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The History of the Qur’anic Text

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From Revelation to Compilation

A Comparative Study with the Old
and New Testaments
By Muhammad Mustafa Al-A}zami
UK Islamic Academy, Leicester, England, 2003

It is difficult to summarize this scholarly work in a few pages, so many are

the issues approached, often in novel ways, and so varied the degree of
support given by each to the major premises. The book approaches three
subjects in three parts: The History of the Qur’anic Text, The History of the
Biblical Scriptures, and An Appraisal of Orientalism. These three hang together
logically, for the first attempts to establish the integrity of the Qur’an, the
second by contrast to demolish evidence for the integrity of the Bible, and the
third to show how bias informed by political, economic, cultural and religious
interests has clouded these issues heretofore. All three of these issues are dealt
with in more detail in earlier essays by other authors. However, this work
remains the single most important source on the state of the conflict between
the books. It raises a rather seedy and unsavoury battle to a new level of
academic expertise. One should hope the book is indicative of a turn in the
tide towards greater objectivity.
In part one, The History of the Qur’anic Text, the author deals with the
early history of Islam, a contextual concept of revelation, the early transmission
of the Qur’an, the recording and compilation, the sources, ‘Uthman’s
recension, the evolution of graphic reading aids, the history of Arabic
palaeography and its relationship to Qur’anic orthography, the causes of
variant readings, and the Islamic method of transmission to deal finally with
alleged textual variants.
In part two, The History of the Biblical Scriptures, the author approaches
the early history of Judaism, the Old Testament and its corruption, the early
history of Christianity, and the New Testament focusing on it anonymous
authorship and its corruption.
The third part is divided into two areas. The first relates to Orientalist
approaches to the Qur’an, showing their deficiencies. The second motivates
those deficiencies as the result of subjective and biased investigation having
largely political causes.

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A summation of the message of the book is that the Qur’an, when

objectively reviewed, must be seen to maintain an integrity of text going back
to its origins, which contrasts with the Bible, clearly a corrupted text having
little to do with an original revelation, while the failure to recognize this is due
to the biased approaches of Orientalists who have denigrated the Qur’an and
failed to present it in the proper light.
It was probably wise of the author in part one to bring forward in clear
and detailed summation the traditional arguments Muslims have made for the
integrity of the Qur’an by appealing to historical sources. In addition to this
the author makes much use of the strength of the transmission of oral material
at the relevant times in Arabic society, an argument that is strengthened by the
academic study of historical transmission in non-literate societies since the
seminal work of Jan Vansina. While the question of the lack of primary
historical documentation remains, the author’s careful referencing of Islamic
transmission is a telling contribution in favour of Qur’anic integrity. In the light
of this preparation, the arguments drawn in the final chapter gain in credibility
and will have to be answered in a scholarly way, if the results of historical
critical studies of the Qur’an are to be maintained.
Part two is largely a rehash of historical criticism of the Bible that has made
the careers of thousands of Biblical scholars, and can hardly be expected to
reveal anything new. Nevertheless, the author contrives to raise a few issues
that have been largely neglected by Biblical scholars, most prominently the
questioning of the Qumran texts as evidence.
In the third part, the evaluation of Orientalist approaches, the author is
heavily dependent on Edward Said. Further, he evaluates in some detail the
attempts of Flügel, Blachère and Mingana to disprove Qur’anic integrity.
He deals with the Puin and San’a fragments, and finally readdresses the
question of a completed Qur’anic compilation in the first century. This is
followed by a documentation of the subjectivity of scholars down to the
present and a plea for objectivity in historical criticism.
The issue raised is very much that of objectivity. Yet the study in itself
fails to measure up to a high standard of objectivity, although it gives every
indication of honesty on the part of the writer. The insistence on applying the
same stringent criteria to the Bible, an earlier compilation of writings
distributed over many centuries, as to the Qur’an, a later text compiled soon
after its production, and the consequent rejection of the Bible as a historical
document in toto, is evidence enough of lack of objectivity. The failure of a
clearly honest researcher to achieve the necessary level of objectivity to
engage in comparative studies reflects not so much on the researcher,
but on the academic trend to turn away from the transmission and refining of
comparative method to focus on Religious Studies, a field that often invites the

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reinforcement of sectarian views on a scientific level despite its strengths in

perusing a single tradition to depths beyond the reach of comparative scholars.
In sum, the book is valuable from many points of view. The first part is an
invaluable expression of a finely scholarly Islamic view of the subject. The
second part shows uncommon sophistication in regard to historical criticism of
the Bible, but adds little to an already over-exposed subject. The third part
raises the issue of academic objectivity, and rightly demands that scholars set
aside the constant pressure to relinquish the ideal of objectivity, which is the
only safeguard of science.

Thomas McElwain
University of Stockholm
Sweden

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