Harmony between the Bible and the Qur'an

[smaneck]

By the way, sue, Christianity did not just spread to Rome or through it.

Even before that, the Gospel already spread EASTWARDS, into the Byzantine and to Constantinople, Turkey, and Northwards through large parts of north Africa.

I'm afraid you are a bit confused. Byzantine is what European historians call the Roman Empire once it loses Italy. Where do you think Constantinople gets its name? Constantine built it! By the time we start referring to Anatolia (there was no Turkey at the time) as the Byzantine Empire, it has already become fully Christianized thanks to the Roman Emperor Theodosius who outlawed all other religions within the Roman Empire by 399 AD. Likewise, all those other places you mentioned were part of the Roman Empire.

Which occurred without any 'force' whatsoever.

At the time Constantine converted only 5% of the Empire was Christianized, with perhaps as many as 20% in Anatolia. Constantine's conversion takes place in 314 AD, and as I mentioned earlier all other religions are prohibited by 399AD.

It was when islam spread its hegemonic tentacles north, south east and west, that real force was employed to wipe out the pre-existing Christianity that was already there.

Not really. Initially, under the Umayyads non-Arabs were not even allowed to convert unless they joined an Arab tribe. Sure Arabs conquered a good deal of the Middle East and Med. world but conversion occurred much slower. In most cases it was a full three centuries before the majority of the population had become Muslim.

Don't be hypocritical, sue, to claim blindly that Christianity used force to convet others.

LOL. I'm not the one being blind here, Dan. I'm a historian, remember? Charlemagne converted the Saxons in Germany by the sword. His scriptural justification was Luke 14:23

"And the lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled."'

He got this from St. Augustine who had previously used this verse it to justify the Roman authorities forcing the Donatists to except the sacrament from those they regarded as unworthy priests.

It is a deflection by propogandists like you to draw attention away from islam's own atrocities to convert the non-muslims who are derogatively labeled 'kuffar' and bad infidels who must be islamised at all cost!

Sorry Dan, but whether you like it or not Christianity historically did much, much more of this.

[smaneck]

bull. It was convert or die. Then they joined him and raided more people.

I'm glad you know so much more about Islamic history than I do. I guess my Phd was wasted.

]yes, we have. By spreading the gospel and letting people decide for themselves.

Sorry to disappoint you, but this isn't the way Christianity spread.

[smaneck]

The baha'i bias favoring Islam is showing.

Having Ishmael as the one to be sacrificed, when the promise was to come through Isaac ?

Actually, Baha'u'llah wrote an interesting Tablet on the sacrifice of Abraham. Therein He notes the difference between the Bible and the Qur'an regarding who was sacrificed. Then He points out that no one was sacrificed but the goat. It is the Word of God which in one age made Isaac the sacrifice (qurban) and in another age Ismael.

[Sparko]

I'm glad you know so much more about Islamic history than I do. I guess my Phd was wasted.

apparently so.

Sorry to disappoint you, but this isn't the way Christianity spread.

yes, it was.

[smaneck]

apparently so.
yes, it was.

If you think I'm lying Sparko just google in Charlemagne and Saxons. Check out how the Conquistadores forcibly converted most of the Native Americans to Christianity. Then check out the connections between 19th century missionary activities and European Imperialism.

[OneSizeFit]

Well, you wouldn't be the first to think that. Good luck convincing Muslims of it though.

Doesn't the Quran say plainly that Jesus was never crucified though? Seems like a pretty big gap right there.

Ummm....half of my family is Muslim, and they have no problems what so ever with Christianity or Jesus.

Dont believe the hype.

[RBerman]

half of my family is Muslim, and they have no problems what so ever with Christianity or Jesus.

Tell me about that. Do they believe that our right standing before God is only on the basis of Christ's death and resurrection as the atonement for our sins?

[barnasha]

RBerman, we can talk about Jesus all we want, but we cannot be him.

we have to be a good people for ourselves.

if not, all the talk is meaningless...

[OneSizeFit]

Tell me about that. Do they believe that our right standing before God is only on the basis of Christ's death and resurrection as the atonement for our sins?

Well they don't even think about it that much. It's more like any Abrahamic religion is good, just be a good person, do what is right, help the needy, live and let live; etc.

My grandmother who is the only real practicing one (she literally gets up during a conversation or cup of tea to go pray for 20 minutes), thinks its great that I am religious again, my father urged me to go to Presbyterian service with my mom growing up, and some of our closest family friends are Iranian Jews.

[Dan Zebiri]

Barnasha,

First you try repeatedly to parade a falsehood - That 'Jesus never talked about His execution and death' WHILST He was on the earth - as 'fact'.

