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Quran Separated in
Variant Textual?
September 10, 2008 ·
It appears that the Christian
missionaries like to bring the already refuted topics time and again as if we
Muslims have a very short memory. The Christian missionary Jochen Katz’s recent
use of the services of Samuel Green’s article The Seven Readings of the
Qur’an is one such example. The statement of the Samuel Green
indicated with ‘>’ is the older one
and the one which is new does not contain ‘>’ after he updated the article. On 29 Oct 1998,
Jochen Katz wrote: > > The
last week Dr. Saifullah was ranting incessantly about So, it is Katz turn to start a
more incessant ranting about “Versions of the Qur’an”. Even this ranting does
not appear to solve the mess in which the New Testament is in. As we said, if
you can not fix your problems, start flaunting it. Or even better go for a wag
the dog scenario to shift the focus from the issues of your own text to someone
else’s. It turns out that this Christian
missionary was boasting about the ‘versions’ of the Qur’an sometime ago, using
the (below quoted) reference of Adrian Brockett concerning the Hafs
and Warsh transmission of the Qur’an. Unfortunately for him, it appears that he
did not learn his lessons last time. The same issue was refuted long time ago. Subsequently more material was
added to this by us. The contents of the above document are divided as follows:
So, we have essentially dealt
with all the important issues concerning the Qirâ’ât, its
isnad going back to the Companions who then took it from the Prophet(P) himself. We have also dealt with the
criteria of accepting the Qirâ’ât by the Islamic scholars as well as some very
basic examples. Inshallah, some more examples would be added in due course. It turns out that Katz is merely
trying to rehash his already refuted argument by giving it a different colour,
i.e., using Samuel Green’s work who nevertheless quotes the same references
which Katz had quoted. The principal reference used is Adrian Brockett’s “The Value of Hafs And Warsh Transmissions For The Textual
History of The Qur’an”, published in Approaches
of The History of Interpretation of The Qur’an, 1988, Edited by
Andrew Rippin, Clarendon Press, Oxford. Qirâ’ât Or ‘Variant’ We would first like to define
what is the actual meaning of Qirâ’a which is frequently translated as ‘variant
reading’. The Hans-Wehr Dictionary Of Modern
Written Arabic defines Qirâ’a as: Qirâ’a pl. -ât recitation, recital
(especially of the Koran); reading (also, e.g., of measuring instruments);
manner of recitation, punctuation and vocalization of the Koranic text.[1] It is quite clear that the Qirâ’a
is not a ‘variant’ reading or text. The Muslims in history have never
considered different Qirâ’ât as different ‘versions’ of the Qur’an.
Furthermore, neither it is defined as ‘variant’ text as some Orientalists and
Christian missionaries have done so. Keeping this in mind let us now go further
with what is written in the article. > No other
book in the world can match the Qur’an … The Well, firstly what is meant by
the phrase ‘even to a dot’? The earlier Qur’ans were written without any
dotting. Gradual efforts were made in adding the
dots and other markings to facilitate correct reading from the first century of
Hijra. If the expression ‘even to a dot’ is literally taken then one can
say that the Arabic script in Africa differs from that in the The recension of ‘Uthman has been handed down to us unaltered. So
carefully, indeed, has it been preserved, that there are no variations of
importance, - we might almost say no variations at all, - amongst the
innumerable copies of the Koran scattered throughout the vast bounds of empire
of Islam. Contending and embittered factions, taking their rise in the murder
of ‘Uthman himself within a quarter of a century from the death of Muhammad
have ever since rent the Muslim world. Yet but ONE KORAN has always been current amongst them….
