Talk:History of the Quran/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

NPOV, Overrated Nestorians

This section, eulogizing a very recent novel (!) on the subject of the history of islam is given too much credit:

"Osman Kartal continues by highlighting the fact that Sergius was the first of a long line of Nestorian Christian scribes to generations of caliphs. The Nestorians introduced mathematics, philosophy and science to the Islamic tradition, directly leading to the Golden Age of Islam."

The POV/information is controversial, and should be documented by more than a reference to a novel from 2009. Or it should be removed. I believe there is no documentation whatever of the assertion that Nestorian Christians were directly responsible for Islamic science and philosophy. I have therefore inserted a NPOV tag on this section. Agger (talk) 15:08, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Hagarism?

Hey, I'd like to point out that Patricia Crone rebuked her own 'Hagarism' theory. If her theory is mentionned, then it should be as an example of scholarly speculation that is largely not accepted by Islamic scholars, including the author herself. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.247.85.103 (talk) 20:10, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

See here: http://www.bismikaallahuma.org/archives/2007/hagarism-the-story-of-a-book-written-by-infidels-for-infidels/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.247.85.103 (talk) 20:15, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

I am currently in the process of contacting Professor Crone and Michael Cook in verifying what exactly they revoke. I am sceptical of the article mainly because of it's use of language and highly defensive tone and the fact that it never actually appeared in the Michigan Law Review. I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't hold onto all of their thesis as they alluded to the fact that later scholarship may prove them wrong in some respects. However, claiming to discount the entire book on 'dailystar' speculation doesn't cut it - especially as there is a multitude of verifiable facts that have been backed up by the recent independent scholarship of Professor Gerd R. Puin, Christoph Luxenberg and others.

--Ari89 (talk) 15:08, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

She really has abandoned the main points of her Hagarism theory. See what she writes (in 2006) about Muhammad: http://www.opendemocracy.net/faith-europe_islam/mohammed_3866.jsp —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.247.85.103 (talk) 02:27, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

By referencing an article that is a rehash of the first chapter of Hagarism you are telling us she has totally abandoned it? E.g. late date of traditions, non-Muslim Greek and Armenian sources, reliability of 622 date, Judaeo and Biblical influences, etc. Then she jumps into the geographical issues that were touched on in Hagarism and subsequently dealt with in Meccan Trade,etc. --Ari89 (talk) 08:14, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Translate to English

I guess there will be some strong reactions, but this is the English section and therefore words that aren't names should be alvays translated, so the word Allah should be translated to God, if you still want to use some Arabic instead of God, then use one of his names instead, see Names of God in the Qur'an.

--Trizt (talk) 17:52, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

2008 comments

I believe that it would be better to separate the "revisionist" critics into two schools. The older one I might call "conventional" (by which I really mean gullible) and the newer one I would call "skeptical". I admit to being a skeptic. The difference between Montgomery Watt and John Wansbrough is much greater than the difference between Watt and the good old Islamic tradition. I haven't made any edits in the text because I believe I should read all the old talk first and I don't have time for that just now. Perhaps later. DKleinecke (talk) 18:45, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

excellent --Saeed 19:00, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

ha

Factual Inaccuracy

quoting from the article:- "The anti-traditionalist banner dropped by Crone and Cook (C&C) has been taken up by scholars such as Christoph Luxenberg and Abraham Geiger, both of whom support claims for a late composition of the Qur'an......" Now Crone and Crook published their work in 1970's, whereas Abraham Gieger, in autobigraphical article is said to be a 19th century rabbi. How could rabbi Gieger pick up a banner more than a century earlier it was dropped by C&C ?

I just noticed that myself. I'll try to give that a fix. Breadhat 05:47, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

In the article the earliest Qoran was written 100 years after the Prophet's death. But it is obvious that, there is Uthman's own qoran is in Topkapi palace, Istanbul, Turkey. — Preceding unsigned comment added by

See the article Topkapi manuscript. — ℜob C. alias ALAROB 14:09, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

POV Fork

This article seems to be a POV fork. Someone has copied the relevant section from the Qur'an article and then added a thick frosting of Muslim legend, Quranic quotation, and hadith, all of which seem intended to disprove academic accounts. The article seems to be Sunni POV as well. This needs extensive work. Zora 02:50, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

added references. Note that this is a view "accordibf to Muslim scholars". The Hadieth of Bukhari is regarded by most Muslims as most authentic
Blubberbrein2 11:06, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

POV forks are deprecated. You can't have your own "Muslim" article. It either has to be an expansion of the main article, or be deleted. Bukhari is evidence for what Muslims thought at the time he wrote, not for what "actually" happened, whatever that was.

I'm tired and should think on this a bit. If this article is to be kept, it has to be radically restructured and expanded. Zora 11:13, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Bukhari wrote about what the Mohammed (and his companions) said and did. It is one of the main sources of Islam besides the Qu'ran. You are right that it is a Muslim source, and it is highly regarded among Muslims, see Sahih Bukhari.

To know about the islamic story about the early period of islam, i.e. about the history of islam(under which the origin and development of the Qu'ran falls), one can mainly only use islamic sources. See also the article I started about the Historical Mohammed
Blubberbrein2

Style and References

I have 2 questions:
1. Do there exist other sources from which you could draw? There seems to be only one source, Bukhari. If it is possible 3 different sources should be employed at minimum.
2. Could this article be a bit more concise? There's a lot of information here, at least some of which could be removed with some additional wikification.
Also, there are many POV statments subtle inserted into the text let's all try and remember NPOV. -Kode 01:08, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

About citing ahadith, will Sunni and Shi'i sources be included? Many Shi'iites consider some ahadith from the Bukhari, Sahih, and Muslim collections not reliable. I don't know exactly which ones, but this should certainly be adressed too.

Atomsprengja 05:21, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Changes

Please double check my changes, I have removed as much POV wording as I could. I want to make sure I didn't lose any info. I did improve the formatting a great deal I'm sure. -Kode 01:07, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Kode, that's a big improvement. The article could still use a lot of work, of course -- we need to go further into the different Islamic views, and much further into the history of Western academic scholarship. But you don't have to do all of that! Thanks so much for the effort. Zora 02:32, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

• Please give right meaning of Qur'an in the involved sections! I have just made a correction at Mohammed section. Before my correction "the Prophet who can neither read nor write" was writen! I can't believe it! In Qur'an 7:157 "Umm'i" doesn't mean someone who can not read nor write! Umm' means "Mother" in Arabic. "Umm'ul Qura" means Mecca; there Arabic people has said "Umm'ul Qura" to their city(Mecca). They thought that this city, Mecca, is mother of other cities. Umm'i is a adjective that discribe someone's birthplace. For example, "I'm from Turkey"; in Arabic "ene Turk'i". The Prophet was be able to write and read of course! Before the Wahy came to him, he was a merchant. Please tell me someone that how someone who can not write nor read make a trade??? On the other hand, He was not read Gospel nor Torah or write. He was not aware of them. He knew only Qur'an, Wahies from Allah, but nothing. Please give the right meaning of Qur'an...Fatih ERGAN (talk) 09:44, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

The meanings of Quran are "The recitation" as it is mentioned in wikipedia article about Quran.

Muslim Scholar Agha Mahdi Poya has given following details about the word "Ummi";

The word ummi generally means one who can neither write nor read. In many places the Quran addresses the Arabs as ummies. With reference to the use of ummi for the Holy Prophet, commentators say that it is either because the Holy Prophet could neither write nor read, or because he was one of the Arabs, or because he was the inhabitant of the city of Makka known as the Ummul-Qura. Ummi can also be derived from the word umm-the mother. Ummi means the person who remains the same in his native endowments as was born, without receiving any education or training from any (outside) source. The Holy Prophet did not receive knowledge or education from any mortal but by Allah Himself. He was born with divinely endowed .wisdom and remained the same, without letting any worldly agency influence his self, tutored and perfected by Allah Himself.

I am not making any claims, Just FYI, Arabic words can have many meanings for example the world "wali" has about 21 or 27 meanings e.g. leader, guardian, helper, Master, Friend, as well as Cousin and many more. --Mutawassam (talk) 05:34, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I reverted Cltfn's edits

He put arguments re the sources of the Quran in the intro section, where they do not belong. They are controversial, therefore should not be presented as the truth. Furthermore, they are simply wrong as a statement of current academic thinking on the Qur'an. Cltfn is quoting the popular press on Luxenberg, Luxenberg, or he is quoting 100 year old books that are long since out-dated. Cltfn, if you want to present the academic POV, you're going to have read some books and journals. You can't just pick up a bunch of quotes from anti-Muslim websites and assume that they represent the state of the art. They don't. Personally, I don't accept the traditional Muslim POV on the Qur'an, and I'm not arguing for it. But I do insist that anyone who consults this encyclopedia to find out what academics think should get a straight account of contemporary opinion.

--Zora 05:31, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

I am not quoting Luxenberg, although I will as soon as his book is published into English . Zora your mediations between the traditionalist and the secular POV is appreciated, however I think you are marginalizing the secular POV to appease the traditionalist. This is to the point that you are obstructing a great deal of very legitimate and encyclopedic material. Perhaps you are not current with current academic opinion, there are 3 major groups , the traditionalists , the apologists and the secular scholars. Perhaps we should present the 3 groups opinions in their own sections . How about that?

--CltFn 05:38, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

So far as I know, there are two groups, the late-development and the early-development, and the early-development is in the ascendent right now, thanks to the Sana'a manuscripts and the retreat of Crone from the earlier radical position. Luxenberg is not widely accepted. Quoting Wellhausen and Muir is not helpful, save for a history of academic views -- which would not be a bad idea. BTW, since I don't read Arabic and I'm not part of the academic milieu, I'm probably several years behind the times. Unless we get academic reinforcements, we're not going to be cutting edge. Praps I can ask dgl to comment.

Instead of waiting for Luxenberg, you should be waiting for Puin! That might be exciting.

-- Zora 07:22, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

Actually the 2 groups are the traditionalist early developement which is based on nothing more than anachronistic revisionism and (the destruction of contrary evidence and murder of dissident scholars) and the secular research one based on standards of historical and archeological and philological research . The scientific approach of the secular scholars is very ascendent right now, actually has been for quite a long time . The San'a manuscript by the way is dated the 9th century, according to Puin and his colleague H.-C. Graf von Bothmer, who made 35,000 microfilmed photos of the manuscripts. I suggest that the best way to intelligently develop this article then will be to clearly represent the 2 groups in the article.

--CltFn 12:21, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

I completely agree and promote in presenting a neutral point of view in all Wikipedia articles, but I have moved the following statement: "Modern day philologists view the Qur'an as an eighth century Arab compilation and adaptation of earlier Judeo-Christian scriptures and traditions, that had spread to Arabia in the Aramaic and Syriac dialects" to the section under 'According to non-Muslim scholars'.

In both sources that are provided for this statement, this view is described to be held by a "small" group of scholars [2], and a "handful" of people [3]. I feel that it is vital that we DO present this view, but since it is a minority view compared to the view of approximately 1.4 billion Muslims (including Muslim philologists and scholars), we should follow Wikipedia's policy on NPOV, which says:

"NPOV says that the article should fairly represent all significant viewpoints, in proportion to the prominence of each. Now an important qualification. Articles that compare views need not give minority views as much or as detailed a description as more popular views, and may not include tiny-minority views at all." (Emphasis mine)

Also, one of the sources mentioned for the statement is a web blog, and according to Wikipedia's policies on Reliable sources:

"At the other end of the reliability scale lie personal websites, weblogs (blogs), bulletin boards, and Usenet posts, which are not acceptable as sources"

Furthermore, the source mentioned for the article in the blog entry is not valid anymore. It has also been already mentioned in the introduction that non-Muslim and secular scholars are skeptical of the origin and development of the Qur'an.

Also, the claims mentioned under 'Textual evidence' are presented as facts and not claims and research of non-Muslim scholars. I dont want to remove the information presented there because I feel that it contains important findings and opinions, and is relevant and valuable to this article. But further work needs to be done on it before it is not POV anymore.

--Jibran1 02:26, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

I've moved the section Textual Evidence to 2.2.1 a sub category of Secular Scholars and Colaborative Effort. That should fix the first bit. If we can change that beginning line we can address the rest of your concerns.

--Kode 23:25, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Textual Evidence

I'm moving this section to under secular sources. If it's possible to reduce the number of loaded words and offer a more NPOV stance we can put it back. As I understand things muslim scholars would take issue with these 6 points. -Kode 22:51, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

I think that some of the wording is definitely biased-

"... apocryphal and non-orthodox Christian legends, on the other hand, are one of the original sources of Qu'ranic faith."

This is saying outright that the Qur'an is in fact a result of historical influences on Muhammad, thus denying its claim of divine origin. I guess it makes sense in the context of the Catholic Encyclopedia, but it shouldn't be in Wikipedia. This isn't even my main concern, actually, I see no reason why the Catholic Encyclopedia should even be counted as a reliable source, since it is, in many instances, not only biased, but also racist and prejudiced. examples-

"As war is the normal condition of savagery, so to the Indian warlike glory was the goal of his ambition"

"In reality, the Jews were far from prepared for the fulfilment of the promises which the almighty had repeatedly made to their race."

and, in the article on Islam (Mohamedanism, according to the C.E.)-

"The joys and glories of Paradise are as fantastic and sensual as the lascivious Arabian mind could possibly imagine."

"It is hardly necessary here to emphasize the fact that the ethics of Islam are far inferior to those of Judaism and even more inferior to those of the New Testament."

"In matters political Islam is a system of despotism at home and aggression abroad."

The whole Textual Evidence section is a cut and paste from the C.E. article, so should we then also include as textual evidence that the qur'an contains "a combination of fact and fancy often devoid of force and originality," as well as "legends," "threats," and "fanciful descriptions of heaven" and that "the most creditable portions are those in which Jewish and Christian influences are clearly discernible," as the "Encyclopedia" says? I won't include all the errors (or in some cases, like "the man is allowed to repudiate his wife on the slightest pretext," obviously intentional lies) about the shari'a.

How then would anyone ever consider this acceptable?

Atomsprengja 05:13, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Sorry Kodemage

Kodemage, instead of reverting Cltfn's edits, as they deserve, you tried to make sense of them. I'm sorry, I reverted to an earlier version that did not have all that outdated nonsense. It is REALLY nonsense. He's quoting 100-year-old stuff, long exploded, as if it were current academic thought. He is grossly exaggerating the support for Christoph Luxenberg. Cltfn thinks Luxenberg is right, and that academics agree -- everything I've read suggests that they think he may be right on isolated points, but that his general thesis is poppycock. Cltfn is getting his "information" from anti-Islamic websites rather than actually reading the academic material. This is not a question of different POVs, this is a question of gross misrepresentation of academia. As an academia groupie :) I protest.

I will add material re Luxenberg when I find time for it. It should be mentioned, and isn't, which may be one reason that Cltfn is so insistent. Zora 06:50, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Zora, 100 year old information is not invalid by default. Especially when dealing with ~1300 year old subject. Let's talk about this a mlittle bit more, what information that Cltfn is inaccurate? -Kode 22:09, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Article in dire state

The article seems to have been thoroughly worked over by anti-Muslim editors not familiar with scholarship, and eager to publicize anything that proves Muslims "wrong" and also by Muslim editors eager to prove academic sceptics "wrong". The result is a complete muddle, with Muslim arguments interpolated into the non-Muslim section and several extremely distorted versions of the academic state of affairs.

I rewrote some of the article, but there's still a lot to do. This is discouraging. Zora 00:24, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

Hello, Zora. I agree; we should send this article to Dr. Z for a good revision :) giordaano212.190.72.16 10:56, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Uthman and the collection of Qu'ranic verses

The main thing with the Quran, It did not need to be written down, because it is Actually reserved by Memoriztion, Mass Memorization. So no 2 Muslims Disagree on any of the Verses of the Quran. So If Westerners want to Chriticize the Quran, They can not in any way because it has been always the case that it is memorized from generation to generation. There is nothing else in the world that is being perserved that way. The bible and so on. Muslims Perserve the Quran by Memorization. And no 2 people disagree no matter what they belive....

There are numerous factual innaccuracies in this article that I can see; I'm certainly no expert in the field of Islamic studies, but I'm surprised others having caught them. They may be a result of POV rearing its ugly head among some of the contributers, but I'm not sure.

Chief among them is the assertion that Uthman could not have adulterated or excised suras when he collected them for the purpose of codifying them into one volume, since Mohammed was alive at the time. From what I know, this is absolutely false; this event did not occur until Uthman was Caliph, in which case Mohammed already would have been dead for at least a decade. Aside from that, there is no information from that period concerning this event that in nearly that definitive; a number of scholars, western and Muslim alike, have asserted that Uthman had direct control over the editing process, and subsequently burned earlier copies of suras he had collected after the scribes copied his authoratative position. While I want obviously want to present a NPOV in this article, and I realise that many Sunni feel Uthman to be a righteously guided Caliph, many have posited that Uthman carried out this action in order to consolidate his control over the Caliphate and destroy opposition to him; early Muslim scholars generally report that Uthman was nepotistic, power hungry, expansionistic, et cetera. This is far cry from an accusation of him fabricating verses to justify his actions, but it may indicate that he collected already existing verses which supported him and excised those which spoke out against his actions under the claim that they were unorthodox. I have no opinion either way, and know that this presenting this information, while not -specifically- supporting a Shi'i view, discredits the Sunni view of Uthman. This article seems to support an apologetic view of Uthman and the other earlier compilers and consolidaters, to the point where I thought it was overly representative of Sunni views. As this is a commonly proposed academic view, but approaches it from the perspective of higher criticism, I realise that some Muslims may be inherently against voicing this opinion here. My question is this: in the interest of encyclopaedic knowledge, should it be presented? And if so, in what way to be as neutral as possible? I'd like to hear from you all before I attempt any sort of re-write. Kaelus 06:09, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree, I've added and referenced some modern challanges to Uthman's handling of the compilation of the Quran 24.58.15.191 23:42, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Anti-intellectual?

I'm having trouble understanding why this article is split between the thoughts of Muslim and non-Muslim scholars. The article is about historical events, and those events don't change is someone is Muslim or not. (There is one exception: believing that the Qur'an cannot be changed, but everything else is a matter of scholarship.) My point is that seperating them implies that the religious thoughts of Muslims are incompatible with NPOV thoughts of non-Muslims, ie, anti-intellectual. This is obviously false, consider that most non-Muslim scholars ascribe (at least the vast majority) of the Qur'an to Muhammad. I know this adds a lot of work to already big and messy article. What do others think about eliminating this division? --Ephilei 19:14, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I think article shouldn't be splitted between Muslim and non-Muslim views, as most scholars, Muslim or non-Muslim, agree that the traditional Islamic accounts on the history of the Qur'an are more or less reliable, if taken with caution. The split should be between the traditionalist view, accepted by the vast majority of shcolars, and the revisionist view of Lexenberg etc, rather than Muslim vs. non-Muslim. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.247.85.103 (talk) 20:06, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

createdness of Qur'an

There is different idea about this issue. Mu'tazila thinks Qurán has been created. Look at Mihna--Sa.vakilian 13:39, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

The statement defies any commenting. Of course someone created the Qurán. According to many religions, God created the world and everything within it. ... said: Rursus (bork²) 15:01, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

The traditional Muslim explication is that the Qur'an is the speech of God. As such it is an attribute of God, just like his knowledge and mercy, and not created. --Wadq (talk) 15:40, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

First person used in text

The earlier Prophets were sent to specific communities while Prophet Muhammad was sent to both mankind and jinnkind for all time to come, as claimed by the Muslims. If such a claim is true the very different nature - local versus global - can result in some changes between the scriptures. I am suggesting this so that further analysis along the lines of local versus global of the three scriptures could be performed. May be we make the mistake of insisting on identical concepts just because God knows everything there is to know and should not have to revise. Don't teachers tune their lessons to match the level of their audience?

