I wonder why, despite many Muslims scouring the Bible to find prophecies relevant to Islam, none have so far taken notice of Isaiah 42.
I wrote
about it in my book and shared it on various websites and social networks, but many people still struggle to grasp its true significance. I was watching a YouTube video when
something struck me. It is something I have not realized in the past. I said
Wow, how can I be so blind. It is the only place in the Bible where God, speaking in the first person, declared His “chosen one” and, therefore, His chosen people.
Suddenly, all I have read in the Bible about Ishmael keeps falling into
place. Ishmael was the chosen one, not Isaac.
I don’t like
to write a lengthy treatise that may bore readers at a time when there is too
much to read for someone to read to the end; it has to be really interesting, so here goes: Isaiah 42:1
(I
was watching a TV program deceptively titled So Muslims Will Click It where the
guest was a Christian Evangelist trying to discredit everything about Islam
anyway; he said something that struck me. He said that the Qur’an is divided into two parts. The first part was about the life of the Prophet Muhammad in Mecca, and the second half consisted of the revelations in Medina. I said, “Wow, that’s the
answer to my puzzle.” In Isaiah 42, there is a sudden change from being so naïve and gentle to being an avenging angel of justice, which is characteristic of the prophet’s life. The first half of Isaiah 42 describes the
prophet’s life in Mecca, and the second half describes his life in
Medina. Read the following second half of Isaiah 42.
“In
faithfulness, he will bring forth justice; he will not falter or be discouraged
till he establishes justice on Earth. In his law, the Islands will put their
hope…Let the desert and its towns raise their voices; Let the settlements where
Kedar lives rejoice. Let the people of Selah sing for joy. Let them shout from
the mountaintops, give glory to the Lord, and proclaim his praise in
the Islands. The Lord will march out like a mighty man, like a warrior who will stir up his zeal; with a shout, he will raise the battle cry and triumph
over his enemies.”
A
Muslim who is familiar with the life of the Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w) will
recognize Isaiah 42, and for non-Muslims, you can take my word for it: it is the
biography of the Prophet in a nutshell. For more than ten years, the prophet
and his followers endured ridicule and physical abuse in Mecca until after they
had to run for their lives and migrated to what is now Medina, the prophet
was given by God the command to go ahead and fight back: “…The Lord will march
out like a mighty man, like a warrior he will stir up his zeal, with a shout,
he will raise the battle cry and will triumph over his enemies.”
The key
words in the above prophecy are: “My servant” and “Kedar.” The Prophet Muhammad
(s.a.w.) always referred to himself as the servant of God, and if you have not read the book of Genesis, you wouldn’t know who ‘Kedar’ is. Bible dictionaries are just a click away: “Kedar,” any Bible dictionary will tell you, is the second son of Ishmael, who
became a prominent Biblical figure.
All
Christians believe that the above prophecy refers to Jesus, but come on, God called him “my servant, not my son.” Jesus has no relation to ‘Kedar,’ from whom the prophet Muhammad is believed to be descended. Isaiah 42 is a
prophecy for Ishmael's generation, and you can’t argue that “My chosen
one” means “My chosen people.”
If you are a
Christian reading this, you can stop here, but if you are a Muslim, I recommend that you continue reading because you are so ignorant of the Bible that you will be surprised at what you are missing. I will give you only the
highlights of the life of Ishmael in the Bible, or you will need to read the entire book of Genesis.
Ishmael was
favored of God; in fact, I have come to believe that it is this God’s favoritism
that turned Jews into rebellion against the Almighty :-)
THE PLIGHT OF
HAGAR AND ISHMAEL
Genesis
21:10 – ...and she said to Abraham, “Get rid of that woman and her son, for that
slave woman’s son will never share inheritance with my son Isaac.”
The
matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son. But God said to
him, “Do not be so distressed about the boy and the maidservant. Listen to
whatever Sarah tells you because it is through Isaac that your offspring will
be reckoned. I will also make the son of the maidservant into a nation because
he is your offspring.”
Early
the next morning, Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave it to
Hagar. He set them on her shoulder and then sent her off with the boy. He sent
her off and wandered into the land of Beersheba.
When
the water in the skin was gone, she put the boy under one of the bushes. Then
she went off and sat down nearby, about a bowshot away, for she thought, “I
cannot bear to watch the boy die.” And she sat nearby and began to sob.
God
heard the boy crying, and the angel of God called Hagar from heaven and said to her, “What is the matter, Hagar? Do not be afraid; God heard the boy crying as
he lay there. Lift the boy up and take him by the hand, for I will make him
into a great nation.”
Then
God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. So she went and filled the
skin with water and gave the boy a drink.
