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A handwritten manuscript of the opening verses of the Qur’an.
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The
human mind “can operate only on the basis of perceptions previously
experienced by that very mind, either in their entirety, or in some of their
constituent elements.”1 In other words, we cannot form a clear idea of
something that happens entirely outside the realm of our past experiences; and
therefore, it is natural that we find it difficult to comprehend the full
meaning and relevance of mystical experiences like revelation.
The
Qur’an
makes a clear distinction between the perceptible world of experience and the
unseen world of transcendental reality. Revelation is a means for God’s
specially chosen messengers
to receive divine messages; we may call it an exclusive channel of communication
accessible to the prophets. For this reason, by way of an objective
investigation, we can only study the credibility of the person who claims to
have received a revelation, learn the circumstances, and observe the results.
The
Qur’an says what means [It is not
fitting for a man that God should speak to him except by inspiration, or from
behind a veil, or by sending of a messenger to reveal with God’s permission
what God wills: for He is Most High, Most Wise]
(Ash-Shura 42:51). This means that God
does not hold a face-to-face talk with any human. The divine message comes to
the prophets through the angel
Gabriel. There are other exceptional cases, such as the Prophet Abraham getting
God’s message in a dream or Moses hearing God speaking to him from behind a
burning bush. But again, these are exceptional cases.
How
did the Prophet
Muhammad receive revelation? According to his wife `A’ishah,
the Prophet used to go in seclusion in the cave of Hiraa’ outside Makkah,
where he used to worship God continuously for many days.
One
day, an angel came to him and asked him to read. The Prophet, who was
illiterate, replied, “I do not know how to read.” The Prophet related the
incident: The angel caught me forcibly and pressed me so hard that I could not
bear it anymore. He then released me again and asked me to read and I replied,
“I do not know how to read.” Thereupon he caught me again and pressed me a
second time till I could not bear it anymore. He then released me and again
asked me to read, but again I replied, “I do not know how to read” (or
“What shall I read?”) Thereupon he caught me for the third time and pressed
me, and then released me and said: [Read
in the name of your Lord, who created, created man from a clot. Read! And your
Lord is the most bountiful.]2
This
happened in the year 610 CE, when the Prophet was 40 years old. During the 23
years from the revelation of these first verses, the Qur’an was revealed to
the Prophet in stages. It was not revealed at one time for a number of reasons:
to enable the natural and steady development of the community of believers by
gradually implementing the laws of God; to meet the requirements of the changing
conditions and needs of that community; and to facilitate easy absorption and
memorization of the Qur’an.
When
the revelation progressed, the Prophet encouraged his companions
to learn as many verses as possible. Whenever a revelation came, he called for a
scribe and dictated it to him. He was careful to keep the revealed verses safely
recorded. Consequently, the Qur’an was available in written form during the
Prophet’s own time. In the Qur’an, God says what means: [This
is indeed a Qur’an most honorable, in a book well guarded, which none shall
touch but those who are clean: a revelation from the Lord of the worlds]
(Al-Waqi`ah 56:77-80).
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The
exact ways in which the Prophet used to recite the Qur’an were
also recorded and passed down from generation to generation.
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In
his last sermon the Prophet said, “I have left with you something which if you
will hold fast to, you will never fall into error—a plain indication, the Book
of God, and the practice
of His Prophet.”3 This makes it quite evident that the Qur’an in the
written form—though not necessarily in a single volume—existed during his
time.
There
are also three hadiths
in Sahih
Al-Bukhari4 that inform us that Angel Gabriel used to recite the
Qur’an with the Prophet once a year during Ramadan, and that he recited it
with him twice in the year the Prophet died.
The
chief scribe who used to record the revelation dictated by the Prophet was Zayd
ibn Thabit. After the Prophet’s death, in the battle of Yamamah, a large
number of the companions who had memorized the Qur’an died. As a result,
Caliph Abu Bakr appointed Zayd to collect all the available written versions of
the Qur’an and to produce a master copy.
When
Zayd completed this work, he gave the collection of written materials to Abu
Bakr As-Siddiq,
who kept it with him till his death. After his death, `Umar
ibn Al-Khattab, the second caliph, finally gave it to his daughter Hafsa—one
of the Prophet’s wives—for safekeeping. It was from this collection of
material that Caliph `Uthman ibn `Affan prepared several copies in the
form of the first books of the entire Qur’an. Some of these copies still exist
today.
After
the Qur’an was collected in a single volume—known as a mus-haf—Caliph
`Uthman sent copies of it to the different provinces that were ruled by the
Muslims. The succeeding generations of Muslims always included a large number of
people who memorized the Qur’an in its entirety. The extent to which the
Qur’an was preserved is also evident in the fact that the way in which the
Prophet Muhammad used to recite the Qur’an was also recorded and passed down
from generation to generation.
To
this day, the Qur’an is read and memorized by many Muslims all over the
world—many of them non-Arabic speakers. The Qur’an that a Muslim in
Indonesia reads or memorizes is the exact same scripture as one which a Muslim
in Mauritania reads or memorizes. This
is the phenomenon God mentions in the Qur’an, when He says what means [We
have, without doubt, sent down the Message; and We will assuredly guard it (from
corruption)] (Al-Hijr 15:9).
[1]
See Muhammad Asad’s Message of the Qur’an:
www.geocities.com/masad02/appendix1 (July 7, 2004)
[2]
The verse is from Surat Al-`Alaq 96:1-3. The Prophet’s relation of this
incident can be found in both Al-Bukhari and Muslim.
[3]
See
Ibn Hisham’s biography of the Prophet Muhammad.
[4]
Sahih Al-Bukhari is one of the most
accurate and authentic collections of Hadith (the sayings of the Prophet
Muhammad).
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