The Basis of Islamic Belief
Creator: Dr. Gary Miller
Date: 2006-03-30
Format: text
Identifier: http://thetruereligion.org/modules/wfsection/article.php?articleid=96
Language: en
Subject: Non-Muslims
Title: The Basis of Islamic Belief
Created on: Thu Mar 30 22:10:01 -0500 2006
Updated on: Mon Sep 25 13:21:16 -0400 2006
Version: 3
Abstract: ... myself, as I said everyone knows something for sure or has an interest and experience in life; my interest is in mathematics and logic. There is a verse in the Qur'an which says: "This a scripture whose verses are perfected and then expounded." (11:1) Which tells me that there are no wasted words in the Qur'an; that each verse is perfected and then it is explained. It could not be in a better form. One could not use fewer words to say the same thing or if one uses more words one would only be adding superfluous information. This directed my attention to a particular mathematical subject, a logical subject, and I examined the Quran to see if I could find something of what I knew to be the case. A revolution in logic has occurred in the last one hundred years, primarily over the difference between use and mention of words. A structure of logic seemed to be in danger of collapsing about a hundred years ago because it came to the attention of the people who studied these matters that the structure was not quite sound. The issue involved "self-reference" and the use and the mention of words which I will explain briefly. Aristotle"s law of the "excluded middle" was the statement that every statement is either true or false. About a hundred years ago, somebody pointed out that the law of the excluded middle is a statement and is therefore not a law after all. It could just as well be false as well as true. This was a tangled knot for the logicians to untie until they came to understand the difference between the use and the mention of a word. When we use a word, we consider its meaning. When we mention a word we are discussing the word itself. If I say Toronto is a large city, I mean Toronto, that place, is a large city. If I say Toronto has seven letters, I am talking about the word "Toronto". In the first case I used the word and in the second I mentioned the word. You see the distinction. Jesus and Adam Connecting these ideas and the idea that the Qur'an is composed of verses that are perfected and then expounded for us, consider the verse which says: "The likeness of Jesus before Allah is as the likeness of Adam." (3:59) It is very clear that what we have in this statement is an equation. This verse goes on to explain how that is true because they both came under unusual circumstances rather than having a mother and a father in the usual human reproductive way. But more than that, 1 got to considering the use of the mention of words. The words are used clearly enough. Jesus is like Adam and by Jesus and Adam, we mean those two men. But what about the mention of the words? Was the author aware of the fact that if we were considering the words as words in themselves, this sentence also reads that "Jesus" is somehow like "Adam". Well, they are not spelt with the same letters; how can they be alike in this revelation? The only answer came to me fairly quickly and I took a look at the index of the Qur'an. The index of the Qur'an has been made available only since 1945. This book was the result of years of work by a man and his students who assembled a book which lists every word in the Qur'an and where it can be found. So, when we look up the word Isa (Jesus), we find it in the Qur'an twenty-five times. When we look up Adam, we find it in the Qur'an twenty-five times. The point is that they are very much alike in this book. They are equated. So, following up on this idea, I continued to examine the index looking for every case where something was set up as an equation, where the likeness of something was said to be the likeness of some other thing. And in every case, it works. You have for example a verse which reads: "The likeness of those who reject our signs is as the likeness of the dog." (7:176) Well, the phrase in Arabic for "the people who reject our signs" could be found in the Qur'an exactly five times. And so is the Arabic word for "the dog" (al-kalb). And there are several instances of exactly the same occurrence. It was some months after I found this for myself that a friend of mine, who is continuing this investigation with me, made a suggestion that there are also some places in the Qur'an where one thing is said to be not like another thing. As soon as he mentioned this up to me, we both went for the index and had a quick look at several places where one thing is said to be not like another thing and counted their occurrence in the Qur an. We were surprised and maybe should not have been to find that, after all, they do not match up. But an interesting thing does happen. For example, the Qur'an makes it very clear in the verse that trade is not like interest. The two words will be found six times for one and seven for the other. And so it is in every other case. When one thing is said to be not like another, they occur for a difference of one time. It would be five of one and four of the other, or seven of one and eight of another. Good and Evil There is one interesting verse which, I felt, spoke directly to me from right off the page. It mentions two words in Arabic, al-khabeeth (the evil), and al-taib (the good). The verse reads: "Say, the evil and the good are not comparable, even though the abundance of evil will surprise you. So be mindful of your duty to Allah, 0 Man of understanding, that you may succeed." (5:100) Well, I had a look at those two words in Arabic, the evil and the good, and found it in the Qur'an that they both occur seven times. Yet the verse here is saying that they are not comparable. I should not expect to find that they occur the same number of times. But what does the rest of this verse say? "The evil and the good are not comparable. The abundance of the evil will surprise you" and it did for there were too many of them. But it continues: "So be mindful of your duty to Allah, 0 Man of understanding, that you may succeed." So press on. Use your understanding and you will succeed. That is what the verse said to me. Well, I found the answer in one verse further on where it reads: "Allah separates the evil from the good. The evil He piles one on top of the other, heaping them all together." (8:37) Here is the solution to the difficulty. While we have seven occurrences of al-khabeeth (the evil) which matches up with the occurrences of al-taib (the good), according to the principle of this verse, evil is separated from good and is piled one on top of the other and heaped all together. We do not count them as seven separate instances. Occurrence of Words A favourite difficulty, or supposed difficulty, which critics like to cite or have cited in the past years concerning the Qur'an is that, apparently to their thinking, the author of this book was ignorant because he advised the Muslims to follow the lunar year instead of the solar year. The critics say