Christian Missionary Tricks

[Anyabwile]

Assalamu Alalikum Wa Rahmatullahi Wa Barakatuh


I've made a promise to certain Christian posters on here not to speak bad of the bible and they will do the same with the Qur'an. This is so healthy debate can emerge on certain subjects. However this is an Islamic board so i shouldn't feel i can't respond on this topic from an Islamic Perspective, as otherwise this is ridiculous, it's not a Muslti Faith board it is an Islamic one so i should feel i can have my input. I'll just try and refrain from disrespectful terms, if i use any, i'm sure they will be pointed out! I will be speaking from a factual or kind of cold viewpoint on the Bible yes, because it's not a book i personally belive in. But i'll try and avoid any rudeness, if i am rude then sorry in advance but it might be best to stop reading here if you know this is going to upset you as this is an Islamic forum. So i would say <b>STOP READING HERE</b>....and i can guarantee you won't be offended. Otherwise even though i will try not to offend Christians, i can't guarantee. So to the Christians on this board who are sensive, and my Christian friend Ronni i would advise stopping here.


why are you still reading Ronni? Joke...carry on.


Anyway I just wanna gonna explain my expierience with Christians and my own as always personal research. The research is long and takes time but i don't rely on websites alone, never have. Some websites by their nature Muslim and Non Muslim are very dodgy indeed.


It was only really since i started searching for God (was Agnostic about 6 or so months ago) where i looked into the Major religions including the Bible and Christianity. And from then on my interest in the book increased, unfortunately not for the reasons of it bringing me closer to God but because the more i read on it's history and the beleifs Christians accept (Trinity, Original sin for mankind, Jesus himself was God) the more i found out these were introduced by men several hundreds of years after Jesus himself lived, concepts he himself would know nothing about. I read three or four books in a few months on the history of the bible, and what interested me most was what i was reading about the Bible, and how it had been changed was all coming from Christians. None of them said that it didn't have what they thought were the words of God in it but all of them said it has been drastically tampered with by Man, changed, re edited certain books taken out etc etc.


There is one book in particular on this subject huge, in three parts that really goes in depth on the issue. Used alongside others by a few famous Muslim scholars on the Bible. I flicked through this book with a copy of the bible i had recently digged up from the loft of my parents. And the book shows errors / contradictions so blatant that no one Christian or non Christian, Whatever race, nationality etc etc could deny them. What was interesting was the enourmously high number of errors and evidences of the blatant tampering by man, this is a Holy Book to Christians so i just didn't understand why they hadn't questioned this.


I worked at the time in a Call centre and everyday i'd take the books i had in, take in this bible i had and asked the points to be explained to me from a Christian perspective. I thought this is the fairest way, i worked with two knowledgable Christians and they explained to me two things, 1) the bible isn't a literal book as they thought i was taking it and 2) The errors mistakes and contradictions do not take away the message as your African friend said. One person on another occasion said she had seen the Holy Ghost in action so she didn't care what the bible said, or what i said about it. I didn't class her as a regular Christian obviously as i felt this would be unfair to do so for my research, she was interesting to speak with though. More entertaining than anything though i think.


Anyway these and other Christians spoke with me and showed me points and showed me websites where Qur'an is shown to have contradictions like the 50,000 years one and so forth. This was a strange tactic because this wasn't actually addressing the many issues in the bible, it was simply diverting it to Qur'an. But i'd found all the things which seem at first glance like contradictions in the Qur'an are wiped once you find the Arabic original and study the words individually or once you put the whole verse to the rest of section that you've plucked out, or take the verse in context to the Qur'an as a whole. It's quite easy. They would then move on to the next one they thought they could take as a contradiction and then i can explain this and it goes on and on a short while until they are satisfied, but this can't be done with the Bible to many of the serious concerns i have with it's Authenticity can't be explained. Just because of the high number of errors etc. I mean the erros and such aren't what i'm really interested in because Christians admit some of it is written by man, although God is still supposed to be watching over them i belive, or at least he should be. But more than the errors or contradictions, it was the actual <b>real</b> history of the Bible which got me.


I know some people can take a verse out of context, so this isn't my focus in the bible as such. As that's not the point of the Bible to take it literal i understand that so i don't pick at that. It's just the history that's behind the book that fascinated me more. I mean if errors in Qur'an are thrown at me then there's several thousand more in the Bible i can pick but i'm not too interested in this, because it seems a bit nick picky. What my fascination grew to, was how people think it is a Holy book, that God has approved it, or it has the words of God in it. Not so much the errors at this point.


So the same criteria i ask them to do for Qur'an (See what original scripts says, read the entire section not one verse etc) i tried to do with the Bible ask for original hebrew scriptures or greek whatever i needed and see them explained or as far back translations as i needed and try and look into it. And i unwillingly found my self under an avalanche of exposed faults and blatant changes to a book that many belive is holy or the word of God. These were true concerns. I read more books on the subject. And more importantly didn't just read ones that seemed from an Islamic perspective because i genuinely wanted to learn but read these other books with a Bible alongside me to read the complete verses for my self...and to be honest it's completely stunned me. To the point of disbeleif, because i know for a fact many Christians haven't studied this deep enough and once you do it knocks the wind out of you what you find.


This is where i'm at right now, i've read a large number of research books on the Bible and it's history and when you see how certain Christians beleifs, Trinity, and Gods bizarre original sin curse on the whole of mankind and other beleifs Jesus is God himself walking etc etc. Once you see these concepts were introduced by certain people way way after Jesus would have known about this, and are things he never even said in the Bible, the whole thing gets uncomfortable in regards to why these people belive this. I'm still on my research on this going through a few books a month on it when i can, i read a whole heap anyway so two or so books a month is nothing to me but what i'm slowly starting to realise is exacly how the Bible is viewed to many Christians. Those who say to me "well Qur'an is this and that" i loose interest in because we discuss Qur'an when we discuss Qur'an, not at the particular time i want to discuss the Bible, that's sidestepping.


Those who say to me it is the complete word of God and i havent come across any personally but read some belive it, <b>those are the ones i'm most interested in</b>. And those who say to me it's not the actual book, it's what it represents baffle me to the maximum, but then make it easier for me to accept how some people accept Christianity and the bible.


While i'm doing my research on this and seeing the truth more blatantly as time passes, this is how i find it easier to accept in my own head how perfectly nice sane human beings accept the Bible "it's not the actual book, it's what it represents" I would leave a debate there if a Christian told me this, because this is the nature of how they want to have faith. It's totally not how i work in the slightest, but i accept some people do work like this. To them it's more about Jesus and the ideas based around him from a Christian viewpoint than the actual bible. There's in my eyes no need to really push a person who thinks this way this is how they choose to belive and no matter what facts you present to them with a bible in your hand and a massive book of 1000 people showing and explaining where the Bible has been changed etc it will mean nothing to them because they "belive" i like all good Muslims natrually would like to save all good humans from Hellfire but i can't even try with certain people, i just think of most Christians in this way i just described (those who say it's not the actual book but what it represents) and i can accept them clinging on to the Bible easier i think.


I'll PM you some books or links, i only PM and not post them here because a debate on this would really sap me right now, i'm trying to do other things right now, learning Arabic etc trying to understand verses in my own <b>book</b> and i put so much effort into debate on here, and i know i'll have to again on this soon anyway. So i'll just PM you these books and one link in particular. If you're interested fine if not fine also, i know some don't want to take it as deep as i seem to do...with everything, so cool.


And erm, sorry everyone again for the long post


Assalamu Alalikum Wa Rahmatullahi Wa Barakatuh