Page 325 - History of The Quranic Text | Kalamullah.Com

THE ORIENTALIST AND THE QUR'AN 305

Zaid nor anyone elsecould use them as a primary resource for comparative
purposes.'
But if the entire Qur'an had been recorded during the Prophet's lifetime,
kept either in his custody or with various Companions, why was 'Umar
afraid of losingthe Qur'an through the ~lfffii:;:'s martyrdom? This once again
involves the law of witness.
Numbering in their thousands, the ~lfffii:;: attained Qur'anic knowledge
through the one relevant authority on earth, the Prophet. After his death
they became the relevant authorities themselves; their deaths threatened
to terminate the testimony leading back to the Prophet, making the acqui-
sition of authorised knowledge impossible. So too would the verses penned
by their hands lose all merit, their owners buried and unable to verify their
authenticity. Even if a fragment coincided perfectly with the Qur'an as
memorised by others, in lieu of a suitable first-class witness it became at
best a third-class legal document. That is why in compiling the $u~zif, Abu.
Bakr insisted that every person bring not only verses but also two witnesses
to attest that the dictation came directly from the Prophet (wefmd this law
of witness invoked again during 'Uthman's reign). Written verses would of
course remain on shelves and in cupboards regardless of whether the
Yarnama soil soaked up the ~l{[fti:;:'s blood, but the authority of witness,
that essential point upon which the entire value of every document hinged,
was what 'Umar dreaded forfeiting.

3. Transmutation if Islam into Foreign Idioms

A second gateway for an attack on the Qjir'an is the wholesale conversion
of Islamic studies into Western terminology. In his Introduction to Islamic Law,
Schacht divides Islamic jurisprudence into the following headings: persons,
property, obligations in general, obligations and contracts in particular,
etc. This arrangement deliberately transmutes Islamic Law into Roman
5
Law as it has no relevance whatsoever with the headings and classifications
used in the Islamic legal system; the implication of course is that it iswholly
derivative of Roman Law. Wansbrough does the same with the Qjir'an,
dividing his Qyranic Studies along the following lines: Principles of Exegesis
(l) Masoretic exegesis; (2) Haggadic exegesis; (3) Deutungsbedurftigkeit;
(4) Halakhic exegesis; and (5) Rhetoric and allegory"

4 Referring back to pp. 90-91, Sawwar b. Shabib's hadith. claims that Zaid compared
'Uthrnan's Mushaf with the Prophet's personal copy of the Qur'an. If it had been his
personal copy, kept in 'A'isha's custody, then Zaid might have afforded it a secondary
status in the course of his endeavours.
5 J.Schacht, An Introduction toIslamic Law, Oxford Univ. Press, 1964, Contents Table.
6 J. Wansbrough, Qyranic Studies, Contents.