Not so fast Samer- Jerusalem is NOT mentioned in the Quran!

Submitted by sara (United States), Apr 25, 2008 at 17:32

Samer- your claim that Jerusalem is mentioned in the Quran is wrong. Even the quote you provided does not say the word "JERUSALEM" but rather 'Al Aqsa' which only means 'the farthest mosque'.

The fact that there is a mosque that was named Al Aqsa (50 years after Mohamed's death) is purely coinicidental, and in fact was named such in order to establish a relationship between Mohamed and Jerusalem.

This claim has been proven bogus many many times. In fact, see Daniel Pipes article:

http://www.danielpipes.org/article/84

...

Qur'an (17:1) describing the Prophet Muhammad's Night Journey to heaven (isra'):

Glory to He who took His servant by night from the Sacred Mosque to the furthest mosque. (Subhana allathina asra bi-‘abdihi laylatan min al-masjidi al-harami ila al-masjidi al-aqsa.)

When this Qur'anic passage was first revealed, in about 621, a place called the Sacred Mosque already existed in Mecca. In contrast, the "furthest mosque" was a turn of phrase, not a place. Some early Muslims understood it as metaphorical or as a place in heaven. And if the "furthest mosque" did exist on earth, Palestine would seem an unlikely location, for many reasons. Some of them:

Elsewhere in the Qur'an (30:1), Palestine is called "the closest land" (adna al-ard).

Palestine had not yet been conquered by the Muslims and contained not a single mosque.

The "furthest mosque" was apparently identified with places inside Arabia: either Medina or a town called Ji‘rana, about ten miles from Mecca, which the Prophet visited in 630.

The earliest Muslim accounts of Jerusalem, such as the description of Caliph ‘Umar's reported visit to the city just after the Muslims conquest in 638, nowhere identify the Temple Mount with the "furthest mosque" of the Qur'an.

...

see also: http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2006/01/offer-1-million-for-finding-jerusalem-in-the.html

http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2001/11/more-on-the-muslim-claim-to-jerusalem.html

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