Torah and Oral Law interchanged

The Jews brought [to the Prophet peace be upon him] a man and a woman among them who committed adultery. The Prophet peace be upon him said, "Bring the two most knowledgeable men from amongst you."  The Jews brought the two sons of Suriyya, and the Prophet peace be upon him asked them, "What punishment do you find in the Torah regarding these two?" They said, "In the Torah, we find that if four men testify that they saw his male organ in her womb, similar to when the eyeliner is inserted inside the eyeliner container; in this case they are stoned."  The Prophet peace be upon him said, "What made you stop stoning?" They said, "Our kingship (meaning Jewish) was taken from us and we hated killing." The Messenger of Allah asked for four witnesses and they brought four men who testified that they saw his penis in her womb like the eyeliner is inserted in the eyeliner container. The Messenger of Allah ordered that the two [adulterers] are stoned. (Sunan Abu Dawud, Hadith no. 3862, Source. Sheikh Albani declared this hadith authentic in Sunan Abu Dawud, hadith no.4452)

Indeed, we do find in the Old Testament today that adulterers are to be killed (Leviticus 20:10). But nowhere do we find anything about four witnesses (interestingly Islam teaches this) or any eyeliner.

This is indirect proof that this section of the Torah has been distorted with.

well, interestingly we find something on that line in the Jewish Oral ruling (Halakah).

If one has bodily contact or petting with one of the arayot (people with whom sexual relations are forbidden), or he hugged and had genital contact (literally kissing; c.f. Yevamot 55b) and benefited from nearness of the flesh, he receives (biblically sanctioned) lashes, and in suspected of having relations with arayot. Note: if he had intercourse with her, whether vaginally or anally, as soon as he begins intercourse, which is defined as insertion of the glans, he is liable for death or excision. And the witnesses do not need to observe closely similar to insertion of the eyeliner in the tube, rather as soon as the witnesses see them intertwined with one another in the manner of adulterers, they are punishable by death (Tur), and the women is forbidden to her husband (Nimukei Yosef, Yevamot chapter 2). An adult woman who had relations with a minor male under the age of 9 years, is not liable for death at his hand (Tur). It appears to me that she is similarly not forbidden to her husband. And therefore the Rabbi, author of the Turim code wrote many laws defining when people are liable for death or not. The modern day repercussions of these laws (when we no longer administer capital punishment) is that they define which relations cause a woman to become forbidden to her husband, and see further. A female less than 3 years old, her intercourse is not considered as intercourse, and her virginity returns (Hagahot Yevamot). Even if the years were intercalated (e.g she had intercourse at 37 months old in a leap year) her virginity returns (words of the Rav, based on Yerushalmi Ketuboth chapter 1).

(HALAKHAH Shulchan Arukh, Even HaEzer Siman 20)

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Let’s ignore the part where the text sanctions having intercourse with a 3 year old child “A female less than 3 years old, her intercourse is not considered as intercourse, and her virginity returns”(Hagahot Yevamot).

Notice how the rabbi rules, that the “witnesses do not need to observe closely similar to insertion of the eyeliner in the tube, rather as soon as the witnesses see them intertwined with one another in the manner of adulterers, they are punishable by death”. Now if we cross reference with the Hadith it reads:

“we find that if four men testify that they saw his male organ in her womb, similar to when the eyeliner is inserted inside the eyeliner container; in this case they are stoned.” 

This shows that the Jews interchanged the word of God for the words of rabbis.  The Hadith is clear that the Jews testified it is written in their Torah. However this is found in the oral rulings not Torah, proving how the Jews took the words of rabbis more sacretly then the word of God. This can be clarified by the next authentic Hadith.

The Bani Israel wrote a book, they followed it and left the Torah. (This hadith was reported in Tabarani's Al Mu'jam Al Awsat and was authenticated by Sheikh Nasr Al Deen Al Albani in hisSilsila Al Ahaadeeth Al Saheeha, hadith no. 2832.)

Another example on how the Jews interchanged the word of God with the words of rabbis can be found from the Mishnah that: “Adam was created alone to teach you that whoever takes a human life is considered by the Bible to have destroyed an entire world. And whoever saves a human life is considered by the Bible (scriptures) as if he preserved an entire world (Sanhedrin 4.5).

take attention on the second line from the saying 

"that whoever takes a human life is considered by the Bible to have destroyed an entire world"


if says "whoever takes a human life of a Israeli is considered BY THE BIBLE (SCRIPTURES) as destroying the entire world" show us from the Bible where it says that? where can we find such a saying from the Bible which says "killing one Israeli is like killing the whole world?"

How about this 

The Gemara asks: Why does the verse say: And he said? It should say: And I said. Why does the verse say: And you spared? It should say: And I spared.Rather, Rabbi Elazar said: David said to Saul: By Torah law, you should be killed, as you are a pursuer who seeks to kill me, and the Torah says: If one comes to kill you, kill him first. But it was the modesty that you displayed that spared you. (Talmud Berakhot Daf 62b:8)

Christians shouldn't have a problem showing us where in the Torah it say “If one comes to kill you, kill him first”   Unless the Jews were reading a different Torah?

