prepared By: Magdy Abdalshafy
The Holy Book is no longer God's word , inside the Holy Book there are a large number of contradictions between the words, the facts and the statements, there are also many historical anachronisms, scientific absurdities and much other human adulteration.
We do not mean to stage a critique for the sake of critique. Among the basics that Islam is based on is to believe in the previous Holy Books. But is the Holy Book that we read now and a large number of people hold it to bosom God' word?
This question, though answered by many people, but " Jesus Seminar fellows", a group of 200 scientists with high scholarship in theology and Christian sciences, will be the most reliable and shocking in the* same time.
There are two kinds of biblical distortions: explicit distortions which are directly related to clear changes in the text, which arise through alteration, omission or addition to the original text; and implicit distortions which are brought about by deliberate misinterpretation without any actual textual change. There is no dispute over the existence of such distortions in the Bible since all Christians, both Protestants and Catholics, admit their existence.
********* According to them the verses of the Old Testament containing references to Christ and the injunctions which were, to the Jews, of perpetual value were distorted by the Jews through misinterpretation. Protestant theologians claim that the Catholics have distorted many texts of both the Old and the New Testament. The Catholics similarly accuse the Protestants of having distorted the text of the Bible. We therefore do not need to include demonstrations of implicit distortions as they have already been provided by the Christians themselves.
********* As far as textual distortion is concerned, this kind of distortion is denied by the Protestants and they offer false arguments and misguiding statements in their writings in order to create doubts among the Muslims. It is therefore necessary to demonstrate that all the three kinds of textual distortion, that is, alterations in the text: the deletion of phrases and verses from the text; and later additions to the original texts are abundantly present in both the. Old and the New Testaments. (1)
http://www.islam4all.com/human_distortion_of_the_bible.htm
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Jesus Seminar blew fatal blow to the long-established concepts about Christianity
The Jesus Seminar was originally formed in 1985 under the sponsorship of the Westar Institute to “renew the quest of the historical Jesus.” Thirty scholars participated in the first meeting and approximately 200 people now call themselves “fellows.” The Seminar meets twice a year to debate technical papers that have been prepared and circulated in advance. Each paper typically focuses on the dissection of Biblical passages. At the close of each debate on each paper, the Seminar fellows use colored beads to vote on the “authenticity of Jesus’ words or deeds” covered by the dissected scripture.
Jesus Seminar: The Real Goal
The goal of the Jesus Seminar is supposedly to “separate historical fact from mythology.” This goal was originally stated in founder Robert Funk’s opening address to the first meeting of 30 “scholars” in Berkeley, California (March 1985):
We are about to embark on a momentous enterprise. We are going to inquire simply, rigorously after the voice of Jesus, after what he really said. In this process, we will be asking a question that borders the sacred, that even abuts blasphemy, for many in our society. As a consequence, the course we shall follow may prove hazardous. We may well provoke hostility. But we will set out, in spite of the dangers, because we are professionals and because the issue of Jesus is there to be faced, much as Mt. Everest confronts the team of climbers.
Since that first meeting in 1985, the Seminar has rejected the resurrection of Jesus from the dead,
*and over 80% of the teachings normally attributed to Jesus. All of these Biblical records have been rejected because Seminar fellows have determined that they are merely legendary accretions with no historical foundation. For example, only two words of the Lord's Prayer survive as authentic: "Our Father."
Also Jesus Seminar fellows are in agreement on many important areas, among these the following ten points
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The authors of the four canonical Gospels are not Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, as traditionally believed.
None of these four Gospels were written before the fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70.
The oral tradition of Jesus' sayings was quite fluid. Simple teachings were often greatly expanded, embellished, and distorted in the process.
Various people in the early church, including the Gospel writers themselves, felt free to invent sayings of Jesus that had little or no basis in what He actually taught.
If a saying can be demonstrated to promote later Christian causes, it could not have originated with Jesus.
The historicity of John’s gospel is extremely suspect.
Historical analysis cannot admit the supernatural as an explanation for an event. Therefore, Jesus' words after His resurrection—like His earlier predictions about His death, resurrection, and return—cannot be authentic.
Jesus never explained His parables and aphorisms. All concluding words of explanation, especially allegorical interpretations of parables and metaphors, are thus inauthentic.
Jesus never directly declared who He was. All such “self-referential” material (in which Jesus says, “I am…” or, “I have come to…”) is therefore also inauthentic.
The burden of proof rests on any particular scholar who would claim authenticity for a particular saying of Jesus and not on the skeptic.
