Muslims say the NT is corrupted? It was compiled long after Jesus' death and is unreliable? The Koran was also

Question

compiled after Mohammed's death and from memory. Why should we believe it was not corrupted?
Can't use the argument Koran's text was inspired by God. So was the text of N.T.

Suryadi: I read your post carefully. Now, first you talk about how the Koran was compiled---by memory. But you say the ones who memorized the Koran had written copies with them.
You say the Koran was put together within 100 years of his death and that thousands had memorized the text. Were all these people inspired by God with an excellent memory or did they have written copies? How could they have written copies if the Koran was compiled from their memories.
If this question is confusing, it's because I am VERY confused.

I read it again. The original versions of the Koran were destroyed? Sounds familar.

Answer 1

While it is true that the present Koran is generally a very good copy of the 7th century Uthmanic recension, It is not true that this is exactly the way it came from Mohammad. The Koran was originally memorized by devout followers, most of whom were killed shortly after Mohammads death. According to early tradition, Mohammads scibes wrote on pieces of paper, stones, palm leaves, shoulder blades, ribs and bits of leather. Muslims believe that during the lifetime of Mohammad the Koran was written down. But, according to the testimony of Zayd, a contemporary and follower of Mohammad, he was requested by Abu Bakr to “search out the various chapters and verses of the Koran and gather it together”. He responded, “Accordingly, I sought out the Koran: I gathered it together from leafless palm-branches and thin white stones and mens breasts”. Sometime later during the reign of Uthman, the 3rd Muslim Caliph, it was reported that several muslim communities were using different versions of the Koran. Once again, Zayd was called in to oversee the official revised version of the Koran. It is this version that has remained uniform and intact to this day, not any alledged original version that came directly from Mohammad. You can find all this information in Al-Bukhari Volume 6 pages 477-479. There were wide divergences between the collections that had been digested into codices in the great metropolitan centers of Medina, Mecca, Basra, Kufa and Damascas. So Uthmans solution was to canonize the Medinan Codex and order all others to be burned. Therefore, there can be little doubt that the text canonized by Uthman was only one among several types of texts in existence at the time.
A.Guillaume, the man who translated the earliest known biography of Mohammad into english under the title of “the life of Mohammad” and also an Islamic scholar in his own rite said this:
“The truth is that the textual history of the Koran is very similar to that of the bible. Both books have been preserved remarkably well. Each is, in it’s basic structure and content, a very fair record of what was originally there. But neither book has been preserved totally without error or textual defect. Both have suffered here and there from variant readings in the early codices known to us but neither has in any way been corrupted. Sincere christians and muslims will honestly acknowledge these facts. The only difference between the Koran and the Bible today is that the christian church in the intent of truth, carefully preserved the variant readings…….whereas the muslims at the time of Uthman deemed it expedient to destroy, as far as possible, all the evidence of different readings of the Koran in the cause of standardizing one text for the whole of the Muslim”.
As far as when the New Testament was written? They'll always be debate about it because the critics of the bible know they have to discredit the eye-witnesses. But the idea that the books of the new testament were written 150 years later is mostly the 19th century scholarship of the german rational higher critics such as Wellhausen and Graf and that crowd. I think most of the scholarship nowadays is conservative due to archeological discoveries and many other things. The liberal crowd is still around(the Jesus Seminar and others) and they always will be but they don't rule the roost anymore. The Book of Acts is the history of the early church(the first 30 years). But it is dominated by 2 people, Peter and Paul. The book has 28 chapters. The 1st 12 chapters emphasize Peter(although he is mentioned in chapter 15). The next 16 chapters look at Paul (although he is also mentioned in chapter 9). The
book ends in chapter 28 with Paul under house arrest by the romans but the romans are still allowing him to preach. It also shares his plans to go to spain and preach there. He doesn't seem to be in any real danger of death, anymore than he was everyday of his life. Paul and Peter died around 66AD. Yet nowhere in that book does it mention the death of Paul and Peter. It does mention other martyrs such as James and Stephan. Also, the early church was mostly jewish. Only later did it become dominated by the gentiles. From 66-73AD Titus and roman legions destroyed jerusalem, destroyed the temple, killed 2 million jews and sent another million into slavery in egypt. For a jew, it was the most important event in their life. Yet, that's not mentioned either. In 66AD, the Nero persecution of christians started and christians were pretty much persecuted from that time until Constantine in about 311AD. Millions of christians were murdered. Nero used to light his garden up at night by tying christians to a post and pouring tar over them and then setting them on fire. That's also when they started to throw christians to the lions in the coloseum. That's not mentioned either. The only logical conclusion is that the book of acts was written before all those things happened. I think that's the position most of the scholars take nowadays. They date the book of acts around 63-64AD. But the book of Acts was the 2nd in a sequel written by Luke. The 1st one he wrote was the gospel of Luke. The Gospel of Luke was the story of Christ. The Book of Acts was the story of the church right after the death of Christ. That means the Book of Luke was probably written about 59-60AD. But most scholars believe Luke got
