By C.L. Bolt
Islam is much more similar to the Christian worldview than atheism or agnosticism. Some varieties of the non-Christian worldview are so much like the Christian worldview that they actually admit to borrowing from the Christian worldview, and Islam is one of these. Islam states that faith is the starting point and Muslims place their faith in the Bible “like” the Christian does (on the surface). When the Bible is claimed as the starting point by an unbelieving system of thought, how might we begin to answer that system?
Many Christians are unaware that Muslims claim that the Bible is from their god Allah. In order to begin to apply this method of apologetics to Islam, the presuppositionalism that drives our argumentation must be brought to the forefront of the discussion. Since Islam claims to accept the authority of the Christian Scriptures there is no need to argue from anything other than the text of Scripture itself. Issues of canon, translation, transmission, history, and other evidences may be brought to bear upon the discussion taking place as well since it involves a parroted Christian frame work upon which the aforementioned issues are to be understood according to the religious position in question. There is nothing involved in this procedure which is not already a part of the covenantal apologetic method. The Muslim is called upon to be consistent with his or her own ultimate authority which just so happens to rightfully belong to Christians. But notice that Islam is inconsistent with Christian theism. Such inconsistency is a finding of internal critique and fits nicely into our argument.
One need not attempt to answer Islam philosophically since it is explicitly borrowing from the Christian worldview and admits to doing as much by claiming faith in the Bible. The Bible can be used to refute Islam. This is not to say that the more philosophical approach cannot be used on Islam; it can be, however Islam claims to get around the question about the starting point of knowledge by sharing our starting point. Muslims then reject that starting point in their various flawed interpretations of and additions to the text, etc. Islam is a Christian heresy. It claims to accept the same starting point for knowledge as Christianity while also rejecting the starting point for knowledge that Christians have when it deviates from Scripture. So there is a problem with the starting point of Islam as it is divided between the Christian and non-Christian starting points of knowledge.
The Muslim claims that the Injil is inspired with Surah 2 and 4 speaking of the books which were sent down before. The Muslim’s own holy book the Quran calls upon the Muslim to believe in these books. Here we have a clear command from Muhammad around 620 AD to believe in these books. The Muslim must know and be able to identify these books in order to continue to obey and believe them. There is no consistent basis upon which the Muslim may reject the inspiration of the New Testament given these beliefs.
Further, the alleged corruption of these texts calls into question Allah’s ability to preserve his holy writing in order that the Muslim may know how to believe and obey. The Muslim arbitrarily trusts one revelation over another when either or both might be corrupt according to Muslim beliefs consistently applied.
The Muslim claims that Christians do not have the Injil without being able to explain exactly what it is. Additionally, there is absolutely no evidence for the Muslim claims of corruption. The Muslim apologist wants to use the Bible as a reliable witness to Jesus while claiming that the Bible is not a reliable witness to Jesus; a contradiction.
Finally, it may be objectively shown that the books sent down before are reliable documents and that they teach that Jesus is very God of very God who was crucified and died for the sins of man; the Injil. While the Muslim is not willing to immediately accept what has been mentioned there is in fact much inconsistency in the Muslim worldview.
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