DICTIONARY OF ISLĀM. (continued 29)
Reading edition
If the Prophet had been an angel, he would have come in the guise of a man.
Attributes of God.
Muḥammad bidden to become a Muslim.
Those who have the Scriptures ought to recognise Muḥammad as the one foretold in them.
The idolaters will be disappointed of the intercession of their gods on the Judgment Day.
They deny the Resurrection Day now, but hereafter they will have awful proof of its truth.
The next world is preferable to this.
Prophets aforetime were also mocked at, and they were patient.
God could send them a sign if He pleased.
Beasts, birds, and the like, are communities like men.
Their fate is all written in the book.
They, too, shall be gathered on the Judgment Day.
Arguments in proof of the supreme power of God.
Muḥammad is only a messenger.
He is to disclaim miraculous power.
Is not to repulse believers.
He is bidden to abjure idolatry and not follow the lusts of the Makkans.
God’s omniscience.
He takes men’s souls to Himself during sleep.
Sends guardian angels to watch over them.
Preserves men in danger by land and sea.
Muḥammad is not to join in discussions on religion with idolaters, nor to associate with those who make a sport of it.
Folly of idolatry set forth.
God the Creator.
Abraham’s perplexity in seeking after the true God.
Worships successively the stars, the moon, and the sun, but is convinced that they are not gods by seeing them set.
Turns to God and becomes a Ḥanīf.
Other prophets of old were inspired.
The Qurʾān is also a special revelation from God to the Makkans, fulfilling their Scriptures, but the Jews have perverted or suppressed parts of them.
Denunciation of one who falsely pretended to be inspired.
The Creation a proof of God’s unity.
Rebuke to those who call the jinn His partners, or attribute offspring to Him.
Idolaters are not to be abused, lest they, too, speak ill of God.
The Makkans would not have believed even if a sign had been given them.
Muḥammad is to trust to God alone.
Men are not to abstain from food over which God’s name has been pronounced.
God will vindicate His messenger.
Belief or the reverse depends on God’s grace.
The jinns and false gods, together with their worshippers, will be condemned to everlasting torment.
God never punishes without first sending an apostle with warning.
The threatened doom cannot be averted.
Denunciation of the idolatrous practices of the Arabs.
Setting apart portions of the produce of the land for God and for the idols, and defrauding God of His portion.
Infanticide.
Declaring cattle and tilth inviolable.
God created all fruits and all cattle, both are therefore lawful.
Argument proving the absurdity of some of these customs.
Enumeration of the only kinds of food that are unlawful.
The prohibition to the Jews of certain food was only on account of their sins.
God’s revealed word is the only certain argument.
Declaration of things really forbidden, namely, harshness to parents, infanticide, abominable sins, and murder.
The property of orphans is to be respected and fair-dealing to be practised.
No soul compelled beyond its capacity.
The Qurʾān to be accepted on the same authority as the Book of Moses was.
Faith required now without signs.
No latter profession on the Judgment Day shall profit them.
Good works to be rewarded tenfold, but evil works only by the same amount.
Islām is the religion of Abraham the Ḥanīf.
A belief in one God, to whom all prayer and devotion is due.
Each soul shall bear its own burden.
The high rank of some of the Makkans is only a trial from the Lord whereby to prove them.
Chapter LXIV.
Sūratu ʾt-Tag͟hābun.
The Chapter of Mutual Deceit.
God the Creator.
The Resurrection.
The Unity of God.
Wealth and children must not distract men from the service of God.
Chapter XXVIII.
Sūratu ʾl-Qaṣaṣ.
The Chapter of the Story.
The history of Moses and Pharaoh.
The latter and his vizier.
Hāmān oppresses the children of Israel.
Moses is exposed on the river by his mother.
He is adopted by Pharaoh.
His sister watches him, and his mother is engaged to nurse him.
He grows up and slays the Egyptian.
Flees to Midian.
Helps the two Midianites to draw water.
Serves their father Shohaib for ten years and then marries his daughter.
God appears to him in the fire.
Is sent with his brother Aaron to Pharaoh.
Hāmān builds Pharaoh a high tower to ascend to the God of Moses.
His punishment.
Moses gives the Law.
These stories are proofs of Muḥammad’s mission.
The Arabs reject the Book of Moses and the Qurʾān as two impostures.
Those who have the Scriptures recognise the truth of the Qurʾān.
The Makkans warned by the example of the cities of old that have perished.
Disappointment of the idolaters at the Day of Judgment.
Helplessness of the idols before God.
Qārūn’s great wealth.
The earth opens and swallows him up for his pride and his insolence to Moses.
Muḥammad encouraged in his faith and purpose.
Chapter XXIII.
Sūratu ʾl-Muʾminīn.
The Chapter of Believers.
The humble, chaste, and honest, shall prosper.
The creation, birth, death, and resurrection of man.
God’s goodness in providing for men’s sustenance.
Noah sent to his people, who reject him because he is a mere mortal.
They are drowned, and he is saved in the ark.
Moses and Aaron were also called liars.
Mary and her son the cause of their followers’ division into sects.
The God-fearing encouraged.
The Quraish rebuked for their pride, and for denying Muḥammad, and calling him possessed.
They are reminded of the famine and defeat they have already experienced.
Doctrine of the Resurrection.
The unity of God.
He has no offspring.
Is omniscient.
Muḥammad is encouraged not to care for the false accusations of the Makkans, but to seek refuge in God.
Punishment, on the Day of Resurrection, of those who mocked at the little party of believers.
Chapter XXII.
Sūratu ʾl-Ḥajj.
The Chapter of the Pilgrimage.
Terrors of the Last Day, yet men dispute about God and follow devils.
The conception, birth, growth, and death of men, and the growth of herbs in the ground are proofs of the Resurrection.
But some dispute, others waver between two opinions.
The most desperate means cannot thwart the divine decrees.
God will decide between the Jews, Christians, Sabians, Magians, and idolaters on the Judgment Day.
All nature adores God.
The misbelievers are threatened with hell-fire, and the believers promised Paradise.
Punishment threatened to those who prohibit men from visiting the Sacred Mosque.
Abraham, when bidden to cleanse the Kaʿbah, was told to proclaim the pilgrimage.
The rules of the Ḥajj enjoined.
Cattle are lawful food.
Warning against idolatry and exhortation to become Ḥanīfs.
Sacrifices at the Kaʿbah are enjoined.
All men have their appointed rites.
The name of God is to be mentioned over cattle when slaughtered.
Camels may be sacrificed and eaten.
God will defend believers, but loves not misbelieving traitors.
Those who have been driven from their homes for acknowledging God’s unity are allowed to fight.
If men did not fight for such a cause, all places of worship would be destroyed.
The people of Noah, ʿĀd, S̤amūd, Abraham, and Lot, called their prophets liars, and were allowed to range at large, but at last they were punished.
Their cities were destroyed, and the ruins are visible to travellers still.
Muḥammad is only sent to warn the Makkans of a like fate.
Satan contrives to suggest a wrong reading to the Prophet while reading the Qurʾān.
The Kingdom shall be God’s upon the Judgment Day.
Those who flee or are slain in the cause, shall be provided for and rewarded.
Believers who take revenge and are again attacked, will be helped.
All nature is subject to God.
Every nation has its rites to observe.
The idolaters treat the revelation with scorn.
The false gods could not even create a fly.
Exhortation to worship God and fight for the faith of Abraham, whose religion the Muslims profess.
God is the Sovereign and Helper.
Chapter XXI.
Sūratu ʾl-Ambiyāʾ.
The Chapter of the Prophets.
Men mock at the revelation.
They say it is a jumble of dreams, and that Muḥammad is a poet, and they ask for a sign.
The prophets of old were but mortal.
The people who rejected them perished.
Heaven and earth were not created in sport.
Truth shall crush falsehood.
All things praise God.
If there were other gods than He, heaven and earth would be corrupted.
All former prophets were taught there is no god but God.
The Merciful has not begotten children.
The angels are only His servants.
The separation of earth from heaven, the creation of living things from water, the steadying of the earth by mountains, and placing the sky as a roof over it, and the creation of the night and day, and of the sun and moon, are signs.
No one was ever granted immortality.
Every soul must taste of death.
The unbelievers mock at Muḥammad and disbelieve in the Merciful.
Man is hasty.
The infidels are threatened with punishment in the next world.
Those who mocked at the prophets of old perished.
No one shall be wronged on the Last Day.
Moses and Aaron received a scripture.
Abraham destroys the images which his people worshipped.
He tells them that it was the largest idol which did it.
He is condemned to be burnt alive, but the fire is miraculously made cool and safe.
Abraham, Lot, Isaac, and Jacob, all inspired.
Lot was brought safely out of a city of wrong-doers.
Noah also was saved.
David and Solomon give judgment about a field.
The mountains and birds are made subject to David.
He is taught the art of making coats of mail.
The wind and the demons are subjected to Solomon.
Job was saved.
Ishmail, Idrīs, and Ẕū ʾl-Kifl were patient, and entered into the mercy of the Lord.
Ẕū ʾn-Nūn (Jonah) was saved in the fish’s belly.
Zachariah had his prayer granted and a son (John) given him.
The spirit was breathed into the Virgin Mary.
But their followers have divided into sects.
A city once destroyed for unbelief shall not be restored till Gog and Magog are let loose.
The promise draws nigh.
Idolaters shall be the pebbles of hell.
But the elect shall be rolled up as as-Sijill rolls up a book.
As is written in the Psalms, “The righteous shall inherit the earth.”
Muḥammad sent as a mercy to the worlds.
God is one God.
He knows all.
He is the Merciful.
Chapter XVII.
Sūratu Banī Isrāʾīl.
The Chapter of the Children of Israel.
Allusion to the night journey from the Sacred Mosque (at Makkah) to the Remote Mosque (at Jerusalem).
Moses received the book.
Noah was a faithful servant.
Israel’s two sins and their punishment.
The Qurʾān a guide and a good tidings.
Man prays for evil and is hasty.
Night and day are two signs.
Every man’s augury is round his neck.
Each one shall have a book on the Resurrection Day with an account of his deeds.
Each is to bear the burden of his own sins.
No city is destroyed till warned by an apostle.
Choice of good in this world or the next.
Muḥammad is not to associate others with God.
Kindness to parents enjoined.
Moderation to be practised.
Infanticide and fornication are sins.
Homicide is not to be avenged except for just cause.
Honesty and humility inculcated.
The angels are not the daughters of God.
If there were other gods, they would rebel against God.
All in the heavens praise Him.
Unbelievers cannot understand the Qurʾān.
The unity of God unacceptable to the Makkans.
The Resurrection.
Idolaters not to be provoked.
Some prophets preferred over others.
False gods themselves have recourse to God.
All cities to be destroyed before the Judgment Day.
Had Muḥammad been sent with signs, the Makkans would have disbelieved them like S̤amūd.
The vision (of the Night Journey) and the Zaqqūm tree of hell, are causes of contention.
Iblīs’ disobedience and fall.
He is given permission to delude men.
Safety by land and sea a special mercy from God.
All shall have justice at the Last Day.
The S̤aqīf tribe at at̤-T̤āʾif nearly seduced Muḥammad into promulgating an unauthorised sentence.
Injunction to pray.
Man is ungrateful.
Departure of the spirit.
Mankind and jinns together could not produce the like of the Qurʾān.
Signs demanded of Muḥammad.
He is only a mortal.
Fate of those who disbelieve in the Resurrection.
Moses brought nine signs, but Pharaoh disbelieved in them.
His fate.
The children of Israel succeeded him in his possessions.
The Qurʾān was revealed as occasion required.
Those who believe the scripture recognise it.
God and the Merciful One are not two gods, for God has no partner.
