dailogue is the best
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dailogue does not mean neglecting differences, it means discussing those differnces in order to satisfy the exlamations and the questions that the one holds about the other.dailogue means either to convince me or to convince you, and if this case does not take place, the essence in dailogue remains the same: the essence is that we tolerate difference.
between Judaism, Christianity and Islam, there are a lot of similarities as the source of them is one : God. the differences between those religions are small, but important. my focus now on those differences is not out of any negative feelings or bad intentions. i extremely believe that in dailogue, any dailogue, we have first to concentrate on the differences, not by neglecting them, because then we are just posponing what can be done now or make somthings or some feelings become bigger and bigger and deeper and deeper.
i hope you really read what i have written about our views about the Holy Trinity and Jesus' crucifixion and presents to me your real, true feelings and views without any sensivity.and i am sorry, terribly sorry if i upset any one. it is not my intention. mu pure intention is dailogue and have a real image about each other. and i will be extremely happy if you present to me the main objections that you have about islam in a context of objectivity, respect and raison.
i am sorry again, and i hope we really open a real dialogue which sheds light on our differences, not to adopt them, but to co-exist with them in an atmospher of mutual respect, understanding and acceptance *****************************************************
The Trinity is the basic tenet of the Christian faith and Christianity cannot stand without it. In Oxford dictionary, we find out that the trinity is "The union of father, Son and Holy Spirit as one God (ed. Crowther, 1277)." Let’s read the following excerpt in which Augustin explains this hard-to-be understood dogma:
All those Catholic expounders of the divine Scriptures, both Old and New, whom I have been able to read, who have written before me concerning the Trinity, who is God, have proposed to teach, according to the Scriptures, the doctrine, that the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit intimate a divine unity of one and the same substance in an indivisible equality; and that therefore they are not three Gods but one God: although the Father has begotten the son, and so He who is the Father is not the son; and the son is begotten by the Father, and so He who is not the son is not the Father; and the Holy Spirit is neither the father nor the Son, but only the Spirit of the Father and the son, Himself co-equal with the Father and the Son, and pertaining to the unity of the Trinity; … the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, as they are indivisible, so work indivisibly, this is also my faith, since it is the Catholic faith (qtd. in Peters, 286)
From this explanation, I will try to simplify this dogma more and more. The holy Trinity consists of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
1-God who is also the father of Jesus.
2-Jesus is the Son of God and at the same time God incarnate.
3-The Holy Spirit which is the spirit of both the Father and Son.
Now, let’s examine each part of the Trinity separately and put it into confrontation with reason.
1)God: the Father of Jesus
Muslims believe in the purity of Mary and the virgin birth of Jesus as one of God’s miracles. And in this matter, we differentiate from the Jews who believe that Jesus is the son of a quite human father. However, on the other hand, Muslims differentiate from the Christians who believe that Jesus is the son of God. This idea is totally refused by Muslims because it is both repudiated by God and contrast reason. Christians believe that Jesus is begotten, not made. There are millions of people who believe that God begat a son. And this belief is so shameful and disgraceful, for begetting is done through sexual experience which is necessary both in animals’ and man’s worlds (Deedat, The Debate of the Century, 91). Thus, one becomes atheist once he says that God has begotten a son (Deedat, 64). God himself repudiates this idea in the Quran when He says "[. . .], and the Christians call Christ the Son of God. That is a saying from their mouth; (in this) they but imitate what the Unbelievers of old used to say. God’s curse be on them: how they are deluded away from the Truth! (9:30)." Yes, one become so away from the Truth and reason once he believes that God was involved in a sexual experience with one of his servants.
The human reason and good sense naturally believe that there is no one like God, that He is the creator of all, and that He has the supreme ability of doing anything He wants without being involved in the materialistic world of man. The Quran reveals: In the name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.* "Say: He is God, the One and Only;* God, the Eternal, Absolute;* He begetteth not, nor is He begotten;* And there is none like unto Him (112: 1-4)."
2)Jesus: the son of God and at the same time God incarnate
Christians believe that Jesus is God incarnate, although this belief is in complete break with reason.
