From Comparative-religion
| "About 61% of the contents of the Koran are found to speak ill of the unbelievers or call for their violent conquest; at best only 2.6% of the verses of the Koran are noted to show goodwill toward humanity. About 75% of Muhammad's biography (Sira) consists of jihad waged on unbelievers." — Dr. Moorthy Muthuswamy [1]
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The
Qur'an, the central religious text of Islam.
The Qur'an (literally "the recitation") is the central religious text of Islam. It professes to be the book of guidance, and therefore rarely offers detailed accounts of historical events, typically placing emphasis on the moral significance of an event, rather than its narrative sequence.
The Qur'an also does not describe natural facts in a scientific manner but teaches that natural and supernatural events are signs of God. Muslims regard the Qur'an as the culmination of a series of divine messages that started with those revealed to Adam, regarded as their first prophet. As such, the Qur'an is considered to be God's final revelation.[2] The Qur'an thus also refers to many events from Jewish and Christian scriptures, some of which are retold in comparatively distinctive ways from the Bible and the Torah, while obliquely referring to other events described explicitly in those texts.[3]
2. Islam holds that the Qur'an was revealed to Muhammad by the angel Jibril (Gabriel) over a period of 23 years. The Qur'an was written down by Muhammad's companions while he was alive, although the prime method of transmission was oral. It was compiled in the time of Abu Bakr, the first caliph, and was standardized in the time of Uthman, the third caliph. Therefore all Muslims, Sunni or Shia, use the same Qur'an.
3. The Qur'an consists of 114 chapters of varying lengths, each known as a sura. Chapters are classed as Meccan or Medinan, depending on where the verses were revealed. Generally, longer chapters appear earlier in the Qur'an, while the shorter ones appear later. The chapter arrangement is thus not connected to the sequence of revelation. Each sura is formed from several ayat (verses), which originally means a sign or portent sent by God. The actual number of ayat has been a controversial issue among Muslim scholars since Islam's inception. However, the most popular edition of the Qur'an, which is based on the Kufa school tradition, contains 6,236 ayat.[2]
4. The Qur'an's message is conveyed through the use of various literary structures and devices. In the original Arabic, the chapters and verses employ phonetic and thematic structures that assist the audience's efforts to recall the message, the text of which seemingly has no beginning, middle, or end, and its nonlinear structure being akin to a web or net.[2] Critics have commented on the textual arrangement pointing out lack of continuity, absence of any chronological or thematic order, and presence of repetition.[4] Muslims assert that the Qur'anic content and style is inimitable. Michael Sells, citing the work of the critic Norman O. Brown, acknowledges Brown's observation that the seeming "disorganization" of Qur'anic literary expression is in fact a literary device capable of delivering "profound effects — as if the intensity of the prophetic message were shattering the vehicle of human language in which it was being communicated." [5]
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