Do Muslims Worship The SAME God As Christians?
Is Islam From God: A Biblical Christian Perspective
Abstract
Many Jews and Christians believe Muslims worship the same God, they just understand and relate to him differently. Is it more reasonable to believe Islam comes from the same source as Ancient Judaism and Christianity, or Satan, the founder of all false religion? Muslims believe Muhammad, the founder of Islam, to be the last and greatest of God’s prophets sent to correct misunderstanding and bring humanity back to right relationship with God. If true, presumably Islam would provide deeper understanding and intimacy with God, and more thoroughly, succinctly, and cohesively explain God’s interaction with humanity. However, if false, it would pattern Satan’s characteristics and agenda in the Bible which is typically to contradict the essential aspects of Ancient Judaism and Christianity. This paper examines the key historical events, overarching biblical narrative, and fundamental principles of Ancient Judaism and Christianity, and compares them with Islam to determine if Islam is from God or Satan.
Israel and Ancient Judaism
Israel.
The nation of Israel was founded by God, through Moses, who he appeared to in a burning bush in Midian. God sent Moses to free the Israelites from slavery and bring them into the “Promised Land.” God said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘The LORD [Yahweh], the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations… gather the elders of Israel together and say to them, ‘…the God of your fathers… appeared to me, saying, “I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt to the land of the Canaanites…” (The Bible. ESV, 2001, Ex. 3:17) The Israelites hadn’t earned, nor did they deserve this privilege; God wanted a people that knew and reflected him to the world. Moses told Israel, “The LORD [Yahweh] your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth… not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you… but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers…” (The Bible. ESV, 2001, Deut. 7:6-9)
Abrahamic Covenant.
Recorded in Genesis, God taught Moses his history of interaction with humanity, especially Moses’s ancestors leading up to their captivity in Egypt. God taught him how he called a seventy-five-year-old man named Abraham to trust him, leave his country, and travel thousands of miles to Canaan. God promised him that he would make him into a great nation, and through him all the families of the earth would be blessed (Gen. 12:1-3). Abraham and his wife Sarah struggled with how this could be possible, as they were both elderly and childless. Abraham proposed Eliezer, a member of his household, to become his heir. But in a vision God told him, “This man shall not be your heir; your very own son shall be your heir… “Look toward heaven, and number the stars… so shall your offspring be.” And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness.” (The Bible. ESV, 2001, Gen. 15:4-6) God’s covenant with Abraham wasn’t based not on his own righteousness or law keeping, but his faith: his trust in God’s plans and supernatural provision. A fundamental principle emerges here: a righteousness imputed onto a person by God based simply on their trust in God and his provision. Abraham’s righteousness by faith in God is referenced in Deuteronomy 24:13 and Psalm 106:31.
Human Effort (Law) vs. Trust in God (Faith).
After ten years of waiting on God’s yet- to-be-fulfilled promise, Abraham was eighty-six years old and still childless. His wife Sarah and he determined it best to take matters into their own hands and have Abraham lay and conceive a child with Hagar, Sarah’s young Egyptian servant. She gave birth to a son named Ishmael. Though we can empathize with their frustration and doubt, it was an act of faithlessness and disobedience. Thirteen years later it’s apparent God agrees because he appears to Abraham and tells him, Sarah, his now ninety-year-old wife, will supernaturally conceive and in one year bear him a son named Isaac. God says, “I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his offspring after him.” (The Bible. ESV, 2001, Gen. 17:19) Sarah struggled with jealousy towards Hagar and Ishmael and didn’t want any confusion about who would receive their inheritance. Mournfully Abraham agrees, and with God’s approval, Hagar and Ishmael were excommunicated. God promised to bless Ishmael and make him into a great nation too. However, it was always God’s plan to reward Abraham’s faith and bless the world through his miraculous son Isaac, “the child of the promise.” Ishmael was an unfortunate example of the consequences of relying on human wisdom and effort, rather than trusting in God’s plan, timing, and supernatural provision.
Abraham’s Faith Tested.
Years later God tells Abraham, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering.” As they approach the site, Isaac asked where the lamb for the offering was. Abraham responded, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” (The Bible. ESV, 2001, Gen. 22:2,8) The last second before plunging his knife into the chest of his already-bound-on-the-altar son, God says “stop” and a ram miraculously appears to be offered instead. God told Abraham, “because you… have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you… and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed…” (The Bible. ESV, 2001, Gen. 22:16-18) Abraham believed God’s promise to provide descendants through Isaac. “He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead…” (The Bible. ESV, 2001, Heb. 11:19)
Twelve Tribes of Israel.
God also tested the faith and established covenants with both Isaac and his son Jacob. Jacob has a life changing encounter with God who renames him “Israel” (Gen. 32:28). Jacob/Israel’s twelve sons later become the twelve tribes of Israel. Each family tribe was preserved, perpetually, God making covenants and prophesies within them. God’s covenant with King David to have a descendant to be Messiah would be from his same tribe: Judah.
Passover.
