Saturday, January 2, 2010

Abdullah Kunde vs. Samuel Green: "The Preservation of the Bible and Qur'an"

Some of you may remember Australian Muslim debater Abdullah Kunde from his debate with James White. You should definitely know Samuel Green from his articles on Answering Islam. In these videos, Abdullah and Samuel debate the preservation of the Bible and Qur'an.

Samuel's Opening Statement


Abdullah's Opening Statement


Rebuttals


Cross-Examination

45 comments:

MuslimPhantom said...

I just can’t believe that there are people around there debating this topic. If you’re reading my words, beloved brother Abdullah Kunde, I just have to say that engaging in such debates is of no use to Islam. The Holy Qur’an is perfectly preserved because Allah (swt), the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, told to our dear Prophet (saw) that that would be the case forever. Not, obviously, in the same sense that any amazing Mosque is preserved, but in a special way that can be testified by the fact that the present day Holy Qur’an’s text is the same that was communicated by Allah (swt), the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, to our dear Prophet (saw). No one with the smallest amount of intelligence and honesty can doubt that. Only you sick christians, you jew loving people, can invent falsities in order to try to rebuff this reality. On the other hand, since in the Qur’an we have passages, calling us Muslims to read the true Bible and saying things about it’s true message, that are in clear and striking contradiction with what yours nowadays corrupted bible text says, we must realize, if we are obedient people to the will off Allah (swt), the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, that it has been manipulated during the eons of time. By whom? Where? It does not matter: the evidences are by far to evident to have the slightest doubt about it. Who wrote the Odyssey? Where? No one knows, but, at the same time, no one as the smallest doubt that it was written. All evidences are against you. Believing in the actual bible is like placing one’s bet in a pair 2 and a pair of 3 when the opponent already has 4 Aces. How stupid could someone be? As brother Osama Abdallah would say: you are eating the vengeance off Allah (swt), the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, in cold dishes. You are blind people being guided by a blind book created only by man. Even when you say that you divinity helped its writers, how can you trust in the capacities of some people that are, according to your interpretation of the corrupted bible of yours, suffering the consequences of that myth (by the way: where can anyone find this one mentioned in that infected book?) called original sin? Absolute nonsense. Only a person morally irreproachable and faultless like our beloved Prophet (saw) can guaranty the preservation of a book. Who can refute the claims that I, the Muslim Phantom, did in this comment? I guess no one since all your efforts have been, so far, totally ridiculous.

Radical Moderate said...

Wow this was a good debate.

Anyone know where I can get more information on some of the things that Samual Green said.

For instance on the Catologe Librarian Abi Yakalb Al Madine.

Also on the Bankipor Codex.

Radical Moderate said...

On the Bankipur manuscript the only thing I have been able to find is that its a shia text. I'm wondering about its date, what the extra surhas actually say etc... Anyone have any idea's?

getrealman said...

I must confess that the Muslim Phantom is absolutely correct. I quote: "no one with the smallest amount of intelligence and honesty can doubt that". He was speaking of the preservation of of the Quran. Of course, he did not say, "no one with a great amount of intelligence...". I believe he may be on to something here :-).

Thank you Muslim Phantom for your insight. You spoke as someone who is uniquely qualified to explain the proper mindset necessary to approach Islam. We accept your words as truth.

Does anyone remember the "unknown comic"? Glad to know that he is still with us.

GRM

VJ said...

@muslimphantom
Only you sick christians, you jew loving people, can invent falsities in order to try to rebuff this reality

your god loved the Jews so much that he gave them the Torah,he loved the Christians so much that he gave them the ingeel,
so blame your god for loving them first...

how can you trust in the capacities of some people that are, according to your interpretation of the corrupted bible of yours,
why should we accept the interpretation of the theologically corrupted quran who only copied from the original scriptures..

and as for your friend osama hes just another coward...tell him to debate shamoun if he has the courage to be the best apologist in the world...lol
BTW i doubt you are osama in disguise of another id come here to further humiliate yourself

AKunde said...

While I appreciate the emotion, I certainly don't agree with what MuslimPhantom has said, at all. I don't even expect that it is indicative of what general Muslim sentiment either. Having said that, these discussions have the strong potential to bring out emotion more than sense.

As for the Bankipur codex, to my knowledge it only exists in reconstruction (i.e., not actual manuscripts). Certainly, the 'two extra surahs' quoted were reported to having been used by some extremist Shia groups (not the modern day Shia, but extremist groups).

To illustrate how the existence of these surahs, even if on an actual manuscript, has no bearing on the Qur'an itself, I attempted to illustrate that basic principles of textual criticism would rule them out and also gave a comparison to the Marcionic text and Gnostic texts on the Christian Scriptures.

Samuel gave a good response, which rings true for us, using, if I recall correctly, the Gospel of Thomas' poor attitude towards women as an example of how to tell when a text is not authentic.

If we have a book which for 114 chapters portrays God (s) as God (s) and men as men and then in two small additional chapters portrays the family of Muhammad(p) as on some parallel with God (s), we can just as easily tell its not authentic.

Hope that makes sense, The Fat Man. I usually read this blog so will respond to as many queries as I can.

David Wood said...

Abdullah!

Welcome to the blog. I haven't had a chance to watch the debate yet, but I hope to in the next few days. (If you have a website or writings you'd like me to link to in the post, let me know.)

AKunde said...

Greetings David,

Thank you for the welcome. I've posted on the blog before, perhaps most people missed it?

Unfortunately I have little spare time, so not loads of stuff online (actually, I'm doing a well overdue blog post presently) but thanks for the offer.

I've found the blog quite interesting since I've been viewing it (probably about 6 or so months?) and you and the team are putting loads of Muslims to shame with the amount of work you do.

Kind regards,

Fernando said...

Hi AKunde...

glad to see you arounde here ounce again... just some points:

a) I habe not the slightest doubt thate whate thate brother of yours, the MuslimPhantim, said is whate 99% off muslims do believe... whate he bsaide, eben withe all the emotions he expresses, are normal and standard understanding off these matters to comun muslim... whate do you say MuslimPhantom?

b) your analogy between the Bible/sentence of the Gospel of Thomas and the 114/ plus two chapters is only thate: an analogye... eache analogie as a similiaruty and a difference, and in these case the difefrence is:

1) never the sentence of the Gospel of Thomas was part off any Christian orthodox tradition (in other words: never an orthodox Christian claimed they were missing from the compilations thate gave place to the Holy Bible); on teh contrary, the two missing chapters of the qur'an are saide to me missing from it...

