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[Patapwn]

It really wasn't. The council of Nicea didn't occur til 325 AD, and decay and conflict amongst the Christians continues to this day, the great schism between the East and West Churches occurred some 1000 years later, and then we move on into further fracturing between Protestant and Catholic.The assertion that Christianity was the same for 600 years is absolutely contradicting all the historical evidence. Do you still assert it? If so, on what foundation?

I suppose I cannot sway you, but the historical evidence is that Christianity, from day 1, was not Islam. And that the words and ideas told by Muhammad were different from what Christianity was and has always been. This idea that 'decay' (which by definition is a contentious and compounded breakdown) is incorrect because the words and ideas were always equally incorrect. This idea of decay filling in gods absence for hundreds of years is a nice apologetic attempt but under investigation shows to not be. I don't know why you continue to stand by such assertions, perhaps it is something you believe on faith alone?

Simply because people do not have direct access to a Prophet or Messenger (alayhis salaam) does not mean that they are without access to the word of God. Every community has been visited by a Prophet at some point in time, and so every community has access through their own traditions to something of the truth. They are held accountable to their reaction to this truth, not to their reaction to the original message, that they don't have access to in its pure form. This is how equality exists, where an individual is held accountable to what he knows, not what he doesn't.

Every community has been visited by a prophet at some point in time? Is this another thing you believe on faith alone or do we have some actual evidence? Because as evidence would show, the pacific islander never heard the words of Judaism, Christianity, or Islam. These things were created in a very specific location at very specific times by very specific people.

Do you base this opinion on anything in particular? While I respect you right to hold your opinion, I am very persuaded by an argument that says 'well in my opinion, you're wrong!'.

This is not opinion. The qar'an is a book of words and untimely ideas. That is what it is. The flowery poetic descriptions that Muslims ascribe to their holy book should not be taken into consideration when comparing and contrasting the meat and potatoes of the Torah, the bible, and the qur'an. And with that said, the stories of the quran were inspired (I would say plagiarized) from the previous works that are the bible and torah.

The Qur'an sets up a test; create something like it. Create something from scratch that contains anything approaching the complexity and beauty of the Arabic poetry. Of course this will be hard for you specifically to appraise. To which I say 'don't appraise it then', you don't have to be convinced, but you also can't be convinced the other way. You simply can't have an opinion on something you have no experience of. That doesn't mean you have to take my word for it. It just means that you are only expressing your subjectivity when you make claims as to its verifiability or not.

Fine, I will create a task for you: Make me a sandwich! (how did I do?) All joking aside, you are a Muslim hyping your holy book as the word of god. I do not look poorly on you for doing so. I understand why you do it. As I mentioned, my mother often accounts her readings of the bible while 'imbued with the holy spirit.' She claims it speaks to her on a level of emotion only god is capable of imbuing. Unsurprisingly, this is the same line of reasoning Muslims (or any religious person from any religion) use when they say 'OMG so complex and beautiful, it speaks to me...'

What makes you think you should be? What in life makes you believe that equality is something bestowed upon you automatically by the Universe? We exist as reflections of the attributes of God. God is al-Rahmen (the Most-Merciful) so there exist people, the Believers, as objects of His mercy. However he is not limited to 'Mercy' as an attribute, he is also al-Hakam (the Ultimate Judge) and so those exist who will be receivers of His judgement. He is al-Muthil (the Degrader) the one who brings degradation upon people.

You misinterpret my meaning. I was not saying I deserve anything. I was saying that in the context of god wanting man to know his word, his omnipotence is very suspicious in light of his efforts. The very fact that god contacts men (Jesus, Muhammad, etc. in the Muslim perspective's opinion) shows that he has nothing against directly accomplishing his goal, (at least to one single man who could perhaps be lying). If this is his will, and he has the power to accomplish his will (considering he's GOD), then why not contact every person and give them the same opportunity presented to the supposed 'prophets'? Such actions seem contradictory. Or inaction if you will. That's why I proposed god as being sleepy in my OP that started the conversation. I gave him the benefit that his actions were not contradictory, but that he was merely sleepy.

 

[RiZ III]

Hey Muslims, I have a question. Why did god wait 600 years to supposedly right a mistelling of his word?

Was he sleeping?

Why did God send down thousands of pages of scripture, and countless prophets but never mention He had a son?

The message of Jesus didn't disappear. The church of Jerusalem which was led by his own brothers were wholly Jewish. Them and their offshoots such as the Ebionites didn't worship Jesus or consider him divine and survived until the coming of Muhammad.

God did not wrong people, the people wronged themselves. Also, it's not like the Torah wasn't around during those 600 years. If you want to know about the historical Jesus, who was a completely Jewish figure, pick up any book on the subject written in the last 200 years. Go ask your pastor about the Jewishness of the historical Jesus, if he is a graduate of a seminary, he will tell you the same thing scholars have been saying about Jesus. Pastors just don't talk about it in church for whatever reason.

 

[Patapwn]

Why did God send down thousands of pages of scripture, and countless prophets but never mention He had a son?

The message of Jesus didn't disappear. The church of Jerusalem which was led by his own brothers were wholly Jewish. Them and their offshoots such as the Ebionites didn't worship Jesus or consider him divine and survived until the coming of Muhammad.

God did not wrong people, the people wronged themselves. Also, it's not like the Torah wasn't around during those 600 years. If you want to know about the historical Jesus, who was a completely Jewish figure, pick up any book on the subject written in the last 200 years. Go ask your pastor about the Jewishness of the historical Jesus, if he is a graduate of a seminary, he will tell you the same thing scholars have been saying about Jesus. Pastors just don't talk about it in church for whatever reason.

I don't have a paster and you haven't been following the discussion. And the offshoots you proclaim were never that of Islam thus the gap of time and the death of millions remains a major issue.

You claim people wronged themselves? Did your god contact them like he did only a supposed few? From the way religion seems to operate, one man proclaims, the rest follow. Like animals without a mind of their own, they follow the supposed words of Muhammad, Moses, etc. as though it was not to be questioned. If anything, the prophets of yesteryear were the ones doing the wronging (assuming your a Muslim this would be your perspective yes?) Seems like god should have dropped such ineffective tactics the first time it failed and just did away with the 'one man' thing. But god does not operate with such efficiency... odd isn't it.

 

[F#A#Oo]

Why is it Jesus returning and not M.? The answer to that would be the bolded?

Muhammad (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) he accomplished the mission that he was ordained by God to accomplish, his return is not needed because he did not really leave the world. Through the well preserved words of the Qur`an and his Sunnah he has assumed a permanent authentic presence in the world. This is also why he is the last prophet. Through the Qur`an and Sunnah prophecy has become an ever-present reality.

Yes Jesus (alayhis salaam) will bring Christians and Jews under the fold of Islam by overcoming factors that have so far prevented this. In case of Christians, these factors are: the doctrine of redemption through the cross, Trinitarian concept of God, and Paulian rejection of the law. In case of the Jews these factors are: beliefs that make them see their nation, their ancient land, and their ancient Davidic kingdom much more important religiously than they actually are.

Jesus (alayhis salaam) upon his return will drive home to Christians the Islamic message that he was no more divine than Moses (alayhis salaam) and other prophets, that his blood had nothing to do with man’s salvation and that the law is not nailed on the cross. To the Jews he will drive home the Islamic message that although in the history of revelation and salvation some nations may be more important than others and God may even at times favor some above the others, as indeed he did in case of the children of Israel, neither the Jewish nation nor any other nation is permanently and unconditionally given a favored or chosen status.

So Christ was created through the Word of God? By that, would that not make the Christ part of the Word? If that is the case and the Word is part of God, would that not make Christ also part of God?

God decreed Mary (alayhas salaam) conceive 'Be,' and it is.

Adam and Eve (alayhis salaam) would be superior to all if we used the Christian concept and definition of birth/creation as they had no mother nor father.

 

[Pollux]

Why did God send down thousands of pages of scripture, and countless prophets but never mention He had a son?

The message of Jesus didn't disappear. The church of Jerusalem which was led by his own brothers were wholly Jewish. Them and their offshoots such as the Ebionites didn't worship Jesus or consider him divine and survived until the coming of Muhammad.

God did not wrong people, the people wronged themselves. Also, it's not like the Torah wasn't around during those 600 years. If you want to know about the historical Jesus, who was a completely Jewish figure, pick up any book on the subject written in the last 200 years. Go ask your pastor about the Jewishness of the historical Jesus, if he is a graduate of a seminary, he will tell you the same thing scholars have been saying about Jesus. Pastors just don't talk about it in church for whatever reason.

The Ebionites weren't Jews, as you're defining Jew, either. Yes the followed Jewish Law, but they also, as you say, did not believe in the divinity of Jesus, yet believed he was the Messiah. If you're a Muslim you view them as keeping true to your interpretation of Jesus. I view them as heretics.

"The people wronged themselves" --> This can be said of any faith. You think I'm wrong, I think you're wrong. Let's move on.

Jesus wasn't exactly Jewish. There are multiple times where he mocked Jewish Law. The Sabbath is one of the holiest ideas in Judaism, and Jesus placed himself above it multiple times.

Matthew 12: 9-14

9 Departing from there, He went into their synagogue. 10 And a man was there whose hand was withered. And they questioned [f]Jesus, asking, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”—so that they might accuse Him. 11 And He said to them, “What man [g]is there among you who [h]has a sheep, and if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will he not take hold of it and lift it out? 12 How much more valuable then is a man than a sheep! So then, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.” 13 Then He *said to the man, “Stretch out your hand!” He stretched it out, and it was restored to [j]normal, like the other. 14 But the Pharisees went out and [k]conspired against Him, as to how they might destroy Him.

