The Quraan and Its Message

Chapter 4 THE QURAAN AND ITS MESSAGE It is He who shows you the lightning, for fear The Nature of the Quraanic Text and hope, and produces the heavy clouds; * Structure the thunder proclaims His praise, and the angels, in awe of Him. He looses the thun- The Quraan is a relatively short book (just derbolts, and smites with them whomsoever over half the length of the New Testament). It He will; yet they dispute about God, who is divided into 114 chapters, or suras, and each is mighty in power. * To Him is the call of of these suras is divided into verses. According truth; and those upon whom they call, apart to Islamic tradition, the division into suras from Him, answer them nothing, but it is as was revealed by God to the Prophet; the angel a man who stretches out his hands to water Gabriel taught Muhammad how to form suras that it may reach his mouth, and it reaches it from the pieces of revelation given to him by not. The prayer of the unbelievers goes only God. At the end of each year, Gabriel would astray. (Q 13:12-14) visit Muhammad in order to review the suras that had thus far been compiled. (Gabriel had 93 94 v THE EMERGENCE OF ISLAM Muhammad review the suras twice during the The Quraan’s 114 suras are organized, for last year of his life, which Muhammad took the most part, in decreasing order of length as a sign that his death was near.) The divi- (an ordering principle that has a precedent in sion into verses, however, was not revealed by the arrangement of Paul’s letters in the New God but was developed by later generations Testament). This principle is not applied pre- after the death of the Prophet. In fact, before cisely, however. Sura 2, and not sura 1, is the the standardization of the Quraan in the early longest chapter of the Quraan; the shortest twentieth century, a good deal of variation in sura (with only three verses) is 108, not 114. verse numbering existed. In fact, the exceptions to this principle are All but two suras of the Quraan are pre- telling. For the most part, the Quraan speaks ceded by the invocation, “In the name of in the voice of God, like the sections of the God the Merciful, the Compassionate.” In Pentateuch or the Old Testament prophetic al-Fatiha, the first sura of the Quaran, these books in which God is quoted. However, the words become part of the sura (verse 1); they first sura—which has only seven verses— are missing altogether in sura 9. Each sura also seems to be a prayer, the words of a believer has a name, a feature similarly understood to speaking to God. The last two suras of the be the work of Islamic tradition (on this, too, a Quraan—sometime called “charm suras” good deal of variation existed). The traditional because they seem to be incantations against names are not like those of biblical books. The evil—also seem to be in the voice of a believer first book of the Bible is known to Christians (although they begin with the command as Genesis because it tells the story of origins, “Say!” and thus are understood as the words and to Jews as Be-reshit (“In the beginning . .”) of God, who is telling humans how to pray). because it opens with these words. However, It is sometimes argued that these suras at the the names of the suras, for the most part, are beginning and end of the Quraan were ini- neither their first words nor their main top- tially prayers, and only later were added to the ics. Instead, they appear simply to be labels by text, and became scripture. which one sura might be distinguished from Meanwhile, in the middle of the text, the others. The first sura of the Quraan is known ordering principle of the suras seems to be as al-Fatiha, “The Opening,” because it is the broken in order to keep certain groups of first sura. The second sura is known as “The suras together. Twenty-nine suras begin with Cow” not because it is about a cow but only a series of letters that in manuscripts are writ- because it refers briefly (verse 67) to a story in ten individually (Arabic is otherwise written which Moses instructs his followers to touch in a cursive script); for this reason, they are a murdered man with the flesh of a sacrificed known in Islamic tradition as “the broken let- cow (that he may come to life and, presum- ters.” Their precise meaning is unclear, which ably, accuse his murderer; a story with connec- is why Western scholars have given them the tions to Num. 19:1-10 and Deut. 21:1-9). more dramatic