the author was unaware of the difference in the length of years, that if one follows twelve lunar months one loses eleven days every year. The author of the Qur'an was well aware of the distinction between the length of the solar year and the lunar year. In chapter eighteen, verse twenty-five it mentions three-hundred years and gives their equivalent as three-hundred and nine years. As it happens, three-hundred solar years is equal to three-hundred and nine lunar years. Let us go back to my original scheme of the occurrence of words in the Qur'an. The Arabic word for "month", shahar, will be found twelve times in the Qur'an. There are twelve months in a year. If we find twelve months, how many days should we expect to find? The word in Arabic is yaum, and as it happens you will find that the word occurs three-hundred and sixty-five times in the Qur'an. As a matter of fact, the original issue which had me interested in looking up the occurrence of months and days was this distinction between the solar year and the lunar year. Well, for twenty-five centuries it has been known that the relative positions of the sun, moon and earth coincide every nineteen years. This was discovered by a Greek by the name of Meton, and it is called the Metoniccycle. Knowing this, I looked again to the index for the word "year", sanah, and found, sure enough, that it occurs, in the Qur'an nineteen times. Perfect Balance of Words Now, what is the point of this perfect balance of words? For myself, it shows the author was well aware of the distinction between using words and mentioning words, a fine logical point. But more than that, it indicates the preservation of this book. After giving a lecture on the subject of the Qur'an, I touched on some of these subjects and a questionnaire from the audience afterwards said: "How do we know we still have the original Qur'an. Maybe pieces of it have been lost or extra parts been added?" I pointed out to him that we had pretty well covered that point because since these items, the perfect balance of words in the Qur'an, have come to light only in this generation, anybody who would have lost the portion of the book, hidden some of it or added some of their own would have been unaware of this carefully hidden code in the book. They would have destroyed this perfect balance. It is interesting to note too that, well, such a thing might be possible to organise today by the use of a computer to coordinate all words so that whatever thought you might have as to a meaning of a sentence or however you might construe an equation out of a sentence, you could check for yourself and the book will always have the balance of words. If that were possible today, if it were possible fourteen centuries ago, why would it be done and then left hidden and never drawn to the attention of those who first saw this book? Why it would be left with the hope of the author who contrive this, that maybe in many centuries someone will discover it and have a nice surprise? It is a scheme that does not make sense. Best Explanation We are told in the Quran that no questionnaire will come to the Muslims with the question for which a good answer has not been provided, and the best explanation for whatever his question. This verse says: "For everything they say we are given something to go back to them and reply." (25:33) We looked again to the index of the Qur'an and we found that the word, qalu (they say), is found three-hundred and thirty-two times. Now, what would be the natural counterpart? The Arabic word, qul, which is the command "say" and you will find at the index it also occurs three-hundred and thirty-two times. Origin of the Qur'an An interesting feature of the Qur'an is that it replies to its critics as to its origin. That is, no one has yet come up with a suggestion as to where this book came from which is not commented on within the book itself. In fact, the new Catholic Encyclopedia, under the heading Quran, mentions that over the centuries there had been many theories as to where this book came from. Their conclusion: today, no sensible person believes any of these theories. This leaves the Christians in some difficulty. You see, all the theories suggested so far, according to this encyclopedia, are not really acceptable to anyone sensible today. They are too fantastic. Where did the book come from? Those who have not really examined the Qur'an usually dismissed it as being, as they say, a collection of proverbs or aphorisms, sayings that one man used to announce from time to time. They imagined that there was a man who, from time to time during the day, will think of some witty little sayings and spit it out and those around him will quickly write it down and eventually these were all collected and became the Qur'an. Those who read the Qur'an will find that it is not anything like that at all. The collection of things said by the Prophet is the subject and the content of the Hadith. But the subjects and contents of the Qur'an are all in a form of a composition and explanation. I cite as an example the chapter, Yusuf, which is an entire story in great detail about one particular episode or one portion of the life of one man. It is a composition. It is for this reason that virtually all those who have actually examined the Qur'an usually refer to it as being the product of the authorship as attributed to Muhammad and his "co-adjudicators". These were supposed to be people who would sit, with him and composed the Qur'an. You see, they imagined that the Qur'an was composed by a committee. They acknowledged that there was too much information and it was too well composed for one man to have assembled. So, they imagined that a committee of men used to meet regularly, brought their various sources of information, composed something and then handed to this man and told him, "Go to the people tomorrow, this is your revelation." In other words, it was a fraud concocted by a group of people. But what do we know about fraud? The Qur'an reminds us as it says: "Say, now the truth has come, and falsehood neither invents anything nor restores anything." (34:49). It is hard to translate it into English precisely, but what this verse is telling us is that falsehood is not the source of a new thing. A new and truthful thing cannot come from falsehood and falsehood does not restore, to our minds, the facts. Truth is in agreement with facts. Falsehood is something else. So, falsehood is empty. If something is born in fraud, it will never bring us new information. It will never endure; it will only collapse over a period of time. Challenge Another interesting verse is a challenge which is addressed to those non-believers. It reads: "Have they not considered the Qur'an, if it came, other than Allah, surely they will find in it many inconsistencies." (4:82) Here is a challenge to the reader. If you think you have an explanation where this book came from, have another look at the book. Surely you will be able to uncover some inconsistencies to support your case. Imagine a student submitting a term paper or a final exam an... [Full Article...]
