97592549 the collection of the qur an a reconsideration of western views in light of recent...

8/12/2019 97592549 the Collection of the Qur an a Reconsideration of Western Views in Light of Recent Methodological Developments

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TheCollectionof theQur anAReconsiderationofWesternViewsin Light

of Recent MethodologicalDevelopments*Harald Motzki (University ofNijmegen)

Dedicatedto thememoryofEd deMoor

L The Qur'an as ahistorical sourceEver sincetheQur'ancame into (earthly) existence,it hasbeen usedfor different reasons. For Muslims it has always been a source of moraland religious inspiration andbenefit. Muslim scholars have studied itchieflyas a basis for their system of legal and theological doctrines and

seldom for purely historical reasons. The interest of modern Western(non-Muslim)scholarsin the Qur'an,however,hasmainly been historical.It isusedas asourcefor thepreachingofMuhammadand fordetailsof hisprophetic career,as adocumentofearly Islam andevenas asourceforpre-Islamicreligion and society of the Arabs.If onedecidestoapproachtheQuranas ahistorical source,itmustbesubjected tosource criticism, whichis one of the great methodologicalachievementsof themodern studyofhistory.Thepurposeofsource criti-cismis to checktheauthenticity, originality and correctnessofwhatasource purportsto be or isthought toinformusabout. When trying todetermine the reliability of a source, the first questions a historianusually asks are:How farawayintimeandspaceis thesourcefrom theevent aboutwhichitinformsus?Are thedateandplaceoforigin whichthesource claimsforitself correct?

* A first draft ofthisarticle was presented at the symposium"Qur'anicStu-dieson the Eve of the21st Century" heldatLeideninJune1998.1amthankfultoJohnNawasandPeriBearmanforcorrectingtheEnglishand forcommentson thefirstdraftofthis article.DerIslam Bel.78, S.1-34 W al te rd eGruyter2001ISSN0021-1818


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2 HaraldMotzkiHowever,most scholars do not asksuch questions anymore. TheytakeforgrantedthattheQur'anisMuhammad's prophecyandthateventhetimeandplaceoforiginof itspartscan bedetermined with some cer-tainty.Yet thefactthatthereare a fewscholarswhodoubtthisalmost

generally accepted view and wonder whether allpartsof theQur'anreallydohavethe sameauthor,remindsusthat historical insights areneverfinal,butmustbeconstantly reviewed.It istherefore legitimate to asksomesource-critical questions concerning theQur'anonce again. Takingasstartingpointthealmost generally accepted viewthatthe Qur'ancon-tainstherevelationswhichMuhammad announced duringthefirst thirdofthe 7thcenturyAD atMeccaandMedina,we mayask: Where doesthispieceofinformationcomefrom?Toanswerthisquestionin anempirically scientific way,wehave threepossible sources ofknowledgeat our disposal: early Qur'anic manu-scripts,thetextof theQur'anitself,and theIslamictraditionrelatingtothe Qur'an.Let us first see whether these sourcesoffer the necessaryclues.Thequestionas towhetheranearly text really goes backto its re-ported author can be easily answered if wefindits autograph. In the caseoftheQur'an,however, no discovery of an autograph has yet been made,neither one written by the Prophet himself nor by the scribes he may havehad. Even early manuscripts of the Qur'an are rare and their datingis controversial. There are, admittedly, some fragments of the Qur'anwrittenon papyrus or parchment dated by some scholars to the end of the1st and the first half of the 2nd century AH, but these instances of datingare rejected by others and have not yetfoundgeneralacknowledgment.1)Additionally, the fragmentary character of most of the oldest Qur'anicmanuscripts doesnotallowus toconclude with certaintythattheearliestQur'ansmust havehad theexact sameform,sizeandcontentas thelaterones. Thus, manuscriptsdo notseemto behelpful(asyet) concerningourissue.

l ) Of.O.P R E T Z L ,'DieKoranhandschriften',in: TH.N L D E K E ,GeschichtedesQorns,part3,Leipzig19382,249-274. A. G R OH M A N N , 'TheProblemofDatingEarlyQur'ns',in:Der Islam33(1958),213-231and A.N E U W I B T H ,'Koran',in:H.GTJE(ed.),Grundri derarabischenPhilologie,vol.2,Wiesbaden 1987, 112.PerhapstheQur'nicfragmentsfoundinYemenin1972 (cf. G.-R.PUIN,Observa-tionsonEarlyQur'nManuscriptsinSanV,in: S.WIL (ed.),TheQuranas Text,Leiden 1996, 107111)willproduce specimenswhichcan bedated with more cer-tainty.


