Corruption of the Torah & the Gospels

The question of corruption


The question of corruption of biblical texts is a major bone of contention among the three communities, Jews, Christians and Muslims. A great deal has been written about it throughout the centuries; even before Islam, the texts have been attacked because of inconsistencies, errors and contradictions in them. There has always been heated discussion about this topic. The People of the books always ask how God's message can be corrupt? Can God's word fail? When did the corruption take place? Who is responsible for it? We shall address this question in this chapter, but first there is something that I should like to point out. Different arguments on the subject of corruption have helped the development of the sciences of textual criticism, the study of comparative religion, interfaith studies, oriental studies and so on. This in itself has given rise to specialist departments in the universities, where scholars defend their own position and try to shake their opponents' position. As I have mentioned earlier, modern biblical criticism gives support to the Muslim claim of corruption. Jews and Christians need to reconsider their position in the light of the Muslim arguments. Why, for example, if the Torah was corrupt, did Jesus not mention its shortcomings? As a prophet he could not use a false text and quote from it. There is an ingenious objection; one could say that the prophet cannot deal with everything. Jesus came for a special purpose and with a special message.


John the Baptist, for example, came to warn people and to command them to repent, in preparation for the coming of the Kingdom of God. That was his sole function. Lot came only to attack the homosexuality practiced by his people, and nothing else. Jesus himself made it clear that the Paraclete, another being like himself, would come after him and tell them what he himself could not. This means that Jesus did not say everything. This supports our viewpoint that each prophet comes with a.specific message and keeps within its limits.

So we cannot take as evidence Jesus' silence about corruption of Jewish books that these books are sound.


Readers will see that almost all modern biblical critics give credence to the Muslims' claim that the Bible has been corrupted. We are speaking from a position of belief, not as enemies wishing to destroy and reject.


Muslims believe in Jesus, and believe equally in his heavenly book and Divine message which brought great benefit to mankind.


Ibn Hazm introduces his argument concerning textual corruption by saying that both Jews and Christians have distorted the Torah and the gospels by Tabdil and Tahrif, changing and twisting the words.(1) He produces many examples to prove his point as will be seen later. In a more general attack on the relationship between the Jewish Bible, the Septuagint (or LXX, the first Greek version of the Old Testament made at Alexandria in the third century B.C.) and the Samaritan Pentateuch, which he finds to contradict one another, he points out that the Christian and Jewish Torah are different. On the basis of the different ages of the Patriarchs he concludes that the chronology of the Septuagint adds 1,300 years to the age of the world.(2) Thus it can be deduced either that Ezra copied the Hebrew correctly and the Septuagint is wrong; or that Ezra miscopied the Hebrew. "Whichever alternative is accepted, both parties believe in what is untrue."(3) Ibn Hazm's criticisms that indicate the differences between the texts are


supported by other scholars"(4)


* He also refers to variations between the Septuagint and the Torah and the Pentateuch of the Samaritans (5)


In the context of transmission Ibn Hazm begins by discrediting Christian Isncul ox ascription, and casting doubt on the authority of the Christian narrators. He applies Islamic methodology to the Christian tradition.


The gospels were not transmitted by Tawatur, unbroken succession. They had come down to Christians through three agents only: Paul, Mark and Luke, and these three had taken their material from only five sources; Peter, Matthew, John, James and Jude.(6) Paul says that he was with Peter only for fifteen days(7) when they first met, and their next meeting only occupied a brief time. The third time they met they were crucified. The five figures from whom the three agents draw their material were subjected to persecution and execution to such an extent that they were effectively scattered after Jesus' arrest; and Christians remained scattered until the time of Constantine (d. 337 A.C.), when they began to show themselves openly and to lead a more stable life. It could be argued that since Ibn Hazm recognizes the trials undergone by the Apostles he has no grounds for finding them personally culpable of corrupting the Injil. Their guilt, however, lies in their failure to recognize or admit the fact of corruption, claiming that everything they wrote was inspired by God.


Ibn Hazm's view of the position of Christians after Jesus' death is clearly determined by his general attitude to the authenticity and authority of The Acts of the Apostles. This calls for some comment. Acts relate the status and pattern of early Christian worship, and provide evidence that Christians were gathering in groups and practicing their faith in the public eye at an early date (Acts 2:5-42).


It is clear that they were free to go to the synagogue and evangelize


(Acts 6:7) and that they attracted converts from among the rabbis.


Persecutions which scattered them throughout Judea and Samara (8: Iff) were succeeded by a period of stability (9:31) and controversial issues relating to Christian practices were discussed and resolved (15:6-21).


