Which Koran? (Part II)
The Significance of Koranic Variation
by Ibn Warraq (March 2008)
DO VARIANTS MATTER?
The variants between Korans (as set out last month) are not trifling, and are,
in fact, of great significance. The problem is to work out what significance,
and this proves to be no easy matter. For a flat-footed fundamentalist like
Maududi, the admittance of any variant whether in the extant printed Korans
available in the Islamic world or in the manuscripts like the Samarqand Quran
or those recorded in the Hadith, commentaries and grammars is, of course,
devastating. Variants constitute an irrefutable, knock-down argument against
his absurdly rigid position (as quoted in part I), a position not held by all
Muslim scholars, however. I believe their significance lies in a wider context,
in their profound implication for the sources of the rise of Islam, for the
forging of Islamic identity, for the genesis of the Koran itself, for Islamic
Jurisprudence, for the so-called oral tradition, and for the history of the
Arabic language and orthography. I shall leave these implications for later.
Even simply on their own terms, variants do result in significant differences
in meaning which in turn have consequences for Islamic practice, ritual and
belief. Thus, the variants in the printed Korans are not trivial. As an example
of a variant reading on the level of vocalisation though not of the underlying
graphic shape (or, in Arabic, rasm), there are the last two verses of Sura
LXXXV: 21-22: (21) bal huwa qur'änun majïdun; (22) fï lawhim mahfüzun or
mahfuhzin. The last syllable is in doubt. The Hafs Koran has, as we saw
earlier, mahfuhãin, the genitive, giving the meaning, "It is a glorious Koran
on a preserved tablet." This is a reference to the fundamental Muslim doctrine
of the Preserved Tablet. But the Warsh transmission has the nominative ending
-un, and we get "It is a glorious Koran preserved on a tablet." Did the
doctrine arise out of the reading, or did the doctrine influence the choice of
the reading?
In Sura III verse 13, there is much ambiguity as the exact reference of the
pronoun is not clear:
Bell: "You have already had a sign in two parties which met, one fighting in
the way of Allah, another unbelieving, who saw them with their eyes twice as
many as they were
."
Yusuf Ali: "There has already been for you a sign in the two armies that met
(in combat): One was fighting in the cause of God, the other Resisting God;
these saw with their own eyes Twice their number."
Arberry: "There has already been a sign for you in the two companies that
encountered, one company fighting in the way of God and another unbelieving;
they saw them twice the like of them, as the eye sees
."
This verse is a said to be a reference to the miracle of the battle of Badr,
when Muslims putatively defeated forces twice their own number. However, this
interpretation is much easier if we read the verb as saying "you saw them"
tarawnahum, as in the Warsh reading, and not yarawnahum (they saw them) as in
the Hafs reading. Warsh gives us a miracle, Hafs gives us a confusion of
pronouns.
Ignaz Goldziher, one of the creators of modern Islamic Studies, showed how
Hadith, Muslim Tradition, reflected "the social, political and religious ideals
of transmitters themselves and of the societies or groups they served as
spokesman. By Sunna was to be understood, not the inherited instruction of the
Prophet, but the ius consuetudinis of a group or party, large or small. By
hadith is meant the vehicle of that sunna, a report, verbal or written,
conveying a description of the relevant practice, opinion or custom approved by
the disseminators of the report."[1] Influenced by Goldziher's work, Joseph
Schacht elaborated a thesis that "rather than spreading out from an original
centre at Medina, Islamic Law originated in the provinces. Reference of the
Sunna to the Prophet was the end rather than the beginning of a process. Its
purpose was to verify some local legal viewpoint. In other words, the Sunna
differed and was differently defined from region to region."[2]
Of course, the conclusions of scholars like Goldziher and Schacht are equally
applicable to Koranic variants, many of which are known to us through hadith,
rather than extant Koranic manuscripts. In other words, the variants reflect
the ideology, as Burton shows, of groups that wish to argue for their own
viewpoint, to establish a ruling, to settle conflict of sources. For example
the rite of Tawäf, going round the two hills of Safä and Marwa during Hajj,
Pilgrimage, are considered obligatory by certain Muslim jurists despite a
certain ambiguity in Surah II.158, which is interpreted by some to mean that
the Tawäf was optional. Others still also regarded the Tawäf as optional but
this time the view "was explicitly derived from the variant reading of II.158
transmitted in the muæùaf of `Abdullah Ibn Mas`üd."[3]
Burton argues that when practice was at variance with the Koran, the partisans
of the practice appealed to the Sunna of the Prophet, their opponents "improve
the wording of the Qur'än, inserting a word and appealing to the authority of a
Companion of the Prophet , from whom not merely a variant reading, but a
variant Qur'än had apparently been transmitted. The alleged variant reading
unmistakably proceeded from one of two rival and competing interpretations. To
that extent the reading arose at a secondary stage."[4]
There is a similar exchange of argument and counter-argument concerning the
penalty for breach of oaths [Surah V.89], a three days' fast, ending as before
with an appeal to a variant reading from Ibn Mas`üd. Al-Shäfi`ï argued that the
Koran did not stipulate if the fast should be consecutive, hence Muslims were
free to choose consecutive or separate days. Ùanïfs argued that the fast should
be consecutive, as a variant reading of Ibn Mas`üd indicates. The same variant
reading was attributed to Ubayy.[5] Ubayy also had a very significant variant
reading of Surah IV.24 concerning the Muslim Law on marriage; only with his
interpolation does IV.24 "sanction the doctrine of mut'a, or temporary
marriage, rejection of which was elsewhere being propounded on the basis of
information from a third Companion of the Prophet as a part of the Sunna.
