The Fourth installment of the series called, the Basics of Islam, centers around one question… Do Christians, Jews and Muslims worship the same God?

RESOURCES:

Sami Yusuf – Supplication Video

Jeremiah 29:13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

Acts 10:23b-48 Cornelius comes to faith

Ida Glasser – The Bible and Other Faiths (Global Christian Library)

Don Richardson – Eternity in Their Hearts

David Bently – The 99 Beautiful Names Of God*: For All the People of the Book

 

James 1:26-27 26 Those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves, and their religion is worthless. 27 Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. Google Search for “echad” in the Shema – Deuteronomy 6:4

30 Day Prayer Guide www.worldchristian.com

MUSIC:

Theme Music by: Nobara Hayakawa – Trail

Sponsor Music by: Drunk Pedestrians – Mean

Interlude Music by: Artificial Music – Humanism, Chris Zabriskie – Heliograph, Josh Woodard – Fight the Sea

 

 

Here starts the auto-generated transcription of Is the God of Muhammed the Father of Jesus? – Part 1:

 

 

Alright. So some of you are probably wondering, is this another episode about is the God of Mohammed, the father of Jesus? And the answer is no. We actually are republishing this into a 2 part series because, quite frankly, 51 minutes is too long. We’ve we’ve learned.

 

We’ve learned. We wanna we wanna we wanna prefer you guys as the listener. I was just under the impression that you would go on a 51 minute run, listener, and have time to listen to it. But it is July, way too hot for 51 minutes. So we’re making it into 2 parts.

 

But don’t worry, we’re not gonna not publish an episode this week. We’re still committed to 1 episode a week. You’ll just see one more extra episode. That’s right. And so we’re gonna do that for the this episode.

 

Alright. We’ll see you next week. Alright. So this week on truth about Muslims, we’re gonna be talking about is the father of Jesus, the God of Mohammed. And, the reason we’re gonna talk about this is we have a listener who had an interaction this past weekend, and the question came up, who is the God of Islam?

 

Hello? Hey, Serenity. You are on the show. You are recorded live right now. Okay.

 

So we know that you had an interaction this past week, and the question came up, who is the God of Islam? And you heard, some perspectives that you hadn’t quite heard before. Could you share that story with us? Yes. I have, I have extended family with some, Jewish background and just from early on in my young life, heard a lot of pro Zionist beliefs and so, you know, Islam’s never been a favorite religion in my home.

 

When I went to visit the this family very recently, I kept just randomly hearing out of the blue how how Allah, not only was he not real, but also that he was actually the demon Moloch. And I kept going, wait. What? I mean, it was just, I well, I looked it up afterwards because when I after I left the visit because I had I knew what was in the Bible at some point and then as a as a god of another religion, And it turns out, I believe it’s the Canaanites, and and he’s this god this false god is famous for a required child sacrifice. I went to Bible college too and remember the horror stories of mothers, like, just dropping their babies into this pit.

 

And, I mean, I don’t know how I personally feel whether all false gods, as in the Moloch god, is an actual demon entity, but it was just, oh no, Allah is not real, Allah is this demon, Moloch, and if you looked at the history you would see that and I’m just like, what? And it would just be like we’d be talking about something completely else, and this person and I have a very fun debating relationship, so we’d be talking about politics, and I’m on one side and they’re on the other side, and then it’d be like, this would just get brought up again. That along with well, you know Islam is automatically a a violent religion. Like, they are just always violent and this is why because this demon is so is this way and I’m just sitting there going, but they’re not. Like, not everybody and I I even said it one time.

 

I said, you realize that the vast majority of Muslims are not fundamentalist. And they’re like, well, they worship this demon, so therefore they’re all gonna be like that. I mean, it’s heartbreaking to dehumanize people in the way that I felt like it was happening, but, you know. Well, once again, Muslim terrorists A terrorist are are alive and well. They are not dead, and their video is not gratuitous, and it certainly is not irrelevant.

 

It is a warning. Welcome to the truth about Muslims podcast, the official podcast of the Swimmer Center For Muslim Studies, where we help to educate you beyond the media. Here are your hosts, Howard and Trevor. Hey. Welcome back to truth about Muslims podcast.

