Transmission of the Qur'an and the Variant Manuscripts

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Question:

I would seriously like you to consider and comment upon the following article:
http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/99jan/koran.htm

I shall make a few comments before my question inshallah:

There have been numerous accusations made by Orientalist and the like that the Qur'an is by no means the same as it was revealed in the time of the Prophet (p). Generally speaking, the Muslim should agree with this statement. Because we know that the Qur'an grew and became ordered, some verses may even have been forgotten. (Qur'an, 87: 6-8). What the Orientalist is actually trying to tell us as the only way to explain the Qur'an as being concocted by man is that it existed before and continued to grow after the time of the Prophet (p), and eventually put into a standard codex as we have it today.

They bring evidence such as the obvious implications of the Yemeni manuscripts (as in the above article). But they also cite Muslim source material too. For example there is an epistle of one Hassan al-Basri who lived around the year 700. In his epistle he quotes an ayah from the Qur'an (I do not have the reference to hand). What he actually quotes however is nowhere to be found in our Uthmanic codex today. We have variants of this ayah, but not the exact ayah.

There is also the question of Ibn Masud's (652/3) version of the Qur'an (a slightly variant text to our present codex) in which this quote from Basri can be found to match more closely, but still not perfectly. The ayah in question is: Qur'an 40:6. Imam Malik is also reported to have said that the ruler (of the time) had a duty to prevent the sale and recitation of Ibn Masud's version of the Qur'an.

In the last decade of the 7th century currency coins had inscriptions of Qur'anic ayahs on them - but were variations to our Qur'anic text today. In the same period Hajjaj of Iraq is described as making several changes to the Qur'anic text, substituting some words for others, and then sending copies to the provinces.

We also have dramatically contradicting sources on who actually compiled, arranged and collected the Qur'an - was it the Prophet (p), or Uthman (ra), or Abu Bakr (ra) etc. as mentioned in various conflicting (so much so that it becomes humorous) hadith? I have even read hadiths stating that Uthman's (ra) Qur'an is incomplete and that "much of it (the Qur'an) is lost".

As is in our Qur'an's today, the issue of parallel passages and the arrangement of Surah's and ayah's suggests to the sceptic today that the Qur'an is in no real order at all, and that in fact this is evidence of man's handling of the book through the ages - in other words one could say it became corrupted, if one assumes that there even was a "finished" version of the Qur'an laid down by the Prophet (p) and it was not, as some have bravely suggested, an "ongoing revelation" after the Prophet's (p) death.

I would very much like you to give as comprehensive comments as you can for the benefit of all your readers and maybe even yourself on the article and my above mentioned points on the historicity of the Qur'an.

My short but precise question would then be the following: how could one say that the Qur'an is as it was left by the Prophet (p) when there is evidence to suggest otherwise?

The Qur'an says it is guarded from corruption. As Muslims we would like to be able to demonstrate this bold statement.

Regards and salaam,
Anonymous

Answer:

I am not an expert of either reading the traditional Arabic scripts or analyzing old manuscripts. Nevertheless, Muslims and non-Muslims alike should realize that the Qur'an has never required substantiation and borrowed authority from any old manuscripts. The simple and easily comprehensible reason for this is that the Qur'an has been transmitted through the consensus and the verbal perpetuation one generation to the other, starting from the times of the companions of the Prophet (pbuh) till the present times.

The foregoing may at first sight seem to be a very simplistic view regarding the security of the Qur'an from any alteration, however, if one were to consider the following facts closely, one would easily see that it is based upon pragmatic deductions:

a. The Prophet (pbuh), according to the directives of God, rearranged and read the whole Qur'an in its rearranged form, before his death. This final arrangement and reading of the Qur'an was memorized and written by many of the companions of the Prophet (pbuh). This final arrangement and reading of the Qur'an may not only have been different from the sequence in which it was revealed but may also not have included some of the verses included in the first revelation. Thus, the Qur'an was not only memorized but also put in writing during the times of the Prophet (pbuh);

b. Within a few years after the death of the Prophet (pbuh), while a very large number of the companions of the Prophet (pbuh) still lived, the Muslim empire rapidly expanded to a large part of the world. Not only the Qur'an was introduced at a mass level in each of the areas conquered by the Muslims, but in most of these areas, the official language was also changed to Arabic;

c. The Qur'an was never a book specific to a select class of Muslims - like priests or scholars - but was always widespread in its written form as well as in its reading;

d. A vast majority of Muslims - not merely their priests and scholars - have always maintained a direct personal interaction with the Qur'an, on a daily basis. The Qur'anic text was not only read by a very big number of Muslims but various parts of it were also read by all the practicing Muslims in their five daily prayers;

e. As a result of the foregoing point, each Muslim generation had a very large number of people, who had memorized the Qur'an from beginning till end. As a tradition, a person is not given the status of an authorized Hafiz - a person, who has memorized the whole Qur'an - till the time that he recites the whole of the Qur'an by heart, in front of an existing authorized Hafiz.

f. Thus, the Qur'an is the only book in the world, whose text as well as its reading has been transmitted from one generation to the other and both these transmissions gain support from the other;

g. Muslims have always held the text of the Qur'an in great veneration. Even in the present times of high moral degeneration among the Muslims and their lack of true adherence to Islamic values and teachings, an extremely large majority - if not all - Muslims are 'fanatics' and 'extremists' in safeguarding the text of the Qur'an, even in the face of most oppressive rules imaginable to man;

h. Since the times of the companions of the Prophet (pbuh) the Muslims have not been ruled by one family only. The Muslim rules have shifted from one hand to another. The three main rules, after the times of the companions have been the Umayyad, the Abbasid and the Ottoman Empires;

i. There have been times in Muslim history where an opposing group - political or ideological - was subjected to severe persecution. Nevertheless, such incidents have been comprehensively and unanimously recorded in Muslim history.

j. Muslim scholars, jurists, muhaddithin, historians, rulers, oppositions and laymen of all times have cited verses of the Qur'an in their writings. All such citations are in accordance with the available text and reading of the Qur'an.

Keeping the foregoing points in mind, it should be clear that the claims regarding the alteration and adulteration in the Qur'an are completely unfounded, illogical and against common sense.

Even during the times of the companions of the Prophet (pbuh), the text and reading of the Qur'an had become so widespread that it was humanly impossible for any scholar or ruler to replace this text and reading with another one. Knowing the Muslim psyche and the veneration in which they have always held the Qur'an, no one can contend that any Muslim ruler or his representative could even have imagined risking taking such an action as to replace the book with another one. Finally, even if a despotic and fearsome ruler had succeeded in replacing the book with another one, then a) the incident undoubtedly would have been reported by all the Muslim historians and the persecution of the masses would not have gone unnoticed ¹. And b) any subsequent rules would at least have tried to reintroduce the actual Qur'an to the Muslims ², which would again have been recorded in history.

It is this state of affairs, which renders all claims of any adulteration of the Qur'an over the years meaningless. If any manuscripts are discovered, which entail a text, which is different from the one contained in the Qur'an, it would render such manuscripts vulnerable to error and inaccuracy, rather than the Qur'an.

I hope this helps.
Regards,
Moiz Amjad
April 1, 2002

^[1] As has, for instance, been the case with the persecution of a number of Muslim scholars including Ahmad ibn Hanbal - at the hands of the Abbasids, for not accepting their opinion regarding the status of the Qur'an.
^[2] Especially, if the altered Qur'an was introduced during the Umayyad dynasty, which was followed by their opposition - in all spheres - the Abbasids.

Taken with thanks from www.understanding-islam.org

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