Zaki Naik:Prophecy #1: Moonlight is Reflected Light?

Prophecy #1: Moonlight is Reflected Light

Zakir Naik has perfected the art of propaganda. This entails maintaining an edifice of scholarship while frequently using half-truths, out-of-context passages and false statistics. It also involves carefully avoiding debate with any serious debaters that oppose him, like Sam Shamoun or Ali Sina , Pandit Mahendra Pal Arya , David , Agniveer Team etc

Let us begin, then, with the moon prophecy shown above by Zakir Naik.
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MOONLIGHT IS REFLECTED LIGHT: It was believed by earlier civilizations that the moon emanates its own light. Science now tells us that the light of the moon is reflected light. However this fact was mentioned in the Qur'ān 1,400 years ago in the following verse:

"Blessed is He Who made Constellations in the skies,

and placed therein a Lamp and a Moon giving light."

(Al-Qur'ān 25:61)

The Arabic word for the sun in the Qur'ān , is shams. It is also referred to as siraajwhich means a ‘torch' or as wahhaaj meaning ‘a blazing lamp' or as diya which means ‘shining glory'. All three descriptions are appropriate to the sun, since it generates intense heat and light by its internal combustion. The Arabic word for the moon isqamar and it is described in the Qur'ān as muneer which is a body that gives noor i.e. reflected light. Again, the Qur'ānic description matches perfectly with the true nature of the moon which does not give off light by itself and is an inactive body that reflects the light of the sun. Not once in the Qur'ān , is the moon mentioned as siraaj, wahhaajor diya nor the sun as noor or muneer. This implies that the Qur'ān recognizes the difference between the nature of sunlight and moonlight.

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The key problem with Naik's argument is that nūr (نُور) simply means "light"; there is absolutely no sense of "reflected" in the meaning of the word in any Arabic dictionary or lexicon. If, for the sake of argument, we adopt Naik's re-definitions, then Allah, bearing the title an-Nūr, must be merely "reflected light," while Muhammad, called "a lamp (sirāj) spreading light" in Sura 33:46 is the original source of light. It all begins to sound rather blasphemous.

In addition, it was known at least a thousand years before Muhammad that the moon's light is reflected light. When Aristotle (384-322BC) discussed the earth's shape, he proved the earth's sphericity by arguing that during a lunar eclipse the earth's shadow on the moon is seen. Centuries before Muhammad , the Jews knew that the moon is "borrowing its light" from the sun (Philo, 1st century) and, "the light of the moon must be derived from the light of the sun" (Midrash Hagadol, mid-1st century).

Naik has attempted to evade this conclusion by dividing God into two parts:
1) a siraaj light, and 2) a ‘reflector’ niche which reflects ‘Allah part #1’ and produces nūr (nauzubillah!). He builds this bizarre idea on a reinterpretation of the lamp verse (24:35). His interpretation utterly contradicts the interpretation of all the sahaba (Ibn ‘Abbas, Ibn Mas’ud, Ubayy bin Ka’b, etc), who all correctly interpreted the niche and glass as the believer’s heart in which the light of faith burns. None of the sahaba ever had the audacity of dividing Allah into two separate parts, one part of Allah a burning wick and the other part the reflecting niche. Zakir Naik's tafsir is wrong and his idea is blasphemous.

The moon does not emit its own light but simply reflects light coming from the Sun. The Arabic word for reflected (in`ikaas) does not appear in this Qur'anic verse that says the Moon is a "light". It instead uses the word "Noor" which is used to denote an entity that emits light.

And hath made the moon a light therein, and made the sun a lamp?

Qur'an 71:16

The word "Noor" is also used in this verse to show that Allah is the "light" of the universe. Clearly the author is not implying that Allah reflects light from another source but is the source of the light.

Allah is the Light of the heavens and the earth. The Parable of His Light is as if there were a Niche and within it a Lamp: the Lamp enclosed in Glass: the glass as it were a brilliant star: Lit from a blessed Tree, an Olive, neither of the east nor of the west, whose oil is well-nigh luminous, though fire scarce touched it: Light upon Light! Allah doth guide whom He will to His Light: Allah doth set forth Parables for men: and Allah doth know all things.

Qur'an 24:35

#Faishal Ahmed (ex-muslim)

http://leftislam1.blogspot.in/