- “The scattered fragments of the Koran were in the first instance collected
by his immediate successor Abu Bekr, about a year after the Prophet’s
death, at the suggestion of Omar, who foresaw that, as the Muslim
warriors, whose memories were the sole depositories of large portions of
the revelations, died off or were slain, as had been the case with many in
the battle of Yemâma, A.H. 12, the loss of the greater part, or even of the
whole, was imminent. Zaid Ibn Thâbit, a native of Medina, and one of the
Ansars, or helpers, who had been Muhammad’s amanuensis, was the
person fixed upon to carry out the task”. The Koran, trans. J.M.Rodwell,
Dent, London, 1937, p.1. Note that in contrast to Christianity, the original
followers of this “religion” of Mohammed were not killed because they
were being persecuted; they were being killed in battle as warriors.
According to the Islamic authorities, it was under Caliph Uthman
(circa 650 A.D.) that variants of the Koran were brought into uniformity.
The newly-standardized Koran being distributed to Medina, Basra,
Damascus, Kufa (and possibly other Islamic centres e.g. Mecca):
the new version must have driven out the variants because of its
official authority and the general desire for uniformity. It was in this way
that there came into being the authorised Kur'an, which has remained
generally authoritative to the present day and in spite of all vicissitudes
has formed, with the Sunna, the solid foundation for Muslim life and
thought. -- The Shorter Encyclopaedia of Islam, London, 1953, p.280.
Modern scholars have questioned the very foundations of the history
of Islam and even of the existence of Mohammed as a real, historical
person (for example, see Robert Spencer, Did Muhammad exist?: an
inquiry into Islam's obscure origins, Wilmington, 2012). Under the
onslaught of evidence unearthed by Western scholars at the turn of the
twenty-first century, even Islamic organisations admit that none of the
manuscripts which were claimed to be the original copies distributed by
Caliph Uthman are complete, are standard and date from 650 A.D. (see
http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Text/Mss/#b). Thus, the idea of. Thus, the idea of)
a standard Koran distributed by Caliph Uthman may be a myth. If it was
not a myth then it seems strange that this first, standardised Koran was an
dana p.
(Dana P.)
#1