 

This is the 4th installment. Of Islam 101. Actually, this isn’t the 4th installment. Number 4 of 101 episodes. Well, we have 3.

 

Oh, okay. And then we had this half, like, what is the Kaaba? Which we didn’t know. So we’re probably not gonna release that one. No.

 

I wanna release it. Okay. I’m just saying it’s that it’s like a little mini, like, a fun, like, things to think about. Alright. Well, we have something probably a little bit more pertinent to think about this week.

 

Well, now that I say it, maybe we should got one. Hey. You know what? We’ll release it as a bonus. It was basically Howard and I sitting around going, I I have no idea.

 

Yeah. What is in there? Yeah. Like, what is inside the cobble? Right.

 

So but, anyway, I thought it was interesting enough. So you you I’ll post it anyway and we’ll we won’t make it an official episode. Okay? Is that cool? Yep.

 

That’s cool. It’ll be like a bonus episode. Bonus. Alright. So today charge 19.99.

 

3 easy installments. I don’t even know how that would break down. Alright. So what are we talking about today? Well, the question is, it’s a toughie and it causes a lot of division.

 

It’s making me concerned. Yeah. I’m actually sweating a little bit. It’s because our air conditioning is not on. That’s true.

 

It ruins the the sound quality. And so we were quality for you. And, the question is, is the God of Mohammed the father of Jesus? So is Allah God? Yes.

 

That wasn’t my answer. That was the question. Yes. That’s the question. Right.

 

That is the question. Everybody just turned it off right there. Like, he said yes. I feel the I feel the hate mail coming already. Alright.

 

So what do we need to say to kinda prep everybody? I say we prep it. I have this this video that’s, called supplication or prayer from Sami Yusuf who’s a a musician in the Muslim world. And there’s a little bit of Arabic there at the beginning, some singing, and then, some English. And I think it’s a good idea that we start there to kinda hear from a Muslim point of view sort of their prayer to God, their, supplication.

 

And it’s in English. Yeah. So you can understand it. Right. And then from there, we’ll kick it off.

 

Okay. So we’ll it’s about in a minute and a half clip. So if you’re not used to this, this is kind of a little bit out of our form. Just know it’s gonna be about a minute and a half and it’s worth listening to. Mhmm.

 

We, you know, condensed it so it’s not the whole track but, you know, I think you’re gonna enjoy it. Here it goes. Oh, my lord. My sins are like the highest mountain. Good deeds pour very few.

 

There like a small pebble. I turn to you. My heart full of shame. My eyes full of tears. Bestow your upon me.

 

Yeah. Prophet and his family and companions and people who follow him. The lyrics go, my sins are like the highest mountain. My good deeds are very few, like small pebbles. I turn to you, my heart full of shame, my eyes full of tears, bestow you for forgiveness and mercy upon me.

 

The thing that struck me is that sounds very Christian. Right. That’s not, there’s nothing said there, at least in that part, that would not be much different from a Christian prayer. Yeah. But, I remember us talking a couple podcasts back in this same series when we were talking about how how Muslims think and emphasize differently, than Christians would when they approach their God.

 

For example, we the Christian emphasizes sin a lot. Like, you know, like, you know, we will really want our sins to be forgiven. Whereas in Islam, it’s really what you said about, remembering, remembering Allah. So how do you, you know, how do you explain? I reconcile that with Sami Yusuf.

 

So Sami Yusuf is, by all means, more of a Sufi Muslim and is very much in in the line of thinking with the connection of their their sin and their closeness to God and their need for forgiveness. And so, like we’ve said in almost every episode we’ve ever produced, there’s no one Islam. There are Islams and there are many Muslims and they’re all following sort of different traditions and paths. And Sami Yusuf, would be along the lines of more of the Sufi Muslims. But what’s interesting is when you hear that song, it does beg the question, who is he praying to?

 

You know what I mean? Yeah. I mean, that’s exactly what I was thinking. When you said he’s more, Sufi from when we were, oh, we haven’t gotten to this episode yet, but this is Dave when we interviewed Dave Cashin about Sufi, Muslims, it didn’t seem like it was as as, as widely accepted by by Muslims. So is is modern media changing that too?

