Dear John & Doves, 
 
 When I write posts that Christians and Muslims do not pray to and worship the same God, I tend to get replies back by private e-mail saying that God is Allah in Arabic, and if you do a search at google.com, it will say that as well.  However, if you do a search about Allah being a moon god from pre-Islamic times that also shows up. According to this article at http://www.biblebelievers.org.au/moongod.htm worship of the moon-god took place in Sumerian times, in the Ur of Chaldees (where Abraham originally lived), in Old Testament times in Arabia, and even in Muhammed's time. The above article also states, "According to numerous inscriptions, while the name of the Moon-god was Sin, his title was al-ilah, i.e. "the deity," meaning that he was the chief or high god among the gods. As Coon pointed out, "The god Il or Ilah was originally a phase of the Moon God." The Moon-god was called al-ilah, i.e. the god, which was shortened to Allah in pre-Islamic times. The pagan Arabs even used Allah in the names they gave to their children. For example, both Muhammad's father and uncle had Allah as part of their names."

"The fact that they were given such names by their pagan parents proves that Allah was the title for the Moon-god even in Muhammad's day. Prof. Coon goes on to say, "Similarly, under Mohammed's tutelage, the relatively anonymous Ilah, became Al-Ilah, The God, or Allah, the Supreme Being."

"This fact answers the questions, "Why is Allah never defined in the Qur'an? Why did Muhammad assume that the pagan Arabs already knew who Allah was?" Muhammad was raised in the religion of the Moon-god Allah. But he went one step further than his fellow pagan Arabs. While they believed that Allah, i.e. the Moon-god, was the greatest of all gods and the supreme deity in a pantheon of deities, Muhammad decided that Allah was not only the greatest god but the only god."

That certainly explains how the title of  the Moon-god as al-ilah, the god was shortened to Allah in pre-Islamic times, and how Muhammed used the term Allah as God when Allah would be considered another god by Bible standards while the title of Yahweh in the Bible is always written as God who is the real God, and any other god is spelled "god" in the King James version of the Bible.  However, the word Allah written in place of the word "God" inside of a Christian Bible written in Arabic would confuse things with one set of  Arabic-Christians along with Muslims referring to God as Allah, and another set of Christians referring to Allah as the moon-god who is another god and who is not Yahweh, the God, the Father of Jesus Christ.  So you can see how deception could work itself into the picture here.

However, one of the problems I have with anyone saying that Christians, Jews, & Muslims pray to and worship the same God is the fact that the Muslims bow down toward Mecca where that black rock is housed in the Kaba when they pray, and they also kiss it as well. Also God, the Father whose name is Yahweh (Jehovah) to whom both Christians and Jews pray does not have any false prophets. Muhammed was a false prophet, and the Koran was not inspired by the Holy Spirit like the Old and New Testaments in the Bible were.  The Koran contradicts the Bible, and the Bible contains the truth.  Jesus said to his heavenly Father in John 17:17, "Sanctify them through the truth: thy word is truth."  The word that the Lord gives to his true prophets always come true.   The Lord said in Deut. 18:20-22, "But the prophet which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak in the anme of other gods, even that prophet shall die. And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the Lord hath not spoken? When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing to follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptously: thou shalt not be afraid of him."

Now many of the prophecies in the Bible have already come true and others will come true in the future like Jesus Christ returning to earth to destroy the beast (antichrist) and the false prophet and to set up his kingdom on earth while he rules for 1,000 years.  The Muslims also have a similiar belief about the second coming of Isa Al Masih who will kill an imposter Messiah, but according to this article at http://www.openmysite.com/firmanallah/Pages/Da'wah/second.html "he will only live 40 more years, will be like a judge, and then will be buried by the prophet Muhammed." Even though Jesus Christ's name is Isa Al Masih in Arabic, Isa Al Masih cannot be Jesus Christ since the real Jesus Christ will live forever. The Christians believe that Jesus will descend down to the Mount of Olives upon his return based on Zechariah 14:3-4 while Muslims believe that Isa will descend either to "Darusalem, Mecca, or Damascus."  I am assuming that Darusalem means Jerusalem.

