Professional Documents
Culture Documents
by
ADRIAN REDDY
Foreword
A.P.R.
June 2009
CONTENTS
Chapter 1 Introduction ...................................... 1
1.1. Muhammad: hero or zero ........................ 1
1.2. Why do Muslims think the Quran was
composed by God? ........................................ 2
1.3. The approach taken in this book.............. 2
1.4. Sources of information............................ 3
References..................................................... 175
Chapter 1
Introduction
1.1. Muhammad: hero or zero
There is only one legitimate basis for adopting a particular
religion: that one believes its claims to be true. In the same
way, there is only one legitimate basis for rejecting any
religion: that one believes its claims to be false.
Islam claims that, around the year 610 in what is now Saudi
Arabia, Muhammad ibn Abdullah began to receive messages
from the Biblical God (‘God’) and that he continued to receive
them until his death in 632. Subsequently, according to Islam,
the messages were compiled into a book: the Quran, which
thereby became a book of guidance, setting out the behaviour
that God expected from humankind.
1
1.2. Why do Muslims think the Quran was
composed by God?
The Muslim case for divine authorship is based upon a number
of claims about the content and qualities of the Quran. From
the description in [1] of the original works by the medieval
Muslim theologians Abu Bakr Muhammad al-Baquillani
(whom we shall meet again in Chapter 5) and Abu Abdullah al-
Qurtubi, they can be summarised as follows. It is maintained
that:
2
existence of God should play a part since, in order for Islam to
be true, it is necessary that God should exist. However, this
issue can be sidestepped. If the Muslim belief that there is
proof of God’s authorship of the Quran is well-founded, then
this also provides proof of His existence. If it is not, then the
objective of the investigation has been achieved without the
question of God’s presence or absence ever needing to be
resolved.
3
- has quoted from a poor translation;
- has misunderstood a passage;
- has quoted a passage out of context;
4
1.5. So….
In a nutshell: we have a book, and a story of how it came to be
compiled, and we have to decide whether the book was
composed by an almighty, all-knowing being or by an
uneducated 7th century Arab. A moment’s consideration makes
it clear that there exists such a vast gulf between the respective
abilities of these two candidate authors that the evidence
should therefore come down emphatically on one side or the
other.
5
Chapter 2
The Muslim Story of the Origins of
Islam
6
then, after his death, by the next Caliph, Umar ibn al-Khattab
and then by Umar’s daughter (and one of Muhamamad’s
widows) Hafsa.
The situation remained unaltered until 653 when the third
Caliph, Uthman ibn Affan, determined that a standardised
version should be created, since Muslims in Iraq and Syria
(parts of the ever-growing Islamic empire) had variant versions
which had given rise to quarrels. His scribes went over Abu
Bakr’s version (retrieved from Hafsa), rendering it in the
Meccan dialect. Uthman then commanded that all other copies
(including Hafsa’s) should be burnt, leaving the revised version
as the official and only representation of the Quran, and so it
remains to this day.
In what follows, the locations within the Quran of selected
passages are denoted by (Qa:b), where ‘a’ is the Sura (i.e.
Chapter) number and ‘b’ is the verse number. As stated in
Chapter 1, the Arberry translation [2] is the version usually
used for the quoted passages.
7
from the Bukhari collection [13] are referred to by the key
(Ba:b:c), referring to Bukhari, Volume ‘a’, Book ‘b’, Hadith
‘c’. Hadiths from the Muslim collection [14] (named after the
man who compiled them, rather than the religion) are denoted
(Ma:b), referring to Muslim, Book ‘a’, Hadith ‘b’.
8
God’s word, therefore, is in Arabic and Arabic only. Any
attempt to render the text in another language is not simply an
act of translation, but potentially one of alteration. Therefore,
translations are regarded with caution within Islam; a translated
Quran is considered not to be a true Quran, but more like an
interpretation or commentary.
9
2.2. Discussion
According to Islam then, the almighty God intended that His
religion, specified in the Quran and elaborated upon in the
Hadiths, should be the one followed by the entire world. One
might therefore expect that His plan for revealing and
spreading Islam to the world would exhibit evidence of having
been conceived and executed by an intellect far superior to our
own. Let us consider the evidence and see if this is so. If it is
not, we may tend to favour the competing explanation: that
Muhammad was one of countless individuals, past and present,
who heard ‘voices’ and that the Quran was, therefore, entirely a
product of his own mind.
10
As described more fully in Chapter 3, Muhammad’s early
attempts to spread the word to his fellow Meccans is a case in
point, with the experience being a slow, frustrating and
sometimes dangerous one. As a result of the general scepticism
and hostility, early conversions to Islam happened slowly. It is
estimated in [16] that, 13 years after he had started,
Muhammad’s converts numbered only around 100. His lack of
success and the persecution of the early Muslims caused him
and his followers to migrate to Medina, some 200 miles to the
north, after which his fortunes improved markedly. The simple
fact is that most of Muhammad’s compatriots, when given the
free choice (an arrangement which was not to last), did not
believe him. This difficulty in getting the Message across
continues to the present day.
11
later commentators as anything up to 200,000 ([11], p239). The
perplexing use of designated ‘enemies’ to hinder the efforts of
the prophets indicates quite unambiguously a process whereby
God is enacting His master plan with one hand while
undermining it with the other and may explain the almost
complete fruitlessness of His previous efforts. Even accepting
this hindrance, one cannot help wondering how, given this
saturation coverage of the Earth’s peoples, God’s word failed
to survive past the Iron Age except within one tribe: the Jews.
Even in their case, according to Islam, the scriptures were
corrupted.
12
2.2.2. The creation of the Quran
The story of the revelation of the Quran is as puzzling as the
story of the earlier prophets. Despite the latter’s almost total
failure, God again selected the same method of transmission.
Furthermore, although God’s message was supposedly
intended for all peoples and for all time (‘the religion followed
by the entire world’), Islam maintains that God has expressed it
only in Arabic; this being then, as now, a minority language in
world terms.
13
which suspension of one’s critical faculties is a prerequisite.
Muhammad’s revelation concerning the existence of seven
versions must surely strike the uncommitted reader as his
attempt to finesse himself out of the consequences of previous
occasions when he had failed to recall correctly the exact
wording of a verse.
The case of the seven versions is not the only occasion where
what appears to be a simple human failing is given a divine
gloss. (Q2:106) refers to verses which God supposedly had
‘cast into oblivion’; caused Muhammad to forget, in other
words. The same verse describes the process whereby
delivered verses were supposedly abrogated, or superseded, by
later ones; a strange procedure for a text which had supposedly
existed in Heaven since the beginning of time and a problem
for subsequent generations since the original chronology was
lost. (Q22:52) relates an occasion where verses had to be
retracted because ‘Satan’ had deviously slipped them into
Muhammad’s mind and (Q3:7) refers to verses which are
‘allegorical’: incomprehensible, as far as the reader is
concerned. These are discussed in more detail in Chapter 3.
14
dictatorial action was responsible for the preservation of the
Quran from 655 to the present day. Von Denffer also tries to
maintain that the retrieval of these fragments during the initial
compilation under Abu Bakr was a simple matter of visiting
Muhammad’s old house, collecting the fragments and
parcelling them up with string. The comment of Zaid Ibn
Thabit (B6:60:201), to whom the task fell:
suggests otherwise.
15
Umar’s concerns were well-founded, because the stoning verse
is, indeed, no longer there. This infamous Islamic punishment
for adultery nevertheless remains in force because of evidence
in the Hadiths that it was sanctioned (and personally carried
out) by Muhammad himself. There is no way to reconcile the
information in the early Islamic reports with the dogma of an
unchanged Quran except with a level of wishful thinking which
only the preconvinced can achieve.
2.2.4. Context
Attempts by Westerners to quote the Quran back at Muslims
are often met with the response that the non-Muslim has failed
to take into account the context of the original ‘revelation’ and
has therefore misinterpreted the text. The passage by Elmasry
[15], quoted above, largely gives the game away: Muslims are
also bemused and have failed to resolve the problem even to
their own satisfaction in nearly one and a half millennia of
‘impressive scholarly work’.
16
idolaters wherever you find them”. Unfortunately, ‘God’ fails
to make clear whether this applies for all time, or not, with the
result that some Muslims believe one thing and the rest, the
other. The verse which, almost single-handedly, defines the
relationship between Islam and the rest of the world, is
ambiguous.
17
strange situation of the supposed words of God being repeated
reverentially by non Arabic-speaking Muslims, even though
they have no clue what they are saying. Was this God’s
intention?
18
The following is only the briefest of summaries of the turmoil
which took place in the next few decades. Upon Muhammad’s
death, a cabal which included Umar appointed Abu Bakr, in
opposition to a rival grouping who supported Muhammad’s
cousin Ali ibn Abi Talib, thereby immediately causing a
schism which grew into the division between Sunni and Shia
versions of Islam. The cause of the split was the proto-Shia
belief that Muhammad had given his blessing to Ali in a public
statement of support, with the essence of the dispute hinging on
the meaning of a single word. Such is a typical consequence of
a religious movement wedded to literalism and a founder who
had a propensity for ambiguity.
Abu Bakr lived for only another two years and spent most of
his time as Caliph putting down the rebellion of a number of
tribes who tried to leave the Muslim fold. On his deathbed in
634, Abu Bakr returned the favour to Umar, strongly
recommending him as the next Caliph, again to the
considerable annoyance of the Ali supporters. Umar’s reign
saw a huge expansion in the Islamic empire until, in 644, Umar
was stabbed to death by a captured, enslaved and humiliated
Persian. Uthman was selected as the next Caliph by an
appointed committee.
19
At this point, things began to turn really unpleasant. A small
group of dissidents, including a cousin of Abu Bakr and
Muhammad’s widow Aisha raised an army to overthrow Ali.
Ali was victorious, but faced another problem when Muawiya
ibn Abi-Sufyan, the Governor of Syria and a relative of
Uthman’s, demanded that the murderers of Uthman be brought
to justice. This Ali refused to do and a further conflict began.
The first four Caliphs: Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman and Ali are
revered in Sunni Islam as the ‘Rightly Guided Caliphs’, so
called because of their supposed devotion to true Islam.
However, of these four Caliphs, three were murdered; two by
other Muslims and their reigns saw internecine fighting and the
acrimonious and permanent split of Islam into Sunni and Shia,
with this being caused predominantly by Muhammad’s
vagueness when he spoke in support of Ali. So, how is this to
be explained in Islamic terms, if no errors can be admitted in
either God’s plan or in Muhammad’s execution of it? Even if
this criticism of Muhammad’s political judgement is thought to
be a little harsh, it is surely an unavoidable conclusion that God
must then have failed to realise that a section of the Muslim
community had interpreted Muhammad’s statement concerning
20
Ali in an unintended and potentially calamitous way. If this
seems like an uncharacteristic oversight for an all-knowing
being, then an alternative conclusion is available, as set out
below.
2.4. Conclusions
Anyone considering the above must surely find it a challenge
to discern any evidence of divine planning in the haphazard
and, at times, chaotic sequence of events leading to the creation
and compilation of the Quran that we see today. Furthermore,
when judged against the supposed divine goal of the adoption
of Islam by the entire world, many features of the process: the
futile efforts of the (alleged) previous prophets, the confusing,
Arabic-only message, the failure of Muhammad to provide a
written, approved copy, the absence of any effective strategy
for the rational conversion of the unconvinced and the post-
Muhammad infighting, are simply inexplicable. The alternative
explanation; that the Quran was composed piecemeal,
consciously or unconsciously, by Muhammad alone, fits the
story perfectly.
21
Chapter 3
Working the Audience
3.1. Introduction
It is a strange quirk of Western culture that the credibility of a
religion is determined more by the its age and size than by the
plausibility of its claims. It is therefore a useful exercise to set
aside the baggage of a religion’s history and to imagine how
things must have been at its very beginning or, alternatively, to
imagine what would happen if its founder had waited until the
present day before appearing on the streets a modern town. By
this means it is easier to judge whether one would have been
among the convinced or the unimpressed.
It is strange to contemplate but, for a short while, Islam
consisted of just one man. Even after Muhammad had gathered
his first few recruits, Islam remained, for more than a decade,
indistinguishable by its nature or its size from any other of the
thousands, more likely tens of thousands of cults which have
existed over the course of history (see Chapter 8 for examples).
In fact, as mentioned briefly in Chapter 2, the first 13 years of
Muhammad’s mission in his native Mecca were so ineffective
that, during this period, he accumulated only about 100
converts [16]: an average recruitment rate of less than one
every six weeks. Those who believe that the Quran is so
miraculously eloquent that its audience immediately recognise
its divine authorship (Chapter 5) should bear this in mind.
When one considers being confronted by someone who claims
to be receiving ‘messages’: from God, the spirit world, aliens
or whatever, it is not difficult to see why the Meccans were as
22
difficult to win over as people would be today. There was
nothing initially to distinguish Muhammad from a run-of-the-
mill street soothsayer and, in addition, the verses which
Muhammad revealed, claiming that they were words of God,
seemed to place disproportionate emphasis upon events which
affected Muhammad personally and spent a suspiciously large
amount of time in defensive self-justification. If his claims, as a
result of their intrinsic implausibility, were difficult to accept
then, why should anyone believe them now?
The verses of the Quran, alternately influenced by criticism and
by setbacks in Muhammad’s mission on one hand, and by his
growing power and increasing hold over his followers on the
other, betray their human origins. The following presents a
selection of examples presented in the approximate order in
which they took place. The order follows the chronological
sequence proposed by Soyuti, as summarised in [11]. The
actual order of suras is uncertain (compare Soyuti’s sequence
with those of Noldeke and Muir in [11]) and some suras
contain verses from different times, so the true story can never
be known, but this approach does provide an indication of the
ad hoc, ephemeral and parochial nature of at least some of the
Quran’s pronouncements. The Soyuti sequence number of each
sura quoted is shown in braces, e.g. {22}.
