No music??

[lumumba_s]

For the sake of argument, I pulled it out of my arse. That still doesn't change the fact that textual criticism was developed shortly after the death of the founder of Islam and became central to our epistemology, while textual criticism in the West occurred more than 1,000 years later and was not applied to your religion until 1,800 years after Jesus' time. I have no citation to offer and I don't care to fact-check such a minor detail of this discussion. But logically speaking, when you look at the bigger picture and one is able to step out of the their comfort zone and acknowledge the intellectual contributions that Islam made to the West, the claim that it is ridiculous is actually not. Now that this particular red herring is out of the way, are you going to bother responding to anything else that has been said or are you going to just jump in whenever you nitpick over a inconsequential statement and temporarily derail the thread? Is the extent of your contribution really a 5 second quote from Bart Ehrman on YouTube, ignoring his larger message that the New Testament as we know it is a religious orchestrated fraud?

Yes, it is quite possible that a Biblical scholar would in fact be ignorant that their discipline is indebted to the Islamic tradition when the whitewashing (both literally and figuratively) of history is an established European phenomenon, particularly when it relates to Muslims. And knowing Arabic is most certainly relevant when you are talking about applying textual criticism to an Arabic document. Do you even know what the meaning of absurd is? Simply wishing an argument to be logical or using the language of rationality does not make it so...

[lumumba_s]

One final point. The discipline of textual criticism is about establishing the fact that written source material itself does not guarantee authenticity. So principally, the issue is not oral vs. written tradition, but rather the veracity of the transmission, irrespective of the mode. That is why "hadith" criticism includes in its meaning both written AND spoken "text" and is the Muslim equivalent of what is referred to as textual criticism in the West. Hence, our assertion that the Qur'an and hadith literature has in fact gone through this process and the fact that later hadith scholars continually re-evaluated previous hadith scholars conclusion and viewed particular narrations in a different light in fact proves the meticulousness of the process. The fact that a particular isnad may be considered deficient by later scholars does not undermine the discipline, but only demonstrates that there was not the stagnation in Muslim thought that Orientalists insist on claiming was there and instead proves the very thing that is being denied.

M. Mustafa al-Azami (among many others) thoroughly refutes the isnad criticism that Hawkeye summarized from Patricia Crone. Briefly, shortly after the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) passed, isnad was not an issue because everyone knew each other. Even then, whenever presented with narrations that conflicted with their understood practice, the Companions challenged one another and often demanded not only an oath that someone had heard a particular narration from the Prophet, but that they had a witness to the effect which heard the same. In the Prophet's life, affirmation was simply a matter of confirming something with the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) himself. I.e., textual criticism existed in the period immediately following the Prophet's (Allah bless him and give him peace) passing. As time when on, the narration of hadith became more and more standardized, both in the language that was used and the completeness of citation. To say that early isnads were absent, sketchy or deficient by subsequent hadith scholars is only a half-truth. Hadith are not only classified by the final conclusion of their authenticity, but also upon the proliferation of their transmission. There were many students of the Companions who would not bother to give a chain of transmission if they had heard a particular hadith from multiple sources and the transmission of such people's hadith rested upon that particular person's narration ability. Likewise, some of the students of the students of the Companions, would equally not narrate a complete chain if they heard a particular hadith from a number of the Companions students, but instead attribute the hadith directly to the Prophet, skipping the Companions who narrated it to them. As time when on, this summarized narration style became problematic for obvious reasons and it was abandoned for the technique of narrating the most prestigious mode of transmission while indicating it was heard from multiple individuals. For instance, Imam Malik narrates many hadith in the Muwatta whose chains are incomplete, but they are narrated upon the authority of individuals who were known to do the above. Someone who has no precision in hadith authentication, could mistakenly accuse Imam Malik of narrating problematic hadith (an accusation ignorant leveled against him by Orientalists and self taught would-be reformists), not realizing the nuances of Malik's time period, and equally not realizing the subsequent scholars veneration Malik's narration by providing rigorously authenticated chains of transmission based on later criterion. To describe this as "absent, sketchy or deficient" narration is deceptive.

