Lost and never found...

The Lost Books of the Bible

A Partial List

There are those that cling to a singular view of all things biblical. If it is not in the King James Bible exactly the way he had it translated, it is a fake, a forgery, or an insidious plot by Satan to corrupt the minds of men. Those works referenced here are not mentioned in the Bible but are associated with it. All, of course, are controversial to some, but authenticity is an individual decision. Anything else is, in any case, intellectual censorship. It should be noted that the references linked in this section are random and individual research must be done on all the books.

 

We have compiled a list of over 500 books that have been associated with the Bible either through archeological research or historical documentation. There is no guarantee that the books listed here are inspired works, or genuine books actually included in original versions of writings used by, and considered true by the Early Christian Church. We do not list any books believed to be written after the corruption of doctrine by the Universal Church established by the Emperor Constantine in the Fourth Century AD. 

The Lost Books of the Bible and the Forgotten Books of Eden, L.B. Press
The Other Bible, Barnstone
The New Testament Apocrypha, Volumes 1 & 2, Schneemelcher

We would appreciate any additions to this list, links to unlinked books,
or verifiable documentation on the authenticity, or lack thereof, of any book
listed here from our readers. 

Books Removed from, or Associated with, the Bible

A - B

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Divine Vs Human (Part II): Refutations to some misused passages.

Having had friendly dialogues with Christians from different backgrounds and denominations, I noticed that they used the same textual references all the time to prove their beliefs. This monotony in the use of alleged textual proofs from the bible is noticeable especially when it comes to the topic of the divinity of Jesus. Probably because there is no unequivocal and clear-cut passage showing that Jesus had any divine nature or claimed divinity and worship for himself.

 Various Muslim scholars and specialists in comparative religion have refuted each and every one of these allegations, misinterpretations and contextual manipulations in many publications. The famous Muslim medieval scholar, Ibn al-Qayyim, in his book "Hidayat al-hayara mina nasara" (Guidence for the confused Christians) and also in a beautiful chapter of his other book "Ighathat Allahfan min masaidi Shaytan" (Rescue of the helpless from the traps of Satan) were probably one of the pioneers in treating these issues in detail, with an incredible scholarly display of deep knowledge on the matter.

Due to the constraints a blog dictates, I will try to keep it brief and concise.

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Divine Vs Human nature? (Part I)

Most Christian denominations and sects claim that Jesus (PBUH) had two different natures. According to them, he was in fact, at the same time, wholly God and wholly human. Thus, they invented a pretext and a way out of the tremendous contradictions between the teachings of their different churches and what the teachings of the New Testament really are. 

In the New Testament we find Jesus (PBUH) bowing down and prostrating (in sujud) to Allah, asking him for protection and delivery (Matthew 26:39-44). We actually never read Jesus (PBUH) saying in his own words that he is God, the son of God or that he deserves to be worshiped. Even the few passages that Christians hold on to, saying that they prove his divinity are not unequivocal and we can find many similar or identical passages throughout the bible making reference to other individuals other than Jesus. (InshAllah, I will refute them in future entries.)

Even the very own disciples of Jesus (PBUH) testify that he (Jesus) is nothing but a man appointed and sent from God as a messenger and a Messiah. (Acts 2:22)

They use this idea of a double nature they claim Jesus (PBUH) had to say that Jesus (PBUH) was thinking as a simple human, every time they are faced by some passage where Jesus (PBUH) is actually saying "I am NOT God".

However, if their claim was true, we would read Jesus (PBUH) speaking sometimes as God and other times as a human being. Problem is, we never see him speaking as God in the whole Bible. 

Now a Christian might jump and say "Hold on a sec sir! We DO see Jesus Christ Speaking as God all over the Bible!"

As I said, Inshallah, in future entries, I will deal with the most notorious biblical passages that Christian claim they prove the so called divinity of Jesus (PBUH).

The case of Christianity is a case of excess: a love gone wrong. Every nation should love its prophets. 

However, when love exceeds certain boundaries, it becomes an obsession and the object of their love becomes the object of worship. The result at the end is exactly what those same prophets tried to avoid: their followers associating other gods with Allah. Only that in this case, the consequences go beyond what those prophets could even imagine, becoming themselves an object of worship.

This is not only the case of Christianity. In other religions the same process has taken place. In Hinduism for example, many names of Hindu gods make us reminisce the name of some Prophets. Brahma, Saraswati and Manu, remind us respectively of Abraham, Sarah and Noah. Is it mere coincidence? 