some of his info from from Mark and another gospel that we don't have called 'Q'. Which means that Mark was probably written around 54-55AD. This means that Mark was in the process of being written much earlier. Almost all scholars(liberal or conservative) believe 1Corinthians was written about 50AD. But 1Corinthians chapter 15 is considered by scholars to be a creed. A creed is something that's around long before it's written down. It could be a song or something like the pledge of allegiance. It's oral teaching. Most scholars date 1Corinthians chapter 15 long before the book of 1st corinthians was finished. That brings it back almost to the time of the crucifiction. There's just not enough time for legend to have developed. Read 'The book of Acts in the setting of hellenistic history' by Colin J. Hemer. He's not a christian. He gives 84 cultural events in Acts and Luke that would have only been known by someone who was there on the scene and not one that came 150 years later. The only books that are dated later are the books of John(all dated in the mid 90's). But John was an eye witness. Sixty five or so years would not cause him to forget, especially when he spent his whole life preaching about these things. There is such a rule called ‘Aristotles Dictum’. It’s a rule for handling ancient documents used by historians. It says one must listen to the claims of the document under analysis and not assumme fraud or error unless the author disqualifies himself by contradiction or known fraud or factual inaccuracies. In other words, when you find an ancient document that claims to be written by a person, you give the benefit of doubt to the document and if you want to discard it as a fraud or whatever, the burden of proof is on you to show why it should be discarded. The writers all said they were either primary sources(eyewitnesses) or secondary sources(they got it from an eyewitness). There is no reason to not believe them. Does this prove that these things happened? NO! It shows that what you read in the New Testament is what they actually said. They could have been lying.
I don't know if you've ever seen the movie 'the passion of Christ'. That movie was given an 'R' rating, mostly because of the violence and the blood. It was very graffic. The scourging scene was especially bloody although I still don't think it accurately depicts what happened to Christ. You just couldn't
show that on screen. But Christ was only scourged once. The apostle Paul was scourged 5 times. He was also beaten with rods 3 times, stoned, the jews always had a contract out on his head(he lived with that threat) and they almost killed him a few times and finally he was beheaded by the romans. All the apostles and disciples and all christians, in general, lived that way. After 66AD, to be a christian was to have a target on your chest. The writers of the New Testament all lived persecuted lives and then died martyrs. The only exception was John. He was sort of like the Steven Segall movie 'Hard to Kill'. They boiled him in oil but he survived. They stuck him into a brass bull which they would heat up until it was red hot and somehow he survived that too. The romans banished him to the Island of Patmos which was a volcanic rock island with no food and most prisoners starved to death. There he got the vision and wrote the 'Book of Revelation'. But he survived that too. The rest died martyrs after being persecuted all their lives. Andrew died in greece, crucified on an X-shaped cross. Phillip was crucified in Asia. Bartholomew was flawed to death in Albanapolis in Armenia. Thomas was martyred in Madras India. Simon was martyred in Persia. Jude was also martyred in Persia. James was beheaded. Mark was drawn and quartered(literally pulled into 4 pieces by 4 horses). Peter was crucified upside down by the Romans. He requested to be crucified that way because he didn't feel worthy to be crucified like his Lord. But before he was crucified the romans made him watch as they crucified his wife of 50 years. Surely, if they were making all this up, Peter would have said when they started to crucify his wife "that's enough......this lie has gone far enough....we made it up". But he didn't, neither did all the other apostles. They went to their death preaching the gospel. I don't think they lied and I'm not willing to reject what they said just because the miraculous is involved. If there is a God you can't rule out the miraculous.
Christs character was impeccable and even non-believers seem to agree with that. Ghandi once said that Christ was the most morally pure person that ever lived on earth. His problem, he said, was not with Christ but with christians. I would think that the disciples were of very high moral quality also, otherwise they wouldn't want to be associated with somebody who had such a high moral standard that they had to live up to. That’s another reason why I don’t think they would lie.
As far as other gospels being written. The 27 books of the New Testament were accepted by the church. It was the Gnostic gospels which were not accepted by the church. The church knew what was real and what wasn't. The Gnostic gospels came later. They were written probably between 150-300AD. They were not even written in the isreal area. They were all written in egypt, mostly around the alexandria area.
As far as extra-biblical writings about the life of Jesus, writings confirming His birth, ministry, death and resurrection include Josephus, The Babylonian Talmud, Pliny the younger's letter to the emperor Trajan, The annals of Tacitus, Mara Bar Serapion, Suetonius's 'Life of Claudius' and 'Life of Nero' and also Thallus. Read Dr. Gary Habermas. He's written a number of books mostly on the resurrection. He goes through all these.

