Series 2: The Quran’s Fatal Dilemma 

Part 7–Islamic Apologetic Evasions and Their Collapse

Introduction

When confronted with the Islamic Dilemma — the logical paradox that the Quran affirms the Torah and Gospel while also claiming to supersede or contradict them — Muslim apologists are left with a set of limited, and ultimately self-defeating, strategies. These apologetic responses aim to maintain two contradictory beliefs at once:

1. That Allah’s word (including the Torah and Gospel) is incorruptible and authoritative.

2. That the Bible today cannot be trusted because it allegedly no longer reflects Allah’s original message.

The problem is that every attempted escape from this dilemma only deepens the contradiction or introduces new ones. In this section, we will examine the main evasive tactics used by Islamic apologists, why they fail under logical and historical scrutiny, and how each collapse reinforces the original dilemma.

---

1. “Corruption Means Misinterpretation, Not Textual Change”

The Claim

One of the most common evasions is to say that when the Quran accuses Jews and Christians of “altering” the scriptures (tahrif), it refers only to misinterpretation or misapplication — not physical corruption of the text. In this reading, the Torah and Gospel texts remain intact, but their meanings are distorted by followers.

Why It Fails

If this is the case, then:

• The Torah and Gospel are still preserved in their original form.

• Islam still contradicts those texts on key doctrines (divinity of Christ, crucifixion, resurrection).

• Therefore, the contradiction is not removed — it is actually confirmed, because now Muslims are admitting that the same preserved texts Islam claims to confirm still oppose its core teachings.

This tactic also collapses historically: Muslim polemicists throughout the centuries (e.g., Ibn Hazm in the 11th century) clearly accused Christians and Jews of textual corruption, not merely interpretive distortion. To back away from this is to abandon over 900 years of Islamic apologetic tradition.

---

2. “The True Torah and Gospel No Longer Exist”

The Claim

Another common approach is to argue that the “Torah” and “Gospel” the Quran refers to are not the books Christians and Jews have today. They were original revelations given to Moses and Jesus, but those have been lost entirely. What exists now are man-made versions.

Why It Fails

This response creates two fatal problems:

1. Contradiction with Quranic Affirmation – The Quran commands Jews and Christians in Muhammad’s time to “judge by” and “stand firm upon” the Torah and Gospel they possessed (Surah 5:43, 5:47). If those texts were already lost and replaced, Allah was instructing people to follow forgeries. That would be divine deception.

2. The Preservation Paradox – The Quran repeatedly says “None can change the words of Allah” (6:115; 18:27). If the Torah and Gospel were genuine words of Allah and they disappeared, then Allah’s word was changed — destroying the Quran’s own credibility.

---

3. “The Quran Corrects Earlier Scriptures”

The Claim

Some apologists argue that the Quran does not fully confirm the Bible but instead serves as the “final criterion” (Surah 5:48), correcting earlier texts where they have deviated from the truth.

Why It Fails

This directly contradicts the Quran’s repeated claim that it confirms (musaddiq) previous scriptures (3:3, 10:37, 35:31). Confirmation is not correction. If a text needs correction, it is not confirmed — it is contradicted.

Further, the “correction” argument collapses into the same problem as the lost scripture claim: If the Torah and Gospel needed correction, that means they contained falsehoods, which means God’s word was changed, which means the Quran’s guarantee of preservation is false.

---

4. “The Bible Was Changed After the Time of Muhammad”

The Claim

A less common but still present evasion is that the Torah and Gospel were genuine in Muhammad’s day but corrupted afterward.

Why It Fails

Historically, this is impossible. We have complete or near-complete manuscripts of the Bible centuries before Muhammad (e.g., Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Vaticanus, Peshitta). These match today’s Bible with extremely minor variations that do not alter any doctrine in dispute.

If a corruption event happened after Muhammad, it would have required altering tens of thousands of manuscripts spread across multiple continents — without leaving any trace. That is not only historically implausible; it is logistically impossible.

---

5. “The Torah and Gospel Were Limited to the Law of Moses and the Words of Jesus”

The Claim

Some apologists claim that the “Torah” means only the Mosaic law and the “Gospel” means only the direct words of Jesus — not the whole Bible. Thus, they argue, much of what Christians call the Bible is irrelevant to the Quran’s affirmation.

Why It Fails

Even if we grant this redefinition, the problem remains:

• The words of Jesus in the Gospels (even in red-letter form) affirm his divinity, his role as Savior, and the necessity of his death and resurrection.

• These directly contradict Islamic Christology.

• Therefore, Islam still rejects what it claims to confirm.

---

6. “Manuscript Variants Prove Corruption”

The Claim

Muslim apologists often point to textual variants in biblical manuscripts to claim corruption.

Why It Fails

Textual variants exist in all ancient literature, including the Quran itself (with its Qira’at and manuscript differences). The scholarly discipline of textual criticism allows us to reconstruct the biblical text with over 99% accuracy for the New Testament and an equally high degree for the Old Testament.

Variants do not equal wholesale corruption; in fact, the sheer number of manuscripts increases confidence in reconstruction. The same argument would, if applied consistently, prove the Quran corrupted — which is why apologists apply it selectively (fallacy of special pleading).

---

7. The Collapse – Why All Evasions Fail

Every apologetic escape route from the Islamic Dilemma either:

• Confirms the contradiction (by admitting the Bible is preserved yet opposing Islamic doctrine).

• Destroys the Quran’s credibility (by implying God’s word can be lost or changed).

This is why the dilemma is airtight. The Quran’s affirmation of the Torah and Gospel is not peripheral — it is central to its self-understanding as a continuation of the same divine revelation. Remove that affirmation, and the Quran no longer stands in continuity with God’s prior revelations. Keep it, and the contradictions make Islam theologically untenable.

---

Conclusion

Islamic apologetics has no stable solution to the fatal contradiction at the heart of the Quran’s relationship with the Bible. Every attempt to evade it either undermines the Quran’s divine claim, concedes the contradiction, or requires rewriting both history and scripture.

The Islamic Dilemma is therefore not a clever debating trick — it is an unavoidable consequence of the Quran’s own words. The more apologists try to escape it, the more they expose the impossibility of Islam’s core claim.