23
was pointed out at the time, the Quran responded (Q69:40-42)
{16}:
“It is the speech of a noble Messenger. It is not the
speech of a poet (little do you believe) nor the speech of
a soothsayer (little do you remember).”
Although these verses are regarded by Muslims as
‘confirmation’ of God’s authorship, such responses in fact
consist of nothing more than Muhammad making the same
claim twice: the first time as himself, the second time as ‘The
Quran’. Having been fobbed off with this retort, the doubters
would, quite reasonably, have then enquired as to why
Muhammad had been selected for such an exalted role.
However, when they asked ’Why was this Quran not sent down
upon some man of importance in the two cities [i.e. Mecca and
the nearby town of Taif]?’ (Q43:31) they were told by
(Q43:32) {19} that it was none of their business to question
God’s methods. Enquiries as to why the Quran was in Arabic
(rather than, say, Hebrew, Latin or Persian) were headed off
with the response (Q41:44) {25}: “Had We [i.e. God] sent this
as a Quran (in the language) other than Arabic, they would
have said: …What! (a Book) not in Arabic and (a Messenger)
an Arab?”. If the obvious next question: “So why did God
choose an Arab?” was ever asked, neither it nor its response
were recorded in the Quran.
Muhammad also faced incredulity within his own family. His
uncle, Abu Lahab, and his aunt categorically rejected
Muhammad’s claims and the relationship between them soured
to such an extent that Abu Lahab and his wife became the
subject of a short, ill-tempered sura (Q111) {48}:
“Perish the hands of Abu Lahab, and perish he!
His wealth avails him not, neither what he has earned;
24
he shall roast at a flaming fire
and his wife, the carrier of the firewood,
upon her neck a rope of palm-fibre.”
Those at the time must have wondered why an almighty God
would bother to comment upon a personal squabble, why He
would issue what is, in effect, a curse when He had the power
to put the curse into effect and why He should be annoyed at a
situation which He (according to Islam) had deliberately
created. For those of us in the present day, who are aware of
Islam’s developed claim that the Quran is intended for all
peoples and for all time, the inclusion of a spiteful sura about a
7th century Arab of no historical or theological significance
seems all the more remarkable.
The criticism evidently continued. The Quran professes itself
to be ‘clear’: easy to understand and is held to be so by
Muslims. Nevertheless, it is evident that parts of it are
incomprehensible, and were even for Muhammad’s Arab
contemporaries. (Q3:7) {73} conceded as much:
“It is He who sent down upon you the Book, wherein
are verses clear that are the Essence of the Book, and
others ambiguous.”
but decided to go on the attack, suggesting that those who drew
attention to the ‘ambiguous’ verses were just troublemakers:
“As for those in whose hearts is swerving, they follow
the ambiguous part, desiring dissension…”
while explaining that
“..none knows its interpretation, save only God”
And the Quran returns to the subject of its own dubious
credibility time after time after time. Often, it seems to be the
25
hecklers, rather than God, who are driving the content and
forcing Muhammad to issue retorts from ‘God’ in order,
presumably, to convince his followers that he and God had
everything under control. The next passage turned out to be
worth its weight in gold (Q4:82) {74}:
“What, do they not ponder the Quran? If it had been
from other than God surely they would have found in it
much inconsistency.”
The passage establishes for Muslims the characteristic of
‘containing no (or ‘not much’?) inconsistency’ as both a
property of the Quran and as a criterion for its divine
authorship, thereby telling future Muslims what to think and
how to think it. Both positions are, of course, untenable: the
Quran does contain inconsistencies (see Section 4.6) and
consistency is, in any case, hardly so miraculous that only God
can achieve it.
Accusations that Muhammad was simply a fraud or that he was
bewitched or was being coached in Judaism (which Islam often
resembles) are referred to in the text a score of times, as are his
conspicuous failures to provide a miracle to prove he was truly
a prophet. Muhammad is reported in the Quran as being
accused, unjustly of course, of being ‘bedevilled’ and a ‘lying
sorcerer’ and the Quran ‘fairy-tales of the ancients’ and ‘a
hotchpotch of nightmares’. How can a divinely-authored book
be so preoccupied with papering over the cracks of its own lack
of credibility?
26
Islamic dogma insists that all things happen only because God
wills them to happen (Chapter 7), why should unbelievers exist
at all? This caused Muhammad to introduce ‘explanations’ as
to why this should be so. One of these: that God had arranged
‘enemies’ for each of the prophets, was discussed in Chapter 2.
Another is the notion that God has ‘set a seal’ on the hearts of
certain individuals (Q2.7) {68}, either as the cause of, or as
punishment for, their initial doubt. Either way, the ‘seal’
ensured that they would continue to fail to recognise God’s
word.
27
(or sometimes ‘infidels’), but implying those who recognise the
truth of Islam but cover it up. (Q2:109) states:
28
“That anyone should be able to oppose Islam with a
good conscience quite exceeds the Muslim's
imagination”.
3.3. Abrogation
The intrinsic implausibility of Muhammad’s claims was
worsened when, early on, the Quran began to contradict itself.
Verses 73:1 to 73:4 require Muslims to pray for almost half of
the night {23}:
“O you enwrapped in your robes,
keep vigil the night, except a little
(a half of it, or diminish a little,
or add a little), and chant the Quran very distinctly”
One can imagine that this proved rather difficult, so ‘God’
(who had, seemingly, failed to anticipate the problems) reduced
the burden somewhat (Q73:20):
29
“O believers, draw not near to prayer when you are
drunken until you know what you are saying”
30
(Q5:3) as ‘perfect’.
The change of rules concerning alcohol is explained away
within Islam by the argument that giving up alcohol was
sufficiently difficult that a staged approach was necessary. This
is a plausible argument, though it does not take account of the
fact that, after Verse 5:93 had been revealed, anyone wishing
(or having) to convert to Islam would have to go cold turkey.
However, the argument that God was breaking people in gently
does not explain the instances where the changes in the
Quran’s laws go in the opposite direction.
The Quran originally had high expectations of a Muslim’s
ability in battle (Q8:65):
“…if there be a hundred of you, they will overcome a
thousand unbelievers, for they are a people who
understand not.”
but had to moderate these expectations later (nowadays Q8:66,
the very next verse):
31
And there is more. Verse 2:106 {68} above mentions verses
which have not just been replaced, but have been ‘cast into
oblivion’: forgotten, in other words. It is entirely possible that
Muhammad could have forgotten verses occasionally; the
Hadith mentioned in Section 2.1.2 suggests that he made
mistakes in recalling the exact wording and had to invent a
cover story that the Quran had been revealed in seven different
forms. The following (M4:1720) is even more explicit:
32
which had been written down since the creation and then
arranged to have the verse forgotten almost immediately.
Again, one can only imagine the scorn which must have been
heaped upon Muhammad when the sceptical Islam-watchers of
Mecca heard of his ‘explanation’ for his poor memory.
33
which indicates that God specified the previous Qibla as some
kind of test of sincerity. The argument that, in the early days,
when recruitment was extremely difficult, an unpopular and
unfamiliar prayer direction was necessary to winnow out
unworthy individuals is difficult to support in the light of the
claim that God requires everyone to convert. In addition, why
should God set up a test, when He knows its outcome?
34
confirms His signs”
35
was not from God, but an insertion by Satan. The verse
praising the goddesses was annulled and replaced by (Q53:23):
“They are naught but names yourselves have named,
and your fathers; God has sent down no authority
touching them.”
which re-established the orthodox Islamic teaching. As a
comfort to Muhammad, God then revealed (Q22:52), quoted
above, to set things straight.
Is this story true? Did Muhammad speak the ‘cranes’ verse,
then withdraw it later? Despite the fact that the story was part
of standard Islamic tradition for centuries, it appears nowadays
to have become an embarrassment to some and efforts seem to
be underway to discredit it. Certainly, the story seems to imply
that God had been outmanoeuvred by Satan but, from an
outsider’s viewpoint, the traditional account of the story does
not seem any more implausible than the Muslim version of the
origin of Islam, so it is not entirely clear why Muslims are
uneasy about it.
However, seen from a more objective stance, the story appears
to be yet another example of Muhammad altering his teaching.
Modifications to doctrine or verses forgotten were attributed to
God; major errors committed under pressure (which must have
been considerable) were blamed on Satan. The last sentence of
(Q53:23): “God has sent down no authority touching them”
looks suspiciously like a reference to the deleted verse and,
even if the ‘cranes’ story is untrue, something along these lines
certainly happened at some time, because (Q22:52) says so.
Again: another retraction; another blow to Muhammad’s
credibility.
36
3.3.3. Sister Mary
The conversion of non-Muslims to Muslims is an original and
abiding goal of Islam. Consider now a much-criticised verse of
the Quran concerning Mary, the mother of Jesus, which states
(Q19:27-28) {113}:
“Then came she with the babe to her people, bearing
him. They said, ‘O Mary! now have you done a strange
thing!
O sister of Harun [Aaron]! Your father was not a man
of wickedness, nor unchaste your mother.’”.
The problem lies with the ‘sister of Aaron’ phrase, implying
that Muhammad had confused Mary with Maryam (Miriam),
the sister of Aaron and Moses, who had lived centuries before.
Significantly, this apparent mistake was noticed at the time, as
referred to in the following Hadith (M25:5326):
“Mughira b. Shu’ba reported: ‘When I came to Najran,
they [the Christians of Najran] asked me: You read “O
sister of Harun” in the Quran, whereas Moses was born
much before Jesus. When I came back to Allah’s
Messenger I asked him about that, whereupon he said:
“The (people of the old age) used to give names (to
their persons) after the names of Apostles and pious
persons who had gone before them.”’”
The Islamic explanation is that ‘sister’ in this instance simply
means someone of the same tribe. Even Rodwell [7], a
Christian clergyman, finds it difficult to believe that
Muhammad, with his obvious knowledge of Biblical theology,
could have made such a mistake. However, this explanation is
not convincing, Christian assent notwithstanding. One would
expect the terms ‘brother’ or ‘sister’ to be given to one’s
37
contemporaries, but not to one’s ancestors or descendents. If
Mary’s people had wanted to imply descent from Aaron, would
they not have used ‘daughter’? Furthermore, there is an earlier
verse which seems to confirm the error:
(Q66:12) {51}“And Mary, Imran’s daughter, who
guarded her virginity”
In Islam, Jesus is considered to be an entirely human prophet,
but miraculously born of a virgin. Therefore, the Mary in
(Q66:12) is definitely the mother of Jesus. Imran (Amram in
the Bible) was the father of Moses, Aaron and Miriam, so
Muhammad appears to have made the same mistake twice. The
only way out of this difficulty for Muslims is to assert, in
addition to the above special pleading concerning the
unconventional use of the term ‘sister’, that Mary’s father just
happened to have the same name as Miriam’s: an unlikely
coincidence.
Even if the above assertion is maintained, why would God utter
something which seems like an obvious howler, and which has
caused scepticism ever since it was revealed, when the problem
could just as easily have been avoided? A further related
example occurs in Muhammad’s apparent misidentification of
the components of the Christian Trinity:
(Q5:116) {111} “And when God said, ‘O Jesus son of
Mary, did you say to men, “Take me and my mother as
gods, apart from God”?’”
Again, if the purpose is to convert Christians to Islam, why
invite disbelief like this?
38
3.4. The perks of the job
3.4.1. Good times
It is commonly acknowledged, though seldom experienced
personally, that having groups of adoring followers increases
one’s opportunities for sex considerably. That Muhammad was
able to take advantage of this and still remain within the strict
constraints of Islamic law was due to a number of
dispensations which were ‘revealed’ at convenient moments.
39
When Muhammad developed a desire for his adopted son
Zaid’s comely wife Zainab, she was offered to him by her
husband. He initially refused since she was, after all, his
daughter in law. A new revelation then came his way, allowing
him to marry Zainab and chastising him lightly for previously
being so scrupulous (Q33:37-38) {50}:
“…So when Zaid had accomplished what he would of
her, then We gave her in marriage to you….There is no
fault in the Prophet, touching what God has ordained
for him”
As Goldsack [21] says:
“Can the intelligent Muslim reader believe, we ask, that
the words quoted above are indeed the words of God?
Is it not rather self-evident that the whole passage,
instead of being a revelation direct from God, was
deliberately framed and promulgated by Muhammad in
order to justify his conduct?”
The correct answers to these two questions are ‘apparently’ and
‘yes’ respectively.
In another incident, Muhammad became attracted to his
Egyptian slave-girl, Mary. This aroused the jealousy of his
wives, who scolded him and made him swear an oath to keep
his hands off her, which he failed to do. However, they were
subsequently overruled by yet another revelation accompanied,
again, by the lightest of divine slaps to the wrist (Q66:1,2)
{51}:
“O Prophet, why do you forbid what God has made
lawful to you, seeking the good pleasure of thy wives?
And God is All-forgiving, All-compassionate.
God has ordained for you the absolution of your oaths.
40
God is your Protector, and He is the All-knowing, the
All-wise.”
and a warning to his wives not to be selfish, because (Q66:5):
“It is possible that, if he divorces you, his Lord will
give him in exchange wives better than you, women
who have surrendered, believing, obedient, penitent,
devout, given to fasting, who have been married and
virgins too.”
41
The relevant verses, (Q24:11-19) {97}, which target the
rumour-mongers, are as follows:
“Those who came with the slander are a band of you;
do not reckon it evil for you; rather it is good for you.
Every man of them shall have the sin that he has earned
charged to him; and whosoever of them took upon
himself the greater part of it, him there awaits a mighty
chastisement.
Why, when you heard it, did the believing men and
women [i.e. the Muslims] not of their own account
think good thoughts, and say, 'This is a manifest
calumny'?
Why did they not bring four witnesses against it? But
since they did not bring the witnesses, in God’s sight
they are the liars.
