Often I hear a question similar to this one:

Recently I have looked at my encyclopidia & was interested as of what was the Christian & Jewish point of view of the prophets I was shocked to find out the result.The prophets were viewed upon as great sinners. This is some of the things I found:

Lut: His daughters had put alchohol in his food, making him drunk, & made sex with their own father.

Aaron: When Moses went away Aaron made a golden calf for people to worship, & that is shirk (Associating Allah with something else) so how can a prophet make the greatest sin?

Noah: After the flood he had discovered Wine & became a hopeless drunk.

David: They claim that David is a bastard. A prophet has to be clean even from the parents.

I am not sure what encyclopaedia this Muslim found these statements, some of them are right and others wrong. For example David is not claimed to be a bastard anywhere in the Bible. It is only reported that Noah was drunk at one time, nowhere is it implied that he became "a drunk" which probably means a drunkard who is drunk regularly.

We could talk about all these stories in detail, but seemingly the point is really something else, which was part of the follow up statement and question:

The prophets do not sin. They were chosen by Allah & are protected by Allah from their sins.

Think of this: how can you tell someone not to do something if you do it yourself?

Let me try to explain why Christians do not see this as a problem.

Muhammad told his followers to not have more than four wives.
Muhammad had at least 11 wives and left 9 wives when he died.

Obviously, his followers are still expected to accept and obey his command of having only four wives.

Is that not possible?

Obviously you will say that this is no problem.

Then, why it is impossible that prophets who have sinned can tell the people what the true command from God is? They can admit that they were wrong and have done wrong at times. But what hinders them to preach what is true? They cannot preach against something and at the same time do it and pretend it is no big deal, that is hypocrisy and destroys your credibility. But when they repent and condemn what they have done wrong, then I see no problem that they can still preach what is right and be taken serious. I find people attractive who can own up to their sin and admit it and then change their lives and struggle not to do it again. This in my mind does not subtract from their message. Instead it shows their integrity and it gives me hope that when God could use those fallible people, then he can use me too and my life can be pleasing to God even though I might have sinned but I have repented of my sin. I am very much comforted by the fact that the prophets in the Bible are humans very much like me. Because then there is hope for me as well.

I can understand that some Muslims might have a problem with this, since that is what they have been taught all their life. But Islam is very different from the Bible and one should try to understand each book and religion in its own terms. There is nothing insulting about telling the truth. The Bible is a ruthlessly honest book. It even reports the sins of its heros. That is one reason I feel I can trust its message. It is not hiding anything from me. It tells life as it is. The good and the bad, and God's grace in the midst of it.

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