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Aspect of Islamic historiography

The history of the Quran, the holy book of Islam, is the timeline and origin of the written compilations or manuscripts of the Quran, based on historical findings. It spans several centuries, and forms an important major part of the early history of Islam. According to Muslim belief and Islamic scholarly accounts, the revelation of the Quran to the Islamic prophet Muhammad began in 610 CE when the angel Gabriel appeared to Muhammad in the cave of Hira, near the city of Mecca. Muslims believe that Muhammad continued to receive revelations until his death in 632 CE. However, some Shia Muslims believe that Ali ibn Abi Talib was the first to compile the Quran into one written text, a task completed shortly after the death of Muhammad. As the Islamic Empire began to grow, and differing recitations were heard, the rasmor consonantal skeleton of the Quranwas compiled for uniformity in recitation under the direction of the third caliph, Uthman ibn Affan (r. 644–656 CE). For this reason, the Quran as it exists today is also known as the Uthmanic codex. According to Francis Edward Peters (1991), what was done to the Quran in the process seems to have been extremely conservative and the content was formed in a mechanical fashion to avoid redactional bias. Arabic orthography continued to develop into the second century, allowing qira'at, or variant oral readings of the rasm, to be documented in Quranic manuscripts. However, Islamicist scholar Gerd R. Puin, former head of the Sanaa manuscript restoration project commissioned by the Yemeni government, argues that the Quran had undergone a "textual evolution" with textual variations, unconventional ordering of the chapters (surahs), rare styles of orthography, and may include stories that were written before Muhammed began his ministry and which have subsequently been rewritten. The Yemeni government subsequently denied him any further access to the manuscripts. Non Muslim people questioned the nature and modes of Muhammad's revelations. The Meccans interpreted the Quranic revelations based on their understanding of 'inspiration'. For them, poetry was closely connected to inspiration from a higher spiritual source. For this reason when Muhammad began preaching and reciting the Quran, the Meccans accused him of being a poet or a "poet possessed".

While there are various proposed etymologies, one is that the word قرآن 'Quran' comes from the Arabic verb قرء 'qaraʾa' 'to read' in the verbal noun pattern فعلان 'fuʿlān', thus resulting in the meaning 'reading'. Others are that it is a name given to the book by God, without any previous etymology, that the word comes from the verb قرن 'qarana' 'to join, to yoke', referring to the gathering together of revelation, and that it comes from قرائن 'qarāʾin', the plural of a word variously translatable as 'evidence', 'yoke', 'union'. Nine out of the ten imams of recitation have it read in their tradition with a hamzah, as قرآن 'Qur'ān' with only Ibn Kathir's tradition excluding the letter, reading it instead as قران 'Qurān'.

In the 1970s, what has been described as a "wave of sceptical scholars" challenged a great deal of the received wisdom in Islamic studies. They argued that the Islamic historical tradition had been greatly corrupted in transmission. They tried to correct or reconstruct the early history of Islam from other, presumably more reliable, sources such as coins, inscriptions, and non Islamic sources. The oldest of this group was John Wansbrough (1928–2002). Wansbrough's works were widely noted, but perhaps not widely read. The Corpus Coranicum project is an ongoing effort to develop a critical edition of the Quran.

Aside from the Bible, Quran relies on several apocryphal sources, like the Protoevangelium of James, the Gospel of Pseudo Matthew, and several infancy gospels. Several narratives rely on Jewish Midrash Tanhuma legends, like the narrative of Cain learning to bury the body of Abel in Surah 5:31.

Before Uthman established the canon of the Quran, there may have been different versions or codices in complete state, though none has yet been discovered. Such codices as may exist never gained general approval and were viewed by Muslims as individuals' personal copies. The two most influential codices at this time are ʿAbdullah ibn Masʿud's and Ubayy ibn Kaʿb's. Al Qurazi recounted seeing the mushafs used by Ibn Mas'ud, Ubayy, and Zaid b. Thabit and finding no differences between them.

The most influential of the allegedly varying codices was that of ʿAbdullah ibn Masʿud, an early convert who became a personal servant to Muhammad. It is reported that he learned around seventy suras directly from Muhammad, who appointed him as one of the first teachers of Quranic recitation. Later he was appointed to an administrative post in Kufa by the caliph ʿUmar, where he became a leading authority on the Quran and Sunnah. Some sources suggest that Ibn Masʿud refused to destroy his copy of the Quran or to stop teaching it when the ʿUthmanic codex was made official. Most of the other differences involve only altered vowels with the same consonantal text, which caused variations in recitation.

