I'm reading a translation of Quran and I'm finding it a quite enjoyable reading...

Do you have any sources over this?

Not the guy you asked, but I believe the Hadiths from muslim themselves state some things about this. How some verses were lost because they were eaten by a goat, or how wrong copies of the quran were burned.

Nice source.

with a quick google search, that's all I could find.

thoughtco.com/compilation-of-the-quran-2004545

but since this article quotes no external sources, I am quite unsatisfied with it.

>But I wonder, if the Quran is a phony revelation, how did Muhammad wrote it?

First of all, Muhammad didn't write anything. The Quran was composed during the reign of Caliph Uthman. Up to that point, verses that Muhammad supposedly received from God were either memorized or written down on whatever was at hand. After one battle so many people who memorized some of the revelations died, that Uthman feared that everything will be lost soon. So he set up a commission that interviewed the surviving memorizers, read what was written down and on basis of that they compiled what we know as Quran.

The way it was done opens a whole house of speculation whether and how much the text was altered. It's almost certain that due to faulty human memory there were discrepancies even among most honest informers, so even assuming the commission's best intentions, they had to make guesses. Some revelations were lost forever regardless of all efforts, like those verses that were written down on palm leaves that were eaten by a donkey. I shit you not.

I believe it's safe to assume that because Quran was compiled, it was made specifically with the text's coherence in mind. By the time of Uthman, Islam was already pouring outside Arabia, so it was also made polemical with Christian and Zoroastrian scriptures. Just how much it was changed to suit those purposes remains open to speculation. The final result so infuriated some Muslims that Uthman was killed in a riot. It would suggest that it was changed a lot.

>Where have he got inspiration for its theological contents and inter-textual narratives? Was he really illiterate? Did he had some help?
>Has he got in touch with Christians and Jews to learn then write things that seems to be commentaries/answers to the contents of the Torah and Gospels?

Islam has lots in common with monophysite Christian sects that proliferated on the Roman-Persian border at that time. That's where we should look for inspiration.

I'm in the same boar as you OP. Reading the Quran and finding it to be of such a superb quality that I am inclined to believe it is divine in origin.

The Jews claim that the decrees and traditions in the Talmud are part of the oral law that Moses recieved at Sinai. So they do consider it holy. In fact, that's nearly all they study in their yeshivas.

boat*

That says the Koran was fully written down before Mohammad died and was compiled into one volume shortly after his death, which is the standard Muslim claim.

It doesn't say anything about it being written after his death or goats eating part of it.

So Muslims claim that it was written before his death? Why then are people in this thread claiming otherwise? What's the evidence?

>Why then are people in this thread claiming otherwise?

You'll have to ask them.

"Folk belief" among Muslims says that Quran was given by God to Muhammad intact. Some of them even go to the point to believe that Quran was literally sent by God as a ready book.

All Muslim scholars actually admit that Quran was made into one book under Uthman.

>All Muslim scholars
Source please

Find me a serious scholar who would deny that.

Hold up! OP here.
Nope, I'm not "inclined to believe its divine origin" for a series of reasons. I'm just admiring how it was well-composed in poetry and pretty much related to the bible in some way that no stupid man of the desert could write all by himself.

It is a great book, but for me it is nothing but a piece creative writing. Anyone in the ancient world could compose a similar work (e.g. Gnostic Gospels and Apocrypha), especially when Christianity was so wide-spread.

You're the one claiming information here. I'm new to the subject. If you claim that Muslim scholars believe that give me a source. By the way, when you say scholar do you mean academicians serving in contemporary mostly Western institutions or do you include classica Muslim scholarship under that designation?

Oh, I see. Thanks for clarifying. It's impressed considerably more than that, and since I don't read Arabic I can't speak for its poetic qualities. Mainly I'm impressed by the quality of the content.

impressed me more than that*

“Brothers and fathers, listen to me. The God of glory appeared to our ancestor Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran, and said to him, ‘Leave your country and your relatives and go to the land that I will show you.’ Then he left the country of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. After his father died, God had him move from there to this country in which you are now living. He did not give him any of it as a heritage, not even a foot’s length, but promised to give it to him as his possession and to his descendants after him, even though he had no child. And God spoke in these terms, that his descendants would be resident aliens in a country belonging to others, who would enslave them and mistreat them during four hundred years. ‘But I will judge the nation that they serve,’ said God, ‘and after that they shall come out and worship me in this place.’ Then he gave him the covenant of circumcision. And so Abraham became the father of Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day; and Isaac became the father of Jacob, and Jacob of the twelve patriarchs.

