The Bible and the Qu'ran

In what relationship does the Quran stand to the Gospel, and what is the nature of the difference between them? The Quran is written in Arabic in heaven, it is written in Arabic on earth:it is studied in Arabic, it is committed to memory in Arabic, often without being understood; it is recited in the Mosque in Arabic, it claims to be attested by the purity of its style, it enjoins as an obligatory duty a journey to an Arabic Qibla. Cannon Godfrey Dale examines the sources of the Quran; How Muhammad received his revelations and gives a summary of the compilation and style of the Quran.

In what light does the orthodox Muslim regard his Sacred Book? He buys a copy at some bookstall; he believes that the text itself is a faithful copy of the text which was arranged in the days of the Khalif Othman, (there are seven editions which differ mainly in the number of the verses), and there is no reason to question the accuracy of his belief. If he asks about the sources from which Othman's text was compiled, he will be told that it was a new and revised edition of the old edition compiled by order of Abu Bakr at Omar's suggestion after the battle of Yemama. Abu Bakr's edition had to be revised owing to different modes of recitation and owing to differences of expression in the sources from which Zaid's copy was made. A variety of different readings had crept in. This alarmed the faithful, the theory being that the Qur'an is free from error.

So the Khalif Othman ordered the new edition and burnt all the older copies. Othman's version has been, ever since, the authorized version of Muhammad’s scriptures.

There was no complete canon of Islamic Scripture for at least a year after Muhammad's death, in the same way that there was no written Gospel in the years following our Lord's Ascension. In each case it was the death of those who knew their Master's teaching, or the approach of their death, which suggested a complete record. Zaid was ordered by Abu Bakr to make one. Zaid had been accustomed to write down the revelations of Muhammad in Muhammad's life - time and he proceeded to collect them from date - leaves and tablets of white stone and bones and the hearts of men.

Muhammad had left his revelation in very disorder. Zaid collected it in the order in which the book is now arranged, which is really no order at all, and for twenty - three years this edition remained the authorised edition, viz.; until Othman's. Thus the Muslim student will travel back to Muhammad himself and learn that he either wrote down his message (it seems very probable, if not certain, that Muhammad could write. He asked for a pen on his deathbed) or recited it to men who wrote it down or committed it to memory.

Had it all been written down word for word we should not hear of Omar's alarm after the battle of Yemama. There is no reason to doubt, however, that the text as it stands, apart from the arrangement of the various chapters and verses, is substantially a correct transcript of the sayings of Muhammad.

We are tracing the book up to its source, according to the views of the orthodox Muslim. Not a word or letter of it is Muhammad's; it was all revealed to him in various ways in a space of more than twenty years. He was a servant sent with a message which he had to deliver word for word. We are told that brightness like the brightness of the morn came upon the Prophet. Through this brightness Gabriel revealed the will of God. At times Gabriel appeared in the form of one of the companions of the Prophet renowned for grace and beauty. At times Muhammad heard the sound of a bell, he alone discerning the meaning of the sounds. He became ghastly white and the perspiration would roll from his face. At other times he roared like a camel, the sound as of bells well nigh rending his heart in twain. At the time of the journey to heaven "Miraj". God spoke to the Prophet without the intervention of an angel, though it is not certain whether the face of God was veiled !

Sometimes God appeared in a dream. Twice angels having six hundred wings appeared. The exact words of the Qur'an were written in Arabic by the pen of power on what is called in the Qur'an the "preserved table", by the fiat of Almighty God. The Qur'an was then entrusted to the Angel Gabriel, (Surah 85:21) who descended with it to the lowest of the seven Heavens and revealed it piecemeal to Muhammad as the occasion required.

The Qur'an as we see it is an exact transcript, to use the language of the Qur'an, of this heavenly original. The heavenly original is said to date as far back as two thousand years before the creation of the world. The letters are created, but the message enshrined in them is eternal and immutable as proceeding from the Essence of God Himself.

Since it was revealed to Muhammad no man has ever seen the original. It is far beyond the reach of the human critic; it is never made a subject of investigation nor tried by the ordinary rules of criticism.

A Muslim, holding a copy of the Qur'an, believes he holds in his hand the very Word of God, both in matter and form; the last and perfect revelation of God's Will to mankind. He believes that part of this revelation is so clear that he who runs may read it, but that the meaning of part of it is hidden, ambiguous and capable of several interpretations, and that some passages are so difficult that only the prophet can understand them. Such are the anthropomorphic phrases "God’s hands,"“the face of God". In all doubtful passages the resort is to the traditions, of which there are several authorized collections, traditions, that is, of the sayings of the infallible prophet. These traditions have to be traced back by an unbroken line to trustworthy persons or to a companion of the prophet. Such a traditional rendering and explanation would be accepted as final. The commentator has only to reproduce what has been written before. Anything like the work of a Christian commentator is out of the question. Innovation or novelty of any kind is abhorrent to the mind of a Muslim.