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TheCollectionof theQur'an 3What aboutthetextitself?Doesthe Qur'ancontain clear indicationsasto its authoror itscollectors? This is acontroversial question, too.There are only very few concrete historical facts mentioned in theQur'an.2)Inmost caseswe are notabletograspfromthetextitselfwhat

thehistorical circumstancesare towhichthetextseemstorefer.3)Thename Muhammad is mentioned onlyfourtimes and always in the thirdperson.4)Usually the text isonly concerned with someone called 'themessenger'or'theProphet',who as aruleistakento bethissameMu-hammadinmost places. However,it can be and hasbeen arguedthattheperson addressed in the Qur'an in the second person singular is notnecessarily alwaysthemessenger (andthereare a fewinstances wherethis clearly cannot be thecase),but can also be regarded in many placesas the readerorreciterof thetextingeneral.5)Ifsuchapointofviewisadopted, the issue ofMuhammad'sauthorship or transmission of the en-tireQur'anbecomes questionable.J O H N W A N S B B O U G H advocated emphatically such a thesis in hisQuranic Studies.He concluded on the basis of form-critical and otherargumentsthat the Qur'an had emergedout ofpericopes of propheticlogiawhich developed independently duringthe first twoIslamic cen-turiesinMesopotamia.Thecanonical collection, i.e.,theQur'anas it nowexists, cannot be dated, according toW A N S B B O U G H ,beforethe beginningof the third century AH.Consequently,the Qur'an loses muchof itsquality as a reliable historical source for Muhammad's lifetime and en-vironment and becomes instead a source for the development of onetypeof religious literature of the early Islamic communities elsewhere.6)W A N S B B O U G H ' S conclusionscan be andhave been criticized forseveralreasons7) andonlya fewscholars have acceptedhisviews.Nevertheless,

2) Of. for a collection N. R O B I N S O N , Discoveringthe Quran,London 1996,30-31.3) Of.for asummaryof theQur'anichistoricalframeworkM. COOK,Muham-mad,Oxford1983,69-70.4) Some scholars have even suggestedthatthefourverses werelateradditions,e.g. H. H I R S C H F E L D , NewResearches into the Compositionand Exegesisof theQoran,London 1902, 139.5) As argued by A.RIPPINin,"'Muhammadin theQur'an:Reading Scripture inthe21stCentury',in: H. M O T Z K I(ed.), TheBiographyofMuhammad: TheIssueof the Sources ,Leiden 2000,298-309.6) J.W A N S B B O U G H ,QuranicStudies,Oxford1977, 1-52.7) Cf. the reviewsby G.H.A. J U YN B O L L , in: Journal of Semitic Studies 24(1979),293-296;W.A.G R A H A M ,in: Journalof theAmerican OrientalSociety 100(1980),137-141;A.N E U W I R T H ,in:Die Welt desIslams23-24(1984),539-542.