 

Well, I mean, the Sufis are are quite popular in a sense of, Sami Yusuf anyway because he’s a musician. And he does some incredible, music in, you know, the more fundamentalist traditions and and more radical forms. Music is gonna be forbidden And so he’s done something a little bit interesting here and that he’s taken prayer and put it to music and it’s got more of a poetry sense. And so I don’t know. I’ve I’ve met some Muslims that I think to myself, wow.

 

They are absolutely dogmatic and fundamentalist and old school and traditionalist. And then all of a sudden, you bring up Sam Yousef, and you’re like, oh, I love Sam Yousef. Really? That’s so interesting. So he’s kinda penetrated all the, different sects of, Islam.

 

Okay. Alright. So this show wouldn’t be possible without sponsors. And at this point in the show is where, if you wanna partner with us, we would put your ad. So if you wanna be a part of the show, you wanna partner with us, you like what we’re doing, you wanna be on our team, what have you, bringing this show to the world, then email us and let us know.

 

But, what what I find interesting about the song is that he he does beg the question, one, who is he praying to, which we’re gonna get into. And, do you think God hears the prayers of Muslims? You mean our God? Right. Yes.

 

Yeah. It’s go ahead. It it reminds me of, the passage, and I’d have to look it up because I’m not really good at addresses. But, where, you know, if you seek me with all your heart, you will find me. And I I don’t know.

 

I I just know the graciousness of God, at least in in my life and how he pursues people, in in Muslims. I know, the Muslims that I do know that are are devout are the ones that really do seek after God. Sure. I mean, we we’ve got you know, this week begins Ramadan here in about 7 7 or 8 days. Right.

 

And you’re going to have a whole gambit of Muslims. You’re gonna have those Muslims that don’t fast at all. And, you know, soon as they’re out from their home, they get a big jug of water and, hamburger and drive down the road and and eat. Do they really do that? Sure.

 

I’ve had oh, yeah. And then you’re gonna have those Muslims that are so devout that they will fast and then they will actually fast extra days beyond what’s required. And then even in the midst of Ramadan you have, a certain period of Ramadan which you’re looking for the, the night of power and they will stay up and pray and recite the whole Quran and so you have a a whole gambit of different participants. Wait. Wait.

 

Wait. You said night of power. That sounds interesting. What is that? I think Warren Larson touched on it in his, podcast on spirit world, but that would be the night of which the revelation came down to Mohammed.

 

And so it’s sort of a, a night where if you’re found praying or performing any, you know, these, rituals, your forgiveness or the amount of forgiveness that’s bestowed upon you in the mercy of God is is multiplied multiplied by a lot. Interesting. So it’s it’s a personal power. It’s a power that affects you Mhmm. Rather than you actually have power.

 

Right. No. No. It’s, it’s really about the forgiveness and attaining forgiveness. We’re gonna do a whole another episode after this one on on sin and atonement and looking at that.

 

But for this one, we need to deal with this question of, you know, who is the God of Islam? Who is the God of Christianity? Does the God of Christianity are they different, same similarities? And then do Muslims when they pray, does God hear them? Now, what’s really funny is I asked that question, does the God of, does our God, God of the Bible, hear the prayers of Muslims?

 

I asked that question in a class and I got these blank stares and, you know, when someone kinda chews on the end of their glasses or someone is rubbing their beard thinking and Oh, so they’re all thinking. Yeah. They’re all academics and It wasn’t deer in the headlights. There were some deer in the headlights, but it’s for other reasons. Like, can we ask that question?

 

Yeah. But, I asked the question at a church and there was a young boy, probably, must have been 9 years old. And, I said, does God does our God hear the prayers of Muslims? And this 9 year old boy just shouts out, of course, he hears the prayers of Muslims. What does god not hear?

 

And I thought, there it is. Out of the mouth of babes. That’s right. Yeah. You’re getting, you’re getting to seminary, and all of a sudden, you start thinking about these things deeply.

 

Does God hear the prayers of a Muslim? How many angels spit on the end of a plane? That’s right. Can God make a rock so big he can’t lift it? But but Alright.

