Miracles of the Quran - Essay Example

?Your Full Your 13 March Miracles of the Quran The Quran, or Qur’an, is the religious text of Islam. The word itself means “reading” or, as some translate it, “glorious reading.” The Muslims consider it to be the final revelation of God, or Allah, which was revealed to Muhammad, the Prophet of Islam, who is also considered to be the last of the Prophets by Muslims. It was revealed piecemeal to him in twenty three years, starting from when he was forty, till he died at the age of sixty three. The book was not compiled during his lifetime, with many Muslims memorizing it by heart; some years afterwards, a lot of these memorizers, or Hafiz, were killed in battle, therefore, the Muslim Caliph Usman decided to get it compiled. The compilation of Quran in its present form was, hence, done under the Caliphate of Usman. The Muslims believe that the Quran is the direct word of God. They believe that the angel Gabriel, or Jibra’eel, came to the Prophet Muhammad and revealed the word of God to him, which the latter disseminated amongst his followers. Muslims further believe that the word of God, the Quran, is revealed to be a source of guidance and direction for all humanity. The fact that they consider it the last revelation of God to mankind further stipulates that Muslims consider this to be the last guidance sent to man from God. This entails that they spend their lives trying to live according to the edicts of the Quran, and trying to bring their lives as close to the commands of the Quran as possible. The Muslims consider this to be a book from God for a multiple of reasons. One reason, as is put forward in the Quran itself, is that such a book, with its poetic and miraculous nature could never be produced by man. In the second Chapter, or Surah, of the Quran (the Cow, or Al-Baqarah), it is said “And if ye are in doubt as to what We have revealed from time to time to Our servant, then produce a Sura like thereunto; and call your witnesses or helpers (if there are any) besides Allah, if your (doubts) are true” (verse 23). Furthermore, the Muslims believe that there have been miraculous claims in the Quran that are further testament to it being the word of God. These include various predictions or prophecies in the Quran that were later fulfilled. One such prophecy relates to the body of the Pharaoh (the Pharaoh said to have oppressed the Jews); when relating the story of his death, God thus speaks to the Pharaoh in the Quran “This day shall We save thee in the body, that thou mayest be a sign to those who come after thee! but verily, many among mankind are heedless of Our Signs!” (10: 92). The mummified body of a Pharaoh in an Egyptian Museum in Cairo is said to have been that of the same Pharaoh, thus the Quran’s prophecy regarding his body being preserved has proven to have come true. Further, a few years after the Byzantines had been defeated by the Persians completely, a revelation of the Quran said “The Roman Empire has been defeated – In a land close by; but they, (even) after (this) defeat of theirs will soon be victorious – within a few years…” (60: 2-4). This seemed impossible as the Byzantines had incurred heavy losses and the Empire seemed to be at the brink of total annihilation, however, a few years after this revelation, the Persians were, indeed, defeated by the Byzantines. Moreover, in Chapter 48 of the Quran, a prophesy is given regarding the taking of Mecca: “…ye shall enter the Sacred Mosque, if Allah wills, with minds secure, heads shaved, hair cut short, and without fear…” (27). Some time afterwards, Mecca was indeed conquered by Muhammad and his followers, and they did enter the Sacred Mosque, or Kaaba, in the same condition described herein. Also, there have been some statements in the Quran that have been recently proven to be scientifically accurate. For example, when a verse of the Quran says “By the Firmament which returns (in its round)” (86: 11) and “By the Sky with (its) numerous Paths” (51: 7), while referring to the universe, and it was not until recently that it was discovered that the universe is rotating and there are orbits and axes that all heavenly bodies revolve around. It is interesting that it was not, until recently, known that even the sun rotates around a set orbit. It was considered to be stationary. However, in the Quran, it is written “And the sun runs his course for a determined for him…” (36: 38), thereby claiming that the sun also travels around a trajectory. There was no way that this could be known so many years ago, in a place where no powerful telescopes or little to no technology was present. In the Quran, it is said, “And it is He who spread out the earth…” (13: 3). A recent discovery has revealed that the land mass of the earth has been expanding for a long time, with all the continents being part of one big land mass one. What is more, it is revealed that the earth is constantly expanding or spreading, facts that have been proven by satellite measurements and pictures. The various verses of the Quran regarding embryology have also been proven to be very accurate. For instance, in chapter 23 it is said “Man We did create from a quintessence (of clay); Then We placed him as (a drop of) sperm in a place of rest, firmly fixed; Then We made the sperm into a clot of congealed blood; then of that clot We made a (foetus) lump; then We made out of that lump bones and clothed the bones with flesh; then we developed out of it another creature …” (12-14). This is very much in line with the modern day discoveries of how the fetus attaches itself to the uterine wall (firmly fixed), and how bones are developed relatively prior to the muscles. There is another set of “miracles” of the Quran that we can refer to as the numerical miracles. This include the equality of repetition of certain words. For instance, the words “world” (dunya) and “hereafter” (akhira) are mentioned equally in the Quran, 115 times. Also, the words “faith” (iman) and “disbelief” (kufr) are both mentioned 25 times in the Quran. The words “paradise” and “hell” are also equally mentioned in the Quran – 77 times. The numbers of time “man” and “woman” have been used in the Quran is 24 timesThe words satan (shaitan) and angels (malaika) are mentioned 88 times. The words disaster (musibah) and “thanks” (shukr) are also mentioned equally in the Quran, for a total of 75 times. The words “trouble” and “peace” are mentioned equally too, 13 times. The words “life” and “death” are mentioned 115 times each in the Quran. The words “hardship” and “patience” are also mentioned equally in the Quran – 114 times. . Interestingly, the word “Day” (yawm), in singular, is repeated 365 times, whereas it is mentioned 30 times in plural, and the word “month” (shahar) is mentioned 12 times. The word “prayer” (salat) is mentioned 5 times in the Quran, and the number of obligatory prayers for Muslims is also five. The word sea is mentioned 32 times, and “land” is mentioned 13 times, if we take a percentage of these two, we see that “sea” has the percentage of 71.11111111 whereas land is 28.88888889 percent, which is the exact percentage or ratio of sea to land on earth. Such discoveries are being made constantly as scholars interested in these topics try to find out more. Though there are many scholars who research the Quran along these lines and who have made many such discoveries which they claim to be proofs of the Quran being Divine, however, it should be noted that the main purpose of the Quran, according to most Muslim scholars, is the guidance of people regarding how to live their lives. Nonetheless, such research does open a lot of room for discussion regarding the miraculous nature of the Quran. Works Cited The Qur’an: Translation. Trans. Abdullah Yusuf Ali. Elmhurst: Tahrike, 2000. Print. Read More