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4 HaraldMotzkihis contribution has reminded usthaton the basis of theQur'anictextalone Muhammad's'authorship5of thewholetextisdifficult,if not im-possibletoprove.8)It seems thenthattheconfidenceofthose scholarswhobelievethattheQur'anis thecollectionofMuhammad'srevelations mustbefoundedonsomething else.Theonly sourcewhichremains, if weexcludenon-em-pirical sources of knowledge, is the Islamic tradition. 'Islamictradition'isto beunderstoodin abroad sensetoinclude exegeticaland historicaltraditionsof anykindwhichpurporttogive background informationonthe Qur'an and itsdetailsor arethought toprovide such information.These sources,whicharefoundindifferenttypesofliterature, tafslr, sira,collectionsofsunan or ofhistorical traditions, can belabeledHadith.Wearefacedhere withaparadoxinmodern Western Islamic studies.MostWestern scholars are highly skeptical about the historical reliabilityoftheHadithbut nevertheless accept on the basisofhadith reportsthatthe Qur'an is therevelation preachedbyMuhammadandthatitreflectsthe historical circumstances of his life. Even scholars such as I G N A ZG O L D Z I H E Rand J O S E P H S C H A C H T ,whoregarded mosthadithreportsasfictitious andwithoutanyhistorical valuefor thetimewhichthey pur-porttoreflect,did notcontesttheviewthattheQur'an went backto Mu-hammadand they regarded it as the most reliable source of hislifeandpreaching. This inconsistent positionhasbeen abandoned only recentlyby the followers of Schacht's radical opinions on the Hadith such asW A N S B R O U G H , M I CH A E L C O O K , PATRICIA C R O N E , A N D R E W RIPPIN,G E R A L D H A W T I N Gandothers. They doubtthattheIslamic traditioncanbeahistorically reliableframeofreferencefor theQur'an, becauseit isgenerally uncertain whether the information in reports on Qur'anic itemsis based on real knowledge independentofthe Qur'anictextitself andfreeoflaterapologetic, dogmaticandjuridical preoccupations. Consequently,they also questionthegeneral convictionthattheQur'anas awholeis acontemporary recordof Muhammad'sutterances.Isthistheonlyway toescapetheparadox?Theobvious alternativewouldbe toinsiston thehistorical reliabilityof theIslamic tradition, atleastin itsessential points. Thisis the positionwhiche.g.W.M O N TG O -M E R Y WATThasadoptedinassumingthatthe 8contains'abasic coreofmaterial whichis sound' and inthinkingthat itwouldbeimpossibleto

8) Of.thecontributionsin H.B E R G(ed.),'IslamicOrigins Reconsidered: JohnWansbrough and the Study ofEarly Islam5, in:Method &Theory in the Studyof Religion 9/1 (Special Issue) 1997 for positive judgmentsof W A N S B R O U G H ' Sstudies.


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TheCollectionof theQur'an 5make senseof thehistorical materialof theQur'anwithout assumingthetruthofthiscore'.9)But how can weknow whatthetruecoreof thesiratraditionis?WA TT'Spoor methodologyinansweringthisquestionand indismissingSCHACH T'Sobjectionsto theHadithas notbeing applicabletothesiramaterialhas notconvinced critical mindsand hasbrought uponhimselfthe reproach of being gullible. To avoid such a reproach, scholarswho are prepared to accept that the Qur'an contains Muhammad'spreachingandthustoconcedeto theIslamic traditionacertainvalue,too, cannotbuttackletheissueof thereliabilityof theIslamictraditionsagain.In thelastdecade several scholars-myself included-have devotedthemselvestothis task.Ihave designeddifferentstrategies tocope withthe problem:a) acritical revaluation of thestudies which deny to thehadithreports a historical value for the first century, and b) an improve-mentof themethodstoanalyzeanddatetraditions.Bothstrategiescanbeemployed either on a more general level, e.g. concerning certaintypesof traditions, such as exegetical or legal ones,10) or on a more specificlevel,e.g.with a singletraditionor complex oftraditions.11)In thefollow-ing, Iwill exploretheissueof thecollectionof the Qur'an, anissue whichisfundamentalinassessingtheauthorshipanddateof thestandardtext.This paper can only sketch someaspectsof the problems; a comprehen-sive discussioncan befoundin amoredetailedstudyI amcurrentlypre-paringonthis issue.

