Is Muhammad In The Bible?

Dear Muslim, the Qur’an says Muhammad is prophesied in the Bible and to expect him to come. Muhammad’s prophecy is essential to prove that Muhammad’s messages are the words of God, because many false prophets have made this claim and led people astray.

Let’s look at the following Ayas: 

“Those who follow the messenger, the unlettered Prophet, whom they find mentioned in their own (scriptures),- in the law and the Gospel.” -Surah 7:157 

And remember, Jesus, the son of Mary, said: “O Children of Israel! I am the messenger of God...and giving Glad Tidings of a Messenger to come after me, whose name shall be Ahmad.” -Surah 61:6 

Muslims commonly go to Deut. 18:18 in the Bible to claim that this verse is stating Muhammad is the coming prophet. “I will raise up for them a Prophet like you (Moses) from among their brethren, and will put My words in His mouth, and He shall speak to them all that I command Him."

Muslims will say Muhammad was like Moses, they both were married, both were political leaders, both led battles. But these are just similarities that prove nothing. The similarities need to be distinct prophecies pointing to Muhammad without vague interpretations, besides many of the prophets like David, Solomon, Joshua could claim these same parallels. 

There were three unique likenesses Moses shared with Jesus.

1.) They each made a covenant with God. 


“God said to Moses ‘tell the children of Israel:…if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people.’” -Exo. 19:4-5 


Moses and Jesus both had a covenant with God. “Likewise, He (Jesus) also took the cup after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you.’” -Luke 22:20

This new covenant with Jesus was established because we couldn’t keep the laws of God. God sent Jesus who kept the law perfectly and was the only one worthy to take our punishment. This is the New covenant that Jesus would shed his blood for our sins. Muhammad had no covenant with God like Moses or Jesus did.
 

2.) Moses and Jesus knew God face to face. 

The Qur’an testifies to this concerning Moses “Of some messengers We have already told thee the story; of others We have not;- and to Moses God spoke direct;” -Surah 4:164. This fact about Moses can be found in the Bible at Exo. 33:11, “So the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend.” 

Jesus was with God before the creation of the world and knew him face to face. “And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.” -John 17:5 “But I know Him, for I am from Him, and He sent Me.” -John 7:29 Muhammad did not know God face to face.
 

3.) Moses and Jesus both did incredible miracles. 

Moses split the Red Sea, fed the Israelite's bread from Heaven, and provided water out of a rock. Jesus walked on water, fed 5000 people with few loaves of bread, healed the sick and raised the dead. Muhammad performed no miracles and the people in Qur’an found this suspicious. “Why are not (Signs) sent to him, like those which were sent to Moses?” -Surah 28:48 


Even Jesus told the Jews that the Prophet Moses was speaking about is him “For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me (Jesus); for he wrote about Me.” -John 5:46

The final point, the prophecy Muslims attributed to Muhammad from Deut. 18:18, says the Prophet will come from “among their brethren”, but Muhammad was a descendant of Ishmael and Ishmaelites were foreigners that were not included in the twelve tribes of Israel (Exo. 1:1-5). Jesus was a direct descendant from the tribe of Judah (Luke 3:23-33). The Qur’an itself disqualifies Muhammad as a prophet because his lineage is not of Isaac. “And We gave him Isaac and Jacob, and We ordained among his descendants prophethood.” -Surah 29:27 

Another Bible verse Muslims believe prophesied about Muhammad is John 14:16, “And I will pray to the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever.” Muslims will claim the Helper is the coming of the prophet Muhammad. They say the Greek word for “Helper” which is parakletos is corrupt and that word should be periklytos which means “glorious” and this describes Muhammad. But Greek words have vowels included like English words do, unlike Hebrew and Arabic which don’t include vowels; therefore, there is no debate as to which word the author intended. There are 70 Greek manuscripts of the New Testament today dating before the time of Muhammad and not one of them has the word periklytos. 

If you look at the very next verse John 14:17, it describes who the Helper is, “the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.” 

John 14:16: “He may abide with you forever” - is Muhammad with us forever?  Of course not. 

John 14:17: “The Spirit of truth,” - is Muhammad a spirit?  No, he is human, made of flesh. 

