The Qur'an

The Qur'an is the holy book of Islam, divided into 114 suras (chapters). In the traditional order, they are placed with the longest ones towards the front, and the smaller ones at the end of the book. The text was dictated orally by Muhammad over his career, but was only written down in a patchy manner until the need for a comprehensive collection became clear. Newer verses can override old ones, just like the Qur'an as a whole overrides older religious books.

Click on the table headings to sort the chapters:

1. The Qur'an is Incomplete and Untrustworthy

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The text of The Qur'an has a few unfortunate problems. The first is that the Suras are ordered roughly in size order, because the original compilers didn't know when each was dictated. This is important because older verses can be overridden by new ones. Secondly, there could be any quantity of missing text, potentially including important declarations, or important nullifications of other statements. Thirdly, the amount of variant and contradictory collections of Suras in the 650s₂ worried the first caliphs into creating a final version - it was they, and not Muhammad, who put the Qur'an together_3,4, Although their methods were sensible, there was no sure way to know which versions of texts to dismiss and which to include; the compilation process was all too human, and it is undoubted that at least some mistakes were made. Fourthly, the verses that Muhammad said were inserted into the scripture by Satan - the Satanic verses. These verses pacified three hostile pagan neighbours by saying that their gods were valid. If this is true, then Satan saved Muhammad's life, and the Qur'an in total is indebted to Satan. Or, if false, they were actually invented by Muhammad to save himself. In either case, we don't know how many other verses are untrustworthy.

For more, see:

• "The Qur'an is Incomplete and Untrustworthy" by Vexen Crabtree (2002).