SOME THOUGHTS ON THE "PROOFS" OF THE

ALLEGED DIVINITY OF JESUS

Dr. Gary Miller

One of the crucial issues which separates Islam and Christianity is their beliefs
concerning the nature of Jesus - peace be upon him. The majority of Christians
believe that Jesus is "Divine", i.e. they believe him to be God incarnate. Muslims, on
the other hand, believe that Jesus was only a great Prophet of God and a faultless
human being.

Approach to a Muslim--Christian Dialogue

The doctrine of the Trinity says that the three distinct co-equals are altogether God --
or that God is made up of three co-equal "persons". In particular, Jesus is said to be
"God the Son", or the "Son of God". In a Muslim-Christian dialogue, inevitably the
Muslim will question the details regarding this theology. The Christian, on the other
hand, will usually form a common explanation by complaining that Muslims simply
do not understand the Trinity, and that what the Muslim accuses the Christians of is
one thing which Christians don't really believe. In short Muslims do not understand
how the Christians understood the Trinity. The Muslim seeks to find clarifications of
the teachings of this doctrine by asking for explanations as to how that would be so,
because the term Son of God cannot have a literal interpretation: Sonship and divine
nature would be two attributes which are incomparable, because Sonship describes
someone who receives life while divine nature describes someone who receives life
from no one. To be a son is to be less than divine and to be divine is to be no one's
son. Eventually the Christians would seek refuge in the response of "these are things
which we cannot understand."

Verification and Understanding

Christians seem to be confusing two concepts -- the concept of verification and the
concept of understanding. This can be illustrated in the example of hydrogen
combining with oxygen to make water. We can verify this statement in a laboratory to
see whether this statement is a statement of fact. But after verification, that does not
mean what we have understood the nature of atoms. Verification and understanding
are two different concepts. Thus, what Muslims should do is to re-direct the
discussions because the first issue is more basic than simply resolving all the difficult
points of Trinitarian doctrines. It is not the explanation of how to understand the
concept of the Trinitarian doctrine that we seek, but rather, to seek verifications of
their belief, that is, why in the first place must we believe that Jesus is divine (not how
but why).

The Trinity -- A Church Doctrine

If Muslims pursue this approach, ultimately many Christians will usually say that "the
Church says so", that is, it is the Church's doctrine. Thus many Christians' arguments
stop short of questioning the Church's authority. They will not challenge it to find out
the basis for their claim or their teaching. Although many Christians in fact concede
that this is the case on the subject of Trinitarian doctrine, there are also others who
insist that Jesus did talk about the Trinity himself.

"Let them produce proof"

We have been told in the Qur'an to tell the Christians "Let them produce proof". Thus
we demand them to provide documentation that Jesus himself claimed unqualified
divinity for himself, and that he said in so many words: "I am God". The Muslims are
advised by another Qur'anic verse to tell the Christians: "Say: O people of the Book
you have no ground to stand upon unless you stand fast by the Law, the Gospel and
all the Revelation that has come to you from your Lord." This demand is reasonable,
for Muslims are also told in another verse that Jesus never claimed to be God.
Therefore if the Christians were to look into their own scripture they would not be
able to find any saying of Jesus that should him clearly claiming to be equal with
God.

Explicit and implicit statements

From the Biblical record, the sayings accredited to Jesus are very small because after
allowing for duplications in the Four Gospels' account of his -life, these sayings could
be reprinted in two columns of a typical newspaper. And none of these texts is a clear
claim to divinity, because nowhere does he explicitly claim to be God. All the
quotations are implicit. The difference is, an explicit statement is one which requires
no explanation. The meaning is right on the surface of the word. For example, when
your gas gauge in your car shows empty, you do not need to ask your passenger to
interpret it for you. It is very clear. An implicit statement is a statement where the
meaning is carried just beneath the surface of the word. It requires some thought
before we determine what was meant by the words. And all quotations that are cited
by Christians in order to put in the mouth of Jesus the claim of deity are implicit --
which means interpretation is required. Thus what happens is, when we are told what
Jesus said, we are then told what he meant. In other words, they interpret the meaning
for us.

Christians' claim

The Christians' claim of Jesus to be God through his Virgin birth (The Immaculate
Conception) is cited as one case of insufficient evidence. But, the Bible also tells us
about the Creation of Adam -- i.e. without father or mother; and the account of the
miracle associated with the prophet Elisha. Also, the case of Melchizekdek can be
cited: "without father or mother or genealogy, and has neither beginning of days nor
end of life, but resembling the Son of God" - Hebrews 7:3. For these men, no
Christian will say he was divine. Yet each has the qualifications in common with
Jesus. Another claim is that Jesus was God because the Hebrew Scripture predicted
his coming before he was born. Yet the Christians seem to betray a selective or
forgetful recall of the Scriptures because in places where they predict the coming of
John the Baptist they quote prophecies from the Book of Malachi.

Son of Man, Son of God, Messiah, Saviour

Another argument of Christians that Jesus claimed to be God is that Jesus constantly
used the terms, "Son of God", "Son of Man" and "Messiah" and "Saviour". Since he
uses these terms, they argued, therefore he was claiming to be God. These terms were
also applied to other individuals as well, in the Bible. For example, Ezekiel was
addressed as "Son of Man". Jesus himself speaks of the peace makers as "sons of
God". It is interesting to note that even though Jesus is called the "Son of God" in the
Bible, he is never called "God the Son", which is what the Christians have made him
into due to their Trinitarian theology. Even Cyrus the Persian is called "Messiah", or
"the anointed", in Isaiah Chapter 45. This verse has been translated in a misleading
way. The meaning of the Hebrew word "Messiah" is "God's anointed". Here, when it
refers to Cyrus, they translated the Hebrew word "Messiah" with "God's anointed".
But in places where the Bible is talking about Jesus, when the term "Messiah"
appears, instead of translating it as "anointed", they simply transliterate it (i.e. they
write the Hebrew words with the Roman Alphabet without translating it) so that it
reads "Messiah". Interestingly this word "Messiah" is in the Greek equivalent written
as "Christ". Thus there seems to be a conspiracy to give us the impression that there is
only one Messiah, one Christ and no other. As for the term "Saviour", the word is
clearly applied to other individuals besides Jesus, for example the Book of II Kings,
Chapter 13, Verse 5, says: "And the Lord gave Israel a Saviour, so they went out from
under the hand of the Syrians; and the children of Israel dwelt in their tents as
beforetime."

"I and My Father are One"

In John, Chapter 10, Verse 30, Jesus is quoted as saying "I and my Father are one".
Some Christian scholars have insisted that the only probable understandings of these
Words are: as one in essence or nature. Yet there are several examples where the same
Greek words were used but not understood in the same way. For example, John 17:11
says: "And now I am no more in the world but these are in the world and I come to
thee. Holy Father keep through their own name, those who thou hast given me that
they may be one, as we are."

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