Warning Against False Prophets

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

والصلاة والسلام على نبيه الامين

والعاقبة للمتقين

Some Christian fundamentalists say that the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth (peace be upon him), warned the people that false prophets will appear after him, and one of those false prophets is – God forbid –  our beloved master Muhammad, the Apostle of God (peace be upon him):

“And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.” (Matthew 24:11)

Logically, however, a warning against false prophets does not necessarily mean that every claimant of prophesy after such a warning is a liar. That could only be the case if Jesus said that all of the claimants of prophesy after him will be liars, but there exists no such statement. In fact, the warning against false prophets strongly implies that the door of prophesy is still open. Out of all the prophets of God, it was only the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) who made a claim of finality, as it occurs in the Qur’an:

مَّا كَانَ مُحَمَّدٌ أَبَا أَحَدٍ مِّن رِّجَالِكُمْ وَلَـٰكِن رَّسُولَ اللَّـهِ وَخَاتَمَ النَّبِيِّينَ

Muhammad is not the father of any of your men, but he is the Apostle of Allah and Seal of the Prophets

(Sura 33:40)

And our blessed Prophet said:

وَإِنَّهُ سَيَكُونُ فِي أُمَّتِي ثَلاَثُونَ كَذَّابُونَ كُلُّهُمْ يَزْعُمُ أَنَّهُ نَبِيٌّ وَأَنَا خَاتَمُ النَّبِيِّينَ لاَ نَبِيَّ بَعْدِي

“Verily, there shall be in my Umma thirty liars; each claiming that he is a prophet, but I am Seal of the Prophets, there is no prophet after me.” (Hadith)

So like Jesus of Nazareth, our blessed Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) warned about the rise of false prophets after him, but the crucial difference is that while Jesus of Nazareth never denied that a true prophet may rise after him, our blessed Prophet Muhammad said that every claimant to prophesy after him is necessarily a liar, as he is the last prophet. In fact, far from stating that no prophet will be sent by God after him, Jesus of Nazareth gave glad tidings of someone who shall come and guide the people into the full truth: “Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.” (John 16:13)

Christians claim that this prophecy is in reference to the Holy Spirit, who is the “third person” of the triune godhead according to them. But on closer inspection, it becomes clear from this text that the Pneuma tes Aletheias is not a person of the so-called “godhead”, but a prophet of God who does not speak of himself “but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak”, as stated in the Torah: “I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee, and will put my words in his mouth; and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him.” (Deuteronomy 18:18)

Hence, Allah Most High says about our blessed Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him):

وَمَا يَنطِقُ عَنِ الْهَوَىٰ ﴿٣﴾ إِنْ هُوَ إِلَّا وَحْيٌ يُوحَىٰ

Nor does he speak from his own inclination. It is but a revelation revealed.

(Sura 53:3-4)

It is worth noting here that some sects of Christianity like the Jehovah’s Witnesses do not believe the Holy Spirit is a person, but rather: “The holy spirit is God’s power in action, his active force...the Bible shows that the holy spirit is not a person”. This is all the more reason for Jehovah’s Witnesses in particular to consider the prophetic words of Jesus in John 16:13, because the ‘Spirit of Truth’ spoken of there is clearly a person. According to another statement attributed to Jesus in the Gospel of John, the Parakletos (Paraclete), which means ‘advocate, intercessor, consoler, comforter, helper’  (Strong's Concordance) could only come after the passing away of Jesus: “Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.” (John 16:7) If Christians insist that the Paraclete is none other than the Holy Spirit and not a future prophet, they will have no choice but to confess that the Holy Spirit was not present with Jesus, but only came after the passing away of the latter. This, however, is clearly contrary to the Gospels which speak of the presence of the Holy Spirit throughout Jesus’s ministry. According to the Christian New Testament, a false prophet does not persist for long: “But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.” (2 Peter 2:1) Among the clear signs of a false prophet is that he calls people to heresy and rejection of God, like the false prophets and oracles of Baal and other idols. Such false prophets are in reality soothsayers, and they do not prophesy in the Name of the One, True God. The Book of Acts describes one such false prophet, Barjesus, a Jewish sorcerer (Acts 13:6). In our own time, there have risen various Christian false prophets, like Joseph Smith. He founded an openly polytheistic cult, known as Latter-Day Saints or Mormons. The teaching of polytheism is a definite sign of a false prophet, while the teachings of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) are radically monotheistic and unitarian, affirming belief in the same God of Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, Jacob and the succeeding Israelite Prophets.