In the light of the information relating to the early Christians in Acts, which suggest that they had the opportunity to practice their faith publicly and in private, collectively and individually - it is striking that Ibn Hazm presents

a very different picture of Christian activity at this date. Was he ignorant of the evidence in Acts, or did he intentionally ignore it to suit his purpose in discounting Isnad?


The first possibility cannot be maintained since the author of Al~Faisal was clearly familiar with the text. .(8)


He provided a good description of it, its possible authorship, size, etc.(9) He himself quoted from it,(10) and compared the miracles related in it with those of other religious sects, considering them to be false.(11)


As for the second possibility, Ibn Hazm's discounting of the evidence in Acts is less a matter of deliberate, expedient omission than the consequence of Acts failing to fulfill the requirements of an authoritative text. In common with other Muslims, he would have found the information given in Acts unacceptable because it had not been transmitted by the masses to the masses, and was not traceable to eye witnesses. The rejection of information carried in Acts is then, a consequence of its being based on the work of a single author.(12)


Given the circumstances of the early Christians as described by the author of Al-Faisal Jesus' followers were in no position to keep and protect the Injil given to them intact by Jesus. According to Ibn Hazm God protected those parts of the Injil that he wished to stand as a testimony against corruption, and as proof of the truthfulness of Islam.


This falls within Ibn Hazm's general outlook which states that the existence of negation or falsehood necessitates the existence of truth.(13) The differences among the people "of the religions" do not prove that there is no truth at all in their utterances, or that their true utterances cannot be distinguished from those which are false. He says that Jews and Christians necessarily have both truth and falsehood in their scriptures. .(14) This leads directly to the question of how it is possible to mine out the truth in the Christian dogma and scriptures.


Ibn Hazm argues that this task must be undertaken on the basis of reasoning and Revelation;(15)

for instance he rejects the Christian belief in Christ's divinity on the basis that it is irrational, and furthermore this leads him to reject those texts on which Christians claim to base such a belief. The argument of a reasonable foundation is supported by the argument based on Revelation in that the Qur'an, as God's Revelation, sanctions the objection to Christ's divinity. Ibn Hazm does not reproach Jews or Christians for the contradictions and mistakes per se in their scriptures but for their ascription of them to God. His objections are directed towards the failure of Jews and Christians to investigate properly the process of transmission or to admit the possibility that mistakes had crept into their texts. Muslims deny that God could be responsible for lies, or the acceptance of transmitters as infallible people. It is necessary to make a minute and systematic examination of those responsible for transmission.


Ibn Hazm makes a plea for Christians to sift the material in their possession rather than simply accepting it as it is, and expresses the wish that they might countenance the possibility that transmitters might have committed errors. This having been done it would be possible to correct or reject mistakes on the Muslim scheme. Once again this leads the discussion to the question of how Jesus' true speech can best be distinguished from words that have falsely


been put into his mouth.


Ibn Hazm did not attempt to identify the genuine Gospel in toto - an undertaking which could not be expected from a literalist conscious that neither the Qur'an nor tradition had set a precedent for such a task. Nevertheless, his work does indicate some passages which he clearly regards as part of the real Injil as compared with others which he considers to be irrefutably corrupted. The criterion on which his distinctions are made is the Quran itself - he accepts what is consistent with the Qur'an and rejects what is incompatible with it,

this latter understood as passages specifically denied in the Qur'an or implicitly contradictory.


Ibn Hazm's categorization of passages relating to the identity of the true Injil can be set forward in three groups.

Firstly,


he fully accepts certain passages, for example, Luke 4:24, describing this as part of what God protected and kept as a testimony against Christians.(16) Likewise he accepts those verses which argue for Jesus' humanity and prophethood and the references to the Paraclete which he understands to constitute a prophecy about Muhammad. In this context it is noteworthy that Ibn Hazm's reference to the Paraclete does not correspond to any of the four references in John (14:16, 26; 15:26; 16:17). The text of Al-Faisal states that the prophecies concerning Muhammad in the Torah "are accompanied by those in the Injil concerning Jesus' prayer to God; "send down the Paraclete to teach the people that the son of man is human",(17) followed by the comment: "This is perfectly clear for whosoever is ready to understand; when Jesus knew that his followers would exaggerate his status, insisting that he was God, or the son of God, he prayed that He might send down (the Paraclete) who would clarify the fact that he was neither a deity nor the son of the deity, but a man born of woman"..(18)


Ibn Hazm goes on to ask whether any prophet succeeding Jesus clarified t his point, other than Muhammad.