The gestation of some similar process was being planned by some Jews and hypocrites in Madina. Only that Allah (SWT) intervened with his divine words to abort their wicked plot. And this is the reason why I really started typing this entry. I was starting to read Surah Al-ahzab, as I read the Tafseer of At-tabari at the same time, when I came across ayah number four that says:

Allah has never given any man two hearts in his body

(Quran 33:4)

The Tafseer says that some of the hypocrites and the Jews in Madinah were starting to claim that Muhammad (PBUH) had two different hearts. They asserted that sometimes the prophet (PBUH) was acting as a mere human being, and that other times he was following his other heart which was divinely protected from sin and error.

Just as they had previously introduced alien pagan and sacrilegious concepts in Christianity, falsifying and deviating the original pure, immaculate message of Jesus, they were now trying to carry out the same plot against Islam. However, Allah says: "Certainly, it is We that have sent down the Dhikr, and certainly We shall preserve it." (Quran 15.9)

Their malicious plans against the final revelation of Allah Almighty were and are bound to fail.

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Poem about Christianity by ibn Al Qayyim (A few interestin questions)

أعباد المسيح لنا سؤال ... نريد جوابه ممن وعاه
Oh, Christ worshipers! We want an answer to our question from your wise.

إذا مات الإله بصنع قوم ... أماتوه فما هذا الإله
If the Lord was murdered by some people’s act…what sort of god is this?

وهل أرضاه ما نالوه منه ... فبشراهم إذاً نالوا رضاه
We wonder! Was He pleased by what they did Him? If yes,
blessed be they..they achieved the pleasure of His

وإن سخط الذي فعلوه فيه ... فقوّتهم إذاً أوهت قِواه
But if He was discontented….this means their power subjugated His!!

وهل بقي الوجود بلا إله ... سميع يستجيب لمن دعاه
Was the whole entity left without a Sustainer… so who answered the prayers?

وهل خلتِ الطباق السبع لما ... ثوى تحت التراب وقد علاه
Were the heavens vacated…when He laid under the ground somewhere?

وهل خلت العوالم من إلهٍ ... يدبرها وقد سُمرَت يداه
Were all the worlds left without a God…to manage while His hands were nailed?

وكيف تخلت الأملاك عنه ... بنصرهم وقد سمعوا بكاه
Why did not the angles help Him when they heard him while he wailed?

وكيف أطاقت الخشبات حمل الإله ... الحق شد على قفاه
How could the rods stand to bear the True Lord when He was fastened

وكيف دنا الحديد إليه حتى ... يخالطه ويلحقه أذاه
How could the iron reach Him and His body pinioned?

وكيف تمكنت أيدي عداه ... وطالت حيث قد صفعوا قفاه
How could His enemies’ hands reach Him and slap His rear

وهل عاد المسيح إلى حياة ... أم المحيي له ربّ سواه
And was Christ revived by himself…or the Reviver was another god?

ويا عجباً لقبر ضم رباً ... وأعْجَبَ منه بطن قد حواه
What a sight it is!A grave that enclosed a god!
What’s more weird is the belly that had Him in it!

أقام هناك تسعا من شهور ... لدى الظلمات من حيضٍ غِذَاه
He stayed there for nine months in utter darkness…fed by blood!

وشق الفرج مولودا صغيرا ... ضعيفا فاتحا للثدى فاه
Then he got out of the womb as a small baby,
weak and gaping to be breastfed!

ويأكل ثم يشرب ثم يأتي ... بلازم ذاك هل هذا إله
He ate and drank, and did what that naturally resulted in. 1
Is this a god??!!

تعالى الله عن إفك النصارى ... سيسأل كلهم عما افتراه
High Exalted be Allah above the lies of Christians
All of them will be held accountable for their libels

أعباد الصليب لأي معنى ... يعظّم أو يقبّح من رماه
Oh cross worshipers…for what reason is it exalted
and blamed who rejects it?

وهل تقضى العقول بغير كسر ... وإحراق له ولمن بغاه
Is it not the logic to break and burn it along with the one who innovated it?2

إذا ركَبَ الإله عليه كرها ... وقد شدت لتسمير يداه
Since the Lord was crucified on it…and his hands were fastened to it?