2) the message portraited in the sentence of the Gospel of Thomas is totaly oposite to teh Biblical message; thats not the case withe the pair qur'an / the two missing chapters, and you only can say whate you saide by reducing the all qur'an to thate false conclusion thate it makes a clear separation between God and man... it does not as teh shahadah shows: the prototipical prayer off any orthodox muslim in its sotoriological dimention agregates a man (muhammad) to allah...

3) the Marcionic text is not a different text from wahte we habe in the Bible: the Marcionic text is present in the Bible butt is a reduction from the original text off Luke... the two missing chapters of the qur'an are not present in the qur'an...

neber the less I have to say I liked your tie bery much... also I liked your polite way of presenting your (false) claims... quite different from the typical muslim apologist... your non-muslim background, no doubt...

May God, the Holy Trinity, bless you and your family...

AKunde said...

Greetings Fernando,

Perhaps you misunderstood me? I did not use the Gospel of Thomas as an example - Samuel Green did. In fact, as you can see in the cross-examination portion, Samuel politely agreed with me that texts that belong to such sectarian groups (Christian and Islamic) are clearly not - nor ever were - part of the core text (Bible and Qur'an).

The Marcionic Gospel, while containing elements of Luke, is hardly a 'redaction' of it. It is an entirely different text which has portions of a range of NT apocrypha and presents a theology which has YHWH as an inferior and different God to the God of Christ. Moreover, the similarities between the two are irrelevant, its the differences that are important.

As for the suggestion that Muslims equate men to God through the testification of faith - I know no Muslim or even non-Muslim which would actually attempt to hold this argument up. Moreover, how does it support your argument that the Qur'an doesn't distinguish between God and men?

I welcome your questions and look forward to any further ones you may have. Whilst I find some of your generalistions a tad insulting, I hope that you will not feel bad about asking whatever you feel like.

Kind regards,

Sunil said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Sunil said...

(Part-1)
I think we should be thankful to people like Mr. Abdullah Kunde for willing to debate these issues in a reasonable manner. More and more such debates over time would bring out and crystallize the key points and the side that has the best argument (and truth) with go from strength to strength and will eventually win.

Mr. Samuel Green has made some key points, but often the time allocated in debates is not enough to nail down the points and adequately refute (but again, debates are a process in history). One of the important proof to identify a true prophet is the consistency of message with previous prophets (It is important therefore that Jewish scriptures are part of Christian Bible). If the person/prophet in question is the most important figure, then there has to huge number of prophecies, and themes surrounding that person by the prophets. To be a Muslim, though, one has to believe that God has left no reliable information/source of all the prophets, so there is no way to validate the theological message/doctrine. And there are no prophecies about the supposed most important person (while there are hundreds about Jesus). There is hardly an attempt by Quran to validate the truthfulness/validity of Muhammad from previous prophets (while the NT is filled with that attempt). Going by the references to the Christian/Jewish scriptures by Muhammad, it is clear that Muhammad himself did not believe that Christian/Jewish scriptures are unreliable. I don’t think we heard a rebuttal on this point from Mr. Kunde.

The origins of Bible is many times more complex than the Quran. Bible has multiple authors, written over history as it unfolded, more older text etc and there has been no attempt by any individual to forcefully standardize the text by burning manuscripts. While this comes along with some issues like textual variants and a more complex process of textual criticism and canonization etc, this also brings more reliability about the message due to the testimony of multiple authors, affirming/reaffirming of the message over history of God‘s revelation, prophecies by multiple prophets over time, ability to validate with history etc. Muhammad is standalone prophet (making him a false prophet) and the Quran does not base itself on the history of God’s revelation.

Mr. Samuel Green's point is that both Bible and Quran has to go through a process of establishing the text which is in use today. The process is more complex with respect to Bible (for reasons mentioned above) . But the debate on this issue brings about key theological issues that makes it very difficult to stay a Muslim (they end up opposing Muhammad himself in opposing the Jewish/Christian Scriptures, exposes the theological rootlessness of Muhammad/Quran etc). Basically, to be a Muslim, every available evidence has to be put aside and even oppose Muhammad himself. As Mr. Green rightly pointed out, what the Muslim is doing is to force-fitting history (and I would say, God’s revelation/theology/doctrine as well) by Muhammad/Quran in opposition to known history and history of God’s revelation, and Muhammad/Quran made no attempt to explain this (unlike the NT again).

Sunil said...

(Part-2)
Another important issue raised by Mr. Samuel Green at the end of cross examination is the issue of how/why would God deceive the public/followers by making it appear as if Jesus died on the cross (not to talk of the fulfilled prophecies about the suffering/death of Jesus from the prophets!). Mr. Kunde responded that it may be to deceive the enemies of Jesus. That can hardly be the case, as all the disciples/followers of Jesus believed it and were willing to die for it (not just enemies of Jesus). Unfortunately there was no time at the end for a discussion on this very important point, which I am sure Mr. Green would have nailed it if he had time. I think Mr. Kunde is also mistaken in making a broad statement that all scholars agree that there are glaring historical errors in the NT (if he is referring to one specific question/issue, he is over-stretching and making a broad conclusion that is not warranted, as few questions might be debated or even remain open to assumptions etc, especially when we are talking about history that is 2000 years back).

More and more such debates would give an opportunity to drill down and nail down the key points over and over again. This debate gives an opportunity to bring out the sheer unreasonableness and non-viability of the Islamic faith and expose its theological/Divine rootlessness. I think this debate on scriptures will be more and more difficult for the Muslims to handle in the times to come.

Traeh said...

In Sahih Bukhari, the most canonical of hadith collections, Muhammad said, "Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him."

In the same hadith collection, Muhammad said, "I have been ordered to fight the people till they say: 'None has the right to be worshipped but Allah.' And if they say so, pray like our prayers, face our Qibla and slaughter as we slaughter, then their blood and property will be sacred to us and we will not interfere with them except legally and their reckoning will be with Allah."

In other words, if you are not a Muslim, Muhammad says your blood and property will not be safe from Muslims.

Qur'an Chapter 8, Verse 12
When your Lord revealed to the angels: I am with you, therefore make firm those who believe. I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Therefore strike off their heads and strike off every fingertip of them.

Those Muslims who do not leave Islam, even if they know that the above quotes are representative of the central core of Islam, are not different from the members of any other pathological cult. Some members are criminally minded, some are mentally ill, some are both at once, some are simply afraid to leave Islam, and some are indifferent. I don't say there is nothing good about Islam. I know there are plenty of Muslims who are good human beings. But plenty of Nazis officers, according to reports, were very good family men. That didn't stop them eagerly bringing on the almost complete destruction of Europe and the murders of many millions of human beings of many nationalities. I'm not saying Islam = Nazism. The two cults are different. But they are both more destructive than creative, and more lies than truths, more cruelty than kindness, even if many of their members are unconscious of the evil.