POV or original research? Is there any supporting evidence ?

rgds <b>Johnmark<br>H 18:34, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

shouldn't be in there really. ITAQALLAH 18:41, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Completeness

I question the factual accuracy of the statement that most Muslims do not believe that the Quran (or, more precisely, Ayaat of the Qur'an) was ever abrogated. While I am not familiar enough with the Shia POV to answer on their behalf, I can say that the view that Abrogation occured is the normative one among Sunni Scholars. That 2:106 refers to earlier Scriptures is the minority view (supported by Muhammad 'Asad in his Tafsir). If one were to look at the works at the greatest scholars in the Sunni Tradition and at those Tafseers that are most highly regarded, one would find that these support a belief in abrogation. In addition, it seems as the interpretations introduced in this section are speculative; either no source is given or the source is questionable. Akbarally Meherally is not a scholar. He is an anti-Ismaili polemicist and critic of hadith. His qualifications in Islamic Studies appear to be extremely slight. لقمانLuqman 14:24, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

If you mean "نسخ", Shi'a believe it has happened for example at first wine wasn't banned compeletely:"و لا تقربوا الصلوة و انتم سكاري" Then wine was banned completely. Also there is an Ayat in Qur'an which says abrogation is possible:"None of Our revelations do We abrogate or cause to be forgotten, but We substitute something better or similar: Knowest thou not that Allah Hath power over all things? "(2:106)--Sa.vakilian 03:54, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Not all Shia believe this: Ayatollah Khoei rejected this and said that the verse commanding Muslims to not come to prayer intoxicated was just what Allah Almighty told Muslims to do should they have committed the sin of drinking. I'm not certain if Ayatollah Khoei actually believed this, but a trustworthy person presented this view and attributed it to Ayatollah Khoei. Armyrifle 21:13, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

"Later Judaism and Rabbinism are equally well represented"

This doen't mean anything. We need to state clearly that Geiger find parallels between Medrashim such as the Medrash Tanchuma and other Medrashim and the Koran. It's important since it demonstrates quite clearly the methods used in writing the Koran. I will attempt an addition but I don't mind if it's rverted as it's not my field.Wolf2191 16:48, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

I addressed the issue of completeness and I agree with you, Varkilian. The claim that both Shia and Sunni unequivocally accept that abrogation was not in regard to the Qur'an but the previous revelations is nonsense from the traditional Muslim point of view. Ibn Abbas, Jalal and Ibn Kathir are adamant that it is in relation to the Quran and not previous revelations and they source sufficiently from the traditions and Quran in reaching this conclusion.

The attempted exegesis by the author failed greatly as it clearly rejected context and was nothing more than ignorant eisegesis.

Horribly written. I have tried to fix some of it but a lot of editing would need to go through it. It seems like it was originally critical - and then someone inserted a grand amount of POV and poor scholarship to lean it towards the Islamic narrative - although contradictory to what Muslims actually believe (E.g. abrogation). I think it might be best to just delete those inaccurate statements altogether rather than arguing against them.--Ari89 (talk) 03:02, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

--Ari89 (talk) 19:20, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Wrong information

According to the auther of this article: (Narrated Ibn 'Abbas: 'Umar said, "I am afraid that after a long time has passed, people may say, "We do not find the Verses of the Rajam (stoning to death) in the Holy Book...)

Omar said verses and the author claimed that in Qura'an there is only one reference found in the Qur'an which is "The woman and the man guilty of adultery or fornication, flog each of them with a hundred stripes..." 24:2

I'm asking him to continue reading in the same chapter he will find another verse:-

"And those who launch a charge against chaste women and produce not four witnesses(to support their allegation) flog them with eighty stripes and reject their evidence ever after: for such men are wicked transgressors" Quraan 24:4 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ibrahim Fahd (talk • contribs) 12:42, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Proposed move

I propose we move this article to "History of the Qur'an".Vice regent 22:09, 6 September 2007 (UTC) Support: A better name. → AA ^(talk) — 23:08, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

DEVELOPMENT!!!

The word Development should not be used, development might be understood as there are some changes, on the contrary this is the opposite of the fact that the Qur'an is the same.Abouilyass 21:25, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

At the first paragraph

at the first paragraph, The truth is " it is the same go to any library you will have the same Qur'an with no difference, Even the "some of" secular scholars who wanted to think so failed... so it should be converted into It is the same... Abouilyass 21:31, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

The title "Different" copies

What is meant by "Different"? I think it should be converted to IBIN MASU'D. Again the use of words titles is not appropriateAbouilyass 21:34, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree, sinceit talks about him--Nables 12 13:50, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

, to accuse each other of lying....

I think the fact is that they were both true but because they are new Muslims they didn't know about the readings, so it is better to add that

to accuse each other of lying...without knowing that they are both true...Abouilyass 21:36, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

It is an increasing claim made by some Muslim and non-Muslim

It is not a claim...The writing system is different not only early Uthmanic texts of the Quran differed... The whole Arabic writing system is different... I think the addition of this paragraph is unnecessary and it should be removed...Abouilyass 21:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Paragraph #3 at Oldest copy known today

What is the source? I think it should be deleted...Abouilyass —Preceding unsigned comment added by Abouilyass (talk • contribs) 21:50, 7 September 2007 (UTC) what are the islamic traditions that the auther is talking about?--Nables 12 13:56, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

divine origin

1. It is better to change the title to be "Qur'an is the miracle of Prophet Muhammad" and it should also be mentioned about scientifc, numerical, historical,,, etc that make a lot of people including scientists become muslims such as the verse that talks about the expansion of the We constructed the sky with our hands, and we will continue to expand it. quran 51:47 //
and the one that talks that the earth has seven layers Allah is He Who created seven Firmaments and of the earth a similar number. Through the midst of them (all) descends His Command: that ye may know that Allah has power over all things, and that Allah comprehends, all things in (His) Knowledgequr'an 65:12 and many other scientific miracles
http://www.55a.net/firas/english/ for more information--Nables 12 21:03, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Quranic text during the life of Muhammad?

What is the meaning of the word text here? I suggest to change it into "The Writing of the revelation during the life time of prophet Muhammad"--Nables 12 15:06, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Substantial work

I think most people reading this article can agree that the manner in which it has been done doesn't meet the quality of, say, the article on the documentary hypothesis.

To an extent, this article looks like it's trying to please people who are looking for two different things; the view of the Qur'an as stated by the Qur'an (ie. unchanging, eternal, divine) and the view of the Qur'an from a critical perspective (ie. probably changing, possibly divine). And so it's ended up as a content fork, where one section flat-out states "It is impossible for a human to produce a book like the Qur'an," and another says that the Qur'an is based off texts that are (again, article's words) "faulty" and "not historically accurate." As a result, we end up with an article that is self-contradictory and near-useless for someone actually reading it.

I think this article needs an overhaul along four major lines;

1) First, we desperately need to remove or resource the parts that use the Qur'an as their primary source (eg. the section on Divine origin). There is certainly a wide range of both secular and Islamic texts on the perfection of its Arabic and its divine origin; we should be using that wherever possible. It wouldn't be acceptable for an article on Old Testament criticism to cite as fact Exodus 34:27 in favor of Mosaic authorship, and it shouldn't be acceptable here, either.

2) The article should reflect, wherever possible, modern scholarship over traditional scholarship. There should not be an "Islamic version" and a "non-Islamic version;" there should be a mainstream scholarly position and a minority scholarly position. The fact that 1.4 billion Muslims (as expressed earlier on this talk page) believe the inerrancy of the Qur'an should not be the determining factor - most of those 1.4 billion are not scholars. If the majority of scholars believe that the Qur'an has remained substantially unchanged since the 7th century, that should be the position expressed. The current "it has remained unchanged," "it has remained mostly unchanged," and "it went through several centuries of revision" shouldn't be done. This fork is already causing issues in the texts; in the Oldest copy section, we find a note about varying versions, which is given in more detail in the 'return to traditionalism' section.

3) The article should be read over to make sure things follow. For example, the section in First standardization regarding diacritics; why does whether the text was abrogated matter to the history of Arabic lettering? If these things are related, it is nowhere made clear in the article.

4) The article should include some mention of the various arguments in favor of earlier sources for the Qur'an, as can be found in Historicity of Muhammad or The Syro-Aramaic Reading Of The Koran, and later interpolations into the Qur'an, such as in Satanic Verses. We do not have to claim these as true, but we have to recognize that these arguments exist and are being debated in academic circles.

Above all, the default POV here should not necessarily be the Islamic one, but the scholarly one. That's what this text fails to do right now. The Islamic opinion should be included, and even held to be the mainstream where it actually is, but we shouldn't go farther than that.

I'll be spending some time working on this over the next week or so. -Senori 22:05, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree with most of what you say, except number 4. the disucssion regarding that is conducted by very few and we may give that discussion undue weight.Vice regent 16:40, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I have rewritten the intro to present the two views.--CltFn 04:42, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Muadh ibn Jabal

Hi, i was going through the old backlogs and ran into the article Muadh ibn Jabal. It needs improvement - currently parts of it look like a children's story and not like an article. Can somebody improve it, please? I am not an expert on Islam.

If you don't have the time for serious improvement, here are three very simple tasks that anyone with understanding of the Arabic language can do:

What is the preferred spelling of Muadh - Muadh or Mu'adh?

What is the preferred spelling of ibn - ibn or bin?

Finally, can somebody add the correct spelling of the name in Arabic language?

Thanks in advance. --Amir E. Aharoni 15:05, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

HI, I agree with you.. BUt please add that The main source that saves the quran unchanged is the fact It is memorized. At least every small village, or city has so many people that Memorize the Quran And that has been the way from Generation to Generation. From the Sahabah to the Followers all the way down to us. They needed to write the quran because Khalif Othman was scared that many of the People that memorize the quran were dying, so he decided to collect all of it and write it directly from the Memorized Generation of Sahabah and Tabeeen.. Please add this informaiton to the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.226.29.244 (talk) 07:21, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Non-neutral

The article is no longer neutral, as it presents the Muslim view as the incorrect one. Much work has to be done before we can balance both views and not judge either of them.Vice regent 21:23, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Catholic views

Why are we giving the view of Catholics such importance in this article? Why does it even matter what they believe about other the Islamic scriptures?Vice regent 21:49, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

why wouldn't it matter? If they are notable scholarly views, which they are, they disserve recognition. Sefringle^Talk 20:38, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

They are "scholarly" because they are Catholic scholars and experts in the Catholic faith. While that is certainly significant in an article about Catholicism, it's a bit irrelevent in an article about Islam. Consider this: would the opinion of a nuclear physicist necessarily matter in a discussion of the Crusades?Vice regent 21:01, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Actually, the scholars cited are mostly not Catholic. But the Cath. Enc. extract represents a pretty solid summary of Western secular and non-muslim scholarship circa 1910. The reason that it is (or was) necessarily secular and non-muslim scholarship is obvious: if, as a traditional Muslim, you believe that the Qur'an was dictated verbatim from God, then you're going to regard any discussion of "influences" and "sources" as utterly misguided and simply empty of sense. Jheald 16:09, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

While Catholic may be considered as "western" I don't agree with the secular designation. Consider this link. The entry to "CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Jesus Christ" is summarized as "The incarnate Son of God and the redeemer of the human race." Now I don't think it is secular for an encyclopedia to regard Jesus Christ as the "redeemer of the human race". The Catholic encyclopedia is as much religious as Muslim sources. The only point is: this is an article about Islamic scriptures, not Christian/Catholic ones.Vice regent 21:46, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Given the not insubstantial evidence that the Qur'an is at least partially based on ideas derived from Christian/Catholic scriptures, I should think the opinions of those well-versed in such scriptures would be extraordinarily useful. -Senori 03:34, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Your logic is circular: those who claim the Qur'an is at least partially based on ideas derived from Christian/Catholic scriptures also happen to be those well-versed in the scriptures. I would have no problem with this if we had secular, academic and reliable sources saying this. But these religious sources (which are given so prominent a place) seem to be little more than polemic.Vice regent 20:23, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

The point here is that we should use scholars that can provide their part in a balanced view on the topic, irrespective if they're "catholic" or not whatever we mean by that! (Imagine an insinuative moralist tone here, anybody who's attacking my friends, the Catholics, will have to step over my dead body!) Scholarly opinions on the origins and developments of the Qur'an should be sorted according to opinion, not according to what faith they happen to have. The islamic positions are very important, however, and should be central to the article. ... said: Rursus (bork²) 15:14, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

weasel and offensive words

All templates from "Refimprove" to "Original research" are dated 2007 and it is almost 2009 (11/02/2008). The article suffers severely from weasel words and original research & unverified claims. Wikipedia, the internet's best encyclopedia should have a better article on such an important and notable topic. Sentences like "The most important "revisionists" include Christoph Luxenberg (scholar of ancient Semitic languages in Germany), and John Wansbrough (formerly of the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London). Their ideas are isolated and have never gained any degree of serious currency except amongst certain fundamentalist Christians." Sentences like this without notation do not belong and "certain fundamentalist Christians" is exceedingly vague and possibly negative in nature. The majority of the referneces in the article are from the text of The Holy Quran itself and are not historical data developing the focus of the article the "origin and development of the The Holy Qur'an. What can be done if article does not "shape up?" Ka'Jong (talk) 16:45, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

This article is very biased and has weasel words. An example would be found in the fourth paragraph: "Their ideas are isolated and have never gained any degree of serious currency except amongst certain fundamentalist Christians."

The article has a Refimprove, dated March 2007 and a POV template dated December 2007. Parts of the article appears to contradict itself. This article seems to have lots of original research and unverified claims. (ex. "Muslims maintain that the verse actually implies satans attempts to 'sway' prophets (not just Muhammed) away from the divine will, and Satan's influence does not pertain to the Quran."

All the templates from Refimprove to Original research are all over a year old.

The article fails to meet the standards of the internet's finest encyclopedia! The article at points is disrespectful and offensive. Please review and resolve. Ka'Jong (talk) 16:24, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Ka'Jong you will have to address specific parts you want changed. Yes, this isn't a very good article. But, this is an extremely contentious subject that requires experts to write--and with Zora and some of are best writers taking indefinite breaks this isn't happening.

I do want to caution you about making this more political than it is. Luxemberg became a political topic because of news coverage. Wansbrough is not necessarily political. You cannot just dismiss someone as being accepted "amongst certain fundamentalist Christians". It is not giving them due weight. It is true to say that not many people accept Wansbrough in total... but that doesn't make him an unimportant figure. Often you have strong assertions which become incredibly important in a field even if just as a foil for later writers (take Waltz in IR, to a lesser degree). This brings me to my next point...

"Objectivity" or some approximation is very difficult on this subject. We have a very minimal level of third party sources which address the debate as a whole--most sources we use are from within the debate itself which leaves us problems in how to choose sources. We need experts and we don't have them. We also tend to come at this from a very backwards, un-academic way. We got users who say "Hagarism is true" and then Muslims or more sympathetic users saying "Hagarism is false". This clearly misses the point. I think the best response is Hagarism is old. The academic field has learned from it, taken some pieces of it and rejected others... this is how scholarship in these fields go... it's a progression and this is why expertise is so important.

Wikipedia is as good as the Wikipedians who write it. We have some amazing articles and some crappy ones... we need expertise and non-polemical discussion. And most importantly that includes access to academic journals that even many large universities don't have... Journal of Qur'anic Studies is not available in many big U.S. institutions. Popular literature on the subject is widely available for $10 on Amazon or snippets for free on Google Books. This creates a horrible imbalance which is difficult to address. gren グレン 16:22, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Ka'Jong does have a point. There are several parts of the article that have remained unsourced for quite some time. I think it is time to move them to the talk page.Vice regent 20:48, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

He does have a point. And, if you challenge something because you believe to be inaccurate or literally unsourced then you can remove it (I see no point in moving here...). But, make sure it really is unsourced--some of the sentences have sources which really should be checked but you should discuss before removing any of that. But, only remove material that is unsourced and you believe to be incorrect. There isn't too much precedent for removing large chunks only because it's unsourced if it looks decent enough. gren グレン 11:04, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

A quick note about British/American English. You most often shouldn't change it (centre→center, fibre→fiber). I didn't revert because this article is a melange (the header is already in American English with standardization). gren グレン 11:08, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Ka'Jong supports User:Vice regent's proposal to move unsourced material/data to the talk page. Ka'Jong (Ka'Talk) 15:12, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

You can remove unsourced material which is controversial--but don't move it here. Each article has a history for a reason, so we can keep track of additions and removals. gren グレン 12:10, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Propose rename

I propose we rename this article to the "History of the Qur'an". This would be a more standard title.Vice regent 01:42, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

The problem with that is that it is too vague. It includes all translations of the Qur'an, all tafsir, all everything related to the Qur'an. This article is discussing anything from the inception of the idea of the Qur'an in whatever form it took to its final codification in the form we now know as standard. "Development" is a good word because there wasn't always a standard and both Muslims and non-Muslims alike talk about that. I see no reason to change the title. gren グレン 11:41, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Ka'Jong also supports User:Vice regent's proposal to rename article. "History of the Qur'an" does appear more standard and "History" encompasses "Origin and Development." Ka'Jong (Ka'Talk) 15:17, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes it does... but this article is about a specific historical epoch of the Qur'an. From the time the idea of it existed on earth to the time it was standardized as we see it today. History of the Qur'an is a perfectly valid article but it is not this article. This article is far narrower a subject. gren グレン 12:08, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Ka'Jong still supports User:Vice regent's proposal to rename the article. With respect, Ka'Jong believes the article is broader than User:Grenavitar wants or thinks it is. The article reads more like a trivia section on the history of the Holy Qur'an; As the majority of the article is focused on history, while the other sections are vague and unsourced. It appears a more standard title would help set an emphasis on the origin and development of the text rather than comparing what Islamic historians and unamed "western scholars" agree or disagree on. Ka'Jong is not sure what User:Grenavitar means by "specific historical epoch," which reads like it would make up a significant portion of an article renamed "History of the Qur'an." Ka'Jong (Ka'Talk) 15:02, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Gren, perhaps we can increase the scope of this article so that it may become the history of the Qur'an? I know that while the literal text of the Qur'an was standardized, its interpretation has nonetheless evolved, and it would be good if the article reflected that.Vice regent 05:48, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay. Well, I took a look around and there is no History of the Bible but they name the equivalent to this article The Bible and history. I think this article has enough information in it to remain its own article and not History of the Qur'an... and I'd be curious what you think the scope of the History of the Qur'an should be... because, more or less any view of the Qur'an could be accounted for in the article... and we'd have to have someone write for other sections of Qur'anic history. This article has problems but I'm not sure how a rename would help and this article is just about the origins of the Qur'an be those origins divine or human, during 30 years of the Prophet's life or over decades after it. Etc... it's not about the whole history.

What I do think would be useful is making a list on this page of what you find to be the most egregious violations of WP:CITE and WP:NPOV and posting them here so we can either try to clean them up or maybe just remove them. gren グレン 03:32, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Note, I don't want this article to be moved or changed without consensus.Vice regent 05:49, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

I also back the move. --Wadq (talk) 02:34, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

I also support the rename and move "Qur'an and history" would be more suitable or "Qur'an scripting"...etc. The article mainly talks about collection and scripting Dr eng x (talk) 23:25, 13 February 2014 (UTC)

Islamic View or Sunni View?

The proposed universal traditional Islamic view seems to be merely the view based on the Sunni traditions and ignores the Shi'a traditional view. There is contention in regard to the completeness of the Quran and even who commissioned its collection. Much of this is found in the 2-3rd Century AH polemics between the Shia and Sunni schools which makes reference to interpolations and omissions.

Then there is the debate in regard to Uthman rejecting Ali's Quran in favor of conglomerating a number of competing codices and the 'rejection' of Ibn Massud's text. --Ari89 (talk) 15:22, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Claiming Bell, Watts and Rippin hold onto the traditionalist view is quite a stretch. They reject the claims of divine authority rather openly and Rippin makes a point of textual variations. I think a redefinition of the Traditional vs 'Sceptical' view is necessary or else we run in to a lot of trouble. For example, the 'sceptical view' is defined by rejecting the Uthman Edition canonisation story yet it goes down the Hagarism road.