There is probably in the world no other work which has remained twelve
centuries with so pure a text.[2] And guess who wrote it? The
famous Christian missionary from University of “There is probably in the
world no other work which has remained twelve centuries with so pure a text”
refutes
the status of the Bible as a pure book! Are Qirâ’ât Due To The Lack Of Vowel & Diacritical Points In The Early
Qur’ans? Samuel Green says: > … owing to
the fact that the kufic script in which the Koran was He adds further that: VOWEL
DIFFERENCES - In the Arabic script of the modern Qur’an the vowels are indicated by
small symbols above or below the basic printed letters. Again these were not
included in Uthman’s edition of the Qur’an. It is to be made clear that the
Arabic script before and during the time of cUthmân was written without vowel and diacritical
marks. To say that the vowels and diacritical marks were not included in the cUthmânic Qur’an actually shows the
ignorance of the Christian missionary Samuel Green concerning the evolution of
Arabic script. The need for vowel and diacritical marks arose only after
the time of cUthmân to
prevent the wrong recitation of the Qur’an by ignorant Arabs and non-Arabs. Arabic orthography at the time of
cUthmân was not yet developed in the
way we have known for centuries, particularly in two important areas. There was
no distinction between letters of the alphabet of similar shape and there were
no vowel marks. This may now give the impression that such a system must have
given rise to great confusion in reading. This was not actually the case
because the morphological patterns of words in Arabic enable readers to read
even very unfamiliar material without the short vowels being marked. More
important, however, as far as the Qur’an was concerned, was the fact that
learning and reading relied above all on oral transmission. In the Islamic
tradition, writing remained a secondary aid; nevertheless, to ensure correct
reading of the written texts of the Qur’an, particularly for those coming after
the first generation of Muslims, steps were taken gradually to improve the
orthography. This started with the two above mentioned areas by introducing
dots to indicate different vowels and nűnâtion and these were put in different
coloured ink from that of the text. There were also dots to distinguish between
consonants of similar shape. This work was carried out chiefly by three men:
Abű-l-Aswad al-Du’alî (d. 69 / 688), Nasr Ibn cAsim (d. 89 / 707) and Yahya Ibn Yacmur (d.129 /746). Understandably there was
some opposition at first to adding anything to the way the Qur’an was written.
Ibn cUmar (73/692) disliked the dotting; others
welcomed it, clearly because it was, in fact, doing no more than ensuring
proper reading of the Qur’an as received from the Prophet(P), and this view was accepted by the
majority of Muslims throughout the different parts of the Muslims world, from
the time of the tâbicűn. The people of Madinah were reported to have used red dots for vowels -
tanwîn, tashdîd, takhfîf, sukűn, wasl and madd and yellow dots for the
hamzas in particular. Naqt (placing dots on words in the mushaf),
became a separate subject of study with many books written on it. For details
please see the article Qur’anic
Orthography: The Written Representation Of The Recited Text Of The Qur’an. Further, the conclusions of the
missionary is that there was an … ambiguity as
to which vowels should be used. This ambiguity has lead to differences between
the vowels in the different transmissions. The aim of the Christian
missionary here is to show that prior to the introduction of the vowel and
diacritical marks, that is, throughout the period of the Prophet(P) and the Companions, as well as the
generation immediately following the Qur’an was in undetermined, fluid state, a
kind of limbo, and that it assumed concrete form only with the addition of
diacritical marks and vocalization signs, which of course was long after the
age of Revelation. In other words, for almost a century before Hijra the Qur’an
was in the fluid state and as soon as the vowels and diacritical marks were
introduced, the Qur’an started to crystallise in the form that we have now
after going through many ‘versions.’ For such a situation there is no
historical evidence. Neither, there is historical evidence that Muslims
differed over the Qur’an unlike the
Christians who differ over the extent of the canon even to this day. It
must be emphasized that for Muslims down through the centuries the consensus (ijma’)
of the community has always been a decisive proof in all matters; and as the
community is agreed that man has not contributed a whit to the Qur’an, the
matter may be considered settled. This is precisely the point which has been
noted in the quote of N J Dawood used by the missionary. It is quite clear that
all the Qirâ’ât are given equal authority. The above quote taken from N J
Dawood’s translation of the Qur’an is actually in direct contradiction of what
Samuel Green had intended to show in his article, i.e., that the Muslims follow
different ’sets of the Qur’an’ as if they are not all authoritative. One
wonders why did he choose to quote the material which does not even serve his
purpose! Further evidence against the view
in question may be drawn from the Qirâ’ât themselves. It is certainly germane
to the issue at hand to note that in many instances where the unmarked cUthmânic canon is capable of being read in
diverse ways, we find the Qurra (i.e., the Readers) agreeing on a single
reading. Such agreement can most reasonably be accounted for on the basis of a
firmly established oral tradition of recitation. Take for example the verbal
prefixes ta and ya (or tu or
yu), which in the unmarked text would be represented by the
same symbol. Taking the form turjacűna and yurjacűna as a case point we note that all the Qirâ’ât use
the first of these forms in 2:245; 10:56; 28:88; 36:22, 83; 39:44; 41:21 and
43:85; while all use the second in 6:36 and 19:40. There are also many words in the
Qur’an which could be given different form than the one given in the readings,
but in fact are not. For example, the word mukht in 17:106 is
so read by all the readers, although there is no reason why it could not be
read as mikth or makth. The verb khatifa-yakhtafu,
which appears in 2:20; 22:31 and 37:10 could be correctly read as khatafa-yakhtifu,
but all the Qirâ’ât keep the former form.[3] A few other examples can be shown by
refering to the books on Qirâ’ât. So, if the Qurra invented the
Qirâ’ât just because the earliest manuscripts were undotted, why then we see
that they had converged to one single reading many times? The Christian
missionary’s last resort will be to invoke two conspiracies on a massive scale
from The emphasis is that Muslims just
do not dump any readings as they all go back
to the famous Companions of the Prophet(P) such as Ubayy, Ibn Mascud, Zaid Ibn Thâbit and cUthmân(R). According to Samuel Green: > Fact 2. If
we now turn to an Islamic encyclopedia written by a practising Are we greatly surprised? A few
examples of the printed edition of masâhif
of the Qur’an in various Qirâ’ât are given below:
This is a well known and common mushâf printed in the
This is a mushâf
from
Yet another mushâf
in the riwaya of Warsh. This is printed in
The riwaya Qâlűn from Nâfic. This mushâf is published in
The Qur’an in the riwaya of Dűri from
Abî cAmrű. This mushâf is from
Only the canonical Arabic text, as collected and compiled
under the Caliph ‘Uthman with the consensus of the companions (Ijma as-Sahaabah)
may be recited, in one of the seven acceptable versions of the punctuation and
vocalization (al-Qira’at as-Sab). These,
though fixed only in the 4th century of the Hijrah, are taken to correspond to
the seven Ahruf (”letters”, “versions” or possibly “dialects”) of the Koran
which according to a hadith, the Prophet refered to as all having divine
authority. In practice, only two of the seven readings have become customary:
in So, we have the authority
directly from the Prophet(P) that the Qur’an can be recited in any of the
Qirâ’a. Indeed the presence of masâhif
of the Qur’an in different Qirâ’ât as well as the professional Muslim reciters
(and common folk too!) reciting the Qur’an in various Qirâ’ât indicates their
importance. There are people even in this day and age who recite in more than
one Qirâ’a and some of them upto ten. > Conclusion
2. According to this Islamic encyclopedia there are seven basic Samuel Green thinks he is pretty
clever. All of a sudden “Seven Basic Readings” now become “Seven Basic Texts”.