The adaptation of the Qur'an to new conditions of life is impossible. A passage has a certain obvious meaning or a certain traditional meaning, and nothing but a new tradition (a practical impossibility) can throw new light on a passage in the Qur'an. As it has been said (Sell’s Faith of Islam):

"The greatest proficient in theology is the man who can repeat the Qur'an by heart, who knows and can produce at will what the early commentators have said, who can remember and quote in the most apposite manner the Prophet's sayings preserved in the traditions handed down by the Companions, their followers, and the followers of their followers; who can point out a flaw in the chain of narrators of a tradition, or can maintain the authority of a tradition he quotes himself. A good memory, not critical acumen, is the great desideratum in a Muslim theologian."

The correct repetition and pronunciation of the Qur'an is the important point, and often men can repeat and pronounce correctly a passage without having the least knowledge of the meaning of the passage. No man ever invented a more mechanical theory of inspiration than that accepted by the orthodox Muslim.

It is once more the denial of the "Word made Flesh" of Christian belief. The type has been set up in Heaven, was conveyed to Muhammad, and by him repeated to his followers, word for word, letter by letter.

Something must be said here about the doctrine that certain passages have been abrogated. At first sight it does not seem easy to reconcile this doctrine with the Muslim belief in an exact copy of the heavenly original.

There are two hundred and twenty - three abrogated passages according to Sale. Every commentator must know what passages abrogate and what passages are abrogated. Sometimes sense and words have been abrogated. Sometimes the sense remains and the letter is abrogated. Sometimes the sense is abrogated and the letter remains.

To give a few illustrations of this convenient doctrine,

1. The first case is when a verse has been altogether omitted.

2. The second case is when a verse is omitted but the sense remains. The Khalif Omar said there was a passage about stoning adulterers in the Qur'an originally. It is no longer there but the sense remains.

3. The third class is the most important. The best illustrations are the change in the position of the Qibla and the change in the attitude adopted towards Jews and Christians. The letter remains but the sense is abrogated.

If you ask how a passage can be abrogated in a book which is entirely the composition of God, they answer that the circumstances which necessitated the abrogation were determined on from all eternity.

There was therefore a Surah for the original circumstances and a Surah for the altered circumstances. And this is the explanation given of the celebrated verse, Surah 2:100

"Whatever verses we cancel or cause thee to forget, we give thee better in their stead or the like thereof,"

and again, (Surah 13:39)

"What He pleaseth, will God abrogate or confirm, for with Him is the source of revelation."

There is an interesting illustration of the uses to which this law of abrogation was supplied. It was revealed (Surah 4:97) that those who stay at home in the time of Jihad are not in the sight of God as those who go to war. Two men exclaimed"And what if they were blind? Muhammad asked for the shoulder blade upon which the words were written, had a ‘revelation’ and made Zaid add the words (Sale quotes this interpretation from the Muslim commentator Beidhawi)

"free from trouble.""Those believers who sit at home free from trouble."

It is such an obvious afterthought. Let us judge this theory of abrogation by passages abrogated. The Qibla was altered from Jerusalem to Mecca (Surah 2:109 and 139).

The verse Surah 33:52

"It is not permitted to thee to take other wives hereafter, nor to change thy present wives for other women,"

is abrogated by Surah 33:49 a verse in which it is stated

"We allow thee any other believing woman who hath bestowed herself upon the Prophet."

Again another Surah 73:2 read '

"Stand up all night except a small portion of it, for prayer."

A year later-according to Ayesha the prophet's favourite wife - we read (Surah 73:20)

"God measureth the night and the day He knoweth that ye cannot count its hours aright and therefore turneth to you mercifully. Recite then so much of the Qur'an as is easy for you."

We cannot help feeling that Muhammad found it necessary to shift his position from time to time, and thus it became necessary to annul earlier portions of his revelation. And of course this was all the easier because of the way in which what he uttered was recorded. It was easy to rub out what had been written on a shoulder bone. There is a well known tradition that a verse recited one day was found to have vanished from the material the next. When inquiry was made, Muhammad merely replied that it had been revoked (C / F Sell, p. 59 quoting Abdullah bin Masud).

