Thursday, April 9, 2009

Another Quranic Deficiency Mentioned in Bukhari

For those of you who have been following this blog since the end of last year, you may have noticed that the topic of Qur'anic preservation has been of utmost interest to me. As a Muslim, I had been utterly convinced that the Qur'an today is exactly the words that Muhammad had received from Allah. And, at least beyond the source of the words, I thought that the evidence was so strong that no one would even consider disagreeing.

Then I studied. I heard about Ibn Masud, Ubay ibn Kab, the Uthmanic edition, Kitab al-Masahif, Aisha's goat, etc. All of that stuff has been outlined already on this website. Since my Muslim days, I've done a complete 180 on my position of Qur'anic textual preservation. I believe that there is no possible way to be confident that these are the words Muhammad told the scribes to write. I believe that it is highly likely that much of it is well preserved, but I think it is even more likely that some parts are lost and there's no reason to think that today's Qur'an has even the correct number of surahs, let alone the exact words it should.

Not too much of the information we have drawn from concerning Quranic preservation has come from Bukhari. The verse outlining the top Qur'an scholars does, the burning of the manuscripts does, and the verse of rajm does. Most of our other evidences are from the rest of the sahih sitah. But we have been informed of another one from Sahih Bukhari. It reads:
Narrated Ibn 'Abbas: 'Umar said, Ubai was the best of us in the recitation (of the Qur'an) yet we leave some of what he recites.' Ubai says, "I have taken it from the mouth of Allah's Apostle and will not leave for anything whatever."  Sahih Bukhari, Vol 6, Book 527
Here we see another indication that one of Muhammad's top teachers of the Qur'an, one of the ones Muhammad himself said we should turn to if we are to learn the Qur'an, says that he heard Muhammad reveal a verse that others have left out of the Qur'an.

Now we can look at this one of two ways:
  1. Ubay was right about this verse, and it was left out of the Qur'an mistakenly
  2. Ubay was wrong about this verse, and Muhammad did a poor job picking his top teachers (especially if, as Muslims usually purport, there were many huffaz at that time who could have corrected his false understanding)
So it seems we have a dilemma. Either the Qur'an is incorrect for sure, or Muhammad did a poor job choosing his top teachers and there's no way of knowing how correct the Qur'an is. In fact, this has been the conclusion here for months, this last evidence only continues to strengthen our conclusion.

What is not an option? The perfect preservation of the Qur'an.

28 comments:

Anonymous said...

We already know what the response will be.

Weak source.

However, if the preservatoon of the Quran was such a big deal for muslims, how could false sayings like this be passed to so long?

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

I met a muslim recently who claimed that the most recent discoveries of the Qur'an in Yemen which predate Uthman's revised standard version is a Western conspiracy.

This muslim is a very respectful, well learned person, and highly trained in his religion (someone I respect dearly), I must say I was slightly surprised to hear his conclusion.

Must muslims on this blog argue that the Yemen discovery is not a problem, however well learned muslims who understand the complication think otherwise.

Obviously the Yemen discovery only supports the fact that the Qur'an was not fully preserved, but went through a process of change based upon a multiple number of earlier different Qur'ans possessed even by Muhammad's own followers.

Ho-Logos said...

Muslim apologists place so much emphasis on the Qur'an being the ultimate miracle and only one necessary to validate Islam. A pity the issues of literary imperfection and evidence of evolution(grounded in their own traditions as well as in the physical evidence) sufficiently weakens the claim.

faktb said...

It appears that the earliest Muslims had no problem with the Quran being incomplete. It was only much later that the doctrine of the perfectly preserved Quran was developed. I think Muslims today should be honest enough to admit that the Quran was not perfectly preserved. This is anyway what scholarship has been saying about the Quran for years! Even scholars who are Muslim acknowledge it, because they have investigated it and are intellectually honest.

Dk said...

I think when something is Ijma in Islam it is set in stone.

Take for example the belief that the earth is flat, agreed upon by all authorative tafseeroon....This still effects alot of non-western Muslims today..

The belief that todays quran is identical with the recitial of Muhammads quran is not even suggested or implied by surah 15:9, this verse actually implies the "MESSAGE" would be preserved, not some kind of STRICT codex or letter by letter format, or ver batim recital of the Quran as Muhamamed did.. it only mentions the preservation of the "message/content" of what God has to reveal to human beings.

p.s. being a Quran only Muslim must be easy.. haha.

Unknown said...

Dk:Take for example the belief that the earth is flat, agreed upon by all authorative tafseeroon

I'd like to see evidence for that claim.

Sepher Shalom said...