Sunil said...

Mr. Abdulla Kunde makes an issue of Paul saying that he has become all things to all men (Jew to a Jew etc), that it amounts to lying/decpetion etc. I do not quite see why it has to be seen that way (and I am sure Mr. Kunde would have seen several responses to this all over the internet etc, so it is surprising that he raises the issue). There are often some cultural aspects that sometimes become a needless bottleneck while presenting the Gospel. For example, there are sections in my country (India) who have been strongly culturally conditioned from childhood to be vegetarians and can't even stand listening to anyone or anything related to the contrary. So a person living among that community and witnessing/presenting the Gospel can eat only vegetarian food (while being with that group) so that he/she can mingle/dine with them etc. That is not a deception (if he tells that he never ate meat, when he did, or if he says that Christianity also forbids meat etc, that would be deception/lying). The presenter of the Gospel may not care about food, but if that is such a culturally indoctrinated issue and a red flag for the group, there is no point in confronting the group on such a peripheral issue and nothing to with the core of the Gospel. That would be a needless distraction from the core of the Gospel. If a listener wants to reject Christ, let him/her do so for deliberately rejecting the Salvation of Christ - let there be no other reason.

Royal Son said...

Is it just me or does Abdullah Kunde's appearance remind you of Keith Thompson ? :)

Absolutely no disrespect to either gentleman intended at all.

AKunde said...

Greetings Sunil,

I find some of your suggestions a little strange, given the specifics discussed within the debate, but I'll look at some of them:

1) Muslims/Qur'an does not attempt to follow earlier revelations or prophets.
a) This is absolutely false. The Qur'an, in multiple instances, asks Christians and Jews to look to what is still contained within their books for guidance towards the Qur'an and Islam.

In fact, we see in the Gospels a clear and progressive steering away from the earlier message. In Mark (12:29) we find Jesus saying the greatest commandment is "Hear, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.", yet in the parallel passage in Matthew (23:36) states: "Love God with all your heart, soul and mind." Why? Possibly developing Christian theology?

2)All the disciples/followers of Jesus were also mislead by the fake crucifixion.
a) This is only if you assume the Gospel accounts are accurate, which I do not, and as I argue, it is completely reasonable to question the validity of them (at the very least).

3)What Paul did isn't deception.
a)I'm pretty sure I didn't say, "Paul lied", but I did say something along the lines of deception. I was asked a similar question on the night to which I replied: "If it were modern times, would Paul come into a mosque and pray as we pray, etc, in order to present Christianity? Thats what it seems he did. You do realise that by being a 'Gentile to the Gentiles' that means he possibly worshiped their gods while with them? Do you think God needs to be presented in this way?"

If you say 'yes', thats a very interesting belief system.

Greetings Royal Son,

I have no idea who that man is, so no offence at all ;).

minoria said...

Hello:

I remember that SAM SHAMOUN said in JESUS OR MOHAMMED that Jesus was 2 YEARS OLD when visited by the MAGI.I think he wasn't for various reasons.The nativity accounts have interested me.I would believe Jesus was 2 if HEROD had been NORMAL(which he wasn't):

PSYCHOANALYZING HEROD THE GREAT

He was a man who was mentally sick. Of that there is no doubt. Due to his suspicions of everybody he killed his own WIFE, 2 SONS, and his BROTHER-IN-LAW( who at the time was the High Priest ). On top of that he made plans that at his death THOUSANDS of people would be killed so that he would be remembered. Fortunately it was not carried out. He was PATHOLOGICALLY suspicious. Emperor Augustus said of him: " I would prefer to be the PIG of Herod than his SON. "

WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH HEROD AND THE MAGI?

The text says Herod asked them when Jesus was born. So then he ordered all the children from 2 and under in Bethlehem and around it to be killed. In other words he knew appoximately how old Jesus was. But notice those killed were those 2 YEARS OLD, 1 YEAR OLD and UNDER 1 year old.

WHAT IS SO IMPORTANT ABOUT THAT?

How can one tell if a child is 2 years old or 6 months old? The difference is that children till around 11 months or 1 year DO NOT WALK. That is how to tell if a baby is under 11 months or around 2 years. Again, Herod was PATHOLOGICALY suspicious. If he mistrusted his own wife, sons, and brother-in-law, do you think he would have 100% BELIEVED COMPLETE STRANGERS ( the Magi )regarding he date of Jesus' birth?

IT COULD REALLY GO EITHER WAY:

The text could be taken to show Joseph and Mary had stayed in Bethlehem for 2 years OR for ANY TIME under 2 years, like 1 year 6 moths....or even under 2 months ( 60 days ). The order by Herod to kill all childen 2 and under simply shows he was TAKING NO CHANCES: it could be the Magi told him Jesus was 2 months old and Herod, being ever suspicious, ordered, just in case, ( after all, maybe the Magi were lying to him ) to kill those up to 2 years of age. There simply is not enough information when you remember the mentality of Herod.

Anonymous said...

Just wondering if Samuel Green knows this website? I hope he will come and write on this blog thus the discussion will be great as Abdullah Kunde is also here.

Anybody can contact Samuel Green and asks him to join the blog?

Fernando said...

Abdullah Kunde saide: «In Mark (12:29) we find Jesus saying the greatest commandment is "Hear, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.", yet in the parallel passage in Matthew (23:36) states: "Love God with all your heart, soul and mind."»...

Abdullah Kunde... I habe seen you're quite socratick in your aproaches... are you been serious?

1) does not Mark 12:29 say «Hear, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One. Love God with all your heart, soul and mind»?

2) does not Mt. 23:36 say«In truth I tell you, it will all recoil on this generation»?

you alsi saide: «You do realise that by being a 'Gentile to the Gentiles' that means he possibly worshiped their gods while with them?»...

just a question to you: what do you imagine to be a "gentil" to Paul? I'm absoluttely amazed by such a possible ignorance comming from someone so clerly well prepared like you...

finally: can you explain why do you do not trust the truth of the Gospels?

whate do you inted withe this all? Thankes in advance for a posible answer...

Brianman said...

Salam Abdullah Kunde

You did a great job Mashallah.

I would just like to tell you that because you are new to this forum, many of the regular posters are not skilled when it comes to debating at all.
It's best to just reply to David and Nabeel. Nobody else.

