On an extraordinary evening at Anfield, Yossi Benayoun snatched a point for the Reds deep into injury time to take them top of the table, above United on goal difference.
The opening goal came against the run of play, Arshavin's strike giving the Gunners a half-time lead on Merseyside.
Despite dominating the half, the hosts paid for a mistake by Javier Mascherano on the edge of the penalty area which allowed Cesc Fabregas to cross for the Russian to score from close range.
However, Fernando Torres headed home the equaliser early in the second half. Bacary Sagna's awful clearance fell to Dirk Kuyt and the Liverpool forward's cross from the right was met by Torres.
The striker headed the ball into the near corner of Lukasz Fabianski's goal to equalise for the Reds.
And just seven minutes later, Kuyt's cross from the right was turned home by a flicked finish from Benayoun at the far post. Fabianski clawed the ball back but he was already behind the goalline so the referee rightly awarded the goal to give Liverpool the lead.
But on 67 minutes, Arshavin took advantage of a defensive slip from Alvaro Arbeloa to stride forward and strike a superb effort from the top of the box into the far corner of Jose Reina's goal.
And three minutes later, Arsenal were ahead again. Samir Nasri's corner from the left was turned straight to Arshavin by Fabio Aurelio. The Gunners forward took control of the ball and sent a low effort under the body of Reina from eight yards for his hat-trick.
Incredibly, the match was level again two minutes later. Torres made space just inside the Arsenal box as he took the ball away from Mikael Silvestre and turned a low effort into the bottom left-hand corner of Fabianski's goal.
Yet in the 90th minute, Arsenal broke forward from a Liverpool corner with Theo Walcott storming into the home side's half. The sub played a neat pass to Arshavin and the Russian ran through one-on-one on Reina and sent a powerful drive into the back of the net.
The contest seemed over, but there was to be one final twist. Nabil El Zhar's header from the right hand side of the Arsenal box fell to Benayoun and the Liverpool winger turned his effort home from 12 yards to make the final score 4-4.
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