9) W. M O N T G O M E R Y WATT,M uhammad'sMecca,Edinburgh1988,1.10) Of.forsuchan approach H. M O T Z K I ,DieAnfnge derislamischen Juris-prudenz,Stuttgart1991;revised Englishedition:TheOriginsofIslamic Jurispru-dence.MeccanFiqhbefore theClassicalSchools,Leiden 2001.u) Examplesare H.M O T Z K I, 'DerFiqhdes-Zuhri:dieQuellenproblematik5,in: Der Islam 68 (1991), 1-44; revised English edition: 'The JurisprudenceofIbnSihbaz-Zuhri.ASource-criticalStudy',Nijmegen2001,1-55,http://webdoc.ubn.kun.nl/mono/m/motzki_h/juriofibs.pdf; idem,'QuovadisHadit-Forschung?',in:DerIslam 73(1996),40-80,193-231;revisedEnglishedition: 'WitherHadithStudies?',in: EHardy(ed.),Traditions ofIslam: Understanding, theHadith,Lon-don2002; idem,'TheProphetand theCat:OnDatingMalik'sMuwatta andLegalTraditions',in:Jerusalem StudiesinArabicandIslam22(1998),18-83;andidem,'TheMurder ofIbnAM 1-Huqayq: On the Origin andReliabilityof someMaghazi-Reports',in:idem (ed.),TheBiography ofMuhammad: TheIssue of theSources,Leiden 2000,170-239.


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6 HaraldMotzkiII. Thetraditionson thecollectionof theQur'an

TheMuslimpointofviewAccordingto currentMuslimopinion,the canonicaltextof the Qur'anas it nowexistsand hasbeenfoundinmanuscripts dating atleast fromthethirdcenturyAH,possibly evenfromearlier times, came into beingasfollows:WhentheProphet died, therewas nocompleteanddefinitive col-lectionof hisrevelations authorizedbyhim.Moreorless extensive piecesofhisrevelationhadbeen rememberedby hisfollowersandsomehadbeenpartly written down on various materials by several persons. Shortlyafter hisdeath,afirst collectionofeverythingwasmadebyorderof thefirstcaliphAbuBakrand it waswrittenonleaves.Thereasonforthiswas

that several Companionswhowere famous fortheir knowledgeof theQur'an haddied duringtheriddawars,andpeople were afraidthatpartsoftheQur'anmight become lost.AbuBakr gave Zaydb.Thabit,aformerscribe of the Prophet, the task to collect what was available of theQur'an.When AbuBakr died,the leavesonwhichZaydhadwritten theQur'anpassedto theformer'ssuccessorcUmarandafterhisdeathto hisdaughterHafsa, one of the wivesofMuhammad.Some20years afterAbuBakr'scollection, during the caliphateofcUthman,dissension betweenfollowersofother collections inducedthecaliphtoissueanofficialcollectionof theQur'an,to deposit a copy in the most important administrative centers ofthe empire and to suppress other existing collections. This canonical ver-sion was again edited by the Medinan Zayd b. Thbit, helped by three menfromQur'aysh,on thebasisof thecollectionhe hadalready madeon AbuBakr'sbehalfwhichHafsa put at the disposal of the committee. This ca-liphal editionof theQur'an,al-mushaf al-uthmani,became quickly uni-versally acceptedandthusthetextusreceptusamongMuslims.12)

The opinions of Western scholarsIn thefirst substantial Western studyof theQur'n,T H E O D O R N L -D B K B ' SGeschichtedesQorans,publishedin1860,theauthor adopted theMuslimstandardaccount of the history of theQur*an.In thelastdecadesofthe 19th century, however, doubts raisedbyWestern scholars withre-12) Many authorscan becitedfor theMuslimstandardaccountof the history

ofQur'an.Iconfinemyselfto afairly recent one:G H N IM Q A D D R I A L - H A M A D ,Rasmal-mushaf, Baghdad 1402/1982,100-128.


