Lesson 26, Jihadists All.
Now we finish Sura 7, and then move to sura 8, called "The Spoils", and sura 9, "The repentant".
The ending verses of chapter 7 are yet another reminder of the insecure future afforded mankind by Allah, Islam's god. Verse 179: "And indeed, we have created for hell many of the jinn and the humans." He goes on to sound a little like Jesus, by saying these people have hearts that do not understand, eyes that do not see, ears that do not hear. He then says they are like animals, only worse. Of course, he is speaking of "those who considered our verses lies."
"Whomever Allah causes to go astray, so there is no guide for him. And he will leave them in their rebellion blindly." The thing closest to hope that he says on these two pages is in verse 204: "And when the Koran is read, then listen to it and pay attention, perhaps you may receive mercy."
Perhaps.
The New Testament agrees that there are many whose heart is hard. God has prepared a place for the disobedient He saw from the foundation of the world. But God continually allows for His grace to operate. Saul of Tarsus was a part of that group for whom Jesus offered His worst sayings, including the one above that Muhammad borrowed from Isaiah and Jesus. Yet Saul received the wonderful grace of the Lord and not the fate of the Pharisee, though he was one for sure! No "perhaps" with him. Anyone who calls on Jesus' name has a glorious future. It's not about reading the Koran or even the Bible, it's about an encounter with the true God of Heaven.
Sura 8, "The Spoils", takes us back to Medina, the later years. It is a relatively short chapter, yet a very intense one. Allah is once again the warrior who is to be exalted above all. The spoils of battle (hence the title of the chapter) are to go to Allah and his messenger, Muhammad. The infidels are to be cut off, literally. Heads and fingers are to be severed to show Allah's severity against those who dare oppose Muhammad. The torment of the fire follows soon after.
Do you Muslims see some marching infidels? Engage, "do not turn your backs to them." Kill them, but "it was not you who killed them, but Allah killed them." So it's justified .
For comparison, never once did Jesus of Nazareth ask His disciples to take the life of another human being. Never will He, until His return, exercise violence. He conquers now by serving, loving, giving life. He taught His followers to love their enemies. And so many enemies they had! Ultimately Jesus died for His enemies, sealing His teaching with His blood. There is no one like Jesus.
But Muhammad, and I continue in chapter 8, curses not only the infidels but the deaf, the dumb, and "those who do not understand", perhaps the ones we would call mentally ill or cognitively delayed today. Allah saw no good in these people and that is why they were created this way. Deaf people would have heard the sound of battle and turned back, after all. In Muhammad's vision, life is war. Those unfit for war must be cursed.
Again the contrast is stark and sharp. What did Jesus do for the deaf and dumb? Compassion. Healing. Deliverance. He calls all His people to similar love. Worthless? Not to Jesus. When they are healed, they noise abroad His wonderful works. And is it not possible that Jesus would love them just to love them, not for what He could receive from them? Is not His love unconditional and freeing?
Verse 36. "Surely those who became infidels spend their money to prevent others from the way of Allah." Amen and may it be so. May we who know Jesus spend much money and time and love preventing others from this Muhammadan way. The very infidel who speaks to you now is spending his retirement time in doing just that! May God raise up many of my readers to go even farther into enemy territory to inflict a wound on the spirits who are behind this movement. And may the love of God and the compassion of Jesus Christ bring many to the truth.
Verse 39. "And engage in war with them until... the religion will be completely to Allah." You see friend, true Muslims want Islam to be universal. True Christians must want the same for their Lord. Jesus died for this world. He deserves it all. Let us continue calling out a people who will one day rule this world with Him.
In the war, verse 41, when you take the spoils, remember that one fifth belongs to Allah and the messenger Muhammad. Remember also to strike terror into the heart of the enemy. Muhammad is told to "provoke the believers to engage in war." To take no captives. To conquer the earth, and leave the hereafter for Allah. To perform jihad by emigrating and with their money and with their lives and by giving asylum to fellow-Muslims.
Those who continue this sort of worldwide violence and conquest, "those are the true believers, they will receive forgiveness and generous provisions."
So step back and look at the present world condition. Who are those striking terror into the hearts of many innocent people throughout the world? Who are provoking others to engage in war? Who are emigrating to countries around the planet and using their money and their influence and their career and their choice of a marriage partner to wage a holy war against infidels?
On the other hand, who on a global scale are entering nation after nation to bring good news of the Kingdom of God? Who heal the sick and preach hope to the poor and desolate? Who are using untold amounts of cash to invest in the lives of those who might otherwise be considered their enemies?
The battle is on.