But for God's bounty to you and His mercy in the
present world and the world to come there would have
visited you for your mutterings a mighty chastisement.
When you received it on your tongues, and were
speaking with your mouths that whereof you had no
knowledge, and reckoned it a light thing, and with God
it was a mighty thing.
And why, when you heard it, did you not say, ‘It is not
for us to speak about this; glory be to Thee! This is a
mighty calumny’?
God admonishes you, that you shall never repeat the
like of it again; if you are believers.
God makes clear to you the signs; and God is All-
knowing, All-wise.
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Those who love that indecency should be spread abroad
concerning them that believe -- there awaits them a
painful chastisement in the present world and the world
to come; and God knows, and you know not.”
If the author of this passage had truly been an all-knowing
deity, an obvious and effective declaration might have been
(something along the lines of) “I, God, see all, and nothing
untoward happened”, in contrast to the long-winded rant
quoted above. Strangely, the verses contain no such direct
statement of exoneration. Most say nothing more than ‘Don't
pay attention to gossip’, which may be sound advice but, given
that the creator of the universe had allegedly decided to
intervene in the matter, it is hardly the unambiguous
declaration of innocence that one might have hoped for.
And the more detail one adds to this story, the less divine the
revelations appear. Several weeks had passed since the incident
in the desert and the rumours had spread unchecked, with
Aisha out of the picture and unable to defend herself. So, when
did ‘God’ step in to sort things out? According to ([12], p497),
Aisha had just finished her tearful declaration of innocence to
her husband when:
and the above verses were revealed. Yes, it was several weeks
too late and it occurred at the very moment when Muhammad
had himself become convinced of Aisha’s fidelity. Quite a
coincidence, is it not?
43
Islamic texts (e.g. [8], [12]), following the Quran, are full of
pious indignation that anyone could possibly have believed the
rumours about Aisha. Note, however, that Muhammad had
offered her the opportunity to confess: “..if you have done
wrong as men say..” ([12], p496). Furthermore, according to
Aisha:
“The story had reached the apostle and my parents, yet
they told me nothing of it though I missed the apostle’s
accustomed kindness to me. When I was ill he used to
show compassion and kindness to me, but in this illness
he did not and I missed his attentions. When he came in
to see me when my mother was nursing me, all he said
was “How is she?” so that I was pained and asked him
to let me be taken to my mother so that she could nurse
me. “Do what you like”, he said.”
44
If the rule had predated the Aisha episode, one might speculate
as to how it came to have that precise form since, as discussed
further in Chapter 7, it seems to be an adulterers’ charter. This
suggests that a man with frequent sexual opportunities might
find that such a rule meshed perfectly with his requirements.
The apparently arbitrary nature of the ‘four witnesses’
requirement may therefore not be quite so arbitrary after all.
45
Any comment would be superfluous. The passage speaks for
itself.
46
as described above, the Quran contains so many obvious signs
of human authorship, and vacillating human authorship at that,
it is a wonder that Muhammad achieved any converts at all.
47
Chapter 4
The Claim of Science in the Quran.
4.1. Introduction
In 1976, a book was published which claimed that the Quran
“..does not contain a single statement that is assailable from a
modern scientific point of view”. The book: ‘The Bible, the
Quran and Science’ [22] had been written by a French doctor,
Maurice Bucaille, who became interested in Islam after he was
appointed family physician to King Faisal of Saudi Arabia. In
the early chapters, Bucaille proclaims articulately,
enthusiastically and with apparent sincerity that the scientific
accuracy of the Quran is such that “I could not find a single
error…“ and that “…there can be no human explanation” for
its contents.
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enigmatic verses.
As summarised above, ‘The Bible, the Quran and Science’
does not make a feature of claiming that the Quran contains
new information. It mostly promotes the weaker claim that
there is no contradiction between the Quran and modern
science and so falls short of the extravagant claims of
Bucaille’s many successors. Nevertheless, it is perhaps a
surprise that such a claim can be made at all for a book nearly
1400 years old, so it is worth attempting to determine how at
least the illusion of scientific compatibility came about. This
chapter therefore presents a brief review of Bucaille’s approach
and an assessment of selected Quranic statements. It also
discusses the evidence in the book for Bucaille’s guilty secret,
of which more later.
4.2. Water
The Quran contains many statements urging people to be
grateful to (or fearful of) God for various natural phenomena.
Not surprisingly, given the desert location of Mecca and
Medina, where Islam began, the Quran emphasises the
importance of water in such verses as (Q39:21):
“Have you not seen that God sent water down from the
sky and led it through sources into the ground? Then He
caused sown fields of different colours to grow.”
and (Q50:9-11):
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with further references in (Q23:18,19), (Q36:34) and (Q56:68-
70). It is evident that such verses remain true to the present day
by being expressed as straightforward qualitative observational
statements. Bucaille nevertheless contends that the work of a
mere mortal would inevitably reveal errors, but that
50
evaporates from the sea and falls as rain upstream. Therefore,
the statement that a barrier exists is simply incorrect and
disproves, if further disproof were needed, the notion that the
Quran was authored by an all-knowing deity. In addition,
Bucaille’s favourite get-out argument: that God adjusted his
descriptions so as to be comprehensible to 7th century Arabs, is
particularly inappropriate in this case, for there were then, as
there are now, no rivers (at least, no permanent ones) in Arabia.
Most of Muhammad’s compatriots must therefore have been
mystified by the reference to the ‘two seas’.
The lack of Arabian rivers explains why the description of the
‘two seas’ is so muddled for, surely, even an unschooled river-
bank dweller would realise that the separation between fresh
and salt waters exists because of the continuous downstream
flow. Muhammad’s meagre knowledge must therefore have
been based entirely on hearsay from travellers familiar with
(for example) the huge deltas of major rivers such as the Nile
and the Tigris-Euphrates. The Quran therefore does not
demonstrate scientific knowledge of the water cycle; quite the
opposite: it demonstrates nothing but a naïve ignorance, an
ignorance consistent with its authorship by an uneducated 7th
century Arab.
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On many occasions in his book, Maurice Bucaille displays
considerable inventiveness in perceiving the poetic imagery of
the Quran as divine wisdom, but this inventiveness reaches its
peak in the chapters dealing with ‘the Heavens’. A number of
verses are helped along by scientific-sounding translations,
such as that of the sun and the moon ‘travelling in an orbit’
where the Arberry translation refers to them as ‘swimming in
the sky’ (Q21:33) which, incidentally, the Quran verses below
imply is some sort of physical object:
(Q22:65) “(God) holds back the sky from falling on the
earth unless by His leave”
(Q13:2) “God is He who raised up the heavens without
pillars you can see…”
As stated above, Bucaille takes the view that God expressed his
concepts within the limited vocabulary of 7th Century Arabia
and that therefore these concepts can now be freed from these
constraints by means of the replacement of the original
vocabulary by modern scientific terminology. This is a highly
dubious process, and not just from a secular point of view. The
idea that God was somehow prevented from expressing
Himself properly does not seem compatible with the Islamic
notions that the Quran is perfect and that God is unlimited in
his power. Furthermore, since (according to Islam) God chose
the time, the place and the language for his revelation, it seems
somewhat insolent to imply that this choice impaired the
effectiveness of what He had to say. From the non-Islamic
perspective, the manipulation of the wording in this way just
looks like cheating.
52
fairly vague statements, such as:
(Q31:29) “Have you not seen how God merges the
night into the day and merges the day into the night?”
(Q39:5) “. . . He coils the night upon the day and He
coils the day upon the night.”
Bucaille states, obscurely: “This process of perpetual coiling,
including the interpenetration of one sector by another is
expressed in the Quran just as if the concept of the Earth’s
roundness had already been conceived at the time-which was
obviously not the case”. The statement, in addition to being
largely incomprehensible, fails to note that the idea that the
earth was a sphere had been around for centuries. Eratosthenes
(276–194 BC) had even made a remarkably accurate estimate
of its diameter.
Sura 15, verses 14 and 15, speak of the unbelievers in Mecca:
“Even if We opened unto them a gate to Heaven and
they were to continue ascending therein, they would say
‘Our sight is confused as in drunkenness. Nay, we are
people bewitched.’”
The verse clearly says only that unbelievers would not
recognise Heaven even if it was right in front of them.
Bucaille, however, states that “It describes the human reactions
to the unexpected spectacle that travellers in space will see”.
Of course, the author of the Quran is not to blame for
Bucaille’s over-active imagination. However, Sura 36 contains
verses which reveal the primitive level of understanding
underlying them. Verse 38 states:
“The Sun runs its course to a settled place. This is the
decree of the All Mighty, the Full of Knowledge.”
53
and Bucaille comments: “’Settled place’ is the translation of
the word ‘mustaqarr’ and there can be no doubt that the idea of
an exact place is attached to it”. The following recollection in
the Bukhari Hadiths, along with the passage quoted above,
suggest that Muhammad remained in complete ignorance about
the true nature of the solar system:
(B9:93:520) “I entered the mosque while Allah’s
Apostle was sitting there. When the sun had set, the
Prophet said, ‘O Abu Dharr! Do you know where this
(sun) goes?’ I said, ‘Allah and His Apostle know best.’
He said, ‘It goes and asks permission to prostrate, and it
is allowed, and (one day) it, as if being ordered to
return whence it came, then it will rise from the west’”
In discussing the following verse, Bucaille misses a most
significant error:
(Q36:40) “The sun must not catch up the moon, nor
does the night outstrip the day….”
Since the moon, along with the earth, orbits the sun, it is
meaningless to speak of the sun actually ‘catching up’ with the
moon, so the verse must (and does) refer to the apparent
motion of the sun’s and moon’s disks across the sky. Because
the moon orbits the earth in the same direction as the earth
spins, its apparent speed across the sky is slightly less than that
of the sun. The result is that the sun’s disk does indeed catch up
and overtake that of the moon, an occurrence which can be
clearly seen in sequences of photographs of a solar eclipse, of
which one example is shown on the title page of this book.
Furthermore, the sun overtakes the moon, in violation of
(Q36:40), not just during eclipses (when both bodies happen to
line up with the Earth, making the event visible), but once a
month, resulting in the familiar phenomenon of the new moon.
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The wording of (Q36:40) is sufficiently clear and unambiguous
that no significant difference exists between the various
English translations. Its meaning is, therefore, exactly as it
appears. Even if, by some creative interpretation of the original
Arabic, it could be argued that some other meaning than that
suggested above was intended, it is evident that the suspicion
raised by the dubious way that the verse is expressed is trivially
avoidable. Had the first part been expressed as “The moon
must not catch up the sun”, the astronomical interpretation
would have been correct. Had it been omitted altogether,
nothing would have been lost. To include it was the author’s
decision and therefore the author’s error. Again, provincial
ignorance, not divine knowledge, is evident in the verse.
In addition to the remarks made above, it appears that the
wording of the second part of the extract from (Q36:40): ‘..nor
does the night outstrip the day..’ is superfluous. The following
verse suggests a possible reason for its inclusion: that the
author does not quite grasp the underlying natures of light and
darkness:
(Q25:45,46) “Have you not seen how thy Lord has
spread the shade. If He willed, He could have made it
stationary. Moreover We made the sun its guide and
We withdraw it towards Us easily.”
As a final observation: for a man selected to receive
communications from God, Muhammad had a remarkably
unsophisticated attitude to the harmless appearance of a solar
eclipse. One of the Bukhari Hadiths (B1:8:423) reports that:
“The sun eclipsed and Allah’s Apostle offered the
eclipse prayer and said, ‘I have been shown the Hellfire
(now) and I never saw a worse and horrible sight than
the sight I have seen today.’”
55
4.4. The earth
As with the verses dealing with the sky and the water cycle,
those mentioning the earth reflect an almost total lack of any
understanding of natural processes. For example, the following
verse tells us that valleys came before rivers, rather than the
other way around:
(Q27:61) “He Who made the earth an abode and set
rivers in its interstices and mountains standing firm….”.
In fact, the Quran is rather keen to emphasise the ‘stability’ of
mountains, for example:
(Q79:30-33) “After that (God) spread the earth out.
Therefrom He drew out its water and its pasture. And
the mountains He has firmly fixed….”
56
(Q78:6,7) “Have We not made the earth an expanse and
the mountains stakes.”
about which Bucaille says: “The stakes referred to are the ones
used to anchor a tent in the ground”. The idea that mountains
are like stakes, anchoring the earth’s surface to some sort of
stable foundation, is an analogy which has probably never
occurred to any non-Muslim geologist.
57
sometimes identified as Mt. Cudi in the south east of present-
day Turkey, about half way between the towns of Cizre and
Sirnak. The Tigris river runs near to Mt. Cudi so it is not
beyond the bounds of possibility that a river flood could have
deposited a boat on the bank close to the lower slopes of the
mountain. So far, so good.
However, things are not quite so straightforward. First, it is
worth noting that the story of the Ark had been rattling around
the Middle East for centuries before it was incorporated into
the Bible. It appears in the Epic of Gilgamesh, a tale
originating in Sumer (bronze age central Iraq) and involves a
character by the name of Utnapishtim. It seems, therefore, that
Noah was simply transplanted into an existing pagan tale.
Second, it has even been proposed (see the entry for ‘Noah’ in
[23]) that the attribution of the Biblical flood story to Noah was
a mistake and that the ‘true’ captain of the Ark was Enoch,
Noah’s great-grandfather. This would certainly avoid the
uncomfortable conclusion that the man saved from global
extermination because of his extreme righteousness was the
same individual who had subsequently drunk himself into a
stupor (Genesis 9:21) and placed a curse on his grandson
because his (Noah’s) son had played some sort of prank on him
when he was out cold and au naturel in his tent. If this is true
then not only did the Quran simply repeat the error, but
Muhammad’s role model was not actually the hero of the
flood, but merely a vindictive sot.