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TheCollectionof the Qur'an 7gardto thehistorical reliability of thetraditionsconcerningthetimeoftheProphet and theearly history ofIslam multiplied. Instrumental inthisdevelopment werethestudiesby I. G O L D Z I H E Ron theHadithpub-lished in 1890 in the secondvolumeof hisMuhammedanische Studien. Inthisfamouswork,G O L D Z IH E Badvanced thethesisthatthehadlthswhichallegedly reporton theProphet and hisCompanions cannot,as a rule, betaken ashistorically authentic, forthey reflect the political, dogmaticand juridical developmentsof the Muslim communityat alater time(Umayyadand'Abbasidperiods).13)This suspicionbyWestern scholar-ship of theMuslimtraditionwhichoriginated around theturnof the cen-turyfoundexpressionin therevised editionofN L D E K E 'sGeschichtedesQorns ofwhich the first two volumes were prepared by F R I E D R I C HSc H WA LLY .14 )He wrote a completely new and more detailed study on theissue of the collectionof the Qur'n,15)and hisconclusionsdifferedsub-stantially fromthoseof N L D E K E .SCHWALLYrejected the historical reliability of the report thattherehadalready beenacollectionof the Qur'anmade shortly afterthedeathofthe Prophet on behalf of the first caliph AbuBakr.16)His conclusion isbased on thefollowingarguments: 1)The connection which the report es-tablishes between the collection and the heavy losses of experts of theQur'anin the battleofal-Yamama isspuriousfor tworeasons: on theonehand,the transmitted listsofMuslims killedinthis battle containonlyvery fewnamesofpersonswellknownfortheirknowledgeof theQur'an,17)and on theother hand,theconnectionisillogical becausethereisgood reasontosupposethattheQur'anhadalready been written downpiecemeal-wiseduringMuhammad'slifetime.Thedeathofexpertsof theQur'an,i.e.,peoplewhoknewit byheart,canthereforenothave beenthe

13) I. G O L D Z I H E B ,Muhammedanische Studien,Halle1889-90,vol.2,passim.14) Volume1 waspublishedin1909, volume2 in1919,but wasalready finishedin 1914.15) 'DieSammlung des Qorns', in: TH. N L D E K E , Geschichte des Qorns,part2,Leipzig19192,1-121.16) Hegaveasummary ofhisargumentsin thearticle'BetrachtungenberdieKoransammlungdesAbuBekr',in:Festschrift EduardSachau zumsiebzigstenGe-burtstage,Berlin 1915,321-325.17) In hisAnnali dell'Islam,Milano1906-26,vol.2,702-715, 738-754;andvol. 7,388-418,L.C AE T AN Ihadalready made referencetothiscontradictionandreachedtheconclusionthatthetraditionoh afirst compilationin thereign ofAbuBakris ahistoricallyunreliablereportwhichhasbeeninventedtojustifythecom-pilationof "Uthman.


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8 HaraldMotzkireason for the decision to collect the Qur'an; 2) Some reportsdifferas tothe question whether the collection made on behalf ofAbuBakr and theofficial editionmade duringthe caliphate ofcUthman were almost iden-tical.SCHWA LLYconcludesfromthecontradictionthattheauthorsof thereportshad noreal information going backto thetimeof thefirst caliphs,butmadeuptheirownminds about whathadhappened.Besides, he re-gardsit asstrange that'Uthmanhadappointed acommitteetocollectandeditthe Qur'anunderthedirectionofZaydb.Thbitif thelatterhadalready collectedandwritten downthetextonleaves some yearsago andifthistextwas used as the modelwhichwas only copied;3)From the claimofthe reports thatthe first collectionhadbeen instigated by the firstcaliphAbuBakrandthathebequeathedhiscopyto hissuccessorcUmarwemust concludethatit was anofficialcopy.This feature is contradicted,however,byreportswhichindicatethatin theprovinces collections madebyother Companions were widely used and by the claimthat cUmarbequeathed AbuBakr'scopy to his own daughter Hafsa instead of tohis successorcUthman,whichseems odd if it were a caliphal copyBasedonthese arguments,SCHWA LLYconcludedthatthereportson afirstcollectionof theQur'anforAbuBakrwerelater inventionsinordertogivethecollection brought togetherby thecontroversial 'Uthman -disapproved of by asectionof the Muslimcommunitymore authority.Thetraditionsconcerningtheofficial edition preparedfor thethirdca-liph, however, were acceptedby SCHWALLYashistorically reliableinsub-stance, althoughhedetected some inconsistent orimprobable detailsaswell,suchas theclaimthatthe Qur'an hadbeen revealedin thelanguage,i.e.,thedialect,of theQuraysh.18)Aroundthesame time other scholars tookamore radical viewand re-jected even the historicity of anofficialcollection in the time ofcUthman.P A UL CA S A N O V Awas thefirsttoclaimthattheQur'anwas not collectedand officially promulgated before the caliphate of the Umayyad Abdal-Malikandthatthishadbeen doneon the initiativeof hisnotoriousgovernoral-Hajjjb.Ysuf.19)This viewwasadoptedand substantiatedinmoredetailbyA L P H O N S E M IN G A N Ain hisarticle 'The transmissionoftheKur'an'.20)Hisarguments were:1)Theearliest record aboutthecom-pilation of the Qur'anistransmittedby IB N SACD(d.229/844)in his Ta-baqt,about 200years after the death ofMuhammad. Aboutthe oral