Answer 2

It was God's promise to preserve the Qur'an and this he has done so. There is only one version of the Qur'an. Contrast this to several Bible versions. :

"Nay, this is a Glorious Qur'an, (Inscribed) in a Tablet Preserved!" [Qur'an 85:21-22]

The Qur'an was memorized and preserved in the original language of Arabic and is now as it was 1400 years ago during the lifetime of Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings of God be upon him).

This has always been the case and today also: many Muslims completely memorise the Qur'an, usually done at a young age and the one who has memorised the Qur'an is known as Hafiz. Plus every single Muslim has memorised at least some portion of the Qur'an in the original Arabic language.

"And We (Allah) have made the Holy Quran easy to understand and remember, then is there any that will receive admonition."(The Quran, 54:17)

"Do they not consider the Qur'an (with care)? Had it been from other Than Allah, they would surely have found therein Much discrepancy. " [Qur'an 4:82]

"This is the Book; in it is guidance sure, without doubt, to those who fear Allah; " [Qur'an 2;2]

"We have, without doubt, sent down the Message; and We will assuredly guard it (from corruption). " [Qur'an 15;9]

" That this is indeed a qur'an Most Honourable, In Book well-guarded, Which none shall touch but those who are clean: A Revelation from the Lord of the Worlds. Is it such a Message that ye would hold in light esteem? And have ye made it your livelihood that ye should declare it false? Then why do ye not (intervene) when (the soul of the dying man) reaches the throat,- [Qur'an 56:77-83]

"Nay, this is a Glorious Qur'an, (Inscribed) in a Tablet Preserved!" [Qur'an 85:21-22]

Internal Structure of the Qur'an --- advice to non-Muslims on reading the Qur'an for the first time from a Muslim convert:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJrX6tZdWzc

Answer 3

They're not ones to talk about corruption in the light of all the acts of terror and bloodshed they've committed through the centuries. As to when the NT was written, my research has revealed that most of the NT was written within ten years after the ascension of Christ. The gospel of Matthew was written during the time of Christ. Ten years certainly doesn't render the book inaccurate. The first writings of the civil war weren't written for almost 25 years after the fact, but I don't hear anyone offering that we should scrap all the history books read in High schools and universities across the land.