And this is just the chain of transmission. In reality, a particular narrator is only considered to be strong, weak or deficient, after their ability is established, when their content of their narrations are compared. This is precisely where what is known as "textual criticism" in the Western paradigm is parallel. The various modes of transmission, in their textual component, are analyzed and compared to one another, in order to discover mistakes, deficiencies and aberrations. When you combine both the chain of transmission and the content of what is being transmitted, a much larger picture and a much more rigorous form of textual criticism emerges. This is why Shaad, al-Boriqi and myself have insisted that textual criticism in its Islamic form is much more substantial, reliable and informative than its Western form. Muslim textual criticism includes all the techniques which make up Biblical criticism. Western textual criticism on the other hand only compromises half of what its Muslim counterpart comprises. Hence, there is no such things as encyclopedic biographies analyzing and documenting the relative strength and weaknesses of particular narrators in the Western tradition. The truthfulness of particular people, the few who could write, has to be taken at the word in Western history, while the qualities of a particular narrator is known and established in the Muslim one. But our textual criticism is inferior? You similarly do not have isnads for written material as a standard of academia. So not only are hadith, fatwa and personal opinions of the early scholars traceable, man by man, to the origin; but our books themselves, in pre-modern times, were equally traceable, man by man, to the original scribe who composed them. So the notion that hadith were not written down until 200 years after the Prophet's (Allah bless him and give him peace) death is a lie, untrue, and in the larger scheme of things, besides the point. The oral tradition of the early Muslim community is certifiable and verifiable. The notion that transmission does not count until it is written is both short sighted and intellectually baseless.

In Rome and early Christianity, oral tradition was woefully unreliable. Illiterate people were absolutely so and even the literacy of the poorer classes was relative. In Arabia at the time of the revelation, illiteracy is not the proper word to describe their condition, but unlettered. There were many people had nonetheless memorized hundreds, if not thousands of lines of poetry and the same sort of phenomenon still exists in the Muslim world, though at a much smaller scale. Someone who cannot write, but understands the nuances romance poetry and is able to articulate at a sophisticated level should not be called illiterate. These "illiterates" nonetheless composed lines of poetry that contemporary Arabic linguists take apart and analyze at the PhD level. The failure to acknowledge other cultures for what they are and understanding their nuances and cultural contexts is a scourge upon Western academia. The framing of "literacy" and its limited definition indicative only of written language is precisely one of the primary criticisms of the Eurocentric view of the world that unfortunately still dominates Western academia. The redefinition of what it means to be literate is a large part of the re-claiming of heritage on minority and indigenous populations across the world. For our purposes, failing to acknowledge the cultural context of the Arabs at the time of the Qur'anic revelation is the first mistake of the body of opinions Hawkeye is representing. Hence, it seems perfectly logical for him to associate the illteracy of Palestinian Jews who were unable to speak Hebrew, let alone write it, to the "illiteracy" of the Arabs during the time of revelation and hence, Bart Ehrman's analysis of the state of affairs of Rome appears to apply equally across the board to the pre-modern world. But such conclusions are an unacademic generalization and establishment of one particular culture and civilization as the norm, something which are particular group of people seem especially eager to do. But such generalizations and assumptions are patently false when actual comparisons are done. Makka in the 6th century was not Palestine in the 1st, nor was it Rome in 300 B.C.E.

So you assumptions about the Oral records for the Quran and Hadith are totally unfounded, even laughable. No written Quran earlier that 70 years after your prophets death and as much as 200 years later for the Hadith.

As has and can be demonstrated beyond any reasonable doubt, the oral records of hadith are not unfounded and the claim that written records did not exist until 200 years later is a blatant lie. And quoting a liar who wrote it down in a book does not change it to truth. What is laughable is such ideas being passed for scholarship and presented here as if they should be a cause of concern. Thank you for your time.

Wa-Llahu `alim wa musta`am.

[ProphetofTolerance]

That still doesn't change the fact that textual criticism was developed shortly after the death of the founder of Islam and became central to our epistemology

I'm curious what your definition or standard of textual criticism is.

Do you have any articles on textual criticism in the Islamic tradition? Wikipedia has a lengthy article on Biblical textual criticism.

By loose enough standards, then many early Christian theologians were Biblical critics.

Is the extent of your contribution really a 5 second quote from Bart Ehrman on YouTube, ignoring his larger message that the New Testament as we know it is a religious orchestrated fraud?