Dk: Take for example the belief that the earth is flat, agreed upon by all authorative tafseeroon

Ibn: I'd like to see evidence for that claim.

Before anyone invests time in responding to your personal request, Ibn, please inform us all which of the Tafseer you accept as authoratative, and if there are any of the commonly held Tafseer that you reject?

It would be a shame for someone to invest time only to bring you evidence from a Tafseer you reject.

Nakdimon said...

yeah Book of Peace, just like they have come to reject Ibn Ishaq, who accurately depicts their prophet. They would rather go with the embellished accounts of the so-called Sahih series of more than a century later than Ibn Ishaq and more than 2 centuries after their prophet.

Sepher Shalom said...

Just wanted to say happy Passover to everyone!

And remember, despite the historical inaccuracy of the Quran, Yeshua atoned our sins on the cross.

faktb said...

Ibn,

Do you believe that the Quran has been perfectly preserved?

I'm curious to know your answer because you seem to be more informed and intelligent than others.

Fernando said...

faktb saide: «I'm curious to know your answer because you seem to be more informed and intelligent than others»...

well... thate's saying a lott about the others... but I couldn't agree more...

nontheless I bet Ibn won't give any answer... ite's a typicale muslime tactic...

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

Personally I don't think the Qur'an states the earth to be flat, but there certainly are some indications if one considers Kathir and Tabari.

Furthermore, there is a lot of metaphorical language of the earth in the Qur'an being spread out or expanded much like the language in the Bible, however these do not need to refer to the actual flatness of the earth.

Many muslims have attacked the Bible for using these metaphorical words, but seem to forget that the Qur'an utilizes them as well.

In fact people within the eras between 500 BC to 700 AD and beyond did not typically believe the earth to be flat; it was rather a general opinion that the earth was spherical, probably into all direction.

What is funny however, is that while the Qur'an plagiarizes so much of the scientific language and the ideas of these ancient scientists it totally leaves out the notion about a spherical earth.

It is true that Osama Abdallah has made some assertions on his website related to the egg-shaped earth based upon the Arabic word dahaha in Sura 79: 30.
This assertion is nevertheless laughable, no expert translators agree, Osama has it from a ridicolous speculative translation of the Qur'an and the word does not even mean egg-shaped.

Besides this a egg-shaped earth would not be far away from the opinion of the early scientists anyway, such as Empedocles, who often envisaged the earth to the shaped like the universe, and they typically envisaged the universe to be either spherical or egg-shaped.

Sepher Shalom said...

"yeah Book of Peace, just like they have come to reject Ibn Ishaq, who accurately depicts their prophet."

I noticed that in some of the debates I was watching, Nakdimon. I was most surprised at this. I always thought it was heretical for Sunni Muslims to throw out Sahih Hadiths and the Sira.

[by the way achi, I linked to your refutation articles of Tovia Singer's oral Torah claims in a recent blog post. Very solid work. Baruch Ha'Mashiyach!]

faktb said...

Ibn, Are you there?

Is there a single Muslim out there reading this that believes in the perfect preservation of the Quran?

Radical Moderate said...

I recently got into a discusion with a muslim on the quran. He made the claim that they have the Uthman koran with Uthmans blood on it. To prove this he posted a link to a bbc article which re-stated his position. He called this proof. I tried to explain to him that posting a article re stating your position with out any proof to back up not only his position but the position of the article is not proof.

He completely rejected the fact that this koran was written in the Kuffic Script. He rejected the fact that the kuffic script was not used until 800 AD, and he said that his 1924 Egyption Edition koran was the same as the Kuffic script koran in the Uzbechastan.

Then he made the claim of scientfic miralces. Saying Nasa proves that the Moon was split. What he is talking about is taht there is a fault line in the moon. You can see it with a good telescope. I sugjest if you look at the moon with a telescope get a moon filter. It will hurt your eyes.

This fault, is dated over 4 million years old (sorry you young earthers will have to join the muslim on his argument)

He then quotes a english tranlation of the quran Surah 86. Were it says "A Nocking Star". I go and quote Ibn Kahtir, and suddenly Ibn Kathir is a nobody. I then quote the three main english translations of the koran from the Muslim student assosiations website. None of them say "Knocking Star" they all say Morning star or piercing star". I ask him wear he gets his english translation?

The answer might shock some of you. But he has english translation done by isalmic scholars (Just ignore the fact that he cant remember the names of those scholars). He litteraly says "I'm a arabic speaker so you have to take my word on what I say the koran says". Totaly disregarding what his own scholars say the verse meens, totaly ingoring what all islamic translatoins of the verse say it says. The merry go round of the muslims never end. Sometimes you just have to step off the ride.

faktb said...