Evidently the Qur'än, in the form of the Ubayy reading, is playing the role of
a counter-sunna, rather, a counter-exegesis, the function of the Ubayy
interpolation to gloss and bring out the full meaning of the root of samta`tum,
mt`."[6]
As Al-Suyütï put it, "The differences in the readings indicate the differences
in the legal rulings."[7] Thus we have two opposing doctrines - the
invalidation of the ritual purity [wudü'] and the contrary doctrine - depending
on how we read a certain word in IV.43 and V.9 as lämastum or lamastum; it is
worth noting that all the printed Korans that I have listed in part I except
the Flügel have the "defective" writing, with the long vowel after the letter
läm indicated by a dagger alif, only the Flügel has the plene alif. Similarly,
we have two opposing doctrines depending on how we read II.222 -yathurna or
yattahirna -concerning the permissibility of sexual intercourse with a
menstruating woman at the expiry of her period but before she has cleansed
herself. [8]
Finally we have the example of V.6, as al- Suyütï says, "The verse was revealed
to sanction two distinct legal doctrines: arjulakum - enjoined the washing of
the feet, ajulikum -permitted the wiping of the feet."[9] Herbert Berg
summarises the larger significance of these two interpretations, "Al-Tabarï
adduces 47 hadiths which seek to clarify the expression wa-arjulakum ila
al-ka`bayn (and your feet to the ankles) of Quran V:6. The first 27 hadiths
read the passage as arjulakum (accusative); the other 20 hadiths read the
passage as arjulikum (genitive)
.Goldziher would see in these two sharply
divided sets of hadiths the vestiges of a later debate within the Muslim
community about the proper form of wudü' (ablution) that has been projected
back to the earlier generations of Muslims. Schacht might trace this ablution
debate in other texts to determine the relative chronology and the provenance
of the hadiths. He might also, along with Juynboll, seek a common link to help
date the debate. `Ikrima is a candidate since he appears in five hadiths,
though the isnads form more of a spider pattern. Wansbrough would abandon such
use of the isnad except to note that their presence implies that the 47 hadiths
reached their final form after 200 A.H.[9 Century, C.E.] Moreover, the hadiths
are primarily halakhic and masoretic: they contain pronouncements from the
Prophet, his Companions and their Successors and have recourse to variant
readings and grammatical explanations. Their presence implies a relatively late
date as well."[10]
Burton following Al- Suyütï argues that "the majority of variant readings came
to be regarded as little more than exegeses that had gradually crept into the
texts transmitted from the Companions."[11] While the latter observation may
well explain some of the mechanism of how the Companion texts came into being,
I would go further and doubt the very existence of Codices belonging to the
Companions; they have been conjured up by exegetical hadiths. In other words,
the question of variants leads inexorably to the questions of the authenticity
of hadiths relating them.
KORANIC MANUSCRIPTS
In his translation of the Koran, the British convert to Islam, Marmaduke
Pickthall [1930] had the scholarly courtesy to tell us that the copy of the
Koran [mushaf] that he had used was a lithograph copy of that written by
al-Hajj Muhammad Shakarzadeh at the command of Sultan Mahmud of Turkey in 1246
A.H. [circa 1830 C.E.].[12] It does not tell us enough, however. We still do
not know which Koran, which manuscript, the scribe Al-Hajj had relied on. The
situation is even worse with other translators of the Koran. George Sale [1734]
in his Note to the Reader of his translation [13] tells us, "As I have had no
opportunity of consulting public libraries, the manuscripts of which I have
made use throughout the whole work have been such as I had in my own study,
."
But he does not specify which manuscripts he had in his possession.
J. M. Rodwell [1861][14] used Gustav Flügel`s edition. Flügel published the
Arabic text of the Koran in 1834, and a concordance in 1842. We no longer know
on which Arabic manuscripts Flügel depended for his published text, but when
Jeffery and Mendelsohn examined the orthography of the Samarqand Quran Codex, a
ninth century C.E. work produced in Iraq, they found something astonishing :
"The most striking fact in this list [of verse endings] is the number of
coincidences of verse endings in the Codex with those adopted by Flügel in his
text
.Since we are entirely in the dark as to the source from which Flügel
drew his verse divisions, these coincidences are significant. Flügel's verse
endings agree with none of the known systems whose tradition has come down to
us, nor with any that we have been able to trace in the Masoretic literature
under the section Ru'üs al-Ayy, and it has been generally assumed that he
selected his verse endings on an arbitrary system of his own. The number of
agreements between his system and that followed in this Codex, however, suggest
that he may have been following the system of some MS in his possession which
may have followed some divergent Oriental tradition. It must be admitted,
however, that the table Shebunin [Russian scholar who studied the original
manuscript in St. Petersburg in 1891] constructs of the divergences between the
Samarqand Codex and the Flugel text in the matter of verse endings, is equally
long and imposing, so that it is obvious that the question of Flügel's system
of verse division awaits further elucidation."[15]
At any rate, Flügel's edition remained the standard one for reference for all
of the nineteenth century.
While E. H. Palmer [1880],[16] and N. J. Dawood [1956][17] do not indicate
which Arabic text they were using, Yusuf Ali [1934] says he mainly used the
"Egyptian edition published under the authority of the King of Egypt" for his
numbering of the verses; there is no indication if he used the same edition for
the translation itself.[18]
A. J. Arberry [1964],in the introduction[19] to his translation, makes the
extraordinary claim worthy of an Islamic fundamentalist,"
.[T]he Koran as
printed in the twentieth century is identical with the Koran as authorized by
`Uthmän more than 1300 years ago."[20] One wonders how Arberry knows that the
present printed Koran [The Egyptian version of 1342 A.H.?] is identical to the
so-called `Uthmänic one; did he look at and compare dated manuscripts that can
be said to be genuinely `Uthmänic? No wonder Arberry does not feel obliged to
reveal which Arabic text he used, let alone which manuscript.