I didn't said that user was write, I merely sent the link that explained how the Quran was composed. Apparently, there was many versions of it, and some of these other versions and now lost and burned. Just as was said by I also heard this story that Quran was "given" intact by Muhammad, and therefore is the unmistakable word of God.
This information of compilation of the Quran doesn't make me feel like so.

Good post, quite informative, but again, it lacks sources.

Isn't Islam partially derived from Nestorianism?

>Everything the Father of Lies says is a lie, and allah is the Father of Lies who has always wanted to be worshiped as God.
Allah is the same God as the christian God, you know it, right?

So for those alleging various influences and sources which Mohammed drew upon in composing the Quran: am I correct in ascertaining that you a priori rule out the possibility of a divine revelation ever occurring, and that you consider such an idea preposterous and fantastic?

Soc. I perceive, Ion; and I will proceed to explain to you what I imagine to be the reason of this. The gift which you possess of speaking excellently about Homer is not an art, but, as I was just saying, an inspiration; there is a divinity moving you, like that contained in the stone which Euripides calls a magnet, but which is commonly known as the stone of Heraclea. This stone not only attracts iron rings, but also imparts to them a similar power of attracting other rings; and sometimes you may see a number of pieces of iron and rings suspended from one another so as to form quite a long chain: and all of them derive their power of suspension from the original stone. In like manner the Muse first of all inspires men herself; and from these inspired persons a chain of other persons is suspended, who take the inspiration. For all good poets, epic as well as lyric, compose their beautiful poems not by art, but because they are inspired and possessed. And as the Corybantian revellers when they dance are not in their right mind, so the lyric poets are not in their right mind when they are composing their beautiful strains: but when falling under the power of music and metre they are inspired and possessed; like Bacchic maidens who draw milk and honey from the rivers when they are under the influence of Dionysus but not when they are in their right mind. And the soul of the lyric poet does the same, as they themselves say; for they tell us that they bring songs from honeyed fountains, culling them out of the gardens and dells of the Muses; they, like the bees, winging their way from flower to flower. And this is true. For the poet is a light and winged and holy thing, and there is no invention in him until he has been inspired and is out of his senses, and the mind is no longer in him: when he has not attained to this state, he is powerless and is unable to utter his oracles.

3 What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision?

2 Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God.

>How some verses were lost because they were eaten by a goat

Most Muslim scholars have rejected this hadith, because all common routes of transmission of it either contain narrators charged with dishonesty when disclosing their sources

The exclamation 'Eureka!' is famously attributed to the ancient Greek scholar Archimedes. He reportedly proclaimed "Eureka! Eureka!" (i.e. twice) after he had stepped into a bath and noticed that the water level rose, whereupon he suddenly understood that the volume of water displaced must be equal to the volume of the part of his body he had submerged. (This relation is not what is known as Archimedes' principle—that deals with the upthrust experienced by a body immersed in a fluid.[2][3]) He then realized that the volume of irregular objects could be measured with precision, a previously intractable problem. He is said to have been so eager to share his discovery that he leapt out of his bathtub and ran through the streets of Syracuse naked.

Well, yeah, now he could calculate density and know if the crown was made of pure gold or not.

islamqa.info/en/175355
Literally googled 'hadith' and 'goat', m8. I even give you a muslims scholar opinion, who arguments why the hadith does not discount the inmutability of the quran. But this hadith where a verse is eaten does indeed exist.

islam.ru/en/content/story/third-caliph-uthman-ibn-affan-ra-0
" The Uthmani Quran

After the death of Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him), and during the time of the Caliphs, hundreds of thousands of non-Arabs converted to Islam. Consequently, the Quran began to be recited and written in various different dialects and scripts. One of Prophet Mohammad’s companions, and Uthman’s friend Hudhaifah, whilst on a journey noticed that there were many different recitations of Quran throughout the Muslim Empire. Hudhaifah suggested to Uthman that there be an official version written in the style used in Medina.

Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) knew the Quran by heart and had intimate knowledge of the context and circumstances relating to each verse. The Quran had been gathered during the time of Abu Bakr and was in the safekeeping of Prophet Muhammad’s wife Hafsah.

Uthman (may Allah be pleased with him) took possession of the originals and ordered some of the most trusted companions to make careful copies. He then ordered all other unofficial copies to be burned or otherwise destroyed. Five official copies were sent to the greatest cities of the Muslim Caliphate. Original copies exist to this day in Tashkent, Uzbekistan and the Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, Turkey."

