Answering Objections to Islam · Source of the Insight
Four possibilities: guesswork, informants, skill or revelation
Handle with care. A disjunctive argument is only as good as its list. If they propose a fifth option, engage with it honestly instead of forcing the four.
In short
- 1.Guesswork: blind guessing produces failures, and no failure is on the record
- 2.Informants: the predictions were made in open conversation, often answering questions on the spot
- 3.Personal skill: no analyst in 615 CE could time a Byzantine reversal or foresee the greening of Arabia
- 4.Revelation: the Qur'an itself frames it exactly this way — knowledge given, not obtained
The claim being examined
If the predictions stand, only four explanations remain for where the knowledge came from.
The Islamic position
Guesswork produces a mix of hits and misses; there were no informants for events centuries away; political skill cannot reach the Persian throne or Arabian rainfall. What remains is revelation.
Analysis
This is a disjunctive argument, and its force depends entirely on the earlier cards holding. Say so openly: if any of the predictions collapse, this card weakens with them. The strongest premise is the absence of failures — a guesser making claims across empires, climates and centuries would leave a trail of misses. The weakest is the exclusion of skill, since a sceptic can always propose an unusually perceptive mind; answer that by pointing to the predictions that ran against the visible trend rather than with it.
From the Qur'an
Qur'an 11:49
تِلْكَ مِنْ أَنبَاءِ الْغَيْبِ نُوحِيهَا إِلَيْكَ مَا كُنتَ تَعْلَمُهَا أَنتَ وَلَا قَوْمُكَ مِن قَبْلِ هَٰذَا
That is from the news of the unseen which We reveal to you, O Muhammad. You knew it not, neither you nor your people, before this.
Sources
Abu Zakariya, Forbidden Prophecies, Ch. 2, 'The Prophet of God' · Forbidden Prophecies, Ch. 2, pp. 99-102
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