We can conclude the current “Torah” which is read the Jews and Christians, is not the actual word of God. It may contain some words of God which was passed down orally and then written. However, calling it the absolute word of God would be injustice.  

The Jews of Medina read a different Torah then what the modern Jews read now. The Torah which the Jews of Medina read can be found in the oral law not the current Torah modern Jews read. This tell us not all the Jews during the early periods  held a consensus on the authenticity of scriptures.

Age of Jacob When Joseph Was Born

How old was Jacob when Joseph was born?

74 (http://www.sacredcalendar.info/AnnoMundi.html)

The age of Jacob at the birth of Joseph requires a calculation of 130-2-7-30-17=74. This is necessary because the Bible does not explicitly tell the age of Jacob when Joseph was born. You can take the age of Jacob when he stood before pharaoh (Genesis 47:9). Subtract the number of years of famine before Jacob came to Egypt (Genesis 45:6). Subtract the number of years of plenty (Genesis 41:53), minus the number of years before Joseph interpreted the pharaoh's dream (Genesis 41:46. Subtract the number of years before which God first called Joseph by giving him a dream of his future (Genesis 37:2). This formula will obtain Jacob's true age when Joseph was born.

• And Jacob said unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my pilgrimage are an hundred and thirty years: few and evil have the days of the years of my life been, and have not attained unto the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their pilgrimage. Genesis 47:9.
• And Jacob lived in the land of Egypt seventeen years: so the whole age of Jacob was an hundred forty and seven years. Genesis 47:28.
• For these two years hath the famine been in the land: and yet there are five years, in the which there shall neither be earing nor harvest. Genesis 45:6.
• And the seven years of plenteousness, that was in the land of Egypt, were ended. And the seven years of dearth began to come, according as Joseph had said: and the dearth was in all lands; but in all the land of Egypt there was bread. Genesis 41:53.
• And Joseph was thirty years old when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh, and went throughout all the land of Egypt. Genesis 41:46.
• These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph, being seventeen years old, was feeding the flock with his brethren; and the lad waswith the sons of Bilhah, and with the sons of Zilpah, his father's wives: and Joseph brought unto his father their evil report. Genesis 37:2

91 years (https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100102103929AAET7Yy)

We know from the Bible data that Abraham was 100 years old when Isaac was born (Gen. 21:5). Next we know that Isaac was 60 years old when Jacob was born (Gen. 25:26). The age of Jacob when Joseph was born we derive as follows. We know that Jacob died at age 147 (Gen. 47:28), further do we know that Joseph was 30 years old when Pharaoh elevated him to second in power in Egypt (Gen. 41:46). Right at that time when Joseph was 30 years of age the 7 years of plenty began (Gen. 41:47) and Joseph harvested and stored the grain. This was followed by the 7 years of drought during which Jacob and his family moved to Egypt when he was 130 years old (Gen. 47:9). Calculation: (147 (Gen. 47:9) - 17 (Gen. 47:28)= 130). The year Jacob moved to Egypt was after the 2nd year in the drought (Gen. 45:6) before Jacob moved his whole family to Goshen. That would make the age of Joseph 39 when he met his father again and 56 years of age (39 + 17 = 56) when his father Jacob died. Joseph died when he was 110 years old (Gen. 50:22). Therefore Jacob was, 147 - 17 - 39 = 91 years of age when Joseph was born.

77 years (https://sites.google.com/site/calendarstudies/genesis-28-9)

Genesis 28:6 When Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob, and sent him away to Padanaram, to take him a wife from thence; and that as he blessed him he gave him a charge, saying, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan;

Genesis 28:7 And that Jacob obeyed his father and his mother, and was gone to Padanaram;

Genesis 28:8 And Esau seeing that the daughters of Canaan pleased not Isaac his father;

Genesis 28:9 Then went Esau unto Ishmael, and took unto the wives which he had Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael Abraham's son, the sister of Nebajoth, to be his wife.

The verses above give an account of events right after Isaac blesses Jacob. Recall that Jacob, the younger brother of Esau, took the blessing meant for Esau, Jacob's eldest son. As a result, Esau was very angry and had determined to kill his brother in revenge. However Rebekah learned of Esau's plan and encouraged Jacob to flee to her brother Laban in Haran (Padanaram). Rebekah also got the support of Jacob's father Isaac by reminding him how unhappy they were with Esau's Canaanite wives (Genesis 26:35), and how it would be better for Jacob to find a wife in the land of Haran instead (Genesis 27:46). Now it was at this time that verse 8 indicates that Esau, possibly in an attempt to regain favor with his father and upon learning that his parents were unhappy with the Canaanite wives he had, decides to go to take a wife of Abraham's son Ishmael, his father's brother. One might suspect Esau figured if he married into the family of Abraham's descendants, that this would satisfy his parents. In any case, we learn that Esau goes to Ishmael, and arranges to marry Ishmael's daughter Mahalath.

