Prophet Muhammad vs Jesus Christ

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Here is a copy of a post I made on another forum:

If there is anyone here genuinely interested in seeing Islam dissected look here:

http://www.catholicapologetics.info/apo ... /index.htm

"Fear not; I am the first and the last:" Revelation 1:17

"Son, thy sins be forgiven thee." Mark 2:5

I and my Father are one. John 10:30

Jesus saith...he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father? John 14:9

[A]ll men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him. John 5:23

But unto the Son he [God] saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom. Hebrews 1:8

Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am. John 8:58

In which of those did he claim to be the ruler of heaven and earth?

Since he says that he is god, he is the ruler of earth and heaven.

You are making an inference.

If you read Genesis 1 carefully, you will see it says "let us make man in our image." The members of the Trinity worked together. Same "blood line", same essence of being, same character qualities, but different persons. That is why I used the analogy of the Royal Family. The prince is just as much royalty as the king. This carries through many of the other Scriptures where the Father speaks of one day exalting the Son and making him ruler over all. The Father "stayed home" in Heaven, and the Son went forth into the land as an ambassador to the people and became like them in order to communicate with them better and restore their relationship to the royal family. The Holy Spirit is like the authority of the royal family. It is all powerful, is part of the essence of royalty, is in agreement with the royalty, and "does the work", but is not tangible.

A couple of things, here.

First, I don't think Jesus ever claimed to be "ruler of Heaven and earth" specifically (don't have time to read through all the Gospels right now), even though he did equate himself with God. He would never have claimed to have authority OVER his father, which would have been implied had he said he was "ruler of Heaven and earth."

Second, why does this particular phrase matter? Jesus equated himself with God, which white as snow made clear through the quotes. Also, his miracles showed that he had power over the natural world, and his temptation in the desert showed his power over Satan. One particular miracle, when he healed the paralyzed man who had been let down through the ceiling, was done to show that he had the power to forgive sins.

From Luke 5:

"21 And the scribes and the Pharisees began to question, saying, “Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” 22 When Jesus perceived their thoughts, he answered them, “Why do you question in your hearts? 23 Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk’? 24 But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he said to the man who was paralyzed—“I say to you, rise, pick up your bed and go home.” 25 And immediately he rose up before them and picked up what he had been lying on and went home, glorifying God."

Jesus' miracles showed he had authority over both the natural and supernatural/spiritual realms.

As you don't seem to have tackled any of the links given, here's just one bit of concrete evidence from them.

At several points, particularly in Deuteronomy, the writer makes references to towns, events, and other things that occurred long after Moses' time.



I hoped I was quite clear in talking about the scholars who were in agreement, not lay people attending Bible study, and not pastors, ministers, priests etc, but scholars, people whose life's work is the study and discovery of history.

Oh... and as an aside, the theology I studied was under a Presbyterian tutor in 1975 - very conservative. And as I also said, the discussion has changed a lot since then but I have tried to stay current on it.



That's ok. I'll bow out with you too. It's not the sort of thing anyone can get a full picture of overnight. And in a forum like this, it is difficult to do justice to something that took me months of study on this one topic.

Cheers

What would be interesting, in my estimation, is the ultimate result of any inquiry determining why Trinitarian Christianity, out of all the other Christian theologies, pantheistic religions, etc. of the time and thereafter, was able to acquire such a foothold in the hearts of the majority of European-descended people--and to continue this foothold 2,000 years later!

How this itinerant preacher, out of all the itinerant preachers of his time, was able to instigate this Juggernaut known as Christianity!

Christianity must have been doing something right! Forceful compulsion in Medieval days is not the only answer.

Note: I'm an agnostic/atheist.

Actually, some scholarly evidence suggests that it was the early Roman Empire with the help of the early Catholic Church that enforced a rule of mythological Soldier/Sun GOD Christianity FOR A TOOL IN the ability to subjugate and oppress the common folks PER illusory fears of eternal damnation and an alternative of potential punishment of death if one did not follow the early Roman Empire inspired Catholic rule of book.

IT appears from all evidence that currently exists that these are the folks who decided there IS a trinity and psychopathic leaning Constantine erected a gigantic Sun GOD of himself to ride on the coattails of the soldier Sun GOD that these early leaders, both in church and state, aligned IN creating the trinity that is the Father, 'Sun' (Jesus/Yeshua), and Holy spirit as a GOD with three separate yet unified parts.

If Christianity and Islam was not ENFORCED BY church AND STATE, WE WOULD NOT HAVE IT IN THE PERCENTAGE OF NUMBERS OF FOLKS IN THE WORLD that we have today, obviously.

It would just be another set of beliefs in how it all works together as is, whether that might be the TAO or science, it matters not, as humans naturally tend to dictate some kind of order on reality whether it is housed in the scientific method or vehicles and vessels of truth in myth.

There are many archetypal human types that fit well within the ideal of a trinity per the yin and yang of all that is and the ONE that IS that is, per what SOME folks ascribe as the anthropomorphic traits of the divine masculine and feminine as part of a whole of Mother Nature TRUE aka All that IS aka GOD, Allah, or a an almost limitless number of humanly designed abstract languaged concepts of human existential intelligence.

To not find a path on this journey of some kind, is both chaos and insanity as one.

Some paths are better, some are more clear, but the truth is out there if one keeps seeking the truth as one sees it for one's self, even IF that means that no one sees truth the same.

But wherever I see human suffering, I see metaphorical 'lies', and certainly the religions of ISLAM and Christianity in both historical and modern days are still social bonding positive ways of survival as well as DEADLY SUFFERING AND KILLING OF OTHERS WAYS.

