https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/shared?ci=n9T7E9lZdkU<\/a><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Honestly, I don\u2019t think that I knew that this video even existed, so I\u2019m grateful to Matthew Wheeler for calling it to my attention. \u00a0It was obviously filmed a few years ago, since I\u2019m visibly less debonair and handsome in it than I am now.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
I remember this experience quite sharply. \u00a0It was sponsored by the Muslim Students Association at Idaho State University, in Pocatello. \u00a0It was supposed to be a friendly dialogue about\u00a0common ground, of the kind in which I\u2019ve participated several times both before and since. \u00a0(They had invited Elder Jeffrey Holland to represent the Latter-day Saints \u2014 he was a member of the Seventy at the time, not yet in the Twelve \u2014 but he had suggested my name, instead.)<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
As the event drew closer, I began to wonder about it. \u00a0I was picking up subtle vibes that it might not\u00a0be as friendly as I had hoped. \u00a0And my suspicions were confirmed when, entering the hall where the event was to take place, I saw a whole table of Muslim-produced anti-Mormon pamphlets. \u00a0They weren\u2019t very good, and I remember thinking to myself that the Muslims who wrote them could have profited by learning\u00a0a few tricks of the anti-Mormon trade\u00a0from our more experienced Evangelical friends.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
You\u2019ll note, early in my opening statement, my declaration that I didn\u2019t intend the evening to be a debate. \u00a0That was an attempt to indicate that I hadn\u2019t been invited<\/em> to a debate, and that I didn\u2019t want<\/em> one. \u00a0My comment had no effect, however.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
As I say, I had anticipated a nice\u00a0little interfaith conversation, but I soon scrapped any notes I had for that<\/em> kind of a meeting. My interlocutor, Shabir Ally, had come from Toronto to argue, and he was loaded for bear. \u00a0His principal avenue of attack, as I recall \u2014 I haven\u2019t yet watched this video, and, frankly, it may take me a while to\u00a0bring myself to do so \u2014 was against the deity of Christ, a topic for which\u00a0I hadn\u2019t planned or prepared. \u00a0(I had to improvise all evening.) \u00a0He had even brought with him a series of images showing pages from the specifically LDS edition of the King James Bible, for projection on a screen.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
One funny aspect of the event was that, although\u00a0there are many\u00a0Mormons in Pocatello, there were few in the fairly large audience that night. \u00a0The LDS Institute director at Idaho State had apologized to me over an early dinner, saying that they were having a big event that evening for all of the \u00a0LDS students. \u00a0They\u2019d planned it for a year. \u00a0So the audience that night\u00a0was heavily Muslim, with quite a few Evangelicals joining them\u00a0along with\u00a0maybe two or three of my former students.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
The organizer for the event was a Muslim physician at a hospital in Rexburg. \u00a0He\u2019s the one who does the Muslim invocation at the beginning of the video.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
I thought, once it became clear that night that I was defending the divinity of Christ from attack, that the Evangelicals in the audience might (at least temporarily)\u00a0come over to\u00a0my side. \u00a0But, so far as I could see, their hostility toward Mormonism was too strong to permit them to support me.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
It was a very long evening. \u00a0It seemed much longer than 2.5 hours.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Afterwards, the ISU grad student who was the president of the Muslim Students Association took me aside and apologized for the \u201cambush\u201d (his word). \u00a0He said that he had expected a cordial interfaith meeting, and that the Rexburg physician had turned the gathering in a direction that he himself strongly regretted and hadn\u2019t expected.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0 \u00a0 For roughly 2.5 hours, Shabir Ally and a mean-spirited Mormon hack\u00a0who goes under the name of \u201cDaniel C. Peterson\u201d discuss \u201cThe Concept of God in Mormonism and Islam\u201d in this videotaped discussion: \u00a0 https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/shared?ci=n9T7E9lZdkU \u00a0 Honestly, I don\u2019t think that I knew that this video even existed, so I\u2019m grateful to Matthew Wheeler […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/a>