THE QURAN MISQUOTES THE NEW TESTAMENT

Quoted from the "ISLAM REVEALED"

THE QURAN EXPOSED

THE QURAN MISQUOTES THE NEW TESTAMENT

The Story of Zacharias
The Quran

(Remember) when the wife of ‘Imran said: My Lord! I have vowed unto Thee that which is in my belly as a consecrated (offering). Accept it from me, Lo! Thou, only Thou, art the Hearer, the Knower!

And when she was delivered she said: My Lord! Lo! I am delivered of a female--Allah knew best of what she was delivered--the male is not as the female; and lo! I have named her Mary, and lo! I crave Thy protection for her and for her offspring from Satan the outcast.

And her Lord accepted her with full acceptance and vouchsafed to her a goodly growth: and made Zachariah her guardian. Whenever Zachariah went into the sanctuary where she was, he found that she had food. He said: O Mary! Whence cometh unto thee this (food)? She answered: It is from Allah. Allah giveth without stint to whom He will.

Then Zachariah prayed unto his Lord and said: My Lord! Bestow upon me of Thy bounty goodly offspring. Lo! Thou art the Hearer of Prayer.

And the angels called to him as he stood praying in the sanctuary: Allah giveth thee glad tidings of (a son whose name is) John, (who cometh) to confirm a word from Allah, lordly, chaste, a Prophet of the righteous.

He said: My Lord! How can I have a son when age hath overtaken me already and my wife is barren? (The angel) answered: So (it will be). Allah doth what He will.

He said: My Lord! Appoint a token for me. (The angel) said: The token unto thee (shall be) that thou shalt not speak unto mankind three days except by signs. Remember thy Lord much, and praise (Him) in the early hours of night and morning.20

The Quranic story of Zacharias has its origins in Pvotevangelion's James the Lesser, a second-century A.D. apocryphal Christian fable, and from Luke 1:5-20. Here is the reconstruction of the Protevangelion story with the direct quotations found in the Quran italicized for emphasis.

And Anna (wife of Joachim) answered, "As the Lord my God liveth, whatever I bring forth, whether it be male or female, I will devote it to the Lord my God, and it shall minister to him in holy things, during Its whole life ... and called her name Mary ... And the high-priest received her, and blessed her, and said, "Mary, the Lord God hath magnified thy name to all generations, and to the very end of time by thee will the Lord shew his redemption to the children of Israel."

But Mary continued in the temple as a dove educated her there, and received her food from the hand of an angel. Then the high-priest (Zacharias) entered into the Holy of Holies, and taking away with him the breastplate of judgment made prayers concerning her.2'

Muhammad's eighth wife, Maryam, was a Christian slave girl from Ethiopia. Al-Moqawqas, the Governor of Egypt, sent her along with her sister and a white mule as gifts to Muhammad. It is very likely that Maryam either brought copies of the above documents with her, or simply related the stories of Jesus, the son of Mary, to Muhammad. Upon closer scrutiny of the chronological order of the Surats, you will have to agree with me that the popular name for Jesus, "Son of Mary," began in the Quranic text after Maryam entered Muhammad's life.

The Bible
Luke's Gospel gives the accurate record in chapter, verses 5-20:

There was in the days of Herod, the king of Judea, a certain priest named Zacharias, of the division of Abijah. His wife was of the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless. But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and they were both well advanced In years.

So It was, that while he was serving as priest before God in the order of his division, according to the custom of the priesthood, his lot fell to burn incense when he went Into the temple of the Lord. And the whole multitude of the people was praying outside at the hour of incense.

Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing on the right side of the altar of incense. And when Zacharias saw him, he was troubled, and fear fell upon him. But the angel said to him, "Do not be afraid, Zacharias, for your prayer is heard; your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John. And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth. For he will be great in the sight of the Lord, and shall drink neither wine nor strong drink. He will also be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother's womb. And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God. He will also go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, ‘to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,' and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord."

And Zacharias said to the angel, "How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is well advanced in years.

And the angel answered and said to him, "I am Gabriel, who stands In the presence of God, and was sent to speak to you and bring you these glad tidings. But behold, you will be mute and not able to speak until the day these things take place, because you did not believe my words which will be fulfilled in their own time.

One of the obvious mistakes in the Quranic story is its claim that Zacharias was speechless for three days, whereas the Gospel states (verse 20) that it was actually nine months. There are other incompatible statements which become apparent upon reading the three above-mentioned records.