Chapter XVI.
Sūratu ʾn-Naḥl.
The Chapter of the Bee.
God’s decree will come to pass.
He sends the angels to instruct his servants to give warning that there is no other God.
The creation and ordering of all natural objects are signs of His power.
The false gods are inanimate and powerless.
God is but one.
The unbelievers who call the revelation old folks’ tales, must bear the burden of their own sins.
On the Resurrection Day, their associates will disown them.
Reception by the angels of the wicked and the good in Hell and in Paradise.
The infidels strenuously deny the Resurrection.
The Muhājirūn are promised a good reward.
The Jews and Christians to be asked to confirm the Qurʾān.
All nature adores God.
Unity of God affirmed.
When in distress, men turn to God, but forget Him and become idolaters when deliverance comes.
The practice of setting aside part of their produce for the idols reproved.
The practice of female infanticide, while they ascribe daughters to God, is reproved, and disbelief in the future life also rebuked.
Satan is the patron of the infidels.
The Qurʾān sent down as a guidance and mercy.
The rain which quickens the dead earth, and the cattle which give milk, and the vines which give fruit and wine are signs.
The bee is inspired from the Lord to build hives and to use those made first by men.
Its honey is lawful.
The rich Arabs are reproved for their treatment of their slaves.
Helplessness of the false gods illustrated by the parable of the slave and of the dumb man.
Goodness of God in providing food and shelter for men.
Idolaters shall be disowned by the false gods at the Resurrection.
Every nation shall have a witness against it on that day.
Justice and good faith inculcated, especially the duty of keeping to a treaty once made.
Satan has no power over believers.
Verses of the Qurʾān abrogated.
The Holy Spirit (Gabriel) is the instrument of the revelation.
Suggestion that Muḥammad is helped by some mortal to compose the Qurʾān.
This cannot be, as the person hinted at speaks a foreign language and the Qurʾān is in Arabic.
Denunciation of misbelievers.
Warning of the fate Makkah is to expect if its inhabitants continue to disbelieve.
Unlawful foods.
God will forgive wrong done through ignorance.
Abraham was Ḥanīf.
The ordinance of the Sabbath.
Muḥammad is to dispute with his opponents kindly.
The believers are not to take too savage revenge.
They are exhorted to patience and trust in God.
Chapter XIII.
Sūratu ʾr-Raʿd.
The Chapter of Thunder.
The Qurʾān a revelation from the Lord, the Creator and Governor of all.
Misbelievers are threatened.
God knows all, and the recording angels are ever present.
Lightning and thunder celebrate God’s praises.
All in heaven and earth acknowledge Him.
God sends rain and causes the torrents to flow.
The scum thereof is like the dross on smelted ore.
The righteous and the believers are promised Paradise, and the misbelievers are threatened with hell-fire.
Exhortation to believe in the Merciful.
Were the Qurʾān to convulse nature, they would not believe.
Further threats against misbelievers.
God notes the deeds of every soul.
Stratagem unavailing against Him.
Paradise and Hell.
Muḥammad bidden to persevere in asserting the unity of God.
Had he not followed the Qurʾān, God would have forsaken him.
Other apostles have had wives and children.
None could bring a sign without God’s permission.
For every period there is a revelation.
God can annul or confirm any part of His revelation which He pleases.
He has the Mother of the Book (i.e. the Eternal Original).
Whether Muḥammad live to see his predictions fulfilled or not, God only knows.
His duty is only to preach the message.
The conquests of Islām pointed to.
God will support the prophets against misbelievers.
Chapter XXIX.
Sūratu ʾl-ʿAnkabūt.
The Chapter of the Spider.
Believers must be proved.
Kindness to be shown to parents; but they are not to be obeyed if they endeavour to lead their children to idolatry.
The hypocrites stand by the Muslims only in success.
The unbelievers try to seduce the believers by offering to bear their sins.
Noah delivered from the deluge.
Abraham preaches against idolatry.
Is cast into the fire, but saved.
Flees from his native land.
Isaac and Jacob born to him.
Lot and the fate of the inhabitants of Sodom.
Midian and their prophet Shuʿaib.
ʿĀd and S̤amūd.
Fate of Qārūn, Pharaoh, and Hāmān.
Similitude of the spider.
Muḥammad bidden to rehearse the Qurʾān.
Prayer enjoined.
Those who have scriptures are to be mildly dealt with in disputation.
They believe in the Qurʾān.
Muḥammad unable to read.
Signs are only in the power of God.
The idolaters reproved, and threatened with punishment.
The believers promised reward.
God provides for all.
This world is but a sport.
God saves men in dangers by sea, yet they are ungrateful.
The territory of Makkah inviolable.
Exhortation to strive for the faith.
Chapter VII.
Sūratu ʾl-Aʿrāf.
The Chapter of al-Aʿrāf.
Muḥammad is bidden to accept the Qurʾān fearlessly.
The Makkans must take warning by the fate of those who rejected the prophets of old.
The creation and fall of Adam.
Iblīs allowed to tempt mankind.
Men are to go to mosque decently clad.
God has only prohibited sinful actions.
Men are warned not to reject the mission of the apostles.
Their punishment at and after death if they do so.
The happiness of believers in Paradise.
Description of al-Aʿrāf, the partition between heaven and hell.
Immediate belief in the Qurʾān required.
God the Creator.
Humble and secret prayer enjoined.
Proofs of God’s goodness.
Noah sent to warn his people.
He is saved in the ark while they are drowned.
Hūd sent to ʿĀd.
They reject his preaching and are punished.
Ṣāliḥ sent to S̤amūd.
Produces the she-camel as a sign.
The people hamstring her and are punished.
Lot sent to the people of Sodom.
Their punishment.
Shuʿaib sent to Midian.
His people reject him and are destroyed.
Thus city after city was destroyed for rejecting the apostles.
Moses sent to Pharaoh.
The miracles of the snake and the white hand.
The magicians contend with Moses, are overcome and believe.
Pharaoh punishes them.
The slaughter of the first-born.
The plagues of Egypt.
The Israelites are delivered.
Moses communes with God, who appears to him on the mount.
The giving of the Law.
The golden calf.
Moses’ wrath against Aaron.
The seventy elders.
The coming of Muḥammad, the illiterate Prophet, foretold.
Some Jews are just and rightly guided.
The division into twelve tribes.
The miracle of smiting the rock.
The manna and quails.
The command to enter the city, saying, “Ḥit̤t̤atun,” and punishment for disobedience.
The Sabbath-breaking city.
The transformation of the wicked inhabitants into apes.
The dispersion of the Jews.
The mountain held over the Jews.
The covenant of God with the posterity of Adam.
Am I not your Lord?
Humiliation of one who, having foretold the coming of a prophet in the time of Muḥammad, would not acknowledge the latter as such.
Many, both of the jinn and of mankind, predestined to hell.
The names of God are not to be perverted.
Muḥammad is not possessed.
The coming of the Hour.
Creation of Adam and Eve.
Conception and birth of their first child, ʿAbdu ʾl-Hāris̤.
Their idolatry.
Idols are themselves servants of God.
They have neither life nor senses.
Muḥammad is bidden to treat his opponents with mildness.
The mention of God’s name repels devilish influences.
Men are recommended to listen to the Qurʾān and to humble themselves before God, whom the angels adore.
Chapter CXIII.
Sūratu ʾl-Falaq.
The Chapter of the Daybreak.
The Prophet seeks refuge in God from evil influences.
Chapter CXIV.
Sūratu ʾn-Nās.
The Chapter of Men.
The Prophet seeks refuge in God from the devil and his evil suggestions.
THE SIXTH AND LAST PERIOD.
Twenty Sūrahs given at al-Madīnah.
Chapter XCVIII.
Sūratu ʾl-Baiyinah.
The Chapter of the Manifest Sign.
Rebuke to Jews and Christians for doubting the manifest sign of Muḥammad’s mission.
Chapter II.
Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah.
The Chapter of the Heifer.
The Qurʾān a guidance.
Rebuke to unbelievers.
A parable of one who kindles fire.
God is not ashamed of trifling similitudes.
The creation of man.
Adam taught the names.
Iblīs refuses to adore him.
The temptation and fall.
The Children of Israel.
Their trials in Egypt.
The golden calf.
The manna and quails.
Bidden to enter the city and say, “Ḥit̤t̤atun.”
Moses strikes the rock.
He bids the people slaughter a dun cow to discover a murder.
Charge against the Jews of corrupting the Scriptures.
The golden calf.
The mountain held over them.
Gabriel reveals the Qurʾān.
Hārūt and Mārūt.
Believers are not to say “Rāʿinā,” but “Unz̤urnā.”
Verses which are annulled will be replaced by better ones.
Paradise not exclusively for Jews and Christians.
Mosques to be free.
Story of Abraham.
He rebuilds the Kaʿbah.
Was a Ḥanīf.
The qiblah free.
Aṣ-Ṣafā and al-Marwah may be compassed.
Proofs of God’s unity.
Lawful and unlawful food.
The law of retaliation for homicide.
Testators.
The fast of Ramaẓān.
Rites of the pilgrimage.
Its duration.
Fighting for religion lawful during the sacred months.
Wine and gaming forbidden.
Marriage with idolaters unlawful.
The law of divorce.
Of suckling children.
The Muhājirūn to be rewarded.
The Children of Israel demand a king.
Saul (T̤ālūt).
The shechina.
The ark.
Saul and Gideon confounded.
Goliath.
Jesus.
The Āyatu ʾl-kursī (verse of the throne), asserting the self-subsistence and omnipresence of God.
Nimrod and Abraham.
Almsgiving.
No compulsion in religion.
Proofs of the Resurrection.
Ezekiel’s vision of the dry bones referred to.
Abraham and the birds.
Almsgiving recommended.
Usurers denounced.
Laws relating to debt and trading.
Persons mentally incapable are to act by agents.
The believer’s prayer.
Chapter III.
Sūratu Āli ʿImrān.
The Chapter of ʿImrān’s Family.
God’s unity and self-subsistence.
The Qurʾān confirmatory of previous scripture.
The verses are either decisive or ambiguous.
Example of Pharaoh’s punishment.
The battle of Badr.
Islām the true religion.
Future torment eternal.
Obedience to God and the Apostle enjoined.
Conception of the Virgin Mary.
She is brought up by Zachariah.
Birth of John.
The annunciation of the Virgin.
Birth and infancy of Jesus.
The miracle of the birds of clay.
The disciples.
Allusion to Muḥammad’s dispute with a Christian deputation from Najrān.
Abraham a Ḥanīf.
Reproof to Jews who pretend to believe and then recant, and who pervert the scriptures.
No distinction to be made between the prophets.
The Jews rebuked for prohibiting certain kinds of food.
The foundation of the Kaʿbah.
Abraham’s station.
Pilgrimage enjoined.
Schism and misbelief reproved.
Battle of Uḥud referred to.
The victory at Badr due to angelic aid.
Usury denounced.
Fate of those who rejected the prophets of old.
Muḥammad’s death must not divert the believers from their faith.
Promise of God’s help.
Further account of the battle of Badr.
The Muslim martyrs to enter Paradise.
The victory of Badr more than counterbalanced the defeat at Uḥud.
The hypocrites detected and reproved.
Death the common lot, even of apostles.
Prayer for the believers.
Exhortation to vie in good works and be patient.
Chapter VIII.
Sūratu ʾl-Anfāl.
The Chapter of the Spoils.
Spoils belong to God and the Apostle.
Who are the true believers?
The expedition of Muḥammad against the caravan from Syria under Abū Sufyān.
The miraculous victory at Badr.
Address to the Makkans who, fearing an attack from Muḥammad, took sanctuary in the Kaʿbah, and prayed to God to decide between themselves and him.
