, not those who apologize), will defend a Christian Church having monetary stakes in a weapons manufacturing company. What if a Masjid decided to invest their donation money into a Saudi Arabian arms dealer or a Sudanese weapons manufacturing company? At the end of the day, the Church of England invested in a weapons manufacturer and the only way they can make a profit is through war and combat, the Church, we can say – is making money off of violence.

and God knows best.

Pastor Condemns Christians Who Pray for Forgiveness

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This is an absolutely priceless video. Pastor Martin Richling of the ‘Scripture Alone Bible School’,has released a video, confirming what Muslims have been saying to Christians for centuries.

Why do you pray for forgiveness if Christ already died for your sins?

Forgiveness is to ask for the sin to be absolved by God – the absolute moral authority. Yet, how can you ask God to forgive you, if He’s already forgiven you? Seems a bit redundant, but nevertheless, it’s still being done by the Christian faithful. The Calvinists did try to answer this theological dilemma by claiming only the elect are forgiven, because although all are open to salvation, only the elect have accepted this sacrificial gift by Christ.

He provides Muslims will a solid rebuttal to Christian apologists by reminding us of these verses:

13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you[a] alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross. – Colossians 2:13-15.

According to these verses, he’s already forgiven the sins of all of us, there is no need to repent or ask for forgiveness.

Thank you for raising this moral dilemma, will perhaps Dr. James White respond to him, or perhaps Shamoun can provide some of his famous logic for us?

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