It wasn't Mohammed who founded Islam.

[pocaracas]

Rhythm, I'm not using the Quran and hadiths to prove that the Quran and hadiths are true. We wouldn't have been having this discussion for so long if that was the topic of our debate.

My argument is simply that Muhammad claimed and preached to people that he was a Prophet of God, irrespective of whether the claim itself is true or not. Poca, however, thinks that the prophethood of Muhammad is more likely to have been a later addition (after his death) and thus Muhammad never claimed himself to be a Prophet. He thinks that Muhammad was initially just a military leader, and only later had prophethood attached to him for some reason, after his death. So we've been talking about which is more likely and why since there's no hard evidence for either position.

yep, I agree... that does sound a lot like what we've been doing.
It's being educational, at least, Rayaan. Even if, in the end, we have to agree to disagree, I'm really enjoying this.

Of course, it is also possible that Mo himself claimed to be a prophet of god. It is possible that all claims of prophethood and all stories of his interaction with god or the archangel are true.
But this then forces the question: WHY is there no mention of such prophethood for such a long time?

1. The most sensible answer to that is that writings about his prophethood are more likely to become available only after people in other parts of the world have heard about it. You can't expect there to be Roman or Christian or Jewish or Persian writings about Muhammad's prophethood without there being Muslims to spread the news over there. That obviously takes some time to happen. That's why the Quran and hadiths are the primary sources we have for knowing who Muhammad was.

Sounds reasonable, yes... up to the point where Sebeos, an Armenian bishop, writes, around the 660's, about Mahmet, the preacher. Remember that guy?
I still wonder why you presented him as an example of someone mentioning prophethood for Mahmet.
I can understand the name morphing due to different accents and writing on consonants, but the absence of prophethood in the text you quoted... it's strange.... and raises suspicions about the later claims made in the qur'an and hadiths.

2. Given that Muhammad was known to be such a legendary leader, by both Muslims and non-Muslims, it follows that if someone did attach prophethood to him after his demise, then most likely such a later addition would have been noticeable and even likely to be exposed since he was a well-known figure at that time. If someone added prophethood to Muhammad, then most likely the Christians and Jews who knew Muhammad as a leader would have been the first ones to point it out, and yet they made no such arguments. How would you explain that?

Human nature. It's amazing how this detail tends to be ignored by religions!
It also helps when the rulers can decree the death on anyone who raises a voice against the established law.... and that law could have been established just the day before.

You ever read Animal Farm?

According to Orwell, the book reflects events leading up to the Russian Revolution of 1917 and then on into the Stalin era in the Soviet Union.[1] Orwell, a democratic socialist,[2] was a critic of Joseph Stalin and hostile to Moscow-directed Stalinism, an attitude that was critically shaped by his experiences during the Spanish Civil War.[3] The Soviet Union, he believed, had become a brutal dictatorship, built upon a cult of personality and enforced by a reign of terror.

Sounds familiar?

4. You probably know that the Arab people prior to Islam were fiercely polytheistic when it came to religion. The nomadic tribes in pre-Islamic Arabia were mostly pagans who used to believe that animals, plants, trees, rocks, and other inanimate objects possessed spiritual qualities, and they even worshipped those things. There were hundreds of gods they used to venerate and worship at that time. But around the 7th century, all of that changed drastically and very quickly when a new set of laws and new acts of worship were introduced, which marked the emergence of a religion called "Islam." So, the question is, if it wasn't Muhammad who brought about such a great religious transformation in Arabia, then how do you think that another person (the mysterious "someone") that was behind all of these changes going on would remain completely unmentioned in history for all these years? Isn't it more likely that there would be at least some mentions of that person?

You know that rumors spread like wildfire and no one knows who starts them, right?
Again, human nature working in the background.
Once the rumor is minimally well spread, and even the ruler believes it, the ruler just needs to consolidate it... wasn't that the word that was used when mentioning Abd al-Malik?
Also, as I remember it, arabia was a crossroads of world trade, from asia to europe to africa. They would be filled with references from everywhere. Some animists, some hindus, some jews, some christian, some egyptian, some zoroastrian (whatever that is... I still have to look into that)

What we know and can attest to (Sebeos) is that the rumor of Mahmet's leadership seems to have reached the outskirts of the arab reach before the rumor of his prophethood, hinting at different origins for both these rumors.

3. You also have the question: Why is it that the role of a Prophet in Arabia always been attached to the same military leader named Muhammad, and not anyone else? Just a coincidence?

Always is such a harsh and demanding word, don't you think?
First legend, then prophethood. If the legendary hero/leader/preacher was called Muhammad, then why would they change his name once prophethood was attached?
Or rather, it seems you're asking why would they attach prophethood to Mo, instead of some other leader of old, right?
I guess the rumor started with Mo and stuck with Mo...

And the desert climate is perfect for preserving ancient things... so, if many things were written at the time, at least a scrap should still exist...

Well, yeah, we do have Uthman's copy of the Quran, who himself was a companion of the Prophet Muhammad.

Late 1st century / early 2nd century of hijra:
Hussein dates this manuscript to the 7th century CE. Moritz dates this manuscript to the 1st / 2nd century hijra. Déroche gives three dates for this manuscript, the beginning of the 2nd century hijra / 8th century CE, the middle of the 2nd century hijra / 8th century CE and the latter half of the 2nd century hijra / 8th century CE, although it is not clear which of these dates he prefers. Von Bothmer dates this manuscript to the 2nd century hijra / 8th century CE. On the basis of a privately held fragment of the Qur'an carbon dated to the 7th century CE (609-694 CE with a 95.2% confidence level) showing similar script, textual aids and illumination, Dutton dated Arabic Palaeography Plates 1-12 (i.e., Ms. 139) to a roughly similar timeframe, i.e., the Umayyad period.

http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/T...ak139.html


So, apparently, we don't have a scrap, but rather we have a whole bundle of scrap, currently stored in a museum in it's original form.

Lends further credence to my argument, doesn't it?

And you only bring this up now?!?! How many more aces do you have up your sleeve?

But wait... it's a fragment of the qur'an... but the same site said that Abd al-Malik's coin was the oldest reference of Muhammad as a prophet...
What does that fragment say?

And still... it's posthumous.
Some things that later became part of the complete qur'an were already floating around a few years earlier than Abd al-Malik? wouldn't surprise me... lots of material that became the bible were already floating around before they got compiled into one volume.