Now these remarks on abrogation lead us on to the vital difference between the orthodox Muslim and any other person who approaches the study of the book from outside the Islamic world. The orthodox and devout Muslim thinks that the Our'an is the very Word of God, and this accounts for the scrupulous care with which he handles it, the extreme reverence with which he treats it. It has an honoured place in his house, he holds it in a certain way, never places it on the ground and before he reads it performs an ablution and utters a prayer. The student however who approaches the Qur'an from outside, especially if he has first studied Muhammad's history, and reads the Qur'an as far as possible in chronological order (it is very important to do this the first time, and after reading Muhammad's life), is more and more convinced that it is exactly what you would expect from a man so gifted, and of such a character, at such a time, and under such circumstances. We naturally say Muhammad said this or that, but the Muslim will point out, that the first words revealed to Muhammad were

"“Read in the name of the Lord the Creator, read for thy Lord is the most Beneficent. He hath taught men the use of the pen (to be a faithful copyist). He hath taught man that which he knoweth not,"(Surah 96)

"Say, say."

The very words of God are put into his mouth.

The Sources of the Qur’an

And yet to the student who is not a Muslim it is obviously the work of man, and of one man, who picked up information from all kinds of sources, Jewish, Christian, Oriental, Persian. Space will not permit me to dwell long on this.

I will take two instances. First, A story from the Old Testament, and second, a story concerning the boyhood of Christ, each containing details which we should consider puerile.

In the account given of Cain and Abel, (Surah 5:30) we are told that when Cain was puzzled what to do with the body of his brother and God sent a crow to scratch in the earth and show him how he might hide his brother's shame, he said" Alas for me. Am I too helpless to become like the crow and hide my brother's shame?"

Now the Jewish fable in the Talmud differs very slightly from this. Adam and his wife sat weeping and lamenting, not knowing what to do with the body of Abel, as they were unacquainted with burying. Then came a raven whose fellow was dead and took and buried it in the earth, hiding it before their eyes. Then said Adam,"I shall do like this raven." I might just add here that both the Talmud and the Qur'an say that the people of the flood were destroyed with boiling water. (C. f here Dr. Arnold’s Islam and Christianity, pp. 128 - 129)

Again take the story of our Lord's boyhood supposed to come from the Gospel. In the Surah 3:40 we read

Most Christians know that this and similar stories of our Lord's infancy come from the Apocryphal Gospels

These two instances are quite sufficient to give an idea to the sources from which Muhammad compiled the greater portion of the later Suras which are full of such tales taken from the Talmud and from the Canonical or Apocryphal Scriptures.

Again the frequent, wearisome, and monotonous repetition of the same idea, the same moral truths, the same stories, the ever recurring description of the terrors of eternal torments, of the delights of the eternal paradise (which are said to occupy one - sixth of the book), the utter want of system, or arrangement, or connexion, the not infrequent contradictions, the obvious historical and chronological blunders; these tell us plainly enough that this is man's work and not God's; these, in spite of the purity of the Arabic, in spite of passages inculcating ethics sound if somewhat commonplace, in spite of passages of superb poetry, in spite of passages full of religious awe and emotion to which it is difficult to refuse the word inspiration, make the reading of the Qur'an a wearisome task to any but the man who believes he holds in his hand the perfect, eternal, and final Word of God to man.

To read the Qur'an - specially in a translation like Rodwell's where the Suras are arranged in chronological order - s not unlike a journey in the Arabian desert as we find it described in the books of travellers. First there is the promise of the dawn, and the splendour of the sunrise, and the radiance of the morning when all nature seems clothed in new and beautiful apparel. Then a long stretch of monotonous desert, until the first oasis appears which breaks the tedium of the desert, where there are cool waters, refreshing shade and welcome repose. The heat of the sun untempered by any cloud becomes intolerable, the long waste of sand more and more wearisome, more and more monotonous, until the traveller begins to long for the journey's end, and sometimes, in the absence of any landmark, to wonder if the journey will ever lead anywhere at all.

The orthodox Muslim seems to believe that the Gospel was given to Jesus in the month of Ramadan, all at once in a book.

"We gave Him the Book-the Injil."

The Qur'an does not charge the Jews or Christians with corrupting the text of their sacred books and many learned Muslim commentators admit this. It asserts that the scriptures sent down by God existed in the days of Muhammad, who invariably speaks of them with respect, (Surah 5:77) and as these expressions of respect are found in the very latest Suras there is no reason to believe Muhammad ever altered his opinion.

The Gospel existed in his day intact. Christians could read it and should read it. But there are statements in the Qur'an about reading the scriptures perversely. Christians or Jews are accused of interpreting it falsely, it is said that they pronounced words in the wrong way and that they misstated the context of the books; but the text itself was intact. It is certainly noticeable that the older commentators, who had probably never seen the Gospel, interpret this charge of corruption as referring to bad interpretation, not to any tampering with the text. Had they known the text they could never have admitted so much. Modern commentators of the Qur'an who are far better acquainted with the contents of the Gospel see what a fix they are in. For if the text of the Gospel was intact in Muhammad’s day, and is the same as that referred to in the Qur'an as sent down by God, then to the orthodox Muslim it must be of divine origin. Why then does he reject so much of it?