This is a muslim site that asserts some unofficial copies were burned and five definite copies of the quran people know today were made.

The mind is a universe and can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.

John Milton

>am I correct in ascertaining that you a priori rule out the possibility of a divine revelation ever occurring, and that you consider such an idea preposterous and fantastic?

I do not find divine revelation preposterous, but I do think that Jesus Christ gave the final revelation, and finished the work of the hebrew prophets.
Now why would some descendant of Ismael (who was the son of a non-hebrew egyptian slave woman) suddenly gain an revelation?

Are you shizo?

Himyarites.

MUFTI TAQI USMANI
way of Allah, and they should forgive and forego. Do you not like that Allah forgives you? Allah is Most-Forgiving

>islamqa.info/en/175355

Yes mate. I only have a wiki/google knowledge of Islam myself like you. And everything in the source you just confirms what I said, which is the Koran was written in Mohammad's lifetime and compiled after his death.

It says nothing about any passages being lost due to goat's eating them or it being written after his death, something no one has yet provided a source for.

>Himyarites.

Thanks for that, I'll be reading more about it.

Muhammad didN't wrote the Coran, dumbass. It was compiled and put down by scribes after two following califfs to unify the doctrine through the newly conquered land.

I think I might, one of the oldest mosques in the world is in India and it faces east to the sun, the original place where the muslims bowed to was to the east, then it changed toward jerusalem during the time of Abu Bakr because the political drive for the arab conquest was justrified by saying that they were bowing to heathens and they had to take jerusalem for themselves. And it was during the time of Uthman that the whole idea of praying towward the Kaaba even came up as a theory, this was later made into canon when the Quran was written down and the hadiths were given legitimacy.

Essentially it is mostly bullshit religion that lacks the substance of orthodoxy so creates it artificially as a power structure to justify its existence.

"Those who follow the messenger, the Prophet who can neither read nor write, whom they will find described in the Torah and the Gospel (which are) with them......"Quran 7:157.

Written....by this man described above.....

>The final result so infuriated some Muslims that Uthman was killed in a riot.
Cursory skimming shows it to be simple anti-gov rebellions.
Any more details on this episode, and Uthman in general?
Seems like a pretty ok guy.

Again, it is a standard Muslim claim that Mohammad was illiterate and couldn't read or write. This is isn't some profound new info someone with access to the Internet and a bit or curiosity wasn't already aware of.

Muslims don't claim Mohammad personally wrote the Koran, they claim he recited it to his followers.

>am I correct in ascertaining that you a priori rule out the possibility of a divine revelation ever occurring, and that you consider such an idea preposterous and fantastic?
Nah, i just consider some parts to fit too good to older groups, apocryphas and stories that were circulating in Arabia during those times.

Doesn't influence anyway when it comes to it being divinely inspired or not.
The Gospel of John is influenced by greek philosophy, but christians still think it's divinely inspired.

user above claimed just that. I'd say the Quran is good for wiping one's ass, but it really isn't. It's too rough.

>I think I might, one of the oldest mosques in the world is in India and it faces east to the sun
Hmm, something they took from the christians, perhaps?
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_orientem

>The Gospel of John is influenced by greek philosophy, but christians still think it's divinely inspired.

Yes, because unlike you, we're not idiots. We know who the Logos is.

Nigga, im a christian myself.

I was just giving an example for our probably muslim friend of how divine inspiration is untied to wordly influence.

I wouldn't say the Koran is even useful for wiping one's ass with, I would just take a dump right on it, but I was the user above and I said the standard Muslim claim was tat it was written in his lifetime and compiled shortly after his death, which is different from saying Mohammad personally wrote it. learn to read what people say to you not what you imagine they have said to you.

Ignore this user. It is probably an adventist or JW anyway.

or basically "asking if one thing takes cues from another is outside the scope of it's spiritual veracity"
The Quran is still apocrypha.

Eastern Orthodox.
Trust me, i have a good enough critique of the Quran from St. John of Damascus.

>The Quran is still apocrypha.

So is the New Testament if you are a Jew.

ejournal.anztla.org/anztla/article/view/123

Here, you go, an article written by a scholar in comparitive religion. With sources from muslim scholars.

link?

>Eastern Orthodox.
Then explain me your views on the Gospel of John. Why wouldn't it be divinely inspired?

orthodoxinfo.com/general/stjohn_islam.aspx
It is.
That's my point.
A book can be divinely inspired even if it takes some concepts(like the Logos) from other sources.
Or it can be super unique, and non-divinely inspired.