Régis Blachère in his French version[21] used the Arabic text of the Cairo
edition of 1342 A.H./1923 C.E.[22] However, the Cairo edition is not based on a
comparison of manuscripts but a comparison of readings in written sources such
as hadiths, Koranic commentaries, lexica, and so on, but ultimately derived
from the reading of Hafs (805) from `Äsim (744), with a reliance on an Oral
Tradition about the orthography of the Koran. Again, manuscripts do not seem to
have played a significant role at arriving at a Koranic text. I shall come back
to the 1342 Cairo text later.
Admittedly, some of the above translations were meant for a general public, but
so was Gideons` Bible, and yet the latter gives the list of previous
translations consulted, and the original texts used; for Hebrew the celebrated
R. Kittel edition of Biblia Hebraica was referred to, and for the Greek, the
23rd edition of Nestle Greek New Testament.[23] As for the Biblia Hebraica
itself, in their forward to the New Edition [1977], Wilhelm Rudolph and Karl
Elliger write, "There is no need to defend the use of the Leningrad Codex B 19
A (L) as the basis of the Hebrew Bible, whatever one may think of its
relationship to the Ben Asher text.
In any event, L is still `the oldest dated
manuscript of the complete Hebrew Bible ' [dated 1009 or 1008 C.E.].[24] If
we consult the Greek New Testament edited by F. H. A. Scrivener [1903] we are
informed on the title page that the text utilized is the one established by
Stephanus in 1550 C.E. with variants from Bezae, Elzevir, Lachmann,
Tischendorf, Tregelles, and Westcott -Hort.[25] Here we learn which texts were
examined for translations, and if we go to the texts themselves we are
immediately apprised of the manuscript used.
The situation is different and, at present, far more difficult in the world of
Islamic Studies. A Western scholar simply does not have a complete or
comprehensive catalogue of all the extant Koranic manuscripts round the world
at his disposal. Many collections remain uncatalogued such as the Damascus
Korans of Istanbul.[26] There are also many private collections not inventoried
or are inaccessible to scholars. There are scattered references to Koranic
manuscripts in various articles in the two editions of the Encyclopaedia of
Islam, such as those by Bernhard Moritz in the article Arabia, sub-section
Arabic Writing in EI Ist edn., or Dominique-Sourdel`s Khatt in the 2nd edn.,
but no comprehensive treatment of the subject. As Déroche remarks, "The bulk of
the material, manuscripts without illumination or in more ordinary hands of
later periods, have not even been examined or catalogued in spite of their
importance for the study of a wide range of subjects, from popular piety to the
diffusion of the book in the Islamic lands."[27] Déroche's own article in the
Encyclopaedia of the Qur'än [EQ, henceforth]is perhaps the first of its kind,
but Déroche also seems unaware of the significance of the variants, since he
minimizes them. He writes,"
most of the manuscripts currently known are very
close to the canonical text." And yet adds immediately afterwards the
observation, "Some fragments of Hijäzï codices found in San`ä' are said to
include some textual variants which were not recorded by later literature , and
to offer an order of the suras differing from the arrangements of both the
canonical text and the codices of Ibn Mas`üd and Ubayy."[28] There is no
further discussion of the San`ä' finds. It is clear Déroche is not interested
in variants and what their wider meaning might be. Déroche's fellow
contributor to the EQ, Fred Leemhuis, on the other hand, thinks there are
variants and they are important, "Although the concept of the `Uthmänic rasm
suggests a uniform and invariable text, such uniformity is not presented by
most of the oldest extant codices. Considerable variation is found especially
in connection with long a and words which in later classical Arabic orthography
required a hamza. Even the word qur'an is found spelled as qrn (e.g. in Q 50.1
of the St .Petersburg fragment as reproduced in E. Rezwan, Fruhe Abschriften,
120-1).[29] In addition to their value for study of the Qur'än's textual
history such evidential examples are important for the history of Arabic
orthography."[30]
Even if they have access to the necessary catalogues, it is not certain that
infidel researchers will be allowed to examine Koranic manuscripts with their
skeptical, profane eyes. Then there is the additional problem of the dating of
Koranic manuscripts; polemics and prejudice have penetrated this field as well.
Presumably no revisionist who follows Wansbrough in his argument that the Koran
was not put into its final form until the 9th Century C.E. would accept an
early date for any complete Koranic manuscript. There are indeed some leaves,
folios and Koranic inscriptions that have been dated to the Eighth Century C.E.
or earlier but no complete Korans that can be dated with confidence to earlier
than the Ninth Century C. E.
But even if these difficulties are resolved, one has the impression that
Western scholars, on the whole, are simply not interested in examining Koranic
manuscripts for the sake of variants, to see what they might teach us about the
history of that text, about the history of Arabic orthography, and about the
history and nature of the Arabic language. Most scholars have uncritically
accepted the Islamic version of the history of the text, and even believe, as
Arberry does, that "the Koran as printed in the twentieth century is identical
with the Koran as authorized by `Uthmän more than 1300 years ago."