THESE DEFINITELY ARE not paths that I CAN FOLLOW WHOLE HEARTEDLY, AS I KNOW LIFE NOW, but I can still adapt to them well enough, to not want to fall to the level of folks in these arenas of philosophy whether it is extreme Atheists, Christians, or Muslims who exclude people as sub-human for their different ways of belief.

Humans are innately evolved, overall, to share and cooperate socially together as a tribe for survival.

Complex Language and cultures throw A HUGE RIGHT-HANDED MONKEY WRENCH OF CONFUSION into the mix.

I may be very wordy in ways of written communication and even verbal communication in real life, but my internal philosophy AND the balance I feel inside, as well as health AND WELL BEING IS SEALED WITH A KISS

KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID.

I FLOW LIKE A RIVER TO THE OCEAN, IN BALANCED EBB AND FLOW INSIDE, NO MATTER WHAT THE TORNADO LOOKS LIKE ON THE OUTSIDE. :)

AND I SUPPOSE THAT IS THE WAY GOD DOES IT TOO.

AS ABOVE SO BELOW.

AFTER ALL, GENERALLY SPEAKING, EVEN SCIENCE SHOWS THAT'S HOW ALL IT ALL WORKS TOGETHER AS ONE, ANYWAY, INSIDE AND OUTSIDE AS ABOVE SO BELOW.

SAME BASIC CONCEPT that the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas has been speaking to as truth for centuries before science got this far with a more refined scientific measure of the observable Universe in repeatable and controlled experiment.

GOD is a living force that lives within us naked and free.

http://www.sacred-texts.com/chr/thomas.htm



And I for one dance walk in these shoes, no matter who wears them first. :)

The truth is what I CAN see through the housing of the vehicles and vessels of both myth and metaphor as similar and SIMiLIE as well as smiLies. :)

I have 100 percent faith and 100% belief in GOD as I have a GOD that can be measured both by empirical means and heART.

Otherwise, my he and art WILL be broken, as they certainly HAVE BEEN in the past, and that is ONE HAS BEEN I HOPE TO REMAIN THE SAME. :)

I would agree that compulsion by nation/states pertaining to the establishment of religion had lots to do with the perpetuation of both the Christian and Islamic religions.

However, both have remained firmly entrenched in the ethos of many, mostly without true inquiry. My feeling is that the Abrahamic religions provide some measure of stability, amid the constant chaos of individual human existence. Even beyond compulsion.

I definitely agree, as elements of truth lie true in most all abstract housings of vehicles and vessels of religion and other myths.

After extensive research and analysis I personally find Unconditional Love IN PRO-SOCIAL EMOTION to be the greatest evolved HUMAN POWER IN BOTH SURVIVAL AND FUN, per nature and nurture.

ALTHOUGH one must be one of the TRIBAL 'in' folks instead of 'out' folks to truly take full advantage of that per White Arrow Straight manly Male in the U.S. or White Arrow Straight manly Male in Saudia Arabia, FOR example, respectively, in Christian and Islam religions.

It works very well for the folks it works for.

But truly crappy in historical context for women and those who are perceived as different from both the religious AND MYTHICAL NORM.

Those in power are the ones who expand their own truth as both human nature and history shows.

THE UNITED States and similar mixed free market capitalistic/social welfare states solve that AGE OLD PROBLEM increasingly with separation of church and state and FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION PER first amendment right.

Yeah, thank GOD for countries NOW under the OVERALL 'rule' of A free TRUE GOD of Mother Nature TRUE, instead of A man-made patriarchal myth of GOD that is FALSE. ;)

Nerdygirl-

Glad to hear you'r not a fundie. While I consider myself a theological moderate, my church body, the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, is mainline conservative (though there is a fundie element trying to ruin it for everyone). Might I ask what denomination you belong to?

So what did Jesus mean with "I was before Abraham"?

Dare I say I am <cough, cough> a Baptist?

I *MUST* qualify this!! !

I attend an *unafiliated* Baptist church. We do not belong to a larger denomination. We are not fundamentalist. We do not subscribe to a bunch of rules. Anything that you think is "Baptist" must be thrown out. The only way in which we are "Baptist" is in our understanding of baptism, and even then other Baptist pastors will disagree with my husband because he is willing to baptize children who profess to be believers while many will only baptize adults. (Our church subscribes to a Baptist view of church polity, and we put up with it.)

Our church is more like a "non-denominational" church and has been in existence for 150 years, so we aren't going to change the name.

My husband and I are open to different views and thoughts across denominations, even Catholic. The Christian faith boils down to personal faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, and I think the splitting up among denominations is really problematic. I would say that I am in great agreement with Bonhoeffer regarding his views on ecumenism.

In summary, we are theological conservatives but find that there's a lot of gray areas and room for "agreeing to disagree" when the issue at hand is not a primary-level, essential tenet of the faith. These are the four essential tenets my husband uses to explain things at church.

1. Jesus Christ is the Son of God
2. Jesus paid the penalty for sin on the cross in a substitutionary atonement personally applied to believers.
3. Jesus rose from the dead physically.
4. Jesus will return again to judge the living and the dead.

This line of thinking does not explain how the Christian church is growing so quickly in China where it has been suppressed for decades. Neither does it explain how Christianity stayed alive (though it slowed down a bit) in the USSR. Neither does it explain how Christianity remains worldwide the fastest-growing religion, though the last century saw the growth of governments (primarily atheistic/communist) that were the most oppressive to Christianity (and religion in general.)

If the growth of Christianity was explained by government enforcement, we should see by corollary that government oppression should wipe it out. But this just isn't so. If that were true, Christianity never would have survived the first couple of centuries when Christians were thrown to the lions and such.