The above passage concerning Jesus' prayer to God in Al-Faisal represents an unusual error from such an exact critic, and the recent discovery and publication of Ibn Hazm's Al-Usul Wa Al-FunC suggests that it is an editorial error. This book gives the complete picture of the identification between the Paraclete and the prophet made by Ibn Hazm. The other passages in John concerning the same issue are discussed but the quotations differ from those in the current version, and correspond closely to Ibn Rabban's version.(19)


Ibn Hazm comments on the passages that

"despite the differences between them they are close (in meaning). They differ because the Apostles who took them from Jesus were many". The explanation of the passages in Al-Usul is worth quoting at length: "Who is this, the spirit of truth, who does not speak on his own but through what is revealed to him? and who is this who came after Jesus and gave his witness to what Jesus brought (from heaven) ... and who declared the truth, and foretold the unseen things such as the coming of the anti-Christ or the one-eyed liar and those matters concerning the Day of Judgment, the coming, the Hell-fire and Paradise which are not mentioned in the Torah, the Gospel and the Psalter - except our Prophet Muhammad."(20)


It is very interesting that our author refers to Matthew 11:14 "And if you are willing to accept it, this is Elijah, who is to come", and follows this with the comment; "This name (Elijah) can be understood in a number of ways. Firstly, it is possible that he (Jesus) said 'Ahmad' is to come, but they changed the name, substituting Elijah instead. Secondly, Jesus may have said 'iluhim' or 'il' was to come, meaning 'God is to come'. The coming of God is the sending of Revelation, and no sacred book has come after Jesus except the Qur'an. Thirdly, it is possible that Jesus intended something - not necessarily a person - and called that something Elijah."(21)


The above quotation reveals Ibn Hazm's firm belief in the prophecy of Muhammad appearing in the Gospel, although he does not specifically refer here to the Qur'an, 61:6. In this passage the Qur'an employs the word "Ahmad" rather than "Muhammad" to name the Prophet.


Leaving aside the problem of the quotation, it is important that Ibn Hazm should have been interested in identifying the Paraclete with a Prophet who followed Jesus, and who must have been Muhammad on the basis of the (mistaken) quotation in Al-FaisaL Unlike some earlier and later Muslims,


Ibn Hazm does not develop this argument further -there is a broad range of arguments surrounding the identity of the Paraclete in both Muslim and non-Muslim scholarship.

Secondly,

Ibn Hazm recognizes that some verses in the Gospel accounts may be true - he does not commit himself to saying that they are remnants of the true Injil, but he does not exclude the possibility that they could be. An example of this can be found in his comment on Matthew 16:19-24. He begins with an outright denial that Jesus offered the keys of heaven to Peter: "By God I swear that Jesus never said such a thing",.(22) such an authorization being, in his view, destructive to the omnipotence of God, but he recognizes the possibility that Jesus' rebuke to Peter which follows in the text may be correct: "It is not impossible that he uttered the last statement."(23)


Thirdly,


as indicated above, the author of Al-Faisal absolutely denies certain verses which purport to be the utterances of Jesus; introducing his comments with a series of phrases such as: "By God, Jesus never said so", "This could not have come from God, nor a prophet, nor an infallible source, nor an honest scholar, from among the people", "By God, nobody but a liar could have said this, it could not have come from God."(24)


These three categories represent the general outline within which Ibn Hazm suggests to his reader the actual utterances of Jesus.

The question of how God safeguarded those verses welcomed as genuine by the author of Al-Faisal is not one that its author considers as relevant. The fact that God chose to protect parts of the Gospel only is a matter of God's will, which is beyond question; however parallels are drawn between the destruction of certain parts of the true Gospel, the loss of some ancient sacred books and the murder of some of the prophets, some of whom were martyred for the greater glory of God. Moreover, God preserved the essential part of the revealed Gospel to stand as a witness against those people who failed to keep the Gospel intact.


Nevertheless the reason behind God's will concerning the survival of the Gospel, rather than the consequences of His will, lies beyond the understanding of men, it is "as God wishes" and to query those would be fruitless.


The author of Al-Faisal seems to reject the idea that the correct passages in the extant gospels have been either transmitted by an unbroken chain of authorities - a view which is supported by all Muslim scholars with the exception of an insignificant minority to which Ibn Hazm refers in Al-Faisal and which he rejects as ignorant of the Qur'an and Tradition -or that they are revealed or inspired (25) as has been discussed earlier in this thesis. In this context the Qur'anic verse which states that the disciples of Jesus had been inspired by God to believe in Him and His messenger, Jesus(26) should be noted - it does not, however, constitute a generalization which can be taken to embrace the term inspiration as understood by Christians. Moreover, in the Qur'an God endowed Jesus with the Holy Spirit only as all His prophets and messengers were endowed. In common with all Muslims Ibn Hazm denied


the disciples and Apostles as prophets or capable of performing miracles as discussed above.