However, all this is mythology or, at best, history. To return to
the Quran’s account: although there is no direct mention of the
Flood as a global event, there is an unambiguous indirect
reference. Verse (Q26:119) refers to the Ark as a ‘laden
vessel’; verse (Q36:41) says of the unbelievers of
58
Muhammad’s time “We carried their seed in the laden vessel”.
According to Maududi [9]:
“’A laden vessel’ : the Ark of the Prophet Noah. … All
the rest of mankind had been drowned in the Flood, all
later human beings are the children of those who were
rescued in the Ark.”
Therefore, Muslims who claim that the Quran only deals with a
local event (and therefore does not conflict with science) are
failing to take account of all the Quran’s statements on the
subject and are consequently expressing an opinion which runs
counter to Islam’s considered view. Even without any
reference to the ‘laden vessel’ verses, a little thought indicates
that the orthodox view of what the Quran is saying must be
correct. The Quran is deeply Biblical and refers to Old
Testament stories frequently, without re-telling them to any
great extent. The references to Noah and the Ark therefore
relate to the Biblical version and not to some other account, for
it would be remiss of the Biblical God to refer to an unfamiliar
version without making it clear that this was a significantly
different account from the one which people would assume.
So, although you may read claims to the contrary, the Quran’s
story of the Flood is indeed the same story as that in the Bible:
a global catastrophe in which all the Earth’s inhabitants, except
59
for those on the Ark, were destroyed. As if to underline the
point, (Q29:14) tells us what the Bible tells us:
4.5. Biology
When Bucaille is within his intellectual comfort zone, he
commits none of the howlers that he makes when dealing with
astronomy or geology. However, he is forced to confront the
realisation that some Quranic statements relating to mammal
physiology appear to be complete nonsense. Bucaille then steps
beyond the bounds of merely lending a helping hand to the
vocabulary, to the point where he simply rejects the existing
translations because the errors can no longer be ignored.
60
”Coming from between the back and the ribs.” (Shakir)
There is also an equally inaccurate verse concerning the
biology of mammalian milk production:
(Q16:66) “And surely in the cattle there is a lesson for
you; We give you to drink of what is in their bellies,
between filth and blood, pure milk, sweet to drinkers”
(Arberry)
“ from what is within their bodies between excretions
and blood…” (Yusufali)
“ of that which is in their bellies, from betwixt the
refuse and the blood….. “ (Pickthal)
“ of what is in their bellies–from betwixt the faeces and
the blood….” (Shakir)
“ between dregs and blood, which is in their bellies…”
(Rodwell)
So, semen comes from between the backbone and the ribs and
milk is formed in the bellies of cattle between faeces and
blood, whatever that means. Bucaille now takes a step beyond
the already dubious process of ‘modernising’ the Quran’s
vocabulary. He now alters the sense of the text for no other
reason than that it is wrong in its original form, expressing it as
61
“These translations are the work of highly eminent
Arabists. It is a well known fact however, that a
translator, even an expert, is liable to make mistakes in
the translation of scientific statements, unless he
happens to be a specialist in the discipline in
question….From a scientific point of view,
physiological notions must be called upon to grasp the
meaning of this verse”
whereas, in reality, they have been used to correct the verse.
The translators, though not experts in the sciences, were in no
worse a position than the millions of others who have tried to
understand the Quran. It is therefore reasonable to suppose that
what they expressed in their translations is pretty much what
the Quran says.
62
The Quran also makes a number of dubious statements
regarding the Earth’s animal life. For example:
(Q16:79) “Do they not look at the birds subjected in the
atmosphere of the sky? None can hold them up (in His
Power) except God.”
As with (Q36:40) above, all the translations say more or less
the same thing, implying that there is no ambiguity in the
original. The verse says that birds can fly only because God
holds them up. Now, it is true that Muslims believe that all
things happen by the ‘will of Allah’, so (Q16:79) could be
interpreted as a purely theological statement. However, it looks
suspiciously like the verse is drawing our attention to the
evident ‘miracle’ of the flight of birds, which is attributed to
God’s direct intervention rather than to the lift produced by the
shape and motion of their wings. This again is a sign of human
ignorance, rather than divine knowledge. Bucaille clearly also
had difficulty with this verse since, in addition to the
substitution of the scientific term ‘atmosphere’ instead of the
mundane ‘air’, he feels it necessary to misdirect his readers by
including an irrelevant discussion of the alternative ‘miracle’ of
migration.
4.6.1. Talking Ant
Not surprisingly, Bucaille also fails to include in his book the
account of one of King Solomon’s expeditions with his army.
Starting with (Q27:17)
“And his hosts were mustered to Solomon, jinn, men
and birds, duly disposed…”
The verse therefore claims that (a) Solomon’s army contained a
division of birds and (b) it contained another division of the
Arab folklore beings called jinn who, according to (Q55:15),
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were created by God from “..a smokeless fire”.
The question of the existence of jinn presents something of a
problem for the modern Muslim. To assert that they exist not
only flies in the face of overwhelming evidence that they do
not, but also implies the remarkable coincidence that only the
Arabs, out of all the Earth’s cultures, had managed to discern
them prior to the delivery, also to the Arabs, of the Quran,
where their existence was ‘confirmed’. It must be tempting to
consider the alternative explanation: that the Quran was
composed by an Arab who had been brought up to believe in
jinn.
However, for a Muslim to deny the existence of jinn is to doubt
the Quran, which entails apostasy ([10], Section o8.7): a capital
offence. It is as if Irish law specified the death penalty for
denying the existence of leprechauns.
The account of Solomon’s journey does not get any more
plausible, because the next verse tells us that
“.. when they came on the Valley of Ants, an ant said,
‘Ants, enter your dwelling-places, lest Solomon and his
hosts crush you, being unaware!’ ”
Solomon understood the local ant dialect, though his response
was rather dismissive:
“But he smiled, laughing at its words….”
and he proceeded to ignore the ant, and to concentrate instead
on a rather edgy discussion with one of his birds (Q27:22
onwards).
The story of Solomon and the ant is an old Jewish legend (see
entry for ‘Solomon’ in [23]). Many of the Earth’s cultures have
a variety of barmy folk tales but Islam is unusual in that, in
64
effect, it stakes its life on its own stories being true. For if the
account of Solomon and the ant is untrue, then the Quran
contains errors and the whole basis of Islam is false. It is
indeed a heavy burden to place on the narrow shoulders of a
talking ant.
Muslim apologists are uncertain regarding the appropriate
interpretation of the ant story. Those who prefer a rational
explanation suggest that the inhabitants of the valley were a
tribe called the ‘Naml’ (Arabic for ‘ant’), thereby avoiding the
embarrassment of having to defend an indefensible position.
However, the original Jewish story does indeed concern an
actual ant, as the phrase “..lest Solomon and his hosts crush
you, being unaware” implies. Furthermore, the ‘Naml’
explanation does not adequately deal with the subsequent
implausible account of the man-bird dialogue and suggests that
God included in the Quran an account so misleading that, for
centuries, Muslims held the mistaken view that a warning
voiced by a tribal leader was in fact given by an ant.
The more traditional explanations portray Solomon as a Bronze
Age Dr. Dolittle, miraculously endowed with the ability to talk
with creatures. Although such a claim is no more implausible
than many others within this and other religions, it nevertheless
falls well short of explaining all the extraordinary features of
the story. Although, according to the tale, Solomon possessed
miraculous powers (including, presumably, very acute
hearing), it is the abilities of the humble ant which are the more
remarkable. Not only could it speak, it also achieved the feat of
recognising Solomon from a distance and evidently already
knew his name. Unless Solomon had previously dropped in for
a chat from time to time, it is difficult to see how the ant could
have come by this knowledge.
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Remind us of your conclusion, Maurice. Ah yes:
“.. the Qur’an does not contain a single statement that is
assailable from a modern scientific point of view”.
“I knew then [i.e. during his studies] that the Quran was
the “Work of Allah” and had not been authored by any
human being.”
which looks almost, but not quite, like ‘yes’. However, he goes
on to say
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which sounds suspiciously like a ‘no’. Campbell (see [25]) has
looked into this subject more thoroughly, and says
And [25] also points out that the following passage occurred in
the catalogue of the Islamic publisher and book distributor Pak
Books in 1998:
67
these concepts can have no human explanation on
account of the period in which they were formulated.”
I think that, for a long while during his studies, Bucaille did
genuinely believe that the Quran was divinely authored: “..my
inner soul cried out that Al-Quran was the Word of God”.
68
However, I suspect that, at some point during his researches,
Bucaille began to realise that this belief could not be sustained.
The contrived special pleading that he was forced to make,
time and time again, to support so many flagrantly poor
descriptions of the natural world, must have had its effect.
4.8. Summing up
There are no verses in the Quran with any modern scientific
content. Those of the Quran’s statements about the natural
world which have survived unrefuted to the present day have
done so not because they contain profound truths, but precisely
because they contain no profound truths. Most are just
everyday rustic observations; those which venture beyond the
mundane often contain nothing more than an opaque mixture
of poetic description, vagueness and mysticism. How did
Muhammad largely avoid expounding a series of then-current
but erroneous scientific ideas? Because he was interested only
in theology, lived in an intellectual backwater and had not
received a formal education, so knew nothing of them.
69
There remains, however, a residue of statements in the Quran
which are both clear enough to be understood and specific
enough to be identified as erroneous. Even ignoring the simple
errors and absurdities which Bucaille overlooks or tries to
divert our attention from, the descriptions of natural
phenomena in the Quran are often so poor that they cannot be
the product of divine revelation, nor even of an educated
mortal. There is no sense in which (Q36:38) is an adequate
description of the motion of the sun, nor (Q78:6,7) an adequate
description of the geology of mountains, nor (Q86:5-7) a
competent account of human biology. Are Muslims really
suggesting that the above was the best that an almighty, all-
knowing deity could do? For anyone who believes that the
descriptions quoted above are satisfactory, consider this: if you
were marking an examination paper and you came across one
of the above passages without realising it was a direct quote
from the Quran, how many marks out of 10 would you give?
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‘discovery’ of new predictions contained in the quatrains of
Nostradamus. However, while the latter is a relatively
inconsequential pastime for devotees, the former helps sustain
the delusion that the Quran is miraculous, thereby giving
support to the grim edifice of Islam itself.
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Chapter 5
The Claim of Inimitability
5.1. Introduction
Islam claims that the text of the Quran is of such a quality that
no human can match it, and that this property provides proof
that the author was God (see e.g. [1]). This section reviews this
claim and the evidence cited to support it. If it cannot be
supported, then Islam is founded on nothing more than the
assumption that the voices and visions experienced by
Muhammad were not the products of his imagination. That
would be a flimsy basis for such a demanding system of belief.
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What is going on here? How can a book which is ‘perfect’ with
‘superb clarity’ simultaneously be as bad as Carlyle describes?
Does the relentless torrent of superlatives from Muslim
commentators imply that this is a truly unique written work, if
only we had the knowledge of Arabic to appreciate it, or are
these commentators simply behaving like the courtiers in the
story ‘The Emperor’s New Clothes’: sycophants locked into an
ever-rising spiral of flattery? These are the questions that we
shall try to answer.
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available at the time.
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understood, as well as examples of many other peculiarities,
are given in [30].
Muhammad, in (Q3:7) above, had already suggested that the
incomprehensible verses had deeper meanings. Muslim
scholars continued to build on the idea. According to [31]:
Zamakhshari and Fakhr al-Din Razi [two respected 12th
century Muslim scholars] do not consider the existence
of the allegorical verses as a defect but as a mark of
aesthetic excellence and as being conducive to the
development of culture and science.”
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5.2.1. So, why the superlatives?
The above features of the Quran seem to be imperfections;
what other interpretation can there be? So why is the Quran
described by Muslims in a manner which implies that it is
flawless? The answer lies in the Islamic view of the nature of
the Quran. Muhammad’s fellow Meccans, who doubted his
claims (Chapter 3), challenged him to perform a miracle. His
response was that the Quran itself was the miracle that they
sought. The Bukhari Hadith (B6:61:504) reports:
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Muslims sometimes make the mistake of assuming that such
opinions are based on empirical evidence; in fact, the opinion
and the available evidence may markedly conflict. The
description of the Quran as ‘clear’ is but one example. Another
is the description of Islam itself as a ‘perfect’ religion. This is a
view which has its basis in (Q5:3) “Today I have perfected
your religion for you”, not in any assessment of Islam against a
set of agreed criteria.
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“It is He who sent down upon thee the Book….and
those firmly rooted in knowledge say, ‘We believe in it;
all is from our Lord’; yet none remembers, but men
possessed of minds”.
For those who have begun to feel that the analogy with ‘The
Emperor’s New Clothes’ is perhaps an apt one, please compare
the above verse with the claim, made by the swindlers in that
famous story, that “this material has the amazing property that
it is invisible to anyone who is incompetent or stupid.”
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5.3.1. Literary excellence?
Part (a) above represents an argument so ill-defined that it is
difficult to know where to begin the task of assessing it, as it
places the judgement of its validity firmly in the realm of the
subjective and, because of the need for the assessor to be at
least fluent in Arabic, beyond the reach of most of the Earth’s
population. Fortunately, a claimed proof of the miraculous
nature of the Quran based on (a) above, written by the 9th
century Muslim scholar al-Baquillani has been translated in
part by the Islamic scholar G.E. von Grunebaum [33]. Al-
Baquillani endeavours to show that the Quran is superior to
two of the then most famous classical Arabic poems by means
of a line-by-line critique of the latter. His views on both
celebrated works are lengthy and unflattering, but the
following give a flavour of his opinions. The first poem
possesses “…diction which at one time splits a rock and at
another time melts away, changes colour like a chameleon,
varies like passions, whose grammatical construction teems
with confusion”. A selected aspect of the second “…comes
closer to incompetence than to eloquence and closer to
barbarism than to excellence”.