God was with the boy as he grew up.
He lived in the desert and became an archer. While he was living in the desert
of Paran (Hijjas), his mother got him a wife in Egypt.
According to the Biblical verses above, Prophet Ishmael must be one of the rare Prophets guided by God as he grew up: “God was with the boy as he grew up.” I know of no other prophet in the Bible provided by God with such special treatment. In the
Islamic version, the well of water gushed from the desert/rocks where the
boy’s heel struck the ground while crying. When the infant's crying stopped, Hagar came running, thinking the boy had died, only to find
the infant Ishmael playing in the pool of water. This became known as the
“Ishmael’s Well” or Zam-Zam water, which still provides drinks
to millions of visitors to the Haram Mosque.
Genesis
20:10 – “...for that slave woman’s son will never share the inheritance with my son
Isaac.” According to the law, Ishmael, being the firstborn, should be the rightful
heir. For this reason, Sarah wanted Hagar and her son out of the
house, not the obviously concocted, cheap story of Ishmael mocking Isaac. According to the Bible, Isaac was born when Ishmael was 14 years old, meaning Ishmael
was a young man of 17 when Isaac was weaned. The 17-year-old Ishmael would
have been thrilled to have a younger brother to carry around, just for the joy of having him. However, there is an apparent contradiction in the story: Ishmael was no older than 3 years old when he and
his mother were banished by Sarah.
THE COVENANT
Genesis
17:8 – When Abraham was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am God Almighty; walk before me and be blameless. I will confirm my covenant
with you and greatly increase your numbers.”
Abraham
fell face down, and God said to him, “As for me, this is my covenant with you:
You will be the father of many nations. No longer will you be called Abrams;
you will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations.”
Genesis
17:1 – “I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and
you and your descendants after you for the generations to come to be your God
and the God of your descendants after you. The whole land of Canaan, where you
are now an alien, I will give as an everlasting possession to you and your
descendants after you, and I will be their God.”
Genesis
17:10 – “This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you; the
covenant you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You are to
undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and
you.”
Genesis
17:23 – On that very day, Abraham took his son Ishmael and all those born in his
household or bought with his money, every male in his household, and circumcised them as God told him.
Genesis 17:24 – Abraham was 99 years
old when he was circumcised, and his son Ishmael was 13. Abraham and his son
were both circumcised on that same day.
Jews' claim to the Promised Land is laughable at best because you will notice in the
above Bible story that Isaac was nowhere to be found; he was not even born. The
Promised Land, like it or not, was made by God for Abraham and his son Ishmael.
The Jews' only right to the Promised Land is their being a generation of Abraham, but not superior to the Arabs, the generations of Ishmael.
THE SACRIFICE
The Christian Version:
Genesis
22:2 – Then God said, “Take your son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region
of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I
will tell you about.”
Genesis
22:9 – When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an
altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on
the altar, on the top of the wood. And he reached out his hand and took the
knife to slay his son. But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven,
“Abraham, Abraham!”
“Here
I am, He replied.
“Do
not lay a hand on the boy,” he said, “Do not do anything to him. Now I know
that you fear God because you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.”
Genesis 22:15 – The angel of the
Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time and said, “I swear by myself,
declare the Lord that because you have done this and have not withheld your
son, your only son, I will surely bless you and make your descendants as
numerous as the stars and as the sand on the seashore...”
The
keyword in the above story is: “your son, your only son.” If Isaac, as Christians believe, was the son sacrificed...how can he be the “Only son” when Ishmael was the firstborn? It simply meant that Isaac was not yet born at the
time of the sacrifice when Ishmael was the only son. The mention of Isaac’s
name is an evident interpolation by the writers of the Bible for a reason, as Abraham should know his only son’s name. Another proof that it
was Ishmael is the following in the above Genesis 22:15: “...I WILL SURELY BLESS
YOU AND MAKE YOUR DESCENDANTS AS NUMEROUS AS THE STARS AND AS THE SANDS ON THE
SEASHORE.” There are more than 400 million Arabs, not to mention 1.5 billion Muslims, who fulfilled the prophecy, while Isaac’s generation is what,
20 million overall?
Conclusion:
Between Ishmael and Isaac, it’s undeniable that Ishmael was the chosen one, and his Arab descendants were the chosen people of God. Jews' claim to the Promised Land is laughable at best because when the promise was made to Abraham and his son Ishmael, Isaac was not yet born. God’s use of the
word “ALSO” to refer to Isaac’s right to the Promised Land is the only string
that Jews can hang on to lay their claim to the Promised Land, now “Palestine,” renamed Israel by thieves with fake bloodlines.