Let us move quickly to Sura 9, also written from Medina. Scholars tell us that Sura 9, called "the repentant" is the final message of Muhammad. That means that any message in Sura 9 that seems to contradict messages in other suras can be considered the final word, the abrogation. The translator, Usama Dakdok, has counted 124 verses that are abrogated in the Koran simply by 9:5ff., which call for the outright killing of polytheists wherever they are found. "Lay wait for them with every kind of ambush," giving them a chance to be the "repentant" (as in the title), or to be further tormented or killed if not.
Although all other of the 114 suras begin with the words, "In the name of Allah, the merciful, the merciful," This one does not. The assumption being that Allah will now no longer be the merciful, but rather the avenger. So chapter 9 is like chapter 8 in its militant character and message. While opening with a protestation of innocence regarding any dealings with the polytheists, it quickly leads into calls for slaughter.
Verse 20 once more mentions "emigration" as in chapter 8. We acknowledge that there was certainly a local understanding for emigration, as the switch from Mecca to Medina was underway. Muhammad was being chased out of his original setting to become a fugitive in the North. His true followers emigrated to where he was. However, through the years, the expansion of this Arabian/Muslim culture has called for multitudes to follow in the steps of the original Meccans. Emigration is now a way of life. A way of jihad. The populations of European countries and even America give testimony that emigration jihad is very effective.
The Christian way of emigration is a bit different, and sometimes even more effective. While unlike the method of natural childbirth used by Muslim and Catholic, the Christian takes the seed of the Word of God into a foreign land, and God Himself increases His family members in that place, to the point where entire tribes are often converted to Jesus, and nations are turned from darkness into light by a growing presence of God's people. Our jihadists are called missionaries, apostles, and may their tribes increase!
Muhammad next introduces the regulation that Muslims entering and conquering a foreign land are to collect from its citizens tribute, much as conquering tribes of old.
Jesus calls us to ignore the ridiculous assumption that we, as citizens of the Kingdom of God, are bound to pay taxes to a usurper, which would include anyone except Jesus. Ignore the notion, he implies, but not the taxes. So as not to offend the government, whether it be our own or a Muslim infiltrator, we smile and we give them what they ask, knowing our God will provide what we need in spite of their unjust demands.
Oh what a different people we are! Sometimes it is hard for me to stay focused on the Koran, when the Bible's truths keep shining through! The Koran has strengthened greatly my faith in Jesus and His true word by reminding me there is no viable alternative to Truth that comes from Heaven, which Truth we have in Jesus and His Bible.
We will attempt to finish sura 9 next.
Lesson 27, The Superior Koran and the Muslim Pharaoh
Now we finish sura 9, "The repentant," and chapter 10, "Yunus" (Jonah?)
We start out with what appears to be a misunderstanding of Muhammad, in 9:30, where he states that Jews claim that Ezra is the son of Allah as Christians say that the Christ is his son. Not sure where he got his information on that, but I am not aware of such a Jewish claim.
In verses 38ff once more Muhammad is encouraging Muslim soldiers to get out and fight, and they are threatened with " a painful torment" if they do not. Victory is assured, says Allah, even if he has to send troops they do not see... In the following verses he encourages those on the field by letting them know that it was better that the lazy and fearful did not join them anyway. Let them love this world. Let them hide in caves. They will be lost forever.
60ff .Not only they, but all who oppose Muhammad will be in the fires of hell. Other classes of people are enumerated in this passage, the infidels, the hypocrites, as curse after curse comes from the Muslim god.
In verse 73 Muhammad himself is commanded to perform jihad against all of the above, to be harsh with them. "And their abode will be hell."
Yes, Muhammad, we understand sin and judgment for sin. But where is the mercy from the merciful? Where is the hope for salvation for those who repent? I know where it is. It's in Jesus. And if there be a Muslim hungry for God who is reading these words, I encourage you to come to this Jesus and ask Him to forgive you. For as I keep reading in this chapter, verse 80, I see that no one in your religion may be able to help you if you are wanting more than your religion can give . It says "ask forgiveness for them, or do not ask forgiveness for them; if you ask forgiveness for them seventy times, so Allah will not forgive them..." So, Infidels, hypocrites, come to Jesus. His blood is so powerful!
And did your religion ask you to go to jihad and you refused for one reason or another? Verses 81ff say you do not get a second chance. Come to Jesus, He is the God of the second chance. Start your life over, forgiven.
I read now in verses 102ff that certain of the neighbors of the Arabs, Bedouins, were called in to the mix, and weren't one hundred percent sold out. The counsel for them is to pay alms, and in so doing their souls will be purified. Or, like others, they can gain eternal privilege with God by dying in battle somewhere.
We Christians too believe in spending money and blood for our Lord Jesus Christ. But we are called to do it because we are saved, not to be saved. It is love that motivates us to lay our lives down, not fear of hell, a fear which is eliminated when first Christ's sacrifice is believed.
One last call to bloodshed is issued in verses 123ff of chapter 9. This call is to war against neighbors who might be infidels.
