Uthman ibn aFFan (r. 644–656) ordered a com-
mittee headed by Zayd ibn Thabit (d. ca. 655),
Muhammad’s scribe, to establish a single authori-
tative recension of the Quran. Uthman reportedly
had divergent versions, which were being used in
different parts of the early Muslim community,
destroyed. To avoid disputes, everyone was to use
a single version of the Quran, known as the Uth-
manic codex, its technical name, which Muslims
believe to be the canonical version used today.
The first copies were sent from Medina to the
cities of Mecca, damascUs, Basra, and Kufa (the
latter two are in Iraq).
Islamic sources indicate that during Muham-
mad’s lifetime his Companions had both memo-
rized the revelations and written them on palm
branches, stone tablets, and the shoulder blades
of animals. They also state that there was a pre-
Uthmanic version of the Quran in the hands of
his predecessor abU bakr (r. 632–634), which
had been collected out of a concern that the
verses would be lost or forgotten when Muham-
mad’s Companions died. Abu Bakr’s copy was
passed on to Hafsa, one of Muhammad’s widows
and daughter of the caliph Umar ibn al-khattab
(r. 634–644). This was probably one of the main
copies used in the creation of Uthman’s codex.
Nevertheless, evidence from coins, early inscrip-
tions, and texts tells us that there continued to
be non-Uthmanic versions of the Quran circulat-
ing in the Muslim community after the seventh
century. A 10th-century source (Abu Dawud
al-Sijistani, d. 929) indicates that there were
as many as 28 codices at that time. Moreover,
because early Arabic manuscripts of the Quran
were often written without vowels and markings
to differentiate consonants, variant “readings” of
the Uthmanic codex arose in the far-flung lands
of the Arab Muslim empire. At the apex of the
abbasid caliphate (10th century), the consensus
was that there were seven authorized readings.
The standard edition printed today was first
published in 1923 in cairo; it is based on the
eighth-century “reading” of Kufa in iraq. The
numbering of verses in the Cairo edition has
become the standard for most modern printings
of the Quran.
The Quran holds a place of primary impor-
tance in the history of Islam and in the daily life
of Muslims. It is considered a foundational docu-
ment in matters of edUcation, law, theology, and
history. Children begin their religious education
by learning how to read and recite it in Arabic,
believed the unadulterated language of God’s
revelation. All Muslims must memorize short
chapters of the Quran in order to perform their
daily prayers. Some choose to memorize the entire
book. The ulama have had to go even greater
lengths to gain advanced levels of expertise in its
language and rhetoric. Indeed, a work of religious
scholarship would be considered inadequate if it
were to omit quranic quotations. Consequently,
a sizeable body of literature about the Quran has
been produced through the centuries by ulama
working in the major centers of Islamic learning.
Perhaps the most important genre of writings con-
cerning the Quran is that of tafsir, or scriptural
exegesis. This Islamic “science” has helped Mus-
lims both maintain the integrity of God’s revela-
tions in their original language and make them a
part of their lives in times and places quite distant
from seventh-century Arabia, even in modern
Europe and the Americas.
The artful recitation of the Quran, known
as tajwid and tartil, is another way in which the
Quran has been incorporated into the life of the
Muslim community. The Quran can be recited
by individuals in order to gain divine blessing
(baraka) and forgiveness, but recitations are also
performed on formal occasions such as at large
assemblies and during funerals and mourning
rites. Quran reciters can attain a reputation com-
parable to that of opera stars, and several coun-
tries hold national Quran recital competitions.
Recorded recitations of the Quran are available
in all the electronic media, making it possible
for Muslims to listen to them at home, work, or
while traveling. In addition to artful recitation,Quran 573 J