Exhortation to believe and avoid treachery.
Plots against Muḥammad frustrated by Divine interference.
The revelation treated as old folks’ tales.
Rebuke of the idolaters for mocking the Muslims at prayer.
Offer of an amnesty to those who will believe.
Exhortation to fight the infidels.
Division of the spoils.
Description of the battle.
The enemy made to seem few in the Muslim’s eyes, while they seemed more numerous than they really were.
The infidels forsaken by Satan, their leader, on the day of battle.
Fate of the hypocrites.
Warning from Pharaoh’s fate.
The infidels who break their treaty.
Treachery to be met with the like.
God will help the Prophet against the traitors.
A few enduring believers shall conquer a multitude of infidels.
The Muslims are reproved for accepting ransom for the captives taken at Badr.
The spoils are lawful.
The Muhājirūn who fled with Muḥammad, and the inhabitants of al-Madīnah who gave him refuge, are to form ties of brotherhood.
Chapter XLVII.
Sūratu Muḥammad.
The Chapter of Muḥammad.
Promise of reward to believers.
Exhortation to deal severely with the enemy.
Description of Paradise and of Hell.
Reproof to some pretended believers and hypocrites who hesitate to obey the command to make war against the unbelievers.
Their secret malice shall be revealed.
Exhortation to believe, and to obey God and the Apostles, and sacrifice all for the faith.
Chapter LXII.
Sūratu ʾl-Jumaʿah.
The Chapter of the Congregation.
God has sent the illiterate prophet.
The Jews rebuked for unbelief.
Muslims are not to leave the congregation during divine service for the sake of merchandise.
Chapter V.
Sūratu ʾl-Māʾidah.
The Chapter of the Table.
Believers are to fulfil their compacts.
Brute beasts, except those hereafter mentioned, are lawful, but chase during the pilgrimage is unlawful.
The rites and sacrifices of the Pilgrimage are lawful.
The Muslims are not to bear ill-will against the Quraish, who prevented them at Ḥudaibiyah from making the Pilgrimage.
Forbidden meats.
The food of Jews and Christians is lawful to Muslims.
So, too, their women.
Ablutions before prayers.
Rules for purification in cases of pollution.
The Muslims are bidden to remember the oath of fealty (at ʿAqabah), and how God made a similar covenant with the children of Israel, and chose twelve wardens.
Muḥammad is warned against their treachery, as well as against the Christians.
Refutation of the doctrine that Christ is God, and of the idea that the Jews and Christians are the sons of God and His beloved.
Muḥammad sent as a warner and herald of glad tidings.
Moses bade the children of Israel invade the Holy Land, and they were punished for hesitating.
Story of the two sons of Adam.
The crow shows Cain how to bury the body of Abel.
Gravity of homicide.
Those who make war against God and His Apostle are not to receive quarter.
Punishment for theft.
Muḥammad is to judge both Jews and Christians by the Qurʾān, in accordance with their own Scriptures, but not according to their lusts.
Or would they prefer to be judged according to the unjust laws of the time of the pagan Arabs?
The Muslims are not to take Jews and Christians for patrons.
The hypocrites hesitate to join the believers.
They are threatened.
Further appeals to the Jews and Christians.
Fate of those before them who were transformed for their sins.
The Jews reproved for saying that God’s hand is fettered.
Some of them are moderate, but the greater part are misbelievers.
The Prophet is bound to preach his message.
Sabians, Jews, and Christians appealed to as believers.
Prophets of old were rejected.
Against the worship of the Messiah and the doctrine of the Trinity.
Jews and idolaters are the most hostile to the Muslims, and the Christians are nearest in love to them.
Expiation for an inconsiderate oath.
Wine and gambling forbidden.
Game not to be hunted or eaten during pilgrimage.
Expiation for violating this precept.
Fish is lawful at this time.
Rites of the Ḥajj to be observed.
Believers must not ask about painful things till the whole Qurʾān is revealed.
Denunciation of the superstitious practices of the Pagan Arabs with respect to certain cattle.
Witnesses required when a dying man makes his testament.
The mission of Jesus.
The miracles of the infancy.
The Apostles ask for a table from heaven as a sign.
Jesus denies commanding men to worship him and his mother as gods.
Chapter LIX.
Sūratu ʾl-Ḥashr.
The Chapter of Assembly.
The chastisements of the Jews who would not believe in the Qurʾān.
The divisions of the spoils.
The treacherous conduct of the hypocrites.
Chapter IV.
Sūratu ʾn-Nisāʾ.
The Chapter of Women.
God creates and watches over man.
Women’s dowries.
Administration of the property of orphans and idiots.
Distribution of property among the heirs.
Witnesses required to prove adultery.
Believers are not to inherit women’s estates against their will.
No false charge of adultery to be made with a view of keeping a woman’s dowry.
Women whom it is unlawful to marry.
Men are superior to women.
Punishment of refractory wives.
Arbitration between man and wife.
Duty towards parents, kinsmen, orphans, the poor, neighbours, &c.
Almsgiving for appearance sake a crime.
Believers must not pray when drunk or polluted.
Sand may be used for purification when water is not to be had.
Charge against Jews of perverting the Scriptures and saying, “Rāʿinā.”
They are threatened with transformation, like those who broke the Sabbath, for their unbelief.
Idolatry the unpardonable sin.
Some who have Scriptures believe.
Trusts to be paid back.
Quarrels to be referred to God and the apostles only.
The Apostle will intercede for the believers.
Muḥammad commanded to settle their differences.
Believers to take precautions in sallying forth to battle.
They are exhorted to fight, and promised Paradise if they fall.
Obedience to the Prophet is obedience to God.
Salutation to be returned.
The hypocrites.
Deserters are to be slain, unless they have taken refuge with a tribe in league with the Muslims.
Penalty for killing a believer by mistake.
Believers are not to plunder others on the mere pretence that they are infidels.
Fate of the half-hearted Muslims who fell at Badr.
Precautions to be taken against an attack during prayers.
Exhortation to sincerity in supporting the faith.
Rebuke to the pagan Arabs for their idolatry and superstitious practices.
Islām the best religion, being that of Abraham the Ḥanīf.
Laws respecting women and orphans.
Equity and kindness recommended.
Partiality to one wife rather than another reproved.
Fear of God inculcated.
God does not pardon the unstable in faith or the hypocrites.
No middle course is allowed.
The Jews were punished for demanding a book from heaven.
Of old they asked Moses to show them God openly, and were punished.
They are reproached for breaking their covenant with God, for calumniating Mary, and for pretending that they killed Jesus, whereas they only killed his similitude, for God took him to Himself.
Certain lawful foods forbidden the Jews for their injustice and usury.
Muḥammad is inspired in the same manner as the other apostles and prophets.
Jesus is only an apostle of God and His Word, and a spirit from Him.
Doctrine of the Trinity denounced.
God has not begotten a son.
The law of inheritance in the case of remote kinship.
Chapter LVIII.
Sūratu ʾl-Mujādilah.
The Chapter of the Disputer.
Abolition of the idolatrous custom of divorcing women with the formula, “Thou art to me as my mother’s back.”
God’s omniscience and omnipresence.
He knows the secret plottings of the disaffected.
Discourse on the duties of true believers.
Denunciation of those who oppose the Apostle.
Chapter LXV.
Sūratu ʾt̤-T̤alāq.
The Chapter of Divorce.
The laws of divorce.
The Arabs are admonished by the fate of former nations to believe in God.
The seven stories of heaven and earth.
Chapter LXIII.
Sūratu ʾl-Munāfīqīn.
The Chapter of the Hypocrites.
The treacherous designs of the hypocrites revealed.
Chapter XXIV.
Sūratu ʾn-Nūr.
The Chapter of Light.
(This chapter deals with the accusation of unchastity against ʿĀyishah.)
Punishment of the whore and the whoremonger.
Witnesses required in the case of an imputation of unchastity to a wife.
Vindication of ʿĀyishah’s character and denunciation of the accusers.
Scandalmongers rebuked and threatened with punishment at the Last Day.
Believers are not to enter other persons’ houses without permission, or in the absence of the owners.
Chastity and modest deportment enjoined, particularly upon women.
Those by whom women may be seen unveiled.
Slaves to be allowed to purchase their freedom.
Slave-girls not to be compelled to prostitute themselves.
God the Light of the Heavens.
Nothing keeps the believers from the service of God, but the unbeliever’s works are like the mirage on a plain, or like darkness on a deep sea.
All nature is subject to God’s control.
Reproof to a sect who would not accept the Prophet’s arbitration.
Actual obedience required rather than an oath that they will be obedient.
Belief in the unity of God, steadfastness in prayer, and the giving of alms enjoined.
Slaves and children not to be admitted into an apartment without asking permission, when the occupant is likely to be undressed.
Rules for the social intercourse of women past child-bearing, and of the blind, lame, or sick.
Persons in whose houses it is lawful to eat food.
Salutations to be exchanged on entering houses.
Behaviour of the Muslims towards the Apostle.
He is to be more respectfully addressed than other people.
Chapter XXXIII.
Sūratu ʾl-Aḥzāb.
The Chapter of the Confederates.
Muḥammad is warned against the hypocrites.
Wives divorced by the formula, “Thou art henceforth to me like my mother’s back,” are not to be considered as real mothers, and as such regarded as unlawful.
Neither are adopted sons to be looked upon as real sons.
The real ties of kinship and consanguinity are to supersede the tie of sworn brotherhood.
God’s covenant with the Prophet.
Miraculous interference in favour of the Muslims when besieged by the confederate army at al-Madīnah.
Conduct of the hypocrites on the occasion.
Departure of the invaders.
Siege and defeat of the Banū Quraiz̤ah Jews.
The men are executed.
Their women and children are sold into slavery and their property confiscated.
Laws for the Prophet’s wives.
They are to be discreet and avoid ostentation.
Encouragement to the good and true believers of either sex.
Vindication of Muḥammad’s conduct in marrying Zainab, the divorced wife of his freed man and adopted son Zaid (who is mentioned by name).
No term need be observed in the case of women divorced before cohabitation.
Peculiar privileges granted to Muḥammad in the matter of women.
Limitation of his licence to take wives.
Muslims are not to enter the Prophet’s house without permission.
After, they are to retire without inconveniencing him by familiar discourse.
Are to be very modest in their demeanour to his wives.
Are not to marry any of his wives after him.
Those relations who are permitted to see them unveiled.
God and His angels bless the Prophet.
Slander of misbelievers will be punished.
The women are to dress modestly.
Warning to the hypocrites and disaffected at al-Madīnah.
The fate of the infidels at the Last Judgment.
Man alone of all creation undertook the responsibility of faith.
Chapter LVII.
Sūratu ʾl-Ḥadīd.
The Chapter of Iron.
God the controller of all nature.
Exhortation to embrace Islām.
Those who do so before the taking of Makkah are to have the precedence.
Discomfiture of the hypocrites and unbelievers at the Last Day.
The powers vouchsafed to former apostles.
Chapter LXI.
Sūratu ʾṣ-Ṣaff.
The Chapter of the Ranks.
Believers are bidden to keep their word and to fight for the faith.
Moses was disobeyed by his people.
Jesus prophesied the coming of Aḥmad.
The Christians rebuked.
Chapter XLVIII.
Sūratu ʾl-Fatḥ.
The Chapter of Victory.
Announcement of a victory.
God comforts the believers and punishes the hypocrites and idolaters.
The oath of fealty.
The cowardice and excuses of the desert Arabs.
Those left behind wish to share the spoil gained at K͟haibar.
The incapacitated alone are to be excused.
The oath of fealty at the tree.
