Description

The Quran claims to be the last scripture given by Allah, preceded by the Torah and the Gospel (Quran 3:3). In the tenth century, a critic of Islam pointed out that the Bible contradicts the Quran’s teachings on Jesus. Today, Muslims maintain that the early Jews and Christians “corrupted” the Bible, making the Quran the only trustworthy holy text.

I will demonstrate that:

(1) The Quran pits itself against the historical fact that Jesus was crucified, and that His early followers agreed He was God.

(2) Even if the early Christians had somehow corrupted the Bible, the Quran refers to the Bible of the seventh century as true, and that is indisputably the same Bible we have today.

(3) Muslim scholars never claimed the Bible was corrupted until this critique became popular.

(4) Lacking the evidence of continuity, Muslims use the Quran’s “miraculous nature” as evidence of its divine origin. But there is no credible evidence, historical or otherwise, that the Quran is anything more than a normal book.

Biblical History – Preface

We must develop an understanding of the evidence behind the Biblical texts before comparing them to the Quran. So we will begin with a little New Testament history:

There are thousands of manuscripts of the Bible. Atheist and Biblical scholar Bart Ehrman, author of Misquoting Jesus, plainly says in the book (and here on his blog) that the bases for the Biblical divinity of Christ and the real-life crucifixion are so consistent across every manuscript that their authenticity cannot be doubted.

Bart Ehrman also says the scholarly consensus is that the gospels were all written within living memory of Jesus. The earliest was Mark, (70 AD), in which the first sentence calls Jesus “the Son of God” (Mark 1:1). Here are (many) subtler examples of Mark saying Jesus is God using references to the Torah. But each of the four Gospels makes it abundantly clear that Jesus is actually God. The Gospel of John is the most explicit – for example, there is a scene where Thomas says to Jesus, “my Lord and my God,” and Jesus responds, “because you have seen Me, you have believed” (John 20:28-29). In another portion of the text, Jesus says, “before Abraham was, I AM,” pointing to His eternal existence, and referring to Himself using “I AM,” the name of God (John 8:58).

Paul’s epistles, at the latest, were written in 66 AD – 36 years after Christ’s death. They refer to Christ as the Son of God or as God often (Romans 1:4, Philippians 2:5-7, Colossians 1:15, Colossians 2:9, Hebrews 1:3). The epistle of Peter similarly calls Christ God (2 Peter 1:1). The epistle of James calls Him the glorious Lord. (James 2:1). Further, in 1 Corinthians, St. Paul challenges anyone who doubts Christ’s divinity to simply come to Jerusalem and ask everybody what happened, as hundreds were alive to see Him risen.

Beyond the Biblical canon are the letters of Ignatius. Ignatius was a disciple of John the Apostle (Jesus’ closest friend) and wrote them around 117 AD. Each refers to Christ directly as God, Lord, Son of God, divine redemptive sacrifice – or all of the above. There are dozens of letters from other second century Church leaders who also referred to Christ as God, Son of God, savior – some within living memory, some just beyond it, but all considered authentic by scholars. 

Could these men have simply hallucinated seeing the risen Christ? No scholar believes so. The Biblical accounts do not portray the Apostles seeing Christ’s face in a cloud or something – they describe Him eating with them and speaking with them over the course of 50 days. There is no like event in history, especially medical history. Could they have all been lying, then? Scholars accept that Peter, Paul, and James – eyewitnesses to all this, not just believers – died for the Gospel. Less convincing sources attest the other Apostles all did the same, and – while they are weaker sources – there is no significant reason to doubt them. So this leaves us with a question: who would die for something they made up? Even if there were some earthly benefit in the meantime (which I contest), who wouldn’t recant when the hangman approached?

There are non-Christian sources written only a decade after the death of the last Apostle claiming that Christians worshiped Jesus. Here is Cornelius Tacitus, writing around 110 AD that there are “Christians” with a “superstition” about Christ who was crucified. Furthermore, he speaks of how these Christians – who lived well within living memory of Christ – were willing to undergo unspeakable torture for their belief. Here Pliny the Younger, again around 110 AD, writes that Christians are worshiping Jesus “as a god.” The satirical play The Passing of Peregrinus mocks Christians for “worshiping a man as a god” around 160 AD. Historians consider each of these sources unquestionably authentic.