John 14:17: “because it neither sees Him” - was Muhammad ever seen?  Yes, he was but a Spirit is not visible. 

John 14:17: “nor knows Him” - was Muhammad known?  Yes, he was. 

John 14:17: “He dwells with you and will be in you.” -  can Muhammad dwell in us? No, but the Holy Spirit can. 

As Jesus ascended to Heaven he said “you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” -Acts 1:5. Would Jesus say this if they had to wait 600 years for Muhammad? The Holy Spirit did come and Christianity advanced powerfully across the world. These arguments disqualify Muhammad from being the fulfillment of John 14:16.1


The final Bible verse Muslims will claim is a prophecy of Muhammad is in the Song of Solomon 5:16, “His mouth is most sweet, Yes, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem!”

Muslims claim the Hebrew word Machmad (altogether lovely) can be translated to Ahmad which means (praise) and the verse should be translated: to “His mouth is most sweet, Yes, he is Muhammad. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem.” 

First if you read the chapter in its context it’s a love letter from a husband to his wife; so, to interpret that this is Muhammad makes no sense. Also, to change the meaning of a Hebrew word to an Arabic word because they sound similar is terrible linguistics. The word “Achbar” is “mouse” in Hebrew, so applying that same logic, it would mean that every time it says “Allah Akbar” in the Qur’an it should really be translated “Allah is a mouse”. This argument is foolish. To be consistent, every time the Hebrew word “Machmad” is used in the Bible it also needs to be translated as “Muhammad”. Let’s look at another example. 

For example, “Because you have taken My silver and My gold, and have carried into your temples My Muhammad possessions.” -Joel 3:5 

This is a distortion of the text and it exposes the error of this theory. There are eleven more times the word “Machmad” is used and they all are equally incoherent if translated as Muhammad.2 

If Muhammad was mentioned in the Bible as the final Prophet, it wouldn’t be a couple of obscure and hard to interpret passages. Because Muhammad stated he would be prophesied in the Bible and we can’t find any evidence, he should be rejected as a prophet. 

The Prophecy of Isaiah in Chapter 53 is called the forgotten chapter in Israel. Jews will no longer read this prophecy from their own book because when Jews hear it, they say that it sounds like Jesus. It has led to the conversion of many Jews. 

“Surely He has borne our grief And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed.  All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.  He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, And as a sheep before its shearers is silent, So He opened not His mouth...  Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When You make His soul an offering for sin,…By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many, For He shall bear their iniquities…And He bore the sin of many, And made intercession for the transgressors.” -Isa. 53:4-7,10-12

This prophecy took place 700 years before Jesus’ birth and perfectly describes his crucifixion and the plan God had from the beginning of creation to cleanse humanity of their sins. The hundreds of prophecies that were fulfilled by Jesus has a statistical probability of more than a trillion to one. These prophecies can be viewed at: www.accordingtothescriptures.org/prophecy/353prophecies.html 

“If Muhammad is responsible for receiving these contradictory revelations from God, does it not put suspicion on his veracity as a true prophet? Certainly, it does. If God got the story right through thousands of years from Abraham to Jesus, with each successive prophet agreeing with and verifying that which had preceded him, then why all of a sudden did God get it so wrong less than 700 years later with the Prophet Muhammad? Neither Muslims nor Christians would blame God for the contradictions. The blame must be placed on the messenger. Either all the previous prophets got it wrong, or the one who came at the end did.” Muhammad - Apologetic Paper, Jay Smith from MMWU Radical Evangelism to Muslims pg. 161 

“But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed.” -Gal. 1:8 


Dear Muslim friend, please recognize your only hope for Heaven is through Jesus Christ. Please repent and believe in Him.

1 Arguments against Muhammad being the fulfillment of Deut 18:18 & John 14:16 compiled from Dr. John Gilchrist, “Is Muhammad Foretold in the Bible” https://www.answering-islam.org/Gilchrist/muhammad.html 

2 Argument against Song of Solomon 5:16 representing Muhammad compiled from,  David Wood, Acts 17 Apologetics, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNJhCw4zweI&t=395s