God prevented a collision between the Makkans and the Muslims, when the latter were prohibited from making the pilgrimage.
Prophecy of the pilgrimage to be completed the next year.
Chapter LX.
Sūratu ʾl-Mumtaḥinah.
The Chapter of the Tried.
Exhortations to the Muslims not to treat secretly with the Quraish.
Abraham’s example.
Other idolaters who have not borne arms against them may be made friends of.
Women who desert from the infidels are to be tried before being received into Islām.
If they are really believers, they are, ipso facto, divorced.
The husbands are to be recompensed to the amount of the women’s dowries.
Chapter LXVI.
Sūratu ʾt-Taḥrīm.
The Chapter of Prohibition.
The Prophet is relieved from a vow he had made to please his wives.
The jealousies in his ḥaram occasioned by his intrigue with the Coptic slave-girl, Mary.
Exhortation to hostilities against the infidels.
The example of the disobedient wives of Noah and Lot.
And of the good wife of Pharaoh.
And of the Virgin Mary.
Chapter IX.
Sūratu ʾt-Taubah.
The Chapter of Repentance.
(This chapter is without the initial formula, “In the name of the Merciful,” &c.)
An immunity for four months proclaimed to such of the idolaters as have made a league with the Prophet, but they are to be killed wherever found when the sacred months have expired.
An idolater seeking refuge is to be helped, in order that he may hear the word of God.
None are to be included in the immunity but those with whom the league was made at the Sacred Mosque.
They are not to be trusted.
Exhortation to fight against the Makkans.
Idolaters may not repair to the mosques of God.
Reproof to al-ʿAbbās, the Prophet’s uncle, who, while refusing to believe, claimed to have done enough in supplying water to the pilgrims and in making the pilgrimage himself.
Chapter XLIX.
Sūratu ʾl-Ḥujurāt.
The Chapter of the Inner Chambers.
Rebuke to some of the Muslims who had presumed too much in the presence of the Apostle, and of the others who had called out rudely to him.
Also of a man who had nearly induced Muḥammad to attack a tribe who were still obedient.
Of certain Muslims who contended together.
Of others who use epithets of abuse against each other.
Who entertain unfounded suspicions.
Exhortation to obedience and reproof of the hypocrites.
The Muhājirūn are to hold the first rank.
Infidels are not to be taken for patrons, even when they are fathers or brothers.
Religion is to be preferred to ties of kinship.
The victory of Ḥunain.
The idolaters are not to be allowed to enter the Sacred Mosque at Makkah another year.
The infidels are to be attacked.
The Jews denounced for saying that Ezra is the son of God.
The assumption of the title Rabbi reproved.
Diatribe against Jewish doctors and Christian monks.
Of the sacred months and the sin of deferring them.
Exhortation to the Muslims to march forth to battle.
Allusions to the escape of Muḥammad and Abū Bakr from Makkah, and their concealment in a cave.
Rebuke to those who seek to be excused from fighting and to those who sought to excite sedition in the Muslim ranks.
Reproof to the hypocrites and half-hearted and to those who found fault with the Prophet for his use of the alms (zakāt).
Proper destination of the alms.
Hypocrites and renegades denounced.
They are warned by the example of the people of old who rejected the Prophets.
Rewards promised to the true believers.
Continued denunciation of the hypocrites and of those who held back from the fight.
Muḥammad is not to pray at the grave of any one of them who dies.
Their seeming prosperity is not to deceive him.
Happiness in store for the Apostle, the believers, and the Muhājirūn.
Those who may lawfully be excused military service.
The desert Arabs are among the worst of the hypocrites, though some believe.
Some people of al-Madīnah also denounced as hypocrites.
Others have sinned but confessed.
Others wait for God’s pleasure.
Denunciation of some who had set up a mosque from motives of political opposition.
Muḥammad is not to sanction this mosque, but rather to use that of Qubāʾ, founded by him while on his way from Makkah to al-Madīnah during the Flight.
God has bought the persons and wealth of the believers at the price of Paradise.
The Prophet and the believers must not ask forgiveness for the idolaters, however near of kin.
Abraham only asked pardon for his idolatrous father in fulfilment of a promise.
The three Anṣārs who refused to accompany Muḥammad to Tabūk are forgiven.
The people of al-Madīnah and the neighbouring Arabs blamed for holding back on the occasion.
All sacrifices for the sake of the religion are counted to them.
Exhortation to fight rigorously against the infidels.
Reproof to those who receive the revelation suspiciously.
God will stand by his Apostle.
V.—Sources of the Qurʾān.
Muḥammadanism owes more to Judaism (see a book by M. Geiger, entitled, Was hat Muhammed aus dem Judenthume aufgenommen, in which that learned Jew has traced all the leading features of Islām to Talmudic sources; also Literary Remains of Emanuel Deutsch, Essay on Islām; also article on JUDAISM in the present work) than it does to either Christianity or Sabeanism, for it is simply Talmudic Judaism adapted to Arabia, plus the Apostleship of Jesus and Muḥammad; and wherever Muḥammad departs from the monotheistic principles of Judaism, as in the idolatrous practices of the Pilgrimage to the Kaʿbah, it is evident that it is done as a necessary concession to the national feelings and sympathies of the people of Arabia, and it is absolutely impossible for Muḥammadan divines to reconcile the idolatrous rites of the Kaʿbah with that simple monotheism which it was evidently Muḥammad’s intention to establish in Arabia.
“The sources (says Mr. Rodwell) whence Muhammad derived the materials of his Korân, are, over and above the more poetical parts which are his own creation, the legends of his time and country, Jewish traditions based upon the Talmud, and the Christian traditions of Arabia and of S. Syria. At a later period of his career, no one would venture to doubt the divine origin of his whole book. But at its commencement the case was different. The people of Mecca spoke openly and tauntingly of it as the work of a poet, as a collection of antiquated or fabulous legends, or as palpable sorcery. They accused him of having confederates, and even specified foreigners who had been his coadjutors. Such were Salman the Persian (Salmān al-Fārisī), to whom he may have owed the descriptions of heaven and hell, which are analogous to those of the Zendavesta; and the Christian monk Sergius, or, as the Muhammadans term him, Boheira (Buḥairah). From the latter, and perhaps from other Christians, especially slaves naturalized at Mecca, Muhammad obtained access to the teaching of the Apocryphal Gospels, and to many popular traditions of which those gospels are the concrete expression. His wife Chadijah (K͟hadījah), as well as her cousin Waraka (Waraqah), a reputed convert to Christianity, and Muhammad’s intimate friend, are said to have been well acquainted with the doctrines and sacred books, both of Jews and Christians. And not only were several Arab tribes in the neighbourhood of Mecca converts to the Christian faith, but on two occasions Muhammad had travelled with his uncle Abu Talib, as far as Bostra, where he must have had opportunities of learning the general outlines of Oriental Christian doctrine, and perhaps of witnessing the ceremonial of their worship.
* * *
“It has been supposed that Muhammad derived many of his notions concerning Christianity from Gnosticism and that it is to the numerous Gnostic sects the Korân alludes when it reproaches the Christians with having ‘split up their religion into parties.’ But for Muhammad thus to have confounded Gnosticism with Christianity itself, its prevalence in Arabia must have been far more universal than we have reason to believe that it really was. In fact, we have no historical authority for supposing that the doctrines of these heretics were taught or professed in Arabia at all. It is certain, on the other hand, that the Basilidans, Valentinians, and other Gnostic sects had either died out, or been reabsorbed into the Orthodox Church, towards the middle of the fifth century, and had disappeared from Egypt before the sixth. It remains possible, however, that the Gnostic doctrine concerning the Crucifixion may have been adopted by Muhammad as likely to reconcile the Jews to Islam, as a religion embracing both Judaism and Christianity, if they might believe that Jesus had not been put to death, and thus find the stumbling-block of the Atonement removed out of their path. The Jews would, in this case, have simply been called upon to believe in Jesus as a divinely born and inspired teacher, who, like the patriarch Enoch, or the prophet Elijah, had been miraculously taken from the earth. But, in all other respects, the sober and matter-of-fact statements of the Korân, relative to the family and history of Jesus, are opposed to the wild and fantastic doctrines of Gnostic emanations, and especially to the manner in which they supposed Jesus, at his baptism, to have been brought into union with a higher nature. It is more clear that Muhammad borrowed in several points from the doctrines of the Ebionites, Essenes, and Sabeites. Epiphanius describes the notions of the Ebionites of Nabathæa, Moabites, and Basanites, with regard to Adam Jesus, almost in the very words of Sura iii. 52. He tells us that they observed circumcision, were opposed to celibacy, forbade turning to the sunrise, but enjoined Jerusalem as their Kebla (Qiblah), (as did Muhammad during twelve years), that they prescribed (as did the Sabeites) washings, very similar to those enjoined in the Korân, and allowed oaths (by certain natural objects, as clouds, signs of the Zodiac, oil, the winds, etc.), which also we find adopted therein. These points of contact with Islam, knowing as we do Muhammad’s eclecticism, can hardly be accidental.
“We have no evidence that Muhammad had access to the Christian scriptures, though it is just possible that fragments of the Old or New Testament may have reached him through Chadijah or Waraka, or other Meccan Christians, possessing MSS. of our sacred volume. There is but one direct quotation (Sura xxi. 105) in the whole Korân from the Scriptures; and though there are a few passages, as where alms, are said to be given to be seen of men, and as, none forgiveth sins but God only, which might seem to be identical with texts of the New Testament, yet this similarity is probably merely accidental. It is, however, curious to compare such passages as Deut. xxvi. 14, 17, and 1 Peter v. 2, with Sura xxiv. 50, and Sura x. 73—John vii. 15, with the ‘illiterate’ prophet—Matt. xxiv. 36, and John xii. 27, with the use of the word hour, as meaning any judgment or crisis, and the last Judgment—the voice of the Son of God which the dead are to hear, with the exterminating or awakening cry of Gabriel, etc. The passages of this kind, with which the Korân abounds, result from Muhammad’s general acquaintance with scriptural phraseology, partly through the popular legends, partly from personal intercourse with Jews and Christians. And we may be quite certain that, whatever materials Muhammad may have derived from our Scriptures, directly or indirectly, were carefully recast.
“It should also be borne in mind that we have no clear traces of the existence of Arabic versions of the Old or New Testament previous to the time of Muhammad. The passage of St. Jerome—‘Hæc autem translatio nullum de veteribus sequitur interpretem; sed ex ipso Hebraico, Arabicoque sermone, et interdum Syro, nunc verba, nunc sensum, nunc simul utrumque resonabit’ (Prol. Gal.), obviously does not refer to versions, but to idiom. The earliest Ar. version of the Old Testament of which we have any knowledge is that of R. Saadias Gaon, A.D. 900: and the oldest Ar. version of the New Testament is that published by Erpenius in 1616, and transcribed in the Thebais, in the year 1271, by a Coptic bishop, from a copy made by a person whose name is known, but whose date is uncertain. Michaelis thinks that the Arabic versions of the New Testament were made between the Saracen conquests in the seventh century and the Crusades in the eleventh century—an opinion in which he follows, or coincides with, Walton (Prol. in Polygl. § xiv.), who remarks—‘Plane constat versionem Arabicam apud eas (ecclesias orientales) factam esse postquam lingua Arabica per victorias et religionem Muhammedanicam per Orientem propagata fuerat, et in multis locis facta esset vernacula.’ If, indeed, in these comparatively late versions, the general phraseology, especially in the histories common to the Scriptures and to the Korân, bore any similarity to each other, and if the orthography of the proper names had been the same in each, it might have been fair to suppose that such versions had been made, more or less, upon the basis of others, which, though now lost, existed in the ages prior to Muhammad, and influenced, if they did not directly form, his sources of information. But this does not appear to be the case. The phraseology of our existing versions is not that of the Korân, and the versions as a whole appear to have been made from the Septuagint, the Vulgate, Syriac, Coptic, and Greek; Tischendorf, indeed, says that the four Gospels originem mixtam habere videntur; but the internal evidence is clearly in favour of the Greek origin of the Arabic Gospels. This can be seen in part even from the order of the words, which was retained, like that of the Greek, so far as possible, even in such constructions and transpositions of words as violate the rules of Arabic Syntax.