Mary, the Mother of Jesus

One of the most absurd mistakes in the Quran is the reference to Mary as the sister of Aaron. Her identity seems to be quite mixed up. Let us look at Surat Maryam (Mary) 19:28 first:

Oh sister of Aaron! Thy father was not a wicked man nor was thy mother a harlot.

The Mary of the Quran depicted as the mother of Jesus is 1,570 years removed from the real Mary, as indicated from Numbers 26:59: "The name of Amram's wife was Jochebed the daughter of Levi, was born to Levi in Egypt; and to Amram she bore Aaron and Moses and their sister Miriam."
The valiant effort of Muslim theologians to explain that the Quran is simply stating her de descendency from the priestly family of Aaron and Imran is totally unsatisfactory. This mistaken Quranic identity is obvious. Compare the much older historical record of the New Testament's Luke 1:26- 35:

Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary.

And having come in, the angel said to her, "Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!"

But when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and considered what manner of greeting this was.

Then the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David. And He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end."

Then Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I do not know a man?"

And the angel answered and said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore, also, that Holy One who Is to be born will be called the Son of God."

Now, to solve the problem for our Muslim the theologians, I direct their attention to a simple solution. First, Elizabeth was called the daughter of Aaron, which refers to the fact that she was from the lineage of Aaron. Mary, the mother of Jesus, came to visit her while Elizabeth was six months pregnant with John the Baptist. In Luke's Gospel the story is told in one and the same chapter, as indicated above. Apparently, because Muhammad heard numerous stories, he could not accurately remember the details from either the Apocrypha or the Gospels. The end result was the gross mistake of making Mary the daughter of Amram and the sister of Aaron.

The Birth of Jesus
We are told in the Quran that the miraculous birth of Jesus took place under a palm tree (Surat Maryam [Mary] 19:21-26). This story first appeared in an apocryphal fable of the second century A.D. The relevant portions of the story are italicized:

Now on the third day after Mary was wearied in the desert by the heat, she asked Joseph to rest for a little under the shade of a Palm Tree. Then Mary looking up and seeing its branches laden with fruit (dates) said, "I desire if it were possible to have some fruit. Just then the child Jesus looked up (from below) with a cheerful smile, and said to the Palm Tree, "Send down some fruit. Immediately the tree bent itself (toward her) and so they ate. Then Jesus said. 'O Palm Tree, anise; be one of my Father's trees in Paradise, but with thy roots open the fountain (rivulet) beneath thee and bring water flowing from that fount.

After presenting the Quranic and the apocryphal references, let us now consider the accurate record of Matthew 1:25-2:6:

[Joseph] did not know her till she had brought forth her firstborn Son. And he called His name JESUS.

Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, saying, "Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we have seen His star in the East and have come to worship Him.

When Herod the king heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the people together, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. So they said to him, "In Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it is written by the prophet:

'But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,

Are not the least among the rulers of Judah;

For out of you shall come a Ruler

Who will shepherd My people Israel."'

Fables about Jesus

Two of the most far-fetched and fantasy-filled fables ever attributed to Jesus are recorded in the Quran .

Then she pointed to him. They said: How can we talk to one who is in the cradle, a young boy?

He spake: Lo! I am the slave of Allah. He hath given me the Scripture and hath appointed me a Prophet ....

The First Gospel of the Infancy of Jesus Christ which is a second-century Arabic apocryphal fable from Egypt, is the source for this Quranic fable:

... Jesus spake even when he was in the cradle, and : said to his mother: "Mary, I am Jesus the Son of God. That word which thou didst bring forth according to the declaration of the angel...."

Next, we look into the tale that Jesus breathed life into birds of clay. According to Surat al-Imran (The Family of 'Imran) 3:49:

And will make him a messenger unto the children of Israel, (saying): Lo! I come unto you with a sign from your Lord. Lo! I fashion for you out of clay the likeness of a bird, and I breathe into It and it is a bird, by Allah's leave.

The source for this Quranic fiction is found in the earlier Thomas' Gospel of the Infancy Jesus Christ, an apocryphal fable from the second century.

Then he took from the bank of the stream some soft clay, and formed out of it twelve sparrows ...Then Jesus clapping together the palms of his hands, called to the sparrows, and said to them: "Go, fly away."

Neither of the above quotations from either source recognized by biblical scholars, historians, or theologians as authentic events in the life of Christ.

Feeding the Disciples

The New Testament records several instances when Jesus supernaturally obtained or multiplied food for the needy. However, there is no biblical or

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