Thus the author under review ascribed the operation of safeguarding some of the revealed Gospel to God Himself but rejected the possibility that this had been managed by an unbroken chain of authorities; he does not feel impelled to go into the question of how God could have preserved, a part at least, o{ the true Gospel, in depth.


On the subject of such an important issue the author of this thesis has accounted it worthwhile to suggest an answer which would be faithful to Ibn Hazm's own outlook.


It has already been mentioned that Ibn Hazm does not exclude the possibility of a true written Gospel - this is clear from his phrases:

"The Gospel has been lost except for a few portions", and "God has taken it away". Has He taken some of the previous Revelation away? It is possible that God removed those parts of the true Gospel at the time when Christians began to add to or omit from the scriptures. If this is the case, the Gospel of Jesus Christ as a single, complete volume was removed, surviving only in partial form, either in the memory of the disciples, or as an actual text which was introduced into the gospels by the evangelists but mixed with human additions which they regarded as divinely inspired. It seems likely that Ibn Hazm considers that those parts of the true Gospel removed by God


can be inferred from the Qur'an. However, a significant problem arises from this: if the idea of an unbroken chain of authorities is excluded by Ibn Hazm, how can he allow himself to accept any parts of a Gospel that has been transmitted by authors outside the accepted system of Isnadl If some parts are corrupted by failing to fulfill the demands of Isnad, why not all?


Interestingly enough Ibn Hazm addressed himself to precisely this area of difficulty in his objections to a small


Muslim group who acknowledged Isnad with reference to the Jewish and Christian scriptures. He would appear to have had no direct contact with this group, nor to have seen any of their writings if such existed, stating simply that "we have been told (about them)" and from this they would seem to have exerted insignificant contemporary influence.


The reference to them in Al-Faisal, being of such importance to Ibn Hazm's own attitude to the four gospels,


is worth quoting at length: "We have been told of a number of Muslims who, out of ignorance, deny that the Torah and Injil have been corrupted at the hands of Jews and Christians. The reason which caused them (this group of Muslims) to maintain this is their lack of knowledge of the Qur'an and Sunnah. .(27)

He then refers to the Qur'anic passage which mentions the corruption, which will be discussed in detail later in this book, and continues: "We say to those Muslims who hold that their (Jewish and Christian) transmission has come through an unbroken chain of authorities and is necessarily true knowledge which can be taken as evidence,


that no doubt Jews and Christians would agree that what they received and reported of Moses and Jesus contains no reference to Muhammad and no prophecies of his prophethood. If they (the group of Muslims) acknowledge such reports in part, they must also acknowledge them in full, whether they like it or not.


If they think them (Jews and Christians) liars in some of their reports but not in others they are guilty of obstinate contradiction. It is impossible that the tradition which comes through a single channel can be partly true and partly false ... we do not know how a Muslim could make it lawful to deny the corruption of their Torah and Injil while he hears the speech of God telling him that Muhammad was foretold in both sacred books, and nothing like this exists


in the books in the hands of Jews and Christians which they claim to be the Torah and Injil. It is necessary that those ignorant Muslims should either believe the word of their God -that Jews and Christians have changed the Torah and Injil, or that they should become fools and unbelievers in God's word. If this is so, the evidence of corruption we have shown in those books must be raised against all of them together ... what we have discovered as evidence of the corruption and lies in the four gospels are clear to the extent that if there was no scriptural evidence of the extent to which Jews and Christians have corrupted their texts we could be as sure of their distortion as we would be of the evidence of our senses."(28)


Research has failed to identify the particular group of Muslims to which Ibn Hazm refers or to discover the theoretical basis of their thought, and such a task is beyond the scope of this book.

The relevance of Ibn Hazm's objections to the Muslim group he mentions is, of course, his argument that tradition transmitted through a single channel cannot be true in part only. If this is applied to his own distinction between true and false in the four gospels and the classification noted above it would appear to undermine his own argument. However, it should be emphasized that in this instance he does not base his distinctions on the ground of Isnad,


but on Revelation, that is, the Qur'an. As a strict believer in the Qur'an he accepts those verses which, as the word of God, refer to the Gospel of Jesus as having been revealed to him, and as containing guidance.