“From the Arab Jews, Muhammad would be enabled to derive an abundant though distorted knowledge of the Scripture histories. The secrecy in which he received his instructions from them and from his Christian informants, enabled him boldly to declare to the ignorant pagan Meccans that God had revealed those Biblical histories to him. But there can be no doubt, from the constant identity between the Talmudic perversions of Scripture histories and the statements of the Korân, that the Rabbis of Hejaz communicated their legends to Muhammad. And it should be remembered that the Talmud was completed a century previous to the era of Muhammad, and cannot fail to have extensively influenced the religious creed of all the Jews of the Arabian peninsula. In one passage, Muhammad speaks of an individual Jew—perhaps some one of note among his professed followers, as a witness to his mission; and there can be no doubt that his relations with the Jews were, at one time, those of friendship and intimacy, when we find him speaking of their recognizing him as they do their own children, and blaming their most colloquial expressions. It is impossible, however, for us at this distance of time to penetrate the mystery in which this subject is involved. Yet certain it is, that, although their testimony against Muhammad was speedily silenced, the Koreish knew enough of his private history to disbelieve and to disprove his pretensions of being the recipient of a divine revelation, and to accuse him of writing from the dictation of teachers morning and evening. And it is equally certain that all the information received by Muhammad was embellished and recast in his own mind and with his own words. There is a unity of thought, a directness and simplicity of purpose, a peculiar and laboured style, a uniformity of diction, coupled with a certain deficiency of imaginative power, which indicate that the ayats (signs or verses) of the Korân are the product of a single mind. The longer narratives were, probably, elaborated in his leisure hours, while the shorter verses, each proclaiming to be a sign or miracle, were promulgated as occasion required them. And, whatever Muhammad may himself profess in the Korân as to his ignorance even of reading and writing, and however strongly modern Muhammadans may insist upon the same point—an assertion, by the way, contradicted by many good authors—there can be no doubt that to assimilate and work up his materials, to fashion them into elaborate Suras, and to fit them for public recital, must have been a work requiring much time, study, and meditation, and presumes a far greater degree of general culture than any orthodox Muslim will be disposed to admit.” (The Preface to Rodwell’s El-Korân, p. xvi. et seq.)
VI.—The Recital and Reading of the Qurʾān.
Tilāwah (تلاوة), or “the recital of the Qurʾān,” has been developed into a science known as ʿIlmu ʾt-Tajwīd (علم التجويد), which includes a knowledge of the peculiarities of the spelling of many words in the Qurʾān; of the qirāʾāt (قراءات), or various readings; of the ejaculations, responses, and prayers to be said at the close of appointed passages; of the various divisions, punctuations, and marginal instructions; of the proper pronunciation of the Arabic words; and of the correct intonation of different passages.
The reading or recital of the Qurʾān should commence with legal ablution and prayer. The usual prayer is, “I seek protection from God against the cursed Satan!” which is followed by the invocation, “In the name of God the Merciful, the Compassionate!”
The mosque is considered the most suitable of all places in which to read the Qurʾān, and the most auspicious days of the week are Friday, Monday, and Thursday. The ordinary time allowed for reading the Qurʾān through is forty days, although by reciting a juzʾ or sīpārah daily, it can be done in thirty days, which is said to have been the custom of the Prophet. Some read it through by manzils, or stages, of which there are seven, which is done in a week. On no account should it be read through in less than three days, for which there is a three-fold division, known in Persian as the K͟hatam-i-Manzil-i-Fīl, the initial letters of each portion (فى ال) forming the word fīl.
Ejaculations, or responses, are made at certain places. For example, at the end of the Sūratu ʾl-Fātiḥah (i.) and of the Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), say, “Amen!” At the end of the Sūratu Banī Isrāʾīl (xvii.), say, “God is great!” After the last verse of the Sūratu ʾl-Qiyāmah (lxxv.), say, “Is He not powerful enough to raise the dead? Say, Yes, for He is my Lord Most High!” At the end of the Sūratu ʾl-Mulk (lxvii.), say, “God brings it (clear water) to us and He is Lord of all the Worlds!”
In addition to responses to be made after each Sūrah, or Chapter, there are certain ejaculations to be made after certain verses, for example, after the sixteenth verse of the third Sūrah, “There is no God but He, the Mighty, the Wise!” say, “I am a witness to this!”
There are fourteen verses known as the Ayātu ʾs-Sajdah, after which a prostration is made. They are Sūrahs vii. 205; xiii. 16; xvi. 51; vii. 109; xix. 59; xxii. 19; xxv. 61; xxvii. 26; xxxii. 15; xxxviii. 24; xli. 38; liii. 62; lxxxiv. 20; xcvi. 18.
There are numerous instructions given as to pronunciation, and there have arisen seven schools of pronunciation, which are known as those of the Qurrāʾu ʾs-Sabʿah, or “seven readers” (for a list of these readers, see QARI). It is considered quite lawful to recite the Qurʾān according to the pronunciation established by any one of these seven worthies.
There are many marks and symbols on the margin of an Arabic Qurʾān. Mr. Sell, in his Ilm i Tajwid, gives them in detail. (Ilm i Tajwid, Keys & Co., Madras, 1852.) The symbol for full stop is o, when the reader should take breath. The word سكنة is written when a slight pause is made, but no breath taken. There are also signs which are known as waqf, or pause. They were originally of five kinds, but many more have been added in modern times. They are distinguished by letters and words. [WAQF.]
There are twenty-nine Sūrahs of the Qurʾān which begin with certain letters of the alphabet. These letters, the learned say, have some profound meaning, known only to the Prophet himself, although it seems probable that they are simply marks recorded by the amanuensis.
(1) Six Sūrahs begin with the letters Alif, Lām, Mīm. الم ALM, viz. Sūrahs al-Baqarah (ii.), Ālu ʿImrān (iii.), al-ʿAnkabūt (xxix.), al-Rūm (xxx.), Luqmān (xxxi.), as-Sajdah (xxxii.). Golius thinks that they probably stand for Amr li-Muḥammad, “At the command of Muḥammad,” and to have been written by the amanuensis. Jalālu ʾd-dīn as-Suyūt̤ī says that Ibn ʿAbbās said that they stood for Anā ʾllāhu aʿlimu, “I, God, know” (that this is true). Al-Baiẓāwī thinks A stands for “Allāh,” L for “Gabriel,” and M for “Muḥammad.” Mr. Sale gives the meaning as Allāhu Lat̤ifun Majīdun, “God is gracious and exalted”; others have suggested Allāhu li-Muḥammad, “God to Muḥammad.” But the general belief is that the letters have a hidden meaning.
(2) At the commencement of Sūratu ʾl-Aʿrāf (vii.), there is Alif, Lām, Mīm, Ṣād. المص ALMṢ, which may mean: A, “Anā”; L, “Allāh”; M, “Raḥmān”; Ṣ, “Ṣamad”; i.e. “I am God, the Merciful, the Eternal.”
(3) The Sūratu ʾr-Raʿd (xiii.) begins with the letters Alif, Lām, Mīm, Rā. المر ALMR, which al-Baiẓāwī takes to mean, A, “Anā”; L, “Allāhu”; M, “Aʿlimu”; R, “Arā.” “I, God, both know and see.”
(4) Five Sūrahs begin with Alif, Lām, Rā. الر ALR, which some understand to mean Amara lī Rabbī, “My Lord hath said to me,” or Anā ʾllāhu arā, “I, God, see.” These Sūrahs are Yūnus (x.), Hūd (xi.), Yūsuf (xii.), Ibrāhīm (xiv.), al-Ḥijr (xv.).
(5) The Sūratu Maryam (xix.) begins with the letters Kāf, Hā, Yā, ʿAin, Ṣād. كهيعص KHYʿAṢ, which Ibn ʿAbbās says stand for five attributes of the Almighty: Karīm, “Gracious”; Hādi, “Guide”; Ḥakīm (taking the middle letter), “Wise”; ʿAlīm, “Learned”; Ṣādiq, “Righteous.”
(6) The Sūratu T̤H (xx.), as its title implies, begins with the letters T̤ā Hā طه, which Ḥusain says may signify T̤āhir, “Pure”; Hādi, “Guide”; being attributes of God.
(7) Six Sūrahs commence with the letters Ḥā Mīm حم, ḤM, namely, Sūrahs al-Muʾmin (xl.), Fuṣṣilat (xli.), az-Zuk͟hruf (xliii.), ad-Duk͟hān (xliv.), al-Jās̤iyah (xlv.), al-Aḥqāf (xlvi.). Ibn ʿAbbās says they indicate the attribute Raḥmān, “Merciful.”
(8) The Sūratu ʾsh-Shūrā (xlii.) begins with Ḥa Mīm ʿAin Sīn Qāf. حمعسق HMʿASQ, which Muḥammad ibn Kaʿb understood to mean Ḥ for Raḥmān, “Merciful”; M for Raḥīm, “Gracious”; ʿA, ʿAlīm, “Learned”; S, Quddūs, “Holy”; Q, Qahhār, “Dominant”; being attributes of God.
(9) The Sūratu YS (xxxvi.), as its title implies, begins with the letters Yā Sīn يس, which is supposed to stand for Yā insān, “O man!”
(10) The Sūratu Ṣ (xxxviii.), as its title signifies, begins with the letter Ṣād ص, which some say means Ṣidq, “Truth.”
(11) The Sūratu Q (l.), as its name implies, begins with the letter Qāf ق, which Jalālu ʾd-Dīn as-Suyūt̤ī says stands for Qādir, “Powerful,” an attribute of God. Others think it means the mountain of Qāf.
(12) The Sūratu ʾl-Naml (xxvii.) begins with the letters T̤ā Sīn طس, which Muḥammad ibn Kaʿb says stand for Ẕū ʾt̤-t̤aul, “Most Powerful,” and Quddūs, “Holy,” being attributes of the Almighty.
(13) Two Sūrahs, namely ash-Shuʿarāʾ (xxvi.), and al-Qaṣaṣ (xxviii.), begin with T̤ā Sīn Mīm طسم, which supplies the addition of the attribute Raḥmān, “Merciful,” to those of the former section, indicated by T̤S.
(14) The Sūratu ʾl-Qalam (lxviii.) begins with Nūn, ن N, which some say stands for an ink-horn, others for a fish, and some for the attribute of Nūr, or “Light.”
VII.—The Interpretation of the Qurʾān.
ʿIlmu ʾl-Uṣūl (علم الاصول), or the Exegesis of the Qurʾān, is a very important science, and is used by the Muslim divine to explain away many apparent or real contradictions. The most authoritative works on the ʿIlmu ʾl-Uṣūl of the Qurʾān, are Manāru ʾl-Uṣūl and its commentary, the Nūru ʾl-Anwār, and as-Suyūt̤ī’s Itqān (ed. by Sprenger). The various laws of interpretation laid down in these books are very complicated, requiring the most careful study. We have only space for a mere outline of the system.
The words (alfāz̤) of the Qurʾān are of four classes: K͟hāṣṣ, ʿĀmm, Mushtarak, and Muʾawwal.