--Ari89 (talk) 19:13, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, well, there were lots of early debates and views that aren't considered traditionalist. I do think we have a tendency to go to extremes (there are many non-traditionalist views which aren't Crone and Cooks early views) and we put too much emphasis on older research. Hagarism was important but it is old. It's like like trying to use Darwin today... biologists have greatly refined that work and people who followed Crone and Cook (including themselves) have refined their work. We should define better what we mean by traditionalist. I'm not sure of Orthodox is any better "orthodox Sunni view" but, clearly there is a large group of Sunnis--majority of Muslims--who believe that it is the word of God give to Muhammad and compiled by Uthman. Some special moniker needs to be used to indicate this. gren グレン 20:33, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Gerd R. Puin's Recent Scholarship

The Hidden Origins of Islam (2008) Gerd R. Puin (essentially the authoritative source on the Sana'a manuscripts) is now releasing his book (co-authored with Ohlig) on the origins of Islam. It was allegedly released in August but I am yet to see it anywhere. The publishers notes on Puin's new book "The Hidden Origins of Islam: New Research Into It's Early History" (Gerd R. Puin & Karl-Heinz Ohlig) are as follows:

“The standard histories of Muhammad and the early development of Islam are based on Islamic literature that dates to the ninth and tenth centuries--some two centuries or more after the death of Muhammad in 632. Islamic literary sources do not exist for the seventh and eighth centuries, when, according to tradition, Muhammad and his immediate followers lived. All that is preserved from this time period are a few commemorative building inscriptions and assorted coins.

Based on the premise that reliable history can only be written on the basis of sources that are contemporary with the events described, the contributors to this in-depth investigation present research that reveals the obscure origins of Islam in a completely new light. As the authors meticulously show, the name "Muhammad" first appears on coins in Syria bearing Christian iconography. In this context the name is used as an honorific meaning "revered" or "praiseworthy" and can only refer to Jesus Christ, as Christianity was the predominant religion of the area at this time. This same reference exists in the building inscription of the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, built by the caliph `Abd al-Malik.

The implication of these and other findings here presented is that the early Arab rulers adhered to a sect of Christianity. Indeed, evidence from the Koran, finalized at a much later time, shows that its central theological tenets were influenced by a pre-Nicean, Syrian Christianity. Linguistic analysis also indicates that Aramaic, the common language throughout the Near East for many centuries and the language of Syrian Christianity, significantly influenced the Arabic script and vocabulary used in the Koran. Finally, it was not until the end of the eighth and ninth centuries that Islam formed as a separate religion, and the Koran underwent a period of historical development of at least 200 years.”

Having just seen this now it seems I was right in my speculation of where he was heading. He picks up on - the evidence by Yehuda Nevo regarding the inscriptions; Crone and Cook's thesis that Islam originated from the Judeo-Christian context and their scepticism in regard to the authenticity of the Hadith's; Luxenberg's Syriac sources and thesis regarding the heavy Christian influence.

I will examine what this book has to say in regard to the Sana'a manuscripts as soon as I get a chance. --Ari89 (talk) 20:16, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Amazon says this was published my Prometheus, which has no record of it on its website. We'd need to actually have the book (or secondary commentary on it) to use it. gren グレン 17:23, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Seems like a re-hash of the Hagarism theory to me. Prometheus books isn't exactly a credible publisher either. I'm not certain to what quantity the book would be usable in the article - I think that may largely depend on whether or not academic texts discuss it. Don't we already know about Puin's thoughts re: the Sana fragments? ITAQALLAH 18:22, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

I guess we'd know if we could see the book... although, it's skepticism... not necessarily Hagarism... and the problem is people conflate the two... there are plenty of skeptics out there... but no one believes in the group called the Hagarenes. In that case, people talk about Puin as an expert on the Sana'a manuscripts but that's from his 1996 article and he has very little scholarly output and references. It really is hard to get a good picture of what the field looks like without access to the specialist journals (I don't know one American university with access to Journal of Qur'anic Studies). gren グレン 08:26, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Although it leans that way, surely, it wouldn't be a restatement on the Hagarism theory. The original publish of the book in German was Verlag Hans Schiler. They tend to specialise in Arabic works and publish a number of books in the fields of critical archaeology and anthropology. Puin's comments are not limited to the Atlantic monthly comments by any means - he has published a number of essays in the development of the Quranic text and the Sana'a manuscripts in particular. --Ari89 (talk) 11:40, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

I have a review of the book by Hawting from the Journal of Qur'anic Studies; 2006, Vol. 8 Issue 2, p134-137. It seems to be a collection of 11 essays by a variety of authors. It apparently mostly reflects the scholarship of Ohlig, Christoph Luxenberg, and Volker Popp. Puin contributes an essay as well as some scholars involved in the Amari project. --Ari89 (talk) 11:53, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Any other of Puin's works you can cite and source you should add to his bibliography. His publications section only has two works, one being the English version which we can't find much information on. Maybe you can populate it with references. gren グレン 05:20, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Prophet Muhammad being illiterate

I have added a passage from the quran which mentions that prophet Muhammad could neither read or write because ofcourse its an article about the quran and here the quran is itself talking on the possibility of Muhammad writing the quran. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 119.153.63.35 (talk) 20:25, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Another Quranic verse that supports prophet was unlearnt: {'And thou (O Muhammad) wast not a reader of any scripture before it, nor didst thou write it with thy right hand, for then might those have doubted who follow falsehood' } (29:48) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.18.235.210 (talk) 12:49, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

Abu Bakr

"After Muhammad's death, Abu Bakr initially exercised a policy of laissez faire as well"

What? Faro0485 (talk) 03:08, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

as it stands now, the quality of the article is very poor

The first section (History) presents the traditional Islamic account as if it were fact, not simply a (debatable) reconstruction. This section would also urgently need an English revision by a native English-speaker.

The idea of first presenting the traditional Islamic account (naming it "History") and then the entire complex discussion on the historicity of the Quran, smacks of POV.Giordaano (talk) 10:39, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

hey due nice to see u around, now ur mission and intentions are clear to me, i challenge you for a debate on each and every beleive of yours.......

let see who have guts to prove. الله أكبرMohammad Adil 08:28, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

Mohammad Adil, Wikipedia discussion pages are not a platform for challenging people to debate. Please grow up. --Ari89 (talk) 01:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

u get it wrong ..... i am not challenging him here but if he accepts it we will discuss it out side wikipedia, its actually a personal challange not encyclopediac.

i am not tht screwed to start such stuff on an encyclopedia.

الله أكبرMohammad Adil 15:43, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Talk pages are for discussing improvements to the article. If we had more people doing that instead of 'challenging' people for debates on what they believe, perhaps the article might not be in such a mess. Help improve the article. : ) MP ^{(talk•contribs)} 10:47, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Please do not feed the trolls.

Hehe! MP, please observe Don't feed the trolls! and Wikipedia:Deny recognition! Just look at the spelling! Rursus dixit. (^mbork³!) 09:12, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Estelle Whelan: text-critical analysis in support of a history of the Qur'an

(discussion copied across from the talk page of editor Rklawton ). I do not find Whelan referenced in this article, but should she be? TomHennell (talk) 14:48, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

You should probably take some time and read up on the history of the Quran as you see to have bought into popular, modern myths. The current version doesn't match the earliest versions, and parts of it even today are incoherent even to Arabic language scholars. You might also find this article informative Historicity of Muhammad. Rklawton (talk) 22:01, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

My apologies for barging into somebody else's discussion Rk; but I have assumed from your informed contributions to the article on the Gospel of John that you are concerned that Wikipedia articles on religious texts should reflect a robust standard of critical scholarship. I was therefore intrigued by the confidence of your assertions as to the history of the Qur'an and the and the antiquity of the canonical texts and variants, as your views appear incompatible with those of Estelle Whelan;

"The different types of evidence cited here all thus lead to the conclusion that the Muslim tradition is reliable, at least in broad outline, in attributing the first codification of the Qur'anic text to ‘Uthman and his appointed commission. The Qur'an was available to his successors as an instrument to help weld the diverse peoples of the rapidly expanding empire into a relatively unified polity." http://www.islamic-awareness.org/History/Islam/Dome_Of_The_Rock/Estwitness.html

more evidence supporting Whelan's conclusions can be found in the attached article - whose critical scholarship I find very convincing, especially in confirming Whelan's rejection of the speculative and ahistorical theories of such scholars as Wansborough and Crone. http://www.teachislam.com/dmdocuments/64/The%20Quranic%20Manuscripts.pdf

But what is your view, and do you have any more recent evidence which might cast doubt on Whelan's conclusions? TomHennell (talk) 11:51, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Estelle Whelan is grossly dated and not an Islamic scholar or linguist. In short, she's unqualified to have an opinion on the matter. This conversation should take place in the relevant article's talk page - not here. In this way, more editors are invited to the conversation and it becomes part of the article's history. Rklawton (talk) 12:56, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

So far as I can make out, Whelan was primarily an historian of Islamic art and manuscripts - with particular reference to early Islamic inscriptions on monuments and coins. But since Qur'anic quotations within inscriptions - such as those of the Dome of the Rock, and on early coins - form our the earliest surviving corpus of securely dated Qur'anic texts, I would have thought here views are highly relevant to the debate. And although she died in 1997, her work is still a great deal more recent than the are the more skeptical studies of Wansborough and Crone (who I understand no longer maintains those particular views). TomHennell (talk) 16:18, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

In this state, the only word I can find to describe this article is ridiculous

Scholars being called "skeptical" because they don't believe in a supernatural origin of the Qur'an? It is the people who believe in the supernatural origin that should be called believers, be briefly mentioned in the introduction and then the vast majority of the article should be about secular work. Wikipedia is a secular workspace of debate, and not a mosque where to pronouce your beliefs. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.68.175.198 (talk) 13:35, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Not a good article

I'm disappointed by this page. I was hoping to read about what academic historians found out about the Quran, and all I find is a headline "Views of skeptical scholar" as sub chapter 3.1. The views of "skeptical scholars" should not be reduced to a short section, they should be the main content of the entire page. What Islamic and other theologians have to say is of course relevant to a religious subject, but their interpretations should not dominate the page, because they're not scientists and not unbiased.

The chapter starting

However, the Dome of the Rock, with its Qur'anic inscriptions suggests a much earlier dating for the Quran than 'skeptical' scholars would admit. These inscriptions in the Dome of the Rock have been known to scholars for more than a century and have repeatedly been the subject of interpretation, yet little attention has been paid to the elements from which they were composed. ...

specifically annoys me. It smacks of original research. The author apparently tries to object scientific findings because he doesn't like what they say. Anorak2 (talk) 18:27, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

I second that and the statement of the previous poster. This article would deserve Template:In-universe, although I am well aware that it is unthinkable to actually put it there. --80.219.253.63 (talk) 15:15, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree as well. The article just doesn't read like a history article. There's some content concerning history, but the amount of apology and theology is too high. It's like an apology, where the theologist quotes scholarly work in order to refute it on the basis of his/her religous beliefs. Content would be fine for the quaran article, but not for an article about the history of quaran. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.101.4.98 (talk) 11:09, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Request for comment

		Proposal for removing prefixes "Islamic views on xyz"
		I have started a request move to remove the prefixes Attached with the Prophets in Islam to there Names as in Islam. Like Islamic views on Abraham → Ibrahim as it becomes difficult to search the topic. Please participate in the discussion at Talk:Page Thanks. --Ibrahim ebi (talk) 19:47, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Topkapi manuscript

Are there no other sources for this? The source used in this article, [4], says "This manuscript was written in kufic script and contains 408 folios. The extant folios contain more than 99% of the text of the Qur'an. Only two folios are missing. The manuscript shows the script, illumination and marking of vowels that are from the Umayyad times (i.e., late 1st century / early 2nd century of hijra)." But what seems to have been ignored is that the section where it says this links to [5] which states:

"Mehmed Ali Pasha, Governor of Egypt, sent this muṣḥaf to the Ottoman Sultan Mahmud II as a gift in 1226 AH / 1811 CE. A note in the beginning of the muṣḥaf says that it was brought to the Topkapi Palace and kept in the Holy Relics Department, which was built during the reign of Sultan Selim I. A facsimile edition of this manuscript appeared in the year 2007.[1]

Did this Qur'an belong to the third caliph ʿUthmān? The answer is no. There are good number of other Qur'ans [such as the ones at St. Petersburg, Samarqand, Istanbul and two at Cairo, viz., at al-Hussein mosque and Dār al-Kutub al-Misriyya] having at times turned up in different parts of the Islamic world, almost all purporting to show the traces of the blood of the third caliph ʿUthmān upon certain pages, and thus the genuine ʿUthmānic Qur'an, the imām, which he was reading at the time of his death. Moreover, the manuscript clearly shows the script, illumination and marking of vowels that are from the Umayyad times (i.e., late 1st century / early 2nd century of hijra).[2] Furthermore, this manuscript was also briefly discussed by Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn al-Munajjid who did not consider it to be from the time of caliph ʿUthmān."

So the source we are using actually denies that it belonged to Uthman. Dougweller (talk) 08:52, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

(re:)Topkapi is not Uthman's Quran, I think San'a manuscript is the oldest manuscript. Uthman's Qur'an has not been found yet (and probably does not exist), but the Qurans we read today are Uthmanic Quran. An abstract about topkapi's can be found on this website: [6].Kiatdd (talk) 18:39, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

What is the scope of this article? POV tag.

I've added the POV tag to this article, because of a long string of obviously problematic claims, from the very first—"The compilation of the written Qur'an (as opposed to the recited Qur'an) spanned several decades and forms an important part of early Islamic history"—through such as "Due to the fact that the Qur'an was revealed in disjointed verses and chapters, a point came when it needed to be gathered into a coherent whole text" and "Scholars are unanimous regarding the fact that Ali ibn Abu Talib possessed his own personal transcript of the text of the Qur'an, which he had collected himself six months after the death of the Muhammad, and that this was the first compilation of the Qur'an." Almost every sentence in the first paragraph fails WP:NPOV (i.e., there are a significant number of experts who disagree with plain readings of the statements), and the rest of the article has major problems as well.

Some questions: What is the topic of this article? Is it supposed to about the traditional origins theory of the Quran? Is it supposed to be about the scholarly study of the history of the Quran? Something else? --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 23:06, 6 May 2014 (UTC)

It's been about a month: Here's a suggestion: Since this page is primarily about the Quran according to Islamic views, move this page to Quran in Islam, following the model of other such pages, such as Marriage in Islam, Apostasy in Islam, Prophets in Islam, Gospel in Islam, etc. Then this page could be recreated according to WP:NPOV including WP:NPOV#Religion; that is, the notable religious views can be discussed within the context of the views of the mainstream, academic sources. --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 21:05, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

How Exactly did Masʿūd’s Codex Differ from Uthman's Canonized Version?

This article has a section entitled "Varying codices and the start of canonization". In this section it speaks of Masud's variation and Ubay ibn Ka'ab's variations to the Qur'an that we have today. About Masud's variation the article states, "It is believed that it (Masud's variation) did not contain sura Fātiḥa, the opening sura, and the mu’awwithatayni, the two short suras with which the Qur’an ends (Suras 113 and 114)". The article goes on to say that "MOST OF THE OTHER DIFFERENCES involve only altered vowels with the SAME CONSONANT TEXT" (emphasis mine).

It is well known that the Arabic language in the 600s was written without vowel markings. Vowel markings did not start to evolve until after the late 8th century - as the earliest manuscripts of the Qur'an indicate. [http://www.amazon.com/Bible-And-Quran-Steven-Masood/dp/1850783691/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1399886371&sr=8-1&keywords=steven+masood+the+bible+and+the+qur%27an ] Therefore, to state that Masud's textual differences "involved only altered vowels with the same consonant text" would be a false statement. If there were textual differences, those differences had to be greater that simple differences in pronounced vowels.

As an example the article states that, "Masʿūd is said to have written kulla ma as two words rather than one" and quotes an online source. But attributing to the fact that early sources say that Masud and his followers refused to give up their copies of the Qur'an (as this article mentions in agreement with many other sources), one must question whether such a small difference would attribute to such a serious refusal. And it makes one wonder whether such examples are not conjecture or hearsay.

D2west (talk) 09:01, 12 May 2014 (UTC) d2west

I don't believe the primary sources say that Masʿūd's text was only written. Supposedly it included also Masʿūd's own vocalizations as he or those who learned from him would recite them. In English scholarship at least, "text" means whatever substance of the work there is, whether oral or written, and "textual variants" means not just written differences between two manuscripts, but also any substantive differences that are only transmitted orally. Second, another point to remember is that "vowel markings" (i.e., ḥarakāt) aren't the only vowel symbols.

Take this last point to b. Masʿūd. Here's one mentioned in Small 2011 reporting G. Puin (p. 58 n 17): Q 21:4 reads قَـالَ in the standard text (perfect tense, "said") but b. Masʿūd read a base قـل as an imperative (i.e., قُـلْ "say"). --Atethnekos (Discussion, Contributions) 20:59, 13 May 2014 (UTC)

References

Lies, half-truths, distortions and opinions

The whole article is filled with them. Mohammed was taken to a wet-nurse as an infant, to a Christian woman, who later when his own mother could not support him adopted him. He was brought up as a Christian. He later married Khadiyah, a Christian woman. His uncle Waraqa ibn Nawfal was an Ebionite (Jewish Christian).

The Qur'an was dictated by a man who used remote viewing as his method of controlled visioning. Over 23 years Mohammed had 42 different scribes. In 629 he had scribe Abdullah Ibn Sa'd Ibn Abi Sarh murdered (this is being merciful?) for rejecting him as a prophet (due to Mohammed consenting to too many corrective modifications to his 'inspired message').

The order of the Surahs found in the Qur'an is NOT the original order. There are several websites which list the original order. Uthman changed the order and excised a sizable amount of content in at least one Surah and so the Qur’an suffered a ‘linguistic’ cleansing starting from 12 years after Mohammed died. Surah 33 was cut by 63% by Uthman plus everything relating to his Christian wife Khadiya.

Of 114 Surahs, only 29 pass God’s verification test (of letters, known as Al Huruf Al Muqatta'at), as 1-5 letters preceding the 29 verified or sealed Surahs about 25% (only 3 of 28 Surahs written in Medina were sealed), not nearly an acceptable percentage for a trusted authority. (Mohammed admits several times in an offhand way, so he is disbelieved, that he lied).

Whoever has overseen this article has failed to verify the facts or has allowed religionaries to input content unchallenged. 142.165.193.234 (talk) 05:03, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for sharing The Truth with us in your unsigned comment. In future, please confine comments, however preciously eccentric, to the article itself. — ℜob C. alias ALAROB 14:17, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

Accuracy of manuscripts?