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[18]. While there is no doubt that the man had a way with
words, his arguments (at least, as represented in [18]) are little
more than florid but vacuous assertions of the superiority of the
Quran over everything else, in all possible ways. His claim that
even the words of the Quran, when transplanted to other
compositions, ‘shine like jewels’ might strike the uncommitted
reader as absurd.
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“…so that we get phrases like ‘one of the witnesses’
instead of simply ‘a witness’ because the former gives
the rhyming plural-ending, while the latter does not.”
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the throne of God (Q69:17) if the word thamaniyah,
“eight” had not happened to fall in so well with the
rhyme.”
and he continues:
Julius Wellhausen [37] points out another oddity with the ‘two
gardens’ passages in Sura 55: there are two examples of the
two gardens: seemingly a simple case of two alternative
versions of the same text. The first version starts at Verse 46
and the second, at Verse 62. The reader is invited to verify
Wellhausen’s observation using any available Quran.
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“Allah's Apostle said, ‘In Paradise….there are two
gardens, the utensils and contents of which are made of
silver; and two other gardens, the utensils and contents
of which are made of gold.’ ”
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particularly in the second century after the death of
Muhammad. According to Aleem [18]:
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5.3.3. The ‘Sura Like It’ Challenge:
There are four verses in the Quran which present a challenge to
unbelievers. They are:
Produce an alternative Quran:
(Q52:33-34) “Or do they say, ‘He has invented it?’
Nay, but they do not believe. Then let them bring a
discourse like it, if they speak truly.”
No? Then produce ten Suras:
(Q11:13-14) “Or do they say, ‘He has forged it’? Say:
‘Then bring you ten suras the like of it, forged; and call
upon whom you are able, apart from God, if you speak
truly.’ “
No? Then produce just one sura:
(Q2:23) “And if you are in doubt concerning that We
have sent down on Our servant, then bring a sura like it,
and call your witnesses, apart from God, if you are
truthful.”
with a similar challenge in (Q10:38).
The challenge seems to provide an unusually objective means
for deciding a religious dispute, though the Quran gives no
indication that anyone responded to the challenge during
Muhammad’s lifetime. Nevertheless, the challenge is still
open! As an encouragement, it is worth noting that some of the
early suras (near the back of the Quran) are less than 5 lines
long. Sura 108 (in the English version) contains just 23 words.
It seems implausible to claim that to write a sura like 108 is
impossible, so what is the catch?
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challenge must be met in Arabic also. Even on the most
generous estimate, the number of Arabic-speaking non-
Muslims amounts to less than 0.5% of the world’s population,
leaving the vast majority of potential challengers unable to
participate even if they wanted to. Then, for the aspiring
participants, the requirement that the imitation verse should be
‘like’ the real one is a Catch-22. The Quran and the Hadiths
give no clue as to the criteria, leaving the decision entirely to
whoever judges the challenge. If the verses are too alike, then
copying can be claimed. If they differ to a degree such that this
accusation cannot be made, then the imitation can be rejected
on the grounds that the resemblance is insufficient.
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The idea that the Quran is miraculously inimitable was not
developed by observation, but merely inferred from statements
to that effect uttered by Muhammad, either as part of the Quran
or in reference to it. Muhammad’s fellow Meccans, when in
receipt of the early verses of the Quran, were unimpressed to
such an extent that Muhammad achieved only around 100
converts in the first 13 years of his mission (see Chapter 3).
This suggests that any miraculous properties of the text were so
inconspicuous as to be overlooked completely by its target
audience. If, as Aleem states in [18], the Islamic doctrine of
inimitability took more than a century to establish, this must
surely be some kind of clue to its credibility.
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successive challenges in the Quran when the last, alone, is
sufficient? If the author was God, why should He, knowing that
humans could not produce even a single sura like the ones in
the Quran, waste time with the earlier challenges to produce
ten or more? At the very heart of the Muslim ‘proof’ of the
divine origin of the Quran lies a subtle but unmistakeable clue
to human authorship.
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Chapter 6
The Claim of the Quran’s
Prophecies
6.1. Introduction
Explicit prophecies are few and far between in the Quran.
According to Pfander [39], Islamic scholars have claimed only
a limited number of examples, these being contained in
(Q2:21,22), (Q2:88,89), (Q3:10), (Q3:107,108), (Q3:144),
(Q5:71), (Q8:7), (Q9:14), (Q15:9), (Q15:95), (Q24:54),
(Q28:85), (Q30:2-4), (Q41:42), (Q48:16), (Q48:18-21),
(Q48:27), (Q48:28), (Q54:44,45), (Q61:13) and (Q110:1,2). In
truth, few of these have even the appearance of prophecies and
most can be dismissed as requiring far too much creative
interpretation on the part of the reader. Others seem no more
than upbeat assessments of the prospects of the Muslims in
forthcoming battles and can be viewed more as pep talks than
prophecies. One, however, looks like the real deal. It concerns
the ‘Romans’ (sometimes translated as ‘Greeks’) and refers to
the Christian Byzantine Empire, whose capital was
Constantinople. Verses (Q30:2-4) read:
“The Romans have been vanquished in the nearer part
of the land; and, after their vanquishing, they shall be
the victors in a few* years. To God belongs the
Command before and after, and on that day the
believers shall rejoice”
(* The original Arabic term seemingly means ‘three to nine’
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years).
Is (Q30:2-4) a real prophecy or something a little more
mundane? This is discussed below.
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If the verse first appeared just after the Byzantines were
defeated in the Middle East (i.e. from around 615, up to about
619), then it is a genuine example of prediction (though not
necessarily either supernatural or even remarkable).
Unfortunately, a prophecy issued this early cannot refer to the
final victory of the Byzantines (in 630) since this did not fall
within the stated period of three to nine years hence. If the
verse appeared after 622 (after the Byzantine counterattack had
started), but before 627, ‘victory’ may indeed mean final
victory. The predicted time period is then correct but, if the
verse was issued towards the end of this period, it could
represent nothing more than an optimistic assessment of the
news from the front line, with the tide having already turned
against the Persians. If it appeared between 627 and 630, the
prediction is in error because the victory takes place in less
than three years and if the verse appeared after 630, then the
prediction is a fake.
The best Islamic information allowing a dating of the verse is
the hadith that the prophecy formed the basis of a bet between
Abu Bakr, one of Muhammad’s Companions, and one of his
fellow Meccans. Abu Bakr was reported to have waited for
seven years, before eventually collecting his winnings, the
latter event suggesting that the whole episode took place before
the Muslims’ migration to Medina in 622 and dating the
appearance of the verse to 615. This is the date favoured by
Syed Abu-Ala Maududi [9]. However, if the authenticity or
accuracy of the hadith is brought into question, then there
appears to be nothing in either the context or the tense of the
first sentence of (Q30:2-4) to say that the defeat had only just
occurred. According to [41], Harun Yahya (a prolific author of
naive Islamic apologetics) states that the verse appeared
“around 620”: a significant difference. The reason for selecting
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the later date is not given, but it could be simply that by
pushing the date back as late as possible within the Meccan
period, Yahya is able to claim that the final victory was the
subject of the prediction.
Of the two Muslim authors, Maududi is the scholar, Yahya
more the populariser, so the view of the former represents the
opinion which is more in line with the Islamic mainstream. It
must then be emphasised that the claim is therefore
emphatically not that the Byzantines were ultimately
triumphant over the Persians (in 630); the verse supports no
such interpretation because of the time limit. The prediction, as
claimed, is fulfilled by the occurrence of only one single battle
success by the Byzantines within nine years of their defeat in
Jordan: hardly a marvellous piece of precognition. However,
the aura of miraculous prophecy surrounding (Q30:2-4) relies
heavily on the eventual complete Byzantine victory in 630: an
event which was outside the scope of the verse. In fact, had the
Persians rallied, regained the upper hand and conquered the
Byzantines, the prophecy would still technically have been
fulfilled. However, under those circumstances, it is doubtful if
so much present-day weight would have been given to it.
The appearance of a vague prophecy with a flexible time
frame, and the subsequent identification of an event which
satisfies it, should be familiar to Westerners as characteristic of
the process which sustains the fame of Nostradamus, the 16th
century author of many cryptic quatrains. It may then not be a
complete surprise to learn that Muslims have managed to
retrofit a second successful prediction into the verse. In 624, a
small army of Muslims overcame a larger force of Pagan Arabs
at the Battle of Badr. Since this was a cause of celebration
among the believers it was taken as being consistent with, and
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hence predicted by, the last part of the verse.
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previous prophecy having thereby presented itself, no such
statement was made.
That was the curious incident: the prediction was granted no
significance at the time. Seemingly, for whatever reason,
(Q30:2-4) was not considered to be a prophecy of any
consequence. As with the concept of inimitability (Chapter 5),
the idea that it was miraculous is therefore surely a later
invention.
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that the meaning of (Q30:2-4) was massaged prior to the
production of an authorised Quran some 20 years later (see
Chapter 2), the possibility certainly cannot be ruled out on the
grounds put forward by Azmy.
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instead to give an ambiguous statement of the first and a vague
estimate of the second.
However, there exists at least one prediction which got things
completely wrong, as described below.
The first question to be answered is: who exactly was the two-
horned one? He was, according to the evidence, Alexander the
Great, based on (a) Alexander was sometimes represented (on
old coins, for example) as having two horns and (b) the story of
the building of the rampart appears in a fictionalised, earlier
story of his exploits. That Zul-Qarnain was Alexander was
accepted by Muslims for centuries, and it was only when the
credibility of the story became more and more dubious that
recent, rather forlorn attempts have been made to reinterpret it
in terms of someone else.
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day We shall leave them surging on one another, and
the Trumpet shall he blown, and We shall gather them
together, and upon that day We shall present Gehenna
[i.e. Hell] to the unbelievers “
This is an unambiguous prophecy that, one day, God will level
the barrier, let the hordes loose and “..present [Hell] to the
unbelievers” and, if anyone doubts that this is the correct
interpretation, they are invited to consult Ibn Kathir’s detailed
analysis [8]. Therefore, either the barrier is still there, with the
hordes of Gog and Magog still waiting patiently behind it, or
the barrier has already been levelled and Hell presented to
unbelievers, an event which seemingly escaped everyone’s
notice despite (according to [8]) the predicted simultaneous
appearance of nearly five billion angels.
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6.7. Final remarks
Even if all Muslim sources are assumed to be historically
accurate, the Quran’s flagship prophecy concerning the
Byzantine victory over the Persians remains a weak affair and
more remarkable for its vagueness, omissions and lack of
contemporary impact than its predictive success. By contrast,
the prediction of the levelling of the great barrier constructed
by Zul-Qarnain is quite unambiguous and completely wrong.
There is one further point to make. If Islamic claims are true,
there is no reason at all why the prophetic accuracy of the
Quran should not have continued after Muhammad’s death.
Yet, as we know, there are no prophecies which successfully
predicted events after Muhammad’s lifetime, for reasons which
should, by now, be obvious.
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Chapter 7
Aspects of Islamic Law
7.1. Introduction
If imposed rigorously, Islamic (Sharia) law regulates a
Muslim’s life completely and suggests that God has an almost
obsessive preoccupation with commonplace features of human
behaviour. For the purposes of this book, we shall concentrate
only on selected areas which show evidence of incompetence
and therefore of human origin. These consist of the Islamic
laws which govern adultery, the keeping of slaves and the
distribution of the estate of a person who dies intestate.
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the future motions of the planets) but would not
have determined it.
b) God created the universe and the natural laws in
such a way that it developed exactly as he wished,
without His further intervention.
c) God decided that His intentions would be better
served by proceeding as in a), and making judicious
interventions at appropriate moments.
d) God created the universe and then manipulated each
and every event in real time, as a chess player
actively decides upon and instigates each move on
the board.
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guides whomsoever He will; and He is the All-mighty,
the All-wise.”
(Q2:6,7) “As for the unbelievers, alike it is to them
whether you have warned them or have not warned
them, they do not believe. God has set a seal on their
hearts and on their hearing, and on their eyes is a
covering”
(Q16:93) “If God had willed, He would have made you
one nation; but He leads astray whom He will, and
guides whom He will”
(Q9:51) “Say: ‘Naught shall visit us but what God has
prescribed for us; He is our Protector; in God let the
believers put all their trust.’”
(Q57:22) “No affliction befalls in the earth or in
yourselves, but it is in a Book, before We create it; that
is easy for God”
(Q76:29-31) “Surely this is a Reminder; so he who will,
takes unto his Lord a way. But you will not unless God
wills; surely God is ever All-knowing, All-wise.
For He admits into His mercy whomsoever He will”
The passages from the Quran swing our choice strongly
towards option d): God controls completely everything that
occurs in the physical world, and this is the general position
taken by orthodox Islam. However, because of the fatal
implications for free will implicit in this stance (see below), the
subject remains a source of continuing confusion. Broadly
speaking, and using the terminology used by Sell [11], those
who take the uncompromising view that God determines
everything are referred to as Jabarians (from the Arabic jabr,
meaning compulsion). Orthodox Muslims (Sunnis) are
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Jabarians. Those who take precisely the opposite view: that
humans have free will, are known as Qadarians. The Qadarians
were an offshoot of the Mutazilites, a sect which introduced
rationalism and critical thought into Islam in the 8th century,
before declining towards the end of the 10th. Naturally, there
were, and remain, others who try to sit on the fence.
Nevertheless, that d) is indeed the Islamic view is confirmed by
the statement that “to believe that things…have any causal
influence independent of the will of Allah” constitutes apostasy
(i.e. leaving Islam) ([10], o8.7(17)).
