Learn About Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and African Tribal Religions in Scholarly Christian Perspective

I have downloaded (for the right price--free!) and have recently been listening to a seminary level course on Islam, one on Hinduism, and one on Buddhism. as well as a seminar on African Traditional Religions taught by the same professor.  I had listened to a significant number of the great and highly Biblical and expository messages preached at Bethel Baptist Church, and while waiting for another batch of sermons to be uploaded and available, I went on to something else.  Knowing what people in false religions believe is very helpful in effectively evangelizing them, and listening to the lectures has strengthened me to be better equipped to preach the gospel and deal with the spiritual strongholds of those lost in the darkness of Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism.  The professor who taught the courses teaches at Gordon-Conwell, so he is both very scholarly and very neo-evangelical, but, I hope, possibly a genuine born-again Christian.  I by no means unconditionally recommend everything he says in the class (for example, at one point in the Islam course, for example, he mentions that he finds dispensationalism strange, although at another point he mentions that his mother was pre-mil and pre-trib--sad), and he is more concerned about "contextualization" than I would be.  In the lectures on Hinduism he mentions that the vast majority of the congregations he works with in India are Pentecostal, for, following in the footsteps of Keswick leader and Gordon-Conwell founder A. J. Gordon, the professor rejects cessationism for continuationism.  Despite these serious doctrinal problems, much of the information is very useful.  Nor do I unconditionally recommend courses specifically on theology by the neo-evangelical organization that offers the courses.  However, I have not found anything equivalent or better by someone closer to my own theological persuasion, so I wanted to commend these specific courses to you, especially if there are significant numbers of Muslims, Hindus, or Buddhists in your area.  If we are to love our neighbors as ourselves, we would do well to know enough about these demonic religions to be able to effectively understand and deal with them.

I have written a pamphlet to evangelize Muslims, entitled The Testimony of the Quran to the Bible, but I do not have anything specifically for Hindus or Buddhists at this time; if you are aware of something similar to my pamphlet for Muslims, please mention it in the comment section, and I will, Lord willing, evaluate whether I want to use it.  Also, if you know someone who is capable and willing to translate the Muslim pamphlet into Arabic, please feel free to get in touch with me about it. (For that matter, I would be happy to have the various evangelistic resources and other material on my website in as many languages as possible, so if you want to do any translation, are of a like mind theologically, and are capable of doing a good job, please let me know, and I can post your translation so that the world can hear the truth in as many languages as possible.)

There are commentaries on the Quran written by people in the realm of Christendom (see here, #2) (I do not know enough about their authors to tell you if he is a true Christian or not), and a translation of the Quran by a born-again Baptist from a Muslim country that does not attempt to cover up the evil and error in the Quran, like many translations made by Muslims do.  My knowledge of Arabic is very limited, so I cannot comment on the accuracy of his translation or any other translation.  I am not aware of equivalent material for the holy books of Hinduism or Buddhism.  If you are aware of useful material for reaching people in any of these false religions, feel free to discuss it below in the comments.

TDR