I boycotted Fernando because of his irrationality and most of them because it's like they refuse to read the deeper meaning of what you are saying - so it's like they can't listen to it in that way or else it harms their faith in their trinity.

Muslimphantom, remember our religion doesn't tolerant foul language. Remember we aren't like Paul who said God possesses foolishness.

Abdullah stick to what you are doing, and it would be good if you can answer the most "contreversial" questions about Islam on your blog rather than on here, because it will just get lost in time as many other articles are posted on, and the people who are answering to are in my experience very stubborn.

Whenever I was coming a step closer to Islam, I heard repulsive language/bad tone/hostile sentences from people on this site. I have converted to Islam, I wanted to be exposed to the poeple who talk the most trash about Islam so they can turn me against Islam, but this religion is truth and the peace I am personally feeling now is totally unbelievable.

They're not a respectful bunch to my opinion.

I think it's important to let you know that. If David deletes this comment, I will post it to you on your blog or email it to you.

AKunde said...

Greetings Fernando,

In answer to your questions:

1)Does Mark 12:29 not say:"...

a) Yes, it does! This is precisely my point. The earlier (Mark) includes firstly, 'Hear The Lord is our God, the Lord is One' and then the love with all your heart and mind comment. The later text (Matthew) removes the focus on worshipping one God. Make sense?

2)Why don't I trust the truth of the Gospels?
a) Several reasons. Most significant include:
-Poor manuscript tradition (No 2 pages of the 6000 Greek manuscripts are identical).
-Lack of early Gospel manuscripts, as you'll know from my presentation,there is no evidence of any synoptic Gospel within 100 years of when the original would have been written
-Gospels contradict one another in many details.
-Ambiguity of many verses within the Gospels.

In short, thats why I don't see how the words 'Gospels' and 'truth' can be within the same sentence, unless they are separated by 'lack of'.

Kind regards,

Unknown said...

Far out, Br Abdullah absolutely pumped Samuel. What about Samuel's cop out statements after realising he had no where else to run.

And from what i hear, there's plenty more where that come from.

Jeez, people need to watch out for this one.

Fernando said...

Brianman saide: «I boycotted Fernando because of his irrationality»...

I neber felt so alliviated ad blessed for being boycotted by someone... I really do not like lyiers, butt I guess that's the normal procedure of muslim people following the example off muhammad... to sad...

butt perhaps someone, iff not brianman, can tell us all why someone coulde habe saide thate: «God possesses foolishness»... I know this is another typiucal muslim attack on Christianity (how they hate Paul for following the true Jesus and nott the invented Isha of muslim tradition), butt nevertheless I woulde love to see someone explaining me the islamic exegesis off the supposed text thate woulde make someone say such thingue...

thanks

Fernando said...

Greetings professor Kunde,

thanks for your always kind words...

1) you imply thate Matthew removes the focus off the worshipp... i have to desagree totally withe you... lets, for a moment, put on the side the contextual rethorical off the gospel of Matthew (that for itself coulde esily explain this aspect) and focouse our attention on the jewish form off, in Jesus time (and not always) oral quotation off the text off the (present day) O.T.... as you know, professor Kunde, when quoting a part off a versicle is quiting all the versicle or even, in thate case, an entire Psalm... butt there is another point: in Mark Jesus is asked aboutte «the first of all the commandments» and in Matthew, in somethingue easily explained, He's asked aboutte «the greatest commandment of the Law?»... do you see the difference? can you understand now why Jesus response being apparently different is, as a matter off fact, the only and same? I do beliebe you can...

2) abboout your probelm abott the truth off the gospels... hummm... I do think you muste habe more in depth problems withe those... the aspects you present are abc of biblical hermeneutical an textual preservation thate any Christian theologian student studies in any the first class off biblical theology...

butt lets see some off them... is thate OK withe you?

aboutte: «Poor manuscript tradition (No 2 pages of the 6000 Greek manuscripts are identical)»... this is preciselly one off its major richeness: the Church neber destroyed, like Uthman did, the texts it had... butt the point is thate there are really no major differences in the central points off the Christian message... isnt thate amaizing?

aboutte: «Lack of early Gospel manuscripts, as you'll know from my presentation,there is no evidence of any synoptic Gospel within 100 years of when the original would have been written»... and that proves whate rather than the material in wich they were written was fragile? where are now the original material where the qur'an was written? The temporal hiatus between the supposed original texts and the earlier text preserved off them is, in the case off the Gospels, one off the smallest off antient times... isn't thate amazing?

aboutte: «Gospels contradict one another in many details»... really? Any "contradiction" in central points off its message? can those "contradictions" be explained by: a) the "party theory"? (woulde 2 persons describe the same party they were presentt in the same way? would ethey be trustfull eben in the case the answer to thate question was "no"?)
b) the contextual circunstances (origin, redactional options and goal) of each gospel...

finaly, aboutte the «Ambiguity of many verses within the Gospels»... dear professor Kunde... where woulde this claim get ys when apoplyied to teh qur'an? more that 90% off its text is uncompreensible withoute the help off a commentary... I know thate: I, when was a muslim, "studied" the message of the qur'an not by reading it (we were nott alowed to read translations and coulde not understand arabic eben when we memorized it fromstart to the end) rather by texts saying wahte the quran intended to say...

Fernando said...

Hi D... is that D for "Dracula" as Bran Stokes sayed that undead romanian monster signed its letters? Have you been drinking many blood lately? I, from your comment, guess so... nevertheless I'm glad to see you arounde here... maybe yoy coulde exoand your tyhoughts as a real "connaisseur"... thanks...

Sunil said...

Dear Mr. Abdullah Kunde,

Thank you for taking time to respond. I am grateful that a learned scholar like you took time to respond to me. I have replied to you in the comments section of the new blog entry with the subject "Reply to Abdullah Kunde on Various Issues". Please have a look. Thanks.

AKunde said...

Greetings Fernando,

I'm not a professor. Not sure if this is some attempt at sarcasm?

Anyway, to deal with a couple of your claims:

1 - Christian message is the same throughout all Gospels.
a)Through the 4 your church selected. What about Marcion's gospel? What about the Nag Hammadi Library?

2 - Not all texts were destroyed like Uthman did.
a)Speaking of the Nag Hammadi Library, what happened there? How many other deviant Gospels were rejected and subsequently destroyed? The Nag Hammadi Library was hidden for 2 reasons: 1 - some Christians believed the texts to be scripture & 2 - other Christians wanted those texts destroyed.

Your claim about the Qur'an is meaningless. Quote an example of the 90% you refer to.