John 5: 10-17

Now it was the Sabbath on that day. 10 So the Jews were saying to the man who was cured, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not permissible for you to carry your pallet.” 11 But he answered them, “He who made me well was the one who said to me, ‘Pick up your pallet and walk.’” 12 They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Pick up your pallet and walk’?” 13 But the man who was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had slipped away while there was a crowd in that place. 14 Afterward Jesus *found him in the temple and said to him, “Behold, you have become well; do not sin anymore, so that nothing worse happens to you.” 15 The man went away, and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well. 16 For this reason the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because He was doing these things on the Sabbath. 17 But He answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I Myself am working.”

John 9: 13-17

13 They *brought to the Pharisees the man who was formerly blind. 14 Now it was a Sabbath on the day when Jesus made the clay and opened his eyes. 15 Then the Pharisees also were asking him again how he received his sight. And he said to them, “He applied clay to my eyes, and I washed, and I see.” 16 Therefore some of the Pharisees were saying, “This man is not from God, because He does not keep the Sabbath.” But others were saying, “How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?” And there was a division among them. 17 So they *said to the blind man again, “What do you say about Him, since He opened your eyes?” And he said, “He is a prophet.”

 

[Pollux]

Muhammad (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) he accomplished the mission that he was ordained by God to accomplish, his return is not needed because he did not really leave the world. Through the well preserved words of the Qur`an and his Sunnah he has assumed a permanent authentic presence in the world. This is also why he is the last prophet. Through the Qur`an and Sunnah prophecy has become an ever-present reality.

Yes Jesus (alayhis salaam) will bring Christians and Jews under the fold of Islam by overcoming factors that have so far prevented this. In case of Christians, these factors are: the doctrine of redemption through the cross, Trinitarian concept of God, and Paulian rejection of the law. In case of the Jews these factors are: beliefs that make them see their nation, their ancient land, and their ancient Davidic kingdom much more important religiously than they actually are.

Jesus (alayhis salaam) upon his return will drive home to Christians the Islamic message that he was no more divine than Moses (alayhis salaam) and other prophets, that his blood had nothing to do with man’s salvation and that the law is not nailed on the cross. To the Jews he will drive home the Islamic message that although in the history of revelation and salvation some nations may be more important than others and God may even at times favor some above the others, as indeed he did in case of the children of Israel, neither the Jewish nation nor any other nation is permanently and unconditionally given a favored or chosen status.

Ok.

God decreed Mary (alayhas salaam) conceive 'Be,' and it is.

Adam and Eve (alayhis salaam) would be superior to all if we used the Christian concept and definition of birth/creation as they had no mother nor father.

Not really. Adam was made from dust or clay, and Eve was made from Adam's rib. Neither was fully created by the Word or Holy Spirit.

 

[RiZ III]

Salaam Ottoman,

Well known? People would collect everything they could of him, down to his fingernails!

Of this there is no evidence. Unfortunately we have almost nothing physical coming out of the first century of Islam besides the Quran. I know strands of his hair still exist supposedly, though I find them highly dubious considering he didn't even want an image of his remaining after his death. What evidence is there at these are his? I'm asking because I honestly have no idea when/where/who these came from.

You use the word 'scripture' to describe the hadith, when that word does not describe what they are at all.

I agree 100% with you. They aren't scripture, but people treat them as scripture. They take the hadith as a source of law banning what God didn't ban, and enjoining what He did not enjoying.

They are equated to the Messenger of God (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) because they ARE what we take of him, they are what remains.

They are equated with him yes, an equality which I don't hold as valid. If Muhammad had written it, or if it had been preserved in the same way as the Quran has been recorded, then I would be among the first to accept it.

As to your final point... as far as I understand it, all the madhabs will take the Qur'an when there is a contradiction between a hadith and the Qur'an, so this point does not work when it comes to talking about the basis of law. They are clarifications of the law itself, the fulfilment of Quranic imperatives.

If only that was the case. The hadith bans foods the Quran doesn't forbid, commands death for adultry, forbids music, forbids silk for men, etc..

I don't have a problem with hadith which don't go against any teaching of the Quran. In fact some are beautiful regardless of whether they are from Muhammad or not. I love this one:
youtu.be/Q9t3vIrQPOk

How many disciples did Jesus (alayhi salaam) reportedly have?

Christian sources are too conflicted on the matter, but Luke writing the Acts about 100 years after Jesus says that there were thousands of followers. His own brothers led the church of Jerusalem and they, according to modern scholarship, were pious Jews who didn't worship Jesus or consider him divine.

Now how many Mohammed (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam)?

How united did they remain after Prophet Muhammad's death? How united was the Ummah? Did they not spread propaganda against each other and start major civil wars? Both inventing lies about the other. Sad how it turned out, but true. The point is that even the early sources can't be trusted a 100%. Does this invalidate all hadith? No, but it doesn't help their case either. Certainly hadith stressing the importance of following their rulers no matter who they are become suspect.

Not really not from Yemen to Iraq, not in the way that would be required to get 10 different people in 10 different places to say the same words... not just for one hadith, but for hundreds upon thousands upon hundreds of thousands.

How many hadith fall into this category? Hadith which were reported by tens of different people in different regions? Is there a collection of just these Mutawatir hadith?

How do you know he did, if not through the same way that the hadith got to you? the same sources that say he banned the writing down of hadith, are those that say the Uthman (radiAllahu anhu) told the Muslims to write them down. If you accept the first account, do you accept the second?

That's exactly my point, the sources aren't reliable. They contradict each other but according to you these sources should be accurate. So how can you accept one and not the other?

I can, off the top of my head, remember hundreds of the sayings of the Messenger of God (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam). I do not say this to post, or posit that I am better than you in any way, I merely point out that it is possible to remember such things easily, especially if one has trained the brain to do so.

This is me, a white dude, who came to Islam with half his braincells gone from his youth, and coming from a recording culture, a culture whose emphasis is rarely on recalled information.

Masha'Allah. Race has nothing to do with it though.

When I say classification, I refer to in terms of authenticity based on number of transmissions, I would never imply that the hadith have the same classification in terms of being the book of God.

O good!

I use the term 'Mutawatir' specifically to refer to the Hanafi use of the term, the equivalent term amongst those who aren't Hanafi is 'Mashur'.[/Q  UOTE]

I'm just pointing out that there is disagreement within the ummah about even the “well established” hadith.

The Qur'an did not come to you directly from Gibril (alayhis salaam) but was conveyed to you in the form of a compilation that was transmitted to you in a similar form to the ahadith, at times memorised and not written down, but still conveyed to you in a coherent form.

The Quran wasn't compiled 200 years after Muhammad though nor was it transmitted in a “similar” manner. I already pointed out in my previous post, the way the two come to is is completely different. If the hadith had come directly from Muhammad, they wouldn't all start by saying “I heard from x that he heard from y that he heard from z that he heard from Muhammad.” No, the Quran has been memorized in its entirety since the start and compiled by Muhammad's own companion. The same cannot be said about the Sahih Bukhari (or any other collection of hadith).

 Like the aforementioned commands that relate to obeying him and more specifically, to take his example.

His example was to live by the Quran and his actions concerning the major commands (salaat, hajj, etc.) have been practiced daily by thousands of people since his time. These would not have suddenly been forgotten one day. They might have gotten corrupted over time, which is one of the few good things the hadith help set in stone. Even if Bukhari didn't have any access to Muhammad's verbatim sayings , I don't believe within 200 years the salaat could have completely changed as it was so widely practiced, so even if some of the hadith concerning prayer were an invention of his time they did record how the Muslims prayed in within 2 centuries of Muhammad, which is good.

So much of the Qur'an is concerned with occurrences at the time, yet without the context conveyed in the Seerah and the hadith one cannot understand these in the least. You may understand them, but this is not because they are made clear in the Qur'an, but rather because they have been conveyed to you from your culture and your education.

It's true, context does help a lot. The Sira by Ibn Ishaq was written much earlier than Hadith books and it gives us a decent lens, but just as any book written about events more than a hundred years before it, it isn't 100% accurate.

Without the hadith, you would not even know who the companions referred to in the Qur'an actually were

Why would this matter? How would this effect my knowing what is righteous or what is wrong? The Quran is a complete guide for approaching God even if you don't know something like this. The Quran in general doesn't bother with minuscule details that a historian would want to know (something the Bible is obsessed with), instead it focuses on teaching lessons.

This analogy does not work brother. The Prophet (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) was not merely a Messenger, he was a Prophet! The Qur'an does not merely say 'obey' it says 'refer to him when you have differences', it says 'take him as your example'.

Do you find it odd that God would tell the people around Muhammad to obey him and refer to him when having differences? Of course the Quran would say this, but it's obviously reffering to those people. How can we refer to Muhammad about the differences you and I are having right now? We can't. God didn't say, refer to the sayings of Muhammad other people are telling you they heard from some other people who heard it from some other people. No, it is telling Muhammad's contemporaries to go to him.

That is how we know that the laws that come to him are divinely inspired.

The commands are the Quran. The people would even ask him to bring something else, and he was commanded to say “I can't change it, I only follow what is revealed.” There are numerous verses which declare that the Quran is the revelation. “These are the verses of the Wise Scripture”, “These are the verses that make plain”, “This is a glorious Quran”, so on. There is no evidence that anything was left out of the Quran, in fact it says the opposite, “He[Allah] has send down to you this Scripture fully detailed.”.

Are you denying that the Messenger of God (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) acted as a law giver?

He gave mankind the Quran, the greatest source of law, so yes he was a law giver.

He did not invent his own laws, he transmitted the laws that were the path to God, that were the embodiment of that which is conveyed in the Holy Qur'an. 

Exactly, that's what I've been saying. He transmitted the laws which are in the Quran. I have the Quran. Why should I search through tens of thousands of hadith looking for more laws? No, the Quran contains all of God's laws which Muhammad faithfully transmitted.

