Some Muslims claim that this is a reference to Mohammed and Mecca.
Deu 33:1
And this [is] the blessing, wherewith Moses the man of God blessed the children of Israel before his death. 2 and he said, The LORD came from Sinai, and rose up from Seir unto them; he shined forth from mount Paran, and he came with ten thousands of saints: from his right hand [went] a fiery law for them. 3 Yea, he loved the people; all his saints [are] in thy hand: and they sat down at thy feet; [every one] shall receive of thy words.The reason Muslims generally just mention only parts of this passage is because the context makes it clear. You don't need to spend time reading it, but hit on the bolded font, and skip to the conclusion (then revisit it as you choose).
[edit addition 10-25-14] Deu 33:1 And
this is the blessing, wherewith Moses the man of God blessed the children of Israel before his death. 2 And he said, The LORD came from Sinai, and rose up from Seir unto them; he shined forth from mount Paran, and he
came with ten thousands of saints: from his right hand went a fiery law for them. 3 Yea, he loved the people; all his saints are in thy hand: and they sat down at thy feet; every one shall receive of thy words. 4 Moses commanded us a law, even the inheritance of the congregation of
Jacob. 5 And he was king in Jeshurun, when the heads of the people and
the tribes of Israel were gathered together. 6 Let
Reuben live, and not die; and let not his men be few. 7 And this is the
blessing of Judah: and he said, Hear, LORD, the voice of Judah, and bring him unto his people: let his hands be sufficient for him; and be thou an help to him from his enemies. 8 And of
Levi he said, Let thy Thummim and thy Urim be with thy holy one, whom thou didst prove at Massah, and with whom thou didst strive at the waters of Meribah; 9 Who said unto his father and to his mother, I have not seen him; neither did he acknowledge his brethren, nor knew his own children: for they have observed thy word, and kept thy covenant. 10 They shall teach Jacob thy judgments, and Israel thy law: they shall put incense before thee, and whole burnt sacrifice upon thine altar. 11 Bless, LORD, his substance, and accept the work of his hands: smite through the loins of them that rise against him, and of them that hate him, that they rise not again. 12 And of
Benjamin he said, The beloved of the LORD shall dwell in safety by him; and the LORD shall cover him all the day long, and he shall dwell between his shoulders. 13 And of Joseph he said, Blessed of the LORD be his land, for the precious things of heaven, for the dew, and for the deep that coucheth beneath, 14 And for the precious fruits brought forth by the sun, and for the precious things put forth by the moon, 15 And for the chief things of the ancient mountains, and for the precious things of the lasting hills, 16 And for the precious things of the earth and fulness thereof, and for the good will of him that dwelt in the bush: let the blessing come upon the head of Joseph, and upon the top of the head of him that was separated from his brethren. 17 His glory is like the firstling of his bullock, and his horns are like the horns of unicorns: with them he shall push the people together to the ends of the earth: and they are the
ten thousands of Ephraim, and they are the
thousands of Manasseh. 18 And of
Zebulun he said, Rejoice, Zebulun, in thy going out; and,
Issachar, in thy tents. 19 They shall call the people unto the mountain; there they shall offer sacrifices of righteousness: for they shall suck of the abundance of the seas, and of treasures hid in the sand. 20 And of
Gad he said, Blessed be he that enlargeth Gad: he dwelleth as a lion, and teareth the arm with the crown of the head. 21 And he provided the first part for himself, because there, in a portion of the lawgiver, was he seated; and he came with the heads of the people, he executed the justice of the LORD, and his judgments with Israel. 22 And of
Dan he said, Dan is a lion's whelp: he shall leap from Bashan. 23 And of
Naphtali he said, O Naphtali, satisfied with favour, and full with the blessing of the LORD: possess thou the west and the south. 24 And of
Asher he said, Let Asher be blessed with children; let him be acceptable to his brethren, and let him dip his foot in oil. 25 Thy shoes shall be iron and brass; and as thy days, so shall thy strength be. 26 There is none like unto the God of Jeshurun, who rideth upon the heaven in thy help, and in his excellency on the sky. 27 The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms: and he shall thrust out the enemy from before thee; and shall say, Destroy them. 28 Israel then shall dwell in safety alone: the fountain of Jacob shall be upon a land of corn and wine; also his heavens shall drop down dew. 29 Happy art thou, O Israel: who is like unto thee, O people saved by the LORD, the shield of thy help, and who is the sword of thy excellency! and thine enemies shall be found liars unto thee; and thou shalt tread upon their high places.
The twelve tribes of Israel are: Reuben, Simeon, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, Benjamin, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Ephraim and Manasseh.
So there are "ten thousands" of His saints from the tribe of Ephraim alone, not even considering the counts of the rest of the tribes of Israel, let alone that Muhammad's tribe the Quraish didn't come along until thousands of years after the time of when Moses was still alive to give this blessing on the
tribes of Israel.
[end addition 10-25-14]Are we really to believe that any of those ten thousands, wandered over a thousand kilometers north from Mecca, over a thousand years before the first caravan route was ever established along the Red Sea, and over 2,000 years before Mecca was ever established in the 4th century AD?http://islamchristianforum.com/index.php?board=56.0"
Seir, from the Hebrew word pronounced say-eer, meaning rough or shaggy, as in a he-goat (interestingly, the word satyr is based on a related Hebrew word) was the name given to
a large area of the mountainous territory south of the southeastern end of the Dead Sea. After it became the possession of Esau (see the Fact Finder question below), Seir, variously spoken of as "the land of Seir" (e.g. Genesis 32:3 RSV) or "Mount Seir" (e.g. Genesis 14:6 RSV), was also known as Edom (
see Edom on the map below)."
http://www.keyway.ca/htm2007/20070219.htm
http://bibleatlas.org/seir.htm
http://islamchristianforum.com/index.php?topic=1483.0
[Edit edition on 10-25-14] In the 4 years since I originally posted this, Muhammad's followers have repeatedly quoted from the sorely compromised NIV:
Deu 33
He said: “The LORD came from Sinai and dawned over them from Seir; he shone forth from Mount Paran. He came with myriads of holy ones from the south, from his mountain slopes.They use green font and bold those spots, because the Islamic dissimulator that duped them, does. The open and outright dishonesty on his page is appalling. The first two maps on the page are particularly amusing. Since
you can't zoom out on the first you my might wonder "where the heck is that piece of map taken from, and of what value is it?" The answer is that it is of no value to his case but it shoots him in the foot, as made obvious once you
web search Negev and find out where it is located. He even cut off the word "Sinai" from the word "peninsula" that appears
at the left side of his map. But but then if
he had zoomed out his readers would have been able to see the truth and also where Beersheba is, which is where Hagar wandered and found the well, after Abraham tossed his
wife Sarah's
bondwoman Hagar and her son Ishmael out of his house.
http://www.answering-christianity.com/paran.htmNot that "from the south" matters, since this passage took place thousands of years before Muhammad invented Islam as we learn in verse that precedes the one proof-texted one of Islam's dissimulator, Deu 33:1 And
this is the blessing, wherewith Moses the man of God blessed the children of Israel before his death", and thousands of years before Mecca ever even existed. Nor would it erase the over 1,000 kilometers of distance, between where Mecca was eventually built in the 4th century AD, to Mt. Paran or Mt. Sinai.
Almost all of the tribes of Israel are mentioned in the passage, none of which of course, are Muhammad's SW Arabian desert dwelling tribe of the
Quraish, that lived 1,000 kilometers away from the tribes of Israel and 2,000 years later.
But where does the NIV come up with that rendering? Here's the Hebrew-English interlinear. No "from the south" in there:
http://www.blueletterbible.org/Bible.cfm?b=Deu&c=33&v=2&t=KJV#s=t_conc_186002Here are more versions:
KJV
And he said, The LORD came from Sinai, and rose up from Seir unto them; he shined forth from mount Paran, and he came with ten thousands of saints: from his right hand went a fiery law for them.
NKJV
And he said:
“The LORD came from Sinai,
And dawned on them from Seir;
He shone forth from Mount Paran,
And He came with ten thousands of saints;
From His right hand
Came a fiery law for them.
NLT
“The LORD came from Mount Sinai
and dawned upon usfn from Mount Seir;
he shone forth from Mount Paran
and came from Meribah-kadesh
with flaming fire at his right hand.
NIV He said: “The LORD came from Sinai and dawned over them from Seir; he shone forth from Mount Paran. He came withfn myriads of holy ones
from the south, from his mountain slopes.
ESV
He said,
“The LORD came from Sinai
and dawned from Seir upon us;
he shone forth from Mount Paran;
he came from the ten thousands of holy ones,
with flaming firefn at his right hand.
HCSB
He said:
The LORD came from Sinai
and appeared to them from Seir;
He shone on them from Mount Paran
and came with ten thousand holy ones,
with lightning from His right hand for them.
NASB
He said,
“The LORD came from Sinai,
And fndawned on them from Seir;
He shone forth from Mount Paran,
And He came from the fnmidst of ten thousand holy ones;
At His right hand there was fnflashing lightning for them.
RSV
He said, "The LORD came from Sinai, and dawned from Se'ir upon us; he shone forth from Mount Paran, he came from the ten thousands of holy ones, with flaming fire at his right hand.
ASV
And he said, Jehovah came from Sinai, And rose from Seir unto them; He shined forth from mount Paran, And he came from the ten thousands of holy ones: At his right hand was a fiery law for them.
YLT
and he saith: -- 'Jehovah from Sinai hath come, And hath risen from Seir for them; He hath shone from mount Paran, And hath come with myriads of holy ones; At His right hand are springs for them.
DBY
And he said, Jehovah came from Sinai, And rose up from Seir unto them; He shone forth from mount Paran, And he came from the myriads of the sanctuary; From his right hand went forth a law of fire for them.
WEB
And he said, the LORD came from Sinai, and rose up from Seir to them; he shined forth from mount Paran, and he came with ten thousands of saints: from his right hand went a fiery law for them.
HNV
He said, The LORD came from Sinai, Rose from Se`ir to them; He shined forth from Mount Paran, He came from the ten thousands of holy ones: At his right hand was a fiery law for them.
So where did the NIV come up with that apparent addition of "from the south"?
[end edit]