So why is this important? First, recall from Genesis 25:17 that Ishmael lived to be 137 years old. Also, Ishmael was 14 years older than Isaac being born when Abraham was 86 years old (Genesis 16:16), while Isaac was born when Abraham was 100 years old (Genesis 21:5). Further, we know Jacob and Esau were born to Isaac when he was 60 years old (Genesis 25:26). From these various ages we can determine that in the year Ishmael died (at 137 years old), Isaac who was 14 years younger, was 123 years old. And since Jacob and Esau were born when Isaac was 60 years old, then in the year Ishmael died they would both have been 63 years old. This means that the oldest Esau could have been when he went to visit Ishmael to marry his daughter Mahalath was 63 years old, and similarly, the oldest Jacob could have been when he left for Padanaram (Haran) was also 63 years old. Thus, we have established that the oldest Jacob could have been when he left his parents to go to Haran was 63 years old.

Note:

The Bible said Joseph was born after Jacob served Laban 14 years (before he served him additional 6 years) -

• And it came to pass, when Rachel had born Joseph, that Jacob said unto Laban, Send me away, that I may go unto mine own place, and to my country. Give me my wives and my children, for whom I have served thee, and let me go: for thou knowest my service which I have done thee. And Laban said unto him, I pray thee, if I have found favour in thine eyes, tarry: for I have learned by experience that the LORD hath blessed me for thy sake. Genesis 30:25-27.

• Genesis 31:38 Now I was with you twenty years. Your ewes and your she-goats have not failed to bear, and I have not eaten the rams of your flock. I did not bring to you the mangled; I replaced it. From my hand you exacted it, that stolen by day and that stolen by night. I was there; by day the heat consumed me, and the cold by night. And my sleep fled from my eyes. Now I have been twenty years in your house; I served you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flock. And you have changed my wages ten times. Genesis 31:38-41

Thus, Joseph was born when Jacob was 63 + 14 = 77 years old.

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Jacob’s Old Age at Marriage

How old was Jacob when he married Leah and Rachel? The answer may surprise you.

http://googleweblight.com/i?u=http://www.askelm.com/secrets/sec027.htm&grqid=rv1d0qZb&hl=pcm-NG

Jacob died when he was 147 years old. He had lived in Egypt 17 years (Genesis 47:28). Thus, Jacob was 130 when he went to Egypt to be with Joseph. His arrival was the second year of the famine (Genesis 45:6). Joseph was then 39 years old (compare Genesis 41:46 and add the 7 years of plenty and the 2 years of famine). This means that Jacob was 91 when Rachel gave birth to Joseph. But Leah already had six children before Joseph was born (Genesis 30:20-24). Reuben (Leah’s firstborn by Jacob) was conceived at least 7 years before the birth of Joseph. This means that Jacob was about 84 years old when he first married. Such an old age for marriage was not normal practice even in those days because people were regularly bearing children at 35 years (Genesis 11:12), 30 years (Genesis 11:14), or 29 years of age (Genesis 11:24). On his wedding night Jacob had trouble distinguishing whether his wife was Rachel or Leah. Because of this, some have jokingly said the 84 year old man was probably half blind already (Genesis 29:21-26). Could be.

Verses Rabbis altered for Greek King!

Narrated by Sa'eed ibn Juabair: Ibn Abbaas said: The kings after the time of Jesus the son of Mary peace be upon him substituted the Torah and Gospel and there used to be amongst them believers who were reading the Torah. It was said to the kings: We do not find an insult greater than the insult of those that read "And those who do not rule by what Allah has revealed, they are disbelievers" and their recitation of these similar kind of verses which they shame us with in our daily activities. So tell them to read just as what we read and let them believe just as we believe.' So the king summoned them and gathered them together. He proposed either death to them or that they leave the recitation of the Torah and Gospel except what they substitute in place of it. [(Sunan Al Nisaa'i, hadith no. 5305), Source, Sheikh Nasr Al Deen Al Albani authenticated this narration in Sunan Al Nisaa'i, hadith no. 5400]

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evidence from the Jews

And Moses took his wife and his sons, and set them upon an ass (Exod. 4:20). This is one of the ten verses our rabbis altered when they translated the Torah into Greek for King Ptolemy.16Megillah 9a. The Septuagint, begun during the reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphus (285–246 B.C.E.). The ten changes are:

“God created in the beginning” (Gen. 1:1);17Instead of In the beginning God created, in order to emphasize that God alone created.

“I shall make man in My image and My likeness” (ibid., v. 26);18Instead of Let us make man in our image. etc.

“And He finished on the sixth day, and rested on the seventh day (ibid. 2:2);19Instead of And on the seventh day God finished, thus giving the impression that God actually worked on the seventh day.

“Male and female He created him” (ibid. 5:2);20Instead of Male and female He created them, etc.

“Come, let Me descend and confound their tongue” (ibid. 11:7);21Instead of Come, let us go down, etc.

“And Sarah laughed among her relatives” (ibid. 18:12);22Instead of And Sarah laughed within herself.