In this final Medina sura, Muhammad is obviously in a tight spot. People are not accepting his new religion. Things are getting bloody. Unashamedly he tells his people to kill, and kill some more, believing Allah will be with those who uphold his and the prophet's honor. And by sending forth this message in his last words to his followers, he seals the message of evangelism by the sword for all time. And so it has been. And so it is in our day. Other methods will be tried first, but Islam is committed to violent conquest if needed.
Do I need remind my listeners/readers here that, at very best, this is Old Covenant thinking? That the Son of God has come and changed Kingdom thinking forever? That the power we have available now is not carnal but mighty through the Spirit of God? We say to all who will rule by the arm of flesh, first that it will fail you, and second, you expose yourself as being not from God but from the Enemy, whether you be the church of Rome, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim. On this side of Armageddon, God's people fight with God's power only!
Let's move quickly out of sura 9, and move back to Mecca, at an earlier more peaceful time. Sura 10 is called "Yunus", by which we think that the prophet meant to say "Jonah." We'll never know, because in this sura there is only one obscure reference to "Yunus."
After many familiar sounding suggestions of Allah's superiority, and the Koran's, readers are asked if people say Muhammad has forged his writings. His response: "So bring a sura like it..." Produce words as great as the Koran's, if you are so great, Mr. Critic.
Hmmm, I think John 3:16 and Matthew 6:33 and Psalm 23 and Genesis 1 will stack up favorably against any Koranic verse I have read so far. How about you? We must not criticize or ridicule the literature of a people who have known little else. A huge percent of Muslims have never even read the Koran, but I still do not want to belittle this book on the basis of literature. Neither must we accept the notion that the Koran is supernatural and exquisite literature on the basis of one man's affirmation of it.
I skip now a lot of verses that are either repeated statements or statements with which we agree, for as I said earlier, there is certainly some truth in the book.
One fascinating difference we come across in verses 90ff is the fact that the Pharaoh who followed Moses into the Red Sea did not drown. At the very last second, he called out, "I believed that there is no god but him on whom the children of Israel believed, and I am of the Muslims."
Yet another Muslim convert. Not only does Muhammad contradict Moses here, but he seems to come against Muhammad, too. In at least two other places, some would say four, the Koran reports the death of Pharaoh in the sea, with no mention of his conversion. Moot point. The fact is, here in chapter 10, the King of Egypt calls upon the name of Allah and is saved. Or is he? Deathbed repentance Muhammad has already disallowed. Second chances are nearly always forbidden. Did he make it or not?
Of course, the Bible does not suggest so. His heart was hard, and harder, and finally so hard that it brought him to his eternal damnation. That seems to be the way of sin.
Once more in verses 94ff, Muhammad sends Muslims to the people of the book if they are doubting his revelations. This would seem, again, to bring us to the conclusion that "the book" of Muhammad's day was in order, and not somehow "corrupted." Muhammad trusted that his people would find confirmation of the law of God in their book. "Indeed, the truth came to you from your lord, so do not be of the doubters." I can agree with that. But if that is so, why do I need another revelation? That which is in agreement with the original word ought to be enough. Allah's words cannot change, says Muhammad, so why are you talking to us?
Verses 99ff , written, you recall, from Mecca in earlier more peaceful days, suggests that Allah could force people to believe. A veiled threat here, a prophecy of what is to come? For now, he says that it is "Allah who causes you to die." Later of course, Allah will enlist Muhammad and his followers to aid him in this project.
So ends chapter 10. Suras 11 -13 next time, as the suras begin to shorten in length, and cover much that we've already discussed. So the tempo will increase.
Lesson 28, Noah's drowned son and the story of Joseph
Today we begin with sura 11, and we also cover 12 and 13.
Sura 11 is called "Houd." "Houd" is a character mentioned in an earlier sura who now gives his name to this one. His story is unique to Muhammad, and we will leave it alone.
Much of the terrain of the rest of this chapter is familiar, with one notable exception in verses 42ff. Here we are introduced to a curious addition to the Bible's story of Noah. You will recall that Noah had three sons, and that all three, along with Noah and all their wives, were saved on the ark. Not so in the Koran. One son, unnamed in the verses, actually got away, and drowned, in spite of the pleadings of his father to come back to the ark.
Perhaps even more damaging to the general theme of truth is the repeated notion that good works will save. To be precise, verse 114: "Surely good deeds drive away the evil deeds." Sometimes we wish so, but in God's eyes it is not going to happen. Only forgiveness can cleanse a man from sin, and that forgiveness is only available through what Jesus did on Calvary. So, both the greatest problem of all mankind, and its solution, are missing in this holy book.