Also, there's no need to personally ridicule people. It doesn't really reflect too well on your fellow Christians.

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

Based upon the various debates we had with Brianman on this blog prior to his supposed conversion to islam, I don't believe for a second that Brianman was ever on a spiritual journey; he is and has always been a muslim.

As to Kunde needs to do a whole lot more research into the first and second century transmission and succession, that will answer a lot of his questions on the nature of the Gospels.

As to the dating of the Gospels manuscripts that we posses, a variaty of scholars have challenged the dating of some of these manuscripts and date the earliest copy of the synoptics gospels to 150 AD and of course the John of Rylands to 130.

Does this show that the Gospels are of later date, not really! Whether the earliest manuscripts written 150 or 200 AD it still provides solid ground for establishing the fact that these were the scriptures used by the Christians in the first century AD.

In fact they are copies of copies that take us right into the first century.

We have to remember that apostolic witnesses were alive up to 95 AD, and John the Elder may have lived until 110 AD. This is only 40 years prior to the oldest Synoptic gospels (if the other dating is correct) and 10-20 prior to the John Ryland manuscripts.

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

Interestingly in one of the earliest fragments of Matthew a label is attached to it with the name Matthew, which was a practice of the early second century to name the author.

Also we need to consider, that apostolic disciples such as Polycarp lived until 145 AD; these were successors, trained in oral transmission and in protecting the written scripture.

There is little historical and logical reason to believe that the Gospels were corrupted within this period.

As to textual criticism (lets be careful not to mix up source criticism and textual criticism, even though both are determined by the trend of succession), I think Ehrman concludes this matter effectively:

Ehrman writes:

‘Most changes are careless errors that are easily recognised and corrected. Christian scribes often made mistakes simply because they were tired or inattentive...In spite of the remarkable differences among our manuscripts, scholars are convinced that we can reconstruct the oldest form of the words of the New Testament with a reasonable (though not 100 percent accuracy) (Barth Ehrman, Lost Christianities: The Battle for the Scripture and Faith We Never Knew, pp. 220-21).

Ehrman agrees in his later book Misquoting Jesus:

‘For my part however, I continue to think that even if we cannot be 100 percent certain...that it is at least possible to get back to the oldest and earliest stage of the manuscript tradition...This oldest form of the text is no doubt closely (very closely) related to what the author originally wrote’ (Barth Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus, p. 62)

As to the Qur'an, scholars have detected a development in the most earliest Qur'anic text in existence:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y40X6ykSQlE&feature=player_embedded

I am not an expert in this; if you are an expert in Arabic and paleography you are welcome to refute them; but it seems to me that these very accusations you muslims launch against the Bible can be turned with the same force against the Islamic religion.

I am sure you have also considered the website of Samuel Green, which reveals differences in a variaty of Qur'an family texts:

http://www.answering-islam.org/Green/seven.htm

While these variants are not of great significance, they do reveal that not all Qur'ans agree word for word, which also is the typical variants you find in the Greek manuscripts.

However, going further back, all we have is ashes; the earliest Muslims knew the importance of burning the earliest evidence of the failure to protect the Qur'an from corruption.

At least the apostles, Clement of Rome, Ignatius others of the first generation did not resort to such practice.

That certainly strengtens the Christian position but asks a lot of questions of the Islamic position and the reliability of the scripture and tradition.

otto said...

I just want to say thank you David and Nabeel for making this blog possible! I think the Jesus or Mohammad show has drawn me closer to Jesus and it has definitely shattered some misconceptions I had about both Christianity and Islam - it is so awesome you guys CHALLENGE virtually ANY Muslim to debate you right on the show, problem is they don’t take the challenge...wonder why....

otto said...

Fernando! You are the MAN!!! Do not let any of these Jokers tell you otherwise.

This "Brianman" - - well you my dear brother Fernando, had NO problem in EXPOSING him for the liar and deceiver he was from the very first time he posted, I still remember that, it was all during Maj. Nadal Missionary works (as Fat Man would say) - - and this "Brianman" first started saying "ohhh im nooo Muslim, im a Polish Christian guy studying medicine at a top British school" (like that actually has any relevance to anything - frankly who cares). You dear Fernando, EXPOSED this phony appealer to compassion in a split second – you knew he was using multiple names on the same blog pretending to be different people (how you did this I do not know) but the FACT is that later on this "Brianman" ADMITTED he was using a few different names (but he still had the audacity to claim "I’m not Muslim"), therefore he admitted to being a deceiver and a phony. It seems like some get paid for this, just play along like "ohhh im confused and trying to find the "truth"; and all of a sudden after a WEEK (lol) of "in depth research" into both religions a "miraculous" conversion to Islam occurs - - sheesh!!! You Muslims really lay it on thick! It wouldn’t take a half brain to see through these DECEPTIONS (I think they call em TAQQIA?) – And I don’t want to be overtly rude but Osama Abdullah website reminds me of a giant gay rainbow, anyone else get that? The website has the potential of evoking seizures. All the Muslims seem to have is other people’s sympathies in the palm of their hand – an appeal – not to truth as they claim.

Brother Fernando – you have taught me so much about Christology and Theology – you have given me philosophical insights into the most minute of details and ideas (for example homoousios), and your writing style, to me at least, is just soo funny and interesting. If people actually took a few seconds to READ what you write, sound out some words, instead of shrugging it off as "bad spelling" (I know you KNOW about 12 languages) then many many eyes would be opened and hearts touched. You are a gentile, kind, warm spirited human being who takes God for what God is – the MOST important. You don’t back away, and you’re ready to protect your faith at all costs, you’re not afraid to call someone a liar when you can see straight through their charade! – God Bless you Brother Fernando, your personal story was touching and inspirational, God Bless your family, and thank you berry much!

otto said...

Miniora – you are a plethora of facts, everything you post has about 3-4 facts in it AT LEAST, these facts have led me onto many quests and have cost me multiple dollars in forms of brand new books. I want to thank you, most of all for your unbelievably clear cut and VERY OBJECTIVE writing style – I can honestly say I have NEVER seen anyone write more OBJECTIVELY then you concerning religious matters in all my time on the internet. I thank you so much for this, I know many Muslims have read what you have to say and their eyes started burning, because they DON’T want to believe it, but know they HAVE to believe it, because they know it’s ALWAYS OBJECTIVE when it’s from Miniora.

To others on this blog such as Hogan (your blogs are great), Nakidimon, Semper, Sepher, Fat Man and all the others, I just want to say THANK YOU! You all have really taught me a lot and it has been a pleasure reading!! I will continue to spread the word about these blogs (and the show) to everyone I possibly can. All of you guys have many fans so do not forget that.