To what end are these laws conveyed otherwise? Was the Prophet (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) disobeying Allah when he conveyed them? This is a central point, the Sha'riah in this sense, as conveyed by the Prophet (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) is an indispensable part of the Messenger's role as a Prophet (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam). How can then our best form of action be to abandon the laws he put down, as a leader? Why would Allah use him as a mute Messenger to the people, with a message that was all they needed, and then make the Sayyidina Rasul'Allah sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam an example and a conveyor of law to the people?

Prophet Muhammad wasn't a “mute” messenger, I never said that. He was probably the greatest politician, uniter of men, and leader the world has and will ever see. His job spiritually was simply to warn mankind and deliver God's message and this the Quran is very clear and repetitive about. However, he was also a husband, a politician, a leader, and military strategist. He performed to the best of his abilities in those roles, but those were not his spiritual mission. The mission was to simply convey the message. That message we have and it's the only thing that has come to us preserved a 100% from him. The hadith try to capture all the rest of him, but unfortunately they come 200 years later which is ample time for history to be distorted.

My dad was actually telling me a story a few weeks ago about how him and his 6 siblings all disagreed about the birth date and date of death of their grandmother. Some of them said she was born in 1892 and others said it was 1895 (or some date around there I don't recall). They were all close to her, and they were all there when she passed away. She was an important person in their lives, they all personally knew her, but now they are all old too. Most of them are over 60, it's been about 50 years or so since her death and now they can't remember the exact date. Human memory is not the most reliable thing to go on unfortunately.

What is this if not making your own ijtihad? How is 'whatever you can spare' defined? 

It is following the Quran as the source of law. God knows everyone can afford to give different amounts of charity. It's a beautiful verse when you consider what it is saying. Each one of us knows what we can spend. If I was a billionaire I could spend much more than 2.5% of my wealth and if I am living off of food stamps and welfare, how can I spare to give anything?

Your original question was how do we know how much to give because God doesn't say, now you see that God did say but now ask “how is 'whatever you can spare defined'” and I wonder why is it so hard to follow what is a very simple command? If God wanted it to be 2.5%, don't you think he would say so? He does give us figures for inheritance after all. No, but you are now seeking another source of law and you don't seem to realize. Consider my friend the story of the children of Israel. God said, “sacrifice a cow”. Instead of following the simple command, they made it complicated and kept asking for more details, “what color is she? How old is she? What condition should she be in?”. In this is a great lesson. Ponder over it.

You say you would take things if they were conveyed to you from the companions, but are you really arguing that Abu Bakr (radiAllahu anhu) went to war against those deviants who determined that what they could spare was 'nothing', if that decision was merely up to them? Or do you not trust that account also?

Consider what I have said above, but to answer this, Abu Bakr didn't go to war over interpretations of the Quran. He went to war because these tribes refused to pay allegiance to his rule. They claimed their allegiance was only to Muhammad and with his passing they no longer had to be part of his community or follow Abu Bakr. It was politics more than anything else.

So you can beat her as much as you like, as long as she is not dead? Of course the translation of 'beat' is a shaky one, but it is shaky because of the contemporary use of the word at the time, which you don't know because the Arabic that would allow you to know it is transmitted through even less sound ways than the Hadith.

The Quran also says you can kill unbelievers, now if you would be in gross error if you ignored the rest of the Quran. No, but it is a Muslim's responsibility to take the Quran into great consideration. Personally speaking, about three years ago I headed down a really nasty path and became really terrible person. Eventually I turned back to the Quran and listen to it every morning as I drive to work. It's teachings have made me into a super pacifist. I've been able to let go of grudges, pain, and anger. I find it impossible that if one is well acquainted with the Quran that he/she could be violent. The verse in question can't be taken alone without the regard to the rest of the Quran which consistently encourages the listener to be forgiving, patient, and not aggressive.

Regarding the translation of the word. One of the great parts of the Quran is that it is self referencing. If one is unsure of what a word means, a great place to start is the Quran itself. Look at how Allah is using the word throughout the book. Here you can see how the word is used in the Quran:
http://corpus.quran.com/qurandictionary.jsp?q=Drb#(4:34:29)

How do you know? That is not something in the Qur'an (it refers to the arrangement of them as being something given to the Rasul sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam, but the revelations are not numbered), the description of the compilation and arranging of the Qur'an is in the hadith....

You are right, I remembered an ayah wrong. The Quran was arranged by God (25:32). The placement of each ayah is not recorded in the hadith, it is a part of the Quran itself.

 What I am referring to is the order of revelation, something of prime importance when it comes to determining which verse comes first in terms of abrogation. Like I said, without the hadith, how do you know the order in which revelation occurred, in order to know which verses come first and which comes second?

The Quran is arranged as it is because God chose it to be arranged this way and that's how it's been memorized since the beginning. I trust God did it for a reason. There are hadith which say so and so ayah was revealed at this time, but again, how accurate are they? Can't be sure. There has never been a consensus on when certain ayahs were revealed.

Abrogation is not something that's been accepted by all Muslims, and this is not something recent. Not everyone is even able to agree on what should be abrogated and what not.

I don't believe the Quran abrogates itself. It does abrogate verses God has sent in the past though, verses of previous scriptures.

Which you know through the hadith. Without the hadith, and the tashkilat, you could not know how to pronounce the Qur'an at all. The hadith are what record the very fact that different ahruf can be used. There is no such reference in the Qur'an.

The hadith don't record how to pronounce the Quran.. They just record the fact that it can be pronounced differently.

Exactly, and not all of them are Messengers, which shows that the laws that they deliver from God do not come in the form of the Qitab, but in the form of the Prophetic example. This is a very central point. There is a clear distinction between Prophets and Messengers, and the two titles describe different roles. The Messenger of God (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) was both, a conveyor of a qitab; in the form of the Qur'an, and a conveyor of the law in the form of the Prophetic example, the Sunnah.

They don't give their own laws though, they let the rest of us know what God is saying his laws are. They judge by the laws of God. The prophetic example is living the Quran, and that is all the prophet follows. He has no authority to come up with his own religious laws. God told him to follow what was revealed (7:3, 7:203, 10:15,46:9, etc.), and so Muhammad said “...I but follow what is revealed to me." (6:50, 6:106).

Interestingly enough the word sunna is used quite a few times in the Quran, but never in the context of the ways and practices of the prophet. Rather it is the sunna of Allah (48:23).

In Muhammad was a good example for people to see, and God says this like in Surah Al'Ahzab when He points out that the Prophet is brave in the face of danger (33:21). Nowhere does God give Muhammad the right to preach his own separate law.

Consider, what it is that Prophet Muhammad will complain to God about on the day of Judgement: “O my Lord, people have treated this Quran as a thing forsake.” (25:30). Why won't he mention people abandoning his sunna or his sayings? No, the Quran is what has been abandoned.

We know what God wants from His giving of us the perfect example to follow as is described in the Qur'an. Otherwise that is a contradiction, he is an example to follow, and yet nothing more than a delivery boy? 

Those verses don't work, 4:80 doesn't say that, nor 6:107, or 10:108 or 39:41 or even 88:22.. 

As stated many times above, the “delivery boy” only followed the Quran, not his own laws. Yet according to the hadith, he invented other laws. Read them again then. He was only a plain warner. Not my words.

He did not need to be immortal in order for him to be an example for us. Our striving to emulate him, as what we have of him reduces, is jihad for us, part of the entropy foretold in the Qur'an. If that entropy does not occur, and all that is needed for the community is the Qur'an and copious ijtihad, then why is this Quranist thing such a bidaa?

When the message says 'take the Messenger as your example and the way to separate disputes about the message' and then you say 'no! Despite having copious access to his example in the preserved traditions of the community, I am going to instead make up my own mind about such things, without any reference to his example'... then you aren't obeying the message. 

Let me be clear. I don't need the results of a 200 year long game of chinese whispers to tell me how the Prophet behaved, his behavior and practices were based on the same book that I have right besides me. Those copious examples are not reliable.

What is clear in the Qur'an is that the Prophet Mohammed (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) was given guidance by Allah, outside of the bounds of the Qur'an. One example is the third verse in Surah at-Tahrim, where he is asked by his wives how he knew something and replies 'The Knower, the Aware hath told me.'. Yet the information conveyed does not exist in the Qur'an, which shows that the Rasul'Allah sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam was not confined to the Qur'an.

Unless you can show me somewhere in the Qur'an where that information exists?

All knowledge is from God. When I find something I lost, I praise Allah because He is the one who revealed me its location. It doesn't require Him coming down in person. When I learn something new, it is God that has taught me. This verse doesn't imply what you are saying.

 

[RiZ III]

Indeed God has described that the Muslims will lose close to everything until near the end. However this does not respond to my question. If the state of the world is one of continual decay, from whence comes this Quranist movement? If not as a reprehensible innovation? If what you say is true, and this is the right path, then why were there not more arguing it in the past? The giants of Islamic scholarship, from Al-Ghazzali to Rumi were not inclined toward it, why then does it come now? Why throughout Islamic history has there been none arguing this point and then suddenly, coming from a Western critique of the hadith (which is, funnily enough, no longer so widely accepted) there arises this Quranist movement, apparently restoring the Haqq?

People have argued against the hadith. Imam Shafi'i was having heated debates with them in the 2nd century hijra. His view won and his views were taken as canon by people following him. Paul debated with James (Jesus's own brother of all people!) and in the end Pauline Christianity prevailed. Why haven't the great Christian minds of the past 2000 years not been realizing what modern scholars (and the Quran) says about Jesus? Allah has already told us that people divide into sects, and follow other than God's scripture after the revelation has come to them. This has happened with those before us too.