Werner Diem [born 1944] presumed to write the history of Arabic orthography
without, astonishingly enough, looking at a single manuscript! He complacently
announced, "Koranic manuscripts, however, have not been looked through, because
they generally go back to a time after `Uthmän, and because they do not
preserve the old orthography as faithfully as the readers did."[31] How can he
know that Koranic manuscripts did not preserve the old orthography without
looking at the manuscripts? And how does one establish, without circularity,
what the "old orthography" is in the first place? Brockett would answer, "by
consulting the oral Tradition." Brockett justifies taking the 1342 Cairo text
as the basis for comparison with other printed texts that he wished to discuss
and examine by pointing to "its clarity and faultless accuracy." How does he
know it is accurate? Where is the original `Uthmänic text to which it can
compared for its accuracy? The Egyptian scholars responsible for the 1342 Cairo
relied on the Oral Tradition about the Orthography of the Koran. Brockett then
adds an unclear, even obscure note:
"Unlike the actual written Tradition of manuscript-copies, which had been
exposed to an on-going effect over fourteen centuries, and in various
locations, this oral Tradition about the graphic form [of the Koran] had begun
to be preserved in writing since about the early third century A.H
.Moreover,
the record of this oral Tradition about the orthography of the Qur'än over the
two and a quarter centuries is carefully documented in these written works,
implying that the exposure to these centuries had no effect either. For the
Egyptian scholars, therefore, the Tradition about the graphic form of the
Qur'än stretched right back to the times of the third caliph. The effect of
time was, if possible, even less after the writing down of this oral Tradition,
and so that the written sources used by the Egyptian scholars date from the 5th
century A.H. and later does not diminish their justification in using them.
Whatever free rein had existed would have been well before even the first
writing down."[32]
One thing is clear: "No Manuscripts please, we are Koranic scholars!" A host of
questions leap to mind. What is an "on-going effect"? "The actual written
Tradition of manuscript-copies"? There is also a naïve faith in oral Tradition.
All oral traditions are inherently unstable: you cannot rely upon oral
tradition to scientifically reconstruct the events at the dawn of Islam. The
chances are that the material transmitted will have undergone a considerable
amount of change: people's memories - the most fragile of human faculties - may
have failed them, and their prejudices, even fears of being accused of impiety,
will have affected, distorted, or altered the contents of what was being
transmitted. Finally, all the thousands of variants that we do have, have also
come putatively from oral Tradition, later collected and written down; in other
words, oral Tradition can lead to alternative texts to that of the 1342 Cairo
Text. How do we choose from among them? In fact, as Gerd- R. Puin has argued,
"the existence of variant readings indicates that neither the oral tradition
nor the [textual] context were strong enough to rule out the emergence of
alternative readings."[33]
The status that the 1342 Cairo text has acquired as the textus receptus has had
unfortunate consequences. Here is how Arabist and linguist Pierre Larcher
expresses his regrets:
"In theory, all Arabist linguists know (or should know) that the Koranic text,
such as we know it today, is not ne varietur. The tradition of "seven canonical
readings," laid down in the Xth century, is, as we have just suggested, all
that remains of a variation, which was much more widespread and lasted much
longer which wants to pass the thesis, ideologically more convenient than
historically confirmed, off as true of an `Uthmanic recension'. But, in
practice, even this `residual' variation is not linguistically exploited. The
exclusive citation of the Cairo edition (Hafs 'an 'Asim, i.e., reading of 'Asim
transmitted by Hafs), recommended, when it is not imposed, by so many journals,
has ended by conferring on the Koranic text an untouchability that historically
it never had! A pity, even if the objective assigned by Rudi Paret [34] to the
study of qira'ät ("to put to good use the known and still unknown variants with
a view to studying the ancient Arabic dialects and, in general, with a view to
preparing a historical grammar of Arabic") seems today excessively ambitious.
Nonetheless, the simple collation of the Cairo edition with the Western version
(N. Africa, W. Africa) of Warsh 'an Nafi' (reading of Nafi' as transmitted by
Warsh) is always fruitful from the linguistic point of view. To give one
example: while in the Eastern Koran there are five occurrences of salam, with a
short a, of which four occur in combination with the verb 'alq (IV. 90 and 91;
XVI. 28 and 87), in the Western Koran, there are six: the latter reads in fact
salam in IV. 94 (where the word is equally combined with 'alqa) while the
former reads salm (with long a) Which suggests 1) that salam and salm are
two variants of one and the same word and 2) that the collocation 'alq
al-sala()m, has everywhere the sense, not of "offering peace", as Masson
would have it and with which her translation is sweetened, but really of
"offering his submission", and 3) allows us to hypothesize on the way that the
three concepts of "submission", "protection / preservation" and "peace" are
connected to one another, and subsumed under the root slm. "Peace" is
understood negatively as "preserving (the war)" and "protection" as a result of
"submission"."[35]
There is also a worrying tendency to interpret all manuscripts, inscriptions
and coins by the standard of the 1342 Cairo Text. For instance, surely it is
scientifically unsound to look at a Koranic manuscript and then judge a
particular spelling or writing of a word as "incorrect", or a "scribal error"
with the yardstick of the 1342 Cairo text, that is to prejudge the issue.
Perhaps the manuscript records a more ancient spelling or an entirely different
word or text, and may have some significance which we cannot dismiss a priori
as a mere scribal error in the way Jeffery and Mendelsohn do in their otherwise
very valuable study of the Samarqand Quran Codex.[36] For example, Jeffery and
Mendelsohn note that at Sura II.119 the Samarqand Quran has, intriguingly, some
word ending in sara, but this is dismissed as a mistake since there is no such
word in the 1342 Cairo text. Potentially significant orthographic variants are
similarly brushed away, as at II.171, II.172, III.78, III.88, III.167, III.17,
XX.47, and so on. And yet these two scholars note that the Samarqand Quran,
"Where it deviates it presents numerous points of interest, so that a detailed
comparison is of a certain importance."[37]
But the most egregious scientific sin committed by Jeffery and Mendelsohn is
repeated by Francois Déroche and Sergio Noseda in their facsimiles of the
Korans from the British Library in London and the Bibliothèque Nationale in
Paris.[38] None of these three Koranic manuscripts is pointed or vowelled.