So, to summarize: we have hundreds of Biblical manuscripts which scholars agree (1) come from incredibly early writings, (2) from multiple sources, and (3) have no meaningful variation. They all claim Christ is God or, even in the most conservative reading, the Son of God. Eyewitnesses were willing to die to testify to this for no apparent worldly gain. There are dozens of non-Biblical letters from the same era with the same sort of scholarly consensus of authenticity. Some letters come from within the Christian Church, some from without, and all agree that the Christians worship Christ.

On to the arguments.

The “First Followers” Contradiction

The Quran makes four major claims about Jesus: 

(1) Jesus was not crucified; it was an illusion (Quran 4:157).

(2) Jesus never taught that He was God. He taught that He was a prophet, and that another prophet, Mohammad, was coming (Quran 3:50, 19:30, 61:6).

(3) Jesus was successful at preaching this message to His closest followers (Quran 3:52), although some others rejected it.

(4) Allah promised Jesus’ believers they would be “superior” to the disbelievers until the day of judgment (Quran 3:55). 

Any of these points being wrong would disprove the Quran.

Regarding the first – Jesus’ crucifixion is one of the most well-attested events in ancient history. His followers – eyewitness – were willing to die rather than reject this. Virtually all historians accept it as fact. The only source claiming it didn’t happen is the Quran, which came 600 years later with no corroboration.

The Gospels and the epistles were written by Jesus’ closest followers and their closest followers, and every single one says that Jesus was God, that He taught He was God, or both. Again, we know these were his closest followers because they claimed to be eyewitnesses and died rather than recant. Now if Jesus did actually claim divinity, that would disprove (2). But if His closest followers believed it due to misapprehension, that would disprove (3) and (4), which say Jesus was a successful Islamic prophet. According to the mountains of evidence, one of these options must be true. Who are these purported Islamic followers of Jesus? Where are their writings? How were they “blessed by Allah” if they were lost to history so swiftly that there’s no evidence they existed?

The Quran contradicts mountains of Biblical evidence, and has no evidence for the counterclaim except appealing to its own authority. That is, your starting assumption needs to be that the authors who were eyewitnesses to Jesus were all lying, and the author who was not there and wrote about it 600 years later is the one telling the truth. Would this be the basic assumption under any other circumstance? If the Bible was the book which required such an assumption, wouldn’t Muslims consider that indisputable evidence of corruption?

The Internal Contradiction

Even more certain than the fact that the early Christians worshiped Jesus is the fact that the Bible of the seventh century featured a divine Jesus who was crucified and resurrected. The Bishops who compiled the canon of the Bible were in unanimous agreement about this. It was very explicit in the ecumenical Christian creed which predates the Biblical canon, and again, the manuscript evidence is incontrovertible. However, the Quran regularly describes the Bible as its true divine predecessor. The argument from here is as follows:

(1) For the Quran to be true, it must agree with the Bible (Quran 3:3).

(2) The Bible does not agree with it.

(C) The Quran is false.

Muslims claim that the Quran does not actually claim that the Bible of the seventh century agrees with it. They instead propose that a long-lost Bible free of corruption is what agrees with it. Unfortunately for them, there are dozens of quotes from the Quran which only make sense when interpreted the former way. There are so many quotes from the Quran about this, I’ve organized them into general categories instead of outright quoting most of them. I invite you to read every hyperlink if you want the verbatim:

(1) Quran 3:78 is crystal clear that the contemporary Bible was not corrupt. It says: “There are some among [the Jews and Christians] who distort the Book with their tongues to make you think this distortion is from the Book – but it is not what the Book says. They say, ‘It is from Allah’ – but it is not from Allah. And so they attribute lies to Allah knowingly.” This passage explicitly says distortions (corruptions) are not from the contemporary Bible. It says the Jews and Christians lied knowingly, meaning they willfully altered the known Biblical truth. This passage makes perfect sense in light of Surahs 6:115, and 18:27, which claim the word of Allah is unalterable. The Quran claims to make all things clear in (Quran 16:89). If this is not clear, what is?

(2) Quran 37:35-37 describes pagans rejecting Islam and the response thereto: “For whenever it was said to them in the world, “There is no god worthy of worship except Allah,” they acted arrogantly and argued, ‘Should we really abandon our gods for a mad poet?’ In fact, he came with the truth, confirming earlier messengers.” Here we have the Quran explicitly using continuity with the Bible as an apologetic argument for itself. Quran 46:29-30 describes the jinn accepting the Quran on the same basis.