One point that has fascinated me about the Quran is this: just how has its text been transmitted down the centuries free of scribal corruption? Let's be honest: people are imperfect, even those with the best intentions make mistakes, & copying any document by hand will inevitably introduce mistakes. (You can verify this at home for yourself: grab a book, any book, & copy a page from it by hand. Now check for mistakes; if you managed to avoid making any mistakes, you are either very lucky or very skilled at copying.) Now I'm taking at face value the implication in this article that all copies of the Quran are free of all mistakes or errors in transcriptions -- & therefore identical, & I honestly have no problem believing that. But I would like some explanation of how this was done. Was it similar to the Masoretic scribes who exerted pains-taking steps to avoid such errors in the first place? Or similar to European scribes, after a copy was written out, did one or more different scribes check the copy against its exemplar, & correct any errors? Or maybe I'm reading into this concern for an accurate text of the Quran something that was not intended. But if all copies of the Quran are correct, the means this was accomplished would be very important to know. -- llywrch (talk) 21:03, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

Cleanup required for "Oldest Surviving Copies" and "Skeptical Scholars"

These sections require an overhaul. Recent discoveries (2015 and 2014) of very early copies of the Quran render some of the information in these sections as outdated. Wansborogh's and John Gilchrist's critiques are compromised by the recent discoveries. There should be a rewording of these sections accordingly. Also, both the sub-sections seem very fragmented and disorganized. There should be a reverse chronological order to the discoveries and theories in both sections for the reader's convenience. Code16 (talk) 19:02, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

The Completeness/Manuscripts section may be merged with "Oldest Surviving Copies" as well, it is a fragment currently by itself. Code16 (talk) 19:32, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

Agree with both of these. I have meanwhile added the BBC story as a citation, as it provides the detailed radiocarbon dates. TomHennell (talk) 23:59, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

I have also linked to the Birmingham University press release; and the Guardian story; as these claim the Brum leaves to be from the same codex as counterparts in Paris. If that is the case, those too will surely be carbon-dated as a matter of priority - which may confirm (or refute) the Brum dating. But that association would be consistent with a date around 642 for the original codex, as that is when the Cairo mosque from which the Paris leaves were obtained, was founded. It is already clear that something of an academic barney is brewing, as a settled, written-form, Quranic text in the early 640s rather undermines the traditonal Sunni narrative of an Uthmanic redaction. Comments from Saudi scholars seek to cast doubt on the radiocarbon date Saud al-Sarhan, the director of research at the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, said he doubted that the manuscript found in Birmingham was as old as the researchers claimed, noting that its Arabic script included dots and separated chapters — features that were introduced later. He also said that dating the skin on which the text was written did not prove when it was written. Manuscript skins were sometimes washed clean and reused later, he said. Also see François Déroche on the dating of the Paris Quran Codex Parisino-petropolitanus. Waley, from the BM, takes the contrary view that the date of the writing is unlikely to be much later than that of the skins. TomHennell (talk) 10:23, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

Very interesting, if the date is pushed back, that would directly support John Burton's argument that the Quran was compiled and standardized within the generation of the Prophet. Burton hypothesized that all accounts otherwise are fabrications, meant to support a status-quo legalistic biases in later sharia formulations. (Source: Cambridge Companion to the Quran. pp. 62–63.) If verified, this would indeed be very damaging to the mainstream sectarian (especially sunni) narrative. Code16 (talk) 13:50, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

Quite so; though I suspect we will need to wait a bit before the full implications of this discovery permeate the published literature to the extent that they can be included in Wikipedia. Obviously, there will be demands to double-check the radio-carbon dates, as also the assertion by the PHD student that other leaves of the same codex are to be found in Paris. There are now quite a number of 'early' radio-carbon dated Qurans - on which see http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Text/Mss/radio.html - which are not infrequently disputed on paleographic or other grounds. Déroche, in particular, claims several instances where carbon dating ranges have overestated the ages of Qurans with dated donative inscriptions, by 50 years or more. The Brum dating though is not out of line with that found for the Sana'a palimsest (578-669), whose underwriting has been classfied as pre-Uthmanic, by those who otherwise defend the significance of the Uthmanic redaction.

What makes the Brum fragments different, and too the Tubingen Quran; is that (unlike the Sana'a underwriting) they appear to present a developed, formally presented, written text, complete with decorated chapter divisions and marked verse endings. It is common ground that the Suras of the Quran were early committed to writing, and that consolidated collections of these writings were then compiled. But in the classic narrative, these writings are regarded as personal aides memoir; the essential recitation of the Quran was committed to memory, and transmitted exactly from memoriser to memoriser orally. But if comparison with other cultures is allowed (as indeed many Muslims would dispute), then such exact oral transmission is not found. If a text that is committed to memory, is to be transmitted exactly, then it really has to be written down as an intermediate stage; even if the memorisers themselves are not literate. Exact reproduction by rote implies a public standard written check-text. As to Uthman, I think his activities would be readily recognised by Thomas Hobbes (or Henry VIII, or Charlemagne); an absolute ruler cannot allow the 'Word of God' to circulate uncontrolled; but must establish himself as the sole fount of valid transmission, suppressing all except the 'offical' version. But this is entirely political posturing; any textual implications are secondary. TomHennell (talk) 15:35, 23 July 2015 (UTC)

Cairo 1924

User @Ballymore1: alleged that "All source material was directly referenced through an extensive bibliography" as a reason to revert my edit. Now I'm asking this last user to defend his claim. First there this paragraph:

At the beginning of the early 20th century, the Quran did not yet have a widely accepted mass-printed version, there being many publications with variations in text and Qira’at (readings).

No source or citation was given. We ask Ballymore1 how "All source material was directly referenced through an extensive bibliography" when this wasn't even sourced?

This was also the case in Cairo, Egypt; hence the Egyptian government was motivated to publish a government-sponsored official version for religious education in its schools.

Again the only cite is an article in Deutsh, who isn't specific as to the page which can support the statement before it. We ask Ballymore1 how "All source material was directly referenced through an extensive bibliography" when this wasn't properly sourced?

The first edition of the Egyptian Quran was published on July 10, 1924 in Cairo; subsequent revisions to the text were made in 1924 and 1936 when it was re-published. The text upon release in 1936 became known as the Faruq edition in honour of the Egyptian king Faruq.

Again it isn't specific as to the page which can support the statements before it. We ask Ballymore1 how "All source material was directly referenced through an extensive bibliography" when this wasn't properly sourced?

While only intended as a government-sponsored version for religious schools and never meant to be text-critical in a historical sense, the Cairo edition quickly became remarkably popular throughout the Middle East and has been almost universally accepted by both Shia and Sunni Muslims as the ‘official’ Qu’ranic text.

No source or citation was given. We ask Ballymore1 how "All source material was directly referenced through an extensive bibliography" when this wasn't even sourced? Those are only some examples. --CounterTime (talk) 19:24, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

@Ballymore1: You're making some pretty big claims in that article. Could you provide another reference than Gabriel Said Reynolds (2007) and the references therein that confirms what you re-added? 19:35, 5 December 2015 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

User @CounterTime: Hi CounterTime. My source is principally Gabriel Reynolds, The Qu'ran in its Historical Context, Routledge, 2007. In it he extensively quotes Bergstrasser's work, whom I also re-reference. Please read Page 2-3 of Reynolds work below; it is in PDF format online:

https://serdargunes.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/the-quran-in-its-historical-context-gabriel-said-reynolds.pdf

I am currently re-phrasing the article to give it a smoother flow. However, in terms of references, I believe it is accurately cited.

Please, after reading Reynolds work, let me know where you disagree.

Many thanks and best regards,

Ballymore1 -- unsigned comment by Ballymore1

Dear @Ballymore1: Using only one source isn't enough for such big claims, there's also the fact that the section is a complete copy-paste from the Reynolds (2007) source using what seems to be a form of cherry picking (see WP:Cherrypicking), and this is contrary to Wikipedia policies that prohibit the pasting from non-free copyrighted material, such as Reynolds (2007). Also a quick search in Google Books and Google Scholars of 'Cairo 1924' suggests that it is merely a myth, I invite you to do that. Regards. 20:07, 5 December 2015 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

User @CounterTime: Hi CounterTime.

I am not making 'big claims', I am relaying the importance of the 1924 Cairo edition to Qu'ranic history from scholarly sources, which is an important development in the history of the Qu'ran.

I feel you are being disingenious, as adjacent sentences in the piece naturally link together rather than being on separate themes.

So let's go through these claims you mentioned:

(1, 2, 3): At the beginning of the early 20th century, the Quran did not yet have a widely accepted mass-printed version, there being many publications with variations in text and Qira’at (readings). Minor adjustments were subsequently made to this text in following editions, one published later in 1924 and another in 1936. The text released in 1936 became known as the Faruq edition in honor of the Egyptian king, Faruq (r. 1936–52).

Referenced in: Gabriel Reynolds, The Qu'ran in its historical context, 2007; based on Bergstrasser:

"In the early twentieth century, therefore, the shape of the Qur’an would have seemed anything but clear. In fact, the Egyptian government was motivated to begin the project that would lead to the Cairo Qur’an edition due to the variations (or “errors,” as an appendix to the Cairo edition describes them) found in the Qur’anic texts that they had been importing for state schools."

I referenced Bergstrasser in the original, one of the most famous scholars of the Qu'ran in the 20th century, and am happy to link this to Reynolds work. Here's Bergstrasser talking about the 1924 Cairo edition of Hafs an Asim:

“Es ist eine Merkwürdigkeit dieses einzigartigen Buches, daß sich auch diese noch belassene Freiheit weiter eingeschränkt hat, so daß heute fast nur mehr die Lesung des Hafs ‘an ‘Asim bekannt und gebraucht ist.” O. Pretzl, “Aufgaben und Ziele der Koranforschung,” Actes du XXe Congrès international des orientalistes, Bruxelles 5–10 septembre 1938, Louvain: Bureaux du muséon, 1940, 328–9. Reprinted in R. Paret (ed.), Der Koran, Wege der Forschung 326, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1975, 411–12.

By the way, I am German. German scholars of Qu'ranic manuscripts were among the most widely published in the early 20th century, including of course Bergstrasser. You cannot discount German scholarship of a field simply because you yourself can not speak the language. Happy to translate for you if that is the case or we can escalate to a German wikipedia editor.

(4) Bergsträsser was deeply impressed by the Cairo edition, commenting that there: “ragt eine alt-islamische Wissenschaft lebenskräftig und leistungsfähig in unsere Tage herein; er ist ein Dokument für den überraschend hohen gegenwärtigen Stand der ägyptischen Koranlesungswissenschaft.” “Koranlesung in Kairo,” 10.

Again do you want me to translate for you? We can also escalate to a German wikipedia editor so he can confirm to you what is stated.

The 1924 Cairo edition, based on Hafs an Asim, became remarkably popular for both Sunni and Shia Muslims and is today seen as the de facto Qu'ran edition. This is recorded history, and I referenced both Professor Reynolds and the late Bergstrasser extensively on this, including both their works.

If you have a specific disagreement with a citation, then please mention it. Otherwise this is looking more like vandalism on your part.

Best regards, -- unsigned comment by Ballymore1

Dear @Ballymore1: I said that "Using only one source isn't enough for such big claims, (1) there's also the fact that the section is a complete copy-paste from the Reynolds (2007) source using what seems to be a form of cherry picking (see WP:Cherrypicking), (2) and this is contrary to Wikipedia policies that prohibit the pasting from non-free copyrighted material, such as Reynolds (2007). (3) Also a quick search in Google Books and Google Scholars of 'Cairo 1924' suggests that it is merely a myth, I invite you to do that. (4)" For (1) it is a big claim since when one stated that the Cairo edition had many discrepancies with historical Qur'anic manuscripts, which needs additional information to back it up. I don't object to the use of Deutsh sources. You currently didn't address (2), (3) and (4), however you successfully provided some sources for the other things that I mentioned, although they were limited in that they were all taken from Reynolds (2007). Regards. CounterTime (talk) 20:53, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

User @CounterTime:

The Cairo 1924 version is most certainly not a myth.

I have quoted Bergstrasser, Reynolds, and work by Mendelssohn all in a short passage. I certainly did not cherry pick any of their work on this either. You are engaging in vandalism. I will remove your vandalism and will escalate this to an administrator who can then decide this dispute in an unbiased and objective way.

Best regards,

B -- unsigned comment by Ballymore1

Dear @Ballymore1: Sorry for not being specific, it isn't a myth, but that it was different from canonical manuscripts is most certainly.

"I have quoted Bergstrasser, Reynolds, and work by Mendelssohn all in a short passage."

Yes, and I said: "Could you provide another reference than Gabriel Said Reynolds (2007) and the references therein that confirms what you re-added?"

"I certainly did not cherry pick any of their work on this either."

The one who wrote that section before most certainly did (he cherry picked Reynolds (2007)).

I didn't remove it for now, so how can you call it a vandalism? Were just in the phase of discussion. I didn't even say that you should delete it. All my point was is that it should have some better references, other than what is in Reynolds (2007) or the references therein, and that it should be conform with WP:Cherrypicking and the policies on not copy/pasting material from non-free copyrighted sources. --CounterTime (talk) 21:19, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

And BTW why did you delete the {{multiple issues| ...}}, we still didn't come to a consensus? 21:24, 5 December 2015 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

@CounterTime: The Cairo 1924 edition has multiple differences with earlier Qu'ranic manuscripts. One of the most known research pieces on this, that is cited in the article, is the comparison between Cairo 1924 and the Samarqand manuscripts by Medelsohn:

A. Jeffery; I. Mendelsohn (1942). "The Orthography of the Samarqand Qur'ān Codex". Journal of the American Oriental Society (American Oriental Society) 62: 175–195.

Gabriel Reynolds work was not cherry picked; his commentary on the Cairo 1924 edition was simply incorporated into the article along with Bergstrasser and Otto Pretzl, among others. Both Bergstrasser and Pretzl have stand-alone commentary that are also referenced independently. This can be expanded to include many other scholarly publications, such as Keith Small (ex. Textual Criticism and Qur'an Manuscripts, 2012), and Von Denffer (ex. An Introduction to the Sciences of the Qur’an), and I am happy to link these into the citations.

This is not a theological discussion, Wikipedia is about facts.

Please keep Wikipedia an objective place based on historical facts, rather than opinions.

Thank you.

B — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ballymore1 (talk • contribs) 21:54, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

@Ballymore1: That's where the conflict is. The article you cite was taken from the Reynolds (2007) source, could you please, for WP:V purposes, quote from it where the authors explicitly say "The Cairo 1924 version has many differences with earlier Qur'anic manuscripts"?

You may complain that it wasn't cherry-picked but still, it's simply copy/pasting from it, which violates wiki policies on the prohibition of copy pasting from non-free copyrighted sources. Could you please change the text according to your own wording to resolve the issue? Could you also remove the link you included? (or you may contact the author to see whether that copy was legitimate)

"This can be expanded to include many other scholarly publications, such as Keith Small (ex. Textual Criticism and Qur'an Manuscripts, 2012), and Von Denffer (ex. An Introduction to the Sciences of the Qur’an), and I am happy to link these into the citations."

That would be great. I have Von Denffer's book, and in it he doesn't say that the Cairo 1924 edition has many differences with earlier Qur'anic manuscripts, here's what he says: "The Qur'anic text in printed form now used widely in the Muslim world and developing into a 'standard version', is the so-called 'Egyptian' edition, also known as the King Fu'ad edition, since it was introduced in Egypt under King Fu'ad. This edition is based on the reading of Hafs, as reported by 'Asim, and was first printed in Cairo in 1925/1344H. Numerous copies have since been printed."

"This is not a theological discussion, Wikipedia is about facts."

Note that most of the criticism I made was on the sources, and on the proper application of wikipedia policies.

I'm fully aware that this isn't a forum for general discussion on the topic, rather it is about discussing the article and its issues, as I have done.

22:51, 5 December 2015 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

@CounterTime: I see, so your issue is with these last two sentences:

"However, the Cairo edition is often at odds with historical Quranic manuscripts." "Professor Arthur Jeffrey, for example, compared the Cairo edition with the Samarkand manuscript, detailing discrepancies and scribal insertions between the two."

Yes, we can change that. What about the following:

"Multiple comparative studies have since been done between the Cairo edition and other early Qu'ranic manuscripts. These include publications by Arthur Jeffrey and Moses Mendelssohn, Ahmad von Denffer, and Behnam Sadeghi."

I think that sounds much better.

I also recommend we change the title section from the lengthy: "The Cairo Qu'ran compilation of 1924: The first widely accepted mass-printed Arabic Qu’ran" simply to "The 1924 Cairo Qu'ran: The emergence of a 'de facto' Arabic Qu'ran"

What do you think?

Best regards,

B

@Ballymore1: Okay, great! Provide the refs, then I'll check them and we'll discuss. As for the title of the section, that was exactly what I was going to state, however it prefer this one: "The 1924 Cairo Qur'an: The emergence of a wide printed Arabic Qu'ran" There should also be a discussion of the Cairo 1936. Regards. 23:49, 5 December 2015 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

@CounterTime: Hi CounterTime, I have updated the last two sentences to the following:

In the field of textual criticism, multiple comparative studies have since been done between the Cairo edition and early Qu'ranic manuscripts. These include publications by Arthur Jeffery and Isaac Mendelsohn[59], Keith Small[60] and Behnam Sadeghi[61].

Although I have the PDF version of Von Denffer, it doesn't contain the page numbers unfortunately so I haven't linked it in yet. Could you let me know which page he references the Cairo edition in particular for textual criticism and I'll add him to the list as well?

As for the proposed title, "The 1924 Cairo Qur'an: The emergence of a widely printed Arabic Qu'ran", this wouldn't be accurate. There were mass-published Arabic Qu'ran's before, such as Gustav Fluegel's Arabic version. What makes 1924 Cairo unique isn't that it was mass-pubished but that it was so widely adopted, not just in the Middle East but globally. So the title "The 1924 Cairo Qu'ran: The emergence of a 'de facto' Arabic Qu'ran" would be an accurate description, but we could also say "The 1924 Cairo Qu'ran: The emergence of a universally adopted Arabic Qu'ran" or something along those lines. Have a think and let me know what you think would be a good title capturing this event in Qu'ranic history.

Thanks,

B

@Ballymore1: I also don't have the page numbers in Von Denffer. Also stating "widely adopted" is a bit ambiguous, could you please suggest something other? Thanks. 21:19, 13 December 2015 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

@CounterTime: We could say 'universally adopted'. Alternatively, we could say the emergence of a 'de facto' Arabic Qu'ran, as though the adoption is virtually universal it was never enforced by any law (in the same way English is the 'de facto' language of the United States and Australia). I believe 'de facto' is actually the most accurate description. Apart from those two, I can't really think of something else at present - do you have any ideas?

Regards,

B — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ballymore1 (talk • contribs) 19:19, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

@Ballymore1: But first, could you please specify in which page of "Behnam Sadeghi & Mohsen Goudarzi, "Sana'a and the Origins of the Qu'ran", Der Islam, 87 (2012), 1−129." do the two professors mention the Cairo 1924 manuscript? Thanks.

22:38, 31 December 2015 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

References

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Page protected for 1 week

Rather than block edit-warrier disruption, I have protected this article for 1 week. Work it out here, OK? ~Amatulić (talk) 18:32, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Amatulic. I have no intention of lining up on one side or the other of this edit war; but I do feel that this article cannot be considered satisfactory without a section describing the 1924 Cairo edition; how it came to be, and its significance in substantially achieving a fixed printed text. Whether the specific section in contention is appropriate for this purpose, I am happy to bow to the consensus of editors; though from my own acquaintance with authoritative opinions in this field, it does not seem a bad starting point. TomHennell (talk) 00:07, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell, Amatulic, and AstroLynx: I deleted content that violated WP policies on copyright, just as moderator NeilN did here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=History_of_the_Quran&diff=prev&oldid=665066207

But the same content keeps being re-added. I think a mod hiding these edits would be the best to solve these constant re-additions of copy-vio material.

12:13, 29 April 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Thank you CounterTime; but if the only issue is copyright violation, then a selective paraphrase - with key opions as directly attributed quotations - will solve the problem without the drastic step of trashing an entire section. Which specific phrases are copyright; and what is the text that they violate? TomHennell (talk) 16:04, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: It is a complete word-for-word copy/paste, and even with the references and footnotes in the original text, except with some changes done by @Ballymore1: where he made some mysterious additions, such as the addition of Behnam Sadeghi and Mohsen Goudarzi's paper on the San'aa 1 manuscript that was published in Der Islam as a ref, which didn't mention Cairo 1924 or anything like that. You can find the source from which the copypaste was made in the edit summary of the revert done by the moderator NeilN. I should mention at the outset that these edits should be hided as soon as possible by a mod to prevent further violations of wp copyright policies.