Déroche and Noseda present the original manuscript facsimile on one side, and
on the opposite side for comparison they reproduce the 1342 Cairo text with its
full panoply of fatahs, shaddas, dots and dagger alifs. Again, for the
scientific study of the manuscript the reproduction of the 1342 Cairo text is
premature, it only prejudges the issue. In fact, no scholar, with the noble
exceptions of Adrian Brockett and Gerd R-Puin, has ever considered how to
represent an unpointed manuscript, short of drawing the basic shapes (rasm), so
that proper scientific remarks can be directed to it. Here is how Brockett
explains:
"Distinctions between Qur'än readings can be fine and are sometimes a matter of
subtle differences in the archaic orthography of the Qur'än, so in order to
write about them in English, it is necessary to have a precise system of
transliteration. Since, moreover, the vocal form of the Qur'än was not
originally indicated in writing, it is useful to have a system which can
highlight, where necessary, which elements are vocal and which are graphic.
(The term 'vocal form', with respect to the Qur'än, is used throughout to
signify the consonantal skeleton fully fleshed out with diacritical marks,
vowels, and so on. The term 'graphic form' refers to the bare consonantal
skeleton.)"
Gerd Puin, the German scholar most closely involved with the of the 16000
sheets or parchments of Koranic fragments discovered in San`ä', Yemen, has
uncovered even more variants in the rasm that are not found in the mammoth work
of eight volumes, Mu`jam al-qirä'ät al-qur'äniyyah,[39] edited in Kuwait
recently. This dictionary lists over ten thousand variants, of which about a
thousand are variants of or deviations in the rasm. In just 83 sheets of
Koranic fragments written in the Hijäzï or Mä'il style, tentatively dated on
stylistic grounds to the early 8th century, Puin discovered at least 5000
deviations in the rasm, never recorded before, not even in the Seven, Ten or
Fourteen Readings tolerated by orthodoxy. The Hijäzï Korans show differences in
the sytem of counting of verses from the two dozen or so schools of counting;
even the sequence of suras is often at variance with not only the Standard
Egyptian edition but with the sequence of suras in the Korans of Ibn Mas`üd and
Ubayy. These deviations cannot be dismissed as mere scribal errors (lapsus
calami) since the so-called errors are repeated with the same word several
times in several fragments studied by Puin. Thus, as Puin emphasizes, it makes
common philological sense to look for a rationale. The recurrent deviations
from the Standard Egyptian text must be taken seriously, and cannot be swept
under the carpet, and attributed to scribal inadequacy.[40]
One of Puin's conclusions is that though there was an oral tradition,
(otherwise the Koranic text could not have been read), there were deliberate
changes in the oral tradition of the reading of the Koran. Thus this oral
tradition was not very stable or elaborate changes must have occurred as can
be seen in the variant orthography to be found in the San`ä' manuscripts. Puin
suggests that the long "a" sound could be rendered by the Arab letter yä', and
originally the name in the present Koran that is read as "`Ibrähïm" must have
been read "Abrähäm". In other words, at some stage that fact that the long "ä"
was rendered with the yä' was forgotten - hence the so-called oral tradition
was not strong or even non-existent.[41]
It is clear that many hundreds of variants, though not all, were invented by
Muslim grammarians, philologists, and exegetes of the 3rd and 4th Muslim
centuries to explain all sorts of obscurities of the Koran, whether of sense or
reference, Koranic grammatical aberrations,[42] or even more seriously, for
doctrinal reasons to defend some particular theological position.[43] A kind of
ethics of variants had developed by the 9th century A.D., according to which
only variants that were not too far from Islamic orthodoxy or doctrines, or not
too ungrammatical were to be accepted and preserved. Hence, if there had been
startling deviations or variants they would have been suppressed. Thus the
variants that do remain are not always very significant. But we need to make a
distinction between the variants fabricated by the Muslim exegetes, and the
variants to be found in the rasm in manuscripts such as those examined by Puin.
The sheer number of variants in the orthography in manuscripts dated as early
as 715 A.D. seem to cast doubt on the traditional account of the compilation of
the Koran. The San`ä' fragments seem to suggest that even in the 8 th century
A.D., there was no definitive text of the Koran.
Andrew Rippin has drawn conclusions similar to Puin's. Referring to the San`ä'
manuscripts, Rippin writes, "the text contains variant readings of a minor
nature that suggest to some scholars that the idea of an oral tradition running
parallel to the written one cannot be given historical credence. What we may
have evidence of is the interpretative nature of the detailed annotations that
were added to the text later: that is, that the current text is the product of
reflection upon a primitive written text and not upon the parallel transmission
of an oral text as the Muslim tradition has suggested."[44]
Rippin goes on to discuss Sura XXI.4 and 112. Should the two verses begin with
the imperative "Say!", [in Arabic:qul] thus indicating that God is the speaker,
or should the word be read as "He said" [qäla]? What do the printed Korans
say? Much depends on the answer to these deceptively trivial questions. Before
quoting Rippin in full, here is a rapid survey of some of the translations and
Arabic texts.
ARABIC TEXT:
1. Saudi: XXI:4: qäla with plene alif: translated as "He (Muhammad, pbuh)[45]
said
"
XXI.112 qala [to be read as qäla] with defective -dagger-alif
translated as "He (Muhammad, pbuh) said
"
2. Muhammad Ali: XXI:4: qala [to be read as qäla] with defective -dagger-alif
translated as "He said:
"
XXII:112: qala [to be read as qäla] with defective
-dagger-alif translated as "He said:
"
3. Yusuf Ali: XXI:4: qala [to be read as qäla] with defective -dagger-alif
translated as "Say [sic, strictly speaking it should of course be translated, "
He said ..." ],:
"
XXI:112: qala [to be read as qäla] with defective -dagger-alif
translated as "Say [sic]:
"
4. Istanbul: XXI:4: qäla with plene alif
XXI:112: qäla with plene alif
5. Iranian: XXI:4 qäla with plene alif
XXI:112 qäla with plene alif
6. Taj: XXI:4: qala [to be read as qäla]with defective -dagger-alif translated
as [in Urdu] "He said ..."