The second most influential codex was that of Ubay ibn Ka'b, a Medinan Muslim who served as a secretary for Muhammad. It is believed that he may have been more prominent as a Quranic specialist than Ibn Masʿud during Muḥammad's lifetime. There are reports that he was responsible for memorizing certain important revelations on legal matters, which from time to time Muhammad asked him to recite. In a few hadiths, Ubay is seen in a variety of roles. For instance, the "sheets" of Ubay are sometimes mentioned in some instances instead of those of Ḥafsa, and sometimes he is also mentioned in some hadiths instead of Zayd, dictating the Quran to scribes. His version of the Quran is said to have included two short suras not in the Uthmanic or Ibn Masʿud texts: Sūrat al Khal, with three verses, and Sūrat al Ḥafd, with six. Professor Sean Anthony has discussed the textual history of these two surahs in detail and noted that their presence in mushafs modelled after Ubayy's (and to a lesser extent, certain other companions) is "robustly represented in our earliest and best sources". While we lack material evidence in the form of manuscripts, he notes that many of the Muslim sources make direct material observations of the surahs in such mushafs. The order of suras in Ubayy's codex is said to have differed from that of Uthman's and Ibn Masʿud's as well,

The first sura, entitled al Khal ("separation"), is translated as: "O Allah, we seek your help and ask your forgiveness, and we praise you and we do not disbelieve in you. We separate from and leave him who sins against you." The second sura, entitled al Hafd ("haste"), is translated as: "O Allah, we worship You and to You we pray and prostrate and to You we run and hasten to serve You. We hope for Your mercy and we fear Your punishment. Your punishment will certainly reach the disbelievers." These two pieces are said to constitute qunut (that is, supplications which Muhammad sometimes made in morning prayer or in witr prayer after recitation of suras from the Quran). They are in fact identical to some parts of qunut reported in the collections of hadiths. (See Nawawi, al adhkar, Cairo, 1955, pp. 57–58.) The single additional so called aya is translated: "If the son of Adam were given a valley full of riches, he would wish a second one; and if he were given two valleys full of riches, he would surely ask for a third. Nothing will fill the belly of the son of Adam except dust, and Allah is forgiving to him who is repentant." This text is known to be a hadith from Muhammad. (Bukhari, VIII, No. 444 47.) According to Ibn 'Abbas (No. 445) and 'Ubay (No. 446) this text was at times thought to be part of the Quran. However, Ubay himself clarifies that after sura 102: "I had been revealed, [the sahaba] did not consider the above to be part of the Quran." (Bukhari, VIII, No. 446.) This explanation of Ubay also makes it very clear that the companions of Mohammad did not differ at all about what was part of the Quran and what was not part of the Quran when the revelation had ceased. It is also important to note that the hadith appeared in the mushaf of Ubay because it was for his own personal use; that is, in his private notebook, where he did not always distinguish between Quranic material and hadith, since the notebook was not meant for public use and he himself knew well what to make of his own notes. All companions of Mohammad are said to have had their own copies of the Quran, with notes, for personal use. The Islamic reports of these copies of the Quran of the companions of Mohammad only tell of various differences according to reports that reached them (e. g., the hadith in Bukhari, VIII, No. 446, that Ubay at some early stage held this sentence to be part of the Quran). However, the tangible manuscripts of these copies of the Quran have not survived but were destroyed, having been considered obsolete.