18) SCHWALLY,'Sammlung',11-27,47-62.19) P CA S A NOV A ,Mohammed etlafin dumonde,Paris 1911,103-142,162.20) Publishedin:Journalof theManchester Egyptian and Oriental Society 5(1915-1916),25-47.


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TheCollectionof theQur' n 9transmission ofhadith reports duringthesetwo centuries we have no re-liableinformation;2)IB N SACDtransmits reportsonCompanionswhocol-lected theQur'an duringthelifetimeof theProphetandduringthe ca-liphateofcUmar.He hasnothing aboutacollectiononbehalfofAbuBakrorofcUthman;3) Welearn aboutthelatteronlyfromthehadithcompi-lationof A L -B U K H R I ,whodiedaquarterof acentury afterIBNS A CD,andfromlatercompilations. AccordingtoM IN G A N A ,thereis noreasontoprefertheyounger reportsofA L - abovetheearlier onesofIBNS A CD ,as Muslim and Western scholarstendto do. Moreover, the reportswhichthese earliest compilations contain on the topic are so mixed upand contradictory thatit is impossible to decide which of them can becredited. In viewof the historical unreliability of the Jiadith material,M I N G A N Aproposestolookforsources outsidetheIslamictradition.HepropoundsthatsomeSyrian-Christian sourcesaremore suitableforhis-torical purposes because theyareearlier thantheMuslimones. M I N G A N Aenumerates thefollowingsources:1) 'Thedispute betweencA m rb.al-cAsand theMonophysite PatriarchofAntioch,John,whichtook placeand wasrecordedin the year18(639); 2 )aletterwritten in the first years of'Uthman'scaliphate by thebishopofNineveh, later knownasIshocyahbIII, PatriarchofSeleucia,andreferringto theMuslims;3) anaccounton theMuslims writtenbyan anonymous Christian in the year 60/680; and 4) the chronicleofJ O H N BARP E N K YBwrittenin70/690,in thefirst yearsof the caliphateof cA bdal-Malik.M IN G A N Aarguesthatin allthese sourcesof the lst/7thcentury thereis nohintof anysacred Islamic Book when they describeormentionthe Muslims and their faith. The same is true, according to him,concerning thewritingsofhistoriansandtheologiansof thebeginningofthe2nd/8th century.isonly towardsthe end of thefirst quarterofthis[the 2nd/8th H.M.] centurythattheQur'anbecame the theme of conver-sationinNestorian, Jacobite, andMelchite ecclesiasticalcircles.'21) MIN-G A N A concludesfrom these factsthat an official Qur'an cannot haveexistedbeforethe end of the 7th century AD.As one of the earliest non-Muslim accountsof the history of theQur'an M I N G A N A quotesapassagefrom the Apology' of the Christianfaithwrittenby A L -K i N D iaround830 AD,some forty yearsbefore A L- .2 2)In thistext,a first collection during the caliphate of AbuBakrismentioned(anotherreasonfor it isgiven,however),and anofficialeditiononcUthman's behalfisdescribedin asimilarway as in thereports

21) A.M I N G A N A ,'Transmission',39.22) Op.cit.,40.


