Understanding revelation by Prof. Shahul Hameed (Islam Online)

The human mind “can operate only on the basis of perceptions previously experienced by that very mind, either in their entirety, or in some of their constituent elements.” In other words, we cannot form a clear idea of something that happens entirely outside the realm of our past experiences; and therefore, it is natural that we find it difficult to comprehend the full meaning and relevance of mystical experiences like revelation.

The Qur’an makes a clear distinction between the perceptible world of experience and the unseen world of transcendental reality. Revelation is a means for God’s specially chosen messengers to receive divine messages; we may call it an exclusive channel of communication accessible to the prophets. For this reason, by way of an objective investigation, we can only study the credibility of the person who claims to have received a revelation, learn the circumstances, and observe the results.

The Qur’an says what means [It is not fitting for a man that God should speak to him except by inspiration, or from behind a veil, or by sending of a messenger to reveal with God’s permission what God wills: for He is Most High, Most Wise] (Ash-Shura 42:51). This means that God does not hold a face-to-face talk with any human. The divine message comes to the prophets through the angel Gabriel. There are other exceptional cases, such as the Prophet Abraham getting God’s message in a dream or Moses hearing God speaking to him from behind a burning bush. But again, these are exceptional cases.

How did the Prophet Muhammad receive revelation? According to his wife `A’ishah, the Prophet used to go in seclusion in the cave of Hiraa’ outside Makkah, where he used to worship God continuously for many days.

One day, an angel came to him and asked him to read. The Prophet, who was illiterate, replied, “I do not know how to read.” The Prophet related the incident: The angel caught me forcibly and pressed me so hard that I could not bear it anymore. He then released me again and asked me to read and I replied, “I do not know how to read.” Thereupon he caught me again and pressed me a second time till I could not bear it anymore. He then released me and again asked me to read, but again I replied, “I do not know how to read” (or “What shall I read?”) Thereupon he caught me for the third time and pressed me, and then released me and said: [Read in the name of your Lord, who created, created man from a clot. Read! And your Lord is the most bountiful.]

This happened in the year 610 CE, when the Prophet was 40 years old. During the 23 years from the revelation of these first verses, the Qur’an was revealed to the Prophet in stages. It was not revealed at one time for a number of reasons: to enable the natural and steady development of the community of believers by gradually implementing the laws of God; to meet the requirements of the changing conditions and needs of that community; and to facilitate easy absorption and memorization of the Qur’an.

The different dialectic versions of Qur’an

Question:

There were many versions of the Qur’an all of which were burnt by Uthman except for one. Therefore is it not true that the present Qur’an is the one compiled by Uthman and not the original revelation?

Answer (by Dr. Zakir Naik with additional notes):

One of the most common myths about the Qur’an, is that Uthman the third Caliph of Islam authenticated and compiled one Qur’an, from a large set of mutually contradicting copies. The Qur’an, revered as the Word of Allah by Muslims the world over, is the same Qur’an as the one revealed to Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). It was authenticated and written under his personal supervision. We will examine the roots of the myth which says that Uthman had the Qur’an authenticated.

1. Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) himself supervised and authenticated the written texts of the Qur’an

Whenever the Prophet received a revelation, he would first memorize it himself and later declare the revelation and instruct his Companions to also memorize it. The Prophet would immediately ask the scribes to write down the revelation he had received, and he would reconfirm and recheck it himself. Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) was illiterate and could not read and write. Therefore, after receiving each revelation, he would repeat it to his Companions. They would write down the revelation, and he would recheck by asking them to read what they had written. If there was any mistake, the Prophet would immediately point it out and have it corrected and rechecked. Similarly he would even recheck and authenticate the portions of the Qur’an memorized by the Companions. In this way, the complete Qur’an was written down under the personal supervision of the Prophet (pbuh).

2. Order and sequence of Qur’an divinely inspired

The complete Qur’an was revealed over a period of 22½ years portion by portion, as and when it was required. The Qur’an was not compiled by the Prophet in the chronological order of revelation. The order and sequence of the Qur’an too was Divinely inspired and was instructed to the Prophet by Allah through archangel Gabriel. Whenever a revelation was conveyed to his companions, the Prophet would also mention in which surah (chapter) and after which ayat (verse) this new revelation should fit.