“For in their anger they slew an ox, and in their wrath they digged up a stall” (ibid. 49:6);23Instead of For in their anger they slew men, and in their self-will they houghed oxen.

“And Moses took his wife and his sons, and made them ride on a carrier of men” (Exod. 4:20);24Instead of… and set them upon an ass.

“Now the time that the children of Israel dwelt in Egypt, and in the land of Goshen and in Canaan was four hundred and thirty years” (ibid. 12:40);25Instead of Now the time that the children of Israel dwelt in Egypt was four hundred and thirty years, etc.

“And he sent the elect of the children of Israel” (ibid. 24:5);26Instead of And he sent the young men of the children of Israel.

“And against the elect of the children of Israel he put not forth his hand (ibid., v. 11);27Instead of And upon the nobles of the children of Israel He laid not His hand.

“Since the Lord thy God hath arranged to give light to all the peoples under the entire heavens” (Deut. 4:19);28The words “to give light” were added.

“Which I had not commanded the people to serve” (Deut. 17:3);29Instead ofWhich I have commanded not. they wrote about “the slender-footed,” but they did not write the word ‘arnevet (“the hare”) (Lev. 11:5) because the name of Ptolemy’s wife was ‘Arnevet,30Actually, her name was Arsinoe. and he might say: “The Jews are ridiculing me by writing my wife’s name in the Torah.”

(MIDRASH Midrash Tanchuma Shemot, Siman 23)

The Qur’an, the Jews and Ezra as the Son of God

Written by Jonathan Brown 

Why does the Quran tell us that the Jews claim Ezra (ʿUzayr) is the son of God (Quran 9:30), when Jews do not make this claim or anything approaching it?  This is not a question that arose just recently during an interfaith panel. It’s not a new question at all. Even in the ninth century, the Zaydi Imam and renowned scholar al-Qāsim b Ibrāhīm al-Rassī (d. 860 CE), who had studied Jewish and Christian scriptures in Egypt and who had engaged in debates with priests and rabbis, said that he had never encountered a Jew who believed Ezra was the son of God.1 Nor was this a question that Muslims pondered at ease in the libraries of Baghdad or Cordoba. As early as the ninth century, Muslim scholars like al-Jāḥiẓ (d. 868, who wrote a famous rebuttal of Christianity) were being confronted by Christian opponents who argued that the Ezra claim was evidence that the Quran contained patent falsehoods. So is the Quran wrong in attributing this belief to Jews?  Is it rebutting the belief of a community that never actually held that belief?  How should we understand this?

An explanation given by Muslim scholars from the time of al-Jāḥiẓ and al-Ṭabarī  (d. 923) was that this belief had, in fact, been held by a group of Jews in Arabia, but that this sect had died out. Ibn Ḥazm, the famous Andalusian scholar (d. 1064), wrote that there was a group of Jews in Yemen who believed this.2 (Interestingly, an inscription from a 4th-6th-century CE Jewish temple in South Arabia suggests possible angel worship).3 A second explanation was that this Quranic verse related to the verse immediately following it: ‘They have taken their rabbis and monks as lords apart from God…’ (Quran 9:31). In other words, Jews venerated Ezra so much that it was as if he were a god to them.4]

Muslim scholars found a basis for the first claim – that some Jews actually considered Ezra to be the son of God – in a Jewish work entitled The Fourth Book of Ezra (probably composed in the first century CE), which had not been included in the Hebrew Bible but which rabbis still read and consulted (it belongs to a body of works known as the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, namely works that claimed to be written by some Old Testament figures such as Enoch but which were really produced in the Hellenistic or early Roman periods). Fourth Ezra tells how Ezra led the Children of Israel after their return from the Babylonian exile, when their scriptures had been lost (this is all in the Bible’s book of Ezra as well). Ezra is given inspiration by God to reconstitute the Torah in 451 BCE. As a reward, God tells Ezra that “You shall be taken up from among men, and henceforth you shall live with my son….”  Here it is important to remember that, like the belief of the Quraysh that angels were the daughters of God (“We worship the angels, who are daughters of God,” said the Quraysh to the Prophet in Ibn Isḥāq’s Sīra; see also Quran 17:40, 37:150-53), in Jewish scriptures of this period angels were called the children of God.5

But there does not seem to be any strong evidence that the Jews of western Arabia at the time of the Prophet ﷺ believed this about Ezra. The problem is that we do not have any external sources (in other words, non-Muslim sources) for what Jews in Arabia believed. As F.E. Peters observed, the Quran is pretty much the only source we have for what Jews believed in seventh-century Arabia.6

Another possibility is that ʿUzayr as mentioned in the Quran was never a one-for-one counterpart of Ezra. First, the Quran does not actually specify that Jews believed that Ezra was the son of God; it says that they said that ʿUzayr was the son of God. The Quran provides no more information about ʿUzayr, nor do the mainstay Hadith collections. A Hadith in Sahih al-Bukhari reiterates the claim made in the Quran, and a Hadith in the Sunan of Abū Dāwūd quotes the Prophet ﷺ as saying that he does not know if ʿUzayr is a prophet or not.7 What other information we find in less critical collections of Hadiths comes from stories drawn from figures like the Successor (and Jewish convert to Islam) Kaʿb al-Aḥbār (d. circa 653) and the early collector of stories of the prophets, Wahb b. Munabbih (d. 732), without any chain of transmission to any authoritative source.8 