(1) K͟hāṣṣ, Words used in a special sense. This speciality of sense is of three kinds: K͟huṣūṣu ʾl-jins, Speciality of genus, e.g. mankind; K͟huṣūṣu ʾn-nauʿ, Speciality of species, e.g. a man; K͟huṣūṣu ʾl-ʿain, Speciality of an individual, e.g. Muḥammad.
(2) ʿĀmm, Collective or common, which embrace many individuals or things, e.g. people.
(3) Mushtarak, Complex words which have several significations; e.g. ʿain, a word which signifies an Eye, a Fountain, the Knee, or the Sun.
(4) Muʾawwal, words which have several significations, all of which are possible, and so a special explanation is required. For example, Sūrah cviii. 2, reads thus in Sale’s translation: “Wherefore pray unto the Lord and slay (the victims).” The word translated “slay” is in Arabic inḥar, from the root naḥr, which has several meanings. The followers of the great Legist, Abū Ḥanīfah, render it “sacrifice,” and add the words (the “victims”). The followers of Ibn Ash-Shāfiʿī say it means “placing the hands on the breast in prayer.”
II. The Sentences (ʿIbārah) of the Qurʾān are either Z̤āhir or K͟hafī, i.e. either Obvious or Hidden.
Obvious sentences are of four classes:—Z̤āhir, Naṣṣ, Mufassar, Muḥkam.
(1.) Z̤āhir.—Those sentences, the meaning of which is Obvious or clear, without any assistance from the context (qarīnah).
(2.) Naṣṣ, a word commonly used for a text of the Qurʾān, but in its technical meaning here expressing what is meant by a sentence, the meaning of which is made clear by some word which occurs in it. The following sentence illustrates both Z̤āhir and Naṣṣ: “Take in marriage of such other women as please you, two, three, four.” This sentence is Z̤āhir, because marriage is here declared lawful; it is Naṣṣ, because the words “one, two, three, four,” which occur in the sentence, show the unlawfulness of having more than four wives.
(3.) Mufassar, or explained. A sentence which needs some word in it to explain it and make it clear. Thus: “And the angels prostrated themselves, all of them with one accord, save Iblīs (Satan).” Here the words “save Iblīs” show that he did not prostrate himself. This kind of sentence may be abrogated.
(4.) Muḥkam, or perspicuous. A sentence as to the meaning of which there can be no doubt, and which cannot be controverted, thus: “God knoweth all things.” This kind of sentence cannot be abrogated. To act on such sentences without departing from the literal sense is the highest degree of obedience to God’s command.
The difference between these sentences is seen when there is a real or apparent contradiction between them. If such should occur, the first must give place to the second, and so on. Thus Muḥkam cannot be abrogated or changed by any of the preceding, or Mufassar by Naṣṣ, &c.
Hidden sentences are either K͟hafī, Mushkil, Mujmal, or Mutashābih.
(1.) K͟hafī.—Sentences in which other persons or things are hidden beneath the plain meaning of a word or expression contained therein: e.g. Sūratu ʾl-Māʾidah (v.), 42, “As for a thief whether male or female cut ye off their hands in recompense for their doings.” In this sentence the word sāriq, “thief,” is understood to have hidden beneath its literal meaning, both pickpockets and highway robbers.
(2.) Mushkil.—Sentences which are ambiguous; e.g. Sūratu ʾd-Dahr (lxxvi.), 15, “And (their attendants) shall go round about them with vessels of silver and goblets. The bottles shall be bottles of silver.” The difficulty here is that bottles are not made of silver, but of glass. The commentators say, however, that glass is dull in colour, though it has some lustre, whilst silver is white, and not so bright as glass. Now it may be, that the bottles of Paradise will be like glass bottles as regards their lustre, and like silver as regards their colour. But anyhow, it is very difficult to ascertain the meaning.
(3.) Mujmal.—Sentences which may have a variety of interpretations, owing to the words in them being capable of several meanings; in that case the meaning which is given to the sentence in the Traditions relating to it should be acted on and accepted; or which may contain some very rare word, and thus its meaning may be doubtful, as: “Man truly is by creation hasty” (Sūrah lxx. 19). In this verse the word halūʿ, “hasty,” occurs. It is very rarely used, and had it not been for the following words, “when evil toucheth him, he is full of complaint; but when good befalleth him, he becometh niggardly,” its meaning would not have been at all easy to understand.
The following is an illustration of the first kind of Mujmal sentences: “Stand for prayer (ṣalāt) and give alms (zakāt).” Both ṣalāt and zakāt are “Mushtarak” words. The people, therefore, did not understand this verse, so they applied to Muḥammad for an explanation. He explained to them that ṣalāt might mean the ritual of public prayer, standing to say the words “God is great,” or standing to repeat a few verses of the Qurʾān; or it might mean private prayer. The primitive meaning of zakāt is “growing.” The Prophet, however, fixed the meaning here to that of “almsgiving,” and said, “Give of your substance one-fortieth part.”
(4.) Mutashābih.—Intricate sentences, or expressions, the exact meaning of which it is impossible for man to ascertain until the day of resurrection, but which was known to the Prophet: e.g. the letters Alif, Lām, Mīm (A. L. M.); Alif, Lām, Rāʾ (A. L. R.); Alif, Lām, Mīm, Rāʾ (A. L. M. R.), &c., at the commencement of different Sūrahs or chapters. Also Sūratu ʾl-Mulk (lxvii.) 1, “In whose hand is the Kingdom,” i.e. God’s hand (Arabic, yad); and Sūratu T̤H (xx.), “He is most merciful and sitteth on His throne,” i.e. God sitteth (Arabic, istawā); and Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 115, “The face of God” (Arabic, wajhu ʾllāh).
III. The use (istiʿmāl) of words in the Qurʾān is divided into four classes. They are either Ḥaqīqah, Majāz, Ṣarīḥ, or Kināyah.
(1.) Ḥaqīqah.—Words which are used in their literal meaning: e.g. rukūʿ, “a prostration”; zināʿ, “adultery.”
(2.) Majāz.—Words which are figurative; as ṣalāt in the sense of namāz, or the liturgical prayers.
(3.) Ṣarīḥ.—Words the meaning of which is clear and palpable: e.g. “Thou art free,” “Thou art divorced.”
(4.) Kināyah.—Words which are metaphorical in their meaning: e.g. “Thou art separated”; by which may be meant, “thou art divorced.”
IV. The deduction of arguments, or istidlāl, as expressed in the Qurʾān, is divided into four sections: ʿIbārah, Ishārah, Dalālah, and Iqtiẓāʾ.
(1.) ʿIbārah, or the plain sentence. “Mothers, after they are divorced, shall give suck unto their children two full years, and the father shall be obliged to maintain them and clothe them according to that which is reasonable.” (Sūrah ii. 233.) From this verse two deductions are made. First, from the fact that the word “them” is in the feminine plural, it must refer to the mothers and not to the children; secondly, as the duty of supporting the mother is incumbent on the father, it shows that the relationship of the child is closer with the father than with the mother. Penal laws may be based on a deduction of this kind.
(2.) Ishārah, that is, a sign or hint which may be given from the order in which the words are placed; e.g. “Born of him,” meaning, of course, the father.
(3.) Dalālah, or the argument which may be deducted from the use of some special word in the verse, as: “say not to your parents, ‘Fie!’ (Arabic, uff).” (Sūrah xvii. 23.) From the use of the word uff, it is argued that children may not beat or abuse their parents. Penal laws may be based on dalālah, thus: “And they strive after violence on the earth; but God loveth not the abettors of violence.” (Sūrah v. 69.) The word translated “strive” is in Arabic literally yasʿauna, “they run.” From this the argument is deduced that as highway-men wander about, they are included amongst those whom “God loveth not,” and that, therefore, the severest punishment may be given to them, for any deduction that comes under the head of dalālah is a sufficient basis for the formation of the severest penal laws.
(4.) Iqtiẓāʾ. This is a deduction which demands certain conditions: “whosoever killeth a believer by mischance, shall be bound to free a believer from slavery.” (Sūrah iv. 94.) As a man has no authority to free his neighbour’s slave, the condition here required, though not expressed, is that the slave should be his own property.
VIII.—The Abrogation of Passages in the Qurʾān.
Some passages of the Qurʾān are contradictory, and are often made the subject of attack; but it is part of the theological belief of the Muslim doctors that certain passages of the Qurʾān are mansūk͟h (منسوخ), or abrogated by verses revealed afterwards, entitled nāsik͟h (ناسخ). This was the doctrine taught by Muḥammad in the Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.) 105: “Whatever verses we (i.e. God) cancel or cause thee to forget, we bring a better or its like.” This convenient doctrine fell in with that law of expediency which appears to be the salient feature in Muḥammad’s prophetical career.
In the Tafsīr-i-ʿAzīzī, it is written, that abrogated (mansūk͟h) verses of the Qurʾān are of three kinds: (1) Where the verse has been removed from the Qurʾān and another given in its place; (2) Where the injunction is abrogated and the letters of the verse remain; (3) Where both the verse and its injunction are removed from the text. This is also the view of Jalālu ʾd-Dīn, who says that the number of abrogated verses has been variously estimated from five to five hundred.
The Greek verb καταλύω, in St. Matthew v. 17, has been translated in some of the versions of the New Testament by mansūk͟h; but it conveys a wrong impression to the Muḥammadan mind as to the Christian view regarding this question. According to most Greek lexicons, the Greek word means to throw down, or to destroy (as of a building), which is the meaning given to the word in our authorised English translation. Christ did not come to destroy, or to pull down, the Law and the Prophets; but we all admit that certain precepts of the Old Testament were abrogated by those of the New Testament. Indeed, we further admit that the old covenant was abrogated by the new covenant of grace. “He taketh away the first that he may establish the second,” Heb. x. 9.
In the Arabic translation of the New Testament, printed at Beyrut A.D. 1869, καταλύω is translated by naqẓ, “to demolish”; in Mr. Loewenthal’s Pushto translation, A.D. 1863, by bāt̤ilawal, “to destroy,” or “render void”; and in Henry Martyn’s Persian Testament, A.D. 1837, it is also translated by the Arabic ibt̤āl, i.e. “making void.” In both the Arabic-Urdū and Roman-Urdū it is unfortunately rendered mansūk͟h, a word which has a technical meaning in Muḥammadan theology contrary to that implied in the word used by our Lord in Matthew v. 17.
Jalālu ʾd-Dīn in his Itqān, gives the following list of twenty verses which are acknowledged by all commentators to be abrogated. The verses are given as numbered in the Itqān.
No. Mansūk͟h, or abrogated verses. Nāsik͟h, or abrogating verses. The Subject abrogated.
1 Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 119. Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 145. The Qiblah.
2 Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 178. Sūratu ʾl-Māʾidah (v.), 49. Sūratu Banī Isrāʾīl, (xvii.), 35. Qiṣāṣ, or Retaliation.
3 Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 183. Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 187. The Fast of Ramaẓān.
4 Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 184. Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 185. Fidyah, or Expiation.
5 Sūratu Āli ʿImrān (iii.), 102. Sūratu ʾt-Tag͟hābun (lxiv.), 16. The fear of God.
6 Sūratu ʾn-Nisāʾ (iv.), 88. Sūratu ʾn-Nisāʾ (iv.), 89. Sūratu ʾt-Taubah (ix.), 5. Jihād, or war with infidels.
7 Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 216. Sūratu ʾt-Taubah (ix.), 36. Jihād in the Sacred months.
8 Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 240. Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 234. Provision for widows.