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Verse 76:31 ends with “…as for the evildoers, He has prepared
for them a painful chastisement..”. And so we arrive at the
Catch-22 of Islam: God determines all we do, but holds us
responsible for our actions, for the Quran includes verses
which seem to indicate that humans have free will, after all:
(Q41:16) “As for Thamood [a tribe], We guided them,
but they preferred blindness above guidance”
(Q18:29) “Say: ‘The truth is from your Lord; so let
whosoever will believe, and let whosoever will
disbelieve.’ “
(Q4:79) “Whatever good visits you, it is of God;
whatever evil visits you is of thyself.”
The difficulty is confirmed by the following, originally written
by the Muslim theologian Muhammad al-Barkavi and quoted
in [11]:
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the result. Furthermore, God does not just react with
disapproval or dissatisfaction, as implied by al-Barkavi above,
He actually gets angry with those who do not follow His
guidance: the very first Sura of the Quran says so in the form
of a prayer:
(Q1:7) “Guide us in the straight path, the path of those
whom You have blessed, not of those against whom
You are wrathful, nor of those who are astray.”
and the ‘Abu Lahab’ sura (Chapter 3) confirms it. Islam
therefore maintains the position that God is angered by events
which He himself has caused. Al-Barkavi clearly sees the
difficulty in this, ending his previous observation with the lame
remark that:
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7.2.2. Fate
Many of the events in the physical world take place as a result
of (or, if predetermined, ‘consistent with’) the human decisions
which preceded them. It is therefore possible that one’s fate is
inevitable but only if the decisions (one’s own, and those of
others) which lead up to it were also inevitable, since the fate
of any person will be seen, in retrospect, to be the culmination
of a whole array of consistent circumstances converging upon
the final moment. It therefore makes no sense to hold that the
events were preordained but that the decisions which brought
them about were not. Nevertheless, in a reference to the Battle
of Uhud, which went badly for the Muslims, we hear
(Q3:145): “It is not given to any soul to die, save by the
leave of God, at an appointed time.”
and
(Q3:154): ”…Even if you had been in your houses,
those for whom slaying was appointed would have
sallied forth unto their last couches..”
The Quran therefore states quite unambiguously that, whereas
one’s fate is inevitable, it is actually independent of the
decisions made prior to it. This is the basis of the well-known
Muslim tendency towards fatalism.
It takes only a little imagination to conjure up any number of
ludicrous consequences of such a position. As an example,
consider the case of a man deciding whether or not to shoot
himself. Let us assume first that his preordained fate is to die.
Islam’s position implies that, had he decided not to pull the
trigger (which he was free to do), he would nevertheless have
died a second later from some other cause. On the other hand,
let us assume that his death is fated to occur at some other time
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and in some other place. If he decides to shoot, Islam must
surely maintain that he will survive the bullet which blows his
brains out, and presumably remained unscathed.
Of course, it could be argued that, under the precise
circumstances which existed as he was considering his
decision, the outcome – whether shoot or not – was inevitable
and would therefore have been consistent with his fate.
However, (Q3:154) clearly says otherwise: the decision was
not inevitable; the Muslim fighters at the Battle of Uhud could
have decided to remain at home, but would have died anyway.
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reinforcing it? Why? Furthermore, was any reinforcement
necessary? The unbelievers would have been unlikely to
change their views without further evidence, and none was
being provided. Finally, the Muslim position is contradicted by
history; the unbelieving Meccans, who had resisted Islam for
two decades, all suddenly converted. Had the seal suddenly
been removed? There is no scriptural evidence that this was the
case. Or was it because the city had just surrendered to
Muhammad and his large army?
The above set of statements on fate and free will from the
Quran could be viewed a collection of profound truths.
However, it is proposed here that they are truly as confused as
they appear. The Quranic verses were uttered at various times
by Muhammad, who either did not appreciate the muddle he
was getting himself into or realised it, but could abandon
neither the concept of an all-controlling deity, nor of one angry
at our disobedience. Just as in the instances of abrogation and
of his additional romantic privileges, he relied on his followers’
loyalty, credulity and considerable persuasive powers to keep
the lid on any dissent.
7.3. Adultery
Although God appears to take a dim view of adultery, in that
He requires that adulterers should be stoned to death, He seems
to make it all but impossible to prove that the crime has taken
place. Islamic law requires that four upright male witnesses
actually watch the act in all its essential biological detail,
where the term ‘upright’ refers not to the men’s unrestrained
state at the time, but to their prior piety. Non-Muslims do not
qualify as witnesses because “..unbelief is the vilest form of
corruption..” and Muslims who are “..without respectability,
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such as a street-sweeper, bathhouse attendant and the like..” are
also excluded ([10], Section o24) although, presumably, they
would still be allowed to watch.
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passage from the Quran relating to this incident, quoted in
Section 3.4.2, is a statement which rather overplays its hand. It
is (Q24:13), and reads:
“Why did they not bring four witnesses against it? But
since they did not bring the witnesses, in God’s sight
they are the liars.”
It is clear that the four witnesses rule, even as amended (see
above), is unsatisfactory because it will clearly exclude from
consideration many actual adulterous acts and, consequently,
many entirely truthful testimonies from eyewitnesses. It
therefore cannot be correct to say, as (Q24:13) does, that those
who do not produce four witnesses are necessarily ‘liars’ (all
the translations use this word), since they may be telling the
truth. Nor does it help to add to the term ‘liars’ the phrase ‘..in
God’s sight..’. The fact is that if someone is knowingly telling
the truth, they are not lying and that is all there is to it. At the
very worst, they might be considered to be technically guilty of
slander, but this arises from their having failed to comply with
the letter of an over-prescriptive law. Muhammad’s own
reaction to the rumours (see Section 3.4.2) suggests that he
agreed with the above analysis.
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Evidence from female and non-Muslim witnesses is
considered worthless. A woman who can't produce
those witnesses can be prosecuted for fornication and
alleging a false crime, the penalties for which are
stoning, lashings or prison.”.
This state of affairs is a direct result of the Quran verses quoted
above. Yet, in Chapter 1, we see that an argument for the
divine origin of the Quran is that “Its legislation cannot be
surpassed”.
7.4. Slavery
The Quran condones slavery while condemning the eating of
pork and the charging of interest on loans. It would be difficult
to find anyone outside the Muslim world who agreed that the
Quran had its priorities right. However, it is evident that even
Muslims are somewhat uncomfortable with Islam’s toleration
of slavery, despite its impeccable theological credentials.
Slavery is represented as something Islam was forced to inherit
from its Pagan predecessors. It was
“…a system of ownership that Islam did not invent but
found fully established and not possible to instantly
abolish, so it rather encouraged its elimination in steps,
with incentives” ([10], Sec. k32.0)
Reference [10] (Sec. w13.0) also quotes Islamophile writer
Titus Burkhardt, who tells us that “Slavery within Islamic
culture is not to be confused with Roman slavery or with the
American variety of the nineteenth century”. The Islamists’
favourite, Sayid Qutb, in his book ‘Milestones’ [45], was
positively enthusiastic about it:
“When Islam entered the central part of Africa, it
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clothed naked human beings, socialized them, brought
them out of the deep recesses of isolation, and taught
them the joy of work for exploring material resources.”
The mysterious activity which brought the African slaves so
much joy: “exploring material resources” apparently denotes
the pastime that we would normally refer to as ‘mining’. It is
not known what researches helped Burkhardt and Qutb form
their favourable opinions, but it is doubtful if they involved
seeking the views of the slaves themselves.
For a Muslim to assert that God has certain objectives is to
enter a trap of his own making. The more earthly objectives
which are claimed for Islam, the more the inability of Islam to
achieve those objectives becomes apparent. If God’s plan was
to phase out slavery by means of Islamic laws, it becomes a
problem for Muslims to explain why the plan was such an
abject failure and why it took the non-Muslim world to do it
effectively. The Quran’s pronouncements on the various
specifics of slavery, without condemning the practice in
general, amount to a tacit approval. The result of this is that
Islamic theology has justified and sustained Arab slavery for
nearly 1400 years, as compared with the relatively brief,
though industrial-scale slave trade between Europe and the
New World. One can hardly imagine the sheer scale of the
human suffering which took place as a result. Furthermore, it is
worth bearing in mind that this approval, preserved in the
Quran, remains as valid for Muslims today as it did for the
seventh century Arabs.
Furthermore, the Islamic claim that the Quran has the slaves’
(long term) interests at heart is based on dubious evidence.
Current Islamic apologists also insist that Islam’s notorious
rules relating to women are, in fact, based on a deep-rooted
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respect for women’s wellbeing and chastity. However, it
remains Islamic law that Muslim men are allowed to have sex
with – the usual word in the West is ‘rape’ – their slave girls
(who are referred to in the Quran as ‘what your right hands
own’). The permission for this is contained in (e.g.) (Q4:3):
“…marry such women as seem good to you, two, three,
four; but if you fear you will not be equitable, then only
one, or what your right hands own; so it is likelier you
will not be partial.”
Verse (Q4:3) suggests marriage as a cover, though this can be
easily ended (by the man) in Islamic law. The following verses
contain no such implication:
(Q23:1,5-7) “Prosperous are the believers who…guard
their private parts save from their wives and what their
right hands own then being not blameworthy “
and again, almost identically
(Q70:29-31) “and guard their private parts save from
their wives and what their right hands own, then not
being blameworthy”
Nor does it matter if female slaves are already married:
(Q4:24) “(Forbidden to you are) wedded women, save
what your right hands own.”
which leaves Islamic claims concerning the humane treatment
of slaves and the respect for women looking somewhat hollow.
However, the question of whether Islam is good or bad is not
the issue. The issue is whether God created the rules in the
Quran. If He did, and if His intention regarding slavery was
truly to “encourage its elimination in steps”, one can only
wonder at the wisdom of issuing eternal rules which
112
perpetuated it.
113
It should be mentioned that the Quran’s rules have
subsequently been refashioned into a workable (though not
necessarily equitable) system for the distribution of a
deceased’s estate. None of this subsequent rationalisation is of
any relevance; only the coherence of the Quran’s rules is of
interest, so later texts will be ignored and only the three Verses;
11, 12 and 176 of Sura 4 will be discussed. Muslims would be
unlikely to argue with the proposition that God should be able
to specify rules competently without the need for a helping
hand from humans.
114
case where there are two daughters.”, therefore implicitly
conceding that the original is deficient. To add further
confusion, Ibn Kathir, who follows the latter opinion,
comments “We should mention here that some people said the
verse only means two daughters, and that ‘more’ is redundant,
which is not true”, where the “some people” were undoubtedly
informed Muslims. Already, the confusion is such that the
same phrase has been taken by various scholars to mean (in
standard mathematical notation), >2, ≥2 or =2. The conclusion
is clear: the error is in the original text.
115
made carefully. They seem to group into Yusufali, Al-Hilali &
Khan and Maududi on one side and everyone else on the other,
with Sarwar at times going off on his own. It is evident that
Yusufali and Al-Hilali & Khan, on a number of occasions, add
words or phrases to assist with the generality and
comprehensibility and it is for this reason that there is an
obvious suspicion that they are giving ‘God’ a helping hand, as
Bucaille did in Chapter 4. Furthermore, it is conceivable that
Arberry et al did not worry about the implications of the rules,
but merely translated what was there. Therefore, on the basis of
this argument, it is assumed that the translation of the latter
group (which includes Arberry) is the more accurate one.
Verse 12, which has been separated here into two parts,
specifies:
“And for you a half of what your wives leave, if they
have no children; but if they have children, then for you
of what they leave a fourth, after any bequest they may
bequeath, or any debt. And for them a fourth of what
you leave, if you have no children; but if you have
children, then for them of what you leave an eighth,
after any bequest you may bequeath, or any debt.
If a man or a woman have no heir direct, but have a
brother or a sister, to each of the two a sixth; but if they
are more numerous than that, they share equally a third,
after any bequest he may bequeath, or any debt not
prejudicial.”.
Though not exactly transparent, the verse is rendered similarly
by the various translators. As an aside, it is instructive to
consider the extraordinary difficulties which even the early
Muslims faced with the Arabic version of the second part of
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the verse. According to Ibn Kathir, the opening phrase reads “If
a man or a woman was left in Kalalah” where “Kalalah is a
derivative of Iklil; the crown that surrounds the head” [8]. This
phrase is essentially meaningless as it stands and a suitable
interpretation, that of “a man who has neither ascendants nor
descendants” or, as Arberry expresses it, a man or a woman
having “no heir direct” was only arrived at by (essentially)
informed guesswork. However, even this leaves it unclear as to
the status of a spouse.
Now, compare the second part of Verse 12 with Verse 176,
reputedly the last part of the Quran ever to be revealed:
“…concerning the indirect heirs. If a man perishes
having no children, but he has a sister, she shall receive
a half of what he leaves, and he is her heir if she has no
children. If there be two sisters, they shall receive two-
thirds of what he leaves; if there be brothers and sisters,
the male shall receive the portion of two females.”
Now, compare the beginning of Verse 176 with the beginning
of the second part of Verse 12. They appear to cover the same
example of a man with no parents, children or spouse but with
surviving brother(s) and/or sister(s). However, the rules in the
two cases are quite different. A way out of this discrepancy,
though it has no support in the Quran, is to assume that Verse
12 refers to the siblings having only the same mother as the
deceased, i.e. half siblings. Verse 176 is then taken to refer to
full siblings or to half siblings having only the same father as
the deceased.
Yet further problems arise when one tries to work out the
numbers. In many instances, the fractions do not add to 1,
meaning that there is money left over (whose fate the Quran
117
does not specify) or, worse, that there is a shortfall. For
example: a woman with two living parents dies, leaving a
husband and two daughters According to first part of Verse 12,
the husband gets 1/4 of his late wife’s estate (“but if they have
children, then for you, of what they leave, a fourth”). The
daughters, according to Verse 11 (and assuming that the verse
applies to both sexes) get 1/3 each (“..then for them two-thirds
of what (he) leaves”) and, by Verse 11 again, the parents get
1/6 each (“..and to (his) parents to each one of the two the sixth
of what (he) leaves, if he has children”), making a total of (1/4
+ 1/3 + 1/3 + 1/6 + 1/6) = 1¼, or 25% more than the amount
available. Of course, various ways out of these problems have
been formulated, but only by adding further rules not in the
Quran. The Quranic rules alone are, as the above discussion
shows, badly flawed.
