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1.2.2.11 John
20:28
"Then saith he (Jesus) to Thomas, Reach hither thy
finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and
thrust [it] into my side: and be not faithless, but
believing. And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord
and my God."
Once again, when I was first quoted this verse, I
immediately thought that I had at long last found my elusive
goal. Finally, I had found a verse that explicitly claims
that Jesus "is" God. However, it was not long after that,
upon further research into Christian theological literature,
I once again would come to find that the true meaning of
this verse was quite different than what a casual glance
might have me believe.
This verse is at best an example of an "implicit"
affirmation of a "Duality." This is because this verse
appears to imply that Thomas thought that Jesus was God
Almighty. The words are those of Thomas and not Jesus.
However, there are a number of problems with interpreting
this verse to mean that Jesus is God.
Firstly, the phrase "Thomas answered" is somewhat
misleading since nowhere before this verses was Thomas asked
a question. Thomas' words could more appropriately be
referred to as an "outburst" or an "exclamation." This is
indeed why most translations of the Bible (excluding the
King James Version) follow this exclamation with an
"exclamation mark" as follows: "And Thomas
answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God !"
Christian scholars such as Theodore of Mopsuestia
(c.350-428), the Bishop of Mopsuestia, interpreted this
verse to not be directed at Jesus but at God "the Father."
Thus, it is similar in meaning to our modern exclamations of
surprise "My God!" or "My Lord!." In other words, this was
an outburst designed to display surprise and disbelief
rather than an affirmation that Jesus was in fact God "the
Father."
Secondly, the word translated in this verse as "God" is
indeed the Greek "Ho theos" (The God), and not
"theos" (divine). However, when studying the history of this
verse in the ancient Biblical manuscripts from which our
modern Bibles have been compiled we find an interesting
fact, specifically, that the ancient Biblical manuscripts
themselves are not in agreement as to the correct form of
this word. For example, the codex Bezae (or codex D) is a
fifth century manuscript containing Greek and Latin texts of
the Gospels and Acts, which was discovered in the 16th
century by Theodore Beza in a monastery in Lyon. The
predecessor of the codex Bezae and other church manuscripts
do not contain the article "Ho" ("THE") in their text (The
Orthodox Corruption of Scripture, Bart D. Ehrman, p. 266).
What this means is that this verse in it's original form, if
it is to be understood to be addressing Jesus (pbuh)
himself, only addresses him as "divine" and not as the
"Almighty God." Thus, it is similar in meaning to the
meaning conveyed when prophet Moses is described as being a
"god" in Exodus 7:1 (or when all Jews are described as being
"gods" in Psalms 82:6, or when the devil is described as god
in 2 Corinthians 4:4), effectively reducing the exclamation
of Thomas, if it were indeed directed to Jesus, to "My lord
the divine!," or "my divine lord!"
For a Muslim the matter is simple. The Qur'an very
explicitly states that Jesus was not forsaken by God to the
Jews to be crucified, rather "it was made to appear so to
them." So the claim that Jesus came to Thomas and asked him
to witness the imprint of the nail in his hand and the spear
in his side is, for a Muslim, clear evidence that this whole
episode was a fabrication and later insertion. However,
since a Muslim's claim in this regard would not be regarded
as authoritative unbiased proof in this matter, therefore,
it is necessary to use a little logic to arrive at the
truth.
Since we now have on our hands a dispute between the
ancient Biblical manuscripts themselves as to what Thomas
actually said, therefore, let me pose this very simple
request. Please get out a pencil and a piece of paper, stop
reading this book for the moment, and in your own words,
please write down in about twenty words, very concisely but
as directly as possible, what is the foremost obvious
conclusion you are able to draw from Thomas' outburst. Study
your words carefully and write them down as if your very
life and the salvation of thousands of generations depend on
what you are about to say. Make it clear and to the point.
Have you finished?. Okay, let us continue.
Let us now compare what you have just written with what
the actual author of this Gospel had written when faced with
the same requirements I have just presented you with. If we
were to continue reading from this same Gospel of John, we
will find that immediately following this discourse between
Jesus and Thomas depicted by the author of "John," the same
author of "John" goes on to write:
"And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence
of his disciples, which are not written in this book: But
these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the
Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have
life through his name."
John 20:30-31
If the author of John had recognized Thomas' words to be
a testimony that "Jesus is God" and if the author
interpreted Jesus' silence to be his approval of this
claimed testimony, then John would have written "that ye
might believe that Jesus is the Almighty God" and not "that
ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ..." (For an
explanation of the terms "son of God" and "Christ" please
read sections 1.2.3.2, and 1.2.3.8 which are coming up
soon).