The evening before Pharaoh agreed to release the Israelites, God instructed every Israelite household to sacrifice a lamb and paint the doorposts of their home with its blood. The blood was a sign for God’s angel of death to “pass over” them. The firstborn son of every home in Egypt without this blood would die that night. For those trusting God, he allowed a lamb to be killed as a substitute in place of their firstborn sons. This was also an allusion to how he provided a substitute for Isaac. God commanded Israel to have an annual Passover holiday to remember and teach the significance of this event to all future generations forever (Ex. 12).
Penal Substitutionary Atonement.
Sin incurred the wrath of God, deserving the penalty of death, but God, in his grace, allowed an animal to die in the place of a repentant sinner as their substitute. God said, “For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it for you on the altar to make atonement for your souls…” (The Bible. ESV, 2001, Lev. 17:11) God desired to dwell within Israelite as their king. However, he’s righteous and holy and will not tolerate being around sin or mixing with the common, so he had the Israelites build him a temple to dwell in. He gave detailed ceremonial laws necessary to be ritually “clean” to enter the temple, designating certain foods and activities as clean and unclean. God provided detailed laws for how to give offerings for blessing or the forgiveness of sin and designated the tribe of Levi as priests to manage it. Fifteen hundred years animals were sacrificed daily for individuals’ sins, and several annual holidays, where sacrifices were offered on behalf of the entire community. This regular practice was also an allusion to Passover and Abraham’s near sacrifice of Isaac, where animals died as our substitute.
Christianity: Logical Fulfillment of Ancient Judaism
Christianity accepts the history, laws, and prophecies in the Jewish Scriptures as true and provides a richer explanation, continuation, and progression of Ancient Judaism. Jesus is the promised Jewish Messiah; a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; from the tribe of Judah, and royal heir to King David. God prophesied that the righteous Messiah would be unjustly killed, but he would be pleased by this because he would be a penal substitutionary atonement for the sins of his people (Isa. 53). This occurred when Jesus was crucified. He’s the embodiment of the ram offered in Isaac’s place and every single animal sacrificed. He was crucified on Passover day. Jesus is the ultimate Passover Lamb of God whose one-time perfect sacrifice takes away the sins of the world (John 1:29; Heb. 10:1-18). Jesus fulfilled every covenant and hundreds of prophecies.
God prophesied that the Messiah would be divine (Isa. 9:6-7). As Jesus, Yahweh, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, became flesh. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin Mary, born as truly God and truly man (Col. 1:15; John 1:1-3,14). This is how God could both fulfill the covenant promises of a human descendant and establish an eternal kingdom with himself as king. Because Jesus bypassed conventional conception, he didn’t inherit the fallen sin nature of Adam and was sinless with unhindered spiritual communion with God. As human he can represent humanity and be our eternal high priest, superseding the Levitical priesthood in the order of Melchizedek, which was also prophesied (Heb. 1-10). As both the lamb and the priest, he is the fulfillment of the Law, making both Jews and Gentiles who trust in and belong to him justified, forgiven, and “clean.” (Matt. 5:17; Rom. 3:21-26). Righteousness by faith in Christ is the fulfillment of Abraham’s “righteousness by faith” (Jam. 2:23; Gal. 3:6, Rom. 4).
God promised a covenant where both Jews and non-Jews could receive his spirit, and he would write his laws on their hearts and minds so they could know him and receive eternal life. Through faith in Jesus, people become adopted by God as their father, and spiritually regenerated when God’s Holy Spirit comes to live inside of them forever. They become the new temples of God (1 Cor. 3:16-17)—which is why God has not rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem. Followers of Jesus can now live in a relational, intimate, and supernaturally powerful way, led by God’s Spirit, to reflect him in the world and share the “good news.” This gospel is how Jesus is fulfilling God’s covenant to bless all nations on earth through Abraham’s descendant (Gal. 3:6-29).
Islam: Illogical, Divergent and Regressive
The Bible anticipates people rejecting the gospel and persisting trying to earn salvation through human effort. Galatians 4:21-31 described the futility of continuing in “slavery” to “Law,” akin to Hagar/Ishmael, when “freedom” is provided through Jesus, akin to righteousness by trusting in God’s provision (Isaac). Nonetheless, Islam does exactly this. It ignores every notion of eternal covenants between God and people. Abraham and all other biblical figures are believed to be mere prophets, esteemed only for their obedience to God’s laws. Ishmael is even considered the greater over Isaac, born as the result of Abraham marrying Hagar, conceived as a good decision. Islam believes that it was he who Abraham nearly sacrificed to God. (IslamicFinder.org) But in Islam there are no covenant promises through that son, nor is there a future temple, priesthood, sacrificial system, concept of atonement, or righteousness by faith developed. So why God would’ve asked Abraham to offer Ishmael, contextually, makes no sense at all. Islam is a simple pagan religion based on laws to appease a deity, making it nothing like Judaism or Christianity.
Law.