“And we gave Jesus, son of Mary, profound miracles and supported him with the Holy Spirit. Had GOD willed, their followers would not have fought with each other, after the clear proofs had come to them. Instead, they disputed among themselves; some of them believed, and some disbelieved. Had GOD willed, they would not have fought. Everything is in accordance with GOD's will. “

I don't consider myself to be a sectarian. I have no issue praying with Shias or Sunnis. I am neither a hanafi or a shafi or a quranist, I am one who submits to God's will (clear and perfect in the Quran). It isn't the Quran that divides people, it is all that is besides it that does that.

The fitna was a product of their own political differences, it did not however involve any differences within the religion itself.

It was their fitna which led to the fracture whih eventually led to the sects and introduced countless fabricated hadith.

[QURAN]It has been given to us that this will occur, that our community will collapse in time. However that does not mean that the core of the community has not remained steady, even throughout the wars and turmoil that have wracked our nations. Do you think that those who become Quranists will be any less burdened with their own nature? Indeed looking at what they must resort to: literalism without recourse to the hadith for explanation, the only product of such seems to be self-deception or extremism. Like I said before, why aren't you out chopping off the heads of non-Muslims, considering that the context for the verse and its practical application exists in the Sha'riah and the hadith? [/QUOTE]

Tell me, where does the Quran tell me to chop of the heads of unbelievers for no reason?

Again, we don't believe in the hadith as the direct commands of God. The hadith are not a Qitab. Rather they are an example of the example of the Messenger of God (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) they are what is given to us as the lived tradition of the religion, that which protects and nurtures what remains of it. You say 'invented it themselves' and therein lays your problem. All of your interpretations are invented by yourself... you do not refer to Allah's command to judge differences according to the Messenger of God (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam). 

If the hadith are not scripture and do not override the Quran, then why do you stone adulterers?

A sect is defined as a group that separates itself from the main. Allah's command says 'don't separate yourself'. The Ahlul'Sunnah have always been the majority. What are Quranists if not a group who 'seperates themselves' creating a group of innovation.

In the beginning was the Quran only. It was the sole source of law which Muhammad himself used to make his decisions. Then he died. 200+ years went by. His legend spread, and as with any famous person, a lot of false ideas attributed to him spread as well. Innovations calling for the ban of music, for the stoning of adulterers, predictions of an anti-christ. Bukhari went around and collected what he thought were the most sound. People came to accept them. Later, when education is a norm and people aren't threatened for their religious views (well they still are in most Muslim countries), people started noticing that the Quran doesn't agree with the hadith in all places and were able to freely question it. Turns out the hadith were compiled centuries after Muhammad. Rejection of hadith is nothing new, it's always been around. Their views have been suppressed, and lost through the centuries. Just because Paul won doesn't make him right.

I am not splitting off from anything. People have split off from the Quran.

Indeed, yet one must believe that they are right, or they are lost also. 

Once you come to believe you are right and everyone else is wrong, the mind is shut and arrogance kicks in. I try to keep it open. Even everything you have said I take into consideration. One can never claim to know the unseen and the past is the unseen.

The fundamental issue here is that I don't find the hadith to be reliable as you do. Until my heart can be content knowing that I am following something which is a 100% reliable, I can't seek another source of law besides the Quran.

 

[RiZ III]

The Ebionites weren't Jews, as you're defining Jew, either. Yes the followed Jewish Law, but they also, as you say, did not believe in the divinity of Jesus, yet believed he was the Messiah. If you're a Muslim you view them as keeping true to your interpretation of Jesus. I view them as heretics.

"The people wronged themselves" --> This can be said of any faith. You think I'm wrong, I think you're wrong. Let's move on.

Jesus wasn't exactly Jewish. There are multiple times where he mocked Jewish Law. The Sabbath is one of the holiest ideas in Judaism, and Jesus placed himself above it multiple times.

Yea, they weren't traditional Jews as they believed the Messiah had come. The Quran also calls Jesus the Messiah. What is your understanding of the word Messiah? The Ebionites can be traced to the Church of Jerusalem however and the CoJ being led by Jesus's brothers was by all accounts a practicing Jew who considered his brother to have been the Messiah. Modern day Christianity stems from Paul who, by his own account, never met Jesus.

Jesus was as Jewish as Jewish could be. He followed the laws of the prophets and told others to do so as well, he worshiped in the temple, he followed the dietary restrictions, and worshiped the God of of the Jewish prophets. This can be found in the gospels themselves.

Criticizing other Jews wasn't anything new. Jews do it now and they did it then. In fact the Jews were an extremely fractured group in the first century.

Jesus in his famous saving the life on the sabbath incident didn't do anything as radical as the gospels lead one to believe. Life has always been considered sacred by Jewish law. What Jesus did is perfectly acceptable under talmudic tradition which the Pharisees were well aware of. He was pointing out their hypocrisy by doing what he did.

If you want to hear a bit of the Quranic narration of Jesus, here is a recitation with translation:
http://youtu.be/2CVJ-tIbvZo

 

[Pollux]

Yea, they weren't traditional Jews as they believed the Messiah had come. The Quran also calls Jesus the Messiah. What is your understanding of the word Messiah? The Ebionites can be traced to the Church of Jerusalem however and the CoJ being led by Jesus's brothers was by all accounts a practicing Jew who considered his brother to have been the Messiah. Modern day Christianity stems from Paul who, by his own account, never met Jesus.

The Ebionites were heretics. They were heretics then, and they are still considered heretics now. They were following a Gospel that was apocryphal.

You're forgetting Peter. Who sided with Paul. And while Paul never met Jesus while he was alive, the Resurrected Jesus appeared to him and delivered His message to him. While Paul did indeed have a great effect on the conversion of Gentiles it was still Peter who had the ultimate say. James may have been the Bishop of Jerusalem but Peter still had primacy.

Peter believed that Jesus was the Son of God, seen in the Gospel of Mark which Peter is said to be the author of.

To your point that Paul never met Jesus....as I said, he met the Sprit of Jesus. He was immediately converted to his belief that Christ was the Son of God.

As to your point about James, he ended up siding with Peter and Paul.

Sorry this doesn't make much sense. It's 4am. Will try to be more coherent tomorrow.

 

[Ashes]

Christianity is being discussed wholesale in the Islamic thread? I suppose I missed something big.

 

[SmokyDave]

Christianity is being discussed wholesale in the Islamic thread? I suppose I missed something big.

It's no stranger than talking about Android in an iOS topic, really.

 

[BocoDragon]

The role of the Caliph is a central one in Sunni communities, the main point of which is to stop movements like the Wahhabis and Khwarij. Without some form of central authority, who can draw upon the expertise of the Ulema combined with the power of the Ummah itself, there is no way to stop the crazies and schizmatics.

The assertion that there was maybe never supposed to be a community of Believers is not something that would be held up the Qur'an or the hadith literature, in the sense that the Ummah forms a central part of what it is to be Muslim. The fact that the Muslims at the time thought succession was so important speaks to this

I'm sympathetic to that reasoning.

It was the same thing in Buddhism. The central doctrine was something that was very resistant to being formalized as a code, or written down..... but then what's to stop people from declaring the practice as whatever they want? From quite early on, there were people who derailed the intent of the teaching, which forced their hand to define the undefinable. They didn't even want holy scriptures... but they were forced into it as a matter of necessity.

The group has to "stand for something, or it will fall for anything" (as the saying goes), even in the case of a religion like Buddhism which is not want to make any kind of declarative theological statements at all.

I typed up a bunch of more stuff about "why can we trust the truth of the religious tradition, even if we accept the truth of God talking through Mohommad?".... but maybe it's not the moment. I want to develop these thoughts....

 

[OttomanScribe]

Salaam all

I'll reply to a bunch of stuff when I get the chance, maybe tomorrow night... got a lot of preparing to do for a Sundae party on Sunday to celebrate my 2nd wedding anniversary with my first wife

Just so you don't think I've bailed.

 

[BocoDragon]

Salaam all

I'll reply to a bunch of stuff when I get the chance, maybe tomorrow night... got a lot of preparing to do for a Sundae party on Sunday to celebrate my 2nd wedding anniversary with my first wife

Just so you don't think I've bailed.

Congrats on that

 

[Herpes Reasons]

i have a question for muslims.
the quran claims that jesus was merely a prophet and not the son of God that gospels proclaim and also did not die on the cross. i also know that muslims believe that the bible is in its current translation is corrupt.

so my questions are:
if jesus did not die on the cross, that would make him a liar and a false prophet because
Jesus predicted his own death, (even if that part is made up, you certainly wouldn't want to change something that puts the apostles looking like idiots to their reactions of his eminent death). the book of mark (the earliest eyewitness account) mentions many times jesus predicts his own death.

if jesus did die on the cross as he predicted, that would discredit the quran.

either jesus was a liar and a false prophet, or he did die and discredits the quran.
catch-22, dont you think?


and my second question is do you have any scrolls/antiquities to back up your claim that the 4 accounts of jesus (matthew, mark, luke, john) are grossly error and misinterpreted?

hope i was clear enough in my train of thought.

 

[crazy monkey]

Salaam all

I'll reply to a bunch of stuff when I get the chance, maybe tomorrow night... got a lot of preparing to do for a Sundae party on Sunday to celebrate my 2nd wedding anniversary with my first wife

Just so you don't think I've bailed.

never think that. I used to think that too and waste lot of time here. I think everyone here will understand it. Also Congratulations.

 

[sagi446]

i have a question for muslims.
the quran claims that jesus was merely a prophet and not the son of God that gospels proclaim and also did not die on the cross. i also know that muslims believe that the bible is in its current translation is corrupt.

so my questions are:
if jesus did not die on the cross, that would make him a liar and a false prophet because
Jesus predicted his own death, (even if that part is made up, you certainly wouldn't want to change something that puts the apostles looking like idiots to their reactions of his eminent death). the book of mark (the earliest eyewitness account) mentions many times jesus predicts his own death.

if jesus did die on the cross as he predicted, that would discredit the quran.

either jesus was a liar and a false prophet, or he did die and discredits the quran.
catch-22, dont you think?


and my second question is do you have any scrolls/antiquities to back up your claim that the 4 accounts of jesus (matthew, mark, luke, john) are grossly error and misinterpreted?

hope i was clear enough in my train of thought.