The persona of Ezra was highly complex in the milieu in which the Quran was revealed. The figures of Enoch (Idrīs in the Islamic tradition) and Ezra were intermingled in the Hellenistic and early Roman periods (roughly 300 BCE – 100 CE), particularly in a body of religio-philosophical writing called the Hermetic Corpus (appeared in Greek circa 1st – 4thcenturies CE).9 All this occurred before Islam, so it would not have been the Quran confusing Ezra with someone else. The Quran would have been referring to a character who had already emerged as a composite figure in the overall body of Judeo-Christian material circulating in the Near East in the centuries before Islam.

Enoch and Ezra were closely associated with one another because both were referred to as ‘The Scribe’ and both were elevated to angelic status. But in the case of Enoch, he was not simply referred to as an angelic ‘son of God.’  In another famous Old Testament Pseudeprigrapha, The Book of Enoch (which dates early second century BCE to first century CE), Enoch is raised up to the status of the righteous ‘son of man,’ i.e., an angel with the appearance of a man (II Enoch 46.1, 71.14). But in III Enoch (which perhaps dates from 5th to the 7thcenturies CE) he is transformed into the Metatron (yes, Metatron!), a super archangel who is designated the ‘lesser God (Yahweh)’ (III Enoch 12.5).10 The figure of the Metatron appears in the Babylonian Talmud11](circa 500 CE), the predominant expression of rabbinic Judaism in the Near East at the time, as well as in the Hekhalot literature (literature of mystical ascent), which developed in the region from the 6th-7th centuries.12 

While we do not have direct information from Jewish sources about what the Jews of Arabia believed at the time of the Prophet ﷺ, we do know that many of the other beliefs that the Quran mentions Jews having were, in fact, found in the Babylonian Talmud (for example, the belief that Abraham would descend into Hell to remove all the Jews, and thus that they would only be punished there ‘for an hour’, reminiscent of Quran 2:80).13 And we know that a belief in Ezra/Enoch assuming the status of a super angel was common among Jews in Babylon/Iraq, the nearest and most influential center of Jewish thought and lore in the area in which the Quran was revealed. In fact, in 8th-century Baghdad, when a Jewish movement named Karaite Judaism emerged as a response to Rabbinic Judaism, one of its criticisms of mainstream Rabbinic Judaism was that it worshiped the Metatron as a archangel and substitute for God.14

The question of what the Quran means by its mention of Jews and ʿUzayr reminds us of an important question, one that has occupied Muslims since the death of the Prophet ﷺ: Is everything in the Quran eternally binding upon Muslims? If not, how do we know which parts are and which parts aren’t?  This would require volumes to answer, since it is, in truth, the single greatest engine of thought in the Islamic tradition.

But briefly, Muslims have always held that the Quran was and remains ‘suitable for all times and all places (ṣālih li-kull zamān wa kull makān).’  But this applies to the revelation as a whole, not to all its particular rules and references. To offer a blunt, non-legal example: ‘Perish the hands of Abū Lahab’ (Quran 111:1) will always be true, but it only applies to one person – Abū Lahab – and he has been dead for fourteen centuries. In the realm of law that could be binding on Muslims, the ulama have also concluded that some legal commands of the Quran applied only in the time of the Prophet. For example, in Surat al-Mumtahana, God commands the Muslims to refuse to return Meccan women who had fled to Medina as Muslims but instead to compensate their husbands by sending them the equivalent of the mahr. Although a minority of scholars has considered this ruling to have continued, so that, when believing women flee from outside the Abode of Islam to Muslims lands, Muslims might have to compensate their husbands, the vast majority of Muslim scholars consider this ruling to have ceased to apply.15 In the case of the Jews and ʿUzayr/Ezra, the same principle applies to a question of theology. The Quran’s discussion of what Jews believe ceases to be applicable once they stop believing it, and it would be sheer ignorance for Muslims to insist that our discussions with Jews hinge on obsolete tenets of faith.

