what is the holy book of islam? (the Koran and the Koran)
islam – question 5
The source of all authority in Islam is the Koran. muslims believe that they are the actual words of allah, the only god, dictated to muhammad the prophet in the arabic language. We need to make the following observations about the Qur’an.
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what is the koran?
The Koran (also written Qur’an or Koran) is the holy book of Islam. It is divided into chapters or suras. the quran contains 114 surahs. suras are further divided into verses called “ayahs”. References are given as chapter and verse numbers in the Bible. however, the verse numbers will vary according to different editions of the quran.
suras are not in chronological order. rather, their order is roughly due to their length, with the longest first.
The word quran is derived from an Arabic word qara which means “to read” or “to recite”. it is based on the first word of surah 96 which begins by saying the following.
It is generally believed that the first five verses of this surah were the first parts of the Qur’an to be put into written form.
except for the first sura which is a prayer addressed to allah, allah himself is the speaker in all the other suras. therefore the quran is not muhammad speaking but allah.
1. Islam’s claims about the Koran
islam makes a number of claims about the quran. can be summarized as follows.
the full text was dictated to muhammad by the angel gabriel
according to islam, the archangel gabriel revealed to muhammad the full text of the quran. the material was revealed in various portions from d. 610 until Muhammad’s death in A.D. 632.
the quran claims to be a unique revelation from allah. he says of himself. says the following about himself.
elsewhere it says,
clearly, it claims to be a revelation from allah.
the original quran has eternally existed in heaven
Muslims believe that there is an original quran that has existed eternally in heaven. this quran is written on a stone tablet in arabic, the language of heaven. Since the original Qur’an is written in Arabic, the Arabic language is given special reverence. this is emphasized in the quran. says,
therefore, the quran on earth is a representative of the one in heaven.
the quran is the final revelation of allah to mankind
islam believes that the quran is the final revelation of the one true god, allah. while the old and new testaments were also given by allah, the quran is his last word for mankind. the quran says,
since the quran was dictated by allah, there are no contradictions in the text.
There can be no authorized English translations of the Qur’an
There is no standard English translation of the Qur’an, nor could there be. only the original Arabic version is believed to be authoritative. the koran, in arabic, is the perfect word of allah.
2. the compilation of the messages in the Qur’an
Regarding the collection of these messages, we can make the following observations.
the message was recited by muhammad to others
since muhammad could not read or write, muhammad recited these revelations to others. The recitations were written down or memorized by Muhammad’s companions.
the recitations were collected after muhammad’s death
After his death, Muslim leaders attempted to collect the Qur’an. the various portions were found written on such things as stones, leaves, and on the shoulder blades of camels. Furthermore, the memories of those who heard these recitations were used to compile the Qur’an. the final compilation of the revelation occurred around the year a.d. 650.
3. the Koran and other holy books
according to islam, the final source of authority is the quran, which muslims believe to be the word of allah. Although Islam teaches that the Old and New Testaments are divinely inspired, they believe that Christians and Jews have corrupted the scriptures. islam considers the bible to be wrong wherever it conflicts with the koran. the quran is the only reliable source of teaching for muslims.
muslims believe that the bible is god’s revelation to mankind
islam believes that the torah, or the law of moses, is also divinely inspired. says,
it also talks about the tavrat and injeel (the law of moses and the gospel) that allah sent to the jews and christians.
allah’s revelations also extend to the life of jesus.
Therefore, the Bible is considered holy scripture by Muslims.
scripture must be consulted
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islam teaches that scriptures should be consulted when problems arise. any problem must be solved by the statements of the scriptures. says,
therefore the quran encourages people to consult the scriptures.
muslims believe the bible has been corrupted by jews and christians
islam claims that the bible and the koran are holy scriptures given by allah. the quran says,
we also read,
why do these holy books contradict each other?
Although muslims consider the bible and the koran to be sacred, they contradict each other in much of what they teach. consequently, the jews and christians presented a series of arguments against muhammad and his followers on the basis of what his scriptures taught. Muslims were forced to find some kind of answer to these questions.
the basic question that had to be answered was this: how could there be discrepancies if the old testament, the new testament and the quran all come from the same source? if the quran only confirmed what was in the old and new testament, why do we find these contradictions?