Answer 4

History has proven itself, and you need to study them.

First, the current Bible ia a translation to a non-Semitic language (ie Latin, Greek etc) and with the translation, concepts get changed or entirely lost. Definitely, the precise meaning can never be retained.

I know this difficulty as, for example, an Arabic word can never be fully translated into English and at the same time evoking the full value of the word. The same applies to Aramaic spoken by Christ which is very close to Arabic.

Secondly, the compilation of the Bible was done after Christ's ministry on earth, after he was 'crucified', 'raised' from the dead, and 'went' to heaven. And as we have it today, it includes not just the supposed revealed Word of God, but also Christ's own words. So its not just Christ telling a story, but another person telling the story about Christ is also in the picture.

Thirdly, the Nicene Council in Constantinople at the 4th CE century has totally thrown out all other 'versions' of the New Testament which they term as apocryphal. This is in line with the acceptance of Pauline Trinity Christianity and discarding or disbanding Arian's Monotheistic Christianity.

Hence with this destroying of the apocryphal texts, it has now become difficult or impossible to compare and contrast the various versions of the Bible and make necessary references.

This is in sharp constrast with the Quran that God guarantees He will protect it. It was revealed a little at a time according to the demands of the situation making memorising it easy, the scribes live nearby Muhammad always ready to copy down the revelations, hundreds if not thousands of Muhammad's companions memorised the Quran while Muhammad was still alive, Muhammad recites to revise the whole Quran revealed thus far with Gabriel every Ramadhan the fasting month, up to the last year before he died, those who memorise the Quran also had written copies with them, after the passing of Muhammad a central standard text was compiled by the Caliph Umar (less than 100 years) and all other texts (which don't differ by the way) were destroyed. Up to this day, even if all the Quran texts were burnt, the Quran is memorised by hundreds of thousands of Muslim the world over such that if any one were to make a mistake in recitation, all the others can check on him and correct it.

Answer 5

My Dear, parts of The Quran were written in the Prophets era.. It was "Collected" By Omar, and in some other story by Othman.. No addition, Modification or removal of any text occured thereto...

The Bible is still being collected and modified till 2006!! see the new international version.

Answer 6

LOL i'm no longer a Muslim and that i think of it is corrupt and unreliable. advertising human beings in the slavery, turning human beings in to salt, plagues, god's revenge, god's lack of expertise, god's mess ups. superb.

Answer 7

ALL written works are corrupted. The very act of forming experience into words corrupts the experience and perceptions. Thinking that a book will be "from God" is silly. People write books. And people read them. There is ALWAYS some corruption, or misunderstanding from what is read. You who read do not read what was written, and what is written is not what was experienced.

Answer 8

Because it was compiled right after the death of Muhammad (PBUH) and those who were memorizing it were the companions of Muhammad (PBUH). Also, God has clearly mentioned in the Qur'an that his book could NEVER be changed, so there is no way that the Qur'an is wrong.

**** SDW you are wrong. The Qur'an was put together in the era of Umar Bin Al Khattab who was the second successor after Muhammad (PBUH) bearing in mind that the first successor only ruled for 2 years!

Answer 9

The NT was written during, at and up to 70 years after His death. The Koran was written 350 to 400 years after the fact.

Cheers!

Answer 10

We have transcripts of parts of the New Testament that are dated less than 20 years after the events they describe (some scraps that make up part of the book of Mark). Qu'ran wasn't even put into writing until 150 years after Muhammad's death.

Answer 11

The Qur'an was almost certainly corrupted, but even if it wasn't, there are parts of it which are simply wrong. But this applies to the bible also.