10:35, 30 April 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Thank you CounterTime, and indeed a cut and past of a whole copyright section cannot stand; but I fear that the talkpage is now such a mess that I am unable to locate the particular texts to which you refer. It would be a great help if you could provide the copyright version and the most recent obected-to version below; so that the two can be compared. Then I propose that we should be able (and Nieln too if s/he is still around) to agree a reworded version that does not violate Wikpidia principles? TomHennell (talk) 18:38, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: The copyright version can be found in the edit summary of the revert by moderator NeilN which I linked in this very section. We'll talk about the Cairo 1924 once those edits are hidden to prevent further disruptive violations of wp policies on copyright. 20:29, 30 April 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

well there is no point in hopping too and fro, CounterTime; so if you are able to copy all the relevant matter into this section; we can get to work on it. That way we can be sure that the non-relevant and superceded discussion in the sections above can be happily ignored.TomHennell (talk) 11:58, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: What "hopping too and fro" are you talking about? You asked me about where the copyright version can be found and I referred you to the edit summary of the revert by moderator NeilN here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=History_of_the_Quran&diff=prev&oldid=665066207

12:17, 1 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

NeilN's contribution was nine months ago; and a lot of water has passed under the article since then. Nothing it Wikiepdia stays still that long, and no moderator action is set in stone. So, to avoid starting again from scratch, we really need to know which is the authoritative source whose copyright is still being violated, and which are the phrases in the most recent version of the section that continue to create a problem. The we can reword these bits, and restore the whole section. Hopefully NeilN will be able to contribute again; but if not, we will need to make the best we can, on the basis of materials presented in this section. TomHennell (talk) 12:48, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: "we really need to know which is the authoritative source whose copyright is still being violated," What are you talking about? Just as I said earlier, the whole section is a complete word-for-word copy paste from that source. If you want to add something about the Cairo 1924 printing then maybe try some other sources such as Von Denffer's An Introduction to the Sciences of the Qur'an, see the previous discussion in the talk about that in the Cairo 1924 section.

13:52, 1 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Thank you CounterTime; but you still have not specified which copyright source we are talking about; and which are the sections that you assert have been pasted from it (and which have not). At the moment we are going round in circles, pointing and repointing at posts now many months old; but that was then and this is now. If you feel that the Von Denffer text is a better starting point; then I am sure your own paraphrase of that text could do as well. Either way, the article cannot continue with a hole where the 'Printed Editions' section should be. TomHennell (talk) 14:58, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

I have left the note below on NieN's talk page. Hopefully, he will be able to contribute directly to this thread. However, I think it would be helpful otherwise not to conduct this debate at second-hand; whatever NielN has to contribute, I am sure he can do so himself.

== History of the Qur'an ==

NielN, I gather that you may be away from Wikipedia for a bit; but if you are able to, you input would be much appreciated in respect of the problematic section on the 1924 Cairo edition of the Qur'an on the History of the Quran article. I gather that you properly reverted a substantial chunk of that section for copyright violation; but now in seeking to formulate an alternative wording for the section in question, it would be a help if you were able to specify the particular phrases and paragraphs that created the problem. Many thanks. TomHennell (talk) 12:07, 1 May 2016 (UTC)TomHennell (talk) 12:14, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

Right folks; the disputed passage is here:

The 1924 Cairo Qu'ran: The emergence of a universally adopted Arabic Qu'ran

At the beginning of the early 20th century, the Quran did not yet have a uniform, universally accepted mass-printed version, there being many publications with variations in text and Qira’at (readings).[52] This was also the case in Cairo, Egypt, motivating the Egyptian government to publish a uniform government-sponsored version for religious education in its schools.[53]

The first edition of the Egyptian Quran was published on July 10, 1924 in Cairo; subsequent revisions to the text were made in 1924 and 1936 when it was re-published. The text upon release in 1936 became known as the Faruq edition in honour of the Egyptian king Faruq.[54] While only intended as a government-sponsored version for religious schools and never meant to be text-critical in a historical sense, the Cairo edition quickly became remarkably popular throughout the Middle East and has been almost universally accepted by both Shia and Sunni Muslims as the ‘official’ Qu’ranic text; Otto Pretzl, for example, noted in 1938 that for the first time a de facto canonical text had emerged for the Quran.[55]

Rather than wanting to reconstruct the ancient form of the Qu'ran, the project was meant to accurately preserve one of the canonical Qira'at readings - Hafs 'an 'Asim.[56] Varying Qira’at readings for the Quran are part of the developmental history of the text; the idea that a number of equally canonical Qira’at exist did not gain full acceptance until the 10th century, when such divisions over the Quranic text arose under Ibn Mujāhid.[57] Ibn Mujāhid believed there were seven equally valid Qira’at for the Quran; others believed ten or fourteen. Over time, Ibn Mujāhid’s seven proposed Qira’at (attributed to him using a Hadith that speaks of "seven letters" of the Quran), each with two versions, gained gradual (though not complete) acceptance.[58]

The Egyptian government-appointed scholars went back through the Quranic manuscripts to see which reports on Hafs ‘an ‘Asim to trust. Researchers at the time generally believed this was relatively well done; Gotthelf Bergsträsser, for example, noted when examining their publication that only in a small number of cases was their reading contradicted by earlier sources on Hafs ‘an ‘Asim.[59]

In the field of textual criticism, multiple comparative studies have since been done between the Cairo edition and early Qu'ranic manuscripts. These include publications by Arthur Jeffery and Isaac Mendelsohn,[60] Keith Small[61] and Behnam Sadeghi.[62]

(as the page is frozen; we cannot get to the editable text; but the closest source that I can find for the section as it now stands is from the cited Gabriel Said Reynolds :Reynolds, Gabriel; The Qu'ran in its historical context, Routledge, 2007, https://serdargunes.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/the-quran-in-its-historical-context-gabriel-said-reynolds.pdf, Page 3)

The common belief that the Qur’an has a single, unambiguous reading is due in part to the bravado of translators, who rarely express doubt about their choices. Yet it is above all due to the terrific success of the standard Egyptian edition of the Qur’an, first published on July 10, 1924 (Dhu l-Hijja 7, 1342) in Cairo, an edition now widely seen as the official text of the Qur’an.2 Initially, however, the publication of this edition was a purely Egyptian affair. It was the work of a government appointed committee, led by Muhammad b. ‘Ali al-Husayni al-Haddad,3 that was meant to establish a uniform text for religious education in Egypt.4

Minor adjustments were subsequently made to this text in following editions, one published later in 1924 and another in 1936. The text released in 1936 became known as the Faruq edition in honor of the Egyptian king, Faruq (r. 1936–52).5 Yet the influence of the Cairo text soon spread well beyond Egypt. It has been adopted almost universally by both Sunni and Shi‘i Muslims, and by critical scholars as well, who have long since given up Gustav Flügel’s 1834 edition. Writing in 1938, Otto Pretzl noted with amazement that in his day for the first time a de facto canonical text had emerged.6

Yet the Egyptian project was never intended to be text-critical, at least as this term is commonly understood. The scholars who worked on that project did not seek to reconstruct the ancient form of the Qur’an, but rather to preserve one of the canonical qira’at “readings” (here meant in the specialized sense it has in Islamic tradition), that of Hafs (d. 180/796) ‘an ‘Asim (d. 127/745). But these qira’at are part of the history of the text, not its starting point, and the idea of a discrete number of different yet equally canonical qira’at did not develop before the fourth/tenth century, when great divisions over the Qur’anic text led Ibn Mujahid (d. 324/936), among others, to sponsor this regulatory concept.

I confess thast I do not see a copyright infraction here; is there another source text that is being improperly used? Otherwise we may have to conclude that the asserted copyright violation is a straw man. TomHennell (talk) 18:24, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: You didn't include many parts: The common belief that the Qur’an has a single, unambiguous reading is due in part to the bravado of translators, who rarely express doubt about their choices.

Yet it is above all due to the terrific success of the standard Egyptian edition of the Qur’an, first published on July 10, 1924 (Dhu l-Hijja 7, 1342) in Cairo, an edition now widely seen as the official text of the Qur’an. 2 Initially, however, the publication of this edition was a purely Egyptian affair. It was the work of a government appointed committee, led by Muhammad b. ‘Ali al-Husayni al-Haddad, 3 that was meant to establish a uniform text for religious education in Egypt. 4 Minor adjustments were subsequently made to this text in following editions, one published later in 1924 and another in 1936. The text released in 1936 became known as the Faruq edition in honor of the Egyptian king, Faruq (r. 1936–52). 5 Yet the influence of the Cairo text soon spread well beyond Egypt. It has been adopted almost universally by both Sunni and Shi‘i Muslims, and by critical scholars as well, who have long since given up Gustav Flügel’s 1834 edition. Writing in 1938, Otto Pretzl noted with amazement that in his day for the first time a de facto canonical text had emerged. 6 Yet the Egyptian project was never intended to be text-critical, at least as this term is commonly understood. The scholars who worked on that project did not seek to reconstruct the ancient form of the Qur’an, but rather to preserve one of the canonical qira’at “readings” (here meant in the specialized sense it has in Islamic tradition), that of Hafs (d. 180/796) ‘an ‘Asim (d. 127/745). But these qira’at are part of the history of the text, not its starting point, and the idea of a discrete number of different yet equally canonical qira’at did not develop before the fourth/tenth century, when great divisions over the Qur’anic text led Ibn Mujahid (d. 324/936), among others, to sponsor this regulatory concept.

Ibn Mujahid argued that there are seven, equally valid qira’at. Others argued

for ten, or fourteen. The gradual (yet never complete) acceptance of the argument for seven qira’at (often attributed to Ibn Mujahid’s use of a prophetic hadith that speaks of “seven letters” of the Qur’an) 7 was generally accompanied with the caveat that each qira’a has two versions. Effectively, then, fourteen different versions were considered equally authentic, only one of which was Hafs ‘an ‘Asim. Even in this scenario there is no unanimity over the precise shape of the Hafs ‘an ‘Asim qira’a. Four different lines (turuq) of transmission are claimed for it, and discrepancies abound in the various texts claiming to transmit it.

In the early twentieth century, therefore, the shape of the Qur’an would have

seemed anything but clear. In fact, the Egyptian government was motivated to begin the project that would lead to the Cairo Qur’an edition due to the variations (or “errors,” as an appendix to the Cairo edition describes them) found in the Qur’anic texts that they had been importing for state schools. 8 In response, the government destroyed a large number of such texts by sinking them in the Nile River and issued its own text. The Cairo project thus followed in the spirit of the caliph ‘Uthman, and the governor al-Hajjaj b. Yusuf (d. 95/714), who are reported to have destroyed competing versions and distributed their own text of the Qur’an in the first Islamic century. When the scholars in Cairo decided to fix a standard text according to Hafs ‘an ‘Asim, they still had to decide which reports of it to trust. Their project, then, involved comprehensive research of the classical qira’at works. 9 In fact, they conducted this research with great thoroughness and attention to detail, according to the observations of several western scholars. 10 Gotthelf Bergsträsser, for example, noted that in only a small number of cases is their reading contradicted by earlier sources on Hafs ‘an ‘Asim. 11

.

In terms of WP policies, this falls under the rubric of "Close paraphrasing" (see WP:CLOP)

Close paraphrasing without in-text attribution may constitute plagiarism, and when extensive (with or without in-text attribution) may also violate Wikipedia's copyright policy, which forbids Wikipedia contributors from copying material directly from other sources.

As in this case, where the source was extensively paraphrased, and left as is at some other points.

18:36, 3 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Close paraphrasing is a matter of degree CounterTime; especially when - as here - the source text is fully referenced, so there an be no accusation of plagiarism. However, if we may take it as agreed that this is indeed the sole copyright violation issue; a rather more radical paraphrase is readily achievable by applying the methods set out in the Wikipedia article. In any case, there is quite a lot in the disputed text that (inadvertently) misrepresents its cited sources; so it does need rewriting. TomHennell (talk) 18:49, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: In this case, the content that was put up does not belong to any category in which close paraphrasing is permitted (see WP:CLOP). You state, "especially when - as here - the source text is fully referenced" what do you exactly mean? Since all the references given were again (unsurprisingly) taken from the Reynold ref, to be precise:

* [53] Gotthelf Bergsträßer, "Koranlesung in Kairo", Der Islam: Zeitschrift für Geschichte und Kultur des islamischen Orients, 20 (1932), 1–42 & 21 (1933), 110–140

** corresponds to reference [3] in Reynold, see p. 20

* [55] “Es ist eine Merkwürdigkeit dieses einzigartigen Buches, daß sich auch diese noch belassene Freiheit weiter eingeschränkt hat, so daß heute fast nur mehr die Lesung des Hafs ‘an ‘Asim bekannt und gebraucht ist.” O. Pretzl, “Aufgaben und Ziele der Koranforschung,” Actes du XXe Congrès international des orientalistes, Bruxelles 5–10 septembre 1938, Louvain: Bureaux du muséon, 1940, 328–9. Reprinted in R. Paret (ed.), Der Koran, Wege der Forschung 326, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1975, 411–12.

** corresponds to reference [6] in Reynold, see p. 20 (again, EXACT, word-for-word copy paste)

* [57] Christopher Melchert (2000). "Ibn Mujāhid and the Establishment of Seven Qur'anic Readings". Studia Islamica (Maisonneuve & Larose) 91: 5–22. doi:10.2307/1596266.

** corresponds to reference [7] in Reynold, see p. 20

* [59] Bergsträsser was deeply impressed by the Cairo edition, commenting that there “ragt eine alt-islamische Wissenschaft lebenskräftig und leistungsfähig in unsere Tage herein; er ist ein Dokument für den überraschend hohen gegenwärtigen Stand der ägyptischen Koranlesungswissenschaft.” “Koranlesung in Kairo,” 10; Reynolds, Gabriel, The Qu'ran in its historical context, 2007; Routledge

** corresponds to reference [10] in Reynold, see p. 20 (again, EXACT, word-for-word copy paste)

* the other refs such as [52], [54], [56], [58] ... are just Reynold's book.

This shows, yet again, that your assumption purporting that "there can be no accusation of plagiarism" is untenable.

20:58, 3 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

CounterTime; since there can be no copyright in an academic reference (or indeed any other purely descriptive name or title); so the reuse of academic references from the Reynolds article in the section in question cannot raise issues of copyright violation. Whether they are appropriate references and citations for the matter in question needs to be established case by case; but is a secondary issue, beyond the scope of this particular discussion.

Close paraphrase in copyright terms, refers to a rewording that retains and reproduces substantial 'creative' elements from the original - word choice, word order, sentence structure. If such is the case (and in my view it is debateable) then we are talking about individual sentences and phrases, certainly not about whole paragraphs. I would agree though, that some of the commented footnotes should be removed as direct copies (and also because English Wikpedia should not reference untranslated German text). But direct translation of Bergstrasser and Pretzl would present no issues, as they are both out of copyright.

Whatever the merits of the asserted close paraphrase; I believe we can now determine that your original characterisation of the deleted section as "a complete word-for-word copy/paste" was without merit.

The section as it stood clearly referenced the Reynolds article which it used as a source (and linked to it). Hence no plagiarism. The matter of how much credited quotation may be used before coyright is infringed involves a nice judgement (Wikipedia is rather stricter here than are US 'fair use' provisions). But the general point is nevertheless that individual phrases, sentences and short paragraphs can generally be quoted, if fully attributed and if they are directly materiel to the point under discussion. TomHennell (talk) 00:41, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: When you copy paste many paragraphs from a copyrighted source, and you paraphrase it here and there (see WP:CLOP for relevant policies), then adding references made in the paragraphs of the copyrighted source wont make the whole text a non-copyright violation. It's actually the opposite.

But in any case, the mere fact that the original edit by @Ballymore1: was a copy-vio, and then after some of his edits it fell down under the title of WP:CLOP, and that this version keeps popping up through edit reverts means that we should stop that, by hiding the edit summaries. What I care about here is WP policies.

"Hence no plagiarism" So when @Ballymore1: first copy pasted Reynold's paragraphs, then rephrased them WP:CLOP, does that in any way mean that it isn't plagiarism when it does not belong to any category in which close paraphrasing is permitted (see WP:CLOP)?

10:48, 4 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

CounterTime; plagiarism is deceptively taking another's work without attribution; which is not the case here. 'Close' paraphrase (where there is no issue of deception) is a matter of degree; most of Wikipedia consists of rephrased summaries of authoritiative opinions - and that is as it should be. If a rewording is still too close to the original, the proper course is to offer an improvemed wording, not to revert the entire section. We should always give other editors the benefit of the doubt.

Getting down to the business in hand, you offered a number of examples of coyright violation in the references, of which only one - "Bergsträsser was deeply impressed by the Cairo edition, commenting that" would appear a bona fide example. Otherwise I propose we agree there can be no copyright objection to any of the rest of these citations and footnotes? Turning to the main body of the text; close paraphrase may perhaps be found in "adopted almost universally by both Sunni and Shi‘i Muslims"; in "Otto Pretzl, for example, noted in 1938 that for the first time a de facto canonical text had emerged for the Quran"( though this is essentially a straight rendering into English of Pretzl's statement, which is not copyright); and possibly "The first edition of the Egyptian Quran was published on July 10, 1924 in Cairo; subsequent revisions to the text were made in 1924 and 1936 when it was re-published. The text upon release in 1936 became known as the Faruq edition in honour of the Egyptian king Faruq." Lets then reword these bits in particular. Do you propose any other instances, or can we get on with rewriting? TomHennell (talk) 14:00, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: Would you mind waiting a bit so that NeilN may offer us his insight into this before making any decisions concerning the status of the disputed text? (and since we're mostly still disagreeing in whether it falls under WP:CLOP)

16:28, 4 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

No problems CounterTime; if NielN asks that we defer a bit before moving on to detailed redrafting, I cannot see any objection, and I am sure his input would be most valuable. But that is for NielN to say (or not say). He may prefer not to participate - or may for one reason or another be unable to do so. We have posted a notice of this process on his talk page, we can easily add another to the effect that, unless he posts to the contrary, we will start redrafting the contentious section. But neither you nor I can speak for him; if he has better things to do, we will have to proceed with what we have here. TomHennell (talk) 10:00, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: Alright, so we'll wait for NeilN's re-coming as a way to solve this dispute. 11:07, 5 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Indeed, though we will have to give him a time-frame to respond; we won't be waiting for him indefinitely. How about a further five days from now? If he doesn't or cannot respond on this page by then, then we press ahead anyway. If says wants more time before joining in, then I will be happy to comply within limits. With your agreement, I will put another note on NielN's talk page to this effect. In the meanwhile, I suggest we proceed to deal with other redrafting issues on this section, unrelated to the assertion of coyright violation (as below) TomHennell (talk) 11:43, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: You should probably add more, see here for when he will return: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:NeilN#Update

Meanwhile as I said I wont do anything until the edits that lead to successive copy-vio be hided once and for all.