All the facts prove that Jesus is just a man and has no divine characteristics. The Quran tells us that there is no one like God: "And there is none like unto Him (112: 4)." So, how can it be believed that Jesus is God in flesh? How can it be believed that God has a body like ours? He eats, drinks, sleeps and does every man’s actions which are done also by animals. God is, as one entirely feels, "a spiritual Being, beyond the imagination of the mind of man (Deedat, 65)." Ahmad Deedat, a comparative religion researcher, presents to us quite convincing arguments that Jesus is just a man. Deedat says that the Bible reveals that the angels had already named Jesus by that name while he was still in his mother’s womb. And Deedat continues wondering: "who was the one named by that name while he was still in his mother’s womb? He is Jesus! And the question in other way is who was in the womb of Mary: Jesus or God? (68)." After this very rational information, Deedat keeps going on presenting more and more reasonable facts. He says: "Suppose that there was a midwife besides Mary, the mother of Jesus at the time of his birth. So, that midwife was receiving between her hands a baby. Thus, how can we believe that this helpless baby was a God! (68)." Furthermore, Deedat becomes more and more convincing as he continues saying that the Bible reveals that Jesus was circumcised in his eight day (Luke 2: 12). Then, he wonders: "A God and an operation of circumcision is done to Him!! (67)."
God Himself declares in the Quran that Jesus is no more than God’s apostle: "Christ the son of Mary was no more than an apostle; many were the apostles that passed away before him. His mother was a woman of truth. They had both to eat their (daily) food. See how God doth make His Signs clear to them; yes see in what ways they are deluded away from the truth (5: 75)."
Moreover, to those who present Jesus’ miracles as signs of his deity, we will show that Jesus’ miracles do not qualify him to be a God. First, because there are miracles of other apostles that surpass Jesus’ miracles. Moses, for instance, "is greater than Jesus because he put life back into a dead stick and transmuted it from the plant kingdom to the animal kingdom by making it into a serpent (Exodus 7. 10) (qtd.in Deedat, Christ in Islam, 92)." Second, Jesus' power is borrowed from God, and it is not his own. In the Bible, we find the Christ himself declares that his miracles are done through God’s spirit: "I can of mine own self do nothing [. . .]. (John 5:30)" "I cast out devils by the Spirit of God [. . .]. (Matthew 12:28)" (qtd.in Deedat, 95)." So, why the Christians advance Jesus' miracles as signs of his divinity, while Jesus himself declares that his miracles are done though God’s power? In the Quran itself, we find an account of Jesus' miracles presented to the people of Israel as signs of his prophethood. And we also have an affirmation that these miracles are done through God’s support:
And (appoint him) an apostle to the Children of Israel, (with this message): "I have come to you, with a Sign from your Lord, in that I make for you out of clay, as if it were, the figure of a bird, and breathe into it, and it becomes a bird by God’s Leave: And I heal those born blind, and the lepers, and I quicken the dead, by God’s Leave; and I declare to you what ye eat, and what ye store in your houses. Surely therein is a Sign for you if ye did believe." (3: 49)
What is most convincingly is that Jesus himself never said ‘I am God’ or "worship me’. Deedat confirms confidently that there is no sentence, in the sixty-six books which form the Old and the New Testament, wherein we find Jesus (PbUH) says: ‘I am God’ or ‘worship me’ (The Debate of The Century,70). Thus, how did Christianity say of Jesus’ deity? Simply, by means of interpretation. In John 10: 30, we find Jesus says "I and my father are one." This expression, as Deedat shows, is misinterpreted by Christian theologians. The problem is that Christians cite this verse out of its context. Through the context (John Chapter 10, verse 23-30), Deedat simply shows that Jesus means nothing by that verse, but that he and God are one in purpose and goal which is people’s remaining in faith (79). Also, in the Quran, we have reinforcement that Jesus asks his people to worship only the one God and follow his path: ‘It is God who is my Lord and your Lord; then worship Him. This is a way that is straight’ (3: 50-54)."
3)The Holy Spirit
As far as the holy spirit is concerned, Augustine had shown that "… the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son, but only the Spirit of the Father and the Son, Himself co-equal with the Father and the Son, and pertaining to the unity of the Trinity [. . .]. (qtd. in Peters, 286)." From this quotation, we come to know that the Holy Spirit, which is one spirit, is the spirit of two persons, the Father and the Son, and not one person! This spirit is also considered as a God, and, thus, the third person in the Trinity. But, in the Christian teachings, there is no reference of the Holy Spirit. So, from where this idea is brought?