After Uthman had the other codices destroyed there were still variations in the reading and the text of this Quran. However, scholars deny the possibility of great changes of the text arguing that addition, suppression or alteration would have led to controversy 'of which there is little trace'. They further state that even though Uthman became unpopular among Muslims, he was not charged with alteration or mutilation of the Quran in general. During the manuscript age, the Quran was the most copied Arabic text. It was believed that copying the Quran would bring blessings on the scribe and the owner. The Arabic script as we know it today was unknown in Muhammad's time (as Arabic writing styles have progressed through time) and the Quran was preserved through memorization and written references on different materials. As Arab society started to evolve into using writing more regularly, writing skills evolved accordingly. Early Quranic Arabic was written in a rasm which lacked precision because distinguishing between consonants was impossible due to the absence of diacritical marks (a'jam). Vowelling marks (tashkil) to indicate prolongation or vowels were absent as well. Due to this there were endless possibilities for the mispronunciation of the word. The Arabic script as we know it today, the scripta plena, which has pointed texts and is fully vowelled was not perfected until the middle of the 9th century. During this time the construction of the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem in 72/691–92 was done, which was complete with Quranic inscriptions. The inscriptions on the Dome of the Rock in fact represent the earliest known dated passages from the Quran. In these inscriptions, many letters are already provided with diacritical points. The main characteristic of these scripts was their writing style. The letters in most of these manuscripts are heavy looking, relatively short and horizontally elongated. The slanted isolated form of the alif that was present in the Umayyad period completely disappeared and was replaced by a straight shaft with a pronounced right sided foot, set at a considerable distance from the following letter. Also, unlike the Hijazi scripts, these are often richly illuminated in gold and other colours. Another difference is that sura headings are clearly marked and enclosed in rectangular panels with marginal vignettes or palmettes protruding into the outer margins. These Qurans of the early Abbasid period were also bound in wooden boards, structured like a box enclosed on all sides with a movable upper cover that was fastened to the rest of the structure with leather thongs. Another central figure during this time was Abu Bakr b. Mujāhid (died 324/936). His goal was to restrict the number of reliable readings and accept only those based on a fairly uniform consonantal text. He chose seven well known Quran teachers of the 2nd/8th century and declared that their readings all had divine authority, which the others lacked. He based this on the popular ḥadith in which Muhammad says the Quran was revealed to him in "seven aḥruf". During this time there was strong Quranic traditions in Kufa, Baṣra, Medina, Damascus, and Mecca. Due to this, Ibn Mujāhid selected one reading each for Medina, Mecca, Baṣra, and Damascusthose of Nafi‘ (died 169/785), Ibn Kathir (died 120/737), Abu ʿAmr (died 154/770), and IbnʿAmir (died 118/736), respectivelyand three for Kūfa, those of ʿAsim (died 127/744), Ḥamza (died 156/772), and al Kisaʾi (died 189/804). His attempt to limit the number of canonical readings to seven was not acceptable to all, and there was strong support for alternative readings in most of the five cities. In the present day the most common reading that is in general use is that of 'Aasim al Kufi through Hafs. Out of seven complete or nearly complete semi Kufic Qurans from before the end of the eleventh century, four contain a verse count. Although a small sample, it does suggest that the use of a verse count was a prevalent and quite deeply rooted practice in semi Kufic Qurans between ca. 950 and ca. 1100. Abu Ali Muhammad ibn Muqla (died 940), an accomplished calligrapher from Baghdad, was also a prominent figure at this time. He became vizir to three Abbasid caliphs and is credited with developing the first script to obey strict proportional rules. Ibn Muqla's system was used in the development and standardization of the Quranic script, and his calligraphic work became the standard way of writing the Quran. This "new style" is defined by breaks and angular forms and by extreme contrasts between the thick and thin strokes. The script was initially used in administrative and legal documents, but then it replaced earlier Quranic scripts. It is possible that it was easier to read than the early 'Abbasid scripts, which differ greatly from current writing. Economic factors may also have played a part because while the "new style" was being introduced, paper was also beginning to spread throughout the Muslim world, and the decrease in the price of books triggered by the introduction of this new material seems to have led to an increase in its demand. The "new style" was the last script to spread throughout the Muslim world before the introduction of printing. It remained in use until the 13th century, at which point it was restricted to titles only. It uses a set of additional symbols and an elaborate system of modified vowel signs and for minute details, not identical to any older system. The Cairo edition has become the standard for modern printings of the Quran with the exception of those used in all North Africa (excluding Egypt) where the Warsh version is used. A committee of leading professors from Al Azhar University had started work on the project in 1907 but it was not until 10 July 1924 that the "Cairo Qur’an" was first published by Amiri Press under the patronage of Fuad I of Egypt, as such, it is sometimes known as the "royal (amīriyya) edition." The goal of the government of the newly formed Kingdom of Egypt was not to delegitimize the other qir’at, but to eliminate that, which the colophon labels as errors, found in Qur’anic texts used in state schools. To do this they chose to preserve one of the fourteen Qira'at “readings”, namely that of Hafs (d. 180/796), student of ‘Asim. Its publication has been called a "terrific success", and the edition has been described as one "now widely seen as the official text of the Qur’an", so popular among both Sunni and Shi'a that the common belief among less well informed Muslims is "that the Qur’an has a single, unambiguous reading", i. e. that of the 1924 Cairo version. Minor amendments were made later in 1924 and in 1936the "Faruq edition" in honour of then ruler, King Faruq. Reasons given for the overwhelming popularity of Hafs and Asim range from the fact that it is easy to recite, to the simple statement that "God has chosen it". Ingrid Mattson credits mass produced printing press mushafs with increasing the availability of the written Quran but also diminishing the diversity of qira'at. Written text has become canonical and oral recitation has lost much of its previous equality. Muslim disagreement over whether to include the Basmala within the Quranic text, reached consensus following the 1924 Edition, which included it as the first verse (āyah) of Quran chapter 1 but otherwise included it as an unnumbered line of text preceding the other 112 chapters, with the exclusion of Quran chapter 9. The Cairo Quran adopted the Kufan tradition of separating and numbering verses, It adopted the chronological order of chapters attributed to Ibn Abbās, which became widely accepted following 1924. A large number of pre 1924 Qurans were destroyed by dumping them in the river Nile.