The Gospel of John is in the first category.

>ejournal.anztla.org/anztla/article/view/123

That just said the same thing I already said. That the Koran was written in Mohammad's lifetime and compiled after his death.

Why just keep providing sources that back what I said and not what the user I originally queried said?

Very much so, they had deep trade connections with the Egyptians, who were mostly Coptics and they had certain rites and procedures in rituals which may have been observed and ultimately influenced early islam.

You genuinely have no idea what you're talking about.

Here.

Back to original user:
>He didn't. It was written after his death by men who supposedly memorized it. Even though they had several different texts.The strongman Abu Bakr decided one of them was The text, destroyed the others, and killed anyone who objected.

Breakdown:
>it was written after his death
Most of the quran was memorised, since most people could not write at that time. From what I know there was not 'one' completed quran, just various parts written down, other parts memorised. But let's say that this is disputable.
>Even though they had several different texts. Fact
>.The strongman Abu Bakr decided one of them was The text, destroyed the others. Fact
>and killed anyone who objected. don't know/disputable

I've given sources to at least argue for two of the claims of original user. To say Muhammed is a complete fictional figure, or a historical Muhammed did exist who made various claims about the universe and God? I would say a historical muhammed of some sort did exist, who made various claims, and people wrote some of those things down. How much altering of the story come centuries later: I don't know.

Now I'm going to sleep, so if you have further questions you need to summon the user who made the original claim back to the thread.

If you have a citation from a decent source why not just provide one other than a random screenshot?

All the citations given say it was written down in full and ALSO memorised and that it was compiled after Mohammad's death. What is so hard to comprehend about this? Not one single citation has back up the claim that I initially queried that it was written after Mohammad's death or this new watered down claim you have just made that it was only partly written down.

The citation comes from the source already provided
ejournal.anztla.org/anztla/article/view/123

its in that islamqa link.
Third page.

meant the other link.

Muslim here. Ask any question in reply to this and I'll try my best to answer.

He's right tho. Allah isn't a name it's just the Arabic word for God. Christian Arabs say Allah as well.

Here (its a long ahadith)
Narrated Zaid bin Thabit: Abu Bakr As-Siddiq sent for me when the people of Yamama had been killed (i.e., a number of the Prophet’s Companions who fought against Musailama). (I went to him) and found ‘Umar bin Al-Khattab sitting with him. Abu Bakr then said (to me), “Umar has come to me and said: ‘Casualties were heavy among the Qurra’ of the Qur’an (i.e. those who knew the Quran by heart) on the day of the Battle of Yamama, and I am afraid that more heavy casualties may take place among the Qurra’ on other battlefields, whereby a large part of the Qur’an may be lost (Zahab). Therefore I suggest, you (Abu Bakr) order that the Qur'an be collected.’ I said to `Umar, ‘How can you do something which Allah's Apostle did not do?’ `Umar said, ‘By Allah, that is a good project.’ `Umar kept on urging me to accept his proposal till Allah opened my chest for it and I began to realize the good in the idea which `Umar had realized.” Then Abu Bakr said (to me), “You are a wise young man and we do not have any suspicion about you, and you used to write the Divine Inspiration for Allah's Messenger. So you should search for (the fragmentary scripts of) the Qur'an and collect it in one book." By Allah If they had ordered me to shift one of the mountains, it would not have been heavier for me than this ordering me to collect the Qur'an. Then I said to Abu Bakr, "How will you do something which Allah's Messenger did not do?" Abu Bakr replied, "By Allah, it is a good project." Abu Bakr kept on urging me to accept his idea until Allah opened my chest for what..........

part 2
He had opened the chests of Abu Bakr and `Umar. So I started looking for the Qur'an and collecting it from (what was written on) palm stalks, thin white stones and also from the men who knew it by heart, till I found the last Verse of Surat at-Tauba (Repentance) with Abi Khuzaima Al-Ansari, and I did not find it with anybody other than him. The Verse is: 'Verily there has come unto you an Apostle (Muhammad) from amongst yourselves. It grieves him that you should receive any injury or difficulty… (till the end of Surat-Baraa' (at-Tauba) (9.128-129). Then the complete manuscripts (copy) of the Qur'an remained with Abu Bakr till he died, then with `Umar till the end of his life, and then with Hafsa, the daughter of `Umar.” (Sahih al- Bukhari, Volume 6, Book 61, Number 509)