If it is not divine, then the statement of the Qur'an that it was sent down by God is untrue. Again, God cannot contradict Himself as these two books represent - one saying that Jesus was crucified - the other denying it. There is no mistaking the meaning of the text in this case. The modem Muslim sees this, and he escapes the difficulty by saying that Christians have lost the Gospel which was given to Jesus Christ, and that what we possess is not the Gospel but the traditions of His companions and the followers of His companions as to what Jesus said and Jesus did. If the text of the Gospel has not been corrupted, Muslims must either admit that the Qur'an contains a few false statements, which is sheer blasphemy to them, or that God can make two contradictory statements. They see this now and rally in the last stronghold and say - you have not got the Gospel which was revealed to Jesus Christ and of which Muhammad speaks. We tell them they must prove that, and that it is impossible to prove it in the face of the evidence at our disposal. The Muslim professor who hears of the theories of the Higher Criticism will say "There, I told you as much, that is what we have been saying all along". But if Higher Criticism has something to say about the Canonical Scriptures, what will it say about the passages from the Talmud and the Apocryphal Gospel imbedded in the Qur'an, believed to be inscribed in the preserved Table beneath the Throne of God?

I will conclude by stating four reasons out of many, why the difference between the Bible and the Qur'an is such that a man who knows both can scarcely hesitate which to choose and which to teach. I place the question of the poetry on one side, inasmuch as it is very questionable whether there is any finer poetry in the world than the poetry of the Christian Scriptures; and I leave out the comparison between the ethical and social teaching of the two Books.

1) First the question of Inspiration because I have just referred to it. I do not believe that Christians need fear any criticism from whatever quarter it may come. We are not tied to the letter. We believe in the Light that lightens every man that cometh into the world”. We believe that the Scriptures which we possess have a distinctly human element - the treasure is in an earthen vessel. We believe that God spoke to men in many parts and in many fashions by the Prophets, that the message He gave them by His Spirit was coloured by the sinful human medium through which it passed, and that all revelations are as it were but "broken lights of Him who is more than they." We believe that there was a progressive revelation until at last the very Word of God Himself" became Flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His Glory - the Glory of the Only - Begotten Son of God - full of grace and truth."

Now a Muslim does not hold such a theory of inspiration. He believes that a man wrote down what he was told to write down exactly as he was given it, and that it never passed through a human medium at all. It was never in any sense a Word of God Incarnate.

2) The Qur'an deals mainly with precepts positive ordinances and not principles.

The more we read the Qur'an, the more we are struck with the commonplace character of its ethics. We are on our own level. The virtues inculcated are the virtues of the natural and not of the regenerate man. But when we study the teaching of Christ we are constantly coming upon paradoxes; human methods of thought and ways of looking at life are turned upside down and the sayings themselves go right down to the very heart of human nature and touch and purify the very innermost man. We are not told to do a certain thing in a certain way but to follow a principle and act according to a certain spirit, to be - not to do.

3) The Qur'an is spuriously catholic, the Bible genuinely so.

Though it is not true to say Muslims will not translate the Qur‘an there is no doubt that such translations are against the current of Islam. It is written in Arabic in heaven, it is written in Arabic on earth: it is studied in Arabic, it is committed to memory in Arabic, often without being understood; it is recited in the Mosque in Arabic, it claims to be attested by the purity of its style, an argument which appeals only to an Arab and not even to all Arabs. It enjoins as an obligatory duty a journey to an Arabic Qibla; it enjoins methods of fasting which would be impossible, say, in the Arctic regions. I need not say that the Bible is catholic in the best sense of the world. It corresponds to the fulness of life. It has proved its claims, and the mere fact that Christianity lays down principles and enjoins character rather than positive precepts and external acts, is a guarantee of the genuineness of its catholicity.

4) The Qur'an is without arrangement or order, contradicts itself, and has no definite aim from beginning to end.

Now the Bible has this definite aim from beginning to end. "All as in some piece of art is toil co - operant to an end." Whatever our opinions may be of the date and authorship of the various books, we are increasingly conscious as we read them of a wonderful unity of thought tending to a definite goal.

The apparent contradictions are contradictions of development. We are conscious as we read it of an "increasing purpose," of a gradual development of spiritual power, of a deepening insight into righteousness, of the gradual revelation of an ideal character, realised at last in the Person of Christ.