name “the mysterious letters.” Chapter 4: The Quraan and Its Message v 95 However, their place in the text is not entirely the inside of his body with pus than to fill it mysterious. It seems clear at least that they with poetry” [Bukhari, 8:175]). Muslim juris- served as labels for certain groupings of suras. prudents generally do not consider poetry The broken letters a.l.r. appear at the begin- forbidden (whereas many consider music for- ning of suras 10–15 (sura 13 has a.l.m.r.). Yet bidden), but the idea that poets are inspired suras 13–15 are all shorter than sura 16, in either by a genie or a demon is widespread in contrast to the larger organizing principle of classical Islamic sources. One of the Prophet’s the Quraan. Presumably, they were kept before own companions, named Hassan b. Thabit, sura 16 because the “a.l.r.” suras formed a unit is said to have attributed his poems celebrat- of some kind even before the present Quraan ing Muhammad’s victories in battle to “his was put together. (Similarly, sura 40—which is brother genie.” This idea, not surprisingly, longer than sura 39—seems to be in its place led Muslims to insist that the Quraan is not because it opens with the letters h.m. along poetry. Accordingly, they are careful to use a with suras 41–46.) This is one small hint into special name for the Quraan’s rhyme (fasila), the way in which the Quraan was compiled, a a name which differentiates it from the rhyme process which is otherwise poorly known. of poetry (qafiya). Yet rhyme, however it is named, clearly had Rhyme a formative influence on the words, and the All of the Quraan’s suras have some sort of order of the words, in the Quraan. This influ- rhyme (usually based on the penultimate let- ence is evident in the opening of sura 95. ter of the last word of each verse). Yet Muslim scholars traditionally insist that the Quraan is (1) Wa-l-tin wa-l-zaytun (2) wa- not poetry, and understandably so. According Turi sinin (3) wa-hadha l-baladi l-amin to the classical understanding (evident in the Greek notion of “muses”), poets were not (1) By the fig and the olive, (2) the Mount like other writers or storytellers, who told Sinai (3) and this land secure! tales from their memory or created them with their wit. Instead, they were closer to The word sinin at the end of the second verse oracles inspired by supernatural spirits. Thus seems to be a version of the word saynaa, or the Quraan warns its audience against poets “Mount Sinai,” in Q 23:20. However, it has (“And the poets—the perverse follow them”; been changed to fit the rhyme of un/in of sura Q 26:224). 95 (although since the form sinin can also The attitude of later Islamic tradi- mean “years,” one modern translation renders tion to poetry is ambiguous. In the hadith, this verse “and the mount of ages”). Muhammad both accepts and condemns We also see the importance of rhyme in the poetry (“Some poetry contains wisdom” order in which the Quraan refers to Moses and [Bukhari, 8:166]; “It is better for a man to fill his brother Aaron. Quraan 7:122 relates, “the 96 v THE EMERGENCE OF ISLAM Lord of Moses and Aaron [harun],” match- (such as, for example, “the reminder” [al- ing the rhyme of un in the following verse. dhikr]) that the Scripture gives itself. Yet Quraan 20:70 relates instead, “the Lord of Aaron and Musa [musa],” matching the rhyme of a in verses 69 and 71. Rhyme also The Traditional Account seems to be a formative factor in sura 55. Here of the Quraan’s Development the Quraan speaks of two heavenly gardens, although elsewhere it speaks of only one, as Pious Muslims, of course, would introduce the dual form of gardens, jannatani, matches the origin of the Quraan in a different man- the ani rhyme of the sura. ner. Although the matter was an issue of fierce These brief observations on the Quraan’s debate for some time in the medieval period, structure and rhyme suggest that at its origin the prevailing Islamic tradition is that the the text was meant for public religious reci- Quraan has always existed in heaven, along tation. The ordering of the text by the length with God. This is the meaning, most com- of suras (and not by topic) and the choice of mentators explain, of the final verses of sura distinctive (and not descriptive) labels for the 85: “Nay, but it is a glorious Quraan, * in a titles of those suras seem to be the product of guarded tablet” (Q 85:14-15).

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