God Bless!!

Ps. Very cool debate – learned a few things about the Bible I previously did not know, and a whole bunch of new things about the Quran! By the way, to Mr. Kunde – righteous beard man!

Fernando said...

Dear Kunde...

you saide: «there's no need to personally ridicule people»... who habe I ridicularized? Did I call somenone a fox? or gaveyesr toombstones? I don't think so... butt it's strange to see someone asking others to behabe when they follow someone's like muhammad who made lot off thingues moraly depraved... how woulde you feel to aske you to kill me for being a pride apostate from islam?

90% is my personal experience... other figures can be presented... my claims have the same validity off any off yours... a clear example is the surah aboutt the negation off Jesus' crucifixion... no muslim provides the same interpretation as another one...

you saide: «Christian message is the same throughout all Gospels. a)Through the 4 your church selected. What about Marcion's gospel? What about the Nag Hammadi Library?»»...

as I pointed out, dear Kunde, Marcion did not wrotte a single gospel: he picked up fragments from the gospel off Luke...

the gnostic gospels presented at the Nah Hammadi library are not christians whatesover and reflect gnostic theories thate were not present at the dawn off Christianity... there were solid rules to choose the 4 gospels as you weel know: 1) they shoulde have been formed by and in apostolic comunities; 2) been accepted reciprocal by other apostolic comunities; 3)
been accepted for liturgical purposes; 4) been quoted by the apostolic fathers; and so one... it was not an arbitrary choice as you well know...

whate happened at the Nag Hammadi Library? The gnostics thate wanted to pass as Christians realized thate those attitude was not working on there behalf and dispite recolecting texts to prove their sincretic theories decided to abandon them... you shoulde know thate...

can you provide us a single proof that a single original qur'anic text is still preserved untill nowadays?

AKunde said...

Greetings Hogan,

Consider Nag Hammadi Library and Festial Letter of 367 CE. If anything, all such clues tell us Christians did worse than burn 'variant' texts and had debates that lasted a lot longer than the short and turmoil ridden reign of Uthman.

"This oldest form of the text is no doubt closely (very closely) related to what the author originally wrote" (Bart Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus, p. 62).

Even Professor Ehrman himself asks 'but what did the originals contain'. Yes, we can be certain what we currently have is based on and closely related to some original, but what did they actually contain and when were they written?

You've got nothing but copies of copies of copies.

As for Professor Gerd-R Puin, he has been claiming since discovering the Sana'a manuscripts (and in a recent letter in 1999) that he is about to publish evidence of the variants in them. To date, only Fogg's Palimpsest, which most scholars agree is just a poor manuscript which was corrected as soon as it was first written, has been put forward. Over 30 years later and no evidence? Claims mean nothing without evidence.

As for the suggestions on the portion of the documentary you posted, that a manuscript from the time of al Walid is the oldest datable Qur'an, again this is false. Check out the UN website I quote in my presentation for access to most of the Sana'a manuscripts, which are freely available, and many dated to pre al Walid. Some scholars (non Muslims) date many of the Sana'a manuscripts to pre-Uthmanic time. Check out Fred Donner and Andrew Rippin.

Kind regards,

Sunil said...

Dear Abdullah Kunde,

>> The earlier (Mark) includes firstly, 'Hear The Lord is our God, the Lord is One' and then the love with all your heart and mind comment. The later text (Matthew) removes the focus on worshipping one God

Do you mean to say that Matthew ever says anything contrary to worshipping of one God? Matthew 4:10 'Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only'. Not just Matthew. A deviation from worshipping one true God is not found in any book of Bible and they all extensively quote/refer/allude to the God's revelation/scriptures given to the Jews (where also, worshipping True God is the most important commandment).

>> Why don't I trust the truth of the Gospels?
>> a) Several reasons. Most significant include:
>> -Poor manuscript tradition (No 2 pages of the 6000 Greek manuscripts are identical).
>> -Lack of early Gospel manuscripts, as you'll know from my presentation,there is no evidence of any synoptic Gospel within 100 years of when the original would have been written

Dr. William Lane Craig writes: "It’s true that the New Testament is the best attested book in ancient history, both in terms of the number of manuscripts and the nearness of those manuscripts to the date of the original. What that goes to prove is that the text of the New Testament that we have today is almost exactly the same as the text as it was originally written. Of the approximately 138,000 words in the New Testament only about 1,400 remain in doubt. The text of the New Testament is thus about 99.9% established. That means that when you pick up a (Greek) New Testament today, you can be confident that you are reading the text as it was originally written. Moreover, that .1% that remains uncertain has to do with trivial words on which nothing of importance hangs. This conclusion is important because it explodes the claims of Muslims, Mormons, and others that the text of the New Testament has been corrupted, so that we can no longer read the original text"
(Source : http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5711 )

>> -Gospels contradict one another in many details.
>> -Ambiguity of many verses within the Gospels

Not insurmountable issues. Most of these sound pretty silly once we hear a proper response to it.

>> I don't see how the words 'Gospels' and 'truth' can be within the same sentence, unless they are separated by 'lack of'.

To say that, we have to discard everything that is available and can be reasonably known/derived/believed, believe that God merely faked the crucifixion, that none of God’s revelation/history/prophets etc is not available in a robust/reliable manner (until one man came along) etc. And BTW, what was Muhammad referring to, when he talked about the Gospel? Something that no one knows/heard?

Sunil said...

A quick response to a couple of points raised by Mr. Abdulla Kunde:

>> You've got nothing but copies of copies of copies.

That in itself is not necessarily an issue. If there are multiple copies and variants are minor and correction can be identified, when there are multiple testimonies of multiple disciples/apostles, if earlier distortions can be ruled out for various reasons like living eye-witnesses/disciples, multiple testimonies etc, that is not an issue. For various reasons like this, the tenacity/robustness/reliability can still be there, as is the case with NT books/gospels.

>> all such clues tell us Christians did worse than burn 'variant' texts and had debates that lasted a lot longer than the short and turmoil ridden reign of Uthman.

A good introduction to how the gospels are identified is seen in a Richard Bauckham lecture which can be found here: http://www.netfilehost.com/wscal/GuestLectures/bauckham.07.11.14.mp3. Also we have to remember that Bible it is not one book/testimony by one person. It has multiple testimonies, from multiple disciples/apostles/authors (with core themes repeated over and over). In such a context, it is natural to have some debates etc (unlike a simplistic case of just one author/testimony, and even that forcefully standardized etc by military leaders etc).

