Did God Deceive People with the Crucifixion? Christianity & Islam Compared

[00:00:01]So there's a really fascinating discussion that I'm seeing um some Christian apologists and also some Muslim apologists having online about the question of divine deception. Uh this is actually a topic that has interest me for years maybe even over a decade now. Uh I remember reading the first time in the Bible passages like Ezekiel that you know says um you know if the prophet speaks something false I the Lord have deceived him or first kings that talks about God sending a lying spirit into the mouths of false prophets. I remember reading this stuff right um and and just thinking what do I make of this right? [laughter] So, it's it's been a pretty fascinating thing for me for quite some time, well over a decade, maybe maybe two decades at this point, right? I've been studying theology in the Bible since 2006.

[00:00:58]Uh, so that would be two decades now.

[00:01:01]And I've also done some videos about the topic of divine deception before where I kind of look at some of those passages from First Kings, Ezekiel, Isaiah, and some of the New Testament passages. Um because you have this concept of divine deception in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. And I've looked at that previously in another video that I did last year in June. And I put a link to it in the show notes if you want to go and take a look at it. I'm not going to rehash that here.

[00:01:30]But I always find it interesting to see that, you know, people are kind of having these discussions online and u picking up on some of the conversations and things that I've I've also observed just in my 20 years or so now of of studying theology. And I want to maybe just educate people about this concept.

[00:01:53]I I don't think a lot of people are very familiar with it from either side, from the Christian side or the Muslim side.

[00:02:00]And again, it's this topic of divine deception. And what I'm actually seeing online is um some Christian apologists saying, "Hey, in the Quran, Allah is described as the best of planners or plotters." And some have understood that to mean deceive uh deceivers.

[00:02:19]And uh he guides whom he wills. He uh leads astray whom he wills. And then especially the concept of the crucifixion in Islam and also in the Quran, you have this um idea that Jesus was not crucified, but rather God made it appear so. So it looked like it was Jesus who was crucified, but he wasn't. And what was the purpose of that? According to the Quran, the purpose was to deceive the Jews as punishment for the Jews.

[00:02:48]Because they plotted evil against Jesus, God punished them by deceiving them further because they already had this deception in their hearts. God tricked them. They wanted to trick God. They wanted to trick the Messiah. Well, God tricked them. That's kind of the idea from uh the Quranic perspective. At least that's how I understand that. Uh feel free to correct me if there's any Muslim viewers watching. Um let me know if I butchered that. Okay. So there's there's that side of the conversation that I see some apologists having. I've of course seen some Muslims respond and say that's a misunderstanding.

[00:03:26]Um as far as the best of plotters thing um and then comparing that to biblical passages where you have God explicitly saying I have deceived the prophet. Um or very clearly you have passages where God hardens the heart of Pharaoh. He leads astray uh some people and then he guides other people. You have that biblical theme. Um but you have a different perspective obviously in the Bible on the crucifixion. Um with the crucifixion in the Bible, Jesus wasn't just made to appear to have been crucified but was actually crucified. Right?

[00:04:06]And what's fascinating about this conversation is that most people may not realize that the concept of divine deception in the crucifixion is not just an Islamic theme. It's actually a Christian position as well. A lot of people don't realize this.

[00:04:25]Both Christians and Muslims believe that there is a certain sense in which God deceived with the crucifixion. The debate is not whether God deceived. The question is who did he deceive?

[00:04:39]For the Muslims in the Quran, he deceived the Jews.

[00:04:44]For the Christian perspective in the Bible and in the petristic literature, so the traditional Christian position is that God deceived Satan and the demons.

[00:04:55]Um so rather than deceiving the Jews by engaging in the crucifixion, he deceived Satan. And this is part of an atonement theory. There's different atonement theories. The idea of the atonement is found all over the Old Testament.

[00:05:10]There's different forms and concepts of it. Of course, you have various atonement theories um being discussed in the early Petristic period.

[00:05:20]People have understood the crucifixion differently and the atonement uh question differently throughout history.

[00:05:27]And some of the earliest atonement theories involve this question of divine deception. Um, and they involve what's called the fish hook theory. And the idea is this that uh Satan thought he was doing good by crucifying and and killing the Messiah. But it was in that very thing that God trapped him that he used uh you know to hook him if you will to hook Leviathon as some of the Petristic literature will reference it you know harking on Old Testament uh themes and imagery with Leviathon and the great dragon and Satan.

