Miracle of the Quran; Quran, Sunnah, and Ahadith, a contextual Explanation.

From: www.defendingislam.com

For any language there is a time when it reached its pinnacle in eloquence. Ask any English professor or any English literature professor, and they’ll unanimously tell you that the English language, whether written or spoken, had reached its pinnacle during the Elizabethan period. No spoken or written English has ever been duplicated after that generation. Therefore, any and every literature that was ever written in the English language after this time period was inferior in its overall linguistics and eloquence.

The pinnacle of eloquence for Greek was during the time of Hippo. What they called Attic Greek. And so for every language, whether it was Hebrew, Latin, or Sanskrit, there was a point in time when that particular language had reached its height. And so, this was nothing different for the Arabic language itself.

In 7th century Arabia, when Muhammad was born, scholars say, either the language was on its initial decline from its pinnacle, or it was in the midst of its pinnacle and declined soon after. Either way, Muhammad appeared during a time when the language was deep rooted.

In Arabia, the dignitaries and the intellectuals, particularly in the tribe of Quraish, would gather on the norm to drink wine and be entertained by various poets and rhetoricians. This was something they were deeply involved and engulfed in. This was their form of entertainment. That being rhetoric and live poetry. This culture was surrounded by poets and rhetoricians who used their talents for money and fame. The dignitaries paid big money to acquire the best “entertainers”, if you will. However, to find the best was something that was becoming an extreme rarity.

If you’ve studied poetry or rhetoric, you know that when a line is recited or written, a Master of Rhetoric can usually come and improve on it. You have what are called “weak lines” in poetry. However rarely, there are times when a statement is made that it simply can not be improved upon. William Shakespeare, when he made the statement “to be or not to be, that is the question”, that was a statement that simply was the best and most eloquent way to make that particular statement. It simply could not be said in any better way. But even within Shakespeare’s work, there were weak lines; lines that he would more often than not, spend hours, days and months editing until he felt what he had written was a masterpiece ready for publish.

Imagine, if you will, 7th century Arabia, an illiterate man who was brought up as an orphan, coming to the masses, and spontaneously reciting verse after verse, in linguistics and eloquence that was admitted by the rhetoricians of the time, as being impossible to match by any man! Verses with no weak lines, and lines that could not be improved upon, and by God they would spontaneously come out of his mouth! Over 6,000 verses! A masterpiece of no small stature. The challenge was made in the Quran, to produce even one single chapter like it. No man was able to step up to the plate. And now that the language has declined from its pinnacle, this outstanding miracle stands tall. No man will ever be able to produce a chapter like it.

When we look at the miracles that God produced through his Prophets, we always notice that the miracles were always relevant to the practice of the people at the time. In Jesus’ time, we noticed that the practice of curing the diseased and ill was prominent, therefore when Jesus came, he cured leprosy, something that was unimaginable. The Pharaohs were impressed by sorcery and magic, so Moses superseded their expectations. But in Arabia, black-magic, sorcery, and the like was the norm. Dignitaries were simply unimpressed by the circus, if you will. On the other hand, poetic dialogue and beautiful rhetoric was something they had a passion for. God melted their hearts with what they themselves had engulfed their lives in.

Therefore upon reading the English translation, it is seriously difficult for one to see the miracle of the Quran. Because the miracle does not lie in the translation, rather it was in the Arabic itself.

This my friend, is only one of the things that makes the Quran different from the Bible. That being its sophisticated grammar and also its beauty and eloquence. Another difference between the Bible and the Quran is that there exists not a single Hadith, not a single statement of Muhammed, or any other man, whether companion, scribe, or anybody else, within the verses of the Quran. It contains only the revealed miraculous verses. It is purely the word of God. Not a single interpretation is included therein. Instead, the Ahadith were separated entirely. This kept the true miracle of the Quran alive and its eloquent verses remained intact.

The biography, the statements, the life of Muhammad (sa) is instead narrated in the collections of Ahadith, separate from the word of God. Why? Do you know why? Because it was Muhammad (sa) himself who stopped his companions from writing a single statement about or by Muhammad within the writings of the Quran! The Prophet told his companions to not write down the Ahadith! This demand by the Prophet (sa) is narrated in the most authentic collections of Ahadith. So by the time when the Ahadith did start to become collected and narrated, the Quran, its verses, and its miracle was already preserved.

The Bible on the other hand, includes the perceptions, the narrations, the hearsay, the interpretations, the opinions, and the beliefs, of the scribes, of the Prophets, of the disciples, and of the scholars. It became a mixture of revelation and “hadith”. What is the Torah and what is interpretation? What is the gospel, and what is eye-witness perception?

After the task of preserving the Quran was completed, the companions had then officially began to narrate and collect the tradition of Muhammad (sa) into books and volumes. Noticeably, in reference to Ahadith, the time frame between the initial occurrences and the narration, was about 100 years.

Nevertheless, the tradition or sunnah was kept alive via oral transmission. We learn that the Jews initially too followed the “oral Torah”, and most Jews understand the “oral Torah” to be of greater significance than that of the latter scripted version. This is because the oral and practiced tradition, as well as the initial revelation, existed prior to the existence of any scripture.

The words that were uttered by Moses and revealed by God, are understood to have been the original and actual Torah. In other words, there is a vital difference between revelation and inscription, both due to the time of deliverance, and due to the time of original practice and occurrence. Scripture, on the other hand is a narrative presenting itself usually after the original occurrences.

Therefore, it is also the Muslim understanding, that when the Glorious Quran refers to the Torah and Gospel, it is referring to the initial revelation given to and traditionally practiced by the Prophets of God – and it is not referring to the latter written scripture that came to include the interpretations, perceptions, narrations, opinions, and hearsay of men.

