Spotlight On Islam

One Injīl, Not Two

The Qurʾān Refutes the Muslim “Lost Gospel” Myth

The Qurʾān names one Injīl, Christians possessed one Injīl — logic allows no second.

When Muslims are asked, “What is the Injīl?” the standard answer goes something like this:

“The Injīl was a divine book revealed to Jesus, but it was lost. The Gospels Christians have are man-written accounts that contain fragments of the original revelation.”

That explanation is neat, convenient — and entirely false.

Not only is it absent from the Qurʾān, it contradicts the Qurʾān, violates basic logic, and rewrites linguistic history to save face for an untenable theology.

Let’s dismantle it.

1. What the Qurʾān Actually Says

The Qurʾān names the Injīl twelve times. From those references, we can extract clear statements:

The Injīl is divine revelation: “He sent down the Torah and the Injīl” (3:3).
It was given to Jesus: “We gave him the Injīl” (5:46).
It contains guidance and light: (5:46).
Christians are commanded to judge by it: “Let the People of the Injīl judge by what Allah revealed therein” (5:47).
It was known and possessed in Muhammad’s lifetime: “They find him written with them in the Torah and the Injīl that they have” (7:157).
It confirms the Torah: (5:46).

Nowhere — absolutely nowhere — does the Qurʾān say the Injīl was:

Lost,
Corrupted beyond recognition, or
Replaced by a different scripture.

The Qurʾān treats the Gospel as present, readable, and authoritative for Christians during Muhammad’s lifetime.

2. The Law of Identity: One Injīl Means One Injīl

Let’s apply a bit of logic — the same logic the Qurʾān itself invites in 4:82.

A thing is what it is (A = A).

It cannot be itself and not itself at the same time

If the Qurʾān says:

“We gave Jesus the Injīl,” and
“The People of the Injīl should judge by it,”

then the Injīl given to Jesus and the Injīl possessed by the Christians are the same entity.

The text makes no distinction. It uses one term, one referent, one revelation.

The later Muslim claim that there were two different Injīls — one authentic but lost, another existing but corrupt — is a post-Qurʾānic fabrication that breaks the Law of Identity.

3. The Linguistic Reality

The Arabic Injīl is a direct borrowing from the Greek εὐαγγέλιον (euangelion), meaning “good news” or “gospel.”
By the time of Islam’s emergence, this word was already the standard term for the Christian Gospels in Syriac and Arabic-speaking regions.

So when the Qurʾān said Injīl, everyone — Muslim, Christian, or otherwise — understood it to mean the Christian Gospel.
There was no alternative meaning, no secret “lost scripture.”
If the Qurʾān had meant something else, it would have had to redefine the term. It doesn’t.

4. The Theological Problem Muslims Had to Solve

After Islam’s expansion into Christian lands, Muslim scholars hit a wall:

The Qurʾān praised the Injīl as divine truth still in Christian hands.
But the actual Gospels contradicted Islamic teachings (e.g., Jesus’ crucifixion, divinity, and sonship).

To escape the contradiction, Muslim exegetes invented two doctrines:

Tahf (corrrīuption): The Christians altered the text.
Lost Injīl: The original Gospel vanished.

Both ideas appear nowhere in the Qurʾān.
They were theological damage control, developed centuries later to reconcile Qurʾānic praise for the Injīl with the reality that the Qurʾān and the Gospels don’t agree.

5. Internal Incoherence of the “Lost Injīl” Theory

If the Injīl was lost, then:

Why does the Qurʾān tell the Christians to judge by it (5:47)?
Why does it say they still have it (7:157)?
Why does it rebuke them for not upholding it (5:68)?

You can’t judge by or uphold a book that doesn’t exist.

This turns God’s command into nonsense — which means the “lost Injīl” theory makes the Qurʾān itself incoherent.

6. What the Evidence Actually Supports

Question Qurʾānic & Historical Answer What is the Injīl? The divine message revealed to Jesus — the “good news. ”Was it a physical book handed down? No. It was revelation preached orally, later written down by Jesus’ followers. What were Christians reading in Muhammad’s day? The same four canonical Gospels we have now. Does the Qurʾān treat those as divine? Yes — “guidance and light” still in use. Who invented the “lost Injīl” story? Later Muslim scholars who needed to explain contradictions between Qurʾān and Gospel.

7. The Inescapable Conclusion

Let’s formalize it:

Major Premise: The Qurʾān affirms one Injīl revealed to Jesus.
Minor Premise: The Qurʾān says the Christians possess and read that Injīl in Muhammad’s time.
Conclusion: By the Law of Identity — the Injīl given to Jesus is the Injīl possessed by Christians.

There are not two Injīls. There never were.
The “lost Gospel” is an invention, not revelation.

Final Word

The Qurʾān never speaks of a missing Injīl. Muslims did.
The Qurʾān calls the Gospel “guidance and light.” Muslims call it corrupted and lost.
The Qurʾān says the Christians have it. Muslim tradition says they don’t.

Both cannot be true.

If the Qurʾān is right, then the Christian Gospels are the real Injīl.
If the Gospels are false, then the Qurʾān’s affirmation of them is false.

Either way, the “two Injīls” theory collapses under its own contradictions.

So What Is the Injīl, Really?

The Injīl is not a vanished book dictated to Jesus. It is the divine revelation — the “good news” (euangelion) — that God communicated to him, which he preached orally and which his followers preserved in writing as the canonical Gospels.

In Qurʾānic terms, the Injīl is the same message of light and guidance the Christians of the 7th century still read and followed. The word never referred to a separate, lost scripture; it always meant the Gospel itself — the divine message embodied in the life, words, and works of Jesus, faithfully transmitted by those who heard him.

Muslims may emotionally or doctrinally reject the conclusion, but that doesn’t affect its truth value. The facts and logic stand regardless of belief.

When faith collides with evidence, the evidence doesn’t bend — only the interpretation does.