Likewise he accepts those verses which describe the corruption of this Gospel which, as he understands it, consists of omission or addition. Concerning the safeguarding of some Divine portions of that Gospel, the author of Al-Faisal regarded God himself as the agent of protection. In this the argument relating to Isnad is subsumed in the higher argument of direct Divine intervention.


Thus Ibn Hazm constructs his theory of corruption on the one hand, but the Divine energy of safeguarding on the other, on a Qur'anic basis. During his entire examination of the four gospels in which his reasoning and critical powers discover certain contradictions and mistakes he never loses sight of the central reference point of the Quran and the necessity of proving what the Qur'an maintains.


In conclusion to his discussion of the gospels Ibn Hazm states that whatever was revealed in the Qur'an and the Sunnah of the Prophet is acceptable; whatever is either discredited by the Qur'an and Sunnah, or demonstrates its own falsity, is to be rejected. Any portion that is neither sanctioned nor discredited could be true or false and Muslims should neither believe nor disbelieve it. The author of Al-Faisal supports his conclusions by reference to the Qur'an and the Sunnah as shall be shown later,

and finally allies himself with the comment of Ibn ' Abbas as related by al-Bukhari: "How can you ask the People of the Book about anything when your own book, which was revealed to the Prophet by God is fresh (recently revealed). You can read it, crystal-clear, unmixed, and it tells you that the People of the Book have changed the Book of God, the Almighty, and have altered it. They wrote it with their own hands and then sold it cheap saying that it came from God."(29)


Ibn Hazm describes this as: "the soundest Isnad or ascription to Ibn v Abbas, which is exactly our view. There is no difference between the companions on this matter." .(30)


His reference to "the soundest Isnad" is an implicit rejection of a tradition that Ibn "Abbas said that the Tahrif occurred in exegesis rather than the letter of the Torah, which had not suffered change. Ibn Hazm clearly discounts this tradition and those who follow it, as mentioned before.(31) I agree with Al-Faisal's distinction between


traditions here - Ibn 'Abbas' statement that exegesis rather than text was false was most probably made on


a particular occasion with reference to a particular scriptural passage and cannot be taken as a general statement. The tradition related by al-Bukhari correctly records Ibn 'Abbas' understanding of corruption as being in the text itself. A fuller examination of the meaning of corruption will be provided later in this book.


Ibn Hazm's argument that the four gospels contain small portions of the actual revealed Gospel should be set against other opinions concerning the extent of the survival of the actual Gospel. Ibn Taymiyah indicates the range of views on this matter. "Some Muslims, and some People of the Book, hold that the actual words of the scriptures have been changed. Of those people some consider the corrupted portions to be large in number, and regard them as more numerous than the sound. This is especially so in the case of the gospels in which the areas of weakness


are more obvious than the Torah. A few would go so far as to state that the scriptures are altogether empty of sacredness, while others would regard those passages which have suffered textual change as minor,


a more obvious viewpoint. Most, however, maintain that the four gospels contain but a few of God's words." (32)


Ibn Hazm clearly belongs with this latter group, as has been indicated above. Ibn Taymiyah defined his own position by concluding that it was best to consider the Torah and Injil in the hands of the People of the Book as containing some of God's commandments. His reference to the People of the Book in the quotation above is interesting, whether he was in fact referring to orthodox Christians, declared Christian heretics, or People of the Book who had converted to Islam is not clear.


Quite unambiguous, however,is the character of the corruption to which the author refers in his description of the range of attitudes to the survival of the actual Gospel:- it is a matter of textual rather than exegetical falseness.


Having presented the views of Ibn Hazm on the transmission of the Christian tradition in the context of Muslim thinking it is important to sketch out the Christian interpretation of the same matter as a point of comparison.


It is not possible, of course, to provide a full account but an indication of the areas of coincidence and difference can at least be suggested. Irenaeus points to the problems of defining authoritative tradition in his comment on contemporary heretics: "When they are refuted out of the scriptures they betake them to accusing the scriptures themselves as if there were something amiss with them and they carried no authority, because the scriptures, they say, contain diverse utterances, and because the truth cannot be found in them by those that know not the tradition.

For that, they say, has been handed down not by means of writings but by means of the living voice..." (33)


Clearly at this date the precise location of the authority of tradition, whether it was discoverable in the scriptures themselves, or existed in some area of oral tradition external to the texts, was a matter of dispute.


