Citizen X
What you keep calling my mental gymnastic is either your inability to connect simple dots or construct some better arguments.
The Ahadeeth you mentioned as problematic would not be problematic if you would have bothered to read the work of Hadith scholars about the discussion of these Ahadeeth, have understood the social relationships, and so on. For example, with your very confined understanding of the Hadith about the age of Aisha (R.A), I can see that it would require me to give you a small lecture on the social sense of adulthood and its metamorphosis in Modern western values and the cause behind it. Also, you seem unaware of the traditions of warfare in the Prophet's time, so you sped past the point of Hadith about the killing of women and children in a war theater. Again I can give you some details on the historical realities, but that would be a red herring in this discussion and a waste of my time on a person who is hell-bent on winning the argument by hook or crook.
If you had only understood the meaning of the Aya I mentioned, you would have realized that Aya is talking about the life of the Prophet among his people before the prophethood. Where do you find this life? In Ahadeeth. Quran says that the Prophet has the best character. Where do you see this character? In Ahadeeth.
You are attributing to me that I said or implied that Hadith is as unquestionable as the Quran is intellectual dishonesty. When you raised the question of the presence of doubtful Ahadeeth in Hadeeth's books, I agreed with you and reminded you that Hadith scholars keep scrutinizing the Hadith. Why? It is not Quran, but it is an essential source of our Deen.
Furthermore, your understanding of my argument about the Hadith of blasphemy is again below basic. Those people in Sialkot were wrong because who was there to determine that the person had committed the blasphemy? The Prophet (PBUH) was not among them who could decide whether the action was right or wrong. There are punishments mentioned in Quran for different crimes. But the Quran is quiet about who would administer those punishments. If an individual or a mob starts implementing those Quranic punishments without any formal proceeding, we would certainly reject that. It doesn't take a genius to understand that Quranic punishments need to be deliberate through a due process of law. But does Quran specifically say that? No. See, this was a dot you could have connected, but you chose not to.
This is just the tip of the iceberg to show how foolish your whole stance has been throughout.
Knowledge
Altering the meanings of the Quran is undoubtedly blasphemy but accusing someone without any proof or proper understanding makes you part of the Sialkot mob. They didn't have an online forum to display their ignorance, but you do.
I respect Dr. Shabbir in many regards but disagree with this argument. Also, if you have given a further listening, he sounded like only one step behind from shying away from the punishments in the Quran. That has been the problem of these West bond scholars lately.
As for the blasphemy punishment, if you challenge all the Ahadeeth on this issue, people who want to punish a blasphemer would justify their actions through this Aya:
The punishment of those who run around and spread mischief about Allah and His Messenger is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter.” Qur’an 5:33-34
This Aya flips your argument on its head that the Hadith and Quran are contradictory on the issue of blasphemy. I hope that lady had asked Dr. Shabbir about the Aya of the Quran allowing men to beat their wives under certain circumstances. And you will see how quickly he would have run towards Sunnah to explain the Aya in the light of the Prophet's life. I have seen these double standards many times.