XXI:112: qala [to be read as qäla] with defective -dagger-alif
translated as [in Urdu ] "The Prophet said ..."
7. Warsh I: XXI:4: qul [Say]
XXI:112: qul
8. Warsh II: XXI:4: qul
XXI:112: qul
9. Lebanese: XXI:4: qäla with plene alif translated as "Say" [ sic ]
XXI:112: qala [to be read as qäla] with defective
-dagger-alif translated as "Say"[sic]
10. Qalun: XXI: 4: qul
XXI:112: qul
11. Flügel: XXI:4: qäla with plene alif
XXI:112: qäla with plene alif
TRANSLATIONS:
George Sale XXI:4: Say
XXI:112: Say
M. Pickthall XXI :4: He saith
XXI:112: He saith
R. Blachère XXI:4: (Notre Apotre ) a dit = (Our Apostle )[46] said
XXI:112: Dis =Say
A. J. Arberry XXI:4: He says
XXI:112: He said
M. Kasimirski XXI:4: Dis = Say
XXI:112: Mon Seigneur dit =My Lord Says
D. Masson XXI:4: Il a dit =He said
XXI:112: Dis =Say.
N. J. Dawood XXI:4: Say
XXI :112: Say
E. H. Palmer XXI:4: Say
XXI :112: Say
R. Bell XXI:4: Say
XXI:112: Say
M. Henning XXI:4: Sprich [German] = Say
XXI:112: Sprich [German] = Say
Here is how Rippin analyzes the significance of this particular variant:
"The very last verse (112) of sura 21 starts "He said [qäla], 'My Lord, judge
according to the truth. Our Lord is the All-Merciful' ". The reference to "My
Lord" and "Our Lord" in the text indicates that the subject of "He said "
cannot be God but is the reciter of the Qur'än, in the first place understood
to be Muhammad. Such a passage, in fact, falls into a common form of Qur'änic
speech found in passages normally prefaced by the imperative "Say!" (qul).The
significant point here is that in the text of the Qur'än, the word here
translated as "He said" is, in fact, more easily read as "Say!" due to the
absence of the long "a" marker (something which commonly happens in the Qur'än,
to be sure, but the word qäla is spelled this way only twice - the other
occasion being in Qur'än 21:4 and that occurs in some of the traditions of the
writing of the text). In the early Sana manuscripts, the absence of the long
"a" in the word qäla is a marker of an entire set of early texts. But why
should it be that this particular passage should be read in the way that it is?
It really should read "Say!" to be parallel to the rest of the text. This opens
the possibility that there was a time when the Qur'än was understood not as the
word of God (as with "Say!") but the word of Muhammad as the speaking prophet.
It would appear that in the process of editing the text, most passages were
transformed from "He said" to "Say!" in both interpretation and writing with
the exception of these two passages in Sura 21 which were not changed. This
could have occurred only because somebody was working on the basis of the
written text in the absence of a parallel oral tradition".[47]
One cannot, I think, continue to maintain that variants are trivial and have no
bearing on the meaning or that they are of no great significance. Several very
important theses have emerged from the above discussions.
1. Variants have always been acknowledged: e.g. Bukhärï , Abï Däwüd, al-
Suyütï.
2. Manuscript variants show that the Koran, like any other text, has a
history, a history different from the Traditional Islamic account of the
Koran's compilation.
3. Those variants that were invoked served many purposes:
i) In August Fischer's opinion, Koranic textual variants
"for the most part (Fischer's emphasis) consist of no more than attempts at
emendation made by philologically trained Koran specialists on difficult
passages in the Uthmanic redaction".[48]
ii) Polemical, see A. Rippin, Qur'än 7:40, Until the camel Passes
through the Eye of the Needle, Arabica, Tome xxvii, Fasc .2, pp. 107-113
"Variants such as those for Surah 7:40 were created when polemicallybased
pressures on the exegetes were the strongest and the attitudes towards the
Qur'änic text less confining." p.113.
iii) Doctrinal. The variants reflect the ideology, as Burton shows,
of groups that wish to argue for their own viewpoint, to establish a legal
ruling, to settle conflict of sources.
4. The existence of variants casts doubt on the existence of an oral
tradition. Skepticism of an oral tradition has been expressed by Fritz
Krenkow,[49] A. Rippin, C. Luxenberg, Gerd R. Puin and G. Lüling. The latter
wrote, "It has long since been proven that there was in principle no oral
tradition at all, either for Old Arabic Poetry or for the Koran, as now this
book goes on to demonstrate by its reconstruction of the editorially reworked
Christian hymnody in the Koran as well as of many (on the level of writing)
reworked Old Arabic classical poems." [50]
5. This thesis leads to the conclusion that the redactor or redactors of
the Koran was or were working on the basis of the written text in the absence
of a parallel oral tradition.
