Most Muslims believe that Jews and Christians have falsified (Tahrif) their own Sacred Scriptures in order to hide references to the coming of Prophet Muhammad. That is a great misunderstanding.

It is true that the four Gospels have verses that quote things that Prophet Jesus said that are similar to, but differ somewhat from, what is quoted in a different Gospel but that is not Tahrif.

The Torah too is claimed by many Muslims to be filled with Tahrif; but Jews say that there are 70 different ways of understanding God’s words and the differences are enlightening; not falsifying.

For example, Dr. David Glatt-Gilad, a senior lecturer at Ben-Gurion University, points out (in the Times of Israel !/29/2025) that Exodus 12:40 declares that the Israelites were in Egypt for 430 years, yet another biblical text (Genesis 15:13) suggests a shorter time. Genesis 15:13  declares “And He [God] said to Abram: Know well that your offspring shall be strangers in a land not theirs (Canaan and Egypt) and they shall be enslaved and oppressed for four hundred years. 15:14 But I will execute judgment on the nation they shall serve (Egypt), and in the end they shall go free with great wealth.”

Dr. Glatt-Gilad writes: Two points need to be emphasized:


1) In the rabbis’ view, the 400 year period of Abraham’s descendants’ subjugation began as soon as Isaac was born, since even in Canaan, Isaac and Jacob were sojourners in a land that did not yet officially belong to them.

2) In order to account for the discrepancy between Exodus 12:40 that refers to 430 years of sojourning and Genesis 15:13 that speaks of 400 years, the rabbis suggested that God relayed the prophecy concerning the 400 years to Abraham 30 years before Isaac’s birth.

This is not Tahrif ! It is simply two different ways of measuring the length of the same event. There are many examples in the Qur’an where more than one verse is similar but not identical to another verse, and only a few Muslims argue about if this is Tahrif.

Anyone who studies the Hebrew Scriptures from a........

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