The Lie That God Was Incarnated in the Tree and the Mountain When He Spoke to Moses
The lie that God was incarnated in the tree and the mountain when he spoke to Moses
Content of the doubt:
Christians claim that God was incarnated in the tree and the mountain during his conversation with Moses. Christians prove this with the following Qur’anic verse:
And when he came to it, he was called from the right side of the valley in the blessed spot from the tree, “O Moses, indeed I am God, Lord of the worlds.”
Then, when his Lord manifested Himself to the mountain, He rendered it level.
Response to this ridiculous suspicion:
Firstly:
For the verse:
And when he came to it, he was called from the right side of the valley in the blessed spot from the tree, “O Moses, indeed I am God, Lord of the worlds.”
This verse ☝️ does not indicate incarnation, because God’s voice coming from a tree does not mean that God was incarnated and sat in it. For example: You can hear my voice outside through your phone or from a recording tape, so does this mean that I was incarnated and entered and sat in your phone or in your recording tape?!
Answer: No, I did not enter, materialize, or sit on your phone.
Likewise, when you hear the announcer’s voice on the radio, this does not mean that the announcer has entered your radio.
A human being can transmit his voice over long distances without residing or being incarnated there, so what about God’s ability to transmit his voice without residing or being incarnated?
So the fact that God’s voice came from the tree does not mean that God was incarnated in it. God is able to transmit His voice to another place without being incarnated or residing there.
By the way, the Christian book itself says that the angel was the one who conveyed the voice of God in the tree.
It is mentioned in the Book of Acts - Chapter 7:
30- “And when forty years were completed, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai in a flame of fire from a bush.
35- “This is Moses, whom they rejected, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and a judge?’ This one God sent as a ruler and a deliverer through the angel who appeared to him in the bush.
38This is the one who was in the church in the wilderness, with the angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai, and with our fathers.
So, even the Christian books themselves testify that it was the angel who conveyed the voice of God to the tree.
secondly:
As for the verse that says that God appeared to the mountain, this verse does not mean that God was incarnated in the mountain. The word (appeared) in the Arabic language means: (appeared) , not incarnated .
Then the verse says: “He appeared to the mountain” and not “He appeared in the mountain . ”
Moreover, the manifestation of God’s form elsewhere does not necessarily mean that God has incarnated there or resided there. As a human being, I can appear before you on television screens, even though I am sitting in my room, without coming to you. So what about God, who is omnipotent?
Third:
Some Christians try to quote from Islamic interpretations in order to prove that God was incarnated in the tree. For example, they cite what is mentioned in Al-Tabari’s interpretation, where he says:
The people of interpretation differed regarding the meaning of His statement, “Who is in the Fire.” Some of them said: God meant Himself by that, and He is the one who was in the Fire, and the Fire was His light , according to a group of the people of interpretation.
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And I reply to them and say:
First: If you look closely at the previous quote☝️, you will find that Al-Tabari did not say this on his own, but rather he attributed it to some other people who said this interpretation themselves and interpreted the verse in this manner. That is why you will find Al-Tabari saying immediately after that the following: [ Mention of who said that: So-and-so on the authority of so-and-so] , then Al-Tabari began to list the names of the people who said this interpretation and interpreted the verse in this manner.
So, it was not Al-Tabari who said that God was in fire, but other people who said that.
Then, when we look at the other people who said this, we will find that their narrations are originally weak in chain of transmission. For example:
★ Al-Tabari mentioned a weak narration that claims that Ibn Abbas said the following:
Muhammad bin Saad told me, he said: My father told me, he said: My uncle told me, he said: My father told me, on the authority of his father, on the authority of Ibn Abbas, regarding His statement: “So when he came to it, he was called, ‘Blessed is he who is in the Fire,’” meaning himself. He said: The light of the Lord of the Worlds was in the tree.
But the previous narration ☝️ is a narration with a very weak chain of transmission and it is not correct to attribute it to Ibn Abbas at all. The narrator of the narration is (Muhammad bin Saad bin Muhammad bin Al-Hasan bin Atiyah bin Saad bin Junadah Al-Awfi) , and he is a weak narrator of weak hadith.
As for his father, he is the narrator/ Saad bin Muhammad bin Al-Hasan Al-Awfi , and he is a very weak Jahmite, and no narrations are taken from him.
As for Saad’s uncle, he is the narrator/ Al-Hussein bin Al-Hasan bin Atiyah Al-Awfi , and he is weak in hadith and his report cannot be relied upon.
As for Al-Hussein’s father , he is the narrator/ Al-Hasan bin Atiyah bin Saad Al-Awfi , and he is a weak hadith narrator and should be abandoned. Rather, he is a calamity and must be abandoned, as the hadith scholars have said.
Al-Hasan’s father is the narrator/ Atiyyah ibn Sa’d ibn Junada al-Awfi . He was a third-class Shi’ite mudallis (false narrator). He is weak and used to learn his interpretation from the liar al-Kalbi. Moreover, this narrator did not explicitly state that he heard it from Ibn Abbas, and therefore, it is not permissible to attribute this statement to Ibn Abbas.
The whole narration is very, very weak, and this interpretation is called: (Al-Awfi’s Interpretation) because its narrators are from the same family, which is the Al-Awfi family.
Then this narration did not say that God was incarnated in the tree, rather the narration said that the light of the Lord of the Worlds was in the fire. So the narration spoke about (the light of God) and not God himself, in addition to the fact that the narration mentioned the fire and not the tree.
Moreover, the appearance of God’s light in fire does not mean that God was incarnate there. As a human being, you can transfer your image and make it appear on a phone or television in another location without being incarnate or entering the phone or television. Rather, God is able to transmit His light from one place to another without being incarnate there.
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★ Al-Tabari also mentioned a weak narration attributed to Saeed bin Jubair, which includes the following:
Ismail bin Al-Haitham Abu Al-Aaliyah Al-Abdi told me: Abu Qutaybah told us, on the authority of Warqa’, on the authority of Ata’ bin Al-Sa’ib, on the authority of Saeed bin Jubayr, regarding the statement of God: “Blessed is he who is in the Fire,” he said: He called out to him while he was in the Fire.
The previous narration ☝️ is originally a weak narration and cannot be attributed to Saeed bin Jubayr R. The narrator of the narration is Ismail bin Al-Haytham Abu Al-Aliyah Al-Abdi, and he is an unknown person.
Moreover, the two previous narrations did not mention that God was incarnated in the tree at all, so why would the Christian try to distort the words to support his false religion?!
Even if we assume that God was in the fire, this does not mean that God was in the tree itself, because the flame of the fire is not mostly inside the burning thing itself, but rather the flame of the fire rises up and floats above the burning thing.
Fourth:
Some pedantic Christians ask a malicious question and say:
O Muslims, is your God unable to incarnate?!
I respond to these Christians with the same logic and say:
By your same logic, Christians, can your God be incarnated in a mangy dog?!
If you say yes, you are insulting your God.
If you say no, you are answering yourselves.