Jesus PBUH is still alive and he will return, his coming is a sign of the end of time. I personally don't know about his visions. But he's a mortal like anyone else and I presume he will die like anyone else after his return.

Quran discredits Christianity as a whole and that it is no longer the right path because it has been modified so much.

 

[RustyNails]

Jesus (alayhis salaam) upon his return will drive home to Christians the Islamic message that he was no more divine than Moses (alayhis salaam) and other prophets, that his blood had nothing to do with man’s salvation and that the law is not nailed on the cross. To the Jews he will drive home the Islamic message that although in the history of revelation and salvation some nations may be more important than others and God may even at times favor some above the others, as indeed he did in case of the children of Israel, neither the Jewish nation nor any other nation is permanently and unconditionally given a favored or chosen status.



God decreed Mary (alayhas salaam) conceive 'Be,' and it is.

Adam and Eve (alayhis salaam) would be superior to all if we used the Christian concept and definition of birth/creation as they had no mother nor father.

I dont disagree. A simpler explanation is that Allah promises every soul shall taste death on earth. Since jesus didnt die and was raised to heaven (according to quran), he will return to live rest of his life on earth and die like every mortal.

 

[Pollux]

Christianity is being discussed wholesale in the Islamic thread? I suppose I missed something big.

Sorry about that. I do have a question though. Is the umma considered hot Sunnis and Shia and all other sects or subsects or does one consider the other not part of the umma?

 

[sagi446]

Sorry about that. I do have a question though. Is the umma considered hot Sunnis and Shia and all other sects or subsects or does one consider the other not part of the umma?

Isn't that the one million dollar question?

 

[Pollux]

Jesus PBUH is still alive and he will return, his coming is a sign of the end of time. I personally don't know about his visions. But he's a mortal like anyone else and I presume he will die like anyone else after his return.

Quran discredits Christianity as a whole and that it is no longer the right path because it has been modified so much.

But where is your proof?

 

[Azih]

It is not a matter of turning away from the faith. It is a matter of having openly said that he is no longer a Muslim, and then coming into the thread to tell Muslims what they should believe about the Qur'an.

Disagreed. He explained exactly what caused him to turn away from the faith and his concerns and you compounded it by acting in exactly the same arrogant manner. It's nuts.

I don't believe I said that at all. I merely asked the courtesy of having the person I am talking to actually believe what they are arguing. If he is not Muslim, then he doesn't believe what he is arguing.

You're not responding to the argument. You're responding to what you believe the person to be and doing so in an incredibly insulting manner.

I do not see where I derided anyone's intelligence

No?

None of those Qur'an alone people I have met have even a basic understanding of Arabic, they rarely know anything about the transmission of hadith, and I get the impression that they have hardly read the Qur'an.... the Qur'an is full of exhortations to seek knowledge, to learn, yet these people appear to show now interest in such things.... It is bizarre, they have an end point in mind, and they make a bunch of sloppy intellectual shortcuts in an attempt to get there.

Instead of actually responding to people you build up a bizarre and insulting caricature of them in your mind and base your response on that demeaning caricature and not what people are actually saying.

You're saying that as far as you're concerned I don't know anything about the transmission of hadith, that I've hardly read the Quran, I have no intereset in seeking knowledge and learning. Hell you've stated that even deigning to TALK to me is a waste of your time.

I find debating with Qur'an alone people a waste of time generally.

The most laughable is that this gem of yours

They have come to their own conclusions, and then are fitting everything they find to those conclusions.

is not only incredibly derisive it can be turned around and thrown right back at you. It can be thrown at *anyone*. It's not a statement worthy of being responded to except to point out how arrogant and shallow it is.

It is with the fact that he is making an argument that he does not believe in

I would submit that you aren't responding to what he's saying but to what you THINK he's saying. I can't speak for Kraftwerk but you sure as hell are.

If someone is arguing that they have the ability to make ijtihad on things based on the Qur'an, and cannot even read the Qur'an, then surely that is not a sound position?

So you ARE saying that the 80% of muslims who don't know Arabic have no right to use their own 'aql and need to suppress it to blindly engage in taqlid with people who do?

They would not be so flippant about him as to discard things of him so readily

Considering Muslims had no problems with killing his grandson over a power struggle I have no idea why you believe this. Aslo the Quran itself warned about hypocrites in the community at the time when the Prophet himself was leading the community.

specifically 'do not create sects/seperate onesself'.

As far as I am concerned the only way to seperate oneself from another is not by the mere fact of difference (humanity is by its nature diverse) it is by being intolerant of someone else's difference. That is to say Riz and you aren't seperate because you both put the Hadith on different levels in terms of their importance (as Riz said the same is true for him and his wife and mother and they're not seperate) you are seperate only if you believe that he isn't a brother in faith because of this difference or that he is somehow inferior in his faith because of it.

The Shia accepted the mainstream Sunni traditions until the coming of the twelvers irrc.

The Shia disagree they say the disagreements started as soon as the matter of successor to the Prophet appeared and were set in stone with the death of the Prophet's grandson Hussein.

I think that every new person that comes into this thread with a bone to pick (which they have undoubtedly got from some anti-Muslim website) should actually read the thread before they troll it, considering that most of their questions are answered in there sometime.

This is not reasonable. Your method of combating the slanders of anti Muslim websites is to tell people to RTF 4300+post thread instead of y'know actually engaging with them?

but their Ulema should know better.

Surely God will judge them and not you? Like I said when I went off on a rant earlier a little caution is a requirement considering that the Shia are killed by religious extremists all the time .

 

[RustyNails]

But where is your proof?

Well for one, there are many versions of Bible. For example, the new international version doesn't have the word "begotten" son in John 3:16. Some bibles have books that are missing from other bibles. The Syrian church accepts only 22 books and excludes some books of Peter and John. The Ethiopian Orthodox includes all 27 and even 8 more in its canon, which Catholic and Protestant churches do not agree are authentic. Anglicans have their own version.

Edit: Link

 

[sagi446]

But where is your proof?

More like where's your proof to the original one? That Bible is the only one with any value.

Even IF it still exists, Christianity is no longer a viable religion if you want to worship God.

 

[Meus Renaissance]

Sorry about that. I do have a question though. Is the umma considered hot Sunnis and Shia and all other sects or subsects or does one consider the other not part of the umma?

That's an interesting question because Jews and Christians were part of the first Ummah

But where is your proof?

What do you know of Bart Ehrman?

 

[Pollux]

Well for one, there are many versions of Bible. For example, the new international version doesn't have the word "begotten" son in John 3:16. Some bibles have books that are missing from other bibles. The Syrian church accepts only 22 books and excludes some books of Peter and John. The Ethiopian Orthodox includes all 27 and even 8 more in its canon, which Catholic and Protestant churches do not agree are authentic. Anglicans have their own version.

Edit: Link

Yes I'm well aware of different Bibles. What's your point? There are different interpretations of the Message of Christ. Are there not different interpretations of the Quran? Are there not groups within Islam that disagree as to which hadiths are valid?

More like where's your proof to the original one? That Bible is the only one with any value.

Even IF it still exists, Christianity is no longer a viable religion if you want to worship God.

Where's your proof that the Quran is legitimate?

That's an interesting question because Jews and Christians were part of the first Ummah



What do you know of Bart Ehrman?

Interesting. Learn something new everyday.

and

I've read parts of his "Misquoting Jesus"...disagree with it.

 

[Patapwn]

Where's your proof that the Quran is legitimate?

The only correct answer, obviously, is faith alone.

 

[Meus Renaissance]

I've read parts of his "Misquoting Jesus"...disagree with it.

I remember hearing of his name in similar discussions in the past from a lecture he gave on this very question of Biblical iterations. I've taken into consideration some of the criticism directed at his views before watching that lecture on YouTube. What claims of this video should I know to be wrong, or at least, contested?

 

[Pollux]

I remember hearing of his name in similar discussions in the past from a lecture he gave on this very question of Biblical iterations. I've taken into consideration some of the criticism directed at his views before watching that lecture on YouTube. What claims of this video should I know to be wrong, or at least, contested?

Can I get back to you on this particular topic later? I'm in the library studying for finals and won't really have time to put 90 minutes aside till after my exam tomorrow morning.

Don't want you to think I'm ignoring you. Keep in mind however, that he is FAR more educated in this area than I ever will be, so my disagreements will probably be very weak in comparison.

 

[Meus Renaissance]

Can I get back to you on this particular topic later? I'm in the library studying for finals and won't really have time to put 90 minutes aside till after my exam tomorrow morning.

Don't want you to think I'm ignoring you. Keep in mind however, that he is FAR more educated in this area than I ever will be, so my disagreements will probably be very weak in comparison.

Sure, okay

 

[Pollux]

Sure, okay

Cool. Granted GAF is definitely not helping with the procrastination. The main issue is I just don't have anyway to listen to it here.

 

[sagi446]

Where's your proof that the Quran is legitimate?

There's only one "version", if it isn't the correct one, I am pretty much screwed.

 

[Pollux]

There's only one "version", if it isn't the correct one, I am pretty much screwed.

haha touche.

This is an honest question that I've been wondering over the last few days, directed to anyone.

If each of our faiths believes that the only true path to Heaven and God is through our faith, how can there be coexistence and mutual respect between our faiths? (Any of the Abrahamic religions).

I'm not saying that Muslims, Catholics, Protestants, and Jews can't work together and live alongside each other - but wouldn't each look at the others and think that their own faith/religion/message was better?

I don't even know if I'm wording this question correctly, if it sounds stupid let me know and I'll try and reword it.