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10 HaraldMotzkitransmittedbyA L - .A L - K I N D Iendsbysayingthatthe existingcopiesof theQur'anwere collectedandrevisedbyorderofcAbdal-Malik'sgovernoral-Hajj j b.Yusufwho'causedto beomitted from the textagreat manypassages',thenhad six newcopies writtenanddistributed tothemain administrative centersof theprovinces.Hedestroyed theear-lier copies as'Uthmanhad donebefore.According to A L - K i N D i ,his ac-count is based completely onMuslimauthorities.Combininghisfindingsfrom Christiansources, M I N G A N Aconcludesthattheremayhave existed several individual collectionsof the Qur'an,evenone for'Uthman,but not anofficial editionbeforethe time of theUmayyad caliph cAbdal-Malikwhenthe Qur'anbecame collected andedited on the basis ofexisting written and orally preserved materialunder the supervision of his governoral-Hajjaj.23)Formany decadesthisradical viewwas notadoptedbymost Westernscholars,whofollowed the more moderate position of SCHWALLY,a feweventhatof N L D E K Ewhich coincided withthedominant Muslimtradi-tion.24)This situation changed whenin1950J O S E P H S C H A C H T 'SbookTheOrigins ofMuhammadan Jurisprudencewaspublished.Inthisstudy theauthor triedto prove definitively G O L D Z I H E R ' Sthesisthatmost Jiadithreports are historically unreliable. His conclusions were even more gen-eraland radical instatingthatthelegallyrelevanttraditionsconcerningthe Prophet and his Companionswere generally fictitious and hadbeen fabricated during the 2nd century AH orlaterwhen early Mus-lim legal scholars developed their doctrines. Although S C H A C H T haddeveloped his ideas on the basis of legal hadlths, he did not limit histheory to this type of tradition but thought it applicable to othersortsas well. S C H A C H T ' Sviews concerning the Hadith impressed mostWestern scholarsand in thedecadesfollowingthepublicationof hisbookskepticism became amajorfactor in the Western study of early Islam.Theissueof the collectionof the Qur'an did not escapethistrend. In

23) Op.eit.,46.M I N G A N As approach and his conclusion concerning the datingofthe Qur'anreappear some60yearslaterin P.C R O N E /M . C O O K ,Hagarism. TheMaking oftheIslamic World,Cambridge1977,3 andchapter 1,passim.M IN G A N A ' Sarticleis,however,notmentionedbythem.24) Cf. N.A B B O T T, TheRiseoftheNorth Arabic Script and its Kur' nic Deve-lopment,Chicago 1939,47ff.A. J E F F E R Y ,Materialsfor theHistory of the Textofthe Quran,Leiden 1937, 4-10. W.M O N T G O M E R Y WATT:Bell's Introduction to theQuran,Edinburgh 1970,40-44.A. W E L C H , 'Kuran', in: The Encyclopaedia ofIslam,2nded., Leiden1954ff.,vol.5,404f.R.B L A C H E R E,Introdiictionau Coran,Paris19772,27-34, 52-62.