Do you actually want to claim the textual criticism Bart Ehrman and many others have applied to the Bible has been applied to the Koran by Muslim scholars for 14 centuries?

I'll get the popcorn ready.

And knowing Arabic is most certainly relevant when you are talking about applying textual criticism to an Arabic document.

No, I don't need to know German to know Einstein's contributions to the field of physics. You clearly did not understand the point of my comment.

Yes, it is quite possible that a Biblical scholar would in fact be ignorant that their discipline is indebted to the Islamic tradition when the whitewashing

You're confusing European tradition of "whitewashing" Muslim contributions to the Muslim habit of falsifying their contributions.

[Ron]

Hawkeye,

I think you missed what was said about such golden eras never occurring again and of course there is no way to know that and it's almost certainly wrong.

No I didn't. I clearly addressed the issue. Your stance seems disingenuous.

Plus there are so many genres that it's impossible to realistically compare them.

You seem to be trying pull at anything. We're not talking about "genres" we're talking about the Arabic language. There has been nothing - before or since - that compares to the Qur'an. This is an axiom. Only the foolish question such a point and usually those who know nothing about the language, its use, its rhythm, its expression etc... The Arabs were stunned; had they not had that initial reaction the progress of the message and mission would have been stifled and we wouldn't be having this conversation. You could deny it all you want but history is there and there's no need to say much more.

One cannot with any sense compare Wodhouse with Shakespear for each was perhaps the greatest exponent of their own genre.

You're kidding right? Anyone with the slightest bit of knowledge knows that from a literary perspective Shakespeare is unmatched; not to mention that Wodhouse was influenced by Shakespeare. Go ahead and do the research and see how many knowledgeable people would even compare the two.

What is odd here is claiming something superior for the Quran when it was expressed in the Arabic of its time, so all that was necessary must have been in the existing state of the language.

There's nothing odd about saying that a beacon of literary light beamed and outshined the brightest wordsmiths in the golden era of the Arabic language. Maybe you just cannot fathom or accept that such brilliance can happen...the Arabs knew it then and those who truly understand the language know it now.

The trouble is one sees all the time clams that Arabic was at its peak but there is almost nothng available from that time to know this or if it is there is where is it?

You see, here you have argued and we are nearly 200 posts in and you ask this question...you don't know about the pre-Islamic poetry that we have today? Even the poems of some of the contemporaries of the Prophet (pbuh)? Seriously, you should consider doing the honorable thing and excuse yourself from this conversation because clearly you're not well-informed. All you've tried to do is posit ideas contrary to human understanding and historical fact. There is such a thing as the best...in this case the Qur'an was the best-of-the-best. You wouldn't know but somehow you find it in yourself to argue you...nevertheless, the most relevant people knew it...that's all that matters.

[shaad_lko]

Just like your claim that Christians and Jews were never persecuted or expelled under Muslim Spain because of their faith, right?

As usual, another one of your claims is torpedoed because *you* obviously have very limited knowledge in history; not anyone else.

No, there was no persecution by Muslims in Spain (at least not any state-sponsored one) unlike the Inquisition that followed. Your nick on the forum is antithetical to what you display here - continue living in your fantasy land...

[lumumba_s]

ProphetofTolerance...

No. What I am saying is that textual criticism developed organically and simultaneously with hadith transmission and authentication as the need for it became apparent. As far as the Qur'an is concerned, the very manner in which it was revealed and the public experience of the Muslim community pre-empted any need for textual criticism being applied to it, as the proliferation of the scripture reached what is referred to in hadith authentication as tawatur or successive mass-transmission such that both mistakes and dishonesty is impossible.