The following article is quoted from"
*It is so choking that we are sure, now, that *82% of the words of Jesus ( as Jesus Seminar fellows claim) *are not his:
"The Five Gospels," is a 550 page book containing translations of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. It was the result of a six year study by 24 Christian scholars from a number of Western universities. They decided to produce a translation of the Gospels which would be uncolored by the translator's personal faith. It was decided that this translation was to give the reader an honest picture of what Jesus* truly said. They scanned the text for the words of Jesus, and collect an index of over 1,500 such sayings. They then tested the validity of each of these sayings, one at a time, to see whether Jesus truly said each one. They then produced a fresh translation, color-coded to show authentic Jesuit sayings and those of an unreliable nature. Their conclusion (page 5) was:
"Eighty-two percent of the words ascribed to Jesus in the gospels were not actually spoken by him."
They go on to reveal that:
"biblical scholars and theologians alike have learned to distinguish the Jesus of history from the Christ of faith. It has been a painful lesson for both the church and scholarship. The distinction between the two figures is the difference between a historical person who lived in a particular time and place...and a figure who has been assigned a mythical role, in which he descends from heaven to rescue humankind and, of course, eventually returns there."
Well then, if 82% of the "words of Jesus" found in the Bible were apparently never spoken by him then where did they come from? Some of the sources demonstrated by the authors are:
"The concept of plagiarism was unknown in the ancient world. Authors freely copied from predecessors without acknowledgment. Sages became the repository of free-floating proverbs and witticisms. For the first Christians, Jesus was a legendary sage: it was proper to attribute the world's wisdom to him. The proverb in Mark 2:17, for example, is attested in secular sources (Plutarch and Diogenes for example)...in the parallel to the Markan passage, Matthew adds a sentence taken from the prophet Hosea (Matt 9:13)."
Also:
"Hard sayings are frequently softened in the process of transmission to adapt them to the conditions of daily living...Variations in difficult saying often betray the struggle of the early Christian community to interpret or adapt sayings to its own situations... Matthew's version of the aphorism "The last will be first and the first last"(Matt 20:16) is softened in Mark 10:31 to "MANY of the first will be last, and of the last MANY will be first"."
And probably most revealing:
"Christian conviction eventually overwhelms Jesus: he is made to confess what Christians had come to believe...The contrast between Christian language or viewpoint and the language or viewpoint of Jesus is a very important clue to the real voice of Jesus, the language of Jesus was distinctive, as was his style and perspective."
The above is only a very small sampling of the very large cache of evidence clearly showing the Bible to have been seriously distorted and altered. To this day it is being continuously edited, corrected, and modified. This is not to say that Christians are not good and honest people in search of the truth. Quite the opposite. Among them are some of the most decent and moral people on this earth. The goal of this book is only to show that the Christian faith as it stands today is not the same one preached by Jesus peace be upon him to his followers nineteen hundred years ago. This is exactly what the Qur'an has been asserting for over fourteen hundred years now.
"O People of the Book! Why do you reject the Signs of God, when you [yourselves] bear witness [to their truth] ?. O People of the Book! Why do you clothe Truth with falsehood, and conceal the Truth, while you have knowledge?* (The Noble Quran, 3:70-71)"
"Say: 'O People of the Book (Jews and Christians)! Why do you reject the Signs of God, when God is Himself witness to all you do?' Say: 'O People of the Book! Why do you obstruct those who believe from the path of God, Seeking to make it crooked, while you were yourselves witnesses? But God is not unaware of what you do' * (The Noble Quran, 3:98-99)"
"Truly, the Religion in the Sight of God is Islam (literally: "the submission"). Nor did those who were given the scripture dissent therefrom except after knowledge had come to them, through envy of each other. But whosoever disbelieves in the Signs of God, [then surely,] God is swift in calling to account.* (The Noble Quran, 3:19)"
"They are not all alike. Of the People of the Scripture there is a party who stand [for that which is right], they recite the revelations of Allah throughout the night, falling prostrate [before Him].* (The Noble Quran, 3:113)"
"And there are, certainly, among the People of the Book, those who believe in God, and in that which was sent down unto you, and in that which was sent down unto them, humbling themselves before God: They will not sell the Signs of God for a miserable gain! For them is a reward with their Lord, and God is swift to take account.* (The Noble Quran, 3:199)"
"O people of the Book! Now has come unto you Our messenger, revealing to you much of what you used to hide in the Book, and passing over much. Indeed, there has come to you from God a light and a plain Scripture* (The Noble Quran, 5:15)"
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magdy.abdalshafy@yahoo.com
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