# The Qurān in Islām/Chapter 2

CHAPTER II
THE RECENSIONS OF ABŪ-BAKR AND ʿUSMĀN
From the third chapter of the Mishkāt we learn that for some time after the death of the prophet, the Quran continued to be preserved in the memories of the people, and was still recited in various conflicting ways; but in the famous battle of Yamāmah a great number of the Qurān reciters were slain. Then ʿUmr, fearing lest another battle should still further reduce the number of those able to recite the Qurān, so that much of it might be lost, came to Abū-Bakr and importuned him to order the Qurān to be collected into one book. At first Abū-Bakr objected. "How can I do a thing which the prophet has not done?" he asked; but at last, yielding to the entreaties of ʿUmr, the Khalif gave orders to Zaid-ibn-Sābit, who had been an amanuensis of the prophet, to search out the Qurān and bring it all together. This the latter did, "collecting it from leaves of the date, white stones, and the hearts of men." This copy of the Qurān was given to the Khalif Abū-Bakr, after whose death it passed into the possession of the Khalif ʿUmr, who in turn gave it into the keeping of his daughter Hafsa, one of the widows of Muhammad.
This valuable tradition of Al-Bukhārī makes it clear that Abū-Bakr, for the first time, collected the whole Qurān into ​one book; but he apparently made no critical study of the text with a view to reducing the various readings to one uniform standard. On the contrary we learn from Al-Bukhārī that within a short period the discrepancies and contradictions which existed in the various readings of the Qurān became of a still graver nature; until at last the Khalif ʿUsmān took steps to allay the doubts which began to arise in the minds of the people. The means which ʿUsmān adopted were drastic in the extreme, and simply consisted in transcribing one complete copy of the Qurān, and then burning all other copies! For this purpose the Khalif appointed a committee, with Zaid at its head, to do the work. In the case of any difference of opinion Zaid, who was a native of Medīna, had to give way,and the final decision lay with the Quraish members of the revision committee, or with the Khalif himself. A significant illustration of the latter's interference is given in one of the traditions. It was the Khalif's expressed desire to preserve the Quran in the Quraish dialect, the dialect of the prophet himself. It is recorded that ʿAli wished to write (Arabic characters) with (Arabic characters) the others preferred (Arabic characters) as (Arabic characters) but ʿUsmān decided in favour of the latter as being according to the Quraish dialect. But it so happens that the word (Arabic characters) is not an Arabic word at all, but was borrowed by Muhammad with many other words from the Rabbinical Hebrew! It is simply the Hebrew for 'ark,' and is so introduced into the story of Moses in Sūra XX. This little incident will serve to show how far the compilers of the Qurān were successful in preserving the book in the Meccan dialect, the language of Gabriel and of Muhammad.
"Anas-ibn-Mālik relates: 'Huzaifah came to ʿUsmān, and he had fought with the people of Syria in the conquest of Armenia; and had fought in Azurbaijan with the people of ʿIraq, and he was shocked at the different ways of people reading the Qurān, and Huzaifah said to ʿUsmān, "O ʿUsmān, assist this people before they differ in the Book of God, just as the Jews and Christians differ in their books." Then ʿUsmān sent a person to Hafsa, ordering her to send those ​portions which she had, and saying, "I shall have a number of copies taken, and will then return them to you." And Hafsa sent the portions to ʿUsmān, and ʿUsmān ordered Zaid-ibn-Sābit, Abdulla-ibn-az-Zubair, Said-ibn-Alās and Abd-ibn-al-Hāris-ibn-Hishām; and he said to the three Quraishites, "When you and Zaid-ibn-Sābit differ about any part of the reading of the Qurān, then do ye write it in the Quraish dialect, because it came not down in the language of any tribe but theirs.” Then they did as ʿUsmān had ordered; and when a number of copies had been taken, ʿUsmān returned the leaves to Hafsa. And ʿUsmān sent a copy to every quarter of the countries of Islām, and ordered all other leaves to be burnt. And Ibn-Shahāb said, "Khārījah, son of Zaid-ibn-Sābit, informed me saying, ‘I could not find one verse when I was writing the Qurān, which I had heard from the prophet; then I looked for it, and found it with Khuzaimah, and I entered it into Sūra Al-Ahzab’."