118
tribute to the human ability of self deception. The chaotic
prescription in the Quran is so obvious a mark of human
authorship, and careless human authorship at that, that one is
forced to profess astonishment that this remains unrecognised
by the entire Muslim world.
119
Chapter 8
Islam’s Cousins
8.1. Introduction
Muslims, ‘the best nation ever brought forth to men’, are
probably largely unaware of the similarities between the origin
of Islam and the origins of other religions, and between
themselves and other religious adherents. In fact, Islam, far
from being unique, is merely one example of an occurrence
which has been repeating itself time and time again, on
different scales, throughout history.
120
of the falsity of their beliefs.
121
First Ray’). Prophet founded a movement called The Summit
Lighthouse [47] and published a series of communications
containing ‘profound teaching’ from the Ascended Masters,
under the title of ‘Pearls of Wisdom’, which today runs to 75
books. After Prophet’s death in 1971 (after which he became
the Ascended Master Lanello), his mission was carried on by
his wife Elizabeth who, in 1974, renamed the movement the
Church Universal and Triumphant and was able to consolidate
her position by means of a number of supportive
communications from the Masters. The CUT descended into
paranoia, militarism and anti-social behaviour in the early
1990s
122
Make Manifest”. Sure enough, in 1853, three years after the
Bab’s execution by the Persian government (under pressure
from the Islamic clergy), one of his devout followers, Mirza
Huseyn-Ali, experienced a vision while imprisoned in a
dungeon in Tehran. He recalled:
In 1820, Joseph Smith of New York went into the woods near
his home in order to pray. He says that then:
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two personages, whose brightness and glory defy all
description, standing above me in the air. One of them
spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing
to the other—This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him! My
object in going to inquire of the Lord was to know
which of all the sects was right, that I might know
which to join….I was answered that I must join none of
them, for they were all wrong….When the light had
departed, I had no strength; but soon recovering in
some degree, I went home.” [51].
However, it was not until another three years had elapsed that
the following took place:
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themselves off for a period of isolation in order to pray. Both
founders saw themselves as restoring ‘original’ forms of
religion. Both founders dictated ‘holy books’; both claimed
that unique physical objects of divine origin and global
importance (for Smith, the gold plates; for Muhammad, the
Kaaba) just happened to be located in or near the towns where
they grew up.
125
In the early 1850s, Hong’s followers began an armed uprising
against the ruling dynasty and he declared himself as the
absolute ruler of the Heavenly Kingdom of Peace. By 1853
Hong, commanding the Taiping Heavenly army, a force of
nearly one million, took the city of Nanjing. Within the
Heavenly Kingdom, many Daoist and Buddhist temples were
burnt to the ground. Idolatry and the use of opium and alcohol
were strictly forbidden. Polygamy was banned, though Hong
himself reputedly had 88 concubines.
126
In all cases, the splits occurred as a result of individuals who
perceived that they had received messages directly from higher
beings which, of course, is also the way Judaism itself
originated. There is one very good and simple reason for this
obvious similarity, and it will be discussed in Chapter 9.
There are two main lessons to be taken from the above. First,
there is no dividing line between those we would call
‘crackpots’ and those we would call ‘prophets’, other than that
the former tend to see beings that they appear to have made up
themselves, whereas the latter see beings who were already in
the public domain. Second, there is no theological dividing line
between a ‘religion’ and a ‘cult’. We simply tend to call these
groups ‘cults’ when they are young small, poor and weak, but
‘religions’ or ‘faiths’ when they are old, populous, rich and
powerful. If there is a meaningful distinction between the two
terms, it usually concerns the amount of control that their
founders (or their successors) exercise over the rank and file.
We shall return to this issue shortly.
What is evident from the above examples and the many other
low-profile movements that pop into existence, then fade away
or die with their founders, is that new religions are surprisingly
easy to create [54]. Once started, whether the new religions
number their followers in the thousands, millions or hundreds
of millions are based on factors other than the plausibility of
their beliefs; factors which include luck, lack of effective
opposition (intellectual or physical), the zeal with which they
are promoted and the disincentives presented to those who
show signs of wavering.
127
consider. The first was very small and ceased to exist some
while ago. Nevertheless, it is important because it gave rise to a
whole new branch of psychology dealing with the stubborn
persistence of treasured beliefs.
128
Seekers (in which Martin was represented as ‘Marion Keech’)
and the research that followed became the basis of the theory
of cognitive dissonance, which analysed the ways in which
people adjusted their beliefs and attitudes in order to minimise
the ‘dissonance’, or uncomfortable conflict, between them [55],
[56]. The adjustment (‘dissonance management’) is commonly
carried out purely for comfort: not a means of getting closer to
reality, but a means of insulating oneself from it.
To the Seekers, the pain of abandoning the belief into which
they had poured so much emotional and material commitment
would have been unbearable, so they created an alternative
explanation for the failure of the prophecy, one which
reinforced and elaborated upon the perception that they had
been right all the time.
129
order to identify the possible sources of error. A follower of
Miller determined a revised date, April 18 1844, but this came
and went, as did July 10. Finally, 22 October 1844 was taken
as the last-chance prediction. It failed, and its failure became
known as the Great Disappointment.
As with the Seekers, some Millerites were sufficiently
disappointed that they left the movement. However, again as
with the Seekers, many renewed their efforts and tried to
reinterpret the prophecy, with a number of sub-religions
forming from their efforts. Judged from the perspective of the
present day, the most successful of these was based on the view
propounded by one of Miller’s followers (which also occurred
as the result of a ‘vision’) that the October 22 date was correct,
but the nature of the event was misinterpreted and that the
Biblical prophecy actually referred to the entry of Jesus into a
particularly holy region of Heaven. The movement became the
Seventh Day Adventist Church, which today has around 10
million members.
As an aside: seemingly, the Bahais (Section 8.2) have a stake
in the above, for they regard Miller’s prediction as essentially
correct, but referring to the emergence of Siyyid Alí-
Muhammad (The Bab) in May 1844.
In 1994, the Jewish Chabad (or ‘Lubavitch’) [58] sect were
shocked when their leader, Menachem Schneerson, died.
Whereas many might be saddened, few would be as taken
aback at the passing of a frail old man of 92 as his followers
were, for they believed that Schneerson was the Messiah. Yet
he was dead; what had happened?
The followers could simply have recognised that they had been
wrong, and they could have done this without in any way
abandoning messianic Judaism. However, their belief in their
130
former leader and their anticipation of his imminent promotion
were so strong that they had to find a way that their belief
could be preserved, even in the face of conclusive evidence that
it had been incorrect. A number of competing explanations
emerged and were promoted with renewed vigour. Schneerson
was still alive, but ‘concealed’ (as with the Shia Mahdi or,
indeed, Elvis) and would be revealed at the appropriate time.
Alternatively, he truly died, but was to be physically
resurrected: an option which resulted in some of its more
enthusiastic proponents sleeping near his grave. The
movement’s present website [59] suggests a thriving
community and now displays no sign of this past trauma,
though doubtless there are many who still hope to see
Menachem Schneerson again. However, to date, he remains
dead.
131
As Chapter 3 discusses, the first to perform this type of process
was Muhammad himself, who had over 20 years to provide
himself, his followers and his successors with a range of
theological ammunition with which to dismiss criticism and
doubt. He was able to get the Quran to deny its own
shortcomings and to grant to itself a range of virtues which it
clearly does not possess, such as that of ‘clarity’. He included
the ‘no inconsistency’ verse as both a statement of the Quran’s
perfection and a bogus rule for confirming it, and threw in the
‘abrogation’ concept so that he could change the rules anyway.
For good measure, he also provided a variety of ad hoc
‘explanations’ for obvious errors (Sections 2.2.2, 3.3.3).
Muhammad further established the principle that unbelievers
recognised the truth of Islam but had a ‘seal’ set on their hearts,
that those who enquired too deeply into the inconsistencies in
the Quran were just troublemakers and that others, particularly
Christians and Jews, were driven by a range of ulterior
motives, including jealousy, to plot against Muslims. These
opinions which, if exhibited in an individual, would be thought
a sign of mental illness, are a part of mainstream Islamic
theology.
Nevertheless, Muhammad did not do all the hard work. His
successors established (though following Muhammad’s hints)
the dogma that the Quran in inimitable and that non-Arabic
speakers must inevitably fail to appreciate the Quran’s
miraculous qualities. The position that critics inevitably quote
poor translations and, as non-Muslims, simply cannot
understand Islam seems to be a more modern invention, though
it would certainly not be a surprise if it had its origin in one of
Muhammad’s sayings.
132
Later Muslim commentators continued the process whereby
obvious defects in the Quran are simply redefined as
miraculous virtues. The identification of the ‘ambiguous’ (i.e.
incomprehensible) verses as ‘a mark of aesthetic excellence’
was described in Chapter 5. Also discussed there was the
occurrence in the Quran of small groups of letters, whose
significance is unknown. Al-Hilali and Khan [5] describe them
thus:
“...one of the miracles of the Quran and none but Allah
(Alone) knows their meanings”
In [60], the point is made that, in the Quran, ‘God’ refers to
himself variously as ‘I’, ‘We’, ‘He’ and ‘God’ (i.e. Allah):
seemingly a clear case of inconsistency. Khalid Zaheer, an
associate professor of Islamic Studies at the Lahore University
of Management Science, explains things thus:
“It is a masterpiece of Arabic literature…The use of
pronouns in the Quran…should be viewed from that
perspective….To someone who knows the subtle
delicacies presentations (sic) that are expressed in the
highest level of literary taste, usage of the same
pronoun can raise that work from the level of ordinary
prose to a much higher level of literary taste”
and he adds:
“The Quranic style of presentation should not be
critically examined from the point of view of ordinary
logic”
And this line of argument is ubiquitous, since no faults in the
Quran can ever be acknowledged within Islam. On the topic of
the Quran’s relaxed approach to organising its subject matter,
the Quran-Islam website tells us [61]:
133
“Quranic verses deliver a truth independent within
themselves. Various adjacent verses contain
independent truths that are placed side by side. Having
said that, it is still necessary for any person studying a
specific subject in the Quran to study all the verses in
the book that speak of the common theme. These are
often found in a number of suras and not one single
sura. Many readers have often arrived at false
interpretations of Quranic verses simply because they
studied one verse in isolation”
134
our normal criteria of acceptability for the coherence of written
works and to weave our own explanations as to what was
‘really’ meant.
By such means, if they are diligently applied, willing Muslims
can successfully avoid ever having to entertain the slightest
doubt about their beliefs. Nevertheless, a leader would be
remiss if he was to assume the unswerving loyalty of all his
subjects. Further incentives are sometimes required. These are
reviewed below.
135
No. Criterion Relevance to Islam
1 The group is focused Though Muslims claim to worship only God,
on a leader to whom their reverence for Muhammad is worship in
members seem to all but name. (B1.2.14): Narrated Anas: The
display excessively Prophet said “None of you will have faith till
zealous, he loves me more than his father, his children
unquestioning and all mankind.”.
commitment.
3 The group is The zakat tax for Muslims and the jizya tax
preoccupied with for non-Muslim subjects are specified in the
making money. Quran. The most blatant example is Sura 8 of
the Quran, which deals with the division of
the spoils of war. According to Maududi [9]:
“Spoils of war … essentially belong to God
and His Messenger. They alone have the
right to dispose of them. As for the soldiers
who fight, they are not the rightful owners of
the spoils; whatever they do receive should
be considered an extra reward from God
rather than their legitimate right.”
136
5 Mind-numbing The most popular examples relating to
techniques are used modern cults seem to be “meditation,
to suppress doubts chanting, debilitating work routines” and so
about the group and forth. In Islam, the 5-times-a-day prayer and
its leader(s). the obsessive-compulsive ablution ritual (see
below) certainly qualify.
8 The group has a See Nos. 2, 7 and 13 of this table. Also, any
polarized us-versus- number of news reports from around the
them mentality, world.
which causes
conflict with the
wider society.
137
10 The group teaches or Ethical decisions are to be made entirely on
implies that its Islamic principles: “ ‘good’ is what the
supposedly exalted Lawgiver [i.e. God or Muhammad] has
ends justify means indicated is good by permitting it or asking it
that members would to be done. ‘Bad’ is what the Lawgiver has
have considered indicated is bad by asking it not to be done.
unethical before Good is not what reason considers good, nor
joining the group. bad, what reason considers bad” [10].
138
Out of 13 criteria, we have 13 direct hits and, in a number of
instances (particularly Nos. 2 and 4), the degree of coercion is
undoubtedly greater than in the type of present-day cult that
Langone had in mind when he compiled the checklist. This,
then, is one of the two main reasons for Islam’s success. The
other is reviewed in the next section.
8.4.2. Jihad
The renowned Muslim historian Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406)
declared that ([64], Chapter 3, Section 31):
139
In the decades following Muhammad's death, the Muslim
Arabs spread out from the Arabian peninsula and conquered
the regions we know today as Pakistan, Afghanistan,
Uzbekistan, Tadjikistan, Iran, Iraq, Azerbaijan, parts of
Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Egypt, Libya, Algeria,
Tunisia and Morocco and the Mediterranean islands of Cyprus,
Sicily, Rhodes and, partly, Majorca, Corsica and Sardinia. In
the east, they failed, despite a number of attempts, to make
extensive inroads into India. In the west, they crossed the
straits of Gibraltar and conquered almost all of Spain and
Portugal. They were only stopped from conquering Europe by
military defeats at Constantinople in 718, at Tours, in mid
France, in 732 and at Rome in 846.