 

[crazy monkey]

^ that is one of the most fundamental question for every human being. Thus I never judge a human being on his religion alone. God will decide what he wants to decide. A good person is a good person regardless. Be nice and have fun.

 

[Ashes]

haha touche.

This is an honest question that I've been wondering over the last few days, directed to anyone.

If each of our faiths believes that the only true path to Heaven and God is through our faith, how can there be coexistence and mutual respect between our faiths? (Any of the Abrahamic religions).

I'm not saying that Muslims, Catholics, Protestants, and Jews can't work together and live alongside each other - but wouldn't each look at the others and think that their own faith/religion/message was better?

I don't even know if I'm wording this question correctly, if it sounds stupid let me know and I'll try and reword it.

Muhammed's last speech before he died is I suppose meant for all human kind, all faiths, all races...

BBC DOC

Ps. Is OS in the vid?

 

[Slurpy2k20]

No clue what's going on in this thread, and I don't wish to join, but has anyone seen the show All-American Muslim?

http://tlc.howstuffworks.com/tv/all-american-muslim

Seems like the concerted campaign by bigoted, islamophobic hate groups to kill it is working.

http://insidetv.ew.com/2011/12/09/ads-all-american-muslim/

The complaint from 'Florida Family Association:

“The show profiles only Muslims that appear to be ordinary folks while excluding many Islamic believers whose agenda poses a clear and present danger to liberties and traditional values that the majority of Americans cherish,” the group said about the show, a docu-soap chronicling everyday Muslim families in Dearborn, Michigan. “Clearly this program is attempting to manipulate Americans into ignoring the threat of jihad and to influence them to believe that being concerned about the jihad threat would somehow victimize these nice people in this show.”

How utterly despicable. I've been watching this show, and this complaint is obcene. ie. GGRRR THERE ARE NO TERRORIST MUSLIMS ON THE SHOW! AMERICANS DEMAND TO SEE TERRORIST MUSLIMS!

I always love how so many of these hategroups have 'Family' or 'Freedom' in their names, while actively fighting against both these things and attempting to censor anything that doesn't serve their bigoted agenda.

Other companies these groups have allegedly convinced to pull out ad support. Sad that they folded from the pressure and listened to an extreme fringe.
(http://theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/print/all-american-muslim)

3M (Command, Scotchbrand tape),
Airborne Vitamin,
Amway,
Anheuser Busch Inbev (Select55),
Art Instruction Schools,
Bamboozles,
Bank of America (Cash Rewards),
Bare Escentuals,
Brother International (Ptouch),
Campbell’s Soup,
Capital One,
Church & Dwight (Oxi Clean, Arm & Hammer),
City Furniture,
Conagra (Hunt’s Diced Tomatoes),
Corinthian Colleges (Everst411),
Cotton, Inc.,
Cumberland Packing (Sweet’N Low),
Dell computers,
Diamond Foods (Kettlebrand Chips),
Estee Lauder (Clinique),
ET Browe (Palmer’s Cocoa butter),
Gap,
General Motors (Chevy Runs Deep),
Good Year,
Green Mountain Coffee,
Guthy Renker (Proactiv),
Hershey kisses,
Home Depot,
Honda North America,
HTC Phones,
Ikea,
JC Penney,
JP Morgan Chase (Chase Sapphire),
Kayak.com, Kellogg (Special K),
Koa Brands (John Frieda),
Leapfrog Enterprise (Leapster Explorer),
Lowe’s
Mars (Dove Chocolate),
McDonald’s,
Nationwide Insurance,
News Corp (We bought a zoo movie),
Nintendo (Mariokartz.com),
Novartis (Theraflu),
Old Navy,
Pernod Ricard (Kahlua),
Petsmart,
Pier One,
Pfizer (Centrum vitamin),
Procter & Gamble (Align Probiotic, Crest, Febreze, Mr. Clean Magic Eraser, Pur, Tide),
Progressive Insurance,
Prudential Financial,
Radio Shack,
Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse,
SC Johnson (Drano, Glade, Scrubbing Bubbles),
Sears ,
Signet (Kay Jewelers),
Sonic Drive-ins,
Subaru, T
HQ (uDraw),
T-Mobil,
Toyota (Camry),
Volkswagen,
Vtech (Mobi Go, V Reader),
Wal-Mart
Whirlpool (Maytag)

 

[Meadows]

Nintendo!

 

[amar212]

Riz, you have my respect.

 

[F#A#Oo]

To which context are you referring? Just curious.

I'm going to try to do the Trinity without referring to Matthew 28:19.

So according to Jason Raize (citing the Quran I'm assuming), Jesus was created through the Word. As seen below (John 1:1-3) the Word was with God in the beginning, and the Word was God. If the Word was with God, and was God, that would make it an aspect of god (the Holy Spirit), and if the Word, through God or by God's will, impregnated Mary, then Jesus would be part of the Word (Holy Spirit). If Jesus is part of the Word, and the Word is part of God, then Jesus by extension is part of God. Thus 3 aspects are apart of 1 God.

While it is true that it's very difficult to understand and comprehend...who are we to comprehend God? God is mysterious, it is impossible to know God.

That's just my two cents. Was it more interesting than your talk or pretty much the same thing?

John 1:1+...is the work of Philo of Alexandria...

The doctrine of the Logos, or Word, as an origination or backbone of divine wisdom is very old. It was found in the ancient religions of Egypt and India. It's recognized in Zoroastrian theology, and was later incorporated into the Jewish theology by Babylonian exiles. It later established an important element in Platonic philosophy. The representation of Jesus as an incarnation of the Logos belongs to the second century. The ideas are primarily those of Plato and Philo of Alexandria. Plato's trinity was Thought, Word and Deed. The Word occupies the second place in the Platonic trinity as it does in the Christian trinity. The the author of the Gospel of John, wrote several decades after the time of Philo of Alexandria borrowing very very heavily from the philosopher.

It is very difficult thus to take the Gospel of John as divinely inspired work for arguing Trinity...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logos

Not really. Adam was made from dust or clay, and Eve was made from Adam's rib. Neither was fully created by the Word or Holy Spirit.

I was talking more about the conceptual idea of the virgin birth and the creation of Adam and Eve...to a muslim the virgin birth was a miracle and birth of a great prophet; Jesus (alayhis salaam) ...

Now if we take the Christian view we sort of end up with a weird situation because Adam(alayhis salaam) believed in one god and worshipped one god...but then Jesus (alayhis salaam) will be coming from the loins of Adam (alayhis salaam) in future? So was he praying or asking intersession from someone who wasn't even born yet?

 

[Pollux]

John 1:1+...is the work of Philo of Alexandria...

The doctrine of the Logos, or Word, as an origination or backbone of divine wisdom is very old. It was found in the ancient religions of Egypt and India. It's recognized in Zoroastrian theology, and was later incorporated into the Jewish theology by Babylonian exiles. It later established an important element in Platonic philosophy. The representation of Jesus as an incarnation of the Logos belongs to the second century. The ideas are primarily those of Plato and Philo of Alexandria. Plato's trinity was Thought, Word and Deed. The Word occupies the second place in the Platonic trinity as it does in the Christian trinity. The the author of the Gospel of John, wrote several decades after the time of Philo of Alexandria borrowing very very heavily from the philosopher.

It is very difficult thus to take the Gospel of John as divinely inspired work for arguing Trinity...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logos



I was talking more about the conceptual idea of the virgin birth and the creation of Adam and Eve...to a muslim the virgin birth was a miracle and birth of a great prophet; Jesus (alayhis salaam) ...

Now if we take the Christian view we sort of end up with a weird situation because Adam(alayhis salaam) believed in one god and worshipped one god...but then Jesus (alayhis salaam) will be coming from the loins of Adam (alayhis salaam) in future? So was he praying or asking intersession from someone who wasn't even born yet?

We'll agree to disagree on the Gospel of John. Even the Quran says that Jesus was created by the Word.

As for Adam, there is no weird situation. Jesus the man hadn't been born, but The Son was with The Father in the Beginning, along with the Spirit. Together they create One God. Different aspects of the same God.

 

[F#A#Oo]

We'll agree to disagree on the Gospel of John. Even the Quran says that Jesus was created by the Word.

Ofcourse but I'm not disputing the Word...I was simply pointing out to you the origins of what you were quoting...

 

[Darackutny]

so my questions are:
if jesus did not die on the cross, that would make him a liar and a false prophet because
Jesus predicted his own death, (even if that part is made up, you certainly wouldn't want to change something that puts the apostles looking like idiots to their reactions of his eminent death). the book of mark (the earliest eyewitness account) mentions many times jesus predicts his own death.

if jesus did die on the cross as he predicted, that would discredit the quran.

either jesus was a liar and a false prophet, or he did die and discredits the quran.
catch-22, dont you think?


and my second question is do you have any scrolls/antiquities to back up your claim that the 4 accounts of jesus (matthew, mark, luke, john) are grossly error and misinterpreted?

hope i was clear enough in my train of thought.

Muslims don't accept that the four gospels were written by the apostles. The burden of proof is upon you to prove to us that these works are indeed by the apostles. You can start with Luke and we'll see where you go from there.


@ Riz: Hey, it has been a while. I'm not sure if I've asked you this yet, but which of the versions of recitations do you follow? And if you follow them all, how do you reconcile the recitations that contradict one another?

 

[Pollux]

Ofcourse but I'm not disputing the Word...I was simply pointing out to you the origins of what you were quoting...

Fair enough. I'm very frazzled right now trying to get all my reviewing in for my exam tomorrow so if I come across as overly sensitive or offensive then I do apologize.

I'm just thrilled that I actually found a place to have a rationale discussion on theology. You ever try talking to Evangelical Christians about theology? It's like talking to a wall. Unless you're talking to someone who has actually looked at the source material and studied on it then they're not that knowledgable.

