I was painfully aware of much of the history of the
Bible and it was one of the main problems that I had with Christianity.[1] I had asked
pastors and the like about this question and most of them at that time, this
was before the fundamentalists became very mainstream, were very open about it
and would admit that there were problems with the historical authenticity of
the Bible. At the same time, though, most of them proclaimed that the “teachings”
have been preserved although the details may not have been. In other words,
the Bible was clearly not God’s word; they would claim that the Biblical
writers were “inspired” by God. That is the most that they could claim,
although even that they could not prove. This seemed to me to be blind faith
because if you do not know if the details have been preserved, how can you be
so certain that the main teachings have truly been preserved. In reality, we
do not even know who Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were and why exactly their
names were attached to those famous Gospels.
In the light of this, I found Jeffrey, while trying to
prove that there are some minor difficulties with the Quran, demonstrating that
the compilation of the Quran from its earliest years is known in great detail,
as most of his work was concerning the time of the Companions of the Prophet. I
was very impressed and this supposed attack on the Quran simply, again as I
alluded to earlier, made me continue in my study of the Quran. (Of course,
much later I would read responses to Jeffrey’s arguments, totally refuting his
claims of the Quran not being preserved in tact.)
The Quran’s Promise that it Shall be Preserved
In any case, it caught my eye that the Quran says about
itself:
“We have revealed the reminder and We shall preserve it.” (Quran
15:9)
This was interesting to me because within the Quran
there is a clear reference as to how the previous peoples fail to preserve
completely the message that they received.[2]
Hence, in the light of what the Quran was saying about previous revelations,
this was a very bold statement. And, incidentally, it can be considered one of
the prophecies of the Quran- coming from a Judeo-Christian perspective,
prophecies were somewhat important to me. If they did not come to pass, they
would be very damaging in my eyes while if they did come to pass, I would
consider that a very good sign.
Once again, the history of Islam presents a different
scenario than that of the earlier revelations. The Prophet Muhammad, may the
mercy and blessings of God be upon him, lived just over 1400 years ago. He is
definitely the most “historical” of the various prophets. Thus, the history of
the Quran is known and documented.
The Quran was preserved with meticulous care. The Quran
describes itself as both a “reading” (Quran) and a book (kitaab). In
fact, it was via both of these means that the Quran was meticulously preserved.
During the life of the Prophet, the Prophet had specific
scribes whose job was to record the revelation when the he received it. The
Quran was not revealed all at once. It was revealed and recorded over a period
of twenty-three years. During that time, revelation could come to the Prophet
at any time. When it did, it would be recognized by physical signs on the
Prophet (a point that led some to claim that he was simply epileptic). He
would then call for his scribes and tell them what had been revealed and
exactly where the new passage fits vis-à-vis what had already been revealed by
God.
The Quran, which is not a large book, was also preserved
in memory as well as written form from the time of the Prophet Muhammad himself.
Many of the Companions of the Prophet had memorized the entire Quran and,
fearing what had happened to earlier religious communities, they took the
necessary steps to protect it from any form of adulteration. The Quran
continues to be memorized today—another amazing aspect of the Quran. In fact, God
says about the Quran:
“And We have indeed made the Quran easy to understand and
remember…” (Quran 54:17)
To this day, millions of Muslims have the Quran
memorized. If Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 were to be a reality today
and all the books were to be burned to ashes, the Quran would still survive. Muslims
would be able to rewrite the entire Quran from memory.
Soon after the death of the Prophet, the Quran was all
compiled together and shortly afterwards official copies were sent to the
distant lands to ensure that the text was pure. To this day, one can travel to
any part of the world and pick up a copy Quran and find that it is the same
throughout the world.[3]
Even the language of the Quran, which is essential to
keeping a true understanding of the text, has been preserved.[4] Such cannot be
said for earlier prophets such as Moses and Jesus, whose Hebrew and Aramaic no
longer exist.
As noted earlier, the greatest care was taken to make
sure that anything that did not belong to the revelation directly from God—even
the Prophet’s own statements—were kept completely out of the Quran. The Quran
was nothing but the words that the Prophet received as revelation and informed
his followers that they formed part of the Quran. Hence, the Quran is
completely different from the Bible, which includes stories about the prophets,
comments on their lives and teachings, letters and writings by non-prophets and
so forth. No such human interpolations and additions can be found in the Quran
whatsoever.
Thus, the Quran originally impressed me in two ways:
First, it clearly proclaimed itself to be the word of God and was not
interlaced with words from humans. Second, it was minutely preserved from the
time of its revelation. These two points meant that the Quran met my logical
parameters for religion and revelation. I was therefore ready to move on to
further study and analyze its teachings.
By the way, someone may rightfully ask as to why it is
that God allowed his earlier revelations to be distorted and not preserved. One
can actually think of a lot of important reasons behind this. First, as is
clear in their own scriptures, the earlier prophets, such as Moses and Jesus,
were not sent for all of mankind. Their messages were clearly for the Tribe of
Israel and for their particular times. Actually, God teaches us that all
peoples had messengers who were sent to them and whose purposes were limited. The
Prophet Muhammad, and therefore his revelation, is meant for all of humankind
from his time until the Day of Judgment. Secondly, if their revelations were
preserved, their followers could use that as a reason for continuing to follow
their prophets and refusing to follow the Prophet Muhammad. Since it is very
clear via many means, such as historical evidence, contradictory statements
within the text and so on, that their scriptures have not been preserved in
detail and that they cannot claim to be following what is purely God’s
religion—not mixed with human interpolation—they have no valid excuse not to
abandon their non-preserved revelation for the true, complete and exact
revelation from God found in the Quran.
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