Joseph Islam's Article "HOW DO WE KNOW THAT THE QURAN WAS FULLY PRESERVED? ...."

[Bassam Zawadi]

I was reading brother Joseph's article over here http://quransmessage.com/articles/how%20do%20we%20know%20the%20quran%20was%20preserved%20if%20nor%20for%20ahadith%20FM3.htm

- Brother Joseph asked "A question bears pondering. When a non Muslim individual sincerely accepts the Quran as the Word of God, does he or she really care 'how the Quran was preserved'? Do they really accept the Quran as God's word because the Ahadith attests that the Quran can be traced all the way back to a Prophet which they do not yet believe in?" to then which brother Joseph answered "The answer is of course, in the negative." I don't think brother Joseph could speak on behalf of everyone. We are living in a time and age where our faith is under attack, especially the Qur'an's preservation by orientalists. Such things could shake a person's faith, hence it becomes relevant to many Muslims to historically demonstrate the preservation of the Qur'an and not simply resort to blind faith. We need to demonstrate that the overall collection process was reliable to the extent where we shouldn't even be open to the question that 15:9 was a false insertion in order to not let others doubt and suspect the other alleged false insertions.

- Many of the claims raised by brother Joseph in his "IT IS ONLY THE AHADITH THAT RAISES DOUBTS TO THE QURAN'S PRESERVATION" section were already addressed by myself in my debate on the subject http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWK1xv0Bt-A&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Eansweringmuslims%2Ecom%2F&feature=player_embedded.

- Many of the subjective concerns raised against the hadiths have already been addressed by traditional Muslims (some examples http://www.letmeturnthetables.com/2008/08/prophet-muhammad-visiting-all-his-wives.html,http://www.call-to-monotheism.com/the_prophet_prohibited_the_killing_of_women_and_children__but_what_about_those_night_raids_,http://www.ahlalhdeeth.com/vbe/showthread.php?t=16188, etc. etc. etc . ). It would be good to see counter rebuttals and a justification for the objectivity of the methodology used to discard these ahaadith. Unfortunately, I feel that there is a double standard going on when it comes to the hadith literature, since I feel the same level and method of argumentation could be equally applied against the Qur'an.

- Joseph talks about "ahad hadiths", so does that mean that he accepts the Mutawaatir ahaadith? How about ahad hadith which have had mutawaatir acceptance?

- Joseph said "The requirement that necessitated the need for ‘isnads’ seems inevitably linked to the fact that the veracity of the statements they provided were most likely challenged by the earliest Islamic communities." Isnads were needed in order to ensure containment and elimination of fabrications and weak evidence based stories from floating around.



I'm afraid that I can't Joseph's method as being serious, since it requires too much blind faith in a personal and subjective interpretation of the Qur'an, while at the same time discards established historical facts by merely sweeping them under the rug.



Bassam

[Joseph Islam]

Dear brother Bassam,

As-salam alaykum.

Thank you for your critique. Please see my responses below which I trust that you will read with academic interest and sincere enquiry.

As I am sure you will appreciate, it is widely appreciated, both in the ambit of traditional and modern oriental scholarship, that the Quran is the 'earliest' historical source, most contemporaneous with the Prophetic ministry. Even as a historical document, I trust that no sincere, yet ardent student of history can deny this.

However, what you respectfully refer to as 'historical established facts' by which I assume you refer to the Islamic secondary source corpus depicting Islamic history, is disputed at best both from an academic perspective and arguably remains mute from a Quranic perspective.

Given my humble yet ardent study in this area, I am not convinced that these sources are either contemporaneous to the Prophetic ministry, or that they have any basis to be assigned the title 'established historical facts' by which I also assume you infer 'veracity'.

It can be quite convincingly argued that the secondary sources were initially fluid narratives which over time became canonised as a result of an enterprise of 'later compilers' often centuries removed from the Prophetic ministry.

Please see my section 'Historical Sources' where I discuss some of these sources. [1]

Therefore, for any sincere enquiry of the Quran, no narrative from 'secondary sources' can override the testimony of the Quran itself which is the earliest Muslim source most contemporaneous to the Prophetic ministry.

You say:

"We are living in a time and age where our faith is under attack, especially the Qur'an's preservation by orientalists. Such things could shake a person's faith, hence it becomes relevant to many Muslims to historically demonstrate the preservation of the Qur'an and not simply resort to blind faith. We need to demonstrate that the overall collection process was reliable to the extent where we shouldn't even be open to the question that 15:9 was a false insertion in order to not let others doubt and suspect the other alleged false insertions. "

It is arguably the 'Ahadith corpus' which in the hands of the polemics which casts serious doubt on the Quran's preservation and not the Quran.

Please see a link below to cite just once example.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=91AM7665cbo

Even from a historic document perspective, the Quran must be first understood from the Quran itself and be allowed to speak about the nature of its own compilation and not from the ‘lenses' of late secondary sources.