Christians and Jews are corrupters of the truth
muhammad addressed this issue during his time in medina. he said that the word that had previously been given in the old and new testaments had been corrupted by both Jews and Christians; the “people of the book”.
the quran makes the following accusation.
the changes were deliberately made by Jews
therefore, when the bible and the quran are in conflict, the quran corrects what was corrupted in the bible. muhammad accuses the jews of knowingly perverting god’s word after hearing and understanding it. the quran says,
He accused them of deliberately perverting the word of god. the quran says,
it is said that they changed the scripts on purpose.
Jews are accused of corrupting the text by displacing the words, changing them from one place to another. in this way they twist the things that God has said.
the quran accuses christians of neglecting the scriptures. says,
the accusation of cover-up is also directed against the “people of the book”. we read elsewhere in the quran,
These people will be severely judged for their behavior. the quran says,
elsewhere, it says,
muhammad brought light to the dark situation
Muhammad, on the other hand, is depicted as coming into the world to bring light to this dark situation.
it is considered that the jews do not assign the correct attributes to allah. the quran says,
Of the Christians, it is said that they forgot what God had revealed to them.
this was islam’s way of trying to explain the obvious discrepancies between the quran and the old and new testaments. they simply attribute it to the deliberate changing of the text by Jews and Christians. Interestingly, some Muslim scholars have concluded that the Jews and Christians did not change the text simply because they did not understand what was being taught. such is the confused nature of Islamic belief.
the gospel of barnabas gives a more accurate life of christ
muslims sometimes refer to a work called the gospel of barnabas as a more authoritative source for the life of jesus. They believe that it gives the correct explanation of what Jesus said and did. In the Gospel of Bernabas, Jesus is said to have been an Islamic prophet, the forerunner of Muhammad.
the literary beauty of the quran
there is one final point that should be mentioned. Those who read the Koran in Arabic testify to its literary beauty. even non-Muslims agree that it is a great literary work. Muslims often use this to defend their divine nature. they claim that a book with such beauty could not have come from mere humans. consequently, it must be a divine work, a work of God. therefore, the beauty of the quran is used as the last line of evidence for its divine inspiration.
These points summarize some of the basic facts about the composition of the Qur’an, as well as how Muslims view this book. To them, the Koran is sacred beyond description.
christian response to the quran
while islam believes that the quran is the word of allah, there are a number of problems with this view. include the following.
1. the text of the quran did not always read the same
islamic tradition teaches that when muhammad died, in a.d. 632, the various revelations he had recited had not yet been brought together in a single book. they were simply engraved “on palm leaves and flat stones and on the hearts of men.”
although an attempt was made to collect the authorized text recited by muhammad, no standard text was created. a number of variations on the text continued to exist until the 10th century. even in the middle of the 20th century two versions were still in use. while the main text was used by most Muslims throughout the world, a variation of this text was in use in North Africa.
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the quran was originally compiled by one individual, zaid ibn thabit. This was done under the guidance of Abu Bakr, Muhammad’s father-in-law. Later, a group of Arab scholars produced a unified version of the Qur’an in which they destroyed all copies that had variant readings.
therefore the text of the quran is anything but true. This should be of particular concern to Muslims, as the Koran is believed to have been dictated from an Arabic original in heaven.
there’s more. recent ancient manuscripts of the quran have appeared in yemen. these manuscripts demonstrate more variant readings in the text. all this should not give a muslim much assurance that he is reading or hearing, in arabic, the exact words of allah.
2. has a wrong understanding of what the bible says
Although the quran claims to be the last word of allah, it does not correctly reflect the truth of the scriptures. again and again he wrongly attributes something to the scriptures that is not there or that contradicts his clear teaching. since god is not the author of confusion, he would not give a revelation to mankind that contradicted what he had previously revealed.
3. there is no objective evidence that he is divine
We find no objective evidence that the Qur’an is divinely inspired. there are no predictions that are miraculously fulfilled, there are no miracles that bear adequate witness, and it is clearly stated that the founder, muhammad, died, was buried, and remains dead.
4. the text of the script has not been changed
The Islamic doctrine of tahrif, that the scriptures have been corrupted, is not supported by evidence. in fact, just the opposite is true. when the evidence is viewed objectively, it becomes clear that the scriptures have been passed down through history with amazing accuracy. people today can read the bible with the confidence that nothing has been added or subtracted.
therefore, islam’s claims regarding the bible are simply false. The text of the Old Testament, as well as the text of the New Testament, have been transmitted with such precision that we can be sure that we are reading the same thing that was actually written.
5. the gospel of barnabas is a fraud
the gospel of barnabas, which attempts to give a version of the life and ministry of jesus that differs from the new testament, is a fraud. there is no evidence that it was written before the fourteenth or fifteenth century. it contradicts both the new testament and the koran!
contradicts the new testament in which it says that jesus was the forerunner of the messiah who proclaimed the future coming of muhammad. it also contradicts the koran by saying that muhammad was the messiah. even the koran recognizes that jesus was the messiah.
6. literary beauty does not prove divine inspiration
the idea that the quran can be a literary masterpiece has nothing to do with establishing a divine origin. The fact that a book is a work of beauty does not mean that it is the inspired word of God. If the Qur’an is what Muslims claim it to be, then there must be some objective evidence to support their claims. as we have seen, there is none.
7. the koran was written six hundred years after the life of christ
Since the Qur’an was written some six hundred years after the life of Christ, it is certainly not in a position to give authoritative statements about what did and did not happen in the first century AD. no court of law in the world would accept the testimony of someone who lived six centuries after the events and had no personal contact with the events he is trying to rewrite. in short, the koran would be dismissed.
on the other hand, the writers of the new testament were eyewitnesses to the events they recorded, or recorded the first hand testimony of others who were there. His account of the life and ministry of Jesus is the only one to be taken seriously.
this summarizes some of the basic facts about the quran, the holy book of islam. The facts make it clear that this work, whatever its ultimate source, is not the word of God. while the bible certainly gives evidence of this, the quran does not.
summary – question 5 what is the holy book of islam? (the Koran and the Koran)
the quran is the holy book of islam. muslims believe it is allah’s last revelation to mankind. while the old and new testaments were divinely given, the teaching of the quran is the final word in all spiritual matters. It is claimed that the Quran contains Muhammad’s recitations given to him by Allah through the Angel Gabriel.
These recitations were finally collected by those who heard or wrote them. the end result, the quran, is said to be the exact duplicate of a book that has been written in heaven in the arabic language. therefore, it is a perfect book. it cannot be altered in any way.
when confronted with the contradictions between the quran and the hebrew or christian scriptures, the quran claims that these older revelations were corrupted by jews and christians. the final revelation, the quran, is the perfect word of allah. muslims sometimes cite a work “the gospel of barnabas” as a more accurate view of the life of christ. this work supposedly has jesus as a muslim prophet.
Finally, the literary beauty of the Qur’an is often invoked as a sign of its divine origin. the fact that the original arabic quran is a work of beauty demonstrates to muslims that it must be the word of allah. indeed, it is argued that no human being could compose such a literary masterpiece.
these are the claims that muslims make about the quran. however, there is no evidence that any of this is true. in fact, it is impossible to consider the quran as the last word of the same god who has revealed himself in the scriptures.
to begin with, there is no exact text of the quran. extant manuscripts have variations between them. the “perfect text” does not exist. consequently, we do not have the exact words that “allah” supposedly gave us.
also, there is confusion in the quran with exactly what the bible teaches. or misunderstands or misrepresents certain scriptural teachings. this makes it clear that it cannot be the last word of the god of the bible.
add to this that there is no evidence that it is divine. In contrast to the Bible, there are no objective miracles, no fulfilled prophecy. in fact, there is nothing in the quran that indicates his divine status.
the quran is also wrong when it says that the text of the bible has been corrupted. the evidence clearly shows that this has not been the case. therefore, the quran makes inaccurate claims about jews and christians.
also, the gospel of barnabas, which supposedly gives a more accurate view of the life of christ, is nothing more than a fraud.
Regarding its literary beauty, this has absolutely nothing to do with its ultimate origin. to be the word of god, there has to be more evidence than the work of being a literary masterpiece. supporting facts must be given to support the claim of divine inspiration. as we have seen, there are no facts to do this.
Finally, there is the question of the time of the composition of these books. the koran was written about six hundred years after the life of jesus christ. Muhammad was obviously not in a position to make authoritative statements about Jesus six centuries after the events took place. The main source of the life of Jesus is the New Testament. has evidence to support his divine nature. not the koran
consequently, the quran must be rejected as a book revealed by god.
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