All of the others (as complete books) have been lost, their remains have survived only as fragments or tampered with in some way so as to make their authenticity doubtful.
You're assuming these "books" ever existed on earth.
I don't think God ever sent down any books. He spoke to the prophets and it was then their responsibility to write things down.
Nowhere in the Quran is the Bible even mentioned, to say nothing of its being among the revealed texts of Allah, or as Christian claim “The Word of God.” Further, we know from respected scholars that although some fragments of the Psalms, the Torah, and the Injeel (the teachings of Prophet Jesus) may be found in the Bible, comprised of the Old and New Testaments, the Bible cannot rightfully be called “The Word of God.” Why is this so?
I think you misunderstand what Christians mean by "word of God." They do not mean the literal words of God, but God's will and/or concepts inspired by the original and literal words of God.
The Bible speaks of God in third person. The God in the Bible is never a narrator as far as I know. The NT also speaks of Jesus in third person. Jesus is never a narrator in the NT. The Tanakh/OT is
about God. The NT is
about Jesus. Most of the time the prophets are also referred to in third person, although there are some who serve as narrators like Daniel, Solomon and king Nebuchadnezzar.
So if the Bible is neither narrated by God nor written by Him, and, as such, is not ‘the word of God,’ then what is it? By any objective criteria, the Bible is a book containing a compilation of stories, legends, folk tales, folk lore, myths, sagas, narratives, poetry, fragments of scriptures (fragments from the Psalms, the Torah, and the Injeel as already mentioned), letters (esp. in New Testament), visions, dreams, accounts of events from doubtful sources (not eye witnesses), editors’ or scribes’ notes, as well as human errors.
The idea of calling it the "word of God" may have much to do with the philosophy of Philo of Alexandria, also called Philo Judaeus and his idea of the Logos. Do you want to know why Christians call it the "word of God?" I am going to do my best to explain it to you now.
The Logos is about how God influences the world. The question often asked is, is God everywhere, in everything, or is He separate from the world, but having a great influence over it?
This is what I think Philo was trying to say about how God influences the world. It began with Abraham, Moses, the prophets and the Torah. Every time God speaks, He is influencing the world. The words of God enter our minds and we became influenced by these words.
The words of God may influence us indirectly to turn toward good or evil, but because God tells us to do good, we focus on the good that people do as a result of hearing the words of God.
Because the Bible contains the words of God, they are being influenced by God when they read it. The Bible itself is about people influenced by God. It is about prophets who sought God, found God, listened to His words and obeyed his instructions. When we read the Bible, we are not only reading the words of God, but stories of people who responded to God.
The Logos refers to the phenomenon created when people respond to the words of God. A picture is a thousand words and the Bible has thousands of words. The picture you see is the Logos itself. The Greek word Logos translates roughly to "the Word" and this is why Christians call the Bible "the word of God."
It is
not because
the whole Bible contains
only the words of God, but because what Christians mean by "the word of God" (influenced by Hellenism and Greek philosophy) is
more than just the literal words of God, but the divine will. It is
everything that God achieves just by speaking.
it is only a book with many limitations and imperfections which disqualify it from being called “The Word of God.”
It doesn't really matter if humans are smart. God gave us the ability to learn from mistakes. Didn't Adam eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil? If humans are smart, why does God even need to send us "corrections" for our holy text?
If we wrote the Bible and talked about God in third person, then at least we don't have to prove the whole Bible is from God. The words of God are still there. All we need to change is how we talked about God in third person. If the Bible contains the words of God, accompanied by commentary, then the real problem is the commentary itself.
The point of me saying this is that there was
probably never a book narrated by God. You're assuming that book exists. If that book ever existed, there would at least be some evidence. If God wrote a book and sent it down, it would be somewhere on this planet.
I think the truth is, God's revelations were always oral. They were written down by people who were wise enough to think about future generations, that the message wasn't just for them, but for their descendants as well.
The New Testament (NT) is the Gospel of Prophet Jesus, or the Injeel. It is neither. It is made up of twenty-seven books, none of which was narrated or written by Prophet Jesus although the NT may contain fragments of the Injeel (sayings and teachings of Prophet Jesus).
The NT referred to Jesus in third person. It also referred to the Gospel in "third person." The NT documented the concept of the Gospel. By documenting the concept of the Gospel, it allows us to "reconstruct" or "rediscover" the Gospel. The NT, therefore does not need to be the Gospel itself. It only needs to tell us what it was and what it meant to the early Christians. This eliminates the need for a book which you call the Injeel. If people remember the concept, they don't need the book.
But like I said, the Injeel was an idea, not a book.
The Injeel as revealed through Prophet Jesus has been lost. The fragments which may be cited in the NT may not be authentic or in their proper context.
I think it's more likely that either you or the Quran doesn't have the proper context. If it's you, bad for you. If it's the Quran, bad for Muslims. I don't want to be too negative here. It isn't nice to be negative.
So it is erroneous to equate the NT with the Injeel mentioned in the Quran.
I think you are talking about some other Injeel, Gospel or "good news," not the one the early Christians followed, a Gospel that probably didn't exist in history -- probably a fantasy Gospel.
If this Gospel was lost, then your Quran should be able to tell us what it was, so I challenge you to produce the Gospel from within the Quran itself. What was the "good news" that Jesus taught in the first century?
Does the Quran tell you that?
the bottom line is, the 'Bible' is not the injeel
The bottom line is, the Injeel was an idea, not a book.