6. The so-called Seven Readings of the Koran should not be taken too
literally since seven has a symbolic value derived perhaps from ancient
Babylonian times with their notion of the seven stars and planets. The Koran
itself talks of the seven heavens (XVII.44), seven gates to hell (XV.44), seven
oceans (XXXI.27), and there is also the motif of seven in the story of
Joseph.[51]
7. The story of the collection of the Koran under `Uthmän is perhaps only
a calque [52]on the story of the destruction of the heretical writings of Arius
on the orders of Constantine as recounted in Socrates and Sozemenus. Socrates
quotes this letter from Constantine to the bishops and the people, "Since Arius
has imitated wicked and impious persons, it is just that he should undergo the
like ignominy. Wherefore as Porphyry, that enemy of piety, for having composed
licentious treatises against religion, found a suitable recompense, and such as
thenceforth branded him with infamy, overwhelming him with deserved reproach,
his impious writings also having been destroyed; so now it seems fit both that
Arius and such as hold his sentiments should be denominated Porphyrians, that
they may take their appellation from those whose conduct they have imitated.
And in addition to this, if any treatise composed by Arius should be
discovered, let it be consigned to the flames, in order that not only his
depraved doctrine may be suppressed but also that no memorial of him may be by
any means left. This therefore I decree, that if anyone shall be detected in
concealing a book compiled by Arius, and shall not instantly bring it forward
and burn it, the penalty for this offense shall be death; for immediately after
conviction the criminal shall suffer capital punishment. May God preserve you!
" [53]
Sozomen tells us, "The emperor punished Arius with exile, and dispatched edicts
to the bishops and people of every country, denouncing him and his adherents as
ungodly, and commanding that their books should be destroyed, ..." [54]
Under Theodosius II, the writings of Nestorius were also burned. Here is how
Gibbon puts it, "After a residence at Antioch of four years, the hand of
Theodosius subscribed an edict which ranked him [Nestorius] with Simon the
magician, proscribed his opinions and followers, and condemned his writings to
the flames, and banished his person first to Petra in Arabia, and at length to
Oasis, one of the islands of the Libyan desert."[55]
8. None of the above theses lends credibility to the Traditional Islamic
understanding of the Koran, its origins, its compilation and its redaction.
Perhaps it is time to start taking variants and Koranic manuscripts seriously.
[1] John Burton The Collection of the Qur'än Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press , 1977, p.5
[2] Ibid., p.6
[3] Ibid., p.31
[4] Burton , op.cit., pp.31-32.
[5] Burton, op.cit., pp.34-35.
[6] Burton , op.cit., p.36.
[7] Jaläl al Dïn `Abd al -Raùmän b.Abï Bakr Al-Suyütï, Itqän fï `ulüm
al-Qur'än, 2 vols., in 1 , Ùalabï, Cairo , 1935 / 1354, pt 1, p.82 , quoted by
Burton op.cit., p.36.
[8] Burton op. cit,
[9] Al- Suyütï, op. cit, quoted by Burton op .cit., p.37
[10] Herbert Berg The Development of Exegesis in Early Islam. Richmond, Surrey
,U.K: Curzon Press.2000 p.221
[11] Burton , op. cit., p.39
[12] M. Pickthall .The Meaning of the Glorious Koran, London: George Allen and
Unwin Ltd., 1930, p. viii.
[13] George Sale, The Koran London: Frederick Warne and Company [Circa 1890]
[Ist edn. 1734] p. ix
[14] J. M. Rodwell. The Koran London: J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd., 1921 [Ist edn.
1861] Preface p.16
[15] A. Jeffery and I. Medelsohn . The Orthography of the Samarkand Quran Codex
.Journal of the American Oriental Society ,62 (1942 ) pp.180-181, Chapter 7.5
[16] E. H. Palmer The Koran Oxford: Oxford University Press , 1949 [ Ist edn.
1880 ].
[17] N. J. Dawood. The Koran Harmondsworth [U.K]: Penguin Books, 1990 [Ist
edn.1956].
[18] A. Yusuf Ali. The Holy Koran. Lahore [Pakistan]: Shaikh Muhammad Ashraf
1938 [Ist Edn.1934], p.iv
[19] Arberry in his short introduction seems to have uncritically swallowed
whole every single Islamic dogma on the Koran, from it being a revelation to
its untranslatability. See A. J. Arberry.The Koran Interpreted Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1964, Introduction, p.ix-xiii.
[20] A. J. Arberry The Koran Interpreted Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1964, Introduction, p.ix.
[21] R, Blachère Le Coran, Paris: G. P. Maisonneuve & Cie, 1949 . p. XII
[22] Cairo Edition: Blachère, Jeffery give 1342 / 1923 as the date of
publication; Jeffery and Mendelsohn [1942], however, give 1344 / 1925; R. S.
Humphreys gives 1347/ 1928; G. Bowering and Brockett give1924. Would
Post-Modernists say all the dates are valid ?!
[Blachère., op. cit. p. xii; A. Jeffery .Materials for the History of the Text
of the Quran, Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1937; Jeffery/Mendelsohn, The Orthography of
the Samarkand Quran Codex, Journal of the American Oriental Society, 3 (1942)
p.177 footnote 5; A. Brockett. Studies in Two Transmissions of the Q uran,
St. Andrews, Scotland: Doctorate Thesis, 1984; R. S. Humphreys, Islamic
History, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991, p. 21. G. Bowering,
Chronology and the Quran, in the Encyclopaedia of the Quran, Vol. 1, Brill:
Leiden , 2001, p. 334]
[23] The Holy Bible Placed by The Gideons, La Habra, Ca.: The Lockman
Foundation, 1977, pp. xx-xxii.
[24] Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, K. Elliger and W. Rudolph, edd. New
Edition, Stuttgart: Bibelgesellschaft , 1967/77 p. XII
[25] Greek New Testament Ed. F. H. A. Scrivener, New York: H. Holt & Co. 1903
[26] EI 2 edn [New Edn] s.v. Khatt.