AKunde said...

Greetings Fernando,

By ridicule I meant the comments you made to D.

Greetings Sunil,

I've given responses to some of your questions on another page of the blog, so I won't repeat anything between them. But if you miss out on some of the specific questions, let me know, please.

However, it's important to note that, while Dr. William Lane Craig may hold that opinion regarding the historical evidence of the Gospels, I do not. Worth considering is that Dr. WLC uses the kalam cosmological argument, a foundational Muslim theological argument, as the basis of his attacks on atheism (which he openly acknowledges).

I know of no Muslim that needs to use the theological arguments of a Christian in order to battle atheists.

Moreover, many of these issues are straw men arguments often presented by Christians.

I am not saying the NT doesn't have loads more manuscripts than Tacitus and much earlier ones than the Illyad and Plutarch and others.

What I do say is that no 2 pages of 6000 NT manuscripts is identical. Now thats a very poor manuscript tradition.

Moreover, I say that there is no evidence for the Synoptic Gospels within 100 years of when they would have originally been written. About 99% of scholars would agree with this statement.

Ergo, all you have as a Christian is copies of copies of copies of something that we can't be certain of the originals, because all the manuscripts we have today aren't completely uniform (no 2 pages are identical).

Yes, thats better than Plutarch and the code of Hammurabi and other ancient texts, but these texts aren't asking me to accept the death of the Son of God as a sacrifice for my personal sin.

I'm not going to use unreliable texts, that don't conform theologically or ritually to what came before it, that contains some historical errors and that disagrees with itself to form the basis of the most important decision I'm going to make in my life, just because they're more reliable than the Illyad and more numerous than Plutarch.

But, you are free to do such, if you wish. :)

Kind regards,

Sunil said...

Dear Abdullah Kunde,

Please refer my previous post (which I think got posted together with your latest), and please refer the blog entry 'Reply to Abdullah Kunde on Various Issues' for more of my responses. Thank you.

ben malik said...

Akunde, your inconsistency is appaling to be quite frank. You speak of no 2 NT MSS being alike as if this somehow means that the mss tradtion IS SO VASTLY different that if you had 2 different MSS of the same book you would be presented with completely contradictory and conflicting theologies, which is a lie.

The other problem is that your comments suggest that this is only true of the NT mss tradition, whereas this can be said of all documents which have been hand copied and of which a substantial number of mss still exist.

Another problem with your statement is that you dishonestly withhold or hide the fact that no 2 Quranic MSS are alike, a fact admitted by Muslim authorities.

Thus saith Muhammad ibn Ishaq [al-Nadim]: I have seen a number of Quranic manuscripts, which the transcribers recorded as manuscripts from Ibn Mas‘ud. NO TWO QUR'ANIC COPIES WERE IN AGREEMENT and most of them were on badly effaced parchment. (Abu'l-Faraj Muhammad ibn Ishaq Al-Nadim, The Fihrist - A 10th Century AD Survey of Islamic Culture, edited and translated by Bayard Dodge [Great Books of the Islamic World, Inc., Columbia University Press, 1970], p. 57)

According to this very same reference it wasn't just the MSS of Ibn Masud's Quran which were not in complete agreement:

Books Composed About Discrepancies of the [Qur'anic] Manuscripts. The Discrepancies between the Manuscripts of the people of al-Madina, al-Kufa, and al-Basrah, according to al-Kisai; book of Khalaf, Discrepancies of the manuscripts; Discrepancies of the People of al-Kufa, al-Basrah and Syria concerning the Manuscripts, by al-Farra'; Discrepancies between the Manuscripts, Abu Da'ud al-Sijistani; book of al-Mada'ini about the discrepancies between the manuscripts and the compiling of the Qur'an; Discrepancies between the Manuscripts of Syria, al-Hijaz, and al-Iraq, by Ibn Amir al-Yahsubi; book of Muhammad ibn 'Abd Al-Rahman al-Isbahani about discrepancies of the manuscripts. (Op., cit. p. 79)

We haven't even gotten into all those hadiths which speak of missing verses, chapters etc. or how Muhammad's companions wrote down from their memorties Qurans which were not completely unform with another, or how the first Muslim communities almost came to blows during the reign of Uthman because of the differences among the various Qurans were so great.

Face it bud, the Quran has a vastly inferior mss and textual tradition than the Holy Bible. So if you were honest you would no longer believe in the Quran.

Your arguments become more laughable when you say that you wouldn't bank your eternal life on the Gospels because of all of their supposed inconsistencies and poor MSS support. But you have no problem believing in the Quran for which you have absolutely no complete codex from Muhammad's time to verify whether the Quran has always had only 114 chapters. To make matters worse your earliest sources on Muhammad's life were written hundreds of years after Muhammad's death and yet you naively believe that the isnad system somehow guarantees the authenticity of the reports which were supposedly circulating for centuries by word of mouth.

In spite of all this you still have the nerve to question the Gospels which were written within the first generation of the eyewitnesses. That is still not good enough for and yet you are willing to bank your etenal destiny on a false prophet named Muhammad whose life is told in sources far removed from the time of the witnesses.

Yes, you are amazingly consistent!

ben malik said...

I don't know if Kunde is being serious or pulling our legs.

You says:

1 - Christian message is the same throughout all Gospels.
a)Through the 4 your church selected. What about Marcion's gospel? What about the Nag Hammadi Library?


What about them? You further say:

Consider Nag Hammadi Library and Festial Letter of 367 CE. If anything, all such clues tell us Christians did worse than burn 'variant' texts and had debates that lasted a lot longer than the short and turmoil ridden reign of Uthman.

I know you can't be seriously suggesting that Marcion's canon or the Nag Hammadi are more reliable or reflect more accurately the teachings of Jesus and his disicles since this would mean that Muhammad is a false prophet since his teachings conflict with what these sources say concerning God and Jesus.

Are you saying that the gnostics were correct in denying that Christ had come into flesh or that he was divine? Then Muhammad is wrong? And are you also saying that Marcion was correct that Yahweh was an inferios deity to the God that Jesus preached? Note your own words.

The Marcionic Gospel, while containing elements of Luke, is hardly a 'redaction' of it. It is an entirely different text which has portions of a range of NT apocrypha and presents a theology which has YHWH as an inferior and different God to the God of Christ. Moreover, the similarities between the two are irrelevant, its the differences that are important.

If Marcion is right then Muhammad is wrong again. Take your pick.

