Because every time I think I'm getting close to something that will give me an answer it can be so easily shot down. Then I go back to a very unhappy square one.
It was also a note and thusly made no sense to anyone but me. I simply didn't have anywhere to write it down so I stuck it on my blog for later use. This is my train of thought and I know moments later someone will post "But thats crazy! Its fabricated because x y z. etc" Because for every answer there is its opposite. For everyone one person who believes, another will take it apart, dissect it, and disprove it. The way of the world's duality.
This is my actual train of thought:
Yes he spoke to Christians and I'm sure he was interested in monotheism. I'm sure he had a rough knowledge of both books. However, to create the Qur'an he would have had to do the following.
Muhammad would have at least needed to memorize the Torah and the Gospel. Then, he would need to re-write it to fit into the rest of the text without writing it down. All in his head. On top of the fact that he then would have needed to create a large amount of original text around these stories, using the stories to teach lessons, and keeping them in a very particular order. All without writing it down. The concept of being able to do that hurts my brain. To create and memorize simultaneously just seems impossible. Unless he was a VERY good improviser and could somehow keep things consist in his head without written notes to check on. And do so for a number of years.
So in other words I'm pretty sure Muhammad did not come up with the Qur'an without help. God must have helped him. It would have been an extensive task to fabricate the Qur'an even with a great deal of knowledge about the Bible and the Torah. Now, if it was a great many people who compiled it (like the Bible) then maybe but the book would not be remotely consistent. The Qur'an has the same literary voice all the way through. The style is also quite consistent from a literary standpoint. Is there a chance someone messed with it? Maybe. But there is a good chance of a large chunk of it being authentic.
Maybe Muhammad was a literary genius who also happen to have great knowledge of monotheistic religions, politics, ethics, human emotion, economics, psychology, sociology, and science. Then I can totally see how he wrote the whole thing and how it has nothing to do with God.
Ok bash away I know you all want to do so. Its an OPINION. not fact. Keep that in mind. Opinions, by nature of the definition of opinion, can be wrong.
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I do agree with your opinion, myself. For the Qur'an to have been "written" by a man who couldn't even write doesn't seem to fit. One could probably take the road that he didn't write it, his companions did, but even then the information contained would've had to come from *somewhere*. It's like the scientific facts found in the Qur'an - who would have known that in the 7th Century? Why would a group of men travel for ages and ages just to find extensive (and sometimes untold) information about Christianity and Judaism? I don't know but the idea just doesn't fit to me.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree - it just doesn't make sense that Muhammad made the whole thing up. Like you said, it is completely consistent and from a literary p.o.v. the only differences are between the Meccan and Medinan surahs.
ReplyDeleteAlso like Ellen said, there are quite a few scientific facts it would have been hard for him to know at the time.
LK, I'm really sorry I commented on your "note" last night. I just happened to see it in Google Reader and didn't think making a comment would be taken in such a strong way. Honestly you made me wonder if *I* knew the truth about Muhammad being a trader thus why I looked it up. I'd thought I read it, but wasn't 100%.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I don't believe Muhammad made up the Quran so I am not going to try to shoot that down.
Again, so sorry you were "pissed" last night because three of us happened to comment on your blog.
I didn't think we were harsh at all, but it seems you took it that way.
:-(
"every time I think I'm getting close to something that will give me an answer it can be so easily shot down."
ReplyDeleteThis is where it can just go round and round in circles forever. Someone can shoot it down, then someone else can shoot their argument down, and so on. It is so frustrating.
Maybe the best way is to work out what it will take to convince you either way, which I know is hard to do.
If you are looking to justify the Quran's divine origins, maybe it's because you already feel that it is true but you just lack certainty? Personally I think if you agree with the text and you feel in your heart it is true, then that is all you need - the rest is a matter of faith. More certainty would probably come through prayer and meditation on the text.
Or maybe the thorny issues are casting a shadow of doubt over Islam as a whole, or Muhammad as a prophet, and stopping you moving forward with practising the faith. In which case perhaps those issues need to be researched and wrestled with a bit more. Because if you can find an understanding of them that satisfies you, as many people have done, then you will feel much more robust and when people try to bash your opinions, you will have a solid understanding to support you.
Sorry I didn't comment on your actual post, but this was all I had to say! Take your time, and try to put the outcome in God's hands - He knows what is right for you, even if you don't right now. :)
I'm not trying to 'bash', though I'm afraid you may take it that way. So I'll apologize in advance. Think of this as my opinion on the subject.
ReplyDeleteWhy do you think Mohammed would have had to memorize the Torah and the Gospel? Yes, the Qur'an contains some of the same stories, but the details differ. They differ enough, in my opinion, for them to be being told by someone who had heard the stories and remembered them, but was filling in the spots they had forgotten. No memorization required.
Of course, it is possible for people to memorize things *and* create at the same time. It happens all the time, on smaller scales. (And here's where people might take offense, but I mean none) It happens in modern day cult leaders. They take what exists and create around it. Yes, they have access to written copy now, but they do memorize large chunks of their chosen 'base' and then create from that. Is it possible that Mohammed was simply extraordinary in this respect? By which I mean his powers of recall and creative thought. Or that he had access to people who had the knowledge that we're not aware of?
