The Holy Quran

The Quran (can also be spelled as Qur'an, Koran, or Coran) is the holy scripture of Muslims. The Quran states that the name of God's religion is Islam and it refers to its followers as Muslims.

The Quran (Koran) started to be revealed by God to Prophet Mohammad through arch-angel Gabriel, when he was 40 years old, around year 610 AD. It was revealed gradually, few verses at a time, over a period of about 23 years. The Quran is a very unique book that differs from the Bible in many ways. Unlike the Bible which supposedly contains the sayings of Jesus and other writings which Christians believe were inspired by God, the Quran is the "literal" word of God. We mean that the words in the Quran are the exact words of God. Therefore, the author of the Quran is God himself. Furthermore, also unlike the Bible, the Quran does not contain the sayings of Prophet Mohammad, nor does it contain an account of Prophet Mohammad's life.

God in the Quran (Koran) promises clearly to protect the Quran from corruption. Indeed, God has protected the Quran. The Quran has remained the same. All the verses that were revealed to prophet Mohammad by angel Gabriel are included in the Quran that is available today.

The Quran states that the Quran, in by itself, is the most important miracle that Prophet Mohammad has brought to humanity. Since Prophet Mohammad was intended to be the last prophet and the Quran was the last message, God decided to give people a unique miracle that can be examined and experienced by not only people who lived at the time of the prophet, but for the hundreds of years to come. So, it was natural for God to choose Quran to be such a miracle.

That is why the Arabic Quran (Koran) is a unique miracle. The only book in the world authored by God himself, word by word, and that is still available today in its original form. People throughout the Ages have wondered whether they can see God or something that can be attributed directly to God. The Quran is the answer. It is available today for all humans to experience how God expresses himself in words. The Quran is a book of knowledge with a uniquely captivating style, in which every verse is a sign from God. Each word used in the Arabic Quran was uniquely chosen by God for a purpose. You can not add or subtract a word to/from the Quran, without the corruption becoming noticeable. Scholars have discovered some hidden logic structures (codes) in the Quran that prove its authenticity and help in protecting its integrity from corruption.

The Quran (Koran) contains lots of scientific knowledge, from various fields such as astronomy, geology, medicine, embryology, etc., that have only been known recently which were totally unknown and could not have been discovered at the time of prophet Mohammad.

The Quran was revealed in Arabic language and Muslims consider only the Arabic Quran to be the Word of God because translations are authored by ordinary human beings, most of the translations were done in the past 100 years, whereas the Arabic Quran is authored by God. Therefore, those translations are not considered by Muslim as a Word of God or holy scriptures. The 5 daily prayers of Muslims are in Arabic (Prayer consist of reciting verses from the Quran as well as saying specific phrases and sentences). However, Muslims are not required to be able to speak Arabic, other than learning to utter few sentences in Arabic that are part of regular prayers.

There are many translations of the Quran currently available. Most of the translators of the Quran are non-Arabs and their knowledge of Arabic is limited. However, even if they were Arabs, you should not expect the translation to be perfect. The Quran is in ancient Arabic language. Many of the vocabulary in the Quran are not used in Modern Arabic. However, even when compared to ancient Arabic literature and poems, the Quran is far more challenging to comprehend fully. That is why ordinary Arabs today, including well-educated Arabs, who are not experts in Arabic language, only understand the general meaning if they simply read the Quran, without reading additional Quran commentaries and interpretation books written by Islamic scholars.

Arabic language is a rich, complex language. The same word may have different meanings. From the same root, you may create tens of derivatives, each derivative has its own significance. By varying the structure of a sentence, you can change the meaning of the sentence. That may explain why translators of the Quran, particularly non-Arab translators, face a very difficult task. No one knows what is in the mind of God and therefore the full intended meaning of each word of the Quran. So, translators find themselves trying to guess what God may have meant.

Furthermore, the most widely-used English translations of the Quran today were done more than 70 years ago: (a) by Abdullah Yusuf Ali who lived from 1872 to 1953 , and (b) by Marmaduke William Muhammad Pickthall who lived from 1875 to 1936 . The discoveries of the miraculous, scientific information in the Quran primarily started in 1970s. The leading figure in such discoveries was a French doctor, named Maurice Baucaille, who converted to Islam and published in 1976 his landmark book, The Bible, The Quran and Science. That is why these popular translations of the Quran do not present clearly the scientific information, embedded in the verses of the Quran.

Each word in the Quran may have multi-level meaning with multi-dimensional significance and may have been chosen by God for multiple purposes. These unique aspects of the Quran may allow, for example, an ordinary Muslim to understand the meaning correctly of a word or verse, but only at one level of depth, while another Muslim may be able to capture a different meaning or significance at another level of depth. Both could be correct in their understanding.

You may think of every word or verse in the Quran as a marvelous painting or piece of art, done by God, the Master Artist and Creator of the Universe, each person who views it (or reads it) may come to a different conclusion regarding the message or meaning intended by God through that word or verse. A Muslim astronomer, who is also expert in Arabic, may be able to infer information of significance in astronomy when reading a verse that an ordinary Muslim will not notice.

We have to consider that God may have also chosen to articulate his message (or multiple messages) in a single verse (or word) with a specific number of words (or letters) for a good reason. God may have intended to send us a numerical message, such as a date of an event or number of certain significance. The Quran was revealed gradually, few verses at a time. However, the way the verses are arranged in each chapter of the Quran and sequence of the chapters which does not necessarily follow chronological order are not haphazard or by chance or coincidence.