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TheC ollectionof the Qur'an 111977 twostudies were publishedwhich dealtwiththisproblem, J O H NW A N S B R O U G H ' S Quranic Studies and J O H N BURTON'S Collectionof theQuran.2*)Both authors tooktheviewofG O L D Z I H E Rand SCH A CH T as anaxiomatic basis fortheirstudies26)andcameto the conclusionthatallMuslimtraditions concerning the collection and redaction of theQur'anare historically unreliable and must be regarded as projections of dog-maticorlegal discussionsfromthe end of the 2ndIslamic century onwards.W A N S B R O U G H basedhisviewnot on aninvestigation of the relevanttraditions themselvesbut onSCHACHTESresultsaswellas aform-analyticalstudy oftheQur'anand theMuslimexegeticalliterature.Accordingtohim,the structureof the Qur'n in the form availablenow'characterizedbyvarianttraditions,ellipsisandrepetitionaresuchtosuggestnot thecare-fullyexecuted workof one ormore men,but rathertheproductof an or-ganicdevelopmentfromoriginally independent traditionsduring a longperiod oftransmission'.27) These traditionscan bethoughtof aspericopesofpropheticlogiawhich had been orallytransmittedover a longer periodoftimeandfinallygrew together intoacanon.The endofthisprocess,thecanonization, cannot have happenedearlierthanthe end of the 2ndcen-turyAH. 'Establishment of astandardtextsuchas isimpliedby theeUth-mnicrecensiontraditionscanhardly have beenearlier/28)Accordingly,thoseandothertraditionsabouttheearly collectionoftheQur'nmustberegardednot ashistorically reliable reports,but asfictions which servedcertain purposes. These reports may have beencreatedby legal scholars,asproposedby B U R T O N ,inordertoexplain legal doctrines thatare notfoundin thecanon, and/ormayhave been modeledonrabbinical accountsoftheestablishment of theoriginaltext('Urtext') of thePentateuchandthecanonization oftheHebrewscripture.They presupposethecanonandcan thereforenot bedated earlierthanthe 3rdIslamiccentury. 9)BU R T ONpresented in hisbookCollectionoftheQuranadetailedin-vestigation of the relevant Muslim traditionsthemselves. Hetried toshowthatthese traditionsderivefrom the discussions amongthe usulscholars on the authority of the two main sources of Islamic jurispru-dence,the Qur'an and thesunnaof theProphet,andon theissueof ab-

25) J. W A N S B R O U G H ,QuranicStudies,Oxford 1977.J. BURTON, CollectionoftheQuran,Cambridge1977.26) Cf.their introductory chapters.27) W A N S B R O U G H ,QuranicStudies,47.28) Op.cit.,44.29) Op.cit.,43-52.W AN S B R O U GHrefersheretoarticlesbyBURTONpublishedbefore1977.


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12 Harald Motzkirogation (naskh) ofQur'nicverses.All the traditions oncollectionsoftheQur'anafter the death ofMuhammadare therefore fictitious. Accord-ing to B U R T O N ,neithera collection on AbuBakr'sbehalf nor an officialedition made by order ofcUthman has ever existed. What were the mo-tivesof thelegal scholarstoinventdifferent collectionsand toclaimthattheexistantQur'an was theresultof anincomplete redactionof thereve-lations made duringUthman's caliphate? B U R T O Nthought thatMuslimlegal scholars neededanincomplete Qur'anictextbecausetherewerees-tablished legal practiceswhichhad nobasein the Qur'an and hadbeendisputed forthatreason. To save them they claimedthattheywere sup-portedbyrevelations whichhad notfoundtheirwayintothe Qur'an as itwas. Suchaview presupposed that the Prophet had not left hisreve-lationsin adefinitively collectedform.Tosubstantiatethissuppositionthescholars invented reports abouttheexistenceofdifferentpre-canoni-cal collections and,inordertoexplainthattherewasactually onlyoneQur'an, they also promoted the idea of an incompleteofficial editionmade on'Uthman'sbehalf. If all thetraditionson differentQur'niccol-lections and codices are spurious, the only historically reliable fact re-maining is the Qur'an itself. B U R T O NassumedthatthisQur'anhad beenleft byMuhammad himselfin the formas weknowit today.30) B U R T O Ndid not explicitly saywhenthemany Muslimtraditionsconcerningthecollectionof the Qur'ancameintobeing.Hisidea, however,thattheyaretheresultof adiscourse betweenusul scholarsand the factthathe ad-heresto SCHA CHTEStheorieson thedevelopmentofIslamic jurisprudencepointto atimefromthebeginningof the 3rdcenturyAHonwards. Thisdatingcoincides roughly withthatofW A N S B R O U G Hand M IN G A N A .This is in a very condensedformthe history of research done by West-ernscholarson theissueof the collectionof the Qur'an.This history ischaracterizedby thegrowing tendencytodepreciatethehistorical valueofMuslimtraditionsconcerningtheissueand toreplace thembyothersourcesand bytheirowntheoriesbywhichthey try toexplainhow theQur'nictextas it is now and how theMuslim viewon itshistory cameintobeