The writings of several prophets were destroyed by the ruling class of the Jews. According to Justin Martyr, the Jews have omitted sayings by Jeremiah and Ezra, as well as the words “from the wood” after “The Lord reigns” in Psalm 95(96):10 (Dialogue with Trypho, 71-73). It means Jews were NOT honest keepers of God’s word. What’s your response?

First of all, it is clear you are looking at material from Muslim critics of Christianity.  It has been my experience from MANY examples, that the vast majority of Muslim critics have literally zero interest in discovering the truth about the inspiration of the Bible.  Their ONLY purpose is to find dirt on the Bible because, unlike the Qur’an, there are clear marks of inspiration in the Bible.  Their level of bias is so great that the things they write really do not deserve serious consideration.  I suggest you do yourself a favor and ignore such biased material.  Nevertheless, because you ask, it is my job to respond, and respond I will!

As to the first charge, I will need to know the names of these prophets whose writings were destroyed, and I will need the evidence of this destruction.  I cannot respond to a completely unspecific charge such as this, especially if I am not given the evidence.  For all I know, these “prophets” whose writings the ruling class of the Jews rejected were false prophets.  The Old Testament makes it clear that there were many false prophets among the Jews.  For Jewish leaders to reject the writings of false prophets is a good thing.   There were many writings of the Jews which did not make the cut to be part of the inspired Old Testament, because the “ruling class” were careful about what entered their canon.  Here is the bottom line.  The entire Old Testament is inspired by God.  The fulfillment of prophecy, the scientific accuracy of the Old Testament, and the historical reliability of the Old Testament show that the 39 accepted Old Testament books are inspired by God. (The Qur’an has no such evidence of its inspiration)  Again, this claim is not specific and it includes no evidence, but even if it did, it would be a red herring argument, because all that really matters is that the Old Testament we have is inspired by God.

About Justin Martyr, he is just one person and his thoughts may well be legitimate.  Unlike Muslims, who pretend that the Qur’an is perfect and has literally no textual issues at all (which is absolutely untrue), Christians acknowledge that there have been a number of textual variations over the centuries.  We have dozens of PhD scholars who devote their career to discussing such textual issues.  We have thousands of ancient manuscripts that we use to reconstruct the most accurate Hebrew and Greek Bibles possible.  We discuss variants.  Muslims ignore them.  Because Christians are honest and open about textual issues, we have a very good Greek and Hebrew Bible.  Because Muslims pretend there are literally zero manuscript issues (a lie!) and refuse to even discuss them, to the point of threatening physical harm to those who talk about them, it is not surprising that the Greek and Hebrew Bible are more reliable than the Arabic Qur’an.  These are the facts.  Here is a set of notes which gives specifics.  Apologetics and Islam   But Muslims refuse to discuss problems with the Qur’an.  Instead, they pretend that there are massive problems with the Old Testament, which is simply not true.  For example, I assume that Justin Martyr is discussing a legitimate textual issue with Psalm 96.  Thank-you Justin for discussing a textual issue.  Good luck getting any Muslim anywhere to have an open discussion about textual issues with the Qur’an.  So, what about this issue.  Was “from the wood” in the original Psalm 96?  This is a legitimate question.  We can discuss this.  Would this make a significant difference in the meaning of Psalm 96?  No, it would not!  Why are Muslims even bringing this up?  What is their interest in this?  Do they want to help us to reconstruct the most accurate Old Testament or are they just trying to destroy the faith of Christians?  Will they participate in discussions about problems in the text of the Qur’an?  Let’s be honest about what is really going on here.  These are not honest players.

Who are the honest keepers of their scripture? I would say that Jews and Christians are honest about questions regarding their Scripture, whereas Muslims, generally, are not honest about issues of the Qur’an.  There is no evidence in the list above of dishonest dealing with the Old Testament in what has been presented here.  What is the evidence of the Jews not being honest keepers of God’s word here?  I see none.

John Oakes