Form the book
((Islam and Christianity /
by Ulfat 'Aziz-Us-Samad –
published by Al-Falah Foundation
www.falahonline.com ,
ISBN:977 -5813-14-X ))
It is therefore with a feeling of deep love and respect for both Jesus
and Muhammad (pbut), and for the religions which they preached, that I
embark upon a comparative study of Islam and Christianity. If at times
I find myself disagreeing with the Christians, it is not over the
religion of Jesus, but over the altered shape and features that they
developed after his departure. In the words of Lord Headley, "Islam
and Christianity, as taught by Christ himself, are sister religions,
only held apart by dogmas and technicalities which might very well be
dispensed with" ((Lord Headley : A Western Awakening to Islam, P.15))
The Authenticity of the Qur'an
On the other hand, there is no such doubt about the Glorious Qur'an.
It contains nothing but the revelations received by the Prophet
Muhammad (pbuh). The revelations came to him in fragments, from time
to time. As soon as he received any, he used to communicate it to his
Companions and ask then not only to commit it to memory, but also to
write it down. Muhammad (pbuh) used to indicate in a precise manner
the place to which the revelation belonged. Thus the complete Qur'an
was committed to writing and also preserved in the hearts of hundreds
of Muslims in the life time of the Prophet.
After the demise of the Prophet, Abu Bakr, the first Caliph, charged
Zaid ibn Thabit with the task of preparing an authentic copy of the
entire text in the form of a book. The Companions of the Prophet wrote
the revelations that had come to the prophet on parchment or pieces of
leather. Zaid ibn Thabit collected all these and after comparing them
with what the followers of the Prophet had learnt by heart, compiled a
copy, called Mushaf (bound leaves). About the genuineness or
correctness of which there was absolutely no doubt.
At the order of 'Uthman, the third Caliph, seven copies of the Mushaf
edition of the Glorious Qur'an, again confined by the memory of those
who had learnt it by heart (hafiz), were prepared and sent to the
different centers of the vast Islamic world. One of these seven copies
is still in existence in Tashkent. The Czarist government of Russia
had published it with a facsimile reproduction; and we see that there
is a complete identity between this copy and the text otherwise in use
all over the world. The same is true of the other extant MSS of
Qur'an, complete or fragmentary, dating from the first century of the
Muslim era.
From the time of the Prophet to our own time the practice of learning
the whole of the Qur'an by heart has continued unbroken, and the
number of huffaz can now be counted by hundreds of thousands all over
the world. The result is that no scholar, Eastern or Western, Muslim
or non-Muslim, has ever cast any doubt on the purity of the text of
the Glorious Qur'an. Even such an unfriendly critic as Sir William
Muri (( The life of Mohamet, Introduction, p.18)) writes about the
Qur'an:
" There is probably in the world no other book which
has remained twelve centuries with so pure a text"
next time we will talk about (The Prophet Muhammad phuh)