(3) In the following seven verses, the Quran claims to confirm the Torah and the Gospel: Quran 2:97, 3:3, 4:136, 6:92, 6:114, 20:133, 35:31. None of the verses say, “the Quran confirms parts of these texts, but many parts are also corrupt.” In Quran 2:85, 2:140, 3:69, 5:15, 5:66, and 5:68, Allah disparages the Jews and Christians for only selectively obeying scripture. But if the scripture is corrupt, they should only be obeying it selectively. Again, the Quran claims to make all things clear in Quran 16:89 – surely this disclaimer would be of the utmost importance? Especially after declaring that distortions are not from the books and that Allah’s word is unalterable? Surely clarity would warrant some explanation as to how these confirmations ought to work given the Bible’s corruption?

(4) These six verses instruct the Jews and Christians (sometimes called “people of the book”) to verify the Quran using their scripture, or reprimand them for refusing to do so: Quran 2:91 2:101, 2:40-41, 7:157, 10:94, 21:7. These four verses instruct the Jews and Christians to verify the Quran using scripture they “already have” or “is in their hands”: Quran 5:43, 5:47, 2:89, 3:81. None of this makes sense if the Bible was corrupt. What are they supposed to verify? If the enterprise here is to objectively validate the Quran against the preceding scriptures, the Quran is thus proven false. If the enterprise here is to validate the Quran by comparing it to the previous scriptures, but only validating it against the parts of the previous scriptures which agree with the Quran, this is just question-begging.

(5) Quran 5:43-48 says Allah made the Jews, Christians, and Muslims into three different communities with different codes and ways of life for the purpose of “testing [them] with what He has given each of [them]” such that the communities all “compete with one another in doing good.” He explicitly says that the Jews “already have the Torah” and that the “people of the Gospel [should] judge by what Allah has revealed in it.” But these commands are deeply confusing if these sources were corrupt. What exactly are they supposed to judge? Further, wouldn’t this needlessly expose the Christians and Jews to the alleged interpolated heresies? The Quran is already a complete rule of faith which makes all things clear; why not just command the Christians and Jews to read the Quran instead?

(6)  Quran 10:36-38 and 5:41-43 admonish Christians and Jews for distorting scripture by making false assumptions and taking things out of context. Neither of these mention textual corruption. There is one passage in the Quran which explicitly mentions textual corruption: Quran 2:75-2:79 speaks of an unnamed group of connivers, some of whom “knowingly corrupt [the word] after understanding it” and some of whom are illiterates who impiously “speculate” on the word for “fleeting gain.” But this passage makes no reference to Christians nor Jews, and they are unlikely candidates, considering they are normally characterized as literate and deeply familiar with their texts. Further, if it were about Christians or Jews, we would expect mention of the Bible; there is none. This passage seems to describe a group fabricating new scripture, not editing the existing. This is consistent with the teachings of the previous 25 citations.

“Corruption” is a Later Argument

Aside from these last three passages I mentioned, the concept of Biblical corruption does not exist in the Quran. In fact, it’s the opposite: Surahs 6:115, and 18:27 claim the word of Allah is unalterable. Quran 3:78 explicitly says the Bible is not textually corrupt. No verses anywhere suggest that the Torah and Gospel were textually corrupted; rather, they suggest that human misinterpretation and people willfully obfuscating scripture corrupted the otherwise uncorrupted message. This obvious reading was the scholarly consensus during the early years of Islam.

This argument that the Quran contradicts itself by claiming the veracity of the Bible was first made in the Apology of Al-Kindi sometime in the tenth century. This was shortly after the Bible was first translated into Arabic. No Muslim scholars claimed Biblical textual corruption prior to this time. Further, the corruption theory did not become popular until the 11th century – the same time the Al-Kindi became popular. Islam had already existed for centuries at this point.

The following Sahih (highest grade of authenticity) Hadiths all confirm the veracity of the Bible:

(1) In Sahih Muslim 8a, the prophet says that belief in Allah’s books (plural) is an article of faith. No mention of textual corruption.

(2,3) Mishkat al-Masabih 154 and 155 confirm the prophet warned of bad oral alterations to tradition coming in the future. He commands the Muslims to believe in the Torah, but not always believe in the Jews who expound upon it. No mention of textual corruption.

(4) In Sunan Abi Dawud 4310, Abd Allah – a Jewish convert to Islam because he supposedly found Mohammad prefigured in the Torah – uses knowledge from those scriptures to corroborate a claim from Mohammad. No mention of textual corruption.

(5,6) In Sunan Ibn Majah 2558 and Sunan Abi Dawud 3626, Mohammad uses the Torah of his time. He then reminds the listeners it came from Allah. No mention of textual corruption.