فذاك المركب الملعون حقا ... فدسه لا تبسه إذا تراه
That is really a cursed cross to carry…so discard it
Don’t kiss it!3

يهان عليه رب الخلق طرّا ... وتعبده فإنك من عداه
The Lord was abused on it…and you adore it?
So you are one of His enemies!!

فإن عظّمته من أجل أن قد ... حوى رب العباد وقد علاه
If you extol it because it carried the Lord of the worlds
وقد فقد الصليب فإن رأينا ... له شكلا تذكرنا سناه
why don’t you prostrate yourself and worship graves,
فهلا للقبور سجدت طُرّا ... لضم القبر ربَّك في حشاه
since the grave contained your god in it?

فيا عبد المسيح أفق فهذا ... بدايته وهذا منتهاه
So, Christ worshiper, open your eyes,
this is what the matter is all about.

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Majestic plural

Many missionaries have cast doubts on the plural personal pronouns Allah uses in the Qur'an to refer to Himself. I am talking about the pronouns 'We', 'Our', 'Us', etc. These premeditated plans to plant doubts in the hearts of both Muslims and non-Muslims, especially truth seekers, have a clear intention to prove the existence of a trinity even in Islam.

They say that since Allah is referring to Himself in plural, then the very Qur'an is testifying for the trinity. However, these doubts find their way only into the minds of the ignorant, or those in whose hearts there is disease and hypocrisy to begin with.

How come they do not ask the same question when the Queen of England refers to herself as We, in her letters and official documents and statements? Wouldn't that mean also that England has more than one Queen?

The answer is that in many languages, including Arabic and English, there is a plural called the majestic plural. This plural is used normally by people of influence and power to refer to themselves, and maybe also to their courts, governments…etc.

"The majestic plural (pluralis maiestatis in Latin) is the use of a plural pronoun to refer to a single person holding a high office, such as a monarch, bishop, pope, or university rector. It is also called the Royal pronoun, the Royal 'we' or the Victorian 'we'. The more general word for the use of "we" to refer to oneself is nosism, from the Latin nos.[1]

In pluralis maiestatis a speaker refers to him or her self in other than the first person and may be implicitly using the third person plural for the plurality they represent. For example, the Basic Law of the Sultanate of Oman opens thus:

On the Issue of the Basic Law of the State We, Qaboos bin Said, Sultan of Oman…[2]

Other instances of use:

* We are not amused. — Queen Victoria (in at least one account of this quotation, though, she was not speaking for herself alone, but for the ladies of the court.)[3]
* In his abdication statement, Nicholas II of Russia uses the pluralis maiestatis liberally, as in "In agreement with the Imperial Duma, We have thought it well to renounce the Throne of the Russian Empire and to lay down the supreme power."[4]
* United States Navy Admiral Hyman G. Rickover told a subordinate who used the royal we: "Three groups are permitted that usage: pregnant women, royalty, and schizophrenics. Which one are you?"[5][unreliable source?]
* Mark Twain once made a similar remark: "Only kings, presidents, editors, and people with tapeworms have the right to use the editorial 'we.'" [1]

The majestic plural is distinct from the plural of modesty (pluralis modestiae) and the author's plural (pluralis auctoris) or the inclusion of readers or listeners, respectively, the latter often used in mathematics. For instance:

Let us calculate! — Leibniz
We are thus led also to a definition of "time" in physics. — Albert Einstein" [1]

The same thing applies to Allah (swt) when he uses the same plural in his holy books (including the Torah and the Gospel which contain the same plural in Hebrew, yet Jews who read the Torah have never considered it to refer to more than one God).

Speaking of the Jews and Hebrew, the term they normally use to refer to Allah is Elohim. The 'im' ending in this term is just a plural suffix. Literally it would translate into English as Gods. However, they do not consider it a plural of number, rather it is a plural that adds respect and might to the meaning of the term 'Eloh'.

The number of times where Allah (swt) refers to Himself in a direct form, in singular, using the pronoun 'I' is quite limited. An example of this, is in surah 20, verse 12 where He says to Moses:

'Verily I am your Lord, therefore, in My presence put off your shoes. You are in a sacred valley Tuwa.'

Here Allah (swt) is speaking in direct speech to His prophet (Moses) and introduces Himself by saying 'I am your Lord'.