To make this matter clearer let us first remember that
Christian scholars tell us that the disciples did not fully
comprehend who Jesus "was" until after the resurrection.
They admit that the Trinity was not "fully" incorporated
into Christianity until three hundred years after the
departure of Jesus (see rest of chapter one). However, they
then point to this verse in order to exhibit to us how in
the end the "true" nature of Jesus was made clear to the
apostles. Now, we need to ask, what is the single most
important piece of information we have just learned from
Thomas' outburst? What is the single most glaring, obvious,
and outstanding, piece of information we have learned from
this statement? Any random missionary would tell us that it
is the fact that "Jesus is God!" In other words, the
disciples have just spent many years with Jesus learning
from him, following him, obeying him, and preaching his
message. Suddenly he is allegedly taken away, crucified,
buried, and then he is resurrected. Now Thomas sees him and
according to the testimony of "John," he realizes that Jesus
is "God the Father" who has come down to earth to walk among
us. So what would we logically expect to be the foremost
topic of most urgent and critical concern in the eyes of the
author of "John"? Obviously, it should be the instillation
within us of the "fact" that "Jesus is the 'incarnation' of
God Almighty!" Does this not stand to reason? Why then does
the author now casually disregard such an earth shattering
observation and choose to simply return to describing Jesus
with the benign terms of "son of God" and
"Messiah/Christ"(see sections 1.2.3.2, and 1.2.3.8)? Did the
author of this book not make the connection which we have
just made? Did the author of "John" have less understanding
of what he was writing than us? Think about it.
Furthermore, some Christian scholars believe that the
whole episode of "doubting Thomas" is a later "insertion."
"The Five Gospels" mark this passage as being a complete
fabrication and not the word of Jesus (pbuh).
There are a number of other verses which could be brought
up in this comparison, however, the ones just quoted are the
strongest and most often quoted verses. A number of other
verses that are brought up in such discussions shall be
dealt with in chapter 1.2.3 since they are more directly
applicable to the concept of the divinity of Jesus or the
claim that he is the physical/begotten son of God than they
are to the discussion of the Trinity.
Finally, let us now have a final look at our table:
-
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Explicit Statement
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Implicit Statement
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God is ONE
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Isaiah 43:10-11, Deuteronomy 4:39, Isaiah 45:18,
Isaiah 44:6, Isaiah 45:6, Isaiah 45:22, Exodus
20:3, Exodus 34:14
|
-
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God is TWO
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John 1:1,
John 10:30
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John 20:28,
John.14:6,
John 14:8-9
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God is THREE
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1 John 5:7
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Matthew 28:19,
I Corinthians 12:4-6,
II Corinthians 13:14,
Jude 1:20-21
|
God is MANY
|
Genesis 1:26
|
-
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As we can see from the table, there is not a single
explicit or implicit statement in the whole Bible confirming
the "Trinity." Indeed this was the very reason why it was
decided so many centuries ago to insert the verse of 1 John
5:7 into the Bible. Because without this fabricated verse
there would be absolutely no earthly way to prove that God
is a Trinity. In such a case we would simply have to take
the Church's word for it. However, by the grace of God
Almighty, this fabrication was not exposed by Muslims, it
was not exposed by a liberal Christian, it was not even
exposed by a conservative Christian, rather it was exposed
by thirty two conservative biblical scholars of the
highest eminence backed by fifty cooperating Christian
denominations. No matter what your church or
denomination, chances are that it was a member of the
committee that compiled the RSV Bible and, among other
changes, threw out 1 John 5:7 as a complete fabrication.
Does it not seem a little strange that God did not choose
to include just one single explicit statement in the whole
Bible where He said "I am three gods in one."?
Does it not seem just a little strange that we have been
reduced to picking and choosing implicit references
to a "Duality" and trying to "piece together" the nature of
God?
Why did God feel the need to repeatedly
explicitly state throughout the Bible that He
is ONE, yet when it comes time for Him to explicitly state
that He is THREE suddenly it is left up to our intellect to
"observe" or "gather" that He "must" be a "Trinity."?
Why was this matter not resolved back at the time of
prophets Noah or Abraham or Moses
(pbut)? Why do we not find a single Jew worshipping a
Trinity?
I know that there are still many unanswered questions,
however, please bear with me, the picture shall begin to
become much clearer once we get into sections 1.2.3 and
1.2.4 by the will of Allah.
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