So, good stuff people.

 

[Heshinsi]

This thread hurts my head. lol

 

[F#A#Oo]

Fair enough. I'm very frazzled right now trying to get all my reviewing in for my exam tomorrow so if I come across as overly sensitive or offensive then I do apologize.

I'm just thrilled that I actually found a place to have a rationale discussion on theology. You ever try talking to Evangelical Christians about theology? It's like talking to a wall. Unless you're talking to someone who has actually looked at the source material and studied on it then they're not that knowledgable.

So, good stuff people.

Forget GAF dude...

RL>>>GAF

Come back when you got time to sink...lol

 

[Meus Renaissance]

Ash-Shuara [26:197]

Is it not a sign to them that the learned scholars (like 'Abdullah bin Salam who embraced Islam) of the Children of Israel knew it (as true)?
​

There are stories of Muhammad (saw) as a child meeting Christian and Jewish monks and rabbis that recognised him as a prophet before it'd be finally revealed during his adulthood. Can someone more knowledgable talk about this, his mark of the seal between his shoulder blades, and generally anything that foretold his coming.

 

[sagi446]

haha touche.

This is an honest question that I've been wondering over the last few days, directed to anyone.

If each of our faiths believes that the only true path to Heaven and God is through our faith, how can there be coexistence and mutual respect between our faiths? (Any of the Abrahamic religions).

I'm not saying that Muslims, Catholics, Protestants, and Jews can't work together and live alongside each other - but wouldn't each look at the others and think that their own faith/religion/message was better?

I don't even know if I'm wording this question correctly, if it sounds stupid let me know and I'll try and reword it.

Well, The Prophet PBUH never forced anyone from their religion. That's actually something we believe we can't do, we can't force faith upon people. For reference, read up on The Prophet's PBUH Uncle, he was his best ally during the first years of his message. But he didn't die a Muslim, The Prophet PBUH was deeply saddened that he couldn't save him.

Islam has no issues with non-muslims living on Muslim territory, however they're judged by our laws and they have to pay a tax. This is assuming they're living peacefully with other Muslims.

I don't know what Christianity's or Jews' view over living together with people of other religions.

 

[OttomanScribe]

Does Islamic tradition say that Jesus was divinely conceived?

Yes, indeed a Surah is named after his mother, Maryam (alayhis salaam) and she is one of the exalted examples for Muslim women to follow.

But are there scholars who are widely influential even though the ideas for their scholarship isn't directly in the Quran?

Islamic scholarship is divided into different fields of knowledge, each field of knowledge has a specific focus. A good way to explain this is using a part of the famous 'Jibril Hadith'.

One day while we were sitting with the messenger of Allah there appeared before us a man whose clothes were exceedingly white and whose hair was exceedingly black; no signs of journeying were to be seen on him and none of us knew him. He walked up and sat down by the prophet.

Resting his knees against his and placing the palms of his hands on his thighs, he said:"O Muhammed, tell me about Islam". The messenger of Allah said: "Islam is to testify that there is no god but Allah and Muhammed is the messenger of Allah, to perform the prayers, to pay the zakat, to fast in Ramadhan, and to make the pilgrimage to the House if you are able to do so."

He said:"You have spoken rightly", and we were amazed at him asking him and saying that he had spoken rightly. He said: "Then tell me about eman ."He said:"It is to believe in Allah, His angels, His books, His messengers, and the Last Day, and to believe in divine destiny, both the good and the evil thereof."

He said:"You have spoken rightly". He said: " Then tell me about ehsan ." He said: "It is to worship Allah as though you are seeing Him, and while you see Him not yet truly He sees you".

One of the ways that this hadith is understood, is that there are three fundamentals of the religion; Islam, Iman and Ihsan. Islam (active acceptance); being the outward performance of the religion, is understood through the religious science of 'fiqh' (Islamic jurisprudence). Iman (often translated as 'faith'); being the inward beliefs of the religion, is understood through the religious science of 'aqidah' (theology). Ihsan (perfection/excellence): being spiritual excellence, understood through the religious science of tasawuf ('Sufism': Islamic mysticism).

The scholars in each of these disciplines loom large in the Muslim consciousness, from Imam Abu Hanifa's legal school to Imam Ghazzali's systematic theology, and the tariqas (Sufi paths) of giants like Rumi, Ibn Arabi or Shah Naqshband. Of course there is a lot of crossover, Islam, Iman and Ihsan being central to the religion of all those mentioned.

I have gone on this divergence in relation to your question of course you say 'even though the ideas of their scholarship isn't directly in the Qur'an. Each of those mentioned represents an attempt to maintain those ideas present within the Qur'an and the example of the Messenger of God (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam). As you say, you would consider Augustine or Luther (you are Catholic so less Luther) to be a reinstatement or an accurate elaboration on Biblical concepts. The same substance in a different form right?

This is kind of how I would discuss the role of the Mujadids (reformers) and the great Imams of the community, their thought does not represent a divergence or an innovation in the religion, rather it represents the systematic application of Quranic principles and the Prophetic example to their individual fields of expertise. Get me?

Why is it Jesus returning and not M.? The answer to that would be the bolded?

I am sure that both you and I are wary of making unproven assertions about the motivations of God

So Christ was created through the Word of God? By that, would that not make the Christ part of the Word? If that is the case and the Word is part of God, would that not make Christ also part of God?

?
Jesus (alayhis salaam) was created 'from scratch', in the same manner as Adam (alayhis salaam). Allah is 'laytha kamithlahi shay' "Unlike Created Things". The idea that Christ or anyone or anything of creation is in any way 'part of God' is an abhorrent idea to anyone who follows sound Islamic aqidah.

Muslims are not pantheists, and they are not polytheists. What you describe seems like a mix of both of those things.

I suppose I cannot sway you, but the historical evidence is that Christianity, from day 1, was not Islam. And that the words and ideas told by Muhammad were different from what Christianity was and has always been.

Here you are arguing against an argument that I did not make. The Christians, like the Jews, were given their own path. What was acceptable to one community was not to another. Early Christians, and Jesus (alayhis salaam) were Muslims in the sense that they submitted to the will of God, but their Sha'riah, their path to God, may have been different. What we are talking here is specifically about the deification of Jesus (alayhis salaam).

This idea that 'decay' (which by definition is a contentious and compounded breakdown) is incorrect because the words and ideas were always equally incorrect. This idea of decay filling in gods absence for hundreds of years is a nice apologetic attempt but under investigation shows to not be. I don't know why you continue to stand by such assertions, perhaps it is something you believe on faith alone?

I see several assertions here made without support. The first bit I cannot understand 'This idea that decay is incorrect because the words and ideas are always equally incorrect'....

Even with the brackets removed it still is incomprehensible.

Additionally the second bit is an example of 'begging the question', where you assume 'God's absence' as part of your point, in support of another point. What investigation specifically, did you read my previous post?

Every community has been visited by a prophet at some point in time? Is this another thing you believe on faith alone or do we have some actual evidence? Because as evidence would show, the pacific islander never heard the words of Judaism, Christianity, or Islam. These things were created in a very specific location at very specific times by very specific people.

The orthodox Muslim belief is that in addition to those 'deens' called Judaism and Christianity, there are many others given to different communities throughout the world. This would include the various obscure examples you may come up with. They are not in an identical form to Judaism or Christianity or what you call 'Islam'.

This is not opinion. The qar'an is a book of words and untimely ideas. That is what it is. The flowery poetic descriptions that Muslims ascribe to their holy book should not be taken into consideration when comparing and contrasting the meat and potatoes of the Torah, the bible, and the qur'an. And with that said, the stories of the quran were inspired (I would say plagiarized) from the previous works that are the bible and torah.

You are missing my point here entirely. The Qur'an, structurally, is not like the Torah or the Bible. The Qur'an comes as a single compilation, in the same style, with a single source, from a single moment in time. Neither the Old or New Testaments come in that form. They also, on the whole, are not poetry.

You also seem to not understand exactly what plagiarism is. Plagiarism is taking someone else's work and passing it off as your own. The Messenger of Allah (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) does not claim to have 'made up' the things described in the Qur'an. He is open about the fact that the revelation he received describes events that are described in the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Messenger of Allah (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) was a fulfiller of the traditions of the Jews and the Christians both. The final seal of their Prophets (alayhis salaam). He did not bring anything radically new, but merely came to restore them to that which they should already have been doing.

Fine, I will create a task for you: Make me a sandwich! (how did I do?) All joking aside, you are a Muslim hyping your holy book as the word of god. I do not look poorly on you for doing so. I understand why you do it. As I mentioned, my mother often accounts her readings of the bible while 'imbued with the holy spirit.' She claims it speaks to her on a level of emotion only god is capable of imbuing. Unsurprisingly, this is the same line of reasoning Muslims (or any religious person from any religion) use when they say 'OMG so complex and beautiful, it speaks to me...'

Within this, there doesn't seem to be a point. Either you are in a position to appraise the claim or you are not. If you are not, just say 'I can't say either way, but that doesn't mean you are right' and move on.

You misinterpret my meaning. I was not saying I deserve anything.

You believe that 'equal opportunity' as you put it, when it comes to access to God, is something that should be a given. Why?

I was saying that in the context of god wanting man to know his word, his omnipotence is very suspicious in light of his efforts.

Here you are begging the question again. You say 'in the context of God wanting man to know his word', as though that is the entire purpose of revelation and Prophethood. This is not an assumption that I have made, why do you make it?

If this is his will, and he has the power to accomplish his will (considering he's GOD), then why not contact every person and give them the same opportunity presented to the supposed 'prophets'? Such actions seem contradictory. Or inaction if you will. That's why I proposed god as being sleepy in my OP that started the conversation. I gave him the benefit that his actions were not contradictory, but that he was merely sleepy.