In early Christiandom, the "New Testament" was not a defined scriptural document and instead was the basic reformatory message of Christ, as taught by the initial convert community (Biblical scholars like Ehrman do believe that there was some primary scripture however, which was the basis for the religious material of the four gospels, but that it was not preserved.) The belief that Christ was going to return within the lifetime of the initial disciples removed the need for any scriptures and soon thereafter, his expected imminent return similarly did not lend itself to establishing a distinct Christian text. However, as time went on and Christ had not yet returned, there became need for scripture and for the members of this community, it consisted in various letters and apocalyptic literature that was being circulated. So the nature of how "scripture" developed made textual criticism both relevant and necessary in order to establish some sort of textual veracity. The Qur'an, on the other hand, was established as a scripture from the beginning and the nature of its distribution and circulation was itself the establishment of textual veracity. So, no, Muslim scholars have not been applying the discipline of textual criticism to the Qur'an for the past 1,400 years - its mutawatir nature rendered textual criticism unnecessary. Rather, Muslim scholars have been applying textual criticism to the hadith corpus, the bulk of which is not established through tawatur. And because the tawatur served to preserve the Qur'anic text, even Orientalists hostile to Islam and its spread begrudgingly acknowledge that the historical Qur'an is the same Qur'an of the initial period of Muslim history.

And though some Muslims, in their nostalgia for the past and desire to be accepted by contemporary Western secular society may exaggerate their contributions, there is unquestionably a European whitewashing of history and Europeans are notorious for crafting narratives that suit their beliefs, irrespective to or without feeling the need to establish any evidence supporting their claims. This is particularly the case with Muslims, for claiming a moral, spiritual and civilization superiority over a group of people as justification for your barbaric treatment and dismissal of their humanity is pretty difficult to do when you have to acknowledge that they actually contributed knowledge to your civilization and help sparked your own cultural and intellectual renaissance. And this is particular the case of Spain, which was traumatic to the Christian psyche, having a Muslim political power so close to the heartlands of Western Europe and which so positively influenced European culture. Christian apologetics still deny what actually occurred there and the archaeological material has exposed much of the Spanish re-writing of history that has been so much a part of Christian "history" in that land.

[shaad_lko]

Do you have any articles on textual criticism in the Islamic tradition? Wikipedia has a lengthy article on Biblical textual criticism.

there are n number of articles on Hadith on Wikipedia, but that is besides the point since WP itself is not a peer-reviewed source. Go and do a search on JSTOR, EBSCO or Google Scholar..

Do you actually want to claim the textual criticism Bart Ehrman and many others have applied to the Bible has been applied to the Koran by Muslim scholars for 14 centuries?

If you had carefully read what Lumumba was implying the answer is that the textual criticism applied by Muslims was of a much higher standard than what Biblical scholars can ever hope to match.

I'll get the popcorn ready.

and I'll pour on the butter.

[theman09]

All the NT is based on manuscripts dated not later than 90AD and of course this means the NT was in wide circulation easily within a generation of its founder

How does your gibberish prove stories like this

51At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split. 52The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. 53After his resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many.

?


unknown matthew told unknown christian audience in an unknown place, 50 years after jesus' murder, that dead jews entered the holy city.

this is your proof?


unknown matthew, wrote in an unknown place to unknown christian audiece that jews payed the romans to spread the story that jesus' deciples stole jesus' dead body, he adds that

"This story became widely known, and is current in Jewish circles to
this day."

does this sound like matthew was writing in israel? or does it sound like he is informing someone about what is going on in israel?

how does "the NT was in wide circulation easily within a generation of its founder" bs prove that jews payed romans to spread a lie?


1. the jews successfully destroy jesus and later they are concerned that his deciples will steal his dead/finnished body? why would they give a damn about his dead body? why would the romans give a damn about dead jewish body when jesus' deciples weren't expecting a ressurection?

[Hawkeye]

Such a claim is completely absurd ...

It is one thing to state what you think is true and quite another to be honest. Your post was long and often mistaken but lets take it more slowly. I'll start with some simple questions and see how you respond and later I'll deal with some Hadith issues (because I quote Crone does not mean she is the only person I know). You claim superior scholarship and unimpeachable epistemology so perhaps we can begin there with a straightforward question.

shaad mentioned earlier the Gospel of Barbabus and although his post was ambiguous he seem to have quoted it because for him it has authority and indeed one finds it referred to all over the place on Muslim websites. The Gospel of Barnabas is often promoted by Muslims as an original Gospel written by the man named Barnabas who it is claimed was a disciple of Jesus. So what is your position; is it a forgery or authentic?