Note: It’s also possible that, in the religious climate of pre-Islamic Arabia, ʿUzayr was actually a reference to Azarias, a figure connected to the Old Testament Book of Daniel. He is one of the Jews thrown into the fire by the Babylonians. But instead of burning, he looks like ‘a son of God’ (Daniel, 3:25). This story was reported by Wahb b. Munabbih and Ibn Qutayba (d. 889).16

 

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 1. Wilfred Madelung, Der Imām al-Qāsim ibn Ibrāhīm und die Glaubenslehre der Zaiditen (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1965), 90.
2. Viviane Comerro “Esdras est-il le fils de Dieu?,” Arabica,  52, no. 2 (2005): 166.
3. An scription from a synagogue in Ḥimyar says that the temple is named after Ṣūrī’īl, close to name of angel Suri’el; Christian Robin, ‘Le Judaisme de Ḥimyar,”Arabia 1 (2003): 108; José Costa, “Les Juifs d’Arabie dans la litterature talmudique,” in Le Judaism de l’Arabie critique (Brepols, 2015), 472-481.
4.  Comerro, ibid.
5. Ibn Isḥāq, The Life of Muhammad, trans. A. Guillaume (Oxford: Oxford U. Press, originally published in 1955), 134; D.S. Russell, The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987), 108-112; Viviane Comerro “Esdras est-il le fils de Dieu?,” Arabica,  52, no. 2 (2005): 165-181.
6. F.E. Peters, Muhammad and the Origins of Islam (Albany: SUNY Press, 1994), 261 (ebook).
7. Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī: kitāb al-tafsīr, bāb sūrat al-furqān; Sunan Abī Dāwūd: kitāb al-sunna, bāb fī al-takhyīr bayn al-anbiyā’ ʿalayhim al-salām.
8.  See, for example, Muḥammad al-Kisā’ī’s Tales of the Prophet, trans. Wheeler Thackston, Jr. (Chicago: Great Books of the Islamic World, 1997), 69.
9.  Fred Lapham, An Introduction to the New Testament Apocrypha (New York: T&T Clark, 2003), 38-39.
10. D.R. Russell, Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, 42-3.
11.  See Babylonian Talmud, Hagiga 125a; Sanhedrin 38b.
12.  Beate Ego, “Hekhalot literature,” Brill’s New Pauly, ed. Hubert Cancik and Helmuth Schneider.
13. From José Costa, “Les Juifs d’Arabie dans la litterature talmudique,” 472-481
14.  Gordon Newby, A History of the Jews of Arabia (U. South Carolina Press, 1988), 59-61.
15.  Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī, Ta’wīlāt al-Qur’ān, ed. Bekir Topaloğlu et al., 17 vols. (Istanbul: Dār al-Mīzān, 2006), 15:125.
16. Comerro, ibid.

Rabbis Inspired by God

What is the difference between the writings of  the Talmudic Rabbis and the authors of the New Testament, since they both claim to be inspired by God? Well at least the Rabbis do, the New Testament gospel writers never claimed to be inspired by God.

The authority of the Talmud is explained in Pirkei Avot:

משֶׁה קִבֵּל תּוֹרָה מִסִּינַי, וּמְסָרָהּ לִיהוֹשֻׁעַ, וִיהוֹשֻׁעַ לִזְקֵנִים, וּזְקֵנִים לִנְבִיאִים, וּנְבִיאִים מְסָרוּהָ לְאַנְשֵׁי כְנֶסֶת הַגְּדוֹלָה. הֵם אָמְרוּ שְׁלשָׁה דְבָרִים, הֱווּ מְתוּנִים בַּדִּין, וְהַעֲמִידוּ תַלְמִידִים הַרְבֵּה, וַעֲשׂוּ סְיָג לַתּוֹרָה:

Moshe received the Torah from Sinai and transmitted it to Yehoshua, and Yehoshua to the Elders, and the Elders to the Prophets, and the Prophets transmitted it to the Men of the Great Assembly. They said three things: Be deliberate in judgment, raise up many disciples and make a fence for the Torah. -( Pirkei Avot 1:1)

The Torah also makes reference to Rabbis having authority Deuteronomy 21:5. how comes Christians refuse to accept what the Rabbis have to say, since they are inspired by God? Christians who claim the New Testament authors were inspired fail to show us any hard evidence. Rather they turn to what 2 Peter says

Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture comes from the prophet’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was everbrought about through human initiative, but menspoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1:20-21)

The only problem with this is, 2 Peter is FORGED. So now they have nothing to show that the authors of the New Testament were inspired unlike the Talmudic and Torah sayings. We have no reason to believe these authors of the NT were inspired by God and turning to 2 Peter only shows how unreliable their books are

Does Quran 2:62 say that even Non-Muslims will be successful in the hereafter?

If we look at the context of the verse...:

إِنَّ الَّذِينَ آَمَنُوا وَالَّذِينَ هَادُوا وَالنَّصَارَى وَالصَّابِئِينَ مَنْ آَمَنَ بِاللَّهِ وَالْيَوْمِ الْآَخِرِ وَعَمِلَ صَالِحًا فَلَهُمْ أَجْرُهُمْ عِنْدَ رَبِّهِمْ وَلَا خَوْفٌ عَلَيْهِمْ وَلَا هُمْ يَحْزَنُونَ

Those who believe (in the Qur'an), and those who follow the Jewish (scriptures), and the Christians and the Sabians,- any who believe in Allah and the Last Day, and work righteousness, shall have their reward with their Lord; on them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve. (2: 62)

...we come to know this is a part of the section actually addressed to the Jews who had made their faith more of a racist i.e. excluding creed and believed (and they still believe) that only Jews would enter the Blissful Paradise.

