- Jan 12, 2012
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A Pakistani guy that I used to converse with took the position that muslims, jews and christians all worshipped the same god. That jews lost their way because of their continual disobedience to god. Christians lost their way because of the different translations into other languages ended up confusing the meaning. Since the Koran should only be read in the original Arabic, it is the only truly accurate account.
This reminds me of the following:
[video=youtube;HsCVuO1yeJc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsCVuO1yeJc[/video]
Now that we have established that Shakespeare must be read in the original Klingon...
That's a common basic belief. The Bible refines the message of the Torah, and any dispute between the two is resolved in favor if the newer text, the Bible. The Quran then further refines the religion, and any dispute between the Bible and Quran is resolved in favor of the newer Quran.
I am given to understand that this same principle also applies within the Islamic text, such that if there is a conflict, the latest revelation is authoritative. Incidentally, my understanding is that the Quran becomes progressively less kind to unbelievers as you move from chronological start to finish, creating some concerns from my perspective.
I would also point out that correct Christian interpretation maintains that the Scripture is the perfect, unerring revealed Word of God and does not contradict itself, so in the event you believe you have found a contradiction, the correct response is to study all Scripture addressing the subject until you resolve your apparent contradiction.
Do you know of any Muslims who believe that God sent His son, Jesus, to lead a perfect life and then be crucified so that the world could be offered forgiveness and eternal life with God?
That is the God that Christians worship. That is the God of the Old Testament. Anyone who does not believe it is worshiping a different being.
I'm probably the only one on INGO with that going on, though. You are arguing I misunderstand the nature of God, not that it is a different God. I find coconut to be disgusting. You may love coconut. We disagree on the nature of coconut, but we're talking about the same thing. Regardless, it's a distinction that is more important to you than to me.
Yes. Translations are never quite right, I think we can agree on that regardless of what language to what language is under consideration. Dirty little secret, though, I've forgotten most of it. It's been so long since I used it that it's mostly fallen out of my head. I was never to the level I would consider fluent, regardless, but I could read and have simple conversation. After 10 years of neglect of the skill, I could probably not read Little Red Riding Hood. A failure on my part, I'm just too comfortable with English translation and then the explanatory text offered with it. I think I understand better that way then in a language I sorta/kinda get. Plus Arabic is hard. *whine* why can't they use regular letters??? Technically a translation is not a Quran, its a translation of the Quran, and that's often an important distinction.
**Edited to add**
The translations are sort of like children's books. They are primers, used until you can digest more and more and eventually master Arabic and not need the crutch of translation any longer. I sort of stalled in the toddler phase of that process and then regressed back to infant level. If I'd stuck with it, I'd probably be proficient, but instead I failed and am basically sticking alphabet blocks in my mouth to try and figure out what sound they make again.
I would say that regardless of how you parse the nature of the disagreement, Christian and Moslem notions of God are mutually exclusive. I will agree that translation by its nature is less precise than some would like to believe it to be, but it is also possible to understand the nature of the translation(s) into your language to compensate for things that just don't translate well. This is the reason why you can go to the Christian book store and get at least one exhaustive concordance, at least one Hebrew concordance, at least one Greek concordance, and at least one expository dictionary keyed to the translation of your choice. Proper understanding and use of those books is sufficient to adjust for any imprecise elements of translation. It is a much more efficient way of achieving excellent results than simply dictating that you WILL learn Hebrew and Greek.
I also have to be enough of a contrarian to point out that the Old and New Testaments were complete several centuries before the appearance of the Quran, which would seem, by Islamic standards, to cast aspersions on its treatment of events which predate it.
But Steve, using your logic, do jews worship the same god as us Christians do?
Personally, I would argue that it is a technical disagreement. The Jews do not doubt that there is to be a Messiah. They simply do not accept Jesus bar Joseph as that Messiah.