11:55, 5 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Good find CounterTime; NielN suggested that he needed a month off from the beginning of March - which is now past, but it would be improper to hold him to the letter. I suggest giving him til the end of May?. Otherwise, you may contribute or not to the progress of re-editing as you please; but note that Wikipedia protocols on copyright violation relate only to the articles themselves - not to any associated disussion of copyright violation in talk-pages. What we say here does not create formal Wikipedia 'publication' in copyright terms, so long as all copied material is fully referenced to the source. Otherwise it would not be possible for editors, such as ourselves, to co-operate on putting together non-vio drafts. In this resepct, you could regard a Wikipedia talk page as equivalent to the 'comments' page below an internet newspaper site; what is posted there is reproduced(in copyright terms) by the person posting it, and hence is not published by the newspaper itself. TomHennell (talk) 12:08, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

NeilN, sorry to press you, as we note from the post above that you said in March that you were likely to be heavily engaged on other projects for several weeks. We would, however, greatly value your input into providing a properly formulated section on the 1924 Cairo edition in the History of the Quran article. We don't intend to proceed with restoring any agreed text into the article itself until after the end of May 2016 at the earliest; but if you would like to take part in this re-edit and do not have the time to do so currently, we would happily wait a bit longer, although not indefinitely. But if you do intend to take part and would like us to defer, please post to that effect on the talk page before the end of May. TomHennell (talk) 13:54, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

On a specific drafting point in relation to the Cairo edition (and not bound up with copyright issues in any way) can anyone confirm whether the 1924 text was a calligraphic text reproduced photolithographically; or was it typeset (some sources say in Gaza)? Published authorities differ on this point, but it has been suggested by Brockett that Muhammad b. ‘Ali al-Husayni al-Haddad, as well as leading the commission, also wrote the text? I am struggling through Bergstrasser's prose to try to establish the point; he is far from clear, but I think he is saying that the larger format edition was typeset, and the smaller format edition then reproduced from it in photofacsimile? What is not in dispute is that all subsequent re-issues have been photolithographic, but was the base text handwritten, typeset, or maybe a mixture of the two? TomHennell (talk) 10:02, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

Gotcha, I think!. This is a scanned image from the author (and hence not usable for Wiki citation) of Thomas Milo's articlce on Arabic Historical Script Grammar. http://www.islamicmanuscripts.info/reference/books/Kerr-2010-Milo-Writings/Kerr-2010-Milo-Writings-248-292-Milo.pdf. As I say, not usable in the article directly, but it does confirm (pages 260-262) that the Cairo 1924 edition was typeset (as Bergstrasser etc. state). Milo discusses typographisms in the unpointed Cairo text - in the context of the counterpart calligraphic formation of the unpointed text in ancient Qur'an manuscripts. Also confirms how different the Cairo unpointed text is from that previously printed in Ottoman Qur'ans - in respect of not consistently recording alif in graphic form. TomHennell (talk) 10:11, 17 May 2016 (UTC)

I believe the edit protection has now been removed; but as per the note to NeilN above, I propose that no actkion to reinstate the section on the Cairo 1924 edition should be made until those with views on issues of asserted copyright violation have been able to make their points. In the meanwhile, I suggest we proceed with a general redrafting of the section below TomHennell (talk) 08:35, 6 May 2016 (UTC)

Cairo 1924 (revisited)

I think that in advance of detailed redrafting, it would be a good idea to clarify what value is expected to be offered by this section. The main article Quran has a section on printing; effectviely the corresponding section of this article should aim to expand on the historical context underlying the opinions recorded there.

Wood-block printing of extracts from the Quran is on record as early as the 10th century.[135]

Arabic movable type printing was ordered by Pope Julius II (r. 1503−1512) for distribution among Middle Eastern Christians.[136] The first complete Quran printed with movable type was produced in Venice in 1537/1538 for the Ottoman market by Paganino Paganini and Alessandro Paganini.[137] Two more editions include those published by the pastor Abraham Hinckelmann in Hamburg in 1694 and by Italian priest Ludovico Maracci in Padua in 1698. The latter edition included an accurate Latin translation.

Printed copies of the Quran during this period met with strong opposition from Muslim legal scholars: printing anything in Arabic was prohibited in the Ottoman empire between 1483 and 1726—initially, even on penalty of death.[138][139] The Ottoman ban on printing in Arabic script was lifted in 1726 for non-religious texts only upon the request of Ibrahim Muteferrika, who printed his first book in 1729. Very few books, and no religious texts, were printed in the Ottoman Empire for another century.[140]

In 1786, Catherine the Great of Russia, sponsored a printing press for "Tatar and Turkish orthography" in Saint Petersburg, with one Mullah Osman Ismail responsible for producing the Arabic types. A Quran was printed with this press in 1787, reprinted in 1790 and 1793 in Saint Petersburg, and in 1803 in Kazan.[141] The first edition printed in Iran appeared in Tehran (1828) and the first Ottoman edition was finally printed in 1877, during the First Constitutional Era.[citation needed]

Gustav Flügel published an edition of the Quran in 1834 in Leipzig, which remained authoritative for close to a century, until Cairo's Al-Azhar University published an edition of the Quran in 1924. This edition was the result of a long preparation as it standardized Quranic orthography and remains the basis of later editions.[41]

In my view, this text requires supplementing chiefly in respect of the notice of the Ottoman editions - which lacks cited authority, and for which the dates given are wrong - and also clearly for the Cairo edition. The Ottoman printings represented a deliberate aspiration to establish an 'official' standard printed Qur'an, reflecting the aspirations of Abdul Hamid II to re-establish the status of the Ottoman Caliphate. The Cairo edition took the form it did substantially in reaction (and opposition) to the Ottoman editions; and even though it only ever had 'official' status as a standard text for Islamic shools in Egypt; nevertheless it has now the status of a standard text, both in academic study, as the base text for almost all modern translations, and also as the text of the Qur'an found on the internet.

Key points about the Ottoman editions:

• each reproduced a pre-existing manuscript Qur'an by photolithography;
• they conformed to Ottoman traditons of Qur'anic manuscript orthography; specifically in generally spelling out the long vowel alif in full graphic form;
• in the attached colophon it was either asserted that all errors found in the source manuscript had been corrected for the lithographic printing; or otherwise appended a table of errors in the diacritic points, as a guide to 'correct' recitation.

In response the Cairo editors:

• estabished their own typeset text; which in its full form - basic graphic form, diacritical marks and reading indications - corresponded to no previous manuscript;
• proceeded on the basis of Islamic scholarship of Qur'anic readings, not on the critical study of Qur'anic manuscripts;
• deliberately sought to remove modern alif graphic forms, re-instating the pre-modern use of the dagger alif diacritic sign where these were believed to have been introduced.

It was this final point that represented the main attraction of the edition for western scholarship of the Qur'an; as the resulting text witnessed both the most relaible recording of the Hafs recitation (in its full apparatus of diacritics and reading indicators), and also,in its unpointed graphic form, the most reliable recovery from Islamic traditons of the unpointed text of the 'Uthman codex' according to Hafs. Conseqently, the graphic form of the Cairo edition could be readily applied to collate variant graphic forms in ancient Qur'anic manuscripts. Otto Pretzl identified only four places where the graphic form of the Cairo edition differed from the best witnesses known to the Uthmanic text, recording in each instance a dagger alif where the graphic form alif should have been retained. TomHennell (talk) 09:41, 6 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: Are you basing all of these on Otto Pretzl's paper? If so, then I may not be of much help since I don't speak German. Muhammad Hussain 'Ali for his part does not mention a weasel statement such as "Cairo edition took the form it did substantially in reaction (and opposition) to the Ottoman editions", rather he states that this printing came in continuum with other printings: See his Tarikh al-Qur'an (can be accessed here: https://alkafeel.net/islamiclibrary/quranscience/quranhistory/15.html)

18:01, 6 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

On the Ottoman printings; chiefly M.Brett Wilson "The Qur'an after Babel" (2009); On the Cairo edition; chiefly Alan Brockett "Studies in Two Transmissions of the Qur'an" (1984). Brockett is the main source for there being a deliberate nationalist aspiration from Egypt in general - and Al-Azhar in particular - to contest late 19th century Ottoman claims to Islamic leadership - see page 11 especially. Brockett does demonstrate a precursor to the Al_Azhar project to recover the Uthmanic graphic form, in a Cairo photolithograpic edition of a Qur'an in the hand of the greatest of late 19th century Turkish calligraphers, Kadirgah (who had previously produced official Ottoman Qur'ans) - see page 40. In his Cairo manuscript Kadirgah adopts 'Uthamanic' orthography; in strong contrast to the 'Ottoman' orthography of his previous Istanbul Qur'an. The important context here being that 'Uthman' and 'Ottoman' are the same Arabic name; hence for the Ottoman caliph, any official Ottoman Qur'an by definition represented the 'text of Uthman'; whereas for the Al_Azhar editors, only a Qur'an that recovered the ancient graphic form could validly make that claim. Also in general see the chapters by Claude Gilliot, William Graham and Navid Kermani, and Fred Leemhuis; in "The Cambridge Companion to the Qur'an" Jane Dammen McAuliffe ed. (2006). TomHennell (talk) 22:43, 6 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: I verified p.11 but I didn't find what you just said, or, to be more precise, that "Cairo edition took the form it did substantially in reaction (and opposition) to the Ottoman editions". 11:24, 7 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

I am not proposing a form of words here; just summarising my impressions. Happy for any more exact wording you may propose. I do thought think that Brett Wilson's point in respect of the aspirations of the Ottoman sultanate/caliphate for exploiting a distinctive printed Qur'an text would merit a direct quote: "In Ottoman Yemen and elsewhere, the printed Qurʾan served a similar function; controlled and distributed by the Ottoman state, and clearly identifiable from manuscript copies, the printed Qurʾan was an unmistakable emblem of the Ottoman sultan and his control over the sacred text." (page 77) TomHennell (talk) 14:06, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: Yeah, but there is no mention of the "Cairo edition took the form it did substantially in reaction (and opposition) to the Ottoman editions". 18:02, 7 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

I'm not claiming that it does in so many words. The colophon of the Cairo edition does state that the primary reason for a completely new addition was that printed Qur'ans from abroad had been found to have had numerous errors which precluded their use in religious schools. It doesn't spell out that these imported Qur'ans were from Istanbul, but we know that most were. Otherwise Brockett identifies other factors as contributing to the need for the enterprise and the form it took; specifically religious motives associated with seeing Cairo as a bastion of Islam against the threat represented by the 'Young Turks'; the growth of Egyptian/Arab nationalism and anti-colonialism, finding its expression in the purity of the Arab Qur'anic text; and also (speculatively) a response to 'Orientalist' scholars presenting the Qur'anic text as uncrtical and lacking a scholarly basis. I think it is fair to discern concerns at developments in Istabul, and an aspiration to demonstrate Cairo rather as the true home of Islamic scholarship as contributory elements in most of Brocketts factors; but I am not wedded yet to any particular form of expression. As I said, more than happy to consider your proposed wordings. TomHennell (talk) 23:11, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: It would be reasonable to ask you to provide direct quotes from the sources you mentioned on each of these points, the source I'm looking into, namely Tarikh al-Qur'an by Muhammad Hussain 'Ali does not state that there were differences between the Ottoman/Cairo printings.

10:49, 8 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Have the relevant works of Muhammad Hussain 'Ali been translated into English, or otherwise cited in authoritative English language secondary literature? In general, it is not good practice to cite untranslated authoritative opinions - users of English Wikipedia should only need English to follow up the citations. Those who do have Arabic, can always cross refer to the Arabic Wikipedia article. The specific issues you raise are chiefly dealt with in Brockett (indeed I am not aware of any other study that undertakes a detaile cross-analysis of printed Qur'ans). Brockett's main point is that the Egyptian printed tradition is 'markedly different' in orthography from the Iranian or Turkish tradions (p31); although the Indian and North African traditions are more similar. The main Ottoman printing that he has to hand is a Cairo reprint, of 1925, of a Kadirgah Qur'an from Istanbul of 1890 (page 36). Brockett summarises Ottoman editons and their calligraphers at page 163 (note 29). The detailed cross comparison of the Cairo 1924 text with other Hafs texts is at page 47 onwards.

"The Turkish and Persian Traditions frequently, but not totally, normalise many of the archaic spellings of the Hafs copy" (p 47). And in the next para; "Nearly all vocal alifs in the Hafs copy are graphic alifs". Indeed this is where the big number 'variants' always are; essentially the Turkish and Persian traditions had by the 19th century consistently modernised the orthography of the Qur'an so that the presentation of the long vowel alif became regular - almost always spelled out in full graphic form, but with the regular exceptions such as its occurence in the demonstrative pronouns. Hence, for the Cairo editors, presentation of an Uthmanic text necessarily implied returning to an archiaic orthography; where for the previous Ottoman editions, it had not. And numerically, most of these orthographic differences relate to the presence or absence from the Qur'anic rasm of graphic alifs. Which is indeed what we see in the oldest manuscripts - many of which show only the rasm of the text. Though the recorded rasm varies from manuscript to manuscript, almost all the variance is due to whether a particular alif is in the graphic form or not. TomHennell (talk) 15:10, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: Relevant policies are found in WP:NOENG, as long as I can provide a quote, and a translation if requested, then it's fine. I'll check each of the specific citations you gave later on. 17:50, 9 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

if you are able to translate; that would be excellent. In respect of the Brockett citations, his remark at page 49 is most revealing "That regional Traditions can diverge on points like this graphic indication of hamza, but not on vowels, indicates how much more fixed the vocal form of the Qur'ãn is than the graphic form." Brockett's intention was to explore the differences between the Hafs and Wars traditions of Qur'anic readings, on the basis of each reading's printed representatives. What he found was the obverse of the conventional simplification of the nature of Quranic variation. Qur'anic readings have sometimes been presented as varying oral narrations or recitations sitting atop an unvarying written text. But the actuality was found to be the other way round; Brockett found few variations in oral recitation; of which none carried exegetical or interpretive significance; but much greater variation in the underlying unpointed graphic text. Moreover, he found more variation within the graphic form of Hafs texts, than between Hafs and Wars. The implications of this he explores in Chapter 11 (page 134). An Orientalist. looking only at written transmission, would find the proliferation of written graphic forms to be inconsistent with Muslim claims to an unchanging and providentially preserved Qur'an. But "not one of the graphic differences caused the Muslims any doubts about the faultlessly faithful transmission of the Qur'ãn". Wide differences in unpointed text are not seen as in any way incompatible with represenatives of the full text being (within each reading) identical.

Which leads back again to the Cairo editors; because, unlike the Qur'anic commentators, they were concerned to achieve an exact written text, as much as an associated oral text. Which I see as Brockett's point on page 12. Reversing the modernising orthography of the Ottoman Qur'ans, not only asserted the stature of Cairo and Al-Azhar against Istanbul; it also demonstrated that the Islamic tradition could be as exacting in its textual standards as the Orientalists; as well as demonstrating much higher success in its outcome. TomHennell (talk) 23:08, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: I don't know why you keep moving from subject to subject, yet consistently failing to heavily quote from the cited works you made, I remind that this isn't a forum for a general discussion on the History of the Qur'an (WP:NOTAFORUM) but rather this is about discussing eventual ways by which to ameliorate this article. 20:15, 10 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Countertime; I've set out my bullet points - see above - I'm waiting for yours. Once we agree the conceptual framework, we can select which points need quotes, and on which the citations are to be summarised. But 'heavy quotes' are unlikely to be goood practice - for exactly the copyvio principles that got us here.

And we still haven't heard from NielN. TomHennell (talk) 23:43, 10 May 2016 (UTC)

You're contradicting yourself, you said at first that: "... but note that Wikipedia protocols on copyright violation relate only to the articles themselves - not to any associated disussion of copyright violation in talk-pages. What we say here does not create formal Wikipedia 'publication' in copyright terms, so long as all copied material is fully referenced to the source. Otherwise it would not be possible for editors, such as ourselves, to co-operate on putting together non-vio drafts. In this resepct, you could regard a Wikipedia talk page as equivalent to the 'comments' page below an internet newspaper site; what is posted there is reproduced(in copyright terms) by the person posting it, and hence is not published by the newspaper itself." and you're now saying "'heavy quotes' are unlikely to be goood practice - for exactly the copyvio principles that got us here."

16:50, 11 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

I appear to have confused you CounterTime. When I say we should not use 'heavy quotes' that refers to how we cite authorities in the text of the article. But that is the third stage; the first stage is to agree the framework of what we have to say. I have put my framework up above. You questioned one of my contextual observations for the framework; on the degree to which the form of the Cairo edition is responding to (and explicitly differentiated from) the previous Istanbul editions. The point is - in my view - implicit in Brockett; but I am happy that the article text simply summarises what Brockett and Brett Wilson have to say.

But can I now assume that you are happy with all the rest? If so, then we can go to the second stage - drafting the text of how the article will summarise the authorities; and then the third stage - putting in the citations and quotes. Which is where my point about 'heavy quotes' comes in. In this talk page we can quote as much, or as little, as we want within the restrictions of publication law. But I am getting a tad impatient. I would be most grateful if you could outline your proposed treatment of this section. As soon as is convenient for you, please. TomHennell (talk) 00:29, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

On a specific drafting point in relation to the Cairo edition (and not bound up with copyright issues in any way) can anyone confirm whether the 1924 text was a calligraphic text reproduced photolithographically; or was it typeset (some sources say in Gaza)? Published authorities differ on this point, but it has been suggested by Brockett that Muhammad b. ‘Ali al-Husayni al-Haddad, as well as leading the commission, also wrote the text? I am struggling through Bergstrasser's prose to try to establish the point; he is far from clear, but I think he is saying that the larger format edition was typeset, and the smaller format edition then reproduced from it in photofacsimile? What is not in dispute is that all subsequent re-issues have been photolithographic, but was the base text handwritten, typeset, or maybe a mixture of the two? TomHennell (talk) 10:02, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

Gotcha, I think!. This is a scanned image from the author (and hence not usable for Wiki citation) of Thomas Milo's articlce on Arabic Historical Script Grammar. http://www.islamicmanuscripts.info/reference/books/Kerr-2010-Milo-Writings/Kerr-2010-Milo-Writings-248-292-Milo.pdf. As I say, not usable in the article directly, but it does confirm (pages 260-262) that the Cairo 1924 edition was typeset (as Bergstrasser etc. state). Milo discusses typographisms in the unpointed Cairo text - in the context of the counterpart calligraphic formation of the unpointed text in ancient Qur'an manuscripts. Also confirms how different the Cairo unpointed text is from that previously printed in Ottoman Qur'ans - in respect of not consistently recording alif in graphic form. TomHennell (talk) 10:12, 17 May 2016 (UTC)

Milo raises a most interesting point; which could be relevant to this section as also to that on 'Skeptical Scholars'. He maintains that the conventional characterisation of the earliest Qur'ans as having been written in 'defective script' is misstated. 7th Century written Arabic was not defective in script, but defective in orthography. The script proided a range of functionality for the unambiguous reprsentation of Arabic vowels and consonants, but a number of these were applied intermittantly - only when the context required them - and not according to consistent rules. Moreover this intermittant functionality was not limited to diacritic signs, but also is found in intermittent variant orthography in the earliest manuscript fragments, of the rasm or skeletal text (as in the variant application of the alif sign, and the mater lectionis for long vowels). The 'Sekptical Scholars', Milo says, have tended to start with the Cairo 1924 edition, strip of diacritics and indications, and then apply an alternative narration to the remaining skeletal graphic form of text. But if the 1924 edition does not deliver a skeletal graphic form corresponding to a consistent earliest manuscript standard, and if furthermore elements of the 1924 edition graphic form present typographisms that would never have been found in any manscript, then the skeptical project falls at the first hurdle. TomHennell (talk) 10:01, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

I am sorry, why was the Cairo section blanked? And why is there no further discussion of modern editions? I came here specifically to find out when the modern ayat division was first introduced, not to learn about the archangel Gabriel; surely the main Quran page is the place to discuss religious matters, this article should merely be about the textual history. I realise this is a religious text, but we are Wikipedia, and the way we deal with complex topics is by creation of sub-topics so people wishing to discuss one topic do not get in the way of people wishing to discuss another. There is already an Early Quranic manuscripts article, so this page merely needs to present a brief summary of that. What it should do is present a more detailed editorial history. Right now, I would be interested in the history of the ayat division, is there any discrepancy among modern editions, is there any historical discrepancy, and what is the date of the oldest manuscript complete with ayat numbering? --dab (𒁳) 11:37, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

The Cairo section has been successively removed by moderator NeilN; due to asserted copyright violation. A previous editor had taken this section largely from https://serdargunes.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/the-quran-in-its-historical-context-gabriel-said-reynolds.pdf (which is readily found on the net). I have been discussing (at length) with editor CounterTime how best to replace the unsatisfactory bits. As for verse divisions; they are found in the earliest securely dated manuscript fragments, the Birmingham Quran manuscript, but not there numbered. I am not aware of any Qur'an manuscript or edition that lacks them. But, though most marked points of division are common, there is quite a wide degree of variaton on the placing of a few. For none of the suras represented in the early Qur'an leaves referred to, do the verse end indications exactly match those of the Egyptian standard edition; and the modern printed editions themselves vary. TomHennell (talk) 12:49, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

@Dbachmann: Verse divisions existed from the earliest Qur'an manuscripts, either by leaving a small space between each ayah, or using three horizontal small dashes, and this before the aya separator evolved to its current form, see here. @TomHennell: Are you talking about the Kufic ʿad according to Hafṣ ʿan ʿAsim? As far as I know that's the one used for the Cairo 1924 edition. For Warsh and Nafiʿ the Medinan ʿad is the one in use, (The first Medinan and the last one)

18:03, 21 May 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

CounterTime; not sure that I am qualified to contribute much on the verse divisions, beyond what I say above. My understanding is that there are two fields of variation observed; variant locations for verse indicators; and variant systems for counting those divisions - substantially turning on how far an initial basmala for a surah should count as a separate verse. Critical scholars tend to be more interested in the former class of variants than the latter. But I'm not convinced that either has a place in this article; better in the article on ayah. TomHennell (talk) 01:19, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

@CounterTime: CounterTime, again, please remember this is not an apologetic website for religion but rather one that details historical facts, in this case, the historical development of the Qu'ran. Cairo 1924 is very influential in the history of the Qu'ran so this topic needs to be included one way or another. If you have suggestions how best to re-write it, then let me/us know. @TomHennell: How would you like to best proceed to include the information? Ballymore1 (talk)

@Ballymore1: So for you, the fact that WP is not an apologetical website for religions justifies violations of WP guidelines on copyright?