Even the Christians have the idea of Vicarious Atonement that suggests that only by belief in Christ one can find salvation otherwise, they say, 'all your deeds are like filthy rags.' I remember never in my discussions I found even a single Christian, not even priests, able to categorically explain as to what will happen to those who passed away before Christ's (PBUH) birth including the Jewish Prophets.

Here the Quran dispels the notion of attributing any such idea to the Noble Faith of Islam for its taste is different. The Jews i.e. Israelites before Christ (PBUH) who believed in Allah and the Last Day were infact Muslims and thus in the Hereafter they'll earn the reward for their Faith and deeds. Same goes for the Christians before the Last Prophet (PBUH) declared his prephethood and the Sabians as well (we cannot with utmost surety say who they actually were).And this is supported by the reports about the point of revelation of this Ayah.

Ibn Kathir with reference Ibn Abi Hatim narrates:

...قال سلمان: سألت النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم عن أهل دين كنت معهم، فذكرتُ من صلاتهم وعبادتهم، فنزلت

'Salman Farisi (RA) said, 'This verse was revealed when I made a mention of the of the prayers and fasting of those believers whom I had met before coming to the Holy Prophet (PBUH)'..(Ibn Kathir in his commentary to this verse)

(If we recall the story of Salman Farisi (RA) then we see that it goes exactly in line with what is written above)

Prerequisite for Salvation and good deeds of non-Muslims:

PREREQUISITE: To have an understanding as to what Quran says about goody goody Jews & Christians, we need to go through the rest of the Quran and authentic Ahadith.

وَمَنْ يَبْتَغِ غَيْرَ الْإِسْلَامِ دِينًا فَلَنْ يُقْبَلَ مِنْهُ وَهُوَ فِي الْآَخِرَةِ مِنَ الْخَاسِرِينَ

"If anyone desires a religion other than Islam, never will it be accepted of him; and in the Hereafter He will be in the ranks of those who have lost (All spiritual good)." (3:85)

عَنْ رَسُولِ اللَّهِ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ أَنَّهُ قَالَ وَالَّذِي نَفْسُ مُحَمَّدٍ بِيَدِهِ لَا يَسْمَعُ بِي أَحَدٌ مِنْ هَذِهِ الْأُمَّةِ يَهُودِيٌّ وَلَا نَصْرَانِيٌّ ثُمَّ يَمُوتُ وَلَمْ يُؤْمِنْ بِالَّذِي أُرْسِلْتُ بِهِ إِلَّا كَانَ مِنْ أَصْحَابِ النَّارِ

It is narrated on the authority of Abu Huraira that the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) observed: By Him in Whose hand is the life of Muhammad, he who amongst the community of Jews or Christians hears about me, but does not affirm his belief in that with which I have been sent and dies in this state (of disbelief), he shall be but one of the denizens of Hell-Fire. (Sahih Muslim, Hadith 218)

This is conclusive!

GOOD DEEDS OF NON-BELIEVERS: About their good deeds like charity etc Insha'Allah they'll be rewarded in this world e.g. Mother Tresa got the goodwill and admiration from all people.

But the verse and Hadith above make it clear that a person who has known about the Holy Prophet (PBUH) for him belief in his prophethood along with all the fundamentals is an absolute necessity for salvation.

We may understand it as if good deeds are decimal powers and the Faith in Fundamentals are Natural Numbers varying according to the quality of the belief. So the decimal power (the good deeds) are of no use unless there is atleast 1 in the left most place.

Two other possible queries answered:

1)Now one may say that here only belief in Allah and the Last Day are mentioned and not the Articles of Faith like belief in the Prophets etc. But the fact of the matter is here the style and context conveys that enumerating the Articles of Faith is not the thing dwelt at. Any such idea is in direct clash with the numerous verses of the Quran and how can one believe in Allah and the Last Day without belief in the Prophets, Angles and the Revealed Scripts?

Further Belief in Allah is the first of the fundamental beliefs and faith in the Last Day is the last of the fundamentals and Quran here tells in its unique style that its a must to believe in all the articles from the first to the last.

2)Why are the Muslims mentioned along with Jews, Christians and Sabeans, isn't it known that they believe in Allah and all the rest of the fundamentals? Keeping in view the rich Quranic style we see that its just like a King while making a new Law says that it is applicable to all the subjects impartially and whoever will obey them will have its reward irrespective of the fact if he was previously a friend or a foe.

Hope that helps!

INDEED ALLAH KNOWS THE BEST!

...by Waqar Akbar Cheema

One of Jesus’ Most Famous Lines Wasn’t in Original Gospels

One of the most famous moral teachings involving Jesus and an adulterous woman didn’t become part of the Bible until at least a hundred years after the Gospel of John was written.

One of the most famous moral teachings of the New Testament is “Judge not lest ye be judged.” It’s a favorite with pastors and politicians alike, and no individual story so exemplifies this maxim as Jesus’ encounter with the woman caught in adultery in the Gospel of John. A woman "caught in the act" is brought to Jesus by the scribes and Pharisees. They ask him if she should be stoned to death in accordance with the law given by Moses. At first Jesus ignores them and writes on the ground. When the accusers continue to challenge Jesus, he does not take the bait. Instead he asks that the person who is “without sin” cast the first stone. Nobody condemns the woman and Jesus tells the woman that he does not condemn her either and that she should go and sin no more.