Actually, the whole idea of the Trinity, as we have gradually seen, has no reference in Christianity. Therefore, one may ask what is the story of Trinity? And how did the Trinity become one of the most important tenets of Christianity? Very surprisingly, the Trinity appeared in the third or fourth century. That is to say, three or four centuries after Christ. In reality, the Trinity is a result of the Christian theologians’ misinterpretation of the Holy Writ. Furthermore, why the choice of the Trinity and not, for instance, of the quatrain or binary? Simply, because the idea of the Trinity was the result of the influence of the Greek methodology.
Trinitarian -or better, triadic, thinking about the primary principle or principles of being was not a Christian innovation. Dyads and triads were philosophical common places among the later Platonist philosophers, and Philo’s triume, "Lord God of three natures, teaching, perfection and practice, whose recorded symbols are Abraham, Isaac and Jacob." Is a notion that can be found, as a whole or in its distinct parts, scattered trough many passages in his writings [. . .]. (Peters, 285)
And it is well known that the relationship between the members of the holy Trinity did not take its last form only in Constantine assembly in 325 A.C. In reality, this is the mere fact of the Trinity. It has more to do with misinterpretation and history than with divinity.
Many philosophers, scientists and priests had come in contact with this fact, and this led them into a revolution and a rebellion. In the first Christian Church, a separation happened as a result of the priests’ withdrawal from the church consensus, and their establishment of the unipolar dogma which was called "Monophysite Christianity". This movement was an expression of the priest’s intellectual independence from the Greek trend which had developed and explained the Christian teaching according to the Greek mythology (AL Damlugi, 104). Also, Hans Küng, the director of the institution of the Christian Churches’ Unions’ Researchers, which follows to Tübingen’s University in South-East of the Federal Germany, decided to make the Christian teachings go back to many of its real principles which Jesus called to. One of these principles is the belief in the unity of God. Küng refused the Trinity and proved that it was added in the third or fourth century (Küng, 71-72).
God himself advices his Christian servants to stop believing in the Trinity, for this concept make them turn from the real path to God, and the inner happiness and satisfaction:
"O People of the Book! Commit no excesses in your religion: nor say of God ought but the truth. Christ Jesus the son of Mary was (nor more than) an apostle of God, and His Word, which He bestowed on Mary, and a Spirit proceeding from Him: so believe in God and His apostles. Say not "Trinity": desist: It will be better for you: for God is one God: glory be to Him: (Far Exalted is He) above having a son. To Him belong all things in the heavens and on earth. And enough is God as a Disposer of affairs. (4:171).
between Judaism, Christianity and Islam, there are a lot of similarities as the source of them is one : God. the differences between those religions are small, but important. my focus now on those differences is not out of any negative feelings or bad intentions. i extremely believe that in dailogue, any dailogue, we have first to concentrate on the differences, not by neglecting them, because then we are just posponing what can be done now or make somthings or some feelings become bigger and bigger and deeper and deeper.
i hope you really read what i have written about our views about the Holy Trinity and Jesus' crucifixion and presents to me your real, true feelings and views without any sensivity.and i am sorry, terribly sorry if i upset any one. it is not my intention. mu pure intention is dailogue and have a real image about each other. and i will be extremely happy if you present to me the main objections that you have about islam in a context of objectivity, respect and raison.
i am sorry again, and i hope we really open a real dialogue which sheds light on our differences, not to adopt them, but to co-exist with them in an atmospher of mutual respect, understanding and acceptance *****************************************************
The Trinity is the basic tenet of the Christian faith and Christianity cannot stand without it. In Oxford dictionary, we find out that the trinity is "The union of father, Son and Holy Spirit as one God (ed. Crowther, 1277)." Let’s read the following excerpt in which Augustin explains this hard-to-be understood dogma:
All those Catholic expounders of the divine Scriptures, both Old and New, whom I have been able to read, who have written before me concerning the Trinity, who is God, have proposed to teach, according to the Scriptures, the doctrine, that the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit intimate a divine unity of one and the same substance in an indivisible equality; and that therefore they are not three Gods but one God: although the Father has begotten the son, and so He who is the Father is not the son; and the son is begotten by the Father, and so He who is not the son is not the Father; and the Holy Spirit is neither the father nor the Son, but only the Spirit of the Father and the son, Himself co-equal with the Father and the Son, and pertaining to the unity of the Trinity; … the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, as they are indivisible, so work indivisibly, this is also my faith, since it is the Catholic faith (qtd. in Peters, 286)
From this explanation, I will try to simplify this dogma more and more. The holy Trinity consists of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
1-God who is also the father of Jesus.