 

I I imagine God up in heaven, like, if he has ears, like, covering his ears or, like, stuffing them with tissue so that he can’t hear the prayers of Muslims or something. He only hears the right kind of people. You know what I mean? And so, of course, God hears the prayers of of Muslims. And so, we think of Acts and, what is it?

 

Acts 10 with Cornelius. Is that right? Where Cornelius is a God fearing man, including God hears the prayers of Cornelius even though he wasn’t yet a believer in Christ. Right. But he didn’t need to hear the message of Christ in order to be saved.

 

But the idea of whether or not God hears people, yes, God hears people. So we we have to look at the question though who is you know, what is the difference? Are these gods the same? And I like Venn diagrams. So if you have, like, 2 circles and they overlap, do we worship the same god?

 

And and the answer is really, well, in some ways, yes. In some ways, no. It’s kind of a funny question because in my mind, Howard, there there is only one God, actually not in my mind. In Paul’s mind, there is only one God. Right.

 

I mean, that’s what Paul talks about in Corinthians to the Corinthian church. First Corinthians, what is it, verse 8 when he talks about food sacrificed to idols. Right. And, he he goes pretty clear into the idea. And I would even say that this is a very much a creedal statement of the early early church, 1st Corinthians, chapter 8 and then looking at verse verses 4 through 7.

 

You want me to read it? Yeah. If you got it there. Therefore, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that an idol has no real existence and that there is no god but 1. For although there may be so called gods in heaven or on earth as indeed there are many gods, lowercase g, and many lords, lowercase l, yet for us there is one God, the father from whom all, are all things and for whom we exist and one Lord Jesus Christ through whom are all things and through whom we exist.

 

Right. And I think of that as, being a very core statement of the Christian faith. There is only one God that’s right in line with Deuteronomy chapter 6. You know, the Lord your God is 1. Here Israel, the Lord your God is 1.

 

And right in line with, Christ being, at the center of that, he is the full image. All of deity dwells in him according to, the high Christology passages, particularly of Colossians. But let’s go back to the Psalms and look at Psalm 148 because I think Psalm 148, I was, speaking with Ida Glasser, who I had the pleasure of meeting in Oxford, and she has written a book about, Christianity and other religions. We’ll put it in the show notes. And she asked me, had I ever thought about what Psalm 148 has to do with other religions?

 

And I read it and I thought, I don’t get it. And so, Howard, let’s I know it’s a little bit long, but let’s read 148. I I did glance through it and I don’t know what that would be either. But I’m excited to find out. Here we go.

 

This is Psalm 148. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord from the heavens. Praise him in the heights. Praise him, all his angels.

 

Praise him, all his hosts. Praise him, sun and moon. Praise him, all you shining stars. Praise him, you highest heavens and you waters above the heavens. Let them praise the name of the Lord for he commanded and they were created, and he established them forever and ever.

 

He gave a decree and it shall not pass away. Praise the lord from the earth, you great sea creatures and all deeps, fire and hail, snow and mist, stormy wind, fulfilling his word. Mountains and all hills, fruit trees and all cedars, beasts and all livestock, creeping things and flying birds, kings of all of the earth and all peoples, princes and all rulers of the earth, young men and maidens together, old men and children, let them praise the name of the Lord for his name alone is exalted. His majesty is above earth and heaven. He raised up a horn for his people, praise for all his saints, for the people of Israel who are near to him.

 

Praise the lord. And then so the idea is what does this have to do with other religions or what does this have to do with other gods? And her point was basically what the psalmist is saying here is there is only one god. He has created all things. And when you look at the context of this passage and you think of ancient the ancient near east, a lot of these things were, quote, unquote, gods of the day.

 

You know, you had kings. You had princes. You had rulers of the earth. Right. Sun.

 

Sun. You had moon. You had the cedars. You had, cattle. You had I mean, a lot of these things you would see deified in the ancient near east.

 

Well, actually, in also animistic cultures and, of course, native American cultures and interesting. Yeah. And so what the psalmist is saying is God has created all of these things and all of these things praise him. Right. So even the the the god’s little g praise god.

 

Like, everything that has been created is pointed to him. Everything that has breath. Right? And even things that don’t have breath, uncreated or everything is created in a sense. So but we still have the question.