Before I go on, let me clarify the position of the Quran. The Quran too was initially revealed by God through the angel Gabriel, in piece meals, as it is stated. Therefore prior to its inscription, it was revelation. The Arabic term Quran means “proclamation”, “recitation”, or “reading”. It comes from the Arabic root “Iqra”. When Gabriel initially came to Muhammad (sa), the angel told Muhammad to “Iqra”. Muhammad being an illiterate man thought the angel was suggesting Muhammad to “read” something, on the contrary, the angel was telling him to “recite”, “proclaim”, and therefore repeat, exactly what the Angel was saying. This was the initial Quran. A recitation of God’s word to the masses that was ultimately memorized and scripted by several – all within the very lifetime of the Prophet. Each verse was memorized and scripted under the direction of Muhammad himself. The Quran, in a piece meal fashion, took a total number of 23 years to reveal. The miraculous verses that were being revealed were recognized as being the very words and speech of God. So therefore that gave Muhammad (sa) himself 23 years to safeguard its verses, as the verse of the Quran itself indicates (15:9).


Now that the difference between Revelation and Inscription has been established. Here comes an important explanation in reference to the difference between Sunnah and Hadith. The “sunnah” or “tradition” of Muhammad was well known, practiced, and orally taught by the Muslims prior to the collected inscriptions of Ahadith. It is obligatory upon the Muslim to accept and follow the tradition of Muhammad. However there is again, a difference between the sunnah – the actual tradition, and between the latter narration of that sunnah. The Ahadith are narratives of that tradition, life, practice, and utterance of Muhammad. The sunnah logically was practiced prior to any narrations, which mind you came to be compiled 100 years later, after the fact.


However, the intentions of these great scholars who lived during the “golden era” of Islam, was in fact to collect the most authentic information they possibly and humanly could. Their intention was to bring to us an organized format of the sunnah, and this intent and accomplishment of theirs is recognized as a great contribution to Islam. However, the difference between actual sunnah and later compiled ahadith, is not to be forgotten.

Now that the above has been put into perspective, and you now understand the position of Ahadith in Islam, let us go over a little history. The Ahadith began to be collected nearly 100 years after the demise of the Prophet (sa), by that time and period, existed three political sects. Political sects that slowly but surely had by than evolved into theological sects as well. Initially, there was a three way split between the Muslims regarding who would lead the Ummah and inherit the Caliphate. This was seen as a political division initially. The “Sunni”, who was not really known as the “Sunni” at the time, felt that the leadership should come from the tribe of Quraish, where the root of Muhammad’s ummah began. They felt that the right belonged entirely to the Quraish, and that the Caliph, Successor, or Vicegerent, should be among the noblest companions of the Prophet. The Shiiytes, narrowed down the equation to the Ahlul Bayt, ie. the direct family and house of the Prophet, which was led by the figure of young Ali ibn Abi Talib. They felt that the Caliphate belonged to the family alone. And the now non-existent Khawarij, who revolted against any Muslim that disagreed with them, felt that anyone who qualified, regardless of affiliation, tribe, or house, had the right to Caliphate. Eventually, these political parties evolved theologically as well.

Nevertheless, during the time in which Ahadith were being collected, each sect had its personal agenda, and made every effort to incorporate their ideology and their interpretation, into the collections of Ahadith. The Imams and Scholars of Ahadith realized that these agendas existed, and Imam Bukhari by himself is known to have rejected more than 90% of the narrations that he came across. This proves that false information was desperately trying to creep its way into the collections of Ahadith. Sound familiar? How about the existence of interpretive gospels and epistles within the Christian world?

The fact of the matter is, that the Imams did the best they possibly could. They came up with a “science” when accepting each Hadith, in order to best decide the authenticity of every narration. This science surrounded the reliability of the narrator, the amount of people in the chain narrating the hadith and therefore confirming it, the reliability of each of them, the time period, place, and situation, in which it occurred, ie. whether it occurred in the Medina period or the Mecca period, in a time of war, or in a time of patience; and also its saying or occurrence within the context of abrogation, again due to situation. A complicated examination that took great effort and work, one could only imagine. In essence, they each made a hypothesis, they tested their hypothesis via their travels and collected knowledge, and finally concluded whether each particular Hadith was authentic or not. Some Imams used other methods, such as Imam Bukhari, who would pray two ra’kats before examining each Hadith. However, each Imam recognized their own fallibility as a human being and also the fallibility in existing Ahadith in general due to the fact that there were false Ahadith which were spreading throughout Arabia. Therefore they left the future generations to also use that same ijtehad, methodology and science, that they used, when examining the Ahadith that they compiled. Later on, Muslim scholars, using this very method, had accepted six books which they called “sahih” or authentic. Nevertheless, the noble effort of these scholars was to provide the Muslims a memory of Muhammad. No Prophet or man in history was ever documented as closely as Muhammad was by his followers. Could you imagine if there existed 7,000 Ahadith pertaining to how Jesus, or David, or Moses conducted their everyday life? Imagine if their every move was documented. After all, these Prophets were men who lived in a totally different time period than we live in today.

The collection of Ahadith nearly 1300 years ago was no small accomplishment. Nevertheless, one must put into perspective all of these things when studying Islam: the Miracle of the Quran, the difference between revelation and inscription, the difference between the Quran and the Bible, the difference between Quran and Hadith, and the difference between Sunnah and Hadith.

Did you know that the name Muhammad appears in the Quran only 5 times? And the name Jesus appears 25 times! Shows you a little bit of a difference between Quran and Hadith, doesn’t it? Both are absolutely important to us as Muslims, but unless one puts them into perspective, one could never really understand Islam.

Related Articles:

Refuting Hadith/Sunnah Rejection

Allegations/Objections against specific Ahadith