[27] F. Déroche, Manuscripts of the Qur'än , in Encyclopaedia of the Qur'än,
Vol. Three: J-O, ed. J. D. McAuliffe, Brill: Leiden-Boston, 2003, pp. 255
[28] Ibid., p. 257 right hand column .
[29] E. A. Rezwan, Frühe Abschriften des Korans, in J. A. Petrosjan et al.
(eds.), Von Bagdad bis Isfahan Buchmalarei und Schriftkunst des Vorderen
Orients (8.-18.Jh) aus dem Institut fur Orientalisti , St. Petersburg, Lugano
1995, 117-125
[30] F. Leemhuis, Codices of the Qur'än in Encyclopaedia of the Qur'än, Vol.
One: A-D, ed. J. D. McAuliffe, Brill: Leiden-Boston, 2001, p.350
[31] W. Diem, Untersuchungen zur fruhen Geschichte der arabischen Orthographie.
Teile I -IV, Orientalia Vol.48-50, 52 (1979-81, 1983), Teil I p. 211,
translated and quoted by Gerd R-Puin, Variant Readings of the Koran, Chapter
8.3 in present volume, footnote 19.
[32] A. Brockett. Studies in Two Transmisions of the Qur'än St. Andrews,
Scotland: Doctorate Thesis, 1984, pp. 9-10
[33] Gerd R-Puin. Variant Readings of the Koran, Chapter 8.3 in present volume.
[34] V. "Qir<a" in EI²
[35] P. Larcher Coran et Theorie Linguistique de l`enunciation, in Arabica,
XLVII (2000), pp. 443-444; Chapter 5.4 in present volume
[36] A. Jeffery and I. Mendelsohn. The Orthography of the Samarqand Quran
Codex. JAOS ,3 (1942) 175-94 passim, Chapter 7.5 in present volume.
[37] Ibid., p.182.
[38] F. Déroche and S. Noja Noseda (eds.), Sources de la transmission du texte
coranique I. Les manuscrits du style higazi vol.i. Lemanuscrit arabe 328 (a) de
la Bibliothèque nationale de France, Lesa 1998; vol.ii Le manuscrit or.2165 (f.
1 a 61) de la British Library. Lesa 2001.
[39] `Abd al-` Äl Sälim Makram (wa-) Aùmad Mukhtär `Umar (I`däd ) : Mu`jam
al-qiräÆät al-Qur'äniyyah , ma`a maqadimmah fi l-qirä'ät wa-ashar al-qurrä'
I-VIII. Al-Kuwayt: Dhät as-Saläsil 1402 1405 /1982-1985
[40] Gerd R-Puin. Neue Wege der Koranforschung: II.Über die Bedeutung der
ältesten Koranfragmente aus Sanaa (Jemen) für die Orthographiegeschichte des
Korans, Universität des Saarlandes Magazin Forschung, 1 (1999), 37-40.
[41] Ibid . p.40
[42] See A. Rippin, Qur'än 21 :95: A Ban is Upon any Town JSS ( 24 ) 1979,
43-53,
"
, the variants still show traces of their original intention: to
explain away grammatical and lexical
difficulties. While obviously this is not true of all variant readings in
the Qur'än, many variants being too slight to alleviate any problem, in Sura
21: 95 and in many others the exegetical nature of Qur'änic variants is
apparent." p.53 .
[43] See A. Rippin, Qur'än 7: 40, Until the camel Passes through the Eye of
the Needle, Arabica, Tome xxvii, Fasc 2 , pp 107-113 "Variants such as those
for Surah 7: 40 were created when polemically based pressures on the exegetes
were the strongest and the attitudes towards the Qur'änic text less confining."
p.113 .
[44] A. Rippin. Muslims, Their Religious Beliefs and Practices London:
Routledge, 2nd Edition 2001, p.30
[45] Brackets in original .
[46] Brackets in original.
[47] A. Rippin. Muslims, Their Religious Beliefs and Practices London:
Routledge, 2nd Edition 2001, pp.30-31
[48] A. Fischer in Der Islam XXVIII (1948), 5f.n.4 quoted by R. Paret, Kirä`a,
E.I.2nd Edn.
[49] F. Krenkow. The use of writing for the preservation of Ancient Arabic
poetry, in: A Volume of Oriental Studie , presented to E. G. Browne on his 60th
Birthday, edd. T. W. Arnold and R. A. Nicholson. Cambridge, 1922, pp. 261-268
[50] Günter Lüling A Challenge to Islam for Reformation Delhi: Motilal
Banarsidass Publishers, 2003, pp. XLI-XLII
[51] A. Rippin. Numbers and Enumeration in E.Q. vol.3 p.552.
[52] I think it was Lawrence I. Conrad who first suggested such a thesis. At a
conference at the University of Mainz, Germany, in 2002, a paper by Conrad was
read out he was unable to attend at the last moment because of a car accident
in which he puts forward this idea. I have not seen the paper in written form
since that conference so I cannot say if he elaborates on this and explains
what he meant. I do not know if he had the acts of Constantine and Theodosius
in mind, they are my proposals.
[53] Socrates Church History From A.D.305-439. trans. A. C. Zenos, in A
Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church edd.
P. Schaff and H. Wace, vol.II W.E.Eerdmans, Michigan, 1997. Book I , Chpater
8.p.14.
[54] Sozomen. The Ecclesiastical History trans. Chester D. Hartranft in A
Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church .
edd. P.Schaff and H.Wace , vol.II W. E. Eerdmans, Michigan, 1997. Book I.
ch.XXI p.255.
[55] E. Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Modern Library,
New York No date, Vol. II ,Ch.XLVII, p.825. Gibbon's source was The
Imperial Letters in the Acts of the Synod of Ephesus ( Concil.tom.iii ,
pp.1730-1735 )
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