10-20-2004, 02:43 PM
Hello shameem.
I do have a Yusuf Ali translation. I have 2 other translations as well - one is by Ahmed Ali and the other is by Dr. Z. Hoque and it has the Arabic text in it (although it does me no good because I can't read or understand it).
Anyhow, I've read through Y. Ali's translation and started reading Ahmed Ali's.
If you say the Arabic is the exact same today as it was first revealed, well.... *which* revealed text are you referring to? Which of the 7 dialects? And then what about the others that cannot be attributed to mere dialect differences?
Most people here seem to be unaware of what I'm talking about, so I will just post a link to the site where you can read it for yourself. I actually bought this book myself to study and then found out it was completely online.
Quote:<b>Other Views</b>
Later on other views emerged, making ten or fourteen
well-known readings. In addition to the seven above, the
following make up the ten and the fourteen readers:
Chapter 5
Quote:In Sura al-baqara, which I take as an example, there are a
total of 101 variants. Most of them concern spelling, some also
choice of words (synonyms), use of particles, etc.
Chapter 2
Chapter 2 goes into a little detail about the variants, but not as much detail as I would like.
So, my question still is: Today's Arabic copy is the same as WHICH of the earlier one's? Some people's copies of the Quran had surahs in a different order, had some additional surahs, some had fewer.... Then there are hadith about some ayats that supposedly *should* be in the Quran, but aren't.
These are the kinds of questions I have about the Quran that I don't really get solid answers to. It seems like the questions get dodged and/or glossed over.