Sura 12, from Mecca, is remarkable in that it is the first one so far that stays on one topic for its entirety. Its topic, and its name, is [Old Testament] Joseph. Muhammad seems to have remembered this one fairly well, but several changes do occur along the way. In the Koran version, his jealous brothers actually ask Dad to send Joseph with them on that fateful day: "O our father, why do you not trust us with Joseph?" they plead.
After their malicious deed is performed, they tell Jacob that a wolf ate him, to which he responds with incredible grace: "Yet your soul lightens the affair. So patience is beautiful, and Allah is the one who will be asked for assistance..." In the Bible, Jacob is distressed almost to the point of heart failure and total collapse. Emotion!
In Muhammad's telling, it is a chance traveler that discovers Joseph in a well, not the brothers who come and pull him out to sell for a profit to some passing merchants.
Then to Potiphar's wife. The captain of the guard is given a name change. He is now Al-'Aziz. His wife does her seducing, and lies to her husband about it, but Joseph is not immediately arrested. The town gossips get together at Mrs. Potiphar's house and wrest a confession from her, which never gets to the husband's ears.
Then Joseph goes to jail, but it is not clear why or how.
When all of the jail events have taken place, and Joseph stands before "the king", not called Pharaoh in this account, it is Joseph who suggests that he be given an administrative position in the kingdom. You will recall that in the Bible story, Joseph simply recommends that someone be appointed to the huge task ahead of them. We cannot tell how much Joseph knew about what he was asking, but it seems that Pharaoh's appointment shocked Joseph.
Then comes the revealing of Joseph to his visiting brothers, suddenly needy customers from a foreign country. Muhammad says that he took one brother aside and told him the truth about himself, right before the poignant Benjamin incident, where Joseph's cup is placed in his younger brother's sack.
The brothers are all sent back to tell Jacob that Benjamin has been stolen, in spite of the fact that one brother [we know him as Judah] offered to be a slave in his place. In the Koran, Joseph says, "That we should take anyone but him with whom our property was found, for then we should act unjustly." In the Bible, Judah's plea, and description of his ailing father brings Joseph to the end of the charade. He tells all.
So, the Koran continues, Jacob hears all this, and begins crying for Joseph instead of Benjamin! His other sons rebuke him for this, and eventually return to Joseph, who rebukes them for what they did. Of course, in the Bible, it just isn't so. There we see God's man, a type of Jesus Christ, freely forgiving his brothers, and bringing great peace and joy to his family.
In yet another added twist to all of this, Joseph finally tells who he is, then gives his shirt, instructing his brothers to "throw it on my father's face..." The idea being that Jacob will smell Joseph's body scent and believe the brothers' story.
The story ends per the Bible, with the exception of the fact that Joseph is said to lodge his parents in Egypt after that. In fact, one of his parents, mother Rachel, has been dead for some time. At least, that's how it is in the Bible, the book to which Muhammad has sent his listeners often, as though it were a trusted piece of literature.
So why, why, you ask? Did Muhammad simply not know this Biblical story, and all the others with which he plays so loosely regarding the facts? Was he simply embellishing and filling in those places where memory did not serve? Was it deliberate corruption of the text, to let all know that it was he, Muhammad, that now had control of history? Was this truly a spirit, as he feared from the beginning, not of God, but the Enemy? Those are the only choices that I think we have.
We know that the Islamic option, that it is true, does not fit any sense of logic, since the Old Testament Scriptures predated Muhammad's recitations by so many hundreds of years.
From Medina comes sura 13, "The Thunder". It is in verse 13 that the word is used, and is meant to strike fear in the hearts of those who listen. In this, the chapter is typically Medinan.
As to its other contents, Muhammad attempts to describe natural phenomena in terms of the power of Allah. We see the sun and the moon traveling, and the earth "spread" and kept in place by "stabilizers."
Questionable science, to be sure. But as always, more questionable theology. And I quote (verse 11): "Surely Allah will not change what is in a people until they change what is in themselves." True? Or false? Have we finally found the source of that ancient quote, "God helps those who help themselves?"
Both quotes are false, from wherever they came. If we are dependent on man to make the first move, we are all lost for sure. Here is love, says the Bible, "not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and gave His Son to be a propitiation for our sin." Propitiation. Atonement. Payment. Calvary. All sadly missing in Muhammad's plan of salvation.
Even in your life, and in mine, was it not God Who moved first?
One other note about this sura: Allah makes it plain several times in the Koran that he has sent down the readings in the Arabic language. Well, not quite true. There are literally hundreds of words, used multiple times, that are from either Persian, Berber, Syriac, Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Ethiopian, Akkadian, Latin, Pahlavi, Abyssinian, Mesopotamian, or absolutely unknown sources. This is distressing to the Muslim mindset, but there is no way around the facts of the case.
No, the Koran is not totally Arabic. Two vivid examples of this are the words for God (Allah) and the book of recitations themselves (Qur'an)!
Next time we begin with sura 14.