Irenaeus complains that the heretics to whom he refers appeal to their individual understanding as authorizing tradition, and counters this with an appeal to "that tradition which is derived from the Apostles,


and which is safeguarded in the churches through the successions of presbyters. " (34)He emphasizes the known succession of bishops transmitted through the church and traceable back to the Apostles who "have lodged all that there is of truth with her, (the church) as with a rich bank, holding back nothing" (35) Unorthodoxy is to be determined


by its failure to recognize the primitive succession" (36)as the test of doctrine: "All doctrine which accords with those apostolic churches, the sources and originals of the Faith, must be reckoned as the truth, since it preserves without doubt what the churches received from the Apostles, the Apostles from Christ, and Christ from God... " (37)


Irenaeus' conception of unbroken tradition has some parallels to the Islamic notion of Isnad but, as can be seen in the following quotation, is far less vigorous in its requirements: "An unbroken succession from the beginning so that the first bishop (of any church) had as his precursor and the source of his authority one of the Apostles or one of the Apostolic men who, though not an Apostle, continued with the Apostles." (38)


Irenaeus, while noting that the objections of heretics could focus on what they regarded as "diverse utterances"


in the scriptures, raising precisely that problem to which Muslims have applied themselves to study, answers

those,heretics in terms which are far more general and which do not really clarify or solve this difficulty.


His description of the transmission of tradition does not specify either exactly what constitutes tradition - whether it is the utterances of Jesus, forms of worship etc., or a firmly-drawn rationale for transmission in the shape of describing, for example, the times and places of transmission or an exact definition of authority.


The phrase "apostolic men" is, for instance, in sharp contrast to the Islamic clarity on the number and identity of Muhammad's Companions.


In more recent times Stott has argued that there is a sharp distinction between scripture, which is Divine and obligatory; and tradition, which is human and optional and which must be tested against and sanctioned by scripture" (39) He makes the point that the balance between the authority of scripture and that of tradition was a


central element in the upheaval of the Reformation, Rome insisting that scripture did not constitute the sole authority, but required a parallel acceptance of "unwritten traditions" (40)From the point of view of the reformed churches "the only 'tradition' which scripture recognizes is scripture. For 'tradition' (Greek paradosis) is what is handed down, and God's purpose has been that His word, His unique Revelation given to prophets and Apostles, should be transmitted from generation to generation. So the Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy: 'What you have heard from me ... entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also'.(41) (From Paul to Timothy, from Timothy to faithful men, and from them to others also). " (42)


Stott argues that scripture is apostolic tradition, while ecclesiastical tradition is the teaching of the church" (43)


Ibn Hazm's arguments against the gospels as inspired or revealed is inextricably linked to his conception of Isnad as the test of authenticity.

The absence of evidence of Isnad leads him to conclude that the gospels could not have been written by Jesus' disciples, nor by faithful people. Western scholarship has also concerned itself with the authority of the Christian gospels and has provided material that could be considered to add substantial weight to the complaints of the author of Al-Faisal regarding the lack of Isnad in the Christian tradition.


Streeter, for example, points out that the designation by the early church of certain texts as authentic must now be recognized as subject to error and revision. 2 Peter and James, for example, were not generally received for centuries, despite their antiquity and orthodoxy. If acceptance was slow to arrive for some texts, other texts which were not apostolic were incorrectly designated so: "That the church accepted as Apostolic certain writings which in point of fact were not so, is undoubted"(44 )Wikenhauser also points out that the Canon


remained flexible for a considerable period of time, and that by 200 A. C. "The New Testament at this time is not a closed collection. (45)


The Islamic argument for the original existence of an uncorrupted true Gospel of Jesus also has its parallel in various suppositions made by Western scholars regarding the sources of the four gospels. Eusebius' comment on Matthew: "so then Matthew composed the oracles (Tahoxia) in the Hebrew language, and each one interpreted them as he could (46) had led many scholars, as Streeter points out, to hypothesize the existence of "a lost collection of the sayings of the Lord, or a collection of proof-texts."(47) Streeter's important work details the complex issues of the relationships between the different early churches that prompted a variety of attitudes towards the authority of certain texts (48)


It is no matter for surprise that the controversies apparent in Western scholarship regarding the authority and

sources of the Christian scriptures should have been traced by Muslim scholars. Rahmatullah, for example, emphasizing the absence of lsnad in the Christian texts points out that the position that Matthew 'might' have been written originally in Hebrew and then translated into Greek, or 'might' have been written in Greek, demonstrates that conjecture, rather than lsnad, is the basis on which the authority of the Gospel text is established (49)


Furthermore he rehearses the problem of canonical acceptance to which, as has been pointed out above,