It is therefore clearly evident that the Qur’an was compiled and authenticated by the Prophet himself during his lifetime, both in the written form as well as in the memory of several of his Companions.

3. Qur’an copied on one common material

The complete Qur’an, along with the correct sequence of the verses, was present during the time of the Prophet (pbuh). The verses however, were written on separate pieces, scrapes of leather, thin flat stones, leaflets, palm branches, shoulder blades, etc.

After the death of the Prophet, Islam started to expand in the Middle East.  Not only the People of the entire region didn't have the same dialect, but also they had different languages.  The languages that were spoken in the region at that time were Arabic (with its 7 dialects), Persian, Assyrian, Hebrew and some Greek.  All of these languages are quite different from each others.  You would need a translator to translate almost 100% of the conversation if you were to pick two languages and have two people converse with them, each person with one language.

As the Muslims expanded through the entire region, which is thousands of squared miles in area, the Qur’an was documented at different places with sometimes different languages and Arabic dialects as well. 

Abu Bakr, the first caliph of Islam ordered that the Qur’an be copied from the various different materials on to a common material and place, which was in the shape of sheets. These were tied with strings so that nothing of the compilation was lost.

4. Uthman made copies of the Qur’an from the original manuscript

Many Companions of the Prophet used to write down the revelation of the Qur’an on their own whenever they heard it from the lips of the Prophet. However what they wrote was not personally verified by the Prophet and thus could contain mistakes. All the verses revealed to the Prophet may not have been heard personally by all the Companions. There were high possibilities of different portions of the Qur’an being missed by different Companions. This gave rise to disputes among Muslims regarding the different contents of the Qur’an during the period of the third Caliph Uthman.

Uthman borrowed the original manuscript of the Qur’an, which was authorized by the beloved Prophet (pbuh), from Hafsha, the Prophet’s wife. Uthman ordered four Companions who were among the scribes who wrote the Qur’an when the Prophet dictated it, led by Zaid bin Thabit to rewrite the script in several perfect copies. These were sent by Uthman to the main centres of Muslims.

There were other personal collections of the portions of the Qur’an that people had with them. These might have been incomplete and with mistakes. Uthman only appealed to the people to destroy all these copies which did not match the original manuscript of the Qur’an in order to preserve the original text of the Qur’an. Two such copies of the copied text of the original Qur’an authenticated by the Prophet are present to this day, one at the museum in Tashkent in erstwhile Soviet Union and the other at the Topkapi Museum in Istanbul, Turkey.

5. Conclusion

Some people argue that the present copy of the Qur’an that we have is not the same original Qur’an that was present at the Prophet’s time. But they fail to realize that the word ‘Qur’an’ means a recitation. Therefore, the preservation of the recitation of the Qur’an is important, irrespective of whether the script is different or whether it contains vowels. If the pronunciation and the Arabic is the same, naturally, the meaning remains the same too.

To this day, the Qur’an is read and memorized by many Muslims all over the world—many of them non-Arabic speakers. The Qur’an that a Muslim in Indonesia reads or memorizes is the exact same scripture as one which a Muslim in Mauritania reads or memorizes.

The exact ways in which the Prophet used to recite the Qur’an were also recorded and passed down from generation to generation.

Chapters from the Qur’an were recited by our Prophet peace be upon him at least 5 times a day during the Muslims' five-daily prayers.  Also, the whole Qur’an was recited during the month of Ramadan, as it is still done today. 

Historically, almost every Muslim scholar had the entire Qur’an memorized by heart.  If you live among Muslims or know well how the Muslims deal with the Qur’an, then you would know that tampering with it is impossible among the Muslims.  If someone recites the Qur’an to the public (i.e. The Imam leading the prayer in the Mosque for instance) and makes a mistake, then he would find many who would correct him because they would have the entire Qur’an memorized by heart.

Today in the Middle East they have programs and rewards for those who have the entire Noble Quran memorized. It is common to find even children as young as 5 or 6 years old to have the whole Qur’an memorised by heart.

This is the phenomenon God mentions in the Qur’an, when He says what means [We have, without doubt, sent down the Message; and We will assuredly guard it (from corruption)] (Al-Hijr 15:9).