Quran Challenge -Write 10 Chapters like it. (revelation, prayer, scientific, human)

[GoCardinals]

Read the Tao text that you posted in its native text/language about 100 times and you will be bored to death.

Same is the case with work of Shakespeare - read his most famous book/writing/drama/novel about 100 times and you will be fed up with it!!

Pick a chapter from Quran and read it in Arabic for 1 million times and you won't be bored. That's a miracle of Quran. No matter how many times you recite it in its original language you NEVER get bored. You are NEVER fed up - you NEVER can get enough of it - NEVER!

Now, try again to bring 10 chapters like Quran. YOU CANT!

[GoCardinals]

Quran is read DAILY in Arabic by hundred and thousands (may be in millions now) of non-native speakers of the Arabic language for 100 of years.

Now, you bring a text in English and see if ten thousand non-native speakers of English language read it in English for a year without you asking them to do so.

[Cliksder]

Originally Posted by GoCardinals

Pick a chapter from Quran and read it in Arabic for 1 million times and you won't be bored. That's a miracle of Quran. No matter how many times you recite it in its original language you NEVER get bored. You are NEVER fed up - you NEVER can get enough of it - NEVER!

If I read the Torah in Hebrew for 1 million times I will NOT get bored either. It is a personal thing. I love Hebrew; it could never bore me. Ever. It's not a miracle; just a personal thing. Same with the Quran, I am pretty sure.

[Woodrow LI]

Originally Posted by Cliksder

What does that mean? If I make up my own fantasy language that is similar to say, Spanish, it is "not like any earthly language" but will be understood by Spanish speakers.

What exactly do you mean when you say it is not "like any Earthly Language?"

No one has been able to make an original sentence using Quranic Arabic. .It is impossible to use as a conversational language. It is understood at least partially by about 1.5 billion people. but not one of them has been able to make a unique sentence in it.

[TRANSPONDER]

Originally Posted by Woodrow LI

No one has been able to make an original sentence using Quranic Arabic. .It is impossible to use as a conversational language. It is understood at least partially by about 1.5 billion people. but not one of them has been able to make a unique sentence in it.

That sounds a bit odd. I gather that the Quran had to be assembled and codified by a committee of redactors, so they must have been able to construct sentences. Yes I know - they were Inspired. Just a quick look at the Quranic grammar leads me to believe that I could translate one of my posts into Quranic Arabic.

I suppose though that I would be told the grammar didn't work or it had not the poetry. It is easy to make such claims to those who are not brought up knowing the Book.

But there are some who were and some of them have given up their belief. Clearly the claims about the Divine qualities of the chapters of the Quran have not cut any ice with them.

Originally Posted by GoCardinals

Quran is read DAILY in Arabic by hundred and thousands (may be in millions now) of non-native speakers of the Arabic language for 100 of years.

Now, you bring a text in English and see if ten thousand non-native speakers of English language read it in English for a year without you asking them to do so.

There's no accounting for the actions of the religious. Mrs Arq recited Buddhist texts daily at length and never seemed to get bored with it (1). This proves nothing.

(1) come to think of it, the Buddhist monks I studied with sat thinking about NOTHING for HOURS every day for MONTHS and seemed to get less bored with doing it the more they did it.

[TRANSPONDER]

Originally Posted by Woodrow LI

No one has been able to make an original sentence using Quranic Arabic. .It is impossible to use as a conversational language. It is understood at least partially by about 1.5 billion people. but not one of them has been able to make a unique sentence in it.

I'm going to have a look but I'll ask you, old friend, first. If not all Muslims understand Quranic Arabic, how do they Understand it? I know I heard that a lot just learn it by Rote and recite it without understanding it. Some Catholic laity did the same thing (with the Latin Bible, that is, not the Qur'an).

I am reminded of Hebrew and Hindi. They were ancient languages BUT, when Israel and Independent India decided to use Hebrew and Hindi (respectively) as the national language, with some updating, they became usable in everyday conversation.

Religious taboos aside is there any reason why Quranic Arabic could not be so updated to become the language of ..well, I'll leave that aside And I saw that it was said to be the Arabic of the 7th century. But you are presumably saying that it isn't as nobody could use it or write it.

I'd welcome your views because looking on the Internet doesn't help much. These are questions that Quran sites (understandably) do not address.

P.s The Grammar of Quranic arabic is supposed to be daunting. It reminds me rather of Chinese where the meaning of the pictograms and the sounds can be altered by the voice -tone and the context. In the example I saw about what would be done to the evildoer it was held up as a marvel that the grammar of 'seize him' implied a number of Siezers. Angels in the hidden meaning and how wonderful that makes it. Of course if the word used had implied a single person, that could also be a Meaning that required explanation. One (Iblis or one of his minions) would be found.

In other words a text put together by a committee not to put too fine a point on it might well become a complex and confusing grammatical text requiring some ingenious explanation to make sense of it. Ok you will say that I don't know what I'm talking about and I don't.

But the sites don't help, because the question that of course occurred to me is - whether Quranic Arabic is the same as 'Classical' (Ummayad and Abbasid court) Arabic or not and if not, how not. Just some Complicated grammatical uses that need some explanation to make a workable context, after which the divine depth of the text can be praised? I gather that study of the meaning of the Qur'an is still going on. There were a lot of sites on classical arabic and modern, but only Wiki even mentioned that Quranic Arabic was some equivalent to Classical Arabic (1).

Be that as it may, the account of what was done to the fellow after he was seized rather overcame any consideration of the ineffable qualities of the language and simply reaffirmed the position that Islam holds on my list of likeable religions.