This was too much:

2 - Not all texts were destroyed like Uthman did.
a)Speaking of the Nag Hammadi Library, what happened there? How many other deviant Gospels were rejected and subsequently destroyed? The Nag Hammadi Library was hidden for 2 reasons: 1 - some Christians believed the texts to be scripture & 2 - other Christians wanted those texts destroyed.


If I said that your comments are desreate I would be putting it mildly. To show the futllity in your comparison, Christians didn't burn copies of NT books and decide to standardize whatever copies they felt were more faithful to the originals. And Uthman didn't burn books produced by heretics such as Musaylima, another false prophet who lived during the time of Muhammad. Uthman actually had the nerve to destroy copies of the Quran written down by some of the very men that the false prophet Muhammad told his followers to go and learn the Quran from!

What you had to say to Fernando exemplifies either your dishonesty or that you are dealing with matters that are way over your head. Since I am a nice chap I am going to say that these issues are way beyond you.

You are going to have a very short career as an Muslim apologist or academic.

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

Mr Kunde wrote

Consider Nag Hammadi Library and Festial Letter of 367 CE. If anything, all such clues tell us Christians did worse than burn 'variant' texts and had debates that lasted a lot longer than the short and turmoil ridden reign of Uthman.

Hogan replies:

I think you are missing the whole point here, the Gnostic problem did not appear until the end of the first century, the earliest Gnostics utilized the four Gospels prior to the Gnostic scripture, hence this is a middle second century matter, appearing 70 years after the traditional Gospels, by a heresy we both deem to be heretical and Greek in nature. The Festial letter appears 300 years after the first generation of Christianity.

Now lets assess this, the Uthman turmoil appeard within the early first generation of Muslims, already at that time there was schism and textual and traditional problems within Islam. How did the Muslim solve the problem? By selecting an inferior text, rewrite it and burn the rest. Oh man, that really attracts me to Islam---noot.

In Christianity schism of this kind appears later, in 90 AD, and there is no burning of books or suppression or persecution until the fourth century.

How on earth did we do worse than the Muslims?

The problems in Islam begin with the earliest followers, the problem within Christianity begins later outside the early Christian community.

Lets reiterate this, heresy appears much later and we know where it came from, variant books such as the Gnostic literature appears more than a hundred years later; no burning of these books or suppression or persecution of the Gnostic followers takes place within the first 300 years.
With the Qur’an what you have is a fabrication of a variaty of sources which were badly lost and forgotten and later badly compiled into a variaty of different manuscripts. Then a faction of the early Muslims corrupt this inferior text while the remaining was destroyed. What you have now is the revised standard version of Uthman.

Where is the Qur’an of Muhammad?

Stupith question? Well not nearly as stupith as your own claims when it comes to the New Testament, we do not possess such a confusion of the text in our traditions.

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

Hogan wrote:

"This oldest form of the text is no doubt closely (very closely) related to what the author originally wrote" (Bart Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus, p. 62).

Mr Kunde replies:

Even Professor Ehrman himself asks 'but what did the originals contain'. Yes, we can be certain what we currently have is based on and closely related to some original, but what did they actually contain and when were they written?

You've got nothing but copies of copies of copies.

Hogan replies:

I suggest that you read Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus. Ehrman does not indicate that the text is corrupted to the extent you claim. He points out the typical end of Mark 16 and the beginning of John 8 and 1 John 5: 7; none of these however present any difficulties for the Christian faith. The real evidence of corruption is that Matthew does not present the angry Jesus in Mark and the that author of Luke or a later scribe borrows a passage from Mark or Matthew to balance the brave Jesus in Luke’s Gethsemane with the Gethsemane experience of Mark and Matthew, but in both case these are speculative attempts, and even if they were not they would not serve to undermine the reliability of the Gospels. In the matter of Luke we are not considering corruption either but simply a borrowing of a Matthean passage into a Lucan. Certainly Ehrman did not loose his faith based upon these matters.
As to your copies of copies of copies, that does not support your case either; again read Ehrman and Metzger and check out what kind of variants we are looking at, and where these variants appear and when. So no two pages are identical, true, you might have two spelling mistakes one page, and a missed word on another, and a grammatical mistake on another; so yeah you are right no page is exactly identical, but this does not reveal the corruption you are so confidently exclaiming. And why don’t you take a look at the passages of the early Qur’ans, do you really think that any two pages are identical, no they are not.

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

Mr Kunde wrote:

As for Professor Gerd-R Puin, he has been claiming since discovering the Sana'a manuscripts (and in a recent letter in 1999) that he is about to publish evidence of the variants in them. To date, only Fogg's Palimpsest, which most scholars agree is just a poor manuscript which was corrected as soon as it was first written, has been put forward. Over 30 years later and no evidence? Claims mean nothing without evidence.

Hogan replies:

Ok let me get this straight your earliest evidence is a poor manuscript that had to be corrected, sounds much like Ehrman on some of the Biblical manuscripts you constantly are bringing up.

Keep in mind this is your earliest material, is it merely poorly written? Ok, in that case there is not reason to believe the Qur’an as there are variants between it and later manuscripts. So it it really a poor manuscripts or simply the earliest form that had to be developed?
On the other hand don’t be too fast to assume that evidence is not on the way, this sort of work takes time; consider also the political aspect of the matter, many universities would not allow such studies to be undertaken and many governments would put pressure on such scholarship to protect the interest of Muslims. I can also imagine all the money involved, much like the attempt to obtain quotes from Western scientists to confirm the highly backward science in the Qur’an; there are indeed scientists in the West who refused to be bribed to contribute to such nonsense.

Mr Kunde wrote:

As for the suggestions on the portion of the documentary you posted, that a manuscript from the time of al Walid is the oldest datable Qur'an, again this is false. Check out the UN website I quote in my presentation for access to most of the Sana'a manuscripts, which are freely available, and many dated to pre al Walid. Some scholars (non Muslims) date many of the Sana'a manuscripts to pre-Uthmanic time. Check out Fred Donner and Andrew Rippin.

Hogan replies:

Well is it the script or the material it is written on that dates back to the time you are assuming? Dating a manuscripts and dating its writing is an entirely different matter.

donna60 said...

I have this entire web-site to myself today, seeing as the rest of the world is watching the Super-bowl, heh, heh, heh

But in any case, Mr Kunde, could you please explain the point you were making in the debate about Origen? (I think it was Origen,) and why he didn't know something or other.

(This debate was very hard for me to follow, because I am a meek and humble biologist and not a textual critic or Arab and Hebrew scholar, or a any other kind of PhD scholar required to understand what both of you were saying in obvious Greek ;)

But I did latch on to some arguement you were making about Origen, and I would be very appreciative if you could explain it further.