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HOW TO CONVERT A MUSLIM

Victor M. Eskew

 

            Converting any individual always involves an honest and good heart in the one who is hearing the truth.  This is what Jesus refers to as “good ground” in Luke 8:15.  “But that on the good ground are they, which in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it, and bring forth fruit with patience.”  Without such a heart, the seed of God’s Word will not have the proper opportunity to germinate, grow, and produce. 

            Beyond the individual’s having a good and honest heart, there are two lines of reasoning that a soul-winner can use that should cause a person to question a false religion he is embracing.  The first line of reasoning centers upon the founder of the religion.  Many founders declare that they are prophets.  As prophets, they have spoken numerous prophecies about future events.  If these events did not come to pass, then the founder of that religion is a false prophet.  Long ago, Moses wrote:  “When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously:  thou shalt not be afraid of him” (Deut. 18:22).  No honest individual should want to align himself with a group whose founder has been proven to be a false prophet.  This man is the foundation of that religion.  If the foundation crumbles, so does the entirety of the religion.

            The second line of reasoning involves the authoritative books of the religious group.  If these books are fraudulent, the religion is vain.  If the books contain errors and contractions, the religion is a fruad.  In his book, The Quran Unveiled, Dave Miller writes:  “…whether a religion has a supernatural origin must be ascertained on the basis of its sources of authority – its foundational fountainhead(s) from which its practice and semination are spawned” (p. i).  It is right here where one can seek to convert a Muslim.  Muslims believe the Qur’an is the word of Allah.  In the remainder of this article, we will show our readers some things they can point out to Muslims about this supposed “holy book.”

            First, the Qur’an quotes extensively from “uninspired contemporaneous Jewish sources” of Muhammad’s day (Miller, p. 74).  Muhammad was exposed to Jews in Medina.  Their staunch monotheism stood in stark contrast to the pagan idol worshipers of the city.  This view would become one of the main elements of Muhammad’s religion.  The Judaism that influenced Muhammad was corrupt.  Miller writes:  “The breed of Judaism to which Muhammad was exposed like Christianity at the time, was a corrupt one.  Literally centuries of legend, myth, and fanciful folklore had accumulated among the Jews, reported in the Talmud, the Midrash, and the Tarummim.  These three Jewish sources were replete with uninspired rabbinical commentary and speculation” (Quran Unveiled, p. 75).  Miller lists numerous, lengthy quotes in the Qur’an that were borrowed from uninspired, Talmudic sources, rabbinical oral traditions, and Jewish legends on pages 78-119.  Thus, these parts of the Qur’an are not inspired.  They are simply borrowed, Jewish legends. 

            Second, there are internal and historical inaccuracies in the Qur’an.  One incongruity is found in Surah 4:11-12, 177.  This Surah sets forth an inheritance law, specifically the division of an inheritance between two daughters, a man’s parents, and his wife.  Here is what is authorized:  the daughters will receive 2/3s of the inheritance.  The man’s parents will receive 1/3 of the inheritance.  And, the wife will receive 1/8.  If these amounts are added together, they exceed the available estate.  How would an all wise God miscalculate these numbers?  Perhaps it was just a mistake made by the man named Muhammad.

            Let’s now consider two historical inaccuracies.  In the days of Moses, it is said that God “placed among you Prophets, and he made you kings…” (Surah 5:18-21).  The problem is that there were no kings in the days of Moses.  Saul was the first king of Israel and he was anointed five hundred years after Moses.  In Surah 28:38-39, Pharaoh is said to have said to Haman, to bake mud; and set up for me a lofty tower in order that I may survey the god of Moses.  The tower (of Babel) is pre-Moses and Haman is post-Moses, being from the book of Esther.  It appears that the “inspired” Muhammad was confused about the chronology of historical events.

            Third, the Qur’an has many problems when it comes to textual transmission.  Three things are needed for the Divine to provide His word in perfection to all mankind.  Messengers of God need to be inspired, that is, supernaturally guided by the Holy Spirit in the reception of the message (See I Cor. 2:9-13).  The inspired message would need to be committed to writing in a pristine, unadulterated fashion.  Then, the original written message would need to be sufficiently preserved and transmitted so that succeeding generations of people would have access to the same information with reasonable certainty that the message had not been altered. 

            The Qur’an fails to meet these criteria.  Muhammad never wrote down any of his revelations himself (Surah 6:7; 7:158; 17:93; 25:5; 29:48, 51).  The gathering of the materials for the Qur’an began about one year after the death of Muhammad.  This gathering was ordered by Abu Bakr.  What was gathered was Muhammad’s oral utterances that had been supposedly written down on date palm leaves, camel bones, parchments, and other assorted materials.  Note:  None of these written documents exist today.  Dear reader, it was the Muslim community that gave the Qur’an in its written form, not Muhammad or God.  Some claim that the Qur’an was compiled by men who have memorized the spoken words of the prophet Muhammad.  “Islamic apologists seem unconcerned that this process of transferring the Quran from the memories of followers to written form was an uninspired process, i.e., with no supernatural guidance attached to it.  Fallible human memory is a dubious basis on which to stake God’s Word” (Miller, 140).  Abu Bakr’s Qur’an was the standard for about ten years.  However, as it circulated, copies of it were made.  These copies often contained errors and contradictions.  Caliphate Uthman commissioned Zaid to establish one standard Qur’an.  All previous copies were destroyed.  Thus, there is no way to verify any previous documents or present renderings.  Lastly, the final document is a jumbled collection.  Miller writes:  “The arrangement is not easy to understand.  Revelations of various dates and on different subjects are to be found together in one surah; verses from Madinah revelation are found in Meccan surahs; some of the Medinah surahs, though of late revelation, are placed first and the very early Meccan surahs at the end” (p. 145).  All of these things show us that the inspiration, revelation, and transmission of the Qur’an are extremely flawed.

            In essence, we are saying that the Qur’an has deep problems.  These problems reveal to us that the book is not inspired by Allah.  The claim made in Surah 4:82 is false.  It states:  “Will they not then ponder the Quran?  If it had been from other than Allah they would have found therein much incongruity.”  If the Qur’an is not inspired, if it is a flawed book that comes from the minds of men, it is not an authoritative source book for a religion.  My friends, the religion cannot be trusted if the book upon which it stands is a fabrication of mere man.  A man with an honest and good heart will admit this.  This will be the very first step in converting a Muslim to Christianity.