Streeter and Wikenhauser addressed themselves. The epistles of James, Jude, the second epistle of Peter,


and the second and third of John were ascribed, without evidence, to the Apostles, and remained doubtful until 363 A.C., while John's apocalypse was doubtful until 397 A.C. He points out that Peter's second epistle, Jude's epistle, and John's second and third epistles and Revelation have been rejected by Arab Christians. He refers to the work


of a critic which states that such epistles were not included in the early Christian church, and pointed out that in the Syriac translation the texts mentioned above, and verses 2-11 in John's Gospel chapter two, and the seventh verse of chapter V of John's first epistle are omitted. Indicating the activity of the first Council of Nicea he notes that six epistles and Revelations were rejected. He continues by arguing that in spite of OrigeiVs statement that Paul had written something to ail churches, the epistles ascribed to Paul are not wholly his - his epistle to the Hebrews not having been included by several churchmen. (50 )Even if Paul's epistles are truly his, Rahmatullah ibn Khalil insists on Paul's unacceptability to Muslims. The other disciples, however, who lived after Jesus' ascension can be compared with the good Mujtahidun - legists who formulate independent decisions in legal and theological matters, and who are thus liable to mistakes, hnad is absent in the crucial period preceding the last decade of the second century. For example, the original text of Matthew is missing.

Bearing in mind that the disciples failed to understand Jesus on many occasions,


and that Luke and Mark were not Jesus' disciples,


it is impossible that the gospels should have been inspired, according to Rahmatullah ibn Khalil.(51)


In the writings of Justine Martyr there is a complete suppression of Paul and his letters, there is not even a single quote from the Paulin Corpus, nor is the Apostle ever referred to. On the other hand, his writings contain quotations from the (Old Testament) (the Septuagint).


It is important in this context to quote Helmut Koester's following statement: "While Marcion emphasized the irreconcilable contradictions between the written Gospel and the Jewish scripture, Justin linked the writings which he called "Memoirs of the Apostles" as lightly as possible to the law and the prophets. While Marcion revised the


Gospel of Luke in an effort to eliminate all quotations and references to the law and the prophets,


Justin did not hesitate to revise the texts of Matthew and Luke on several occasions in order to establish an even closer verbal agreement between the prophecies of the Greek Bible and the record of their fulfillment in the text of the gospels. (52)


Moreover, for Justin, the gospels possess the authority of written records, although they are read in service of the church, they are not "Holy Scripture" like the Torah and the other old testament writings.


Justin never hold the "gospels" or the "Memoirs of the Apostles" as inspired writings. While he regularly quotes the law and the Prophet's as Holy Scripture (53)


Marcion who came from Sinope in Pontus to Rome C. A.D. 140, to join the church emphasizes the irreconcilable contradictions between the written Gospel and Jewish Scripture.

The discrepancies and differences between the Jewish and Christian Scriptures or on the one hand; and between the four gospels on the other, shall be treated in detail elsewhere. (54)

Endnotes

1-Ibn Hazm, Al-Faisal, vol. 1, p. 156 and vol. 2, pp. 23 ff


2-Ibid., vol. 2. pp. 23 ff; see also al-Biruni, aFAthar al-Baqiya, pp. 15 ff, and Ibn al-Ibri, Tarikh Mukhtasr Ad-Duwal, ed, by Antun Salihani al-Yasui (Beirut, The Catholic Press, 1958), pp. 9 ff.


3-Ibn Hazm, Al-Faisal, vol. 2, p. 25; see also Sweetman, op. cit., part 2, vol. 1, p. 234.


4-A. R. Buckland, The Universal Bible Dictionary, (London, Lutterworth Press, 1953), pp. 102 f and 434 ff; Robert H. Pfeiffer, Introduction to the Old Testament, (London, Adam and Charles Black, 1953), pp. 107 f and Randle short, Modern Discovery and The Bible, (London, The Inter-Varsity fellowship of Evangelica Unions, 1972), pp. 68 ff and Ibn Khalil al-Handi, op. cit., vol. 1, pp. 188 f.


5-Ibn Hazm, Al-Faisal, vol. 2, p. 25.


6-Ibid., p. 20 and 83; and (R. A.), pp. 51 and 74.


7-See e.g. Galatians I, 18:19.


8-Ibn Hazm, Al-Faisal, vol. 2, p. 42.


9-Ibid., p. 20.


10- Ibid.,p. 21.


11-Ibid., p. 22; see also vAbd as-Salam Harun, Nawadir Al-Makhtutat, (Cairo, Lajnat at-Ta'lif Wa,an-Nashr Press, 1954), pp. 270 f.