By the way the printing of the Mushaf of Medina is by far more influential.

13:32, 7 June 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Ballymore, I have checked again on User:NeilN's page, and it would not seem that he is able to contribute to this discussion - and we must assume that he has no opbjection to our proceeding. TomHennell (talk) 16:02, 8 June 2016 (UTC)

CounterTime; so far you have not produced a proposal for an outline framework for the revised section. I see no reason not to go ahead with what we have so far. May I take it that your specific concern is limited to issues of copyright violation, and that otherwise you have no reservations in respect of the proposed section on printed editions of the Qur'an? Two particular points of clarfication would help. Firstly; you state that the printing of the 'Mushaf of Medina' is far more influential. Do you have a reference for this observation? Secondly, I have seen a number of statements to the effect that Qur'an texts and recordings on the internet - where these conform to the Hafs recitation - tend to follow the Cairo edition. Do you have any refrences that would confirm of controvert this observation? Alas, none the on-line Qur'an resources that I can find appear to see a positive value in stating whether they are following a particular edition. Translators are more inclined to do so, but this article is not really about translations. 16:02, 8 June 2016 (UTC)

@Countertime:; so far I have found references to an article by Andrew Rippin - 'The study of Tafsir in the 21st Century- - which surveys on-line Qur'an resources; but the links to the downloaded version no longer work. Do you have access to a copy? Otherwise; in respect of on-line Qur'an texts, the following site strikes me as most informative: http://tanzil.net/wiki/Tanzil_Project . They regard the 'Medina Mushaf' as an authoritative printing of the text - and claim to have produced a searchable Qur'an that conforms to that printing. What they do not say is what the textual basis is for the Medina Mushaf; I have found a number of comments to the effect that it is simply a repackaging of the 1956 edition of the 1924 Cairo Qur'an; but I can find no citation of this in an authoritative source. But I think the point is established that most on-line searchable Qur'an's have not been textually sound; especially in that standard internet Arabic scripts have not supported the 'dagger alif' form that was reintroduced into the printed Qur'an traditon by the 1924 Cairo editors. What do you think? TomHennell (talk) 08:57, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: I understand your concerns, but NeilN didn't even respond so far -- and we should be waiting for his opinion -- and I'm a bit busy with some other articles, but hopefully, I'll manage to gather enough sources for a section on printings.

20:31, 8 June 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

NielN has got back to his user page - to indicate that his time is still engaged elsewhere - and could have responded briefly to our message there, and requested that we hold back for his contribution; but he has not. That is entirely his concern; if he does not currently want to be involved it's up to him. But I see no basis for waiting indefinitely if he has chosen not even to indicate an intention of participating in the future. Given that other editors wish to press ahead now, I suggest that is what we do; NeilN can join in later, when he is able and minded to. TomHennell (talk) 09:49, 9 June 2016 (UTC)

It may be useful to know that images of the 1924 Cairo Qur'an are online available on the Corpus Coranicum website. However, it is not clear (to me, at least) whether these are from the original 1924 edition or from one of the later reprints. AstroLynx (talk) 13:28, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

Wow AstroLynx; that is a really good find; and clears a lot of points up.

- it is from the original 1924 edition;

- it is clear (to me at least) that it is typeset, not calligraphic; at least for the main text. Which raises the question of why Adrian Brockett says otherwise?

- it states that the Saudi Arabian offical edition of Hafs takes its text from Cairo 1924; which I assume refers to the Madina Muschaf?

- although the orthography of the rasm follows the rules of ad-Dani etc; otherwise the orthography of recitation, vowels and assimilation were due to the Cairo editors. TomHennell (talk) 14:36, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

Google translate of the attached reference note below:

print version

The Arabic Quranic text as it was printed in Cairo in 1924 in certain countries as a standard. Many Koran editions (the Saudi Arabian, Iranian, Indonesian, among others) have looked to the consonantal text of the Egyptian pressure. You can read a full scan of the 1st edition in 1924, the text in the reading of'Āṣim (d. 744/745 n in Kufa. Chr.) According to the tradition of the reader Hafs (709-796) contains. The Egyptian pressure aimed at the spelling of the Arabic consonants text after two Andalusian scholars ad-Dani (d. 1053) and Ibn Naǧǧāḥ (d. 1103). Koran manuscripts were not used for the spelling of consonants text.

Koran pressure Cairo 1924

Shown here is the Koran side of the selected sura and verse in the Koran pressure of Cairo 1924 (1st edition; reproduction of the present in the Berlin State Library copy). The Arabic text of the Koran is reproduced in the tradition Hafs after reading'Āṣim (d. 744/745 n in Kufa. Chr.). The present reading is one of the seven readings which have been set permissible by Ibn Muǧahid (d. 936) in Baghdad for public use. The orthography of the basic tier of consonants (arab. Rasm), which are not specified by diacritics, follows the regulations of the Koran case, the Andalusian scholar ad-Dani (d. 1053) and Ibn Naǧāḥ (d. 1102/1103) written have. The other areas of orthography as vowels, assimilation character and rests were for this print z.T. first standardized or created in some cases specifically.

Here is a link to Andrew Rippin's paper "The study of Tafsir in the 21st Century". AstroLynx (talk) 13:52, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

many thanks AstroLynx. Just what I wanted. Though I had hoped that Rippin would offer a few observations on on-line editions of the Qur'an itself; and I have not found any. There is a basic point hre: that most on-line Qur'anic resources are scanned from lithographically printed editions; and so have varied greatly in quality. TomHennell (talk) 14:16, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

A possible explanation of the Brockett inconsistency, is that he did not have access to the 1924 edition itself, but to a lithographic Qatari reprint of 1982. Maybe al-Haddad created a calligraphic Qur'an text counterpart to the typeset offical edition; and it was the former that the Qatari publisher reproduced? Brockett does note that as late as 1921, Fuad was still considering whether to issue the edition with a calligraphic text. I presume that this had been the original intention when Kadirgah was originally signed up to the project, but had been stymied by his death in 1913. TomHennell (talk) 15:09, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

I have copied down from earlier in the thread my proposal for the 'bullet point' content of the section on the Ottoman and Cairo texts (with a few changes):

The Ottoman printings represented a deliberate aspiration to establish an 'official' standard Muslim printed Qur'an, reflecting the aspirations of Abdul Hamid II to restore the authority of the Ottoman Sultanate by association with a revived Ottoman Caliphate. The Cairo edition took the form it did in response both to the form of the Ottoman editions, and to the secularising reaction to Abdul Hamid in the Young Turk Revolution of 1908. Indeed in its early stages, the Cairo project employed Kadirgah, the leading caligrapher of later Ottoman Qur'ans. Even though the Cairo edition only ever had 'official' status as a standard text for Islamic shools in Egypt; nevertheless it has now acquired the status of a standard text, both in academic study and as the base text for many modern translations; and hence too as the textual basis for the Saudi 'Madina Mushaf' and the Qur'ans most commonly found on the internet.

Key points about the Ottoman editions:

• the early editions reproduced classic pre-existing manuscript Qur'ans by photolithography. Later editions commissioned contemporary calligraphers in the classic traditon;
• they strictly followed Ottoman traditions of modernised Qur'anic manuscript orthography, specifically in regularly spelling out the long vowel alif in full graphic form, and invariably conforming to the Hafs reading;
• they were provided with a laudatory preface acknowledging the sponsorship of Abdul Hamid II and the Ottoman Sultanate;
• they were produced in vary large print-runs and distributed widely on a non-commercial basis to project the religious authority of the Ottoman Caliphate.

In response the Cairo editors:

• estabished their own typeset text; which in its full form - basic graphic form, diacritical marks and reading indications - corresponded to no previous manuscript;
• proceeded on the basis of Islamic scholarship of Qur'anic readings, not on the critical study of Qur'anic manuscripts;
• deliberately sought to remove Ottoman modernisations especially those effecting the regular application of the alif graphic forms, re-instating instead in archaic form the 'dagger alif' diacritic sign, in acordance with reconstructions of the 'Uthman codex' as codified in 11th century Islamic scholarship.

It was this final point that represented the main attraction of the Cairo 1924 edition for western scholarship of the Qur'an; as the resulting text witnessed both the most relaible recording of the Hafs recitation (in its full apparatus of diacritics and reading indicators), and also,in its unpointed graphic form, the most reliable recovery from Islamic traditions of the unpointed text of the 'Uthman codex' according to Hafs. Conseqently, the graphic form of the Cairo edition could be readily applied to collate variant graphic forms in ancient Qur'anic manuscripts. Otto Pretzl identified only four places where the graphic form of the Cairo edition differed from the best witnesses then known to the Uthmanic text(as proposed by ad-Dani), recording in each instance a dagger alif where the graphic form alif might have been retained. TomHennell (talk) 16:06, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: We already spoke about that last point of yours and how it wasn't even mentioned by the sources you gave, furthermore how can you say that "the orthography of recitation, vowels and assimilation were due to the Cairo editors" when the Cairo editors did nothing but follow the qira'a of Hafs 'an 'Asim?

Also as I already stated we should wait for NeilN comment to decisively end disputes concerning the Reynolds ref.

20:42, 10 June 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

Countertime, I have edited the comment to accord closer with what Brockett says and proposes, especially in relation to the choice of Kadirgah as calligrapher on the project; Brocket demonstrates that the close correspondences and equally marked differences between the Cairo Kadirgah text and the preceding Istanbul Kadirgah text establish that the one is responding to and revising the other. The comment about the Cairo indications of recitation, vowels and assimilation being due to the Cairo editors (over and above the conventional diacritics adopted form their sources for the Hafs recitation) is from the Corpus Coranicum website (quoted in Google translation above) TomHennell (talk) 23:44, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

I find a good historical overview in 'From palm leaves to the internet' by Fred Leemhuis in the 'Cambridge Companion to the Qur'an'. Leemhuis proposes that the global dominance of the Hafs 'an 'Asim reading is largely due to the modernisation and standardisation of the Qur'an introduced by the Ottomans from the 16th century onwards. The Cairo editors don't challenge this Ottoman/Hafs dominance in any way; what they do is to strip away the Ottoman orthographic modernisations and restore the graphic forms for Hafs established in the traditions of ad-Dani and Ibn Naǧāḥ; but then greatly to extend the range and consistency of the recitational signs for vocalisation, nasalisation, assimilation and pauses. Most of these signs were entirely new in typeset Arabic, albeit that they drew on counterpart calligraphic diacritical signs that had been formerly found in Qur'ans printed lithographically. 20th century printed Qur'ans have been proposed as aspiring to be musical scores, providing a full apparatus from which a 'lad of parts' might learn to recite the holy text in a fully correct form, by heart. The Cairo 1924 edition was arguably the first printed Qur'an fully to achieve that goal. TomHennell (talk) 09:19, 11 June 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: Perfect, any chance you could you write up a 'ready-to-go' paragraph on this that we can then post to the main site? @CounterTime: Again, absolutely no recommendation to either of us on how to improve the content. This is very much looking like spamming on your end. @TomHennell: I recommend we move forward without CounterTime and simply post the information and subsequently let an administrator go over it. It's clear CounterTime is not interested in having this information on the site for religious reasons so it's best after the information is up on the main site a third party takes a look at it should he still have issues with it. Ballymore1 (talk)

@Ballymore1: Please stop with worthless WP:ACCUSE, I want to make it clear: I'm not opposed to adding a section on the printings of the Qur'an, starting from the Ottoman age, then to the Cairo printing and the Mushaf of Medina, as long as we make well sourced claims.

15:14, 11 June 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

@TomHennell: Unless we have explicit statements from Brockett to corroborate each point, then we can't be making implicit statements as the ones we discussed earlier.

Could you please give the exact quote from the Corpus Coranicum website that states that? Thanks.

By the way, I saw Fred's essay that you mentioned but he didn't mention the Cairo 1924 printing, perhaps you confused him with Fred M. Donner?

Edit: I found this excellent paper from the Qur'an Printing Complex in Madinah which looks at the printings of the Qur'an, including the Cairo 1924 one, this paper is by far the most detailed and complete, I think we should employ it as the "backbone" if you will of the section on printings, it may be accessed here (without Word) : http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:gHAR5Lh7ySUJ:qprint.qurancomplex.gov.sa/wp-content/uploads/project_files/62/9733092d8a150838.docx+&cd=2&hl=ru&ct=clnk&gl=ru

Using Word: qprint.qurancomplex.gov.sa/wp-content/uploads/project_files/62/9733092d8a150838.docx

--CounterTime (talk) 15:14, 11 June 2016 (UTC)

@CounterTime: We'd like you to give suggestions to make the article better; simply flagging anything you think is critical of Islam from a religious perspective is a) not what Wikipedia is about and b)not a collaborative approach to the historical development of the Qu'ran where the Cairo edition plays a big role. I still remember when I brought up the varying Sana'a manuscripts and you said they didn't even exist...again, this is about historical manuscripts, not religion. Please make that distinction because it seems to me you're still not doing so and it's costing us all a lot of time for no reason.

I'll re-write the Cairo section and post it here later and then we can discuss what to include and what not. On another note, you removed a section by Dbachmann on the same topic, may I ask why? "Most printed editions of the Quran published today are based on the influential Quran of Cairo (1924), which introduced an elaborate system of modified vowel-signs and a set of additional symbols for minute details, and which is based on the recension attributed to Aasim ibn Abi al-Najud (Kufa, d. 745). Other popular recensions in modern editions of the Quran are those attributed to Ḥafṣ (d. 796) and Warsh (d. 812)." What did you disagree with there to extent you removed it? --Ballymore1 (talk)

@Ballymore1: simply flagging anything you think is critical of Islam from a religious perspective

Where did I flag anything critical of Islam 'from a religious perspective'? I'm, in fact, a Jew, and a secular one, who happens to be interested in the evolution and history of Islam and Islamic thought, so making these accusations does nothing but show how uncivil you are.

I still remember when I brought up the varying Sana'a manuscripts and you said they didn't even exist

Can you please provide the exact diff or history showing where I stated that? (If you want to save some time, don't search, since I didn't say that) Otherwise, it would be definitely proven that you make up lies on others.

you removed a section by Dbachmann on the same topic, may I ask why?

We talked about that earlier.

15:55, 11 June 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

@TomHennell: Can you read arabic? If not, I'll just go and make a version of the section that I'll post here that is based on the paper I mentioned above for possible corrections. What do you think?

15:57, 11 June 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

@CounterTime: Not Sana'a, sorry, Cairo 1924 itself. You thought it was a myth. These are your words from before in the original Cairo 1924 section: "Also a quick search in Google Books and Google Scholars of 'Cairo 1924' suggests that it is merely a myth, I invite you to do that." Lol. Anyway, I've re-written the aspect on Cairo 1924 and included Von Denffer in it, who previously you mentioned you liked. His PDF, an Introduction to the Sciences of the Qu'ran, can be downloaded on Google (one of the first results that comes up). You'll notice it says exactly the same as the other sources for the Cairo edition... Anyway, here my revision of the original post:

"At the beginning of the 20th century, the Arabic Qu'ran did not yet have a uniformly printed version, there being a variety of publications with variations in text and Qira'at. The Egyptian government was hence motivated to start a government-sponsored text for religious education in its schools - the first edition of the Egyptian Qu'ran was published in 1924 and was also known as the King Fuad edition (Von Denffer) in honour of the King at the time. Republication with minor revisions subsequently occurred later in 1924 and in 1936 (Reynolds). The project was meant to present an authentic reading of Hafs, as reported by Asim (Von Denffer), rather than reconstruct the ancient historic Qu'ran - researchers at the time, such as Gotthelf Bergstrasser, noted this was relatively well done with only minor variation (Bergsträßer). The Cairo-edition quickly found remarkable success throughout the Middle East among both Sunni and Shia Muslims, leading to Otto Pretzl noting in 1938 that for the first time a de facto canonical text had emerged for the Qu'ran (R. Paret). The Cairo edition has emerged to become the 'standard edition' of the Qu'ran (Von Denffer) and is hence often used for textual criticism by scholars (ex. Jeffreys & Mendelssohn)."

Now, I really don't think this is in any way better than what was on Wikipedia earlier, in fact it contains less detail than the former post. But anyway, I feel this is an extensively references post given its small size that I've written in my own words based on the source material and if you still think that it's 'taken too closely' from the sources given the small size of the paragraph, please feel free to re-write yourself with the relevant information. When I look at most Wikipedia entries, its common entire paragraphs are written with only a single reference...just to put it into perspective.

So anyway, should we use this and move forward from it? You and @TomHennell: can add to it/subtract whatever you think is good/bad so at least we have a starting point and can finally write a good section on the place of Cairo 1924 in the history of the Qu'ran. Thanks Ballymore1 (talk)

CounterTime. With respect of you particular queries; the statement from the Corpus Caronicum website is here:

Korandruck Kairo 1924 Hier dargestellt ist die Koranseite der ausgewählten Sure und des Verses im Korandruck von Kairo 1924 (1. Auflage; Reproduktion des in der Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin befindlichen Exemplars). Der arabische Text des Korans wird nach der Lesart ʿĀṣim (gest. in Kufa 744/745 n. Chr.) in der Überlieferung Ḥafṣ wiedergegeben. Die vorliegende Lesart ist eine der sieben Lesarten, welche von Ibn Muǧahid (gest. 936) in Bagdad als für den öffentlichen Gebrauch zulässig festgelegt worden sind. Die Orthographie des Grundbestands an Konsonanten (arab. rasm), die noch nicht durch diakritische Zeichen festgelegten sind, folgt den Regelwerken zur Koranschreibung, die die andalusischen Gelehrten ad-Dānī (gest. 1053) und Ibn Naǧāḥ (gest. 1102/1103) verfasst haben. Die weiteren Bereiche der Orthographie, wie Vokalzeichen, Assimilationszeichen und Pausenzeichen wurden für diesen Druck z.T. erstmalig standardisiert bzw. in einigen Fällen eigens geschaffen.

The passages in Brockett that I am citing is support of the statement that the project that produced the Cairo 1924 edition was a revision of the previous Insanbul editions are to be found mainly on pages 39 and 40; together with the associated endnotes. The key passage from page 39 is below:

It is entitled "Qur'n karim" in the central design of the upper cover with 56: 77-80 in the four inside corners of the frame. On. the title-page is "al-Qur'an al-karim, biatt is-Sayyid Mustafâ Nazif a-ahir biKadzr'alz, munaqqahart 'ala r-rasm il-'Utrnni" - "The noble Qur'ãn, in the hand of al-Sayyid Mustafã Nazif known as Kadirah, revised according to the 'Utmãnic graphic form".' ° It was printed by Maktabat al-Gumhflriyya al-'Arabiyya under a permit dated 7/8/1965 from the professoriate of the Azhar, and at the expense of the publisher, 'Abd al-Fattãh. 'Abd al-Harnid Murãd. It is the Istanbul Kadirah text in a revised form, having the same number of pages (522), the same number of lines per page (15), and even t,he same position for each word per tine.