Further he confuses himself between ‘transmission’ and ‘text’ or probably he is
delibrately cheating as Katz did sometime ago. The ‘transmission’ was
conveniently changed into ‘text’ to show that Muslims have different Qur’ans. The Abuse of Brockett’s Material On Qirâ’ât The favourite article of the
Christian missionaries when dealing with the Qirâ’ât is that of Adrian Brockett
and is called “The Value of Hafs And Warsh Transmissions
For The Textual History Of The Qur’an“,
published in Approaches Of The History Of
Interpretation of The Qur’an. This book has been used by the
missionaries time and again to show different ‘texts’ of the Qur’an to the
Muslims. Adrian Brockett in no way supports the claim of the
Christian missionaries yet they still like to quote him for some strange
reason. Samuel Green quotes Adrian
Brockett’s article: > The simple
fact is that none of the differences, whether vocal or Is that all that is said in that
article or is it that Samuel Green’s hand suddenly turned heavy so that he
can’t lift the pages of that article? His aim is to show that there is a
‘corruption’ in the Qur’anic text. For that reason he has shown some images of the
difference in the graphic form. And now here comes Mr. Green’s audacity after
he admits his poor knowledge! The above
examples show that there are differences between the basic letters of these two
Qur’ans. These differences in the basic printed letters show that even the
basic text of Qur’an that Uthman standardised has not been perfectly preserved
for the different transmissions have small variation even in the basic text. If one goes back to page 34 of
the article, one can be read precisely the opposite: All this point to a remarkably unitary transmission in
both its graphic form and its oral form.[5] This, not surprisingly, was
conveniently omitted by Samuel Green. Conclusion 3.
There are real differences between the Qur’an according to the Hafs’
transmission and the Qur’an according to the Warsh’ transmission. There are
differences in the basic letters, diacritical dots, and vowels. These
differences are small, but they do have some effect on the meaning. Further, in the section The Extent To Which The Differences Affect The Sense,
Adrian Brockett states: The simple fact is that none of the differences, whether vocal or graphic,
between the transmission of Hafs and the transmission of Warsh has any great
effect on the meaning. Many are the differences which do not change the meaning
at all, and the rest are differences with an effect on the meaning in the
immediate context of the text itself, but without any significant wider
influence on Muslim thought.[6] And interestingly enough the
author went on to say: The limits of their variation clearly establish that they
are a single text.[7] That is something which Samuel
Green would not let us know unless, of course, we point out. We read further: Thus, if the Qur’an had been transmitted only orally for the first century,
sizeable variations between texts such as are seen in the hadith and
pre-Islamic poetry would be found, and if it had been transmitted only in
writing, sizeable variations such as in the different transmissions of the
original document of the constitution of Medina would be found. But neither is the case with the Qur’an.
There must have been a parallel written transmission limiting variation in the
oral transmission to the graphic form, side by side with a parallel oral
transmission preserving the written transmission from corruption.[8] This leads the author to state: The transmission of the Qur’an after the death of
Muhammad was essentially static, rather than organic. There was a single text,
and nothing significant, not even allegedly abrogated material, could be taken
out nor could anything be put in.[9] This leads anyone to the
conclusion that there is no tampering of the Qur’an by humans. In the end: There can be no denying that some of the formal
characteristics of the Qur’an point to the oral side and others to the written
side, but neither was as a whole, primary. There is therefore no need to make
different categories for vocal and graphic differences between transmissions.
Muslims have not. The letter is not a dead skeleton to be refleshed, but is a
manifestation of the spirit alive from beginning. The transmission of the
Qur’an has always been oral, just as it has been written.[10] The rest of the article which Mr.
Green surprisingly omitted says that the Qur’an is one and same text after the
death of Muhammad(P). So, this essentially refutes the whole
‘corruption’ argument of Mr. Green. No Books On Mutawâtir Readings Available? > MAIN
CONCLUSION. There are seven authorised readings of the Qur’an with Mr. Green’s admission is pretty
much honest that there are seven authorised readings of the Qur’an. Not many
missionaries are brave enough to admit it. We have to admit that his confession
has taken a rather torturous route. Further we read: > it is not
superior to other Holy Books. We request that Muslim leaders make As far as the fourteen Qirâ’ât
not being available, as suggested above, shows utter ignorance of the author.
If he had bother to check some of the Arabic literature on the issue of the
Qirâ’ât, we would not be hearing this nonsense. We have already shown above some
of the printed edition of the masâhif
of the Qur’an in different Qirâ’ât. Below are the examples of the
books which deals with ten mutawâtir
readings.