12-Ibn Hazm, Al-Faisai, vol. 2, p. 84; see also Ibn Khalil al-Hindi, op. cit., vol. 1, p. 188 and Savd ibn Mansur ibn Kammuna, Examination of the Three Faiths, trans, from the Arabic with an introduction and notice by Moshe perlmann (Berkeley, Los Angles/London, University of California Press, 1971), p. 93; A. H. Mcneile, An Introduction to the Study of the New Testament, Second Edition revised by C. S. C. Williams (Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1953), pp. 110 f; and C.R.T. and T. Clark, 1907), pp. 54 f.


13-Ibn Hazm, Al-Faisal, vol. 2 pp. 21 f.


14-Ibid.,vol.2,p. 11.


15-Ibid., vol. 2, p. 19.


16-Ibid., p. 64.


17- Ibid vol. l,p. 89.


18-Ibid.


19-Ibn Rabban at-Tabari, Ad-Din Wa Ad-Dawlah, pp. 184 f.


20-Ibn Hazm, Ai-Usul Wa Al-Furu , vol.1, pp. 191 f; see also Timothy, pp. 33 ff. and vAbd al-vAziz Ibn ash-Shikh Hamid ibn Nasir al-Muammir, Minhat Qarib Ai-Mujib Fi Ar-Radd sAla y(Jbbad As-Salib, (Saudi Arabia, Dar Thaqif, 1980), pp. 82 ff.


21-Ibn Hazm, Al-Usui Wa Al-Furu , p. 192.


22-Ibid., p. 46.


23-Ibid.


24-Ibid., pp. 25, 31, 40, 44, 58, 61 and 62.


25-Ibid, vol. 2, p. 12.


26-Qur'an 5:111.


27-Ibn Hazm, Al-Faisal, vol. 2, pp. 12 f; see also vol. 1, p. 80; available data shows that Abu al-Isba Ibn Sahl al-Asdi al-Qurtubi (d. 486 A. H. = 1039 A. D.), one of Ibn Hazm's most bitter opponents criticized his theory of the roundness of the earth, and objected to his view that the Torah had been corrupted and was thus contradictory; some sections of Abu al-Isba's book are preserved in al-Qarawiyyin Library in Morocco, see Millafat Ibn Hazm, an article in Majallat al-Thaqafa, quoted by Uways, op. cit., p. 380.


28-Ibn Hazm, Al-Faisal, vol. 2, pp. 12 f; see also vol. 1, p. 80.


29- Ibid., vol. 2, p. 13, Ibn Hajar, Fath Al-Bari fi Sharh Sahih al-Bukhari, vol 5, p. 323; vol. 8, p. 138 and vol. 13, p. 442.


30-Ibn Hazm, Al-Faisal, vol. 2, p. 13.


31-See p. 99 ff also Monsignor Ignazio de Matteo, op. cit., pp. 70 f.


32-Aj-Jawab As-Sahih, vol. 1, pp. 367 f; also vol, 2, pp. 16 f; see also Ibn Kathir, Fadai'l Al-Qur'an, p. 19.


33-Adv. haereses III, in H. Bettenson, Documents of the Christian Church, p. 68.


34-Ibid.


35- Ibid., pp. 69 f.


36-Ibid., p. 70.


37-Ibid., p. 71.


38-Ibid.


39-John R. W. Stott, Christ the Controversialist, (London, Tynale Press, 1970), pp. 65-89.


40- Ibid., pp. 76 f.


41- 2 Tim. 2:2.


42- R.W. Stott, op. cit., p. 71.


43-Ibid.


44- B. H. Slreeter. The Four Gospels, A Study of Origins, (London. Macmillan and Co. Ltd., 1936), p. 501; see also F. Crawford. Burkilt. The Gospel History and its Transmission. (Edinburgh, T. And T. Clark. 1907), pp. 257 ff.


45- Alfred Wikenhauser, New Testament Introduction, trans, by Joseph Cunningham.


(Dublin. Herder and Herder, 1967). p. 42.


46- Quoted in Streeter, op. cit., p. 19.


47- Ibid., p. 20.


48-Ibid., p. 20-22.


49-Rahmatullah ibn Khalil al-Hindi, op. cit., vol. 1. pp. 29 f.


50-Ibid., and pp. 76 f: see also J. Stevenson, A New Eusebius, p. 223, Wikenhauser. op. cit, pp. 54 IT, and C. R. Gregory, op. cit., pp. 54 tJ.


51-Ibn Khalil al-Hindi, op. cit., vol I, pp. 183 ff.


52-Ancient Christian Gospels, p. 37.


53-Ibid., p. 41.


54-See our forthcoming book, The Four Gospels from inside.