(7) In Sunan Abi Dawud 4736 Mohammad rebukes a man for laughing at a Gospel verse because it is the word of Allah. No mention of textual corruption.

(8) In Jami` at-Tirmidhi 2875 the prophet states that the Torah, Gospel, and Quran are all parts of one whole. No mention of textual corruption.

(9) In Jami` at-Tirmidhi 2653, Mohammad bemoans that the Bible is with the Jews and Christians, but they ignore it. No mention of textual corruption. And again, shouldn’t it be good news they’re ignoring the Bible if it’s corrupt?

I found one sahih hadith, Sahih al-Bukhari 7363, which speaks of textual distortion. However, it uses the same language as Quran 2:75-2:79, describing people who “changed their scripture with their own hands” for “a little gain.” To be consistent with the previous examples, we must assume this refers to contemporaries making up new scriptures to sell them, not corrupting the originals. The hadith right before it, 7632, is in lockstep with this idea, teaching Muslims to disregard the words of Jews, but tell them “we believe in Allah and whatever is revealed to us, and whatever is revealed to you.”

Neither the Quran, nor the Hadiths, nor early scholars teach Biblical corruption. In fact, an unbiased reading of all three leads to the opposite conclusion. But of course, the opposite conclusion means Islam is false.

Total Lack of Evidence

If the Quranic appeal to the Bible to confirm its truth is both tenuous and circular, we may ask: why believe it’s divine? Muslims appeal to the Quran as having multiple marks of divine origin. Let’s explore a few of these:

First, the miraculous beauty of the poetry. First, obviously, this is subjective. One might consider Paradise Lost to be of divine origin by this standard. Second, Quran itself recounts people constantly receiving it with lukewarmness, calling it “old news” (Quran 6:25, 8:31, 9:61, 16:24, 16:103, 17:94, 23:83, 25:4, 27:68, 46:17, 68:15, 83:13). Again, Paradise Lost seems to have been received more warmly than the Quran. Some will claim that Islam spread because of the beauty of the Quran, but this ignores the previously cited words of the Quran stating that people weren’t all that excited about it, as well as the “coincidence” that wherever Islam went, it carried a sword with it.

Second, the miraculous knowledge of Allah’s transcendent nature, as expressed by the divine names. The Quran lays out around 100 unique names For Allah; examples include Ar-Rahman (The Most Compassionate), Ar-Rahim (The Most Merciful), Al-Malik (The King), Al-Quddus (The Pure One), and Al-Khaliq (The Creator). Obviously, this isn’t proof of anything. Aristotle refers to God as Prime Mover, Uncaused Cause, Pure Actuality, Self-Thinking Thought, and Final Cause; does this mean Aristotle is a prophet?

Third, prophetic miracles. Let’s look at a few examples. “Their skins will bear witness against them as to what they have been doing” (41:21). This is allegedly fulfilled by fingerprint technology. “Corruption has spread on land and sea because of what men’s hands have wrought” (30:42). This is allegedly fulfilled by pollution. “And when the wild beasts are gathered together.” (81:6). This is allegedly fulfilled by zoos. These are not strawman examples, these are real, commonly-used examples of the Quran’s prophetic miracles. I don’t feel the need to extrapolate on these at length; these are just exercises in retrofitting ambiguous verses to events. If the Quran were really prophetic, one should be able to use it to identify events before they happen, not merely identify them after the fact.

Fourth, scientific miracles. Let’s look at a few examples. “Have those who disbelieved not considered that the heavens and the earth were a joined entity, and We separated them? We made every living thing from water, will they not believe?” (Quran, 21:30). The first sentence is allegedly proven by the Big Bang theory, and the second by the fact that organisms are, in fact, largely composed of water. These claims have the same issue as the previous example: every supposed scientific miracle is just an ambiguous line applied to an unrelated scientific discovery. If the book is really full of divine scientific knowledge, one ought to be able to use it to make scientific discoveries or inventions, not merely identify them after the fact.

Fifth, the miracle of no errors and no contradictions. This isn’t even true, as the Quran obviously teaches its own continuity with the inerrant Bible. But even if this were true, this is the lowest bar imaginable. Again, I see no reason we couldn’t elevate Paradise Lost to a holy text based on this criterion.

Sixth, perfect textual preservation. This is also not true, as the Quran underwent two rounds of revisions under Abu Bakr and Uthman. Once Uthman’s committee translated the Quran to the Quraysh dialect, he disseminated this version across all major cities under his power and had all competing copies burned. But even if this were true, even if the text were perfectly preserved, I again see no reason we couldn’t elevate Paradise Lost to a holy text based on this criterion.