So what happens if Christians, Jews, & Muslims claim they pray to and worship the same God and along comes a Messiah who claims to be God in the flesh as the Christ. Couldn't they all then claim that they are not going after other gods because they already claim they pray to and worship the same God?  And what happens if this false Messiah and the false prophet of the book of Revelations promise to do great signs and wonders, and they do them by performing miracles? Why should the Christians, Jews, and Muslims and the rest of think that this is a false Messiah and a false prophet if they claim they are not going after other gods.  Deut. 13:1-3 says, "If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, and the sign and wonder come to pass, whereof he spake with thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known and let us serve them: Thou shalt not harken to his words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams: for the Lord your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the Lord your God with all your soul."  So if the false Messiah and the false prophet never say to the people "Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known and let us serve them," because the false Messiah and the false prophet say that the false Messiah is God himself, how will Christians, Jews, & Muslims know the difference between another god and the real God when they claim to worship the same God to begin with?

Well, what does the Bible say about the spirit of the antichrist?  1 John 4:3 says, "And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God; and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come and even now already is in the world."  Christians believe that Jesus came in the flesh, and the Jewish historian Josephus has a record of Jesus coming in the flesh so the Jewish people know that he existed in the flesh. The Muslims also know that Jesus came in the flesh because they consider him a prophet.

What else does the Bible say about the antichrist?  1 John 2:20-23 says, "But ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things.  I have not written unto you because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that no lie is of the truth.  Who is a liar but he that denieth Jesus is the Christ: He is the antichrist:  He is antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son.  Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father: (but) he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also."  This means that apostate Christians, Jews, and Muslims and anyone else would have to deny that Jesus was the Christ and that they would have to deny that Jesus Christ is the Son of God even though they all know that Jesus came in the flesh. "Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father regardless of whether they believe or claim they are all praying to and worshipping the same God. Don't forget that according to John 4:23-26, Jesus said, "The hour cometh, and now is, when true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him.  God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.  The woman saith unto him, I know that the Messiah cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things.  Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he."  John 6:67-68 also says," Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go: thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God."  Also don't forget that Jesus said in John 14:6, " I am the way the truth and the life: no man cometh unto the Father but by me." Christians, Jews, Muslims and others come unto the Father by Jesus Christ.

So anyone can claim that Christians, Jews, and Muslims pray to and worship the same God, but the truth is that Yahweh has a Son named Jesus Christ who is the Messiah who died on the cross for our sins.  Anyone could claim that Christians, Jews, & Muslims pray to and worship the same God, but those who deny that Jesus is the Christ (the Messiah) and who deny that Jesus Christ is the Son of God are not worshipping the Father whose name is Yahweh in spirit and in truth because "Who is a liar but he that denieth Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son. Whosoever, denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father: (but) he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also."  Here is an article at http://answering-islam.org.uk/Nehls/tt2/t23.html called Islamic Allegations Against Jesus And The Atonement."  It states the Islamic Objections to The Trinity, and further down in the article are Qur'anic Objections to the Divinity and Sonship of Jesus. It also gives a list of what Muslims know about Jesus from the Quran (Koran), and quotes chapter and verses from the Koran.  Then it lists the Islamic Objections to the Crucifixion by quoting the Koran, and then the  Islamic Objections to the Atonement.

Of course, you wouldn't make any Muslims happy by telling them that Muhammed is a false prophet, and that the Koran wasn't inspired by the Holy Spirit nor would you make the Jewish people happy by telling them that "he that denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father," since they are praying to the same Yahweh to whom Christians address as "Our Father Who Art In Heaven," or as our heavenly Father in prayer. However, this post is not about making other people happy by pleasing them.  It's about pleasing God by worshipping him in spirit and in truth, the discernment of Bible scriptures, and it's about the truth regardless of anyone's claims that Christians, Jews, & Muslims pray to and worship the same God.  If Muslims and Jews worshipped the same God in spirit and in truth(Yahweh) as Christians, then they would believe that Jesus Christ was the Son of God who died on the cross for their sins.

Before I close this post, I just want to show you what I found in this article called The Curse of the Flying Carpet by Gary Stearman at http://www.prophecyinthenews.com/articledetail.asp?Article_ID=133 about the Hebrew word "alah."   It says,  "It is fact the Hebrew word alah … pronounced exactly as the word "Allah!"  It appears many times in the Old Testament, always referring to a violated oath, malediction, imprecation, or curse.  We find an excellent illustration of this in The New Bantam-Megiddo Hebrew & English Dictionary. There, on page 9, when one looks up alah , on the Hebrew side of the dictionary, the definition shown is "imprecation," that is, a curse.  Turning to the English-to-Hebrew side of the dictionary, one finds on page 9, a primary listing for the word, "Allah." The Hebrew word given as its definition is , which we have already seen, is the word translated "curse" in many Old Testament Scriptures."

God bless,

Donna