This book Al-Nashr fi-l-Qirâ’ât al-cAshr by Ibn al-Jazrî who died in 833 AH. This
is a standard book used by students of the science of Qirâ’ât. This is the
edition from Dâr al-Kutub cIlmiyyah, The below one a very recent book.
For the benefit of the English
speaking readers, we translate the Arabic in the above text.
The Ten Mutawâtir Readings from the ways of ash-Shatbiyyah
and ad-Durrah In the Margin of The Holy Qur’an an idea from cAlawi Ibn Muhammad Ibn Ahmad
Bilfaqih carried out by Shaykh Muhammad Karîm Râjih The Chief Reader in the Syrian
land Dâr al-Muhâjir for Publications &
Distribution
…unique and first work of this kind in the field of Science of the ten Mutawâtir readings from the
ways of ash-Shatbiyyah and ad-Durrah in the margin of the Holy Qur’an is now
achieved, edited, and printed.[11] The 10 readers/transmitters of
the Mutawâtir
readings are listed
here. What is more interesting is that there are reciters even to this day
who have memorised the Qur’an in all the 10 Mutawâtir
readings! In the end, I address Shaykh Kurayyim Râjih the Head of the
Readers in the Syrian lands with my gratitude for carrying out that work and
supervising its course and supplementing it with valuable guidelines that
hardly come from anyone except an expert like him. May God reward his kind student and reader Muhammad
Fahd Khârűf who masters the ten Mutawâtir readings from the ways of ash-Shatbiyyah
and ad-Durrah and at-Tibah for participating to this noble task
making it, with the divine help, a beneficial work
for the holders of God’s Almighty Book and his readers.[12] In any case, one more
issue concerning the ‘lack of availability’ of the Qirâ’ât is down. We also present
the manuscript evidence that marks different Qirâ’ât and is dated probably 3rd
century AH. This is sufficient evidence to show that Qirâ’ât were given utmost
importance even in the past.
Probably 3rd
cent. A.H. no diacritical marks but advanced system of vocalization. Moreover,
this Mushaf marks the different canonical readings of the text
(Qirâ’ât). The process of restoring a masterpeice like this provides
the unique opportunity ot display the beauty and philological precision of one
Mushaf by showing more than just two pages.[13] It is clear from our discussion
about that the ‘variant’ readings of the Qur’an which are actually called
Qirâ’ât do not give the impression as ‘variant’ or something different than the
Qur’an. Muslims in the past as well as in the present have treated them with
utmost respect as they were all recited by the Prophet(P) and his Companions(R). They Qirâ’ât are just not considered as
something different from the Qur’an. One of the important conclusions
of the Christian missionary is also that: > the
evidence is considered. Since the Qur’an has variation within its text It will be good to study the
variant readings (they are truly variant!) in the New Testamant, their origins
and impact in the next section. It will be clear who exactly should be worried
about the variant readings and why should the Bible be considered as the last
candidate to be the ‘inerrant’ word of God. Variant Since this topic of variant
readings is brought forth and Mr. Green’s conclusion that since the Qur’an has
‘variation’ within its text and hence it is not superior to other Holy Books,
which presumably is the Bible. The
Interpreter’s Dictionary Of The Bible, Under “Text, NT“ informs
us that: THE PROBLEM. The NT
is now known, whole or in part, in nearly five thousand Greek MSS alone. Every
one of these handwritten copics differ from every other one. In addition to
these Greek MSS, the NT has been preserved in more than ten thousand MSS of the
early versions and in thousands of quotations of the Church Fathers. These MSS
of the versions and quotations of the Church Fathers differ from one another
just as widely as do the Greek MSS. Only a fraction of this great mass of
material has been fully collated and carefully studied. Until this task is
completed, the uncertainty regarding the text of the NT will remain. It has been estimated that these
MSS and quotations differ among themselves between 150,000 and 250,000 times.