I will address the two remaining miracles in their own section.

A Problematic Prophet

The two final miracles commonly cited to prove the Quran are a perfect understanding of the harmony of human social and personal needs, and timeless moral teachings. Let’s examine these claims through the writings and example of Mohammad:

Mohammad states that child marriage is OK, as long as sex is postponed until three months after first menstruation (Quran 65:4). He says “for [wives] of whom you fear rebellion… leave them apart in beds, and beat them” (4:34). The punishment for fornication is 80 lashes (24:2), but forcing a slave into prostitution has no punishment mentioned (24:33). He permits raping living men’s wives in conquered territories (4:24). One Sahih Hadith (highest grade holy text beside the Quran) describes Mohammad permitting his men to rape POW’s (Muslim 1438). Another describes Mohammad raping a slave and then claiming Allah told him to when caught by his wives (An-Nisa 3959). Another says he married Aisha when she was six (Buhkari 5134) and six others describe Aisha scraping his semen off her clothes (Muslim, Majah (1), Majah (2), Majah (3), An-Nasai, Buhkari).

Quran 33 makes clear that the prophet lusted after his adopted son’s wife, forced him to divorce her, and then married her himself. To avoid outrage about this act, which – beyond the obvious concerns – the culture of his time would call incest, Mohammad pontificates that Allah commanded it. Why? To teach that adopted children are not real children after all, thus marrying their wives is not incest (Quran 33:37). Lovely! To avoid further outrage about exceeding the four-wife limit from Quran 4:3, he says that he – and only he– has the right to marry in excess of four wives. In fact, Allah gave him the right to have sex with any woman who offers herself to him (Quran 33:50). Conversely, a few sentences later he commands that his wives be cloistered, and remain celibate after he dies (Quran 33:53). How convenient!

Now, the Quran teaches that Mohammad is the moral exemplar for Muslims (Quran 3:31, 68:4). It even does so within the very chapter just cited (Quran 33:21). This raises serious questions – namely, how Mohammad is both the model of lawfulness and simultaneously exempt from the laws? But more disturbingly, it means a consistent Muslim is required to believe there’s nothing objectively wrong with rape, slavery, sex trafficking, pederasty, and even to believe these are behaviors befitting of humanity’s moral representative. The Muslim defense of the prophet’s behavior is claiming “presentism.” That is, saying his behavior is not acceptable by today’s standards, but was moral then. But this contradicts that he is the ultimate moral exemplar, and that the Quran makes all things clear (Quran 16:89). And all of this, of course, contradicts the claim that the Quran is full of perfect, timeless, harmonious moral truths.

Summary

The Bible is one of the most well-documented works of ancient history. There is a scholarly consensus that the manuscript changes over time were minimal and unimportant to the general ideas. There is a scholarly consensus that Jesus was crucified, and that His early followers considered Him to be divine. Historians have never found a single piece of credible evidence which suggests the opposite. 

The Quran claims that Jesus did not die, that He taught Islam, that He preached that the prophet Mohammad was coming after Him, and that His early followers believed this. But there is no evidence for any of this except the Quran, and there is immense historical evidence proving the opposite.

Further, the Quran contains no less than 25 verses explicitly describing the Bible as inerrant and claiming continuity with it. Only one Surah mentions textual distortion, and it speaks of illiterate connivers in the 7th century “knowingly” creating false Gospel – so even this exception is a definitive statement that the true scripture existed at the time. 

The early Islamic scholarly consensus was that the only Biblical corruption in the Quran is interpretive, not textual. At least eight Sahih Hadiths support this idea, and no Sahih Hadiths dissent. Only one makes even an abstract reference to scriptural corruption, and it uses it in the same context as the Quran – contemporary, and limited. The idea of Biblical corruption only started to exist when the Al-Kindi refutation became popular.

The Quran has absolutely no meaningful historical evidence. Everything used to support it is circular, nonsensical, totally subjective, or some combination thereof. The most profoundly absurd is the claim to moral timelessness. Mohammad is a moral monster the likes of whom Bin Laden pales in comparison. He used his power to violently conquer nations, rape wives and children, and encouraged his followers to do the same. He married a six-year-old and the wife of his own adopted son. Not only does this present contradictions – namely, how he could be a moral exemplar to anyone? – it also presents the problem of adhering to the moral teachings of an egomaniacal, warmongering sexual deviant whom no sane man – not even a Muslim – would leave alone in a room with his daughter… even if his daughter was in preschool.