The problem is that this story wasn’t originally in the Gospel of John. It didn’t become part of the Bible until at least a hundred years after the Gospel of John was written.  

The earliest manuscripts of the Gospel of John show no trace of the story. It’s simply not included in the text. The two earliest manuscripts of John (known as P66 and P75), which were written in the second and early third centuries, do not include it. Nor do the mid-fourth century books Codex Sinaiaticus and Codex Vaticanus, the earliest complete collections of the New Testament.  So where did the story come from and how did it make it into our Bibles?

In the new book To Cast the First Stone: The Transmission of a Gospel Story (Princeton, 2018), scholars Jennifer Knust and Tommy Wassermanexplore the tangled and complicated history of this beloved story. In it they argue, as others do, that the story was introduced into the Gospel of John by a later interpolator sometime in the third century. Some other ancient authors refer to the story as part of different literary tradition, a lost ‘gospel’ known as the Gospel of the Hebrews. That interpolator presumably believed that the story was important and authentic and added it into the text of the Gospel of John. Looking at the manuscripts themselves it’s possible to watch that happen. One manuscript, Codex Sangallensis 48, leaves a blank space in John 7:53-8:11, the place where the story is usually found.

Though they are careful to point out that we don’t know for sure where the story came from or why it was added to the Gospel of John, Knust, an associate professor of New Testament and Christian Origins at Boston University, and Wassermann, a professor of Biblical Studies at Ansgar Teologiske Høgskole in Norway, told The Daily Beast that the interpolation took place “in a context where Greek was used but Latin was also spoken, and probably because the interpolator thought it fit best into that Gospel.” They added that “we can only speculate about why John and not some other Gospel,” but mentioned several theories, including the prominence of stories about women in the Fourth Gospel. They also note the intriguing theory of New Testament scholar Chris Keith that, in addition to portraying Jesus as forgiving, the story also presents Jesus as able to write. Perhaps it was added, then, to combat the scandalous accusation that Jesus wasn’t fully literate.

“Once it was added,” they said “it made sense to many Christians to read it there.”

The story proved enormously popular. In part, Knust and Wassermann told me, because “[it] fits well within a number of stories and sayings that also highlight the forgiveness or rescue of women who either engage in sexual misconduct or are falsely accused of doing so.” But also because it is intrinsically interesting to people and can be read in a variety of ways.

According to the Jews over 4 million Prophets sent

The Talmud (Megillah 14a) says that there had been twice as many prophets as the number of people who left Egypt (2,600,000), but only those whose messages were for future generations were recorded. This count was 48 male and 7 female Prophets.

Of course, there is much debate about who is included in the list. Rashi (Megillah 3a) suggests that Daniel wasn't a prophet and should be replaced by Shemaia, who told Rehavam not to go to war with Yeravam and the northern kingdom. Rabbein Hananel and the Vilna Gaon start from Moshe and add in the sons of Korach.

Rashi also comments that "two [of the prophets] I don't know," refering to numbers 47 and 48. Another commentator says the missing two prophets are Oded and Hanani Haroeh. 

7 Female Prophets

1. Sarah

2. Miriam

3. Devorah

4. Hannah (mother of Shmuel)

5. Avigail (who became a wife of King David)

6. Huldah (from the time of Jeremiah)

7. Esther

46 Male Prophets

1. Abraham 2. Isaac 3. Jacob 4. Moses 5. Aaron 6. Joshua 7. Pinchas 8. Elkanah 9. Eli 10. Samuel 11. Gad

12. Nosson 13. King David 14. King Solomon 15. Aidoin the Golah 16. Micha Ben Yamla 17. Ovadiah 18. Achiah Hashiloni 19. Yehu Ben Hanani 20. Azaryah Ben Oded 21. Haziel from Bnei Masni 22. Eliezer his cousin 23. Morishah

24. Hoshea 25. Amos 26. Micha 27. Elijah 28. Elisha 29. Yonah Ben Amitai 30. Yeshayah 31. Joel 32. Nachum 33. Habakuk 34. Zephaniah 35. Uriah

36. Jeremiah 37. Ezekiel 38. Daniel 39. Baruch 40. Neriah 41. Sharyah 42. Machsiyah 43. Hagai 44. Zechariah 45. Malachi 46. Mordechai

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Sources: Blackman, Philip. Introduction to Tractate Sanhedrin of the Mishnah. New York: The Judaica Press, 1963; Dimont, Max. Jews, Jews, God and History. New York: The New American Library, 1962; Encyclopedia Judaica "Sanhedrin". Jerusalem: Keter Publishing House, 1971; Kung, Hans. Judaism. New York: Crossroad, 1992; Seltzer, Robert M. Jewish People, Jewish Thought. New York: Macmillian Publishing Co, 1980.