9 Sūratu ʾl-Baqarah (ii.), 191. Sūratu ʾt-Taubah (ix.), 5. Slaying enemies in the Sacred Mosque.
10 Sūratu ʾn-Nisāʾ (iv.), 14. Sūratu ʾn-Nūr (xxiv.), 2. Imprisonment of the adulteress.
11 Sūratu ʾl-Māʾidah (v.), 105. Sūratu ʾt̤-T̤alāq (lxv.), 2. Witnesses.
12 Sūratu ʾl-Anfāl (vii.), 66. Sūratu ʾl-Anfāl (vii.), 67. Jihād, or war with infidels.
13 Sūratu ʾn-Nūr (xxiv.), 3. Sūratu ʾn-Nūr (xxiv.), 32. The marriage of adulterers.
14 Sūratu ʾl-Aḥzāb (xxxiii.), 52. Sūratu ʾl-Aḥzāb (xxxiii.), 49. The Prophet’s wives.
15 Sūratu ʾl-Mujādilah (lviii.), 13, first part of verse. Sūratu ʾl-Mujādilah (lviii.), 13, latter part of verse. Giving alms before assembling a council.
16 Sūratu ʾl-Mumtaḥinah (lx.), 11. Sūratu ʾt-Taubah (ix.), 1. Giving money to infidels for women taken in marriage.
17 Sūratu ʾt-Taubah (ix.), 39. Sūratu ʾt-Taubah (ix.), 92. Jihād, or war with infidels.
18 Sūratu ʾl-Muzzammil (lxxiii.), 2. Sūratu ʾl-Muzzammil (lxxiii.), 20. The night prayer.
19 Sūratu ʾn-Nūr (xxiv.), 57. Sūratu ʾn-Nūr (xxiv.), 58. Permission to young children to enter a house.
20 Sūratu ʾn-Nisāʾ (iv.), 7. Sūratu ʾn-Nisāʾ (iv.), 11. Division of property.
IX.—The Reputed Excellence of the Qurʾān, and its Miraculous Character.
Copies of the Qurʾān are held in the greatest esteem and reverence amongst Muḥammadans. They dare not to touch it without being first washed and purified, and they read it with the greatest care and respect, never holding it below their girdles. They swear by it, consult it on all occasions, carry it with them to war, write sentences of it on their banners, suspend it from their necks as a charm, and always place it on the highest shelf or in some place of honour in their houses. Muḥammadans, as we have already remarked, believe the Qurʾān to be uncreated and eternal, subsisting in the very essence of God. There have, however, been great differences of opinion on this subject. It was a point controverted with so much heat that it occasioned many calamities under the Abbaside K͟halīfahs. Al-Maʾmūn (A.H. 218) made a public edict declaring the Qurʾān to be created, which was confirmed by his successors al-Muʿtaṣim and al-Wās̤iq, who whipped and imprisoned and put to death those of the contrary opinion. But at length al-Mutawakkil, who succeeded al-Wās̤iq, put an end to these persecutions by revoking the former edicts, releasing those that were imprisoned on that account, and leaving every man at liberty as to his belief on this point. (Abū ʾl-Faraj, p. 262.) The Qurʾān is, however, generally held to be a standing miracle, indeed, the one miracle which bears witness to the truth of Muḥammad’s mission, an assumption which is based upon the Prophet’s own statements in the Qurʾān (Sūrah x. 39, xi. 16, lii. 34), where he calls upon the people who charge him with having invented it to procure a single chapter like it. But the Muʿtazilites have asserted that there is nothing miraculous in its style and composition (vide Sharḥu ʾl-Muwāqif). The excellences of the Qurʾān, as explained by the Prophet himself, claim a very important place in the traditions (see Faẓāʾilu ʾl-Qurʾān, in the Traditions of al-Buk͟hārī and Muslim), from which the following are a few extracts:—
“The best person amongst you is he who has learnt the Qurʾān, and teaches it.”
“Read the Qurʾān as long as you feel a pleasure in it, and when tired leave off.”
“If the Qurʾān were wrapped in a skin and thrown into a fire, it would not burn.”
“He who is an expert in the Qurʾān shall rank with the ‘Honoured Righteous Scribes,’ and he who reads the Qurʾān with difficulty and gets tired over it shall receive double rewards.”
“The state of a Musulman who reads the Qurʾān is like the orange fruit whose smell and taste are pleasant.”
“The person who repeats three verses from the beginning of the chapter of the Cave (Sūrah xviii.) shall be guarded from the strife of ad-Dajjāl.”
“Everything has a heart, and the heart of the Qurʾān is the chapter Yā-sīn (Sūrah xxxvi.); and he who reads it, God will write for him rewards equal to those for reading the whole Qurʾān ten times.”
“There is a Sūrah in the Qurʾān of thirty verses which intercedes for a man until he is pardoned, and it is that commencing with the words, ‘Blessed is he in whose hands is the kingdom.’ ” (Sūrah lxvii.)
“God wrote a book two thousand years before creating the heavens and the earth, and sent two verses down from it, which are the two last verses of the chapter of the Cow (Sūrah ii.); and if they are not repeated in a house for three nights, the devil will be near that house.”
“Verily the devil runs away from the house in which the chapter entitled the Cow is read.”
“The chapter commencing with these words, ‘Say God is one God’ (Sūrah cxii.), is equal to a third of the Qurʾān.”
“The person that repeats the chapter of the Cave (Sūrah xviii.) on Friday, the light of faith brightens him between two Fridays.”
In the Qurʾān there are many assertions of its excellence; the following are a few selected verses:—
Sūrah iv. 94: “Can they not consider the Qurʾān? Were it from any other than God, they would assuredly have found in it many contradictions.”
Sūrah ix. 16: “If they shall say, ‘The Qurʾān is his own device.’ Then bring ten Sūrahs like it of your devising.”
Sūrah xlvi. 7: “Will they say, ‘He hath devised it’? Say, If I have devised it, then not one single thing can ye ever obtain for me from God.”
Sūrah liii. 4: “Verily the Qurʾān is none other than a revelation. One terrible in power taught it him.”
Maracci, von Hammer, and other Orientalists, have selected the XCIst chapter of the Qurʾān, entitled the Sūratu ʾsh-Shams, or the Chapter of the Sun, as a favourable specimen of the best style of the Qurʾān. It begins in Arabic thus:—
١ وَٱلشَّمْسِ وَضُحَاهَا
٢ وَٱلقَمَرِ إذَا تَلَاهَا
٣ وَٱلنَّهَارِ إذَا جَلَّاهَا
٤ وَٱللَّيْلِ إذَا يَغْشَاهَا
٥ وَٱلسَّمَآءِ وَمَا بَنَاهَا
٦ وَٱلْأَرْضِ وَمَا طَحَاهَا
٧ وَنَفْسٍ وَمَا سَوَّاهَا
٨ فَأَلْهَمَهَا فُجُورَهَا وَتَقْوَاهَا
٩ قَدْ أَفْلَعَ مَنْ زَكَّاهَا
١٠ وَقَدْ خَابَ مَنْ دَسَّاهَا
Which Mr. Rodwell translates as follows:—
1 By the Sun and his noonday brightness!
2 By the Moon when she followeth him!
3 By the Day when it revealeth his glory!
4 By the Night when it enshroudeth him!
5 By the Heaven and Him who built it!
6 By the Earth and Him who spread it forth!
7 By a soul and Him who balanced it,
8 And breathed into it its wickedness and its piety,
9 Blessed now is he who hath kept it pure,
10 And undone is he who hath corrupted it!
Baron von Hammer rendered it in German thus:—
1 Bey der Sonne, und ihrem Schimmer;
2 Bey dem Mond der ihr folget immer;
3 Bey dem Tag der sie zeigt in vollem Glanz;
4 Bey der Nacht, die sie verfinstert ganz;
5 Bey den Himmeln und dem der sie gemacht;
6 Bey der Erde und dem der sie schuf eben;
7 Bey der Seele und dem der sie ins Gleichgewicht gebracht,
8 Bey dem der ihr das Bewusstseyn des Guten und Bösen gegeben,
9 Selig wer seine Seele reinigt;
10 Wer dieselbe verdunkelt wird auf ewig gepeinigt.
The renowned Orientalist, Sir William Jones, praised the following account of the drowning of Noah’s sons as truly magnificent, and inferior in sublimity only to the simple declaration of the creation of light in Genesis. D’Herbelot also considers it one of the finest passages in the Qurʾān (Sūrah xi. 44–46):—
وَهِىَ تَجْرِى بِهِمْ فىِ مَوْجٍ كَٱلْجِبَالِ وَنَادَى نُوحٌ ٱبْنَهُ وَكَانَ فىِ مَعْزِلٍ يَا بُنَىَّ ٱرْكَبْ مَعَنَا وَلَا تَكُنْ مَعَ ٱلْكَافرينَ قَالَ سَآوى إلَى جَبَلٍ يَعْصِمُنِى مِنَ ٱلْمَآءِ قَالَ لَا عَاصِم ٱلْيَوْم مِنْ أَمْرِ ٱلَّهِ إِلَّا مَن رَحِمَ وَحَالَ بَيْنَهُمَا ٱلْمَوْجُ فَكَانَ مِنَ ٱلْمُغْرَقِينَ وَقِيلَ يَا أَرْضُ ٱبْلَعِى مَٱءَكِ وَيَا سَمَٱءُ أَقْلِعِى وَغِيض ٱلْمَٱءُ وَقُضِىَ ٱلْأَمْرُ وَٱسْتَوَتْ عَلَى ٱلْجُودِىِّ وَقِيلَ بُعْدًا للْقَوْمِ ٱلظّالِمِينَ
It may be rendered as follows:—
“And the ark moved on with them amid waves like mountains:
“And Noah called to his son—for he was apart—
“ ‘Embark with us, O my child! and stay not with the unbelievers.’
“He said, ‘I will betake myself to a mountain that shall save me from the water.’
“He said, ‘None shall be saved this day from God’s decree, save him on whom He shall have mercy.’
“And a wave passed between them and he was drowned.
“And it was said, ‘O earth! swallow up thy water! and O heaven! withhold thy rain!’ And the water abated, and God’s decree was fulfilled, and the ark rested on al-Jūdī.
“And it was said, ‘Avaunt, ye tribe of the wicked!’ ”
X.—Commentaries on the Qurʾān.
In the earliest ages of Islām the expositions of the Qurʾān were handed down in the traditional sayings of the companions and their successors, but we have it on the authority of the Kashfu ʾz̤-Z̤unūn that one Qutaibah ibn Aḥmad, who died A.H. 316, compiled a systematic commentary on the whole of the Qurʾān. The work is not now extent.
Muslim commentaries are very numerous. Dr. M. Arnold (Islam and Christianity, p. 81) says there are no less than 20,000 in the Library at Tripolis.
The best known commentaries amongst the Sunnīs are those of:—
Al-Bag͟hawī, A.H. 515.
Az-Zamak͟hsharī, A.H. 604.
At-Tafsīru ʾl-Kabīr, A.H. 606.
Ibnu ʾl-ʿArabi, A.H. 628.
Al-Baiẓāwī, A.H. 685.
Al-Mudārik, A.H. 701.
Ḥusain, A.H. 900.
Al-Jalālān, A.H. 864, A.H. 911.
Al-Mazharī, A.H. 1225.
ʿAzīzī, A.H. 1239.
Amongst the Shīʿahs the following are works of reputation:—
Shaik͟h Ṣadūq, A.H. 381.
At-Tafsīru ʾl-Kabīr, by Saiyid Muḥammad ar-Rāzī, 30 volumes, A.H. 606.
Aṣ-Ṣāfī, A.H. 668.
As-Sirru ʾl-Wajīz, A.H. 715.
Sidratu ʾl-Muntahā, by Mīr Bakir, A.H. 1041.
Al-Burhān, by Saiyid Hasham, A.H. 1160.
XI.—Editions and Translations of the Qurʾān.