Then, you sneak away from the revelation that proves you wrong about this very thing!

Look here:

Anyway, barnasha doesn't get away with his foolhardy misrepresentations of the Scriptures.

'Difference of opinions' - Hardly!

On At least on THREE separate times Jesus Christ mentions about his impending death in all three Canonical Gospels.

Besides His mention of it in Matthew 16:21-26, Jesus Christ predicts his death by execution 3 times in Matthew 17:22-23

and

Matthew 20: 17-19.

Then the same references Jesus Christ makes to his impending death are ALSO repeated here :

in Mark 8:31-37,
Mark 9: 30-32,
Mark 10:32 - 34,
Luke 9:22-25,
Luke 9:43 - 45

and

Luke 18: 31-34.

The actual event and fulfilment of Jesus' predictions about his execution and death are found in all FOUR Gospels:

Matthew 26 : 47 - 56,
Mark 14 : 43 - 52
Luke 22 : 47 - 53

and

John 18 : 2 - 12.

Then, Jesus' actual death by the Roman execution method took place outside the city of Jerusalem within 1 to 1.5 years after His initial announcements and predictions IE, around A.D./CE 30.

Therefore, barnasha is really desperately MISRepresenting the facts about Jesus in the events of His actual death by crucifixion and His eventual resurrection 2,000 years ago. He tries to parade his speculations as facts but that falls flat as muslim polemics typically do.

This kind of selective reading and presenting of the Bible exposes barney's shallow and abysmal attempts to represent the real facts, and to twist it to fit islamic propoganda at any cost. Thats just a tragic reflection on him.

Dan.

Barnasha, why dont you honestly interact with the following, instaed of coming back later and pretend that you are right and repeat the above false assumption of yours - and the muslims too (in italics above!)

** Note: this post is directed to barnasha only to respond to.

RBerman, we can talk about Jesus all we want, but we cannot be him.

we have to be a good people for ourselves.

if not, all the talk is meaningless...

[Dan Zebiri]

Sue, LOLL!...your shallow 'scholarship' is pathetically shabby.

You are selectively forgetting and discounting the EASTERN Church, also called the Persian church, the Church of the East and the East Syrian Churches.

1) The Assyrian Church of the East was established in Edessa in the first century of the Christian era. It is from Edessa that the message of the Gospels spread. Edessa was a small kingdom, a buffer state between Roman and Parthean Empires. Mar Mary was sent to Persia by his fellow workers in Edessa.

In the second century this church began to be organized. The church in Edessa had four Gospels in Aramaic. The teaching was spread to the Persian Empire. In the third century, the church in the Persian Empire had to take refugees from the Roman Empire where Christians were not welcomed. Streams of refugees turned toward Persia to escape persecution in the Eastern Roman Empire. A great multitude of Christians in all Roman provinces were put off by various punishments, torture professed to renounce Christianity.

From about 280 A.D. Mar Papa organized this church, thus Metropolitan seat of Seleucia became the headquarters. Now the city is in ruins, known as SalmanPark, 30 miles from Baghdad.

Mar Aprim the Assyrian, the representative of the Church in the first ecumenical council at Nicea in 325A.D., played a great role in the literary and religious life of all Christians until today. That is the reason he is recognized by the Roman Catholic Church which declared Saint Aprim as the doctor of the Universal Church

You can just google 'history of the eastern church' or 'nestorian church' to get the evidence, sue!

2) The Coptic Church of North Africa and Egypt,

Then, you forget or discount the Coptic Church in Egypt. This Church has very good, strong and sound history linked to St.Mark, who went to north Africa - specifically Egypt to spread the Gospel of Christ Jesus!

From Mark - the first Patriarch of the Coptic church, there were FIFTEEN different Patriarchs - Annianus, Avlius, to Julian, Demetrius, Dionysius, Maximus and Theonas etc, who led the Church in 300 AD.

Mariam Kibti - Mary the Coptic Christian was one of Muhammad's many wives, but she bore him his only son who survied until young age - Ibrahim, this Mary was a Christian from Egypt and Muhammad was very mournful and sad when this only son died very young.

This church nevertheless encountered aggressive islamic expansion northwards - which tried to subsume it, but the Coptic Christians held firm, being forced to pay the humiliating islamic 'jizya' poll tax until recent times, they steadfastly rejected islam nevertheless!

3) The Ethiopic Orthodox Church of Ethiopia (Habsha)

This is also a very ancient church predating islam's emergence by many centuries.

St. Frumentius who converted Ezana the emperor of Ethiopia in 330 AD. This caused the country to be opened to the Gospel of Jesus Christ very early indeed.

