Value Of Hadith Compared To The Bible - help on this

[Optimus Prime]

Asalamualaikum.

How would you respond to the following claims. A friend of mine posted this to me:

The bible came before the Quran. The Quran approved of both the old and new testaments at the time of it's revelation in the present tense (meaning at the time the Quran was revealed, the old and new testaments were the truth..and not false). At the same time there are even hadith showing Prophet Mohammad SAW directly show respect to the Torah and referring to it as the 'truth' whilst judging jews from it.

Yet in contrast the narrative that holds more stock in the minds of common muslims is the one where Umar RA was reading 'the torah' and the Prophet SAW became angry, saying 'the jews say it is from Allah but it isn't' (something to that extent). To reconcile this..with the Quran..the correct way clearly is to use an example from the bible itself

Jeremiah 8:8 'How can you say, "We are wise, for we have the law of the LORD," when actually the lying pen of the scribes has handled it falsely?
Basically, Umar RA clearly didn't speak hebrew...he would have been reading an arabic translation of the Torah, in which case the argument fits..ie you'd have jewish scribes writing their own interpretations of the torah in their own language...yet majority of muslims who quote that story from hadith, do not even seem to understand this basic issue (ie of the torah here being an arabic translation).

That brings up another issue, if it's possible for jews to have mishandled their scripture in this manner...it's really no different than most muslim translations of the Quran.
There are translations out there, that contain (in brackets) the opinions of the translator yet in the minds of the reader, this is literally passed on as 'THE QURAN' as opposed to 'one particular dudes understanding of the Quran' and in this respect muslims have been easy to fool on various subjects especially inter-religious dialogue. It is not a minor issue, given the fact that the antagonistic view muslims have since held of the bible since the time of Ahmad Deedat to Zakir Faik.....has directly led to an onslaught of attacks from christians against muslim (the internet is vast proof of that).
It's a case of muslims own ignorant views directly leading to attacks against muslim beliefs......so much for 'dawah'.


On the otherhand, the hadiths came after the Quran, they have no divine backing...only the backing of scholars. We're told how amazing these scholars were and really we're not meant to question their knowledge...
you're all familiar with the explict hadith on Aisha's age when her marraige to the Prophet SAW was consumated at age 9. The irony is non-muslims directly use these hadith and present them as literal fact..and that is obviously because in the minds of most sunnis, they really are 'fact'.
Yet in the same hadith collection we get this

(2) Narrated 'Aisha: (the wife of the Prophet) I had seen my parents following Islam since I attained the age of puberty. Not a day passed but the Prophet visited us, both in the mornings and evenings. My father Abii Bakr thought of building a mosque in the courtyard of his house and he did so. He used to pray and recite the Qur'an in it. The pagan women and their children used to stand by him and look at him with surprise. Abu Bakr was a Softhearted person and could not help weeping while reciting the Quran. The chiefs of the Quraish pagans became afraid of that (i.e. that their children and women might be affected by the recitation of Quran)." (Book #8, Hadith #465)

Abu Bakr RA was one of the first muslims...by the time the Prophet SAW married Aisha ie at age 53..that would put Aisha well into her 20s.
this obviously contradicts those infamous hadiths....but im using this as an example of where hadith contradict each other.

My view is that Imam Bukhari himself would have been fully aware of this contradiction(obv there are many more contradictions) yet he allowed it purely in the interest of carrying these as 'sources of information' and not fact.

Whilst Quranites outright attack the hadith, i'll refrain from that. I just wish most muslims stopped giving so much importance to hadith, no different to jews giving more importance to the Talmud than the Torah.


Also, nyone who has read Genesis 1 would clearly know it cannot be 'true' but then that's because our notion of truth is based on logical truth as opposed to mythological truth.
Ask yourself this, if you were to go back in time and to give a message to an ancient civilisation (3-4000 years ago) to improve their morality..and that message was going to last thousands of years...what type of narrative would you give them knowing what you do? Would you tell them the earth is a tiny bit of dust in an endless ocean of galaxies and that we're basically insignificant (but size is relative really)...nor is God just a few miles above us?
similarly in Genesis it is Isaac who is put to the test by Abraham...in the Quran it is Ishmael...this is that mythos aspect playing it's part. The story carries more weight when the man involved is the direct ancestor of those people. My point here is obviously that 'truth' is subjective and the Quran refers to both the Torah and Gospels, physically existing during the 7th century, as the Truth.