[Hawkeye]

You seem to be trying pull at anything. We're not talking about "genres" we're talking about the Arabic language. There has been nothing - before or since - that compares to the Qur'an. This is an axiom. Only the foolish question such a point and usually those who know nothing about the language, its use, its rhythm, its expression etc... The Arabs were stunned; had they not had that initial reaction the progress of the message and mission would have been stifled and we wouldn't be having this conversation. You could deny it all you want but history is there and there's no need to say much more.

Are you saying that Arabic is some kind of perfect language without fault or blemish of any kind? That the Quran is an axiom is just arrogance and in any case like all axioms it is an assumption that only muslims are likely to hold and us lesser mortals must accept it.

You're kidding right? Anyone with the slightest bit of knowledge knows that from a literary perspective Shakespeare is unmatched; not to mention that Wodhouse was influenced by Shakespeare. Go ahead and do the research and see how many knowledgeable people would even compare the two.

if Shakespear is unmatched his writing must also be divine then? There is nothing wrong in being influenced but at some point one needs to be original. The interesting thing about Wodehouse is that he adds into his text quotes or allusions from hundreds of other writers and yet the text is unmistakably his own. If we look at the Quran Mohammed also alludes to other sources but almost always he edits them or to be more precise he plagiarises them so your Quran is not perhaps as wonderful as you think

There's nothing odd about saying that a beacon of literary light beamed and outshined the brightest wordsmiths in the golden era of the Arabic language. Maybe you just cannot fathom or accept that such brilliance can happen...the Arabs knew it then and those who truly understand the language know it now.

good writing is to be prized wherever it comes from and I value Arabic poetry as much as the next man but you keep on insisting this huge body of work which was available at the time of your prophet arrived but seem totally unable to tell anyone where it is so it can be examined.

[lumumba_s]

Why are you asking me about something Shaad said? So your technique of debate is to declare fault in what I said, deflect my criticism of your references and then ask me about a side issue that I have shown no interest in as a starting point? Really?

[shaad_lko]

It is one thing to state what you think is true and quite another to be honest. Your post was long and often mistaken but lets take it more slowly. I'll start with some simple questions and see how you respond and later I'll deal with some Hadith issues (because I quote Crone does not mean she is the only person I know). You claim superior scholarship and unimpeachable epistemology so perhaps we can begin there with a straightforward question.

shaad mentioned earlier the Gospel of Barbabus and although his post was ambiguous he seem to have quoted it because for him it has authority and indeed one finds it referred to all over the place on Muslim websites. The Gospel of Barnabas is often promoted by Muslims as an original Gospel written by the man named Barnabas who it is claimed was a disciple of Jesus. So what is your position; is it a forgery or authentic?

unfortunately the thread has got clutterred with circular reasoning. I quoted Gospel of Barnabas to illustrate that if in your opinion the Quran is not preserved, then the Bible is much less so. Reg. whether it is authentic or not, "academic" opinion hasnt concluded either way, despite whatever you may assert.

And yes, Lumumba is correct taht epistemologically, Muslims have taken the greatest care to authenticate the sources of their faith. To give a simple point, the hallmark of a sound epistemology is a coherent taxonomy - in Hadith sciences, this kind of classification exists, yet in Biblical criticism it is rare to find a universally accepted systemic categorization of the same kind.

[shaad_lko]

good writing is to be prized wherever it comes from and I value Arabic poetry as much as the next man but you keep on insisting this huge body of work which was available at the time of your prophet arrived but seem totally unable to tell anyone where it is so it can be examined.

so you havent even heard of the Seven Hanging Odes and you find yourself competent to discuss the literary value of the Quran?

[Hawkeye]

Why are you asking me about something Shaad said?

You claim superior epistemology so if you trust in and similar sources then that is part of how you get your knowledge - but I guess you don't want to answer such a simple question yet surely truth is at stake here.

[lumumba_s]

Dude, I already answered your question. The two of you (you and "ProphetofTolerance") seem to have a hard time reading between the lines. If you can't reason from clearly articulated generalities to specifics, you should really stop trying to hold adult conversations. I don't "claim" a superior epistemology, I explained how the textual criticism developed by the hadith scholars, includes and surpasses the textual criticism utilized by the West. If you can't discern immediately how I feel about the Gospel of Barnabus by what I have already said, there is no point in us trying to discuss anything further.