Most Muslims believe that Quran, as it is presented today, is complete and untouched, supported by their faith in Quranic verses such as "We [Allah] have, without doubt, sent down the Reminder [the Quran]; and We will assuredly guard it [from corruption]". However, some Sunni literature contains reports that suggest that some of the revelations had already been lost before the collection of the Quran initiated by Abu Bakr. In one report, 'Umar was once looking for the text of a specific verse of the Quran on stoning as a punishment for adultery, which he remembered. Later, he discovered that the only person who had any record of that verse had been killed in the battle of Yamama and as a result the verse was lost. Some of the Companions recalled that same verse, one person being 'A'isha, Muhammad's youngest wife. She is believed to have said that a sheet on which two verses, including the one on stoning, were under her bedding and that after Muhammad died, a domestic animal got into the room and ate the sheet. Experts on hadith literature have rejected this hadith, as all routes of transmission either contain narrators charged with dishonesty in disclosing sources or simply conflict with the majority version of the report, which all have authentic routes of transmission but omit the part about the piece of paper being eaten. Certain Shia scholars state that Ali's predecessors wilfully excluded all references to the right of Ali to be the caliph after Muhammad died. Some Shias questioned the integrity of the Uthmanic codex, stating that two surahs, "al Nurayn" (The Two Lights) and "al Walayah" (the Guardianship), which dealt with the virtues of Muhammad's family, were removed. Al Khoei also argues that by the time 'Uthman became caliph, Islam had spread to such an extent that it was impossible for anyone to remove anything from the Quran. Uthman could have altered the text but he would have been unable to convince all those who had memorized the Quran to go along with his alterations. Any such alteration also would have been mentioned by Uthman's political opponents and assassins yet none accused him of this. Finally, he argues that if Uthman had altered the Quran, Ali would have restored it to its original state upon the death of Uthman, especially if verses of his rule had been removed. Instead Ali is seen promoting the Quran during his reign, which is evidence that there was no alteration. The order of the suras in the lower text of the Sana'a codex is different from the order in the standard Quran. In addition, the lower text exhibits extensive variations from the counterpart text in the standard Quran; such that the lower text represents the only surviving early quranic manuscript that does not conform to the 'Uthmanic tradition. The majority of these variations add words and phrases, so as to emphasize or clarify the standard quranic reading. Some scholars have proposed parallels for these variations in reports of variants in 'companion codices' that were kept by individual companions to the Prophet outside of the mainstream tradition of 'Uthman; but these correspondences are much the minority. François Déroche proposes, on palaeographic grounds, a date for the lower text in the second half of the first century AH (hence 672722 CE) and summarises the character of the Sana'a Palimpsest, "The scriptio inferior of the Codex Ṣanʿāʾ I has been transcribed in a milieu which adhered to a text of the Qurʾan different from the ʿUthmanic tradition as well as from the Qurʾanic codices of Ibn Masʿūd and Ubayy".