Hello?

Would a Muslim please comment on whether or not the Quran is perfectly preserved?

Fernando said...

faktb said: «Hello? Would a Muslim please comment on whether or not the Quran is perfectly preserved?»...

Nowadays its impossible to stand such claimme in the wide NET without lossings totallie one's credebility... so... I guess the silence will bee the answer...

Michelle Qureshi said...

I hope the Muslims haven't left for good... I'd wonder why they did

faktb said...

I started to read this blog because of the fabulous and intelligent interactions between the many Muslims and Christians who contribute. I think that the discussions here top discussions on other boards.

I only wish that the Muslims would not be silent each time a difficult question/issue arises but would be intellectually honest enough to face and confront these important issues.

We should all acknowledge that we are all students for life who are continuously learning and are bound to make mistakes. Given that, let us all recognize that we are in a safe environment where we are able to make mistakes.

I think it's also important to note that these discussions, as intellectually stimulating as they are, have effects in the real world. I absolutely cannot stand it each time I read about, e.g., a Muslim woman who is either violated, beaten, humiliated, or taken advantage of, due to the Quran or hadith. I think these discussions should take place if only for their sake.

Fernando said...

I have benn in some exchange of emails with the blogger Abdul Haziz and he has revealed that, indeed, there is a "wave" of "forces" trying to make all muslims to boicot this blogg...

can it be orchestred by the blocked "The Great Ghamidi"? Doctor Wood spoke about having recieved some menaces about him coming back here with somme new name...

I don't know... with eberithing in the balance, and agreeing with faktb, perhaps it should be better to desactivate, again, for a new period of trial, the sensorinh sistem...

Anthony Rogers said...

In a sense, their silence is good news. Let's pray that their silence here in the face of refutation spreads all over the world.

I smell defeat. This is one sign of many that Islam will not dominate the world.

If I'm wrong, I welcome any Muslim to tell me so. :)

Abdul Haziz said...

Since Fernando wrote my name in connection with the "wall of silence" that has fallen upon this blog, I have to say that I can’t confirm, or deny, EVERYTHING he said. But I agree that the blocking system is awful since it does not allow a fluid exchange of comments.

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

Actually I don't think we are in need of Muslims to keep this blog running.

If the muslims decide to stay away so be it; they have been refuted, they know the danger this blog poses unto the religion of islam.

Of equal or even more importance are the readers (Christians and muslims alike) and the Christians who come on here and learn the arguments against islam and how to refute the arguments from muslims.

This blog is an excellent place to come and share our views, our concerns and experiences, news concerning muslims and Christians, including new arguments.

Hence I see this place more as a think tank and center of sources.

Fernando said...

Dear Abdul... I hope I haben't created anie problemm to you quoting whatte you tolde me... I have been trying to send emails to you, but all off themm seem too be rejected...

faktb said...

I have a lot of compassion for our Muslim friends. Most of them were simply born into the religion and have no idea of its false teachings until the false teachings are pointed out to them. When a Muslim comes face to face with the teachings, he/she is left helpless because the teachings are clearly and poignantly inhumane, false and indefensible. I would urge all of us brothers and sisters in Christ to have much compassion and patience with our Muslim friends.

Also, since every human being is endowed with dignity, when he/she faces the prospect that Islam is not the truth, then that dignity is wounded. As followers of Jesus, we must and willingly imitate him and care for the dignity of our fellow Muslims.

faktb said...

"If the muslims decide to stay away so be it; they have been refuted, they know the danger this blog poses unto the religion of islam."

I agree with Hogan that it may even damage Islam more if Muslims do not participate on this website, especially since the website is a high-profile one. Their non-participation sends the message that Islam cannot be defended. And other Muslims who do or will read the website will realize Islam's incapability of being defended.

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

I agree with you Haziz, but the problem is that we have people like Osama Abdallah and Ibn entering who load this blog down with personal insults and attacks.

Also a open debate is hardly recognisable between Christians and muslims on muslim forums and blogs, I have frequently had my posts deleted while the replies of muslims have been left open to read.

I think Muslims on this blog have had a gracious freedom to express themselves and to debate.

The reason for their recent absent is their realization of defeat and their realization that this blog and their contribution to refute its agenda damages the foundation of their faith.

Hogan Elijah Hagbard said...

According Ehteshaam Gulam the recent financial crises is what has forced himself and Nadir to focus on their economy rather than apologitcs.

Well that is fair enough, possibly the recent situation of the economic market does effect more or less the contribution of debaters on a blog like this.