In the west, Islam was slowly pushed back out of Spain and
Portugal (the Reconquista), though the process was not
completed for another 800 years. Attempts at further Islamic
expansion continued with repeated Arab attacks on Italy and
incursions in the East, carried out by Turks, Persians and
Afghans. India was invaded again in the late 900s, with
Muslim rule over a fluctuating area of the country taking place
over the subsequent centuries.
140
besieged Vienna in 1529 and again in 1683. Again, European
land was regained from the world of Islam, this time by
Austria, as the Ottoman Empire slowly declined. Finally, Islam
lost territory close to home, as Palestine became Israel.
The fact is that the success of Islam has not been achieved
because of any suggestion of plausibility in its doctrines; it has
always had to rely (despite denials) on coercion to convert and
on rigid control thereafter. The reasons why so few convert
because they are convinced of its truth should be clear from the
previous chapters of this book.
141
Chapter 9
The Real Origin of Islam
9.1. Voices in my head
A central part of Islamic doctrine asserts that Muhammad holds
a unique position in history: the last of God’s Messengers.
However, when viewed from a broader perspective,
Muhammad was neither the first, nor the last, nor a particularly
unusual example of someone who heard ‘voices’ that no one
else could hear. We came across a few examples in Chapter 8.
142
cause that could have made all these people and, particularly,
Muhammad have the experiences that they described? Let us
consider Muhammad’s reported behaviour during his periods
of ‘inspiration’.
143
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 any more. 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 has created (all that exists) has created man from a
clot. Read! And your Lord is the Most Generous." Then
Allah's Apostle returned with the Inspiration and with
his heart beating severely. Then he went to Khadija bint
Khuwailid [his wife] and said, "Cover me! Cover me!"
They covered him till his fear was over..”
144
During his spells, Muhammad was observed to sweat
profusely:
become detached:
145
Muhammad to read. To read what? Nothing seems to have
been presented. Furthermore, the angel strangely seems to have
selected for this task a man who cannot read. However, each
time Muhammad points this out he is, in effect, tortured, with
the angel taking no heed of the reply and repeating the request.
Finally, Gabriel appears to abandon the idea and, instead, tells
Muhammad something which makes very little sense. The
whole episode is nightmarish and it is not surprising that
Muhammad was profoundly affected by the experience.
Therefore, given its incoherence, was the event really a divine
visitation, or something altogether different?
You are now asked to come up with a list of possible causes for
Patient A’s behaviour. How would you set about the task and
what would be on your list? In all likelihood, you would search
the appropriate medical textbooks (or modern equivalent) and
compile a number of candidate conditions. Nowhere on the list
would you be likely to put as a possible cause “actual visits
from perceived Being”.
146
However, at the very top of the list would come a single
condition which is capable of producing all of Muhammad’s
symptoms. The condition is temporal lobe epilepsy, or TLE.
Aside from religious hallucinations, discussed below, the
symptoms are many and varied, but some are characteristic and
quite common. These include [66]:
a. fear or anxiety
b. a wide-eyed, motionless stare
c. lip smacking, chewing and swallowing
d. changes in heart rate and sweating
e. pallor or blushing [67]
147
messages, he says, if you just allow yourself to tune in.
I glance at his medical chart, noting that he has suffered
from temporal lobe epilepsy since early adolescence,
and that is when "God began talking" to him.”
148
which has the same kind of portentous yet empty quality
exhibited by Muhammad’s first communication: it is the sort of
pseudo-Biblical thing that believers feel God ought to say.
149
raise and lower her feet alternately.”
150
therefore reviewed below.
151
smooth running of their professional relationship with the
Muslim world, to be seen to be expressing a view which
implies that Islam is false. Some fairly creative equivocation is
then necessary in order to make it unclear as to exactly what is
being said.
152
Dubious? Well, if Farah does not accept the Muslim view of
the origin of the Quran, then he should be honest enough to
admit that all that Muhammad then had ‘to offer posterity’ was
a book which was a fake. And what does he mean by putting
quotes around ‘psychologically sound’? That the whole
madness thing is just a social construct? Very R.D. Laing.
153
he includes a range of opinions concerning Muhammad.
154
6.3, 6.4). However, it should be obvious that the question of
whether Muhammad did or did not suffer from epilepsy cannot
be decided on the basis of whether or not the diagnosis was
also useful as Christian propaganda.
155
learning it had more in common with Dodge City than with
Oxford, Vienna or Baghdad. Therefore, although epilepsy was
known to ancient scholars and physicians, there is no reason to
suppose that it was common knowledge in 7th century Mecca.
156
The day that men shall be like scattered moths,
and the mountains shall be like plucked wool-tufts.
Then he whose deeds weigh heavy in the Balance
shall inherit a pleasing life,
but he whose deeds weigh light in the Balance
shall plunge in the womb of the Pit.
And what shall teach thee what is the Pit?
A blazing Fire!”
Unfortunately, Temkin’s conjectures have been picked up more
recently by the clinical psychologist Vaughan Bell who writes
unequivocally that Temkin has ‘debunked’ the epilepsy claim
[79], when he clearly has not. Whether Bell consequently
considers Muhammad to have been a fraud, he does not say.
9.4.3. Epileptophobia
Finally, number of unjustified objections to the epilepsy theory
are based on the assumption that an epileptic could not have
achieved what Muhammad achieved. Montgomery Watt, a
professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies, stated that:
157
hallucinations and delusions might be an unsuitable head of
state of a secular democracy, it is quite feasible that such a
person could act as an inspirational leader for an ideological or
religious movement. The subjects of Section 8.2 became
leaders of the movements that originated as a result of their
‘visions’ and the most successful, Hong Xiuquan, became head
of an army of more than a million.
158
5. Muhammad experienced visions and messages in a
manner indistinguishable from those mentioned in 1.
above.
6. Muhammad also experienced a number of other effects
which are known symptoms of temporal lobe epilepsy
and most unusual otherwise.
159
had received Bible lessons from an American missionary)
experiencing visions which were entirely consistent with his or
her existing beliefs.
160
9.5.2. What are the implications concerning
Muhammad’s visions?
Even without an identification of the exact cause, it is clear that
Muhammad’s bouts of ‘inspiration’ correspond to the Prophet
Syndrome precisely, so that there is nothing to distinguish his
experiences from those of a number of founders of other
religions. The problem identified at the end of the previous
section therefore presents itself even more starkly. If the
allegedly almighty, all-knowing Biblical God was responsible
for Muhammad’s visions, why did He choose a means whose
outward signs can not only be faked, but which are also
reproduced by a significant number of people who not
prophets, but are clearly not faking either?
The problem only gets more acute as more of the specifics are
considered. Muhammad’s experiences, down to detailed
sensations and behaviour, correspond to a recognised medical
condition: temporal lobe epilepsy. Islam has no satisfactory
explanation for the extraneous oddities of Muhammad’s
behaviour during these episodes, for why should God create
these superfluous effects, if all they achieve is to suggest
strongly to later generations that their origin lay in some form
of mental illness? Did the problem simply not occur to Him?
9.5.3. Summary
Although his name has been dragged through the mud by later
writers, the Byzantine scholar Theophanes must have known
what the subsequent critics had either denied or failed to
discover: that Muhammad had indeed displayed unambiguous
symptoms of epilepsy during his episodes of inspiration and
that this condition, and not God, was the origin of the Quran.
161
The fact is that TLE (or some similar condition) has been
producing almost identical prophet-like behaviour in its victims
since time immemorial and it is a remarkable consequence of
society’s bewildered response to these symptoms that acute
sufferers may end up either in a mental ward or as founders of
a religion.
162
There is therefore no contradiction between the content of
Chapter 3 and that of this chapter: the Quran contains all types
of ‘revelation’.
163
Chapter 10
Summary
Many features of the genesis of Islam and the Quran are simply
inexplicable when viewed as the supposed grand plan of an
almighty deity. Equally perplexing, in that it implies repeated
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failure on God’s part, is the Islamic belief that He had made
many previous attempts to spread His message to other nations,
with all these attempts being unsuccessful (Section 2.2.1).
Furthermore, this belief remains uncorroborated by historical
evidence from elsewhere in the world.
One also cannot help but notice that the alleged divine plan,
while requiring worldwide conversion, has no rational strategy
for bringing it about (Section 2.2.5). The proof that anyone
would reasonably require in order to make such an important
decision, and which should be trivial to provide if the
originator was truly God, is simply absent, and replaced only
by repeated and intemperate denunciations of those who, quite
reasonably, remain unconvinced (Section 3.2). These are
unambiguous signs of an entirely human origin of the Quran.
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appearance of Islam should then be seen not as anything out of
the ordinary, but only as a typical example of a recurring event.
That this same circumstance should occur time and time again
within all cultures and eras is certainly more than coincidence
but cannot, because of the inconsistent theologies revealed, be
evidence of repeated divine communication (Section 9.5). A
possible, indeed highly likely, natural cause is discussed in
Section 10.5.
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the lands where the Islamic conquerors were overthrown. Islam
has (despite vociferous denials) always had to rely upon
coercion to convert and upon rigid control thereafter (Section
8.4).
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Muslim or pro-Muslim writers (Section 5.2). Moreover, the
idea that all the Quran’s claimed miraculous properties are
radiantly apparent in the original Arabic, but simply vanish
without trace when the book is translated, is absurd. If the
merits of human works of literature can at least partially
survive translation, is it really being claimed that God could
not have arranged this for His own composition?
10.3.2. Inimitability
Muslims believe that the Quran is literally inimitable: that
nothing comparable to it can be produced by mere mortals.
However, this idea was not developed by observation, but
simply inferred from statements to that effect uttered by
Muhammad, either as part of the Quran or in reference to it
(Chapter 5).
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Muslims should also keep a sense of proportion about the value
of a challenge in which the rules are unstated, which cannot be
judged objectively and from which at least 99.5% of those non-
Muslims who may be motivated to compete are effectively
barred by being non Arabic speakers. Moreover, the challenge
itself was issued after two previous challenges to write more
extensive passages were ignored. A little thought must surely
indicate that the previous, more difficult challenges were
pointless if it is claimed that the last, easier one could not be
met. Again, this is not a characteristic of a perfect book, nor of
an all-knowing author.
10.4.1. Muhammad
An indication of the true identity of the author occurs when one
observes that the importance attached by the Quran to then
contemporary events increases according to their proximity to
Muhammad himself. Some passages are clearly invented by
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Muhammad for his own personal convenience. When a
supposedly divine, timeless and universal revelation issues
directives to aid Muhammad’s love life and to warn people off
turning up early to his dinner parties, surely a glimmer of
realisation must cross the mind of even the most devoted
follower (Section 3.4).
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10.4.3. Prophecy
Nor does the Quran contain any miraculous anticipation of
future events (Section 6). Even when taken at face value, the
celebrated prediction of the victory of the ‘Romans’
(Byzantines) over (it is assumed) the Persians is, at best, a
much weaker affair than portrayed. Moreover, the fact that no
political capital was made of it during Muhammad’s lifetime,
when the perfect opportunity presented itself, suggests that it
was not viewed as an important prophecy at the time. Its
present-day appearance as an ancient prediction may therefore
be an illusion or a later construct (Section 6.3).
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Muslim theologians cannot agree on a coherent interpretation
of the Quran’s statements on this subject, despite having an
exposition in a book which they describe as ‘clear’ (Section
7.2).
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compulsion to record them, down to the occurrence of odd
aspects of involuntary behaviour during these episodes
(Chapter 9).
10.6. Conclusion
In response to the dawah, or invitation to Islam, issued by Al-
Qaeda, I have reviewed the basis of the Muslim claim that the
Quran was composed in its entirety by an all-knowing, all-
powerful God as His final and definitive message to mankind.
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author is so overwhelming in quantity and so decisive in nature
that only those preconditioned to ignore it could possibly think
otherwise.
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References
The internet allows readers to access referenced material
instantly, and for free, and I have tried to make the best use of
this prolific source of information. However, information on
the internet may change or disappear without notice and has a
(sometimes undeserved) reputation for unreliability.
175
3 Khaleel Mohammed. Assessing English Translations of the Quran,
The Middle East Quarterly, Spring 2005, Volume XII, Number 2
http://www.meforum.org/article/717
176
14 Sahih Muslim (Muslim Hadiths)
http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/crcc/engagement/resources/texts/
muslim/hadith/
or search: http://www.scribd.com/
15 Mohamed Elmasry. Does the Quran sanction violence?
http://muslim-canada.org/elmasry.html
23 Jewish Encyclopedia.
http://jewishencyclopedia.com
177
25 Is Dr. Maurice Bucaille a Muslim?.
http://www.answering-islam.org/Campbell/bucaille.htm
178
36 Theodor Nöldeke. The Quran. An Introduction.
http://www.answering-islam.de/Main/Books/Noeldeke/quran.htm
41 http://www.miraclesofthequran.com/predictions_01.html
45 Qutb, S. Milestones.
http://www.islamistwatch.org/texts/qutb/Milestones/
179
47 The Summit Lighthouse
http://www.tsl.org/
57 Millerism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millerites
58 Chabad
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lubavitch
180
59 Chabad.Org
http://www.chabad.org/
60 Probing Islam
http://www.scribd.com/doc/3378628/Probing-Islam
181
70 James C. Howden. The religious sentiment in epileptics.
Journal of mental sciences, 18, 491-497 1873.
http://asklepios.chez.com/XIX/howden.htm
74 Tor Andrae. Mohammad: The Man and his Faith, trans. Theophil
Menzel.
New York: Harper Torch Book Series, 1960
182
80 G.A. Khwaja, G. Singh and N. Chaudhry. Epilepsy and religion. Ann
Indian Acad Neurol. 2007;10:165-8.
http://www.annalsofian.org/text.asp?2007/10/3/165/34796
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