The five pillars of Islam are: “1) Faith or belief in the Oneness of God (Allah) and the finality of the Prophethood of Muhammad; 2) Establishment of the 5 daily prayers; 3) Concern for and almsgiving to the needy; 4) Self-purification through fasting in the month of Ramadan; 5) The pilgrimage to Mecca for those who are able.” (WhyIslam.org, para. 2) Islam is: 1) the denial of essentials of Judaism and Christianity—God’s covenants, God’s desire to dwell with humanity as king; the perfectly righteous standard of God requiring death to atone for sin; Jesus’ divinity, crucifixion, atonement, salvation by faith, spiritual regeneration; 2) the eminence of Muhammad; and 3) the institution of new religious laws. Islam lacks sufficient coherency and connection to everything before it. The entire system of Jewish law and religious practice implemented for over 2,000 years is overridden, without explanation, with new Islamic laws. Interestingly, many of the “unclean” Jewish foods continue to also be forbidden in Islam—even though there is no temple and thus zero reason for this. It’s a completely illogical deviation from the pattern.
Prophecy.
Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, David, and every prophet of Israel, had God speak directly to them. However, Muhammad didn’t hear from God directly. Every message he received, he was told it was from God, but they were provided second-hand from an angel claiming to be the Gabriel from the Bible. Islam is based on thousands of messages received by Muhammad alone from Gabriel alone, over a twenty-three-year period. This contradicts precedent, where for millennia, every other angelic visitation in the Bible was rare and didn’t provide random “information” but rather specific directives. Muhammad’s frequent communication with the same disembodied spirit is how the Bible describes psychics contacting familiar spirits (demons). In Christianity, Jesus is God and God’s Spirit dwells inside Jesus’s disciples. Muhammad’s source of revelation is thus both dissimilar and unimpressive. Despite the Bible being 66 books written by 40 authors spanning over 1,500 years, it has a unified narrative and voice, arguably God’s. However, the Qur’an has a distinct narrative and voice unlike any others in the Bible.
Islam claims to embrace the same key biblical figures, but it eliminates all meaningful historical relevance of these people and the multifaceted story that connected them. Islam uses their names but asserts that they’re merely “prophets, who taught Islam”—an accusation with zero historical evidence. Those Christian doctrines Islam preserves—Jesus’ virgin birth, miracles, messiahship, and bodily ascension—are irrelevant and illogical within the Islamic narrative.
Conclusion
Christianity provides a continuation, richer explanation, and spiritual progression of Ancient Judaism. Islam is a total distortion and regression of both narratives, stripping all history and spiritual development from its antecedents, leaving behind nothing more than a simplified, entirely law-based sixth-century pagan religion. It brings its adherents farther from the true God and true spirituality in nearly every possible way, all without offering valid explanations for such dramatic differences. Based on the evidence, I conclude that Islam does not come from the same source as Ancient Judaism and Christianity but is rather a satanic counterfeit religion.
References
English Standard Version Bible. (2001). ESV Online. https://biblehub.com/esv/
IslamicFinder.org. Biography of Prophet Ismael (Hazrat Ismail)
Retrieved May 20, 2023, from https://www.islamicfinder.org/knowledge/biography/story-of-prophet-ismail/
WhyIslam.org. (2014, November 4). The Five Pillars of Islam.
Retrieved May 20, 2023, from https://www.whyislam.org/the-five-pillars-of-islam/
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Watch our full 4-hour video covering this topic in even greater depth for FREE here!
Freedom Fridays #45 – Does ISLAM Worship The SAME God As Christians?
What’s covered with timestamps!
5:16 Show & Topic Intro
8:57 Tonight’s Content Outline
10:45 Want a Quick Attack of Islam? (No!)——or a Careful, Thoughtful Examination? (Yes!)
12:39 SECTION 1 – Different God/Reality Believed or Greater Clarity about the Same God/Reality?
24:05 SECTION 2 – History of Israel, Moses, Foundations of the Torah & Judaism, Jewish History
1:04:00 SECTION 3 – History of Christianity, Foundational Christian Beliefs, Law Vs. Faith, Gospel
2:29:00 SECTION 4 – History of Islam, Core Muslim Beliefs, Comparing This
—— 2:47:23 Was Muhammad even a Prophet?
—— 3:11:32 Five Pillars of Islam
—— 3:28:24 Six Articles of Faith
https://www.youtube.com/live/trfRx3BFiL0
Also watch our full 3-hour video here:
The Empower Hour #33 – One Evil World Religion By Muslim Antichrist & Pope False Prophet!
• Ecumenism: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly!
• Evangelical Unity with Catholics? Muslims? Secular people?
• Tower of Babel incident and what it teaches us about Godly/Satanic unity & division
• Pentecost & other teachings about God’s plan for neighborly love & spiritual unity in purpose
• Muslim Antichrist?
• Catholic Pope False Prophet?
• New One World Order
• Daniel’s prophecies & book of Revelation’s depiction of the End Times
• Mark of the Beast, 666, what it is, what it isn’t, how to make sure you’re not doing it
• How should Christian’s live & know we’re doing is right & not going toward Satan’s goals?
• Catholic images and services in an evangelical Christian church?
• Can Christians celebrate a Jewish Sabbath? (& unity with parts of modern Judaism)
• Why people worship demon gods because they believe our lives are made good by them
• All this & more!
