"Qur'anic words continued"

Submitted by Lactantius Jr (United Kingdom), Aug 31, 2008 at 10:51

To sTs

The main languages the Bible was originally written in, were Hebrew in the Old Testament, and Greek in the New Testament, the Old Testament also containing small portions in Aramaic.

Bible translation involves translating the languages of the surviving Biblical manuscripts into English (or other language), and this is no more difficult than translating any other language, Qur'anic Arabic included, Bible translations being very accurate and trustworthy, in regards to what the Bible originally said, and whilst no translation is perfect, or can be perfect, English-speaking Christians, are exceedingly well served with many excellent translations and have no cause for hesitating to conclude that the true Word of God is within their reach. Indeed, in view of the frequent repetition in Scripture of the main matters with which it deals, and also of the Holy Spirit's constant witness to and through the Word, no serious translation of Holy Scripture will so destroy its meaning, as to render it unable to make its reader

"wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus"

2 Timothy 3:15

When did the Bible "corruption" you allege take place sTs, was it before the time of Muhammad, or after Muhammad had died?

The Qur'an has not been "preserved in its original text and word" by Allah, despite the attempts by Caliph Uthman, about 19 years after Muhammad's death to standardize the Qur'anic texts, by imposing the codex of Zaid ibn Thabit as the official text.

Uthman's action was drastic, to say the least, because he ordered the destruction by burning, of complete manuscripts of the Qur'an, copied out by Muhammad's immediate companions.

Muslims need to consider very carefully Uthman's drastic action in burning these Qur'ans. What value would be placed on those manuscripts if they were still in existence today? and why would Uthman have destroyed them, unless there were serious textual differences between them? What would the reaction be today, if a film producer proposed making a film portraying this wholesale destruction of handwritten texts of the Qur'an, the kitabullah, written by Muhammad's close companions? when the tantrums recently caused by the "Teddy Bear Intifada," threatened to result in Gillian Gibbons being executed in the Sudan?

Your claim that the Qur'an has been "preserved in its original text and word" by Allah is plain wrong sTs, being well documented that it hasn't, in essays such as that published by Samuel Green titled "The Different Arabic Versions of the Qur'an" which is online at

http://www.answering-islam.org/Green/seven.htm

with a massive amount of data documenting Qur'anic textual variants, titled,

"Textual Variants of the Qur'an"

being online at http://www.answering-islam.org/Quran/Text/index.html

But even had the Qur'anic text been perfectly preserved, which it demonstrably hasn't, that doesn't validate it as the Word of the True and Living God, had it not been His Word in the first place.

I look forward to having your response to this, and to the unfinished business created in my posting of 28^th.August at http://www.danielpipes.org/comments/137568

With kind regards and best wishes

Lactantius Jr

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