(1) reminding of the well known and understood knowledge of how the Bible was put together by committee - mainly to undermine the heretic Marcion who was putting together his heavily edited NT collection, But you NEVER get this information passed on by the Churches to the believers.

[TRANSPONDER]

Interesting to read about the time of tne Ummayad Caliphate and the various Takes on their virtues. Some saying that the lived in mud huts amongst their people and set up a welfare state, others that they set up an opulent court to distance themselves from the awed populace who were led to believe that they were descended from God and were not just his messenger.

It was during this time the Quran was codified and all earlier versions were destroyed. We have have heard that before when Constantine had a Codified Bible prepared for Universal use.

so the earliest Quran found, though the parchment may date from Muhammad's time to the Ummayad date, must be of that date (c 640 or what 28 in the Arabic calendar?) or later and it is in Hijaz script. That must be script, right? Not the Hijaz dialect (still spoken but not an official language) which of course would not be Quranic (or classical) Arabic.

Yep, there's also one in Kufic (very early) script claimed to be one of Uthman's (3rd caliph) 5 codified Qurans issued, though others say it is more likely 9th or 10th c.

I have to say that the tale of Othman or Uthman collating the Qur'an using a bunch of a dozen people who had memorized bits of it and a collection of texts on camel bones, bits of wood or scraps of leather does not sound particularly reassuring. And I am obliged to think of a court ruler putting together a text of the religion of his empire in the most sophisticated and glittering Court language he could. I'm not saying that he made up what suited him. but the quality of the language suggest to me a court origin of the text rather than a divine one.

[Woodrow LI]

Originally Posted by AREQUIPA

I'm going to have a look but I'll ask you, old friend, first. If not all Muslims understand Quranic Arabic, how do they Understand it? I know I heard that a lot just learn it by Rote and recite it without understanding it. Some Catholic laity did the same thing.

I am reminded of Hebrew and Hindi. They were ancient languages BUT, when Israel and Independent India decided to use Hebrew and Hindi (respectively) with some updating they became usable in everyday conversation.

Religious taboos aside is there any reason why Quranic Arabic could not be so updated to become the language of ..well, I'll leave that aside And I saw that it was said to be the Arabic of the 7th century. But you are presumably saying that it isn't as nobody could use it or write it.

I'd welcome your views because looking on the Internet doesn't help much. These are questions that Quran sites (understandably) do not address.

Well old Friend, I'll attempt to answer your post. Good points you bring up--Like always

Can't prove it,but it is moere like 7th century Arabic developed from Qur'anic Arabic with the dropping of the Tajweed pronunciations of the Qur'an. There is a bit of a rivalry as to what Arabic is closest to Qur'anic. The top contenders are Yemini, and Egyptian.

World wide most Muslim do not speak Arabic. most rely upon Interpretation. although they are called translations, that is a bit of a misnomer as many of the words have no exact translation (at least not in a single word)

Yes the begining process is to learn the Qur'an through rote memory without an understanding.


I know that is a bit strange to most people. But it is a bit of a necessity. The test of time has shown that to be the best way of learning the Qur'an. in Qur'anic Arabic. Learning the words comes first. learning the meanings comes later. the Qur'an uses a very small vocabulary.

You have to think of the Qur'an as being a symphohy and the voice as a Music instruement with the words being notes. While the Qyr'an has a vocabulary of about 6.000 words they are compsed of about 2,000 toot words. Have to think of them as being individual notes.

In order to keep a specific rhythm each word establishes the possible words that can be used after it/ While it would be possible to write a logical sentence using the words from the Qur'an, the musical aspect would be lost. An attempr to maintain the Musical aspect would result in a nonsensical sentence.

The pronunciation of each word determines what word can come after it.

In my younger years, I thought it would be quite simple to make a unique sentence, simply by using the words in the Qur'an. Which I did. the problem was the tonal qualities were almost unbearable to listen to. I can make a sentence using words from the Qur'an, but it is going to sound like a camel coughing up a hairball and have no musical quality.

[TRANSPONDER]

Thank you. I get the idea that you CAN write text using Quranic Arabic but it will sound nothing like as 'euphonic' as the Qur'an actually sounds. What I would need to know is whether there are any Ummayad or Abbasid documents that use a language similar to Quranic, or early courtly Arabic documents again don't approach the Qur'an.

I must at least accept that I could write 10 or more chapters like the content of the Quran (with as you say about 200 root words - toot is quite appropriate for a Quranic symphony), but certainly not in this euphonious quality that you speak of and which Go Cardinals hinted at, that you could recite this stuff for ever and not get tired of it.

Incidentally, in reading about the compilation and codification of the Quran by Othman, I looked for anything that would touch on his authority - something obviously of importance to him. There was one supposed prophecy of Muhammad assuring that righteous would receive the succession.


P.s. It is quite interesting and tantalizing to read of the importance of Arabic poetry before Islam and how highly formalized it was and how the poets were trained in it. I read that the sound and form of it were considered more important than the content. Given that the Qur'an is supposed to have been compiled from various memories and some inscribed artefacts, putting together the resultant book might well have required the services of Uthman's best poets. And they would have had a long tradition of being very good.
P. p s. LI. I am grateful for your answers. Despite myself, I am getting quite interested...

[TRANSPONDER]

sorry duplicate

But. reading about early court poetry makes it clear how supremely important it was in political use as well as just entertainment. But I am obliged to observe that nobody had even (so far) touched on the possibility that Quranic Arabic might well have been within the abilities of Abbasid court poets.