The actual figure is, perhaps, much higher. A study of 150 Greek MSS of the
Gospel of Luke has revealed more than 30,000 different readings. It is true, of
course, that the addition of the readings from another 150 MSS of Luke would
not add another 30,000 readings to the list. But each MS studied does add
substantially to the list of variants. It is safe to say that there is
not one sentence in the NT in which the MS tradition is wholly uniform.[14] After reading this and applying
the conclusion of Mr. Green it would be quite clear that the Bible is not worth
even considering a scripture as it is clear that it is riddled with variant
readings and not a single sentence in the NT is uniform. Also
we do not know which one is the authorized reading. Some New Testament scholars
put the total number of readings or differences in the Bible at least 3,00,000
for 20th century. Hard to believe, is it not? Within this context, what NT textual materials have come down to us? As
early as 1707, John Mill claimed that the (relatively few) NT mss examined by
him contained about 30,000 variant readings (Vincent 1903: 6); 200 years later
B. B. Warfield (1907: 13) indicated that some 180,000 or 200,000 various
readings had been ‘counted’ in the then existing NT mss, and in more recent
times M. M. Parvis reported that examination of only 150 Greek mss of Luke
revealed about 30,000 readings there alone, and he suggested that the actual
quantity of variant readings among all NT manuscripts was likely to be much
higher than the 150,000 to 250,000 that had been estimated in modern times
(Parvis IDB 4: 594-95). Perhaps
300,000 differing readings is a fair figure for the 20th century (K. W. Clark
1962: 669). The textual critic must devise methods by which to sort through
these myriad readings and to analyze the many mss that contain them.[15] Further The Interpreter’s Dictionary Of The Bible
informs us: Many thousands of the variants which are found in the MSS
of the NT were put there deliberately. They are not merely the result of error
or of careless handling of the text. Many were created for theological or
dogmatic reasons (even though they may not affect the substance of Christian
dogma). It is because the books of the NT are religious books, sacred books,
canonical books, that they were changed to conform to what the copyist believed
to be the true reading. His interest was not in the “original reading but in
the “true reading.” This is precisely the attitude toward the NT which
prevailed from the earliest times to the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the
invention of printing. The thousands of Greek MSS, MSS of the versions, and
quotations of the Church Fathers provide the source for our knowledge of the
earliest or original text of the NT and of the history of the transmission of
that text before the invention of printing.[16] So, the tampering of the Bible
was done delibrately by the scribes themselves. It is pretty clear that Muslims
have a point when the tampering of the Bible is mentioned. Let us examine the reasons for
the corruption of the New Testament text. Bruce Metzger categorizes them as
Unintentional Errors and Intentional Changes.[17] 1. Unintentional errors
2. Intentional changes
So, if the Bible is really the
word of God then why did the scribes made intentional changes? Further do we
have the original copies of the Bible to verify what the original reading is
from the corrupted one? Since - like virtually all ancient literature - no
autographs are extant for the NT, its most likely original text must be
reconstructed from these imperfect, often widely divergent, later copies.[18] The interesting bit is not the
absence of original manuscripts but the presence of widely divergent and
imperfect readings. This is further exacerbated by the problem that we do not
have the original document to verify the original reading; therefore, we can
only make a guess of what the original reading could be. This means, we cannot
be sure whether Jesus(P) or Apostles said such a such thing in the Bible.