[00:06:09]And so while they will present Jesus as effectively the worm on the hook that enticed Satan to go and crucify Jesus, but in the process he's caught in the hook and he's destroyed.

[00:06:27]And so you have in the petristic literature very explicitly they'll say that God deceived Satan with this uh crucifixion events with this ransom theory and specifically fish hook theory as it's often called by scholars. You'll find it all throughout the petristic literature. Sometimes understood a little bit differently but certainly you have that concept there. And so, for example, I mean, you can take a look at uh origin, but certainly not limited to origin. This is just a very quick, readily available quote that I pulled up for you from the um uh Petristic literature that you can find in that 38 volume set that I have behind me. Um it's translated in English, very well known. You can find it on New Advent. Um but origin says here, but to whom did he give his soul as a ransom for many? Surely not to God.

[00:07:23]Could it then be to the evil one? That's Satan. For he had us in his power until the ransom for us should be given to him.

[00:07:34]even the life or soul of Jesus since he the evil one had been deceived and led to suppose that he was capable of mastering that soul and he did not see that to hold him involved a trial of strength greater than he was equal to.

[00:07:53]So there's origin in the anti-nyene period. Of course certainly not limited to the antiene period. You have it in the nyine and postnine uh petristic period as well. Again very very common theme but very explicitly saying that um God deceives Satan.

[00:08:12]Augustine is uncomfortable with the concept of God deceiving. And so what he does is actually what the Ignatius Catholic Study Bible does. [laughter] If you've ever read this big huge uh tome here, this is the uh newly released Old and New Testament commentary uh Ignatius Catholic Study Bible. And if you go to the passages that talk about God deceiving people, God deceiving prophets. Um it it's it's clear God is speaking actively. I have deceived him.

[00:08:47]I have deceived that prophet. Um, but what the commentary will do is they will read it, perhaps some might argue reread it as God is allowing them to be deceived, right? They'll make it passive to kind of soften the blow and they'll just say the active aspect is just more rhetorical. Um, and so they'll try to kind of uh uh get off the hook that way.

[00:09:11]And and yes, I'm I'm referencing the hook there. uh ironically in light of the discussion we're having here. Um so you'll see that that concept if you just kind of go to the commentary they'll they'll reread it as um God doesn't harden people's hearts. He allowed their heart to be uh hardened. He doesn't deceive. He allowed them to be deceived.

[00:09:35]Um well Augustine does the same thing, right? That's not new to the Ignatius Catholic Study Bible. You have Augustine who comes along and he's a little uncomfortable with the idea of divine deception. And so what he does is he says, "Well, God doesn't actively deceive Satan. He allows for Satan to be deceived and Satan deceived himself."

[00:09:58]Um so that's another element that you'll see in some of these these discussions.

[00:10:04]For others, however, they're more comfortable with the concept of God deceiving. um such as again origin who who doesn't shy away from that kind of language uh among others again this is not just limited to ecclesiastical writers like origin uh but it also includes uh canonized saints in the petristic period um but let me also show you something here there's a uh article that you can read called the last temptation of Satan [laughter] divine deception in Greek petristic interpretations of the passion narrative. So it's a very dominant theme in the church fathers and the petristic literature and you can get a feel for that from papers like this and just look at the introduction which is available in the public domain. A remarkable [clears throat and cough] excuse me a remarkable number hold on let me clear my throat [clears throat] sorry I've been dealing with cough today. A remarkable number of Greek petristic thinkers gave expression to the theory that Satan was deceived by Christ, who exploited his adversaries mistaken belief that the object of his desires was a mere man and not the deity incarnate.

[00:11:24]Driven by an insatiable hunger for human bodies, the demonic appetite was drawn to devour the seemingly mortal flesh of Jesus.

[00:11:36]That flesh, however, was but a seductive lure concealing the power of divinity that brought about Satan's downfall and even in some traditions, his salvation.

[00:11:48][laughter] That that might raise an eyebrow, his salvation. What? Yeah, there there are some church fathers who do believe that Satan and the demons will be fully restored one day after a period of punishment in hell. You can see this in various forms of the concept of apocatasis in uh especially the Greek petristic tradition and uh arguably some will say that saints like Maximus the confessor held to it. Others will contest that. Uh so there is a debate on on that but uh you have um [clears throat] I believe Gregory of Nissa is very famous for putting that forward. of course origin as well.

