by Abdul Aziz.

 Jesus stressed the Law at the time of his legendary Sermon Mount.  Our good deeds were and are all important and any magical belief in any myth or dogma, is not necessary:

 Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 5:17-20)

 You will see that Jesus, repeatedly stresses our actions and the Law for our salvation and not some fake belief, in all four canonical Gospels.

 Jesus, may peace be on him, profoundly sums up the whole of the Law in one line of the golden rule: So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. (Matthew 7:12)

 In the golden words of Sir Francis Bacon’s advice, read on, but, “Read not to contradict … but to weigh and consider.”

 Jesus stresses repentance in the Gospel of Matthews, in the very beginning of his ministry:

From that time on Jesus began to preach, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” (Matthew 4:17)

 Jesus describes the the wise builders as those, who act on his teachings and the foolish builders, as those who ignore his teachings:

 Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash. (Matthew 7:24-27)

 The same teaching is also mentioned in the Gospel of Luke:

 Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say? As for everyone who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice, I will show you what they are like. They are like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete. (Luke 6:46-49)

 John the Baptist, who in a way was spiritual superior of Jesus, as he baptized him, also stressed good deeds:

 John’s clothes were made of camel’s hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey. People went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River.

 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not think you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. (Matthew 3:4-10)

 The same is retold in the Gospel of Luke:

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar””when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, Herod tetrarch of Galilee, his brother Philip tetrarch of Iturea and Traconitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene”” during the high-priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. He went into all the country around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.  As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet:

 “A voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him. Every valley shall be filled in, every mountain and hill made low. The crooked roads shall become straight, the rough ways smooth. And all people will see God’s salvation.’”

 John said to the crowds coming out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.”

 “What should we do then?” the crowd asked.

 John answered, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same.” (Luke 3:1-11)

 The Book of James also stresses the Law and righteous deeds more than some magical belief:

 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it””not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it””they will be blessed in what they do. (James 1:22-25)

 And:

 Those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves, and their religion is worthless. Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.  (James 1:26-27)

 The Gospel of Mark, also clarifies for us that unlike St Paul’s idea, the Law is not obsolete or futile, according to Jesus.  In this incident, Jesus stresses the essence or spirit of the Law, over the letter of the Law:

 So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with defiled hands?”

 He replied, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written:

 “‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.’

 You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.”

 And he continued, “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! 10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and, ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’ But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is Corban (that is, devoted to God)”” then you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother.  Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.”

 Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them.”

 After he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about this parable.  “Are you so dull?”he asked. “Don’t you see that nothing that enters a person from the outside can defile them? For it doesn’t go into their heart but into their stomach, and then out of the body.” (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods clean.)

 He went on: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them.  For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come””sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.” (Mark 7: 5-23)

 Even in the Gospel of John, which was the last of the canonical Gospels, to be written, Jesus does not deny the Law of Moses, but, only tries to explain it better, when the Jews criticize him for healing someone on Sabbath:

 Jesus said to them, “I did one miracle, and you are all amazed. Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision (though actually it did not come from Moses, but from the patriarchs), you circumcise a boy on the Sabbath. Now if a boy can be circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing a man’s whole body on the Sabbath? Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly.” (John 7: 21-24)

 Here is my final quote from the book of James and this is the conclusion of my presentation also:

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.”

 Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that””and shudders.

 You foolish person, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless?  Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar?  You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend. You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone.  (James 2: 14-24)

 Dear friends, we will have to carry our own cross, because, no one shall bear the burden of another. Every one has to carry his own cross and to account for his own actions. Nobody’s vicarious sacrifice can do one any good. Jesus also taught this.

 Had Jesus, son of Mary (peace be on him) died upon the Cross and come back to life again he would have proceeded to the highest vantage point in Jerusalem and proclaimed his triumph over death to the unbelieving Jews. Putting forward this irrefutable proof of his being the son of God he would have invited them to believe in him as such. He did not do this. Instead, he met the disciples a few times to convince them of the fact that he had not died upon the cross, had not become “accursed” and was still alive in his physical body. (Mathew: 28; 9.10) He charged the disciples not to spread this news and he took precaution to meet them only in secret. There is not a single instance on record of any contemporary Jew or gentile having believed in him because he had died and had come to life. What greater miracle could anybody have desired to see? All this completely contradicts the assertion that death upon the Cross was the very purpose of the advent — and that purpose had been fulfilled.