Hence it becomes a problem in evaluation of the Bible as a scripture. Indeed
the Acts of Apostles has earned the notoriety for the variant readings. In fact no book of the NT gives evidence of so much verbal variation as
does the Acts of Apostles. Besides the text represented in the oldest uncial
Greek MSS, begin with the Codex Vaticanus, often called the Neutral Text and
dating back to the second century AD, there is evidence either of a consistent
alternative text equally old, or of a series of early miscellaneous variants,
to which the name Western text is traditionally applied. The ancient
authorities of the Western Text of Acts include only one Greek (or rather
bilingual Greek and Latin) uncial MS, Codex Bezae of the fifth or sixth
century. But the variants often have striking content and strong early support
from Latin writers and Latin NT MSS. It now appears that while both the Neutral
and Western texts were in circulation, the former is the more likely of the two
to represent the original.[19] Apart from the notorious
variation we also have the problem of which text is the original text. Since we
do not know which one is original, the guess work in pressed into service. The
above problem is one such example of guess work. And how come guess work leads
to truth? Critical Editions & The Methodologies The argument would now be closed
by considering the issue of critical text which represents the variant readings
of the New Testament from the manuscripts as well as the quotes of the Church
Fathers. The widely used critical edition of New
Testament is by Nestle and Aland called Novum
Testamentum Graece Cum Apparatu Critico Curavit. This is a working
text or committee text which was agreed upon by a committee. This text was agreed by a committee. When they disagreed
on the best reading to print, they voted. Evidently, they agreed either by a
majority or unanimously that their text was the best available. But it does not
follow that they believed their text to be ‘original’. On the whole, the
textual critics have always been reluctant to claim so much. Other users of the
Greek New Testament accord them too much honour in treating the text as
definitive.[20] So, as far as the Novum Testamentum Graece (edited by Kurt
Aland and Barbara Aland) is concerned, one can say that the committee itself
does not make a claim that it restored the ‘original’ text of the Bible! So,
where is the original Bible then? In fact, the Kurt and
Barbara Aland, the editors of the recent edition of Nestle-Aland’s Novum Testamentum Graece Cum
Apparatu Critico Curavit compare the total number of variant free verses in
Nestle-Aland edition with the other critical editions such as that of
Tischendorf, Westcott-Hort, von Soden, Vogels, Merk, and Bover. It is
seen that nearly two-thirds of New Testament text in the seven editions of the
Greek New Testament reviewed by Aland and Aland is in agreement with no
differences other than in orthographic details.[21] Since Nestle-Aland’s critical
edition is very complicated to be used in the translation of the New Testament
in other languages, there was a growing need for new edition of Greek New
Testament which would serve this purpose. This need was materialised in the
form of The Greek New Testament, GNT2, (of course, based on Nestle-Aland’s critical
text) which has the following features:
An example of how the
GNT2 critical edition looks like is shown below. The above image
of the Gospel of Mark is taken from The Greek
New Testament edited by Kurt Aland,
Matthew Black, Carlo M Martini, Bruce M Metzger & Allen Wikgren. Note that
it provides lots of information on the textual variants and their relative
degree of certainity which are needed for the translation. This edition is similar
to the Nestle-Aland’s critical edition except
that it has more details on the textual variants and their relative degree of
certainity. By means of the letters A, B, C, and D, enclosed within “braces” { } at the
beginning of each set of textual variants the Committee has sought to indicate
the relative degree of certainity, arrived at the basis of internal
considerations as well as of external evidence, for the reading adopted as the
text. The letter A signifies that the text is virtually certain, while B
indicates that there is some degree of doubt. The letter C means that there is
a considerable degree of doubt whether the text or the apparatus contains the
superior reading, while D shows that there is a very high degree of doubt
concerning the reading selected for the text.[23] The relative degree
of certainity of the textual variants is again based on Committee discussions
which involved either a uanimous agreement or voting when they disagreed on a
particular reading. Also note that the textual variants are cited with their
relative degree of certainity. Certainly, if the New Testament’s original
text/literal text is available then why their relative degree of certainity? This clearly shows that the New Testament
that we have in our hands today is the work of human beings rather than the
word of God. So, by applying the standards of
the Christian missionary Samuel Green, we should reject the New Testament as a
’superior Holy Book’ because there is not a single sentence in it that is
uniform. Oh! we also forgot to mention that according to the great Church
tradition, we have the Bibles of the Protestant
Church, Roman
Catholic Church, Anglican
Church, Greek
Orthodox Church, Coptic
Church, Ethiopic
Church and Syriac
Church. They contain different number of books and God knows best how many
variants one is expected to see in them. So, our question now is which variants
and the books in the Bible are inspired by God? And what the evidence for it? And lastly we will let a
non-Muslim speak on the issue of the Islamic and the Christian scholarship
dealing with the ‘variants’: From an early date Muslim scholars recognized the danger of false testimony
and hence false doctrine, and developed an elaborate science for criticizing
tradition. “Traditional science”, as it was called, differed in many respects
from modern historical source criticism, and modern scholarship has always
disagreed with evaluations of traditional scientists about the authenticity and
accuracy of ancient narratives. But
their careful scrutiny of the chains of transmission and their meticulous
collection and preservation of variants in the transmitted narratives give to
medieval Arabic historiography a professionalism and sophistication without
precedent in antiquity and without parallel in the contemporary medieval West.