Brockett goes on to demonstrate that this revision of the Istanbul text was written as part of the project to produce the 1924 Cairo edition.

Fred Leemhuis discusses the Cairo 1924 edition on page 152.

I regret that I do not read Arabic; so I tend to rely on Google translate to scan the overall meaning; and then beg help from those better equipped for the details. Applying this approach, I fear I have drawn a blank on the paper you linked to from the Qur'an Printing Complex in Medinah; as I can only find references in it to printings up to the mid 19th century (which may well be useful for the article, but not for this actual bit). Nothing about Cairo 1924 and the Madinah Mushaf, nor how the one does or does not differ from the other; which is what we really need. I did see one article listed on the English summary pages of the Complex; relating to the degree to which modern printings of the Qur'an have to go beyond the specifications for the Hafs reading from ad-Dani, in respect of graphic forms of alif. Do you have access to this paper? One problem is that my viruschecker issues a warning against wwww.qurancomplexgov.sa as a dangerous site; so strictly it should not be linked to in a Wikipedia article. See https://safeweb.norton.com/report/show?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.qurancomplex.gov.sa%2F&product=N360&version=22.6.0.142&lang=0901&source=toolbarTomHennell (talk) 22:29, 11 June 2016 (UTC)

@Ballymore1: I wasn't formally acquainted with it at the time, and I used Google Scholar as a metric, since widespread academic coverage meant that it had to be included in WP due to WP:V. In any case, your paragraphs present a lot of problems, for instance the quote from Von Denffer when he talks about the Cairo printing: "The Qur'anic text in printed form now used widely in the Muslim world and developing into a 'standard version', is the so-called 'Egyptian' edition, also known as the King Fu'ad edition, since it was introduced in Egypt under King Fu'ad. This edition is based on the reading of Hafs, as reported by 'Asim, and was first printed in Cairo in 1925/1344H. Numerous copies have since been printed." does not contain what you said. And why use expressions such as: "variety of publications with variations in text and Qira'at", since all mutawattir qira'at, and even the shadh ones, including the differences between them, are known.

This is just from my very first look into those paragraphs, if you could please add specific quotes from each of these references detailing each claim then it would be more than excellent. And I think that using a disposition such as of the one in the essay by Fred Leemhuis in The Cambridge Companion to the Qur'ān (ed. Jane Dammen McAuliffe) would be much better.

23:15, 11 June 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

@TomHennell: Alright for the passage from Corpus...

I don't see where Brockett talks about talks about the Cairo 1924 edition in that passage you quoted, in fact he talks about a Mushaf published by Maktabat al-Guhuriyya al-'Arabiyya in 7/8/1965. Again, hoping that I wont have to repeat myself again, can you please provide exact quotes? And how can it be that this 'revision' of the Istanbul text was part of the project in 1924 when this Mushaf was published nearly 40 years after?

Oh right, sorry I searched for 1924, but Fred mentioned the date of 1923.

It does talk about the Cairo mushaf, and in great detail indeed, here's a quote for instance:

صدرت النسخة المصرية عام ١٣٤٢/١٩٢٤. اعتمد فلوجل في إصدار نسخته على مخطوطات قرآنية وتفاسير قرآنية متوفرة في مكتبات فيينا ودريسدن وباريس وليدن وجوته وغيرها، فأراد إخراج نسخة كما قرأها مشاهير القراء وعامة المسلمين واعتمدها علماؤهم، فأصدر طبعته التي لا تخلو من الأخطاء، واعتمد على مخطوطات لتفاسير مشهورة مثل تفسير البيضاوي الذي نشره هاينريخ فلايشر بين عام ١٨٤٦ وعام١٨٤٩ في مدينة لايبزغ وفي نفس المطبعة التي طبع فلوجل نسخته القرآنية،

It even points the types of errors in this printing:

أما بالنسبة للأخطاء التي احتوتها "فقد كانت حروف الطباعة سيئة وغير صالحة لإظهار جمال الرسم القرآني، و وإضافة لذلك تسببت أخطاء أخرى أسوأ من ذلك في تشويه تلك الطبعة، فعلى سبيل المثال: ١-رسم الكتابة فيها لا يطابق الرسم العثماني، ولا أي كتابة مأثورة أخرى. ٢-فواصل الآيات عشوائية غاليا، وترقيم الآيات مخالف لكل ما هو مأثور في هذا الشأن. أخطاء مطبعية كثيرة جدا"

For the Norton rating, maybe that's a false positive? I possess a licensed version of Kaspersky Internet Security and I didn't get any warnings while browsing, downloading from that site.

On a side note, I don't know if it's WP-friendly to postulate on WP content about a scripture, the language of which the contributor doesn't know.

23:15, 11 June 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

CounterTime; you need to read the whole of the chapter including the endnotes; not just one page; and you cannot expect Brockett's lengthy argument to be comprised within a single handy quote. Sorry. Kadirgah died in 1913, so this Qur'an (though not separately published in this edition til 1965) still represents a preparatory stage for the 1924 Cairo Quran project.

"Since the Cairo KadiraIi

text was completed at least twelve years before the 1342 Cairo text, it iS

therefore most likely that the manuscript for the 1342 Cairo text was modelled

on this Cairo KadiraIi text, incorporating a few small improvements, and

a generally more easily read text."

I think you have misread the comments in the review article you provided; the reference, and associated criticisms) are to the 1834 Flügel edition (on which Fred Leemhuis also comments at page 152). The article states that Flügel's Qur'an (whith all the deficiencies that Leemhuis notes) nevertheless remained the standard Qur'an text for western scholars until the publication of the 1924 Cairo edition. But I see nothing otherwise specific to the Cairo edition. And, alas, nothing about the textual history of the Medinah Muschaf.

the Norton rating is a puzzle. But Wikipedia policy is to avoid linking to sites that may be in any degeree questionable. That should not stop us citing an article on the site though; assuming that it has been separately published in an academic journal. We simply cite the journal not the webpage. TomHennell (talk) 00:32, 12 June 2016 (UTC)

@TomHennell: Sorry for taking such formal measures, but that's to ensure that WP:SYNTHESIS isn't violated. In this case, we shouldn't derive apparently implicit statements from WP:RSs, so we should only include explicit statements mentioned therein, as far as I can see, the phrase "a deliberate nationalist aspiration from Egypt in general - and Al-Azhar in particular - to contest late 19th century Ottoman claims to Islamic leadership" isn't mentioned in it, either explicitly or implicitly. The quote you made also doesn't mean that "a deliberate nationalist aspiration from Egypt in general - and Al-Azhar in particular - to contest late 19th century Ottoman claims to Islamic leadership".

What the heck are you talking about? It said: "صدرت النسخة المصرية عام ١٣٤٢/١٩٢٤" meaning "The Egyptian edition was published in the year 1924 C.E/1342 A.H." How is that the 1834 Flügel edition? Even if one used Google Translate, one could see "عام ١٩٢٤" being translate to "the year 1924". I'll have to repeat my comment earlier, I don't know if it's WP-friendly to postulate on WP content about a scripture, the language of which the contributor doesn't know. That's like having a user trying to incorporate content in a Quantum Field Theory article when he's knowledge doesn't surpass popular sci.

CounterTime on your query relating to good Wikipedia practice; the answer is emphatically 'yes'. Wikipdia is set up as an encyclopedia that anyone can edit, whether they have any expertise in the field in question or not. That is inherent in the whole way that Wikipedia is designed - most specifically in the rule against 'Original Research'. That applies as much to Quantum Field Theory as it does to the History of the Qur'an. All contributions to English Wikipedia should be sourced to published opionions in current authoritative scholarship; in a form that is accessible to users with no language other than English. Which does not exclude authoritive scholarship in other languages; but does require that the key points of any such non-English scholarship are translated in footnote - and fully referenced (in English) to the orginal publication. So it is required of editors that they are able to find, recognise, reference and summarise current scholarship; but not at all that they have specialised knowledge in the field covered by the article, or non-English linguistic skills. If you feel that some aspect of current scholarship in Quantum Field Theory is not adequately covered in the current article, edit away with all our blessings. TomHennell (talk) 10:39, 14 June 2016 (UTC)

00:48, 12 June 2016 (UTC)CounterTime (talk)

CounterTime. The words that you contest are not in the second outline draft above; I no longer propose that the point be made explcitly in the article. On the quotes from the article on pre-20th century printings of the Qur'an, Flügel is specified in the next sentence after the one with the dates in it - and the rest of the para clearly refers to him. The Cairo edition reference is from the previous sentence, of which you have only taken the second half. Your second extract is from the next para but one, but again points to errors in Flügel - noting Bergsrasser's postive evaluation of the Cairo edition is contrast. With all reservations about relying on GoogleTransate, I find the point fairly clearly apparent. TomHennell (talk) 08:57, 12 June 2016 (UTC)

خامسا: طبعة جوستاف فلوجل عام ١٨٣٤50:

في عام ١٨٣٤ قام المستشرق جوستاف فلوجل Gustav Flugel في مدينة لايبزغ Leipzig بنشر طبعة للقرآن الكريم في مطبعة Tuchnitz بعنوان: الهدى والفرقان، وأما عنوانها اللاتيني فهو:

Corani Textus Arabicus ad fidem liborum manuscriptorum et impressorum et ad praecipuorum interpretum lectiones et autoritatem recensuit indicesque triginta sectionum et suraturum addidit Gustav Flugel أي: النص العربي للقرآن طبقا لبعض المخطوطات والمراجع المطبوعة، وحسب قراءات وقواعد مشاهير القراء، مزودا بفهرس لأجزاء القرآن الثلاثين ولسوره، إعداد جوستاف فلوجل، ولما صدرت طبعته استعاض الناس في الغرب عن الطبعات السابقة التي قام بها كل من هنكلمان ومراتشي، وبقيت قيد الاستخدام حتى صدرت النسخة المصرية عام ١٣٤٢/١٩٢٤. اعتمد فلوجل في إصدار نسخته على مخطوطات قرآنية وتفاسير قرآنية متوفرة في مكتبات فيينا ودريسدن وباريس وليدن وجوته وغيرها، فأراد إخراج نسخة كما قرأها مشاهير القراء وعامة المسلمين واعتمدها علماؤهم، فأصدر طبعته التي لا تخلو من الأخطاء، واعتمد على مخطوطات لتفاسير مشهورة مثل تفسير البيضاوي الذي نشره هاينريخ فلايشر بين عام ١٨٤٦ وعام١٨٤٩ في مدينة لايبزغ وفي نفس المطبعة التي طبع فلوجل نسخته القرآنية، وكذلك اعتمد على تفسير أبي السعود: إرشاد العقل السليم إلى مزايا الكتاب الكريم في تفسير القرآن على مذهب النعمان، فقد كان هدف فلوجل الأول هو إخراج نص صحيح للقرآن الكريم؛ ولهذا فقد ذكر في مقدمته اللاتينية السبب في عدم الوثوق بطبعتي هنكلمان ومراتشي، وأنهما وضعا في طبعتيهما تعليقات معادية للإسلام، وأما الطبعات التي نشرت في روسيا أو في الهند فقد كان من الصعوبة للأوروبيين الحصول عليها والاعتماد عليها. والتقدم الحقيقي الذي أضافه فلوجل في طبعته هو أنه لم يفعل كما فعل المستشرقون السابقون من إضافات معادية للإسلام، بل قدم النص خاليا من كل هذه الأكاذيب حتى لا يتأثر القارئ برأي الناشر

وقد نجحت طبعته أيما نجاح في العالم الغربي وخارجه وخصوصا في الشرق الأدنى والأقصى ويعرف ذلك من الطبعات التي أعدت للبيع في الشرق حيث خلت من الترقيم الغربي ومن المقدمات والإهداءات بالحروف اللاتينية. وفي عام ١٨٣٧ طبعت نسخة مصغرة غير مرقمة الآيات وأشرف عليها عالم اللاهوت Gustav Moritz Redslob (1804-1882)جوستاف م. ريدسلوب. وبدءا من عام ١٨٤١ بدأت مطبعة Tuchnitz باتباع أسلوب جديد في الطباعة يمكنها من مضاعفة الإنتاج وتقليص تكلفته. وحاولت المطبعة قدر الإمكان أن تصدر نسخا ذات طابع فني وزخرفي يشبه المخطوطات القرآنية، فنرى مثلا سورة الفاتحة وبداية سورة البقرة متقابلتان في صفحتين مع الزخرفة كما في المخطوطات القرآنية52. بقيت طبعة فلوجل لمدة قرن من الزمان هي المعتمدة لدى الباحثين الأوروبيين بالرغم مما فيها من أخطاء.

أما بالنسبة للأخطاء التي احتوتها "فقد كانت حروف الطباعة سيئة وغير صالحة لإظهار جمال الرسم القرآني، و وإضافة لذلك تسببت أخطاء أخرى أسوأ من ذلك في تشويه تلك الطبعة، فعلى سبيل المثال: ١-رسم الكتابة فيها لا يطابق الرسم العثماني، ولا أي كتابة مأثورة أخرى. ٢-فواصل الآيات عشوائية غاليا، وترقيم الآيات مخالف لكل ما هو مأثور في هذا الشأن. أخطاء مطبعية كثيرة جدا"، وأول مستشرق كشف عن هذه الأخطاء هو أ د جوتهيلف برجشترسر (١٨٨٦-١٩٣٣) الذي كان أستاذا في جامعة ميونيخ وعمل أستاذا زائرا في اللغات السامية في جامعة القاهرة بين عامي ١٩٢٩ و١٩٣٠. فعندما صدرت الطبعة المصرية التي أصدرها علماء الأزهر الشريف عام ١٩٢٤، وبعدما اطلع عليها برجشترسر اعترف قائلا: "إنها إنجاز جد ممتاز، نهدي من أجله التهنئة والصداقة إلى العلماء المصريين....إن هذه الطبعة الرسمية للمصحف الشريف إنجاز لم يكن بإمكان الاستشراق الأوروبي تقديم ما هو أفضل منه أو ما يوازيه...إنها برهان على المستوى الرفيع الذي بلغته حاليا دراسات علوم القرآن في مصر...ولم يكن لكل الدقة والعناية الفلسفية في أوروبا أن تصل إلى هذه الدقة الفائقة"53. وعرض برجشترسر انتقادات لطبعة فلوجل أدت لتعطيلها فقد قال: "فيما يتعلق بطبعة فلوجل للنص القرآني، فإنها لم تكن، على الأقل في عصره، إنجازا رائعا؛ فعندما ظهرت هذه الطبعة لأول مرة عام ١٨٣٤ كانت مليئة بالأخطاء...وليس من المشرف للاستشراق في أوروبا كلها وفي ألمانيا بوجه خاص أن يرى طوال قرن من الزمان أنه ليس من الضروري التوصل إلى بديل لهذه الطبعة التي ينقصها أهم النصوص الشرقية...إن الطبعة المصرية الرسمية للقرآن تعد من الآن فصاعدا مرجعا للباحث الأوروبي، ومنذ ظهورها لم يعد هناك ما يبرر استخدام طبعة فلوجل للنص القرآني"54. وإلى جانب طبعة فلوجل للمصحف فإنه ألف عام ١٩٤٢ معجما مفهرسا لألفاظ القرآن بعنوان: نجوم الفرقان في أطراف القرآن، وقد نال استحسانا كبيرا من صاحب المعجم المفهرس لألفاظ القرآن محمد فؤاد عبد الباقي55.

Fifth: Gustav Gustav Leberecht Flügel edition in 183 450:

In 1834 the Orientalist Gustav Gustav Leberecht Flügel Gustav Flugel in the city of Leipzig Leipzig publish Edition Holy Quran in Tuchnitz Press titled: guidance and the Criterion, and The Latin title is:

Corani Textus Arabicus ad fidem liborum manuscriptorum et impressorum et ad praecipuorum interpretum lectiones et autoritatem recensuit indicesque triginta sectionum et suraturum addidit Gustav Flugel ie: the Arabic text of the Koran, according to some manuscripts and printed references, according to the rules of celebrity readers readings, providing a catalog of parts thirtieth Quran and surah, preparation Gustav Gustav Leberecht Flügel, and what edition replaced people in the West were issued for previous editions carried out by each of the Hnkelman and Marche, and remained in use until the Egyptian version issued in 1342/1924. Adopted Gustav Leberecht Flügel in issuing its version on Koranic manuscripts and interpretations of Quranic available in Vienna and Dresden, Paris and Leiden libraries, Goethe and others, wanted to take out a copy and read celebrity readers and Muslims in general and adopted by scholars, issuing edition which is not free of errors, and relied on the scripts as famous Oval explanation for interpretations published Heinrich Fleischer between 1846 and 1849 in the city of Leipzig and at the same printing press that printed Gustav Leberecht Flügel version of Quranic and also relied on the interpretation of Abu Saud: the guidance of sound mind to the advantages of the holy book in the interpretation of the Koran on the doctrine of al-Numan, it was the first goal Gustav Leberecht Flügel is the true text of the Koran output ; but this was said in Latin preface reason not to trust Btabotai Hnkelman and Marche, and that they situation in Tabotaihma hostile comments of Islam, and the editions published in Russia or in India, it has been difficult for Europeans obtained and reliable. The real progress that Gustav Leberecht Flügel added in the edition is that it did not do as did former Orientalists of hostile additions of Islam, but the text presented free of all these lies so that the reader is not affected by the opinion of the publisher

The edition has succeeded greatly successful in the Western world and beyond, especially in the Near and Far East, and knows it editions prepared for sale in the east, where ago from the western punctuation and introductions and Go romanized. In 1837 it printed a smaller version is numbered verses and supervised by the theologian Gustav Moritz Redslob (1804-1882) Gustav m. Rideslob. Starting in 1841 Tuchnitz Press began following the new method in the printing position to double production and reduce its cost. I tried as much as possible the printing press to issue copies of a technical nature and frilly looks like a Koranic manuscripts, we see, for example, Al-Fatihah and the beginning of Sura Mottagabeltan in two pages with the decoration, as in the Koranic manuscripts 52. Gustav Leberecht Flügel edition remained for a century is accredited to the European researchers despite the errors.

As for the errors that Ahtutea "has been printing letters ill and unfit to show the beauty of drawing the Qur'an, and in addition to that it caused other worse in the distortion of that edition errors. For example: 1-sketch writing which does not match the Uthmaani, nor any writing sayings other 0.2-breaks verses random dearly, and numbered verses contrary to everything that is saying in this regard. too many typographical errors, "and the first Orientalist detect these errors is a d Jothelv Bergstrsr (1886-1933), who was a professor at the University of Munich and worked as a professor visiting in Semitic languages ​​at Cairo University between 1929 and 1930. When issued Egyptian edition issued by Al-Azhar scholars in 1924, and after being briefed by Bergstrsr he admitted: "It's the completion of a very excellent, dedicate for him congratulations and friendship to the Egyptian scientists .... This is the official edition of the Holy Quran achievement was not the European Orientalism can provide what is better than him or matched ... it's proof of the high level reached currently Quranic sciences studies in Egypt ... it was not every philosophical precision and care in Europe to reach these high-precision "53. And display Bergstrsr criticism edition Gustav Leberecht Flügel led to disable them, he said: "With regard edition Gustav Leberecht Flügel Qur'anic text, they were not, at least in his time, a fantastic achievement; when emerged this edition for the first time in 1834 was full of mistakes ... It is not the supervisor of Orientalism in Europe whole and in Germany in particular, to see over a century, it is not necessary to reach an alternative to this edition, which was missing the most eastern texts ... The official Egyptian edition of the Koran is henceforth a reference European researcher, and since its appearance there is no longer justification for the use edition Gustav Leberecht Flügel Qur'anic text "54. Besides Gustav Leberecht Flügel edition of the Koran it a thousand in 1942, a glossary indexed to the words of the Koran titled: Star-Furqan on the outskirts of the Koran, has been highly acclaimed by his Concordance to the words of the Koran Mohammed Fouad Abdel Baqi 55