2-Jesus is the Son of God and at the same time God incarnate.
3-The Holy Spirit which is the spirit of both the Father and Son.
Now, let’s examine each part of the Trinity separately and put it into confrontation with reason.
1)God: the Father of Jesus
Muslims believe in the purity of Mary and the virgin birth of Jesus as one of God’s miracles. And in this matter, we differentiate from the Jews who believe that Jesus is the son of a quite human father. However, on the other hand, Muslims differentiate from the Christians who believe that Jesus is the son of God. This idea is totally refused by Muslims because it is both repudiated by God and contrast reason. Christians believe that Jesus is begotten, not made. There are millions of people who believe that God begat a son. And this belief is so shameful and disgraceful, for begetting is done through sexual experience which is necessary both in animals’ and man’s worlds (Deedat, The Debate of the Century, 91). Thus, one becomes atheist once he says that God has begotten a son (Deedat, 64). God himself repudiates this idea in the Quran when He says "[. . .], and the Christians call Christ the Son of God. That is a saying from their mouth; (in this) they but imitate what the Unbelievers of old used to say. God’s curse be on them: how they are deluded away from the Truth! (9:30)." Yes, one become so away from the Truth and reason once he believes that God was involved in a sexual experience with one of his servants.
The human reason and good sense naturally believe that there is no one like God, that He is the creator of all, and that He has the supreme ability of doing anything He wants without being involved in the materialistic world of man. The Quran reveals: In the name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.* "Say: He is God, the One and Only;* God, the Eternal, Absolute;* He begetteth not, nor is He begotten;* And there is none like unto Him (112: 1-4)."
2)Jesus: the son of God and at the same time God incarnate
Christians believe that Jesus is God incarnate, although this belief is in complete break with reason.
All the facts prove that Jesus is just a man and has no divine characteristics. The Quran tells us that there is no one like God: "And there is none like unto Him (112: 4)." So, how can it be believed that Jesus is God in flesh? How can it be believed that God has a body like ours? He eats, drinks, sleeps and does every man’s actions which are done also by animals. God is, as one entirely feels, "a spiritual Being, beyond the imagination of the mind of man (Deedat, 65)." Ahmad Deedat, a comparative religion researcher, presents to us quite convincing arguments that Jesus is just a man. Deedat says that the Bible reveals that the angels had already named Jesus by that name while he was still in his mother’s womb. And Deedat continues wondering: "who was the one named by that name while he was still in his mother’s womb? He is Jesus! And the question in other way is who was in the womb of Mary: Jesus or God? (68)." After this very rational information, Deedat keeps going on presenting more and more reasonable facts. He says: "Suppose that there was a midwife besides Mary, the mother of Jesus at the time of his birth. So, that midwife was receiving between her hands a baby. Thus, how can we believe that this helpless baby was a God! (68)." Furthermore, Deedat becomes more and more convincing as he continues saying that the Bible reveals that Jesus was circumcised in his eight day (Luke 2: 12). Then, he wonders: "A God and an operation of circumcision is done to Him!! (67)."
God Himself declares in the Quran that Jesus is no more than God’s apostle: "Christ the son of Mary was no more than an apostle; many were the apostles that passed away before him. His mother was a woman of truth. They had both to eat their (daily) food. See how God doth make His Signs clear to them; yes see in what ways they are deluded away from the truth (5: 75)."