By comparison, the historiography of Latin Christendom seems poor and meagre,
and even the more advanced and complex historiography of Greek Christendom
still falls short of the historical literature of Islam in volume, variety and
analytical depth.[24] And Allah knows best! References [1] J M Cowan (Editor), Hans-Wehr Dictionary Of Modern Written Arabic, 1980 (Reprint), Librairie Du Liban, [2] W Muir, The Life Of Mohammad, 1912, Edinburgh, John Grant,
pp. xxii-xxiii. [3] Labib as-Said
(Translated By Bernard Weiss, M A Rauf & Morroe Berger), The Recited Koran, 1975, The [4] Cyril Glasse, The Concise Encyclopaedia of Islam, 1989, Stacey
International, [5] Andrew Rippin (Ed.), Approaches Of The History of Interpretation Of The Qur’an,
1988, Clarendon Press, [6] ibid., p. 37. [7] ibid., p. 43. [8] ibid., p. 44. [9] ibid. [10] ibid., p. 45. [11] cAlawi Ibn Muhammad Ibn Ahmad Bilfaqih,
Al-Qirâ’ât al-cAshr al-Mutawâtir, 1994, Dâr al-Muhâjir, See the back of
the cover page. [12] ibid. [13] Masâhif
San’â‘, 1985, Dâr
al-Athar al-Islâmiyyah, Mushâf no. 70, p. 36. [14] George Arthur Buttrick
(Ed.), The Interpreter’s Dictionary Of The Bible,
Volume 4, 1962 (1996 Print), Abingdon Press, [15] David Noel Freedman (Ed.), The Anchor Bible Dictionary On CD-ROM, 1997, [16] George Arthur Buttrick
(Ed.), The Interpreter’s Dictionary Of The
Bible, Volume 4, p. 595 (Under “Text,
NT“). [17] Bruce M Metzger, The Text Of The New Testament: Its Transmission,
Corruption & Restoration, 1992, [18] David Noel Freedman (Ed.), The Anchor Bible Dictionary On CD-ROM, (Under
“Textual Criticism, NT“). [19] George Arthur Buttrick
(Ed.), The Interpreter’s Dictionary Of The
Bible, Volume 1, p. 41 (Under “Acts of
the Apostles“). [20] D C Parker, The Living Text Of The Gospels, 1997, [21] Kurt Aland & Barbara
Aland, The Text Of The New Testament: An
Introduction To The Critical Editions & To The Theory & Practice Of
Modern Text Criticism, 1995, William B Eerdmans Publishing Company,
Grand Rapids, Michigan, p. 29. [22] Kurt Aland, Matthew Black,
Carlo M Martini, Bruce M Metzger & Allen Wikgren (Editors), The Greek New Testament, 1968 (Second
Edition), United Bible Societies, p. v. [23] Ibid, pp. x-xi. [24] Bernard Lewis, Islam In History, 1993, Open Court
Publishing, pp.104-105. Taken from:The
Seven Readings Of The Qur’an By Samuel Green Refuted http://muslimresponse.wordpress.com/2008/09/10/quran-separated-in-variant-textual/ |
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