My point is basically, given that we live in the age of information and can access many different translations and interpretations of scripture aswell as their history (ie masoretic text compared to septuagint), the example of Umar RA reading the torah and being warned by the Prophet SAW can be overlooked, provided a person has access to more versions of the bible, there's less chance of being tricked into believing a wrong interpretation of the bible. In my view the top muslim scholars out there, and there are many of them in the west...they really need to become more proficient in their bible studies..i feel without that they are pretty lacking in understanding.

just a final example of this
in the new testament it teaches the difference between Faith and The Law...the argument made is that the Law (of Moses) wasn't there from the beginning..but it came not to 'conceal sin' but to 'reveal it's depths'...ie to make people more aware of their need for God's intervention (which obviously it says came through Jesus Christ AS). What this basically means is that the law didn't prevent people from sin, it actually caused them to become aware of their 'sin' which didn't once exist...
for example if you look at Islam, alcohol consumption wasn't sinful, then it became sinful. The point of the law in this respect, wasn't just to control people but to make them more aware of their condition, a measuring point.
So what happens when people cross that point and sin becomes prevalent? the solution in the Bible was to reveal God's grace (ie Forgiveness, mercy) as opposed to punish people because they were perpetually sinful.

Yet you look at a country like pakistan or egypt or any number of muslim countries and the big issue in the minds of the most influencial scholars is 'to implement shariah' with every bit of harshness you could expect...
that type of control always fails in the same way it failed for jews, purely because if people are inwardly corrupt, they'll find new ways to exploit the laws (usury being a perfect example from the Bible). In pakistan, you have all the mess surrounding music/dance, films, dress-code and finally adult relationships (fornication/adultery)..the whole 4 witnesses/rape stuff..it's basically a big mess that could have been improved if these scholars had just a little bit of perspective from the Bible.
minor things you know? like how Jesus Christ dealt with a prostitute.
instead these dudes areall about strict punishment and stoning, they are no different to extremist jews.

[taha taha]

Corruption of the Torah

Did mankind tamper with the Old Testament?

Misheal A. Al-Kadhi

The Jews have, from one generation to another, handed down their
Old Testament, as the faultless words of Moses (pbuh) and the
prophets. The "Old testament" is made up of the "Torah" (Tawrat),
(which is also called "the Pentateuch"), and the "books of the
prophets".
The "Torah" consists of the first five books of the Old Testament.
They are believed by the Jews to have been written by Moses (pbuh).
These five books are: "Genesis", "Exodus", "Leviticus", "Numbers",
and "Deuteronomy". After the Christians decided to incorporate the
Old Testament into their Bible, they began to study these books in
great detail..

For countless ages, the only book of history available to Christians
and Jews was the Old Testament. When someone wanted to know
what happened in the past, they would go back and study the Old
Testament to find the answer. New theories about history literally
lived and died by their conformance to what the Old Testament
taught. Then the discrepancies began to be noticed.

Once mankind began to study the OT in detail, comparing the various
passages which referred to the same topic in order to obtain as much
detail as possible, they began to notice conflicting accounts of many
matters as well as other problems. For instance, in the eleventh
century, it was noticed that the list of Edomite kings in Genesis 36
names kings who lived long after Moses was dead. Then people
began to notice such statements as "to this day" something is true,
which implies that the author was looking back at these matters
through history and has seen that they have endured.

After this, it was noticed that in the beginning verses of the OT
manuscripts, Deuteronomy says: "These are the words that Moses
spoke to the children of Israel across the Jordan...". They noticed
that the words "across the Jordan" refers to people who are on the
opposite side of the Jordan river to the author. But the alleged
author, Moses himself, was never supposed to have been in Israel in
his life.

It was also noticed that Moses speaks in detail in Deuteronomy 34:5-
10 about how he died and where he was buried. Moses also calls
himself the most humble man on earth in Numbers 12:3 (would the
most humble man on earth call himself the most humble man on
earth?). In Deuteronomy 34:10 we read "And there arose not a
prophet since in Israel like unto Moses". This also implies that the
author was looking back at Moses through history a long time after
Moses's death. Now the flood gates were opened and countless other
discrepancies began to show up.

In the beginning, it was claimed that Moses wrote the Pentateuch
(Five "books of Moses") and anyone contesting this fact would be
severely punished or worse. However, when these matters started to
become well known, it became necessary to find explanations. For
example, the first explanation presented for the verses referring to the
death of Moses was that Moses (pbuh) had written his books, but that
later prophets, as well as "inspired" scribes (who could also be
considered prophets), had later on added on a couple of lines here and
there. In this manner the text remained 100% the "inspiration" of
God. This explanation, however, did not stand up to scrutiny because
the style and literary characteristics of the verses are the same
throughout. For instance, the verses which describe the death and
burial of Moses exhibit the same literary characteristics as the verses
before and after them. Thus, they must have been written by the same
person.

continue reading:
http://www.islam101.com/religions/judaism/torah.html

Evidence That Islam Teaches That There Was Textual Corruption of The Christian and Jewish Scriptures

by
Bassam Zawadi
http://www.call-to-monotheism.com/ev...ish_scriptures

[Abu Muhammad]

I'm just looking at the first few paragraphs only due to time constraint.

"The bible came before the Quran. The Quran approved of both the old and new testaments at the time of it's revelation in the present tense (meaning at the time the Quran was revealed, the old and new testaments were the truth..and not false). At the same time there are even hadith showing Prophet Mohammad SAW directly show respect to the Torah and referring to it as the 'truth' whilst judging jews from it. "

From where your friend got this i.e. the Quran approved that Old and New Testaments are the truth at the time of its revelation? As far as I know, if you read properly those Quranic ayahs, they talk about the Bible of Jesus and not the Bible according to Mark, Matthew, Luke and John. Same goes to Torah.

There are a lot of Quranic ayahs making reference to the changes in the Bible and Torah (due to distortion, forgotten & concealment) during the life of the Prophet s.a.w. himself. Amongst them: Al-Baqarah: 75, 79, 159, 174; Ali Imran: 78, 159; An-Nisa':46; Al-Maidah: 13, 14, 15; Al-An'am: 91; Al-'Araf: 162.

"Jeremiah 8:8 'How can you say, "We are wise, for we have the law of the LORD," when actually the lying pen of the scribes has handled it falsely?"

Exactly! That is what the Quran tells us. The law given to Moses a.s. and Jesus a.s. were from Allah but later gradually changed by their followers.

"Basically, Umar RA clearly didn't speak hebrew...he would have been reading an arabic translation of the Torah, in which case the argument fits..ie you'd have jewish scribes writing their own interpretations of the torah in their own language...yet majority of muslims who quote that story from hadith, do not even seem to understand this basic issue (ie of the torah here being an arabic translation)."

It wasn't about translation. By the time it reached Umar r.a., the Torah had already been distorted.

"That brings up another issue, if it's possible for jews to have mishandled their scripture in this manner...it's really no different than most muslim translations of the Quran."

It isn't a matter of translation. Allah says the very source itself i.e. the original books has been changed.

[Optimus Prime]

Thank you brother.

Anymore input from you, or other brothers would be most appreciated.

[Optimus Prime]

Brother Farid, the two narrations discussed whether there is a contradicton to when Aisha (RA) got married. The brother has a request:

I had seen my parents following Islam since I attained the age of puberty.
I did not become aware of my parents in a state other than the religion.

massive difference, how it can be simply a case of a weak translation, can you offer the accurate translation for the whole Hadith? this guy Dr Muhsin Khan also 'translated' the Quran.

[Farid]

As experts in the field of tahqeeq say, "Don't judge a book by the editor, but judge the book by its edition."

I suggest asking someone else that knows Arabic since my qualifications are not established.

Once again, the Arabic says:

لم أعقل أبوي إلا وهما يدينان الدين

Translation: I did not become aware of my parents in a state other than the religion.

My only guess is that the translator may have mixed up بالغ and عاقل. It can happen. Though, it is a big mistake in my opinion.

[Ibn Yahya]

Anyone who thinks the Bible is more reconcilable woth the Qur'an than Ahadith is demented or ignorant