the camel (part two)

At the risk of sending him more traffic, I thought I'd give the identity of the YouTuber I alluded to in the post: "if the camel once gets his nose in the tent, his body will soon follow." His name is Ryan Thompson and his YouTube channel is Remnant Rendezvous.

 

I'm really reluctant to do takfir of anyone and I'm not trying to do that now but I feel like warning people since I see him actively trying to fool Muslims. Ryan frequently presents himself as a Muslim (but on other occasions admitting that he isn't) seasoning his speech with Arabic phrases, quoting the Quran. etc. but he basically does all that to bring Muslims to some version of Christianity (he comes from a Seventh Day Adventist background).

 

At first I thought he was just trying to reconcile Christianity and Islam in some honest but idiosyncratic way. But the more I've listened to him, the more I realize that he doesn't seem to take the "Muslim" part seriously. E.g. he rejects most hadith. He doesn't believe Jummah is important for its own sake but is really just an extended preparation for the sabbath, which he says is obligatory on all people. He doesn't really believe fasting in the month of Ramadan is obligatory [actually more recently he's been arguing that Laylat al-Qadr is Yom Kippur and Muslims are fasting in the wrong time of year altogether]. He says Muhammad (saaws) is guilty of shirk (audhubillah). He gives credence to the Petra theory that Islam wasn't even founded in Mecca. He also has been saying we don't have to pray five times a day because only three times are mentioned in the Bible. He argues that since the disciples of Jesus (as) were Muslim, that Muslims should accept the books of the New Testament (even the ones written by Paul). He strictly clings to the Bible and takes its verses very seriously (even to the point of moving with his family to Jordan recently because of his interpretation of some eschatological passages in Daniel and Revelation. So he reminds me a bit of Harold Camping) but he casually dismisses pillars of Islam and teachings that are known by consensus.

 

Basically, he is a Christian missionary who says he is Muslim. 

 

For an example of where he openly says he is not Muslim (and gets pretty thoroughly spanked on the Christian side by Sam Shamoun) see: "Steve and Ryan" on the Miracle Street Channel:

 

It would be one thing if he just had weird theological views. That's fine. And to his credit, he seems to be a Unitarian Christian. And I would have much more respect for him if he was open about that and made videos as a Unitarian Christian who seems to advocate for the beauty of Islam. But he doesn't really do that. More often than not, he only tries to superficially identify as a Muslim with the purpose of persuading Muslims to look more favorably on Christianity.