On a very different scale, I can tell you the characters and plots of books and movies that I haven't seen or read in *years*, simply because that's the kind of information my brain absorbs.
As for the 'scientific facts' in the Qur'an, I'll leave those aside. I've read enough to know (for myself) that the knowledge in there that's correct had already been discovered long before Mohammed's time, and is not that 'miraculous' at all. Again, in my opinion.
All that being said, I agree with Susanne that I don't think Mohammed wrote the Qur'an without help, but again, I'll leave it at that because it's merely my opinion, and I *know* that it's insulting to people who belive Mohammed was a prophet.
Amber: I can understand your point. No I suppose he would not have to memorize the Torah or the Gospel (considering all the versions of the Gospel that exist that might have been impossible). He would have needed a great knowledge of both to one recall them and two use them to teach lessons and insert them into the rest of the Qur'an.
ReplyDeleteThe problem I have is if Muhammad was a literary genius and wrote the Qur'an, saying it is the word of God, then he would have to be the most blasphemis man in all of creation. I may waver on his prophethood but I cannot believe he is that.
I just read this wonderful artical by Jeffrey Land and I thought you might like it:
ReplyDelete(The great importance the Qur’an assigns to reason in the pursuit of faith is surprising, especially considering the era and place in which it first appeared. By all accounts the Arabian Peninsula was at that time far from being a cradle of learning or philosophy. The Arabs were a callous, poor, illiterate, and uncultured people, often struggling fiercely against their harsh environment and each other for what little there was to extend their survival. While the Scriptures of the other major world religions appeared in developed and refined societies, the Qur’an first appeared in what can be aptly described as a cultural desert. Historians agree that the Arabs were a primitive people with no artistic, literary, or scientific heritage to speak of. They had no schools of philosophy, no significant works of visual art or literature; they were unknowledgeable in higher mathematics and possessed no other Scriptures or sacred writings.
Their only developed art form was poetry, orally communicated and handed down. Such an environment is not expected to produce a work of such genius and literary power. We might assume that a long and gradual, cultural maturation would have preceded the Qur’an’s appearance.
There is no evidence that Muhammad had any formal education. He may have led a few caravan expeditions in his twenties, but that would not provide him with the opportunity to develop his intellectual skills to such a high level. The whole style of the Qur’an, its stress on reason, its logical coherence, its ingenious employment of ambiguity and symbolism, its beauty and conciseness, suggests an author whose insight and wisdom come from far beyond the primitive confines of the then backward and isolated Arabian Peninsula.
I thought that perhaps there may have been more than one author of the Qur’an, but, unlike other Scriptures, there is no internal evidence to support this. The personality behind the Revelations is clearly one and its coherence is too great for it to have been a collective effort. As the Scripture states:
Surely if it were from other than God, they would find in it many a contradiction (4:82).
They could not produce the like thereof, even if they backed up each other with help and support (17:88).
The only reasonable explanation I could come up with is that Muhammad had to be humanity’s greatest genius, for history has known many unusually gifted minds but none that transcended their time and place as he must have.
Einstein was an amazing physicist, but his development of the Theory of Relativity was preceded by centuries of discovery with the science of physics moving in that direction for some time. Had Einstein not come up with the Theory of Relativity when he did, one of his peers almost certainly would have soon after. Andrew Wiles’ recent proof of Fermat’s Last Theorem is a brilliant achievement, but hundreds of years of advancement in mathematics and work on this problem contributed to it. Mozart, Van Gough, and Shakespeare were exceptional, but their works built on and reflect trends within their cultural surroundings. But the Qur’an’s sudden appearance in the Hijaz seemed to me like a rose bush suddenly appearing in full bloom in the most barren sector of the Empty Quarter of Arabia.
continue:
ReplyDeleteI felt that if Muhammad was the author of the Qur’an, then, besides being the most brilliant mind in history, he also must have been intensely devout and altruistic. The Qur’an is the purest testament to monotheism in existence, and it shows a deep, compassionate commitment to helping humanity, guiding men and women to the love of God, and righteous living. It would also seem that the Prophet must have been remarkably humble and self-effacing, as the Scripture repeatedly insists that Muhammad is only a man; that his only role is to deliver the message; that he has no supernatural powers; and that he, like everyone else, should pray for guidance and forgiveness. It criticizes and corrects him on several occasions. Such humility is exteremly rare in persons so intellectually superior to their peers.
Therefore, if Muhammad had authored the Qur’an, it would seem that he was singularly devoted to serving God and humanity and to teaching virtue, but yet, I could not ignore that he must also have concocted the most audacious hoax, fabricating a Scripture that portrays itself as God’s direct communication through him. It does not fit that a person capable of such a colossal lie could also produce such a powerful call to truth and goodness. I toyed with the idea that the Prophet may have had multiple personalities, but the Qur’an is surely not the delusions of a fragmented personality, any more than it could be the work of several individuals).
Anon: Wow. Thank you for giving me that it is really interesting. I need to pick up a book by Jeffery Lang....was it Even Angels Ask? I think that is the one LOL
ReplyDelete