Gabriel Explains Human Reproduction to Muhammad

Muhammad was once asked, as a challenge to his prophethood, why a child sometimes resembles the mother's side of the family and sometimes resembles the father's side of the family. Muhammad said that he received the answer to this question from the Angel Gabriel. The answer, however, is scientifically false. So if Muhammad got a false revelation from the same "angel" that was giving him Qur'anic revelations, how can we believe the Qur'an?

)

In case you want to read it for yourself, here's the hadith we were quoting:

Sahih al-Bukhari 3329—Narrated Anas: When Abdullah bin Salam heard of the arrival of the Prophet at Al-Madina, he came to him and said, "I am going to ask you about three things which nobody knows except a Prophet:

(1) What is the first portent of the Hour?
(2) What will be the first meal taken by the people of Paradise?
(3) Why does a child resemble its father, and why does it resemble its maternal uncle (mother's brother)?"

Allah's Messenger said, "Jibril (Gabriel) has just now told me of their answers." Abdullah said, "He (i.e., Jibril), from amongst all the angels, is the enemy of the Jews." Allah's Messenger said, "As for the first sign of the Hour, it will be a fire that will collect (or gather) the people from the east to the west; the first meal of the people of Paradise will be extra lobe (caudate lobe) of fish-liver. As for the resemblance of the child to its parents: If a man has sexual intercourse with his wife and gets discharge first, the child will resemble the father, and if the woman gets discharge first, the child will resemble her." On that Abdullah bin Salam said, "I testify that you are the Messenger of Allah."

Muhammad's First Encounter with Gabriel

Some Muslims get quite upset when I say that Muhammad wasn't actually getting revelations from God through the angel Gabriel. However, when he began receiving verses, Muhammad himself didn't believe they were from God. Why would Muslims get angry with us for taking Muhammad's first impression of his encounter seriously?

Here's the quotation from Ibn Ishaq on Muhammad's first meeting with Gabriel:

When it was the night on which God honoured him with his mission and showed mercy on His servants thereby, Gabriel brought him the command of God. "He came to me," said the apostle of God, "while I was asleep, with a coverlet of brocade whereon was some writing, and said, ‘Read!’ I said, ‘What shall I read?’ He pressed me with it so tightly that I thought it was death; then he let me go and said, ‘Read!’ I said, ‘What shall I read?’ He pressed me with it again so that I thought it was death; then he let me go and said ‘Read!’ I said, ‘What shall I read?’ He pressed me with it the third time so that I thought it was death and said ‘Read!’ I said, ‘What then shall I read?’—and this I said only to deliver myself from him, lest he should do the same to me again. He said:

‘Read in the name of thy Lord who created, Who created man of blood coagulated. Read! Thy Lord is the most beneficent, Who taught by the pen, Taught that which they knew not unto men.’

So I read it, and he departed from me. And I awoke from my sleep, and it was as though these words were written on my heart.

Now none of God’s creatures was more hateful to me than an (ecstatic) poet or a man possessed: I could not even look at them. I thought, Woe is me poet or possessed—Never shall Quraysh say this of me! I will go to the top of the mountain and throw myself down that I may kill myself and gain rest." (Ibn Ishaq, Sirat Rasul Allah, p. 106)