 Another question which comes up for examination simultaneously is, whether Jesus (peace be on him) free from the sin of Adam is to be worthy of offering atonement. The theory of vicarious atonement is based on the premise that man cannot be pure, for, he is begotten of Adam who had sinned and since the progeny inherits from the parent, the children of Adam inherited sin and have no escape from it and, therefore, they cannot attain salvation. As no sinner can atone for another sinner, it became imperative that there should be one who had not sinned and could of his own free choice, take up the sins of men and offer to suffer for them, so that they could be redeemed. And this person was Jesus of Nazareth who was Son of God. He bore the sins of mankind and redeemed them by vicarious atonement through hanging on the Cross. This in a nutshell, is the theory of vicarious atonement.

Now, if it is established that Jesus is not free from sin, the entire theory of atonement collapses, since if he was not sinless, he was not fit to offer atonement. Christians usually advance the argument saying that because prophets were not free from sin, they could not therefore atone for others, neither Abraham, nor Moses, nor David; they were all sinful and no sinner would atone for another sinner. But we understand from the New Testament that Jesus too was not free from sin. Naturally, therefore, when he was not sinless, he could not bear the sins of others.

 As a Muslim, one should believe in all the prophets sent by God to guide the people. Jesus, son of Mary (Prophet Isa), peace be on him, is not an exemption from the list. We believe in him as we ought to believe, in accordance with the instruction laid by the Quran. We respect them all. If contradiction arise it is obligatory for a Muslim to expose the reality based not only from the Quran but also from the Bible as we too believe in all the revealed books.

 Muslims in general unknowingly believe in a fabricated story by saying that Jesus was not crucified. This is absolutely incorrect in accordance with the verse of the Quran – the only Quranic verse that references the incident of crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

God says in the Quran, “And for their saying, ‘We did slay the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah’ whereas they slew him not, nor did they bring about his death on the cross, but he was made to appear to them like one crucified; and those who differ therein are certainly in a state of doubt about it; they have no certain knowledge thereof, but only pursue a conjecture; and they did not arrive at a certainty concerning it’ (4: 158)

In this verse it is said that Jesus was made to appear like, or was made to resemble. Now the question arises, who is the person who was made to appear “like one crucified.” Clearly it was Jesus whom the Jews tried to crucify or slay. Nobody else can be meant here, for there is absolutely no reference to any other person in the context. Hence, the theory invented by certain commentators that Judas or somebody else was made to appear like Jesus and was then crucified in his place is simply absurd. The context cannot be so twisted as to make room for somebody else of whom no mention at all is made in the verse.

To what then was Jesus made ‘like’? The context provides a clear answer to that question. The Jews did not kill him by crucifixion, but he was made to appear to them like “one crucified”, and thus it was that they wrongly took him for dead. It was thus Jesus who was made to resemble “one crucified”. The interpretation is not only in perfect harmony with the context — but is also clearly borne out by all relevant facts of history.

Two different views prevail among the Jews regarding Jesus’ alleged death by crucifixion. Some of them hold that he was first killed and then his dead body was hung on the cross, while others are of the view that he was put to death by being fixed to the cross. The former view is reflected in the Acts 5:30 where we read “which ye slew and hanged on a tree.” The Qur’an refutes both these views by saying, they slew him not, nor did they bring about his death on the cross. The Qur’an first rejects the slaying of Jesus in any form, and then proceeds to deny the particular way of killing by hanging on the cross. It does not deny that Jesus was hung on the cross; it only denies his death on it.
In these verses God Almighty further clarifies that though it is true that Jesus was apparently placed on the Cross, and that the intention was to kill him, yet it was wrong for the Jews and Christians to suppose that Jesus actually died on the cross.

The Bible also supports the views of the Quran as clearly mentioned in my previous article (LW – 18/4/2014.).

 Further, Holy Quran says: “And we made the son of Mary and his mother a sign, and We have them, refuge on an elevated land having meadows and springs of running water.” (23:50) According to Arabic Lexicons, the description of a place mentioned in this verse fully fits on the valley of Kashmir where a part of the ten tribes of Israel had settled.

 So, he set out for the regions of the east in which the lost tribes were settled all the way from Syria through Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and north western India to Kashmir. The very name of Kashmir is reminiscent of Syria and some of the place names are identical with Syrian place names. The people of Kashmir to this day bear a striking resemblance to the Children of Israel (Bani Israel). Jesus was welcomed and accepted by the Jewish tribes of the diaspora among whom he became known as Yuz Asaf, the prince prophet.

He spent his last years in Kashmir. He lived to the ripe old age of over 120 years and when he died he was buried in the Khanyar street in Srinagar, Kashmir. His tomb is still preserved and is a place of pilgrimage.

 Click to Watch Video – Government of India – on Documentary – Jesus in Kashmir: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9w-xJfSOyc#t=53