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The Origins of the Koran: Classic Essays on Islam's Holy Book

Article in Journal of the American Oriental Society · July 2002

DOI: 10.2307/3087567

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Review
Reviewed Work(s): The Origins of the Koran: Classic Essays on Islam's Holy Book by Ibn
Warraq
Review by: Todd Lawson
Source: Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 122, No. 3 (Jul. - Sep., 2002), p. 658
Published by: American Oriental Society
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 658 Journal of the American Oriental Society 122.3 (2002)

has the opportunity to do justice to the broader question of ar- as "the author of Why I am Not A Muslim," has done a service

tistic "influence." It should be noted, however, that the concept for undergraduates and others who have difficulty in locating
of "influence" tends to put the emPHAsis on the wrong sylLA- the originals of these groundbreaking-and, in some sense-
ble. In his book Patterns of Intention (New Haven, 1985), the relics of Qur'dnic scholarship. It will also quickly become
eminent art historian Michael Baxandall has written that the clear to the contemporary student of Islam, however, that sev-
concept of influence confuses the agent with the patient. Sasa- eral of these various essays are about much more than the pure
nian Iran, for example, could have had no "influence" on the vertical love of Qur'dnic scholarship.
arts of the Islamic lands because the Sasanians were long dead. Beyond questioning the motives for publishing such a col-

Nor could ancient Arabia have "influenced" the architecture lection at the end of the twentieth century, the reader is con-

of Saudi Arabia. Rather, there was something going on in the fronted with an introduction distinctive for its repeated lapses
Islamic lands or in Saudi Arabia that led artists or patrons to in style: "the founder of the Shias" (p. 11), "Heilgeschichte"
look back and borrow from the arts and architecture of earlier (p. 34), unreferenced quotations and assertions (e.g., pp. 14, 19,
times. I wish that some of the participants in this conference 34). Arrogance and amateurish deductions abound; and all is

had addressed such issues. sounded in the key of gormless hysteria: "Some of the stories
in the Koran are enormously long; for instance, the story of
JONATHAN M. BLOOM Joseph takes up a whole chapter of 111 verses. Are we really to
BOSTON COLLEGE believe that Muhammad remembered it exactly as it was re-
vealed?" (p. 13); or even better: "Most scholars believe that
there are interpolations in the Koran" (p. 17). Indeed.
This same introduction uses for a motto a statement pub-
lished in 1933 by that prolific apostle of scientism, Saloman

The Origins of the Koran: Classic Essays on Islam's Holy Reinach (1858-1932):

Book. Edited by IBN WARRAQ. Amherst, New York:

PROMETHEUS BOOKS, 1998. Pp. 411. From the literary point of view, the Koran has little merit.
Declamation, repetition, puerility, a lack of logic and coher-

This is a collection of articles in Qur'dnic studies by some ence strike the unprepared reader at every turn. It is humil-
of the more influential early pioneers in the field: NMldeke's iating to the human intellect to think that this mediocre

famous article for the Britannica (9th ed., 1891); Caetani's literature has been the subject of innumerable commentar-

study of the "Uthmanic recension tradition" (1915); Mingana's: ies, and that millions of men are still wasting time absorb-

"Three Ancient Korans" (1914) and "The Transmission of the ing it. (p. 9)

Koran" (1916); four seemingly idiosyncratically chosen arti-

cles by Arthur Jeffery (1935-39); Margoliouth's study of vari- It is difficult to see how this characterization improves upon

ants (1925); Geiger's "What Did Muhammad Borrow from the more famous and better written one by Thomas Carlyle a
Judaism" (1898); W. St. Clair-Tisdall's "The Sources of Islam" hundred years earlier, except perhaps in degree of offensive-
(1901); and Torrey's "The Jewish Foundations of Islam" (1933). ness. It must be said that it undoubtedly demonstrates the edi-
The collection ends with Andrew Rippin's earnest discussion of tor's diligence and industry in finding churlish things to say
the stimulating, controversial, daunting, and ill-starred work of about the Qur'dn in English. It is difficult to recommend this
John Wansbrough (1985). Here, one gets the impression that production, except perhaps for antiquarian interests and the
Wansbrough is the only post-war scholar to have taken the lit- archaeology of the study of Islam.
erary presuppositions and findings of the other earlier authors
seriously enough to press these to some logical conclusions. TODD LAWSON

Why this should be so is not addressed. But the discussion does MCGILL UNIVERSITY

yield a salubrious insight: the Qur'dn is first and foremost an

instance of "Salvation History," not a book of history qua his-
tory, and that stabilization-and therefore a kind of canoniza-
tion-of the text occurred at a much later period than generally
assumed. The Arabic Manuscript Tradition: A Glossary of Technical
Gathered here together, it will become clear to the reader Terms and Bibliography. By ADAM GACEK. Handbook of
that each article is important also as a product of a specific Oriental Studies: sect. 1, Near and Middle East, vol. 58.
time, place, and 6lan. Such is indeed signaled on the dustjacket Leiden: BRILL, 2001. Pp. xvi + 269. Eur 57.
where it is pointed out that "this penetrating work" begins with
"the first truly scientific study of the Koran" (i.e., N6ldeke's). Orientalists are more and more aware of the importance of

The editor, "Ibn Warraq" whom the same dustjacket identifies codicology and paleography, sciences that have developed re-

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