Moreover, to those who present Jesus’ miracles as signs of his deity, we will show that Jesus’ miracles do not qualify him to be a God. First, because there are miracles of other apostles that surpass Jesus’ miracles. Moses, for instance, "is greater than Jesus because he put life back into a dead stick and transmuted it from the plant kingdom to the animal kingdom by making it into a serpent (Exodus 7. 10) (qtd.in Deedat, Christ in Islam, 92)." Second, Jesus' power is borrowed from God, and it is not his own. In the Bible, we find the Christ himself declares that his miracles are done through God’s spirit: "I can of mine own self do nothing [. . .]. (John 5:30)" "I cast out devils by the Spirit of God [. . .]. (Matthew 12:28)" (qtd.in Deedat, 95)." So, why the Christians advance Jesus' miracles as signs of his divinity, while Jesus himself declares that his miracles are done though God’s power? In the Quran itself, we find an account of Jesus' miracles presented to the people of Israel as signs of his prophethood. And we also have an affirmation that these miracles are done through God’s support:
And (appoint him) an apostle to the Children of Israel, (with this message): "I have come to you, with a Sign from your Lord, in that I make for you out of clay, as if it were, the figure of a bird, and breathe into it, and it becomes a bird by God’s Leave: And I heal those born blind, and the lepers, and I quicken the dead, by God’s Leave; and I declare to you what ye eat, and what ye store in your houses. Surely therein is a Sign for you if ye did believe." (3: 49)
What is most convincingly is that Jesus himself never said ‘I am God’ or "worship me’. Deedat confirms confidently that there is no sentence, in the sixty-six books which form the Old and the New Testament, wherein we find Jesus (PbUH) says: ‘I am God’ or ‘worship me’ (The Debate of The Century,70). Thus, how did Christianity say of Jesus’ deity? Simply, by means of interpretation. In John 10: 30, we find Jesus says "I and my father are one." This expression, as Deedat shows, is misinterpreted by Christian theologians. The problem is that Christians cite this verse out of its context. Through the context (John Chapter 10, verse 23-30), Deedat simply shows that Jesus means nothing by that verse, but that he and God are one in purpose and goal which is people’s remaining in faith (79). Also, in the Quran, we have reinforcement that Jesus asks his people to worship only the one God and follow his path: ‘It is God who is my Lord and your Lord; then worship Him. This is a way that is straight’ (3: 50-54)."
3)The Holy Spirit
As far as the holy spirit is concerned, Augustine had shown that "… the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son, but only the Spirit of the Father and the Son, Himself co-equal with the Father and the Son, and pertaining to the unity of the Trinity [. . .]. (qtd. in Peters, 286)." From this quotation, we come to know that the Holy Spirit, which is one spirit, is the spirit of two persons, the Father and the Son, and not one person! This spirit is also considered as a God, and, thus, the third person in the Trinity. But, in the Christian teachings, there is no reference of the Holy Spirit. So, from where this idea is brought?
Actually, the whole idea of the Trinity, as we have gradually seen, has no reference in Christianity. Therefore, one may ask what is the story of Trinity? And how did the Trinity become one of the most important tenets of Christianity? Very surprisingly, the Trinity appeared in the third or fourth century. That is to say, three or four centuries after Christ. In reality, the Trinity is a result of the Christian theologians’ misinterpretation of the Holy Writ. Furthermore, why the choice of the Trinity and not, for instance, of the quatrain or binary? Simply, because the idea of the Trinity was the result of the influence of the Greek methodology.
Trinitarian -or better, triadic, thinking about the primary principle or principles of being was not a Christian innovation. Dyads and triads were philosophical common places among the later Platonist philosophers, and Philo’s triume, "Lord God of three natures, teaching, perfection and practice, whose recorded symbols are Abraham, Isaac and Jacob." Is a notion that can be found, as a whole or in its distinct parts, scattered trough many passages in his writings [. . .]. (Peters, 285)
And it is well known that the relationship between the members of the holy Trinity did not take its last form only in Constantine assembly in 325 A.C. In reality, this is the mere fact of the Trinity. It has more to do with misinterpretation and history than with divinity.
Many philosophers, scientists and priests had come in contact with this fact, and this led them into a revolution and a rebellion. In the first Christian Church, a separation happened as a result of the priests’ withdrawal from the church consensus, and their establishment of the unipolar dogma which was called "Monophysite Christianity". This movement was an expression of the priest’s intellectual independence from the Greek trend which had developed and explained the Christian teaching according to the Greek mythology (AL Damlugi, 104). Also, Hans Küng, the director of the institution of the Christian Churches’ Unions’ Researchers, which follows to Tübingen’s University in South-East of the Federal Germany, decided to make the Christian teachings go back to many of its real principles which Jesus called to. One of these principles is the belief in the unity of God. Küng refused the Trinity and proved that it was added in the third or fourth century (Küng, 71-72).
God himself advices his Christian servants to stop believing in the Trinity, for this concept make them turn from the real path to God, and the inner happiness and satisfaction:
"O People of the Book! Commit no excesses in your religion: nor say of God ought but the truth. Christ Jesus the son of Mary was (nor more than) an apostle of God, and His Word, which He bestowed on Mary, and a Spirit proceeding from Him: so believe in God and His apostles. Say not "Trinity": desist: It will be better for you: for God is one God: glory be to Him: (Far Exalted is He) above having a son. To Him belong all things in the heavens and on earth. And enough is God as a Disposer of affairs. (4:171).