From this tradition, recorded by Bukhārī, we learn several important facts. Thus it is clear that when ʿUsmān perceived with dismay that the differences in the reading of the Qurān were becoming more and more serious day by day, he ordered Zaid and three others to again compile an authoritative edition of the Qurān. The fact that these scholars had to consider a variety of readings, to weigh their authority, and, if necessary, discard them in favour of the Meccan readings shows. to what an extent corruptions had crept into the text. Having completed his recension, ʿUsmān then collected all the copies of the older editions he could find, and burnt them. He then ordered a number of copies to be made from the new edition, and distributed them throughout the Muhammadan world. From this narrative it is clear that the Qurān compiled under the direction of ʿUsmān, and still current, differed very materially from the readings which were current in different parts of Arabia at that time: ​otherwise it is inconceivable that the Khalif should have taken the trouble to collect and burn them in the manner recorded by Bukhārī. The result is that Muslims to-day are shut up to the arbitrary edition circulated by ʿUsmān, and are quite unable by critical study to arrive at any satisfactory decision as to how farʿ‘Usmān’s recension agreed with that compiled under the direction of Abū-Bakr, or with the various Qurānic readings current in Arabia. This at least we know, that the Shiahs have constantly charged ʿUsmān with suppressing and altering various passages of the Qurān favourable to ʿAli and his family. Thus in the book 'Faniki-kitāb-Debistān' it is written, "ʿUsmān burnt the Qurān, and excised from it all those passages in which was related the greatness of ʿAli and his family.” Shiah books quote numerous passages which haye been altered in this way, but for which this little book contains no room. The reader may find them in the writings of Ali-ibn-Ibrāhīm-ul-Qūmī, Muhammad-Yaʿquh-ul-Kulaini, Shaikh-Ahmad-ibn-ʿAli-Lālit-ul-Tabrāsi and Shaikh-Abū-Ali-ul-Tabrāsi. This two-fold witness of the Shiahs on the one hand, and of Bukhārī on the other, leaves no room for doubt that the Qurān which we possess to-day is far indeed from being free from corruptions and omissions.
Further, from the significant fact that ʿUsmān burnt all the copies of the Qurān which he could find, and circulated only the one copy compiled by himself, we learn that he, at any rate, did not accept the story of the ‘seven readings,’ nor credit the prophet with having called seven mutually conflicting readings of the Qurān equally correct. The fact is, any unbiassed study of the whole story makes it clear that, not Muhammad, but his immediate followers circulated the story which attributed to him such a foolish statement in order that Muslims should not stumble at the astounding sight of a Qurān, sent down from God, appearing in different contradictory texts.
​Additional light is shed upon this subject by a tradition of ʿAli, which runs thus, “At the time that Abū-Bakr became Khalif, ʿAli was sitting in his house. When the former came to visit him, ʿAli addressed him thus, ‘I saw that people were adding to the word of God, and I resolved in my mind that I would never wear my outer cloth again, except at the time of Namāz, until I had collected the word of God’." These various traditions make it perfectly clear that the differences in the reading of the Qurān were by no means confined to pronunciation, but that certain persons were in the habit of ‘adding’ words of their own at the time of reciting the Qurān. From Islāmic history we learn that ʿAli did actually carry out his intention of making a collection of the Qurān; and it is a matter for sincere regret that ʿAli’s compilation is not to be found to-day. That it would have differed materially from the present Qurān is practically certain; for it is recorded that when ʿUmr asked him to lend his copy in order that other copies might be compared with it, he refused, saying that the Qurān he possessed was the most accurate and perfect, and could not be submitted to any changes and alterations which might be found necessary in the other copies. He further said that he intended to hand down his copy to his descendants to be kept until the advent of the Imām Māhdi.