[00:12:32]Uh so that that's what he's referring to there. The crucial events in this drama of de deception. By the way, you you know another person Isaac of Nineveh. I actually interviewed the the foremost scholar in uh Syriak literature, Sebastian Brock, Dr. Brock.

[00:12:49]And I asked him about uh St. Isaac of Nineveh and did he maintain this idea of apocatasis and this eventual universal salvation and and he affirmed that that's correct reading the crucial events in this drama of deception were Christ's agony in the garden and his suffering on the cross moments of apparent weakness and vulnerability which petristic writers daringly reconfigured as the cunning ruses of a master strategist defeating the enemy through his own devices. is such a radical reinterpretation of scripture was achieved largely through the tools of typological and allegorical exogesis by which petristic writers sought to explain and thereby eliminate the shame and folly of the cross along with the attendant spectacles of Christ's apparent fearfulness and uncontrolled emotion. Um, and the typology that they're referring to is if you look at some of those passages in the Old Testament that references a worm or references Leviathan or references something like a hook, they'll they'll allegorize and use typology to say that this is Jesus. Jesus is the worm on the hook catching Leviathan, you know. Um so the Leviathan goes and tries to devour the worm but in the process is himself um destroyed.

[00:14:20]And so that that's what they're referencing there. Um okay. Also you can read uh there are some instances that have been uh put together in this paper.

[00:14:32]Cooking Leviathon. Did Jesus say uh I'm sorry. Did Jesus deceive Satan at the cross? Um, this person in that paper just kind of puts together some of the uh Petristic quotes and has a little bit of a discussion about it. Um, and interestingly, you know, people have kind of picked up on this issue and connected it to passages like first kings and Ezekiel because I came across this uh just a person's blog who's kind of discussing the concept of divine deception and atonement theories and he connects the dots, right? And he connects the dots with Ezekiel and first Kings and Isaiah and was it first or 2 Thessalonians, the the great delusion that God sends upon people, the non-elect.

[00:15:22]The Bible in several challenging passages such as First Kings 22:22.

[00:15:28]That's the one where God sends a lying spirit into the mouths of false prophets to deceive the people. uh in Ezekiel 14:9 where God says, "If the prophet has spoken something falsely, I have deceived that prophet." Perhaps we we'll take a look at it in a second. Well, those passages present God as involved in deceiving false prophets. So, while divine deception is uncomfortable in light of how scripture presents God, divine deception is present in scripture. So they're they're uncomfortable with the concept, but they do um in fairness present it there. And I I commend them for being fair and presenting it however uncomfortable it may be. And they're connecting it to the concept of this form of atonement theory. And just for reference, Ezekiel 14:9, "And if the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a thing, I the Lord have deceived that prophet, and I will stretch out my hand upon him, and I will destroy him from the midst of my people Israel." And you have Jeremiah saying, you know, Lord, you have deceived me.

[00:16:36]Uh and again people try to read that as well they they were deceiving themselves and so God deceived them for I don't know maybe you want to say that Jeremiah was deceiving himself and then God further deceived Jeremiah um you know the prophet was deceiving himself and therefore God deceived the prophet and um you know again some people attempt to read this as well God doesn't actively deceive it's rather um God is allowing for them to be deceived. Well, look, somebody who's already committed to the Bible and Christianity will be satisfied with those explanations. Somebody who's skeptical, who's not committed to the Bible, they're not going to be satisfied with that. And they're just going to read that as you're just reading into the text and you're just trying to explain it away. So, I don't I don't think that those solutions are going to convince a skeptic. I think it's only going to convince somebody who's already committed and is kind of looking for a way to get off the hook, uh, so to speak. So, [clears throat] I wanted to add that to the conversation because I I think that a lot of people aren't aware that oddly enough, it's not just the Islamic perspective that God deceived um, engaged in deception with the crucifixion. It's it's oddly enough a petristic position as well. The the difference is just who did God deceive?

[00:18:03]Was it the Jews or was it Satan? Um for the Quran, it's uh the Jews that were deceived. For the petristic literature, drawing on the biblical literature, um it is Satan and the demons who are deceived.

[00:18:21]Anyways, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this and of course the conversation about divine deception broadly. So, make sure to drop them in the uh comment section. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

[00:18:32]Make sure to hit the like button, hit the subscribe button, and if you want to support this channel, check me out uh right here on uh either Patreon or actually right here on YouTube by hitting the uh channel membership button, and you can become a member and get exclusive patronon videos. All right, that's going to do it for now. We'll see you later. God bless.