The story of the 'minor hegira' of the muslims from Mecca to Ethiopia / Habshi is recorded in islam's history, Muhammad sent his followers to get refuge fro the Christian King there (Negus) who refused to accept the teachings of islam even though the muslims preached to him.

Ubaydullah bin Jahsh, one of the muslims who took part in this minor hegira, abandoned islam here in Ethiopia and never returned to prophet Muhammad nor to islam!

So, sue, your 'history major' flaunting is very selective and truly useless indeed!

Dan.

[penguinfan]

Uhm, I thought it was pretty obvious that Sue is a fake historian. I can't imagine any one who has really studied the Middle East would not know that Bahrain was a province within Arabia for a millennium after prophet Muhammad's death.





http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/sh...&postcount=174

LOL. I never said it wasn't a historical region. I said it was a bunch of islands not part of the Arabian Peninsula. Bahrayn, means two seas because it is located in the place where the two seas meet each other.

Which then of the bounties of your Lord will ye twain deny?

Smaneck, you'll have to take that up with the map from Fred Donner's book. One side of Arabia is clearly marked as al-Bahrayn. The wikipedia article I linked to says al-Bahrayn is "stretched from Basra south along the Persian Gulf coast and included the regions of Kuwait, Al-Hasa, Qatif, Qatar, and the Awal islands (present-day Bahrain). The name means "two seas" in Arabic."

Now, either you or the author of the wiki article and the editor of the map in Fred Donner's book are in denial. I'll let the reader decide for themselves.

http://www.zum.de/whkmla/histatlas/a...sarhistreg.gif

Edit: The wiki article goes on to say: The name "Bahrain" referred to the eastern mainland Arabia until the 16th century at least. The Arab inhabitants of the province, were called Bahrani's after it.

[smaneck]

Sue, LOLL!...your shallow 'scholarship' is pathetically shabby.

You are selectively forgetting and discounting the EASTERN Church, also called the Persian church, the Church of the East and the East Syrian Churches.

First off, you are talking about two very different churches with distinctly different theologies. The Syrian Christians were monophysites while the Persians were Nestorian dualphysites.

Second, Syria was part of the Roman Empire for most of its history.

Third, the Nestorian church remained small throughout its history. It's adherents were mostly of Jewish background and made up a minuscule part of the population though they do manage to spread Christianity as far as India.

Edessa was a small kingdom, a buffer state between Roman and Parthean Empires. Mar Mary was sent to Persia by his fellow workers in Edessa. [/FONT]

Not for most of its history.

2) The Coptic Church of North Africa and Egypt,

Then, you forget or discount the Coptic Church in Egypt.

Egypt was part of the Roman Empire as well. Ethiopia, however, was not. Christianity reaches Ethiopia around the fourth century due to the efforts of missionaries sent out by the Romans.

This Church has very good, strong and sound history linked to St.Mark, who went to north Africa - specifically Egypt to spread the Gospel of Christ Jesus!

This is also a very ancient church predating islam's emergence by many centuries.

So, sue, your 'history major' flaunting is very selective and truly useless indeed!

Obviously you don't know the history as well as you think. You might start by studying the geography of the Roman Empire.

[JAYMZ]

RBerman, we can talk about Jesus all we want, but we cannot be him.

we have to be a good people for ourselves.

if not, all the talk is meaningless...

Barn,
Sounds like you want to take your chances and stand before God based on your own self-righteousness.

Who in this world is actually " good ? " Romans 3:9-12, no one is " good. " Maybe some times, but Gods standard is 100% perfection; you want to be justified before God by your " good deeds. "

Since this is the case Paul writes this. Romans 3:21-25, justified through faith in Christ.

The good deeds come after faith in Christs life, death, and resurrection. James 2:4.

Islam teaches that, maybe your good deeds will out weigh your bad; and then maybe allah will accept you.

[barnasha]

Barn,
Sounds like you want to take your chances and stand before God based on your own self-righteousness.

Who in this world is actually " good ? " Romans 3:9-12, no one is " good. " Maybe some times, but Gods standard is 100% perfection; you want to be justified before God by your " good deeds. "

Since this is the case Paul writes this. Romans 3:21-25, justified through faith in Christ.

The good deeds come after faith in Christs life, death, and resurrection. James 2:4.

Islam teaches that, maybe your good deeds will out weigh your bad; and then maybe allah will accept you.

do you dare stand before God on the day of judgement and offer up the pitiful excuse that what you did in your life should be ignored because Jesus was a good man?

Jesus would not approve of people who instead of being good men themselves, prentended to be good vicariously through others.