Thursday, May 31, 2012

Quest for the historical Muhammad

Muslim apologists are fond of citing Bart Ehrman–although even he defends the historicity of Jesus. But historical skepticism is a double-edged sword:

http://www.nationalreview.com/blogs/print/300131

http://spectator.org/archives/2012/05/25/in-search-of-muhammad/print

4 comments:

  1. Both articles mention that these works are already being translated into Arabic (and potentially distributed for free on the Internet).

    That will certainly be the start of some interesting times and discussions.

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  2. Steve,

    Have you read Spencer's book? I'm curious what you would think of it...do you suppose that evangelicals should approach such a radical work with a bit of initial skepticism?

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  3. I'm not endorsing the book. But it might be useful as a tu quoque argument against Muslims who like to quote liberal scholars on the historical Jesus.

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  4. Everyone should watch / listen to the 2 debates that Spencer and Wood have had, one against each other, and the other they teamed up verses Anjam Choudary and Sheikh Omar Bakri -

    http://www.answeringmuslims.com/2012/05/robert-spencer-vs-david-wood-did.html

    One of the problems with Spencer's argument that Muhammad is not mentioned until decades later, the Muslims and skeptics and liberals have been using for centuries against the gospels - that they were written several decades after Jesus' life - earliest - Mark in late 40s - maybe 45-50 and Matthew and Luke in 50s-65 and John in 80-95 AD at the earliest.

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