This is entire point is attempting to flow from what is essentially a flawed assumption. So it doesn't hold up. You are assuming that God's Will is purely that 'man will know his word', and that the most effective way of achieving that is through direct revelation.

Why do you assume that it is God's will specifically that 'man will know his word' and that the best way for that to occur is direct revelation? This is not something I have said to you in our discussion, so why do you assert it?

If the purpose of humanity was purely to 'know God's word', then there are a million ways that could be accomplished, direct revelation being only one of many. However that isn't the point of humanity. Humanity exists because God exists and has attributes. We exist as a reflection of these attributes, He is Merciful, and so those exist upon whom his Mercy is extended, He is the Judge, so those exist upon whom is judgement falls, etc.

The purpose of humanity is not merely as dumb receivers of God's word.

 

[OttomanScribe]

Salaam Ottoman,

Walaykum Salaam Wa Rahmetullahi Wa Baraketahu

Of this there is no evidence. Unfortunately we have almost nothing physical coming out of the first century of Islam besides the Quran. I know strands of his hair still exist supposedly, though I find them highly dubious considering he didn't even want an image of his remaining after his death. What evidence is there at these are his? I'm asking because I honestly have no idea when/where/who these came from.

There are many artefacts claimed to be those of the Rasul'Allah (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam), W'Allahu alim on their legitimacy, arguably the most likely are a shawl, a standard and a letter that are currently kept in Topkapi Palace in Instanbul.

There are numerous hadith, both that support what you say (that he didn't even want an image of himself remaining after his death) but also that his companions would collect things of his, and that this was something that he allowed. It seems that you cannot assert one and then reject the other.

It is not something mentioned in the Qur'an, indeed there is no verse in the Qur'an that specifically forbids images or statues.

I agree 100% with you. They aren't scripture, but people treat them as scripture. They take the hadith as a source of law banning what God didn't ban, and enjoining what He did not enjoying.

Part of this seems to be about our differing definitions of scripture. What do you mean by the word? Are you saying that what defines scripture is something becoming a source of law?

They are equated with him yes, an equality which I don't hold as valid. If Muhammad had written it, or if it had been preserved in the same way as the Quran has been recorded, then I would be among the first to accept it.

The Rasul'Allah (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) could not write it down, and he did not write the Qur'an down, as we both know. The Qur'an, just like the hadith, was compiled through a combination of the writing down and memorisation of its verses. Umar (radiAllahu anhu) encouraged the writing down of the first, while Uthman (radiAllahu anhu) then encouraged the writing down of the second.

If only that was the case. The hadith bans foods the Quran doesn't forbid, commands death for adultry, forbids music, forbids silk for men, etc..

I don't have a problem with hadith which don't go against any teaching of the Quran.

We have had the discussion about the food, and what it seems to come down to is your contention about what 'Vile' meant to the Arabs at the time... something which, without the hadith, you aren't really in a position to know.

How do you understand the death penalty for 'spreading corruption'? What do you take this to mean, in the absence of Prophetic guidance?

Christian sources are too conflicted on the matter, but Luke writing the Acts about 100 years after Jesus says that there were thousands of followers. His own brothers led the church of Jerusalem and they, according to modern scholarship, were pious Jews who didn't worship Jesus or consider him divine.

So far far fewer than the Messenger of Allah (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam)?

How united did they remain after Prophet Muhammad's death? How united was the Ummah? Did they not spread propaganda against each other and start major civil wars? Both inventing lies about the other. Sad how it turned out, but true. The point is that even the early sources can't be trusted a 100%. Does this invalidate all hadith? No, but it doesn't help their case either. Certainly hadith stressing the importance of following their rulers no matter who they are become suspect.

The first part seems unrelated to the second. What propaganda specifically?

The important fitna occurred after Uthman (radiAllahu anhu) had ordered people to write down the hadith.

As to your final point, how do you take 'obey those put in power above you'?

How many hadith fall into this category? Hadith which were reported by tens of different people in different regions? Is there a collection of just these Mutawatir hadith?

Allahu alim to exact numbers, I am not a hadith scholar. If there was a hadith with 72 Isnad, would you accept it? What is the acceptable level of authenticity before you cease to reject them?

That's exactly my point, the sources aren't reliable. They contradict each other but according to you these sources should be accurate. So how can you accept one and not the other?

That is not a contradiction, Umar (radiAllahu anhu) forbade the writing down of hadith, lest they become confused with the Qur'an, then Uthman (radiAllahu anhu) encouraged people to do so, once that danger was gone.

Masha'Allah. Race has nothing to do with it though.

Race in this case is merely an indicator of culture, specifically me coming from a culture long removed from oral traditions.

I'm just pointing out that there is disagreement within the ummah about even the “well established” hadith.

This is not however what seems to be the case.

The Quran wasn't compiled 200 years after Muhammad though nor was it transmitted in a “similar” manner. I already pointed out in my previous post, the way the two come to is is completely different. If the hadith had come directly from Muhammad, they wouldn't all start by saying “I heard from x that he heard from y that he heard from z that he heard from Muhammad.” No, the Quran has been memorized in its entirety since the start and compiled by Muhammad's own companion. The same cannot be said about the Sahih Bukhari (or any other collection of hadith).

The hadith were also memorised from the start, and recorded and transmitted from the Companions of the Prophet (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam). That is why they will say 'Narrated by Umar (radiAllahu anhu) to Ibn Umar etc. in this manner, they can be checked upon, to see if the narration stacks up.

If you have a chain of individuals, going back to one of the companions, all of whom were of trustworthy character, and report the same thing as another chain, when at no point the individuals on either side of the chain could have collaborated, then any reasonable person will take the narration as sound.

His example was to live by the Quran and his actions concerning the major commands (salaat, hajj, etc.) have been practiced daily by thousands of people since his time. These would not have suddenly been forgotten one day. They might have gotten corrupted over time, which is one of the few good things the hadith help set in stone. Even if Bukhari didn't have any access to Muhammad's verbatim sayings , I don't believe within 200 years the salaat could have completely changed as it was so widely practiced, so even if some of the hadith concerning prayer were an invention of his time they did record how the Muslims prayed in within 2 centuries of Muhammad, which is good.

The four madhabs describe different manners of prayer, because they take different legal reasoning to the sources. The Malikis take your line, and look at the community of Medina as their guide.

How do you pray if not according to the hadith? In general I get the impression that so much of your understanding of Islam is actually sourced through the understandings given to you by others, which have been based upon the hadith. This seems to be especially true in terms of the seerah. Would this be an inaccurate understanding?

Why would this matter? How would this effect my knowing what is righteous or what is wrong? The Quran is a complete guide for approaching God even if you don't know something like this. The Quran in general doesn't bother with minuscule details that a historian would want to know (something the Bible is obsessed with), instead it focuses on teaching lessons.

If you don't understand the context, you miss the lesson. Surah Ikhlas is beautiful on its own, but it is best understood in light of the context of its revelation. That is only a small example, you can entirely miss the point of so many verses when you don't understand the context of their revelation.

Do you find it odd that God would tell the people around Muhammad to obey him and refer to him when having differences?

I think that if I believed what you do (that the Qur'an is all that is needed for all aspects of the religion) then I would. Why would it ask the Believers to refer to Muhammed (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) in relation to their differences if that is not his role? If all that is needed is the Qur'an?

Of course the Quran would say this, but it's obviously reffering to those people.

Why? I have to ask again: what methodology do you use to distinguish between commands limited to contemporaries, and permanent ones?

How can we refer to Muhammad about the differences you and I are having right now? We can't. God didn't say, refer to the sayings of Muhammad other people are telling you they heard from some other people who heard it from some other people. No, it is telling Muhammad's contemporaries to go to him.

Why would the Prophet (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) be referred to as being the way to resolve differences between Muslims, if the Quranist argument was cogent (ie. that the Qur'an is all that is needed)? Within the command to refer to the Prophet (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) on differences is the assumption that the Messenger of God (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) will remain accessible to the community in some way, that way is the hadith. That is one of the things that 'ask those who know' refers to. What do you take it to mean if not that?

The commands are the Quran. The people would even ask him to bring something else, and he was commanded to say “I can't change it, I only follow what is revealed.” There are numerous verses which declare that the Quran is the revelation. “These are the verses of the Wise Scripture”, “These are the verses that make plain”, “This is a glorious Quran”, so on. There is no evidence that anything was left out of the Quran, in fact it says the opposite, “He[Allah] has send down to you this Scripture fully detailed.”.

Whether or not you accept it as valid or not, you surely cannot deny that the vast volumes of hadith literature have some basis. That the Messenger of Allah (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) was actually giving guidance to his community in the forms of laws and treaties and the like, things that were not contained within the Qur'an but were guidance for society? If you accept this, then you must also accept that the Prophet (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam) was not a hypocrite, he would not have done so if to do so (legislate) went against the command of the Qur'an.

He gave mankind the Quran, the greatest source of law, so yes he was a law giver.

The Qur'an contains very little actual law. About 4% I am told. It is scripture, not a law text, the one who gave the law, who arbitrated, as described in the Qur'an (both of him and other Prophets alayhis salaam) over the people using the law, not merely the content of revelation. It was not merely revelation that made him what he is. Revelation made him a Messenger (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam), arbitration, leadership and the law is what made him a Prophet (sullAllahu alayhi wasalaam).

Exactly, that's what I've been saying. He transmitted the laws which are in the Quran. I have the Quran. Why should I search through tens of thousands of hadith looking for more laws? No, the Quran contains all of God's laws which Muhammad faithfully transmitted.

That is not what I said. What he transmitted embodied the Qur'an, in that it was guidance to Islam (the Sha'riah) but it was not revelation. His arbitration, his law giving, was not revelation. When people came to him with issues, when he spoke to people, he did not speak merely the Qur'an, but he spoke the commands of God nonetheless.