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The Roots of Islam and the Qur'an as a textReader comment on item: Friendless in the Middle East Submitted by dhimmi no more (United States), Jan 11, 2012 at 18:33 Hi BB this time I will go after the Qur'an >Who wrote its holy book? The Qur'an is a text written and EDITED by human beings but the best part who ever put it in a mushaf or codex form stitched together clearly other texts that we do not have and the end result is really a poorly edited book and if you apply the tools of textual criticism that were applied with great success by Welhausen to the study of the Bible in contrast the Qur'an falls as a text as it does not have the rich textual deposits that the Bible as a text has. So notice the following: 1. The Qur'an tells us that it is a kitab mubeen or clear book which is far from the truth and anyone who reads the Qur'an without help from the great commentaries written 200-300 years after the death of Muhammad in distant Mesopotamia by non Arabs will fail to understand most of the text (see Puin) 2. The Qur'an has its share of mistakes in the spelling of perfect Arabic words and mistakes in Arabic garmmar and the most celebrated mistake is Q21:63 in hadhan lasahiran and so much has been written about it. So what did the tradition do about such mistakes? A. Muslims have been told that you can leave the mistake written as such but when you recite the Qur'an Muslims should use the correct grammar so Muslims must write Q21:63 as in hadhan lasahiran but recite it as in hadhayne lasahiran you can call this anything you want B. Do not change the text but let the Arabs, when they recite the Qur'an, fix such mistakes C. Invent yes invent grammar to explain such mistake and be brazen enough to deny that this invented grammar is correct and this is why modern Arabs do not follow the grammar of classical Arabic because this is an artificial language with artificial grammar that does not reflect the actual spoken language of the Arabs 2. The Qur'an has its share of foreign words and number one foreign language is, as expected, Syriac and the likes of Allah, Qur'an, Tur, Furqan, Ahad, Ruum are Syriac words and if you believe Luxenberg then the Quran is really an Arabized Syriac text. And yes it has its share of Hebrew words as in Ummi and Ethiopian as in Hawaraiyuun and Latin as in sarat and Greek al-injiil and this should not be surprising and I'm sure you agree with me if the Qur'an was written now it would have its share of English and French But this is indeed very strange for a book that claims to be a Quran written in pure arabic 3. The Qur'an has its share of words that have no clear meaning the likes of ilaf kalala, 3as3as, ghaslin but it is indeed strange for a book that claims to be a clear book but this really means that it is either the Qur'an pre-dates Muhammad as in the case of the story of ahl al-ayka or layka as I explained before and that by the time Muhammad died no one had a clue what is really ilaf but this would detach Islam from Muhammad or that the Qur'an was not canonized until the 9th century CE but by then no one had a clue about what the Qur'an really says but this would detach the Qur'an from al-Hijaz and would place it where it belongs in the civilized late antique Mesopotamia and the far advanced civilization of the Levants and Mesopotamia 4. There is no doubt that the author of the Qur'an incorporates material from the OT and the NT but with a twist and there has been so much written about it but it is very clear that let us say in the case of Jesus in the Qur'an that one can see clear indications that this is really a layer of Neolatonsim whether the author knew or not we will never know 5. It is also very clear that the great commentaries do not agree on what the Qur'an says which really means that the ulama were making things up and this is why we are left with the famous saying that al-tafseer (read this as exegesis) is for al-sahaba or Muhammad's early followers as in the case of Ibu Huaraira and 3A'isha and Ibn Abbas and al-ta'weel (you can read this as exegesis) is for the fuqaha or the doctors of Islamic law. This really gets the tradition out of the trap that the ulama seem not to agree most of the time about a certain verse 6. The Qur'an also incorporates secular literature written by Syrians and Greeks as in the case of the story of Dhul Qarnaian (The Romance of Alexander the great) and the story of ahl al-kahf or the story of the 7 sleepers of Ephesus and the Quranic story of al-isra' wa al-mi3raj must be the Zoroastrian story of the Arta Viraf buraq and all 7. So what is the main message of the Qur'an? Monotheism but this is plagiarized from the Jews. And it seems that the very smart Jewish rabbis that we are told about in the islamic tradition had a little chat with Muhammad that made it to the sira (see page 572) about the Aristotelian problem and it goes as follows: if Allah created this creation then who created Allah. Again you need to read it because the rabbis clearly understood Greek logic which was beyond the author of the Qur'an and they realized that their God is their ethnic God and no more. Oh the "surrender to Allah" and that too.The Word islam? It is a name and no more and it most likely is from Syriac shalmuta or to agree And then we get into the more bizarre doctrines as in the case of al-nasikh wa al-mansukh or abrogation. The doctrine of holy war aka Jihad is cleary one of the foundations of islam and the Qur'an has indeed its share of very violent verses as in the case of ayat al-sayf or Q9:5 (the infamous sword verse) or become Muslim or else 8. Last: so do we really have only one Qur'an? The answer is not true as in fact the Qur'an is really the so called rasm which is the layer of the Qur'an that no one can read without editing becuase it lacks short and long vowels and some consonants and the end result is we have the Cairo edition of the Qur'an and the Tunisian Qur'an and yes there are differences as would be expected between both Qur'ans and why is that? The only way out is that the ulama were guessing what the text is really saying which indeed as i said before detaches the Qur'an from al-Hijaz 9. Is the Qur'an really a linguistic miracle? Not in the least as it is a confused and confusing book that does not make any sense and is violent and it is no match to Virgil or Homer or even the Bible that has great narratives that would eclipse the book of Allah 10. Is it true that there is no interpolation in the Qur'an? this is far from the truth as it has been pointed out by the tradition and if you read chapter 53 or surat al-nijm and you will find that it consists of very short verses and it reads like a poem but verse 32 is long and is out of place and this is indeed interpolation by persons unknown There will be more about the Qur'an Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. 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