First, what is readily apparent is that those things about which you were ignorant during your days as a professing disciple of Jesus remain with you in your embrace of Islam.
Specifically, your glib, but ignorant claim of Jesus as prophet. Yes, this ignorance is too common among many Christians, but the Muslim claim of Jesus as prophet has its own motives. What motives are those you might ask? It is that if Muslims associate and align their self-prophesing prophet with one, such as Jesus, who is well known, revered, adorned, respected and mistakenly regarded by some as a prophet it could only be good to associate Muhammed with Jesus.
The qualifications of a prophet were defined by Yahweh to Moses and Miriam and Aaron who had spoken against Moses in Numbers 12.
He said, “Now hear my words. If there is a prophet among you, I, Yahweh, will make myself known to him in a vision. I will speak with him in a dream.
Additionally, note how Yahweh distinguishes Moses from a prophet. While you acquiesce to Jesus having MUCH knowledge like any prophet with your free, lax tendency to attribute prophet status; you neither understand what constituted a prophet and how that individual received knowledge as to the will of God. The significance of this definition by Yahweh is for you to ask yourself when did Jesus receive ANY message through from God through a vision or a dream.
Second, you are correct there are multiple and various explanations from my saints in Christ as to Jesus' seeming lack of knowledge in Mark 13:32. This is another instance which reveals your ignorance of days past and which remains with you today.
But of that day or that hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 33 Watch, keep alert, and pray; for you don’t know when the time is.
No, Jesus did not know the day of his return. This is what he said.
My question is what bearing does this supposed lack of knowledge have or what it effect does it have, 1) on his imminent return, and 2) our being prepared for that day?
This seeming lack of knowledge by Jesus, which you seize as the opportune case for denial of his deity, is a complete on-your-ear throw down from what had happened in the garden of Eden. Despite Adam and Eve being told by the God of knowledge of good and evil not to eat the forbidden fruit they did so. He knowingly had told them what would happen, - they would die – on the day they ate of it.
Do you similarly question or deny it was God who called out to Adam and Eve, “Where are you?” because he didn't KNOW where they were in the garden? Do you think God didn't KNOW who had told Adam and Eve they were naked?
The response by Jesus that he did not know the time of his return is nothing less than God's call, a reverse action from what the all-knowing God had done in the garden, to TRUST. Jesus had previously sought to ease the disciples' anxiousness about his imminent departure. They could not understand exactly where he was going, but he reasurred them telling them to not let their hearts be troubled and that he was going to prepare a place for them.
Your attempt, with your own seeming knowledge, to scrutinize the Mark 12:32 verse for a discovery that's not there, but which is actually revealed much more clearly and without uncertainty in a later instance. Interestingly, this later instance is wholly explained and shrouded in a web of deception and lies, as I learned according to Muslims, and with which I am sure you are quite familiar. As in the beginning, the all-knowing God has declared, “Unless you believe I am He, you will perish,” but the response is not much different than what happened in the garden.
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