Noah and the Idols of His People (Similar Examples from Ancient Civilizations)

The worship of Horus dates back to the late prehistoric period, while the worship of Ra & Osiris goes back to the 26th century BCE —about 1 thousand years before the supposed time of Abraham. The worship of these deities continued in Egypt, despite the multiple invasions and vast cultural changes, up until the Roman Egyptian era, the worship of Ra and Osiris persisted until the rise of Christianity in the Roman Empire.

It is noteworthy that in the apocryphal Ascension of Isaiah (2nd century CE), the Holy Spirit is described as an angel and called “the Angel of the Holy Spirit.” He appears alongside Michael and is referred to as the same “Angel of the Lord” who reassured Joseph in Matthew 1:20.
This led the translator into English to identify him with Gabriel.

So it isn’t surprising that the Qur’an presents the Holy Spirit as an angel, and even identifies him as Gabriel, while at the same time using the term “spirit” to mean divine support, prophetic revelation,

First:
There is no such thing as a “traditional” method of criticism versus a “historical” method of criticism. The orientalist titles must be corrected first.

There is the Islamic historical method of criticism,
and there is the Western historical method of criticism. Second:

A Muslim’s belief—regardless of sect—in the preservation of the Prophet’s teachings (which has its own evidence) has nothing to do with the actual process and steps of hadith criticism in terms of isnād (chain of transmission) and matn (text).

Despite my old disagreement and opposition to Chonkshonk, this post is commendable and represents a genuine step toward bridging perspectives—something I have always advocated for.. Therefore, I would like to contribute a few points that can enrich and support what he presents in this post, while also clarifying the Muslim point of view..

@floatingwordist All jurists agreed that marrying off a non-pubescent girl is conditional upon the absence of harm (of any kind) and the presence of a clear, overriding benefit.. @floatingwordist For example, a man who knows he is about to die and has a young daughter with no one else to care for her might arrange her marriage out of fear for her future , provided that no harm comes to her..

Recently, there has been a growing trend over the past year that casts doubt on the pagan nature of Mecca, with some even suggesting that “Quraysh” may not have worshipped idols. So let us take a look at some Qur’anic verses that clearly contradict this view… The Quran instructs its followers, when performing the rites of pilgrimage (Hajj), including circumambulating the Kaaba & sacrificing livestock, to avoid idols & to refrain from false speech. However, some may argue about it, so additional evidence will help clarify the picture…

Theologically, the Quran states that the people of Noah, ‘Ād, Thamūd, and others threatened their messengers and the believers with expulsion from their land. In response, God promised to punish them and grant the land to the believers.
The Quran also mentions that there were believing survivors from ‘Ād and Thamūd who were saved along with their messengers. From this, we understand that these surviving ‘Ād people settled in Wadi al-Ramm (Iram) after God annihilated the disbelievers of their tribe,

The Book of Al-Asnam (Idols) by Al-Kalbi is an unreliable book according to Islamic historians & scholars. In fact, Al-Kalbi himself is accused of lying. I do not know why some academics insist on presenting it as if it were the main picture of narrations of Islamic scholars… and then concluding that the narrations of Muslims are unreliable.

Either academics do not know how to deal with Islamic sources and how Islamic scholars view and evaluate these sources, or there is something deliberate aimed at distortion.

@ebntaymea Nice thread, my point of view is that the soul uses the brain to think, so the brain is a machine and a tool for the soul, and I see, and God knows best, that attributing all of this to the heart is a metaphor “Majaz”, because sometimes it be to the chest.. @ebntaymea and i see the uses of the Qur’an pouring into this thing, such as Chest expansion and openness and the blindness of the heart and its disease, and outside the Qur’an, its breaking and filling with pus and black dots and many others..

Our Chonk repeats the same words and repeats himself but with different expressions to make you feel that he wrote many responses, although we mentioned the reason for expressing the same meanings between the two close languages, It seems that he does not even understand what is meant when I say that this is due to common oral traditions. I say that because of the vast difference between Jacob and the Qur’an, so it cannot be a parallel, but rather due to other matters.

@AcademiaEnjoyer @IslamicOrigins Deception here, not deception in the literal sense. A companion may hear from another companion who heard from the Messenger of God, so instead of saying, this companion told me, the Messenger of God said,” he narrates it directly, “The Messenger of God said.” @AcademiaEnjoyer @IslamicOrigins Statements should not be taken out of context, nor should be combined in this way, each “tadlis” according to his specific people. There are many “tadlis” that are acceptable to the hadith scholars.

@RandomHuma11601 Well, first of all, I would like to make it clear that I do not rely on the hadith theologically, nor do I use it to prove the prophethood of Muhammad, and I don’t much care whether it is fabricated or not. but only as a response to your points… @RandomHuma11601 As for the chain of transmission and that Al-Zuhri is the common link, this is outside the scope of my point, because I do not care who said it. My argument was about the reasons for the fabrication. However, I will return to this point from another aspect…

There is nothing in the Qur’an that says that mountains prevent the earth from shaking and earthquakes. Many ancient interpreters made mistakes in interpreting this verse because they read it literally. The expression "أن تميد بكم" "lest it shift with you" is metaphorical, and a similar phrase used today in our dialect is "دارت بي الأرض" (the earth spun around me). This is used to describe a situation where a person feels disoriented or lost in a place.

According to the Qur’an, Sunnah, pre-Islamic poetry, genealogies and historical accounts, the Arabs knew Abraham and Ishmael and had some acts of worship attributed to them, albeit in a distorted form from an Islamic perspective. So finding an inscription that mentions these two names alone in the future will not affect our theology in any way, nor will it affect the fact that there was no Christian-Jewish community or influence in Mecca, but rather will increase our faith & confidence in our narratives.

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Does the allusive narration in the Qur’an indicate that Quraysh were aware of the biblical stories?

In fact, there are four arguments that make the answer is “No”, Quraysh were not aware of the stories, and they are as follows: 1. This allusive narrative has been observed since the ninth century or even before, and this is what Al-Jahiz (d. 868 CE) stated in his book Al-Hayawan, but he noticed something else important, and this is the text of his statement:

There was a campaign carried out by the Prophet himself and also his companions, which was to destroy & eliminate the legacy of the Jahiliyyah like idolatrous statues, inhabited temples, pagan inscriptions (that Arabs of the seventh century could understand) not all inscriptions and honorable graves of the nobles of the Jahiliyyah. The best example of that is the hadith of Abu al-Hayaj about Ali and the missions of Khalid and others..

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“ you can add to it more points”

#drowning_man_clutching_at_straw

“Fables of ancient” means Meccans knew the stories and that they have learned them from the Jews and Christians in Mecca. It is as if the tradition denies the general knowledge of the Quraysh that in the Arabian Peninsula, far from Mecca, and in Byzantium and Yemen, there were Jews whose Prophet Moses and Christians worshiped Christ.