1 John 4:1-3; 1 John 2:21,22
Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world.
I have not written unto you because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that no lie is of the truth. Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son.
MARTIN LUTHER (1483-1546): The Mohammedan thinks his Koran is the will of God.
JOHN CALVIN (1509-1564): All are ready to declare, that they do not speak, except from God―Nor does Mohammed assert that he has drawn his dotages, except from heaven―But to all this I reply, that we have the word of the Lord, which ought especially to be consulted. When, therefore, false spirits pretend the name of God, we must inquire from the Scriptures whether these things are so.
JOHN GILL (1697-1771): Mohammed himself was conversant with the Scriptures, as appears by his wretched perversion of them in his Koran.
C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): The Koran. This is the Muslim’s holy book. A man must have a strange mind who should mistake that rubbish for the utterances of inspiration. If he is at all familiar with the Old and New Testaments, when he hears an extract from the Koran, he feels that he has met with a foreign author—the God who gave us the Pentateuch could have had no hand in many portions of the Koran!
A. W. PINK (1886-1952): The Koran of Mohammed teaches that the mountains were created “to prevent the earth from moving”! In the teachings of the Koran, prayer, fasting and alms are the chief duties required from the Mohammedan. Prayer, it is said, will carry a man halfway to Paradise; fasting will bring him to the gates, and alms will give him entrance.
JOHN TRAPP (1601-1699): Bring it to this test―“Every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God.” Mohammed, in his Koran, speaks very honourably of Christ, except only in two things: First, he denies His Deity.
JOHN GILL: Mohammed represented Jesus Christ only as a mere man, and exalted himself above Him as a prophet.
JOHN TRAPP: Secondly, Mohammed denied that He was crucified, but that someone was crucified for Him. But what saith Peter? He “his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree,” 1 Peter 2:24.
MARTIN LUTHER: From this anyone can easily observe that Mohammed is a destroyer of our Lord Christ and His kingdom. If anyone denies that Christ is God’s Son, and has died for us, and still lives and reigns at the right hand of God, what has he left of Christ? Father, Son, Holy Ghost, Baptism, the Sacrament, Gospel, Faith and all Christian doctrine and life are gone, and there is left, instead of Christ, nothing more than Mohammed with his doctrine of works, and especially of the sword.
J. C. RYLE (1816-1900): False religions, like Mohammedanism, have often been spread by the sword…There is no clearer sign of a bad cause in religion than a readiness to appeal to the sword.
C. H. SPURGEON: Christ is meek, as opposed to the ferocity of spirit manifested by zealots and bigots. Take, for a prominent example of the opposite of meekness, the false prophet Mohammed. The strength of his cause lies in the fact, that he is not meek. He presents himself before those whom he claims as disciples, and says, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am neither meek, nor lowly in heart; I will have no patience with you; there is my creed, or there is the scimitar—death or conversion, whichever you please.”
JOHN TRAPP: Mohammed’s laws run thus―‘Avenge yourselves of your enemies; marry as many wives as you can maintain; kill the infidels, etc.’ But we have not so learned Christ.
JOHN CALVIN: With what rage are they seized, when the question relates to the defence of the reveries of their prophet Mohammed.
JOHN ANGELL JAMES (1785-1869): In all those pretended revelations from heaven, of which Gabriel is said to have been the bearer, where is there such a description of Deity as this—“God is love!” or such a sentiment as that which arises out of it, “he who dwells in love, dwells in God, and God in him?” So far from recognizing this principle, Islamism condemns and forbids it. It enjoins almsgiving, it is true, and gives it a high place among its virtues—but this is not the same as love, and may be often carried to a great extent without a particle of the nature of love. This system of imposture, abounding as it does with minute and ridiculous ceremonies, and a slavish regard to absurd ritual observances; enforces, by the authority of its founder, the most ferocious and blood-thirsty hatred, to all who do not receive it in the exercise of implicit faith. Wars against all infidels are not only enjoined in many passages of the Koran—but are declared to be in a high degree meritorious in the sight of God. How completely Islamism has filled its votaries with the most ferocious bigotry and the most merciless intolerance, is known by universal testimony. They everywhere pour insulting contempt upon all who are not Muslims, and feel a savage delight in adding cruelty to insult. “The infidel dogs” is a common appellation applied to Christians.
JOHN WESLEY (1703-1791): By their fruits ye shall know them,” Matthew 7:16―A short, plain, easy rule whereby to know true from false prophets…Ye know that “no lie is of the truth”―all the doctrines of these antichrists are irreconcilable to it.
MARTIN LUTHER: Where the spirit of lies is, there is also the spirit of murder…Mohammed’s Koran is such a great spirit of lies that it leaves almost nothing of Christian truth remaining, so how could it have any other result than that it should become a great and mighty murderer, with both lies and murders under the show of truth and righteousness.
JOHN ANGELL JAMES: The spirit of the system is everywhere visible in the absolute despotism of the governments of those countries in which it prevails―liberty withers in its shade.
MARTIN LUTHER: No one can openly confess Christ or preach or teach against Mohammed. What kind of freedom of belief is it when no one is allowed to preach or confess Christ?
PHILIP MAURO (1859-1952): For our immediate purpose it is necessary only to call attention to the remarkable fact, that in Islam, we have a movement energized by prodigious spiritual powers of evil, a Satanic caricature of the Kingdom of God, being led by a false prophet and based upon a false Bible, the Koran―and seeking to gain the sovereignty of the world.
ADAM CLARKE (1760-1832): At present, the Mohammedan power is a genuine antichrist.
JOHN ANGELL JAMES: And it is essentially and unalterably cruel. Such is Islamism—a curse to the world, a mystery in the divine government, a dreadful obstacle to the spread of Christianity, and the reverse of all that is holy and beneficent in the glorious gospel of the blessed God.