Therefore I would posit that:

• Any serious attempt at Quranic 'Tafsir' or interpretation should be performed primarily in light of the Quran itself.
• Unqualified verses or narratives must be understood in the context and light of qualified verses or narratives
• Lack of 'perceived' details of an event does not require one to source other material with a view to arbitrarily ‘fill them in’. Many verses have subtle nuances and are complete in that they make clear the general purport of the message and wisdom they intend to impart. Intricate details are not of its concern. From the Quran’s perspective, God does not run out of words (31:27).

You further respectfully assert when speaking of the objectivity of the methodology used to discard hadith that:

I feel the same level and method of argumentation could be equally applied against the Qur'an.

I would strongly, yet respectfully contend with this statement and assert that this remains wholly unproven.

You respectfully ask:

- Joseph talks about "ahad hadiths", so does that mean that he accepts the Mutawaatir ahaadith? How about ahad hadith which have had mutawaatir acceptance?

It is my assertion that neither of them has any 'religious authority' granted to them by God's word, the Quran. My references to types of hadith have never been to legitimise them as an authoritative source of 'religious' law or guidance.

You respectfully assert that:

- Joseph said "The requirement that necessitated the need for ‘isnads’ seems inevitably linked to the fact that the veracity of the statements they provided were most likely challenged by the earliest Islamic communities." Isnads were needed in order to ensure containment and elimination of fabrications and weak evidence based stories from floating around.

Therefore, can I then rightly assume that you confirm that the Ahadith compilation process was potentially riddled with weak and fabricated narratives? Would you also respectfully agree with me that there are still Ahadith within the corpus upon which scholars of Islam have no unity?

A glaring example is that of the Shi'a scholars which do not accept many Sunni Ahadith and vice versa. There are also arguably 'intra' disagreements within the sects on reports.

The fact that no 'isnad' was ever demanded of the Quran nor deemed necessary clearly indicates that the collation, acceptance, authority and mass transmission of the overarching Quranic text was 'agreed' upon by the Muslim communities without dispute.

Therefore in my view, the integrity of the sources is not comparable nor is the transmission process.

You say that:

I'm afraid that I can't Joseph's method as being serious, since it requires too much blind faith in a personal and subjective interpretation of the Qur'an, while at the same time discards established historical facts by merely sweeping them under the rug.

Any interpretation is innately subjective. But the best approach and 'authoritative source' must be first defined with legitimate warrant. Scholars and other learned must attempt to derive the best meaning whilst keeping the Quran at the fore and not interpret the Quran from the lenses of late fallible sources. With respect, the established historical facts' that you refer to is at best in my humble opinion, a 'misnomer' and an extremely moot (i.e. debatable) topic.

With respect as always,

Your brother in faith,
Joseph.



REFERENCE:

[1] HISTORICAL SOURCES
http://quransmessage.com/articles/historical%20sources%20FM3.htm

[optimist]

The fact that no 'isnad' was ever demanded of the Quran nor deemed necessary clearly indicates that the collation, acceptance, authority and mass transmission of the overarching Quranic text was 'agreed' upon by the Muslim communities without dispute.

Assalamu alaikum,

Thank you brother JI for the above thought provoking comment.   Unfortunately, many people equate collation and preservation of the Quran with collection and preservation of Hadiths to prove the veracity of the latter.  This is a tactic to trap ordinary people since in a superficial analysis one might think there is substance in the argument.  In reality collation and preservation of Quran was totally a different process undertaken by prophet himself and his close companions who were with him.  They did not leave the responsibility to any 'Bukhari' or 'Muslim' who might come after them after many many years.

1.  We cannot find a "weak verse", a "sahih verse", an "authentic verse", "unauthentic verse", etc in the case of Quran. 

2.  We can not find any instances in the history about any allegation of  fabrication of verses of the Quran (ignoring some spurious ahaadith/ traditions that cast some doubts).   Accordingly, there was no need to go through a process of isnad verification to prove the authenticity of the verses. 

3.  The verses of the Quran is finite and fixed, and there could be not even a single word more and single word less.  But whatever prophet said, did, agreed, instructed as a leader of the community and ruler of Islamic state could be infinite. No one can argue or claim that the hadith compilers have collected all the genuine and relevant "hadiths" of the prophet. They may have lost thousands of valid and genuine hadiths/ reports of the prophet.  Therefore comparing collection and preservation of hadith with Quran is totally unwarranted.

4. It is an undisputed fact that, the preservation of the Quran was completed during the life time of the prophet himself and memorized by hundreds of his companions during his own life time. 

5. It would be ridiculous even to imagine prophet permitting different people to record different collections of his hadiths and giving such divergent collections to Muslims as religious guidance.  There would be some logic if someone or any group of people had been officially entrusted (either by the prophet himself or at the least by his immediate companions, Abubakr/ Umar/ Usman/ Ali  to collect all valid ahaadith of the prophet, and verify the truthfulness of the same, and then giving the collection to the Muslims as a single collection.  The fact that this has never happened itself is sufficient to reject hadith collections.

Regards,
Optimist