The Qurʾān was first printed in Arabic at Rome by Pagninus Brixiensis, Romæ, 1530, but it was either burned or remained unpublished. Since then the following editions of the Arabic text have appeared in Europe:—
Al-Coranus, seu lex Islamitica, &c., the Arabic text of the Qurʾān, published by A. Hinkelmann, Hamburg, 1649, 4to.
Alcorani textus universus, &c., the Arabic text with a Latin translation and numerous extracts from the principal commentaries, and preceded by a Prodromus, containing a “refutation” of the Qurʾān, by Maracci, Padua, 1698, folio.
القران, an annotated text of the Qurʾān, published by order and at the cost of the Empress Catherine II. of Russia, at St. Petersburgh in 1787, 1 vol. in folio. This edition was reprinted at St. Petersburgh in 1790, 1793, 1796, and 1798, and without any change at Kasan in 1803, 1809, and 1839. Another edition, in two vols. 4to, without notes, was published at Kasan, 1817, reprinted 1821 and 1843, and a third edition, in 6 vols. 8vo, at the same place, 1819.
Corani textus arabicus, &c., the first critical edition of the text, by G. Flügel, Leipzig, 1834, 4to. Second edition, 1842; third edition, 1869.
Coranus arabice, &c., revised republication of Flügel’s text, by G. M. Redslob, Leipzig, 1837, 8vo.
Beidhawii commentarius in Coranum, &c., the text of the Qurʾān with al-Baiẓāwī’s Commentary, by H. O. Fleisher, two vols. 4to, Leipzig, 1846.
The Muḥammadans, so far from thinking the Qurʾān profaned by a translation, as some authors have written (Marracci de Alcoran, p. 33), have taken care to have it translated into various languages, although these translations are always interlineary with the original text. Translations exist in Persian, Urdū, Pushto, Turkish, Javan, Malayan, and other languages, which have been made by Muḥammadans themselves.
The first translation attempted by Europeans was a Latin version translated by an Englishman, Robert of Retina, and a German, Hermann of Dalmatia. This translation, which was done at the request of Peter, Abbot of the Monastery of Clugny, A.D. 1143, remained hidden nearly 400 years till it was published at Basle, 1543, by Theodore Bibliander, and was afterwards rendered into Italian, German, and Dutch. The next translation in German was by Schweigger, at Nürnberg, in 1616. This was followed by the above-mentioned work of Maracci, consisting of the Qurʾān, in Arabic, with a Latin version with notes and refutations, A.D. 1698.
The oldest French translation was done by M. Du Ryer (Paris, 1647). A Russian version appeared at St. Petersburg in 1776. M. Savary translated the Qurʾān into French in 1783. There have also been more recent French translations by Kasimirski (Paris, 1st ed. 1840, 2nd ed. 1841, 3rd ed. 1857).
The first English Qurʾān was Alexander Ross’s translation of Du Ryer’s French version (1649–1688). Sale’s well-known work first appeared in 1734, and has since passed through numerous editions. A translation by the Rev. J. M. Rodwell, with the Sūrahs arranged in chronological order, was printed in 1861 (2nd ed. 1876). Professor Palmer, of Cambridge, translated the Qurʾān in 1880 (Oxford Press). A Roman-Urdū edition of the Qurʾān was published at Allahabad in 1844, and a second and revised edition at Ludianah in 1876 (both these being a transliteration of ʿAbdu ʾl-Qādir’s well-known Urdū translation).
The best known translations in German are those by Boysen, published in 1773, with an Introduction and notes, and again revised and corrected from the Arabic by G. Wahl in 1828, and another by Dr. L. Ullmann, which has passed through two editions (1840, 1853).
XII.—The Opinions of European Writers on the Qurʾān.
Mr. Sale, in his Preliminary Discourse, remarks:—
“The style of the Korân is generally beautiful and fluent, especially where it imitates the prophetic manner, and scripture phrases. It is concise, and often obscure, adorned with bold figures after the Eastern taste, enlivened with florid and sententious expressions, and in many places, especially where the majesty and attributes of God are described, sublime and magnificent; of which the reader cannot but observe several instances, though he must not imagine the translation comes up to the original, notwithstanding my endeavours to do it justice.
“Though it be written in prose, yet the sentences generally conclude in a long continued rhyme, for the sake of which the sense is often interrupted, and unnecessary repetitions too frequently made, which appear still more ridiculous in a translation, where the ornament, such as it is, for whose sake they were made, cannot be perceived. However, the Arabians are so mightily delighted with this jingling that they employ it in their most elaborate compositions, which they also embellish with frequent passages of and allusions to the Korân, so that it is next to impossible to understand them without being well versed in this book.
“It is probable the harmony of expression which the Arabians find in the Korân might contribute not a little to make them relish the doctrine therein taught, and give an efficacy to arguments, which, had they been nakedly proposed without this rhetorical dress, might not have so easily prevailed. Very extraordinary effects are related of the power of words well chosen and artfully placed, which are no less powerful either to ravish or amaze than music itself; wherefore as much as has been ascribed by the best orators to this part of rhetoric as to any other. He must have a very bad ear, who is not uncommonly moved with the very cadence of a well-turned sentence; and Mohammed seems not to have been ignorant of the enthusiastic operation of rhetoric on the minds of men; for which reason he has not only employed his utmost skill in these his pretended revelations, to preserve that dignity and sublimity of style, which might seem not unworthy of the majesty of that Being, whom he gave out to be the author of them, and to imitate the prophetic manner of the Old Testament; but he has not neglected even the other arts of oratory; wherein he succeeded so well, and so strangely captivated the minds of his audience, that several of his opponents thought it the effect of witchcraft and enchantment, as he sometimes complains (Sūrah xv. 21, &c.).”
The late Professor Palmer, in his Introduction to the Qurʾān, remarks:—
“The Arabs made use of a rhymed and rhythmical prose, the origin of which it is not difficult to imagine. The Arabic language consists for the most part of triliteral roots, i.e. the single words expressing individual ideas consist generally of three consonants each, and the derivative forms expressing modifications of the original idea are not made by affixes and terminations alone, but also by the insertion of letters in the root. Thus ẓaraba means ‘he struck,’ and qatala, ‘he killed,’ while maẓrûb and maqtûl signify ‘one struck’ and ‘one killed.’ A sentence, therefore, consists of a series of words which would each require to be expressed in clauses of several words in other languages, and it is easy to see how a next following sentence, explanatory of or completing the first, would be much more clear and forcible if it consisted of words of a similar shape and implying similar modifications of other ideas. It follows then that the two sentences would be necessarily symmetrical, and the presence of rhythm would not only please the ear but contribute to the better understanding of the sense, while the rhyme would mark the pause in the sense and emphasize the proposition.
“The Qurʾān is written in this rhetorical style, in which the clauses are rhythmical though not symmetrically so, and for the most part end in the same rhyme throughout the chapter.
“The Arabic language lends itself very readily to this species of composition, and the Arabs of the desert in the present day employ it to a great extent in their more formal orations, while the literary men of the towns adopt it as the recognised correct style, deliberately imitating the Qurʾān.
“That the best of Arab writers has never succeeded in producing anything equal in merit to the Qurʾān itself is not surprising.
“In the first place, they have agreed beforehand that it is unapproachable, and they have adopted its style as the perfect standard; any deviation from it therefore must of necessity be a defect. Again, with them this style is not spontaneous as with Mohammed and his contemporaries, but is as artificial as though Englishmen should still continue to follow Chaucer as their model, in spite of the changes which their language has undergone. With the prophet the style was natural, and the words were those used in every-day ordinary life, while with the later Arabic authors the style is imitative and the ancient words are introduced as a literary embellishment. The natural consequence is that their attempts look laboured and unreal by the side of his impromptu and forcible eloquence.
“That Mohammed, though, should have been able to challenge even his contemporaries to produce anything like the Qurʾān, ‘And if ye are in doubt of what we have revealed unto our servant, then bring a chapter like it.… But if ye do it not, and ye surely shall do it not, &c.,’ is at first sight surprising, but, as Nöldeke has pointed out, this challenge really refers much more to the subject than to the mere style,—to the originality of the conception of the unity of God and of a revelation supposed to be couched in God’s own words. Any attempt at such a work must of necessity have had all the weakness and want of prestige which attaches to an imitation. This idea is by no means foreign to the genius of the old Arabs.
“Amongst a people who believed firmly in witchcraft and soothsaying, and who, though passionately fond of poetry, believed that every poet had his familiar spirit who inspired his utterances, it was no wonder that the prophet should be taken for ‘a soothsayer,’ for ‘one possessed with an evil spirit,’ or for ‘an infatuated poet.’ ”
Mr. Stanley Lane Poole, in his Introduction to Lane’s Selections from the Ḳur-án, remarks:—
“It is confused in its progression and strangely mixed in its contents; but the development of Moḥammad’s faith can be traced in it, and we can see dimly into the workings of his mind, as it struggles with the deep things of God, wrestles with the doubts which echoed the cavils of the unbelievers, soars upwards on the wings of ecstatic faith, till at last it gains the repose of fruition. Studied thus, the Ḳur-án is no longer dull reading to one who cares to look upon the working of a passionate troubled human soul, and who can enter into its trials and share in the joy of its triumphs.
“In the soorahs revealed at Mekka, Moḥammad has but one theme—God; and one object—to draw his people away from their idols and bring them to the feet of that God. He tells them of Him in glowing language, that comes from the heart’s white heat. He points to the glories of nature, and tells them these are God’s works. With all the brilliant imagery of the Arab, he tries to show them what God is, to convince them of His power and His wisdom and His justice. The soorahs of this period are short, for they are pitched in too high a key to be long sustained. The language has the ring of poetry, though no part of the Ḳur-án complies with the demands of Arab metre. The sentences are short and full of half-restrained energy, yet with a musical cadence. The thought is often only half expressed; one feels the speaker has essayed a thing beyond words, and has suddenly discovered the impotence of language, and broken off with the sentence unfinished. There is the fascination of true poetry about these earliest soorahs; as we read them we understand the enthusiasm of the Prophet’s followers, though we cannot fully realise the beauty and the power, inasmuch as we cannot hear them hurled forth with Moḥammad’s fiery eloquence. From first to last the Ḳur-án is essentially a book to be heard, not read, but this is especially the case with the earliest chapters.
“In the soorahs of the second period of Mekka, we begin to trace the decline of the Prophet’s eloquence. There are still the same earnest appeals to the people, the same gorgeous pictures of the Last Day and the world to come; but the language begins to approach the quiet of prose, the sentences become longer, the same words and phrases are frequently repeated, and the wearisome stories of the Jewish prophets and patriarchs, which fill so large a space in the later portion of the Ḳur-án, now make their appearance. The fierce passion of the earliest soorahs, that could not out save in short burning verses, gives place to a calmer more argumentative style. Moḥammad appeals less to the works of God as proofs of his teaching, and more to the history of former teachers, and the punishments of the people who would not hear them. And the characteristic oaths of the first period, when Moḥammad swears by all the varied sights of nature as they mirrored themselves in his imagination, have gone, and in their place we find only the weaker oath ‘by the Ḳur-án.’ And this declension is carried still further in the last group of the soorahs revealed at Mekka. The style becomes more involved and the sentences longer, and though the old enthusiasm bursts forth ever and anon, it is rather an echo of former things than a new and present intoxication of faith. The fables and repetitions become more and more dreary, and but for the rich eloquence of the old Arabic tongue, which gives some charm even to inextricable sentences and dull stories, the Ḳur-án at this period would be unreadable. As it is, we feel we have fallen the whole depth from poetry to prose, and the matter of the prose is not so superlative as to give us amends for the loss of the poetic thought of the earlier time and the musical fall of the sentences.