 

Is the God of Islam, Allah? Is that the father of Jesus? And here’s here’s the issue. You have it’s a complex. 1, you have a an issue of semantics or definitions.

 

Right. There is no other word in Arabic for God. Alright. This week’s sponsors. CIU.

 

CIU. CIU educates people from a bib Biblical. Biblical world review. Worldview. Real world review.

 

CIU educates people from a biblical worldview to impact the nations with the message of Christ. So there is no other word in Arabic for God other than Allah. And so the the real issue is that the word Allah is pre Islamic. Okay? Mohammed didn’t make up the word Allah.

 

Mohammed didn’t create the god Allah that So we’re talking about the word God. Right. You can’t No subtitles like you need to start calling God God as though that’s somehow the biblical term. And that’s the interesting thing. Right?

 

I mean, we as Christians here in the United States, we have no issue calling God God even though there’s no word in the Bible that is spelled god. God. Right? The the Greek word for God is not God. Right.

 

It’s theos which is actually the Greek term that’s also used for Zeus. Paul chose to use that word. So words are important, but what’s more important is the meaning behind the word Right. That it’s filled with the correct meaning. And so so far as I know, none of my Christian friends are praying to Yahweh or Jehovah.

 

When you pray, Howard, I’m assuming you don’t pray in the name of Yeshua, you pray in the name of Jesus, which is found nowhere in the scriptures. This idea of Jesus. This is a transliteration from the Greek word Iesous. Jesus’ actual name is Joshua, the Lord saves. Right.

 

But it’s okay for those of you that are, like, thinking, oh my gosh. I’ve been praying to the wrong name. You got God knows who you’re praying to. He’s he’s okay. He’s bigger than that.

 

But the idea of the word Jesus, not actually being the correct term, it’s really Joshua, but, you know, the word is really the important thing. It’s not the word itself, but the meaning underneath the word or the meaning that is filled into the word. And so for the word God that we use in the English terminology, it comes from the pagan deity, Gat, which is the word that the English translators chose to use to translate the word theos. And so in some sense, our terminology, our word that we use for God in the English language is actually far more pagan than the term Allah. Wow.

 

I think you’re stepping on some toes, man. Well, I’m not trying. I just not my I’m not the one stepping on anybody’s toes. This is just history and you know. That’s intense.

 

Yeah. But I mean, it’s okay. It’s not like, the God God is somehow receiving glory every Sunday morning in American churches because we’re praying to God. Right. Because the meaning behind it changes everything.

 

But, it’s not but still it’s still uncomfortable a little bit. Sure. I mean, it’s like in the old testament whenever Moses goes up onto the mountain, then he comes back down and there you have them they’ve they’ve created a golden calf. Mhmm. And who is it?

 

Aaron at that point? Right. It says, this is the Lord God who has led you out of Egypt. Was it? Right.

 

I mean, is it just because it has the correct name because I call it the Lord God or I call it Yahweh? Does it suddenly become Yahweh? Right. So in that sense, I just wanna say that as Muslims follow Christ, don’t expect them to change the name to suddenly God because they would probably not be comfortable with that nor should we expect them to do that. There’s nothing wrong with the term Allah.

 

And in some ways, it’s closer. Right? When Jesus is on the cross, he is crying out in the Aramaic, which has a very similar root, which is the, Aramaic term for for God. And so Allah, Elohim, El, Al, they’re they’re all coming from the same semantic root Wow. Of the Semitic language.

 

So we have to be careful that we just don’t all of a sudden we hear somebody say a law and suddenly our our the skin starts to crawl and the hair on the back of our neck stands up. You just gotta get that out of your head. Okay. So, fair, that’s the semantic problem. Right.

 

But then you have another problem, which I think is the deeper problem, which is the nature of God. Yes. That’s the issue. Because we’re talking about meaning. Because to be quite frank with you, Howard, when I hear the some Christians speak about the nature of God, I’m not sure we’re worshiping or talking about the same God.

 

Alright. We’re gonna have to make this into a 2 part series, and so join us again next week for the second part of Is the God of Muhammad, the father of Jesus?