Discussing the Bible with Roman Catholics

Posted on January 28, 2012 by John Samson

TurretinFan writes…

John Lollard (which I presume is a psuedonym) has provided the following dialogue between a hypothetical truthseeker and a Roman Catholic:

Roman Catholic (RC): “Here, this book came from God. Read it and believe it.”

Truth Seeker (TS): “Okay! Hey, this book says X is true.”

RC: “What? Give me that!”

TS: “Right there, ‘X is true’.”

RC: “It doesn’t actually mean that. What it means is that X is false and Y is true.”

TS: “But, you said this book came from God?”

RC: “It did. But you should just listen to me, and not worry about what this book says.”

TS: “What? Why should I listen to you?”

RC: “Why, it says right there in the book, ‘the true believers’ – meaning me of course – ‘will never teach falsely’.”

TS: “But this book teaches X and you teach Y. Doesn’t that mean you do teach falsely?”

RC: “Look, I’m the one who gave you the book in the first place.”

TS: “Then thank you very much for the book that you claim came from God, please read it yourself and obey it.”

I have one criticism of this dialog, though. How many savvy Roman Catholics would suggest to a truth seeker to read and believe the Bible? Reading the Bible is not going to lead you Romeward, and I think most RC proselytizers realize that.

What does the Qur’an teach about the Bible?

Posted on January 27, 2012 by John Samson

Many Muslim apologists like to attack the Bible by claiming that the text has been tampered with and corrupted. Yet in doing so, they undermine the Qur’an which claims this is not the case at all. They cannot have it both ways. If they believe the Qur’an, then they must affirm that the text of the Bible has been preserved by God.

As Dr. James White has stated, “It is great to hear someone whose origins are from “the other side” of the divide confirming what we have been saying repeatedly in reference to this vital issue (i.e., he knows the Islamic sources from the inside though he is a convert). A full and complimentary study would be found in Gordon Nickel’s vital work from 2011, Narratives of Tampering in the Earliest Commentaries on the Qur’an (Brill). The brightest and best of our opponents in the Islamic world need to start realizing that walking the path charted by Ibn Khazem which leads you to walk next to agnostics and skeptics like Bart Ehrman leads inevitably to the destruction of your own faith and text. It is grossly inconsistent with not only your world-view, but with the Qur’an as well!”