So as we see, the false claims about the use of the plural 'We' in the Holy Qur'an are totally baseless. They are contradicted by the Qur'an itself which constantly repeats that Allah is ONE. So those who try to find the trinity where there is no trace of it, and try to prove the improvable, are just trying to find an unexisting needle in a pile of hay, so maybe it would be more intelligent for them to save their efforts.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majestic_plural

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Big Crunch

We often hear and read about the ayah where the Qur'an describes the beginning of the universe, in Surah 21 verse 30, where Allah poses the question:

Have not the unbelievers seen that the heavens and the earth were joined together (as one unit) and We broke them asunder? And We made from water every living thing, will they not then believe?

This verse predates the theory of the Big Bang by hundred of years, and have been known by Muslims way before the invention of any of the modern astronomic devices.

However, our subject here is what scientists call the Big Crunch. Paradoxically, in the same chapter (The prophets) where, as we have seen, Allah talks about the creations of the universe out of a single unit, we find another verse talking about the end of the universe.

In verse 104, Allah (swt) says: "The day that We roll up the heaven like a scroll rolled up for books. Just as We created the first creation, so shall We produce a new one. A promise We have undertaken, truly shall We fulfill it."

Here Allah (swt) foretells the end of the universe, just as most scientists say it is most likely to happen.

 

"The Universe might yet collapse in a devastating "big crunch". Physicists have shown that even though its growth is speeding up, it could still start to implode by the time it is only twice its current age.

"A few years ago, nobody would even think seriously about the end of the world within the next 10 to 20 billion years, especially since we learned that the Universe's expansion is accelerating," says Andrei Linde of Stanford University. "Now we see it is a real possibility."

 

In 1998, astronomers studying distant supernovae found evidence that the expansion of the Universe is getting faster. This suggests that some kind of "dark energy" is pushing space apart.

Most theories of dark energy propose that the Universe's accelerating expansion is driven by a cosmos-wide repulsive "scalar field" that has a uniform magnitude right across space. A similar energy field is thought to have made the Universe expand incredibly quickly just after the big bang, a period known as inflation. In August, Linde won the Dirac medal for his role in developing this theory.
 

Scientists have assumed that the repulsion of the field will drop as the Universe grows, eventually falling to zero. Though this would slow the rate of expansion of the Universe, it would never actually stop expanding. But Linde says this assumption could be wrong." [1]

[1] http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn2759-universe-might-yet-collapse-in-big-crunch.htm

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Facial lift for the earth

See they not how we visit the land, reducing it of its outlying parts? (When) Allah doometh there is none that can postpone His doom, and He is swift at reckoning. (13.41)Tectonic plates (click picture to enlarge)

The surface of our planet is composed of tectonic plates that are in constant change, movement, and mutual preasure. A result of these phenomena are earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanoes. However, Allah has provided the earth with a unique system in order to release this preassure and make this planet an inhabitable one. Allah (swt) has made part of the tectonic plates disappear under others, melting and becoming flowing magma, reappearing in oher parts of the earth in the form of volcanoes.Thus, the face of the earth undergoes a kind of lifting operation and is literally shortened in some parts of the planet like the western shores of South America.

The following is an abstract from www.sciencedirect.com

"The Central Andes of South America form the second largest high elevation plateau on earth. Extreme elevations have formed on a noncollisional margin with abundant associated arc magmatism. It has long been thought that the crustal thickness necessary to support Andean topography was not accounted for by known crustal shortening alone. We show that this may in part be due to a two-dimensional treatment of the problem. A three-dimensional analysis of crustal shortening and crustal thickness shows that displacement of material towards the axis of the bend in the Central Andes has added a significant volume of crust not accounted for in previous comparisons. We find that present-day crustal thickness between 12°S and 25°S is accounted for (10% to 3%)with the same shortening estimates, and the same assumed initial crustal thickness as had previously led to the conclusion of a 25–35% deficit in shortening relative to volume of crustal material. We suggest that the present-day measured crustal thickness distribution may not match that predicted due to shortening, and substantial redistribution of crust may have occurred by both erosion and deposition at the surface and lower crustal flow in regions of the thermally weakened middle and lower crust."

Also, a result of this thrust is the formation of mountains: (source Encyclopaedia Britannica)

"In most mountain belts, terrains have been elevated as a result of crustal shortening by the thrusting of one block or slice of crust over another and/or by the folding of layers of rock. The topography of mountain ranges and mountain belts depends in part on the amount of displacement on such faults, on the angles at which faults dip, on the degree to which crustal shortening occurs by..."

More info on the topic on: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/394808/mountain/49652/Crustal-shortening#ref=ref499662

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