Not all who claim revelation speak for God. This truth becomes especially clear when we examine the life and teachings of Muhammad, the founder of Islam. The Quran is filled with verses that appear more self-serving than sacred, raising serious questions about its divine origin. One of the most revealing examples is the story of Zaynab bint Jahsh, the wife of Muhammad’s adopted son, Zayd ibn Harithah. According to Islamic scripture (Quran 33:37), Muhammad saw Zaynab unveiled, desired her, and shortly thereafter claimed a “revelation” from Allah that not only abolished the practice of adoption in Islam but also allowed him to marry her himself. The verse reads:
“When Zayd had accomplished his want of her, We gave her to you in marriage so that there should be no difficulty for the believers in respect of the wives of their adopted sons...” (Quran 33:37, Shakir translation)
This is not a message from a holy and just God. This is personal lust disguised as prophecy. The noble practice of adoption—a reflection of God’s own adoption of us as His children (Romans 8:15; Galatians 4:5)—was discarded in Islam to accommodate Muhammad’s desire. This is not divine morality. It is manipulation.
And tragically, this kind of manipulation has echoes even in our own Latter-day Saint history—not in the founding revelations of the Prophet Joseph Smith, but in the actions of some who followed him. Joseph Smith revealed the Word of Wisdom in 1833 as a "principle with promise" (Doctrine and Covenants 89:3), offering inspired counsel for health and well-being. Importantly, he never enforced it as a commandment. As late as the 19th century, faithful members—including Church leaders—still drank coffee or tea without being denied temple access or priesthood service.
However, in the decades following Joseph’s death, later leaders began to institutionalize the Word of Wisdom not as wisdom, but as law. By the early 20th century, adherence to it became a requirement for temple worthiness, not based on new scripture, but through administrative enforcement [1]. This shift may have been well-intentioned, but it reflects a dangerous precedent: turning divine suggestion into man-made commandment.
As a convert to the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and a former Muslim leader, I know firsthand the perils of false revelation and religious control. Islam’s distortion of God’s nature and commandments is glaring—its rejection of adoption, its endorsement of child marriage, and its elevation of Muhammad’s desires above divine holiness. But Latter-day Saints must also be vigilant. We must not allow Church culture or hierarchy to drift into the same errors we reject in other religions.
Jesus Christ, not any man, is our final lawgiver (James 4:12). We follow the Spirit, not the bureaucracy. We live by the eternal gospel, not evolving institutional mandates (Galatians 1:6–9). Let us honor Joseph Smith’s original revelations and be wary of any tradition or policy that adds to or subtracts from what God has declared.
Just as we call out Muhammad’s moral distortions in the Quran, we must also keep our own house in order—lest we, too, replace revelation with regulation.
Citations:
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Doctrine and Covenants 89:3 — “Given for a principle with promise, adapted to the capacity of the weak and the weakest of all saints.”
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Bush, Lester E. “The Word of Wisdom in Early Nineteenth-Century Perspective.” Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, vol. 14, no. 3, 1981, pp. 46–65. https://www.dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V14N03_47.pdf
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Quran 33:37 — “We gave her to you in marriage...” (various translations available at https://quran.com/33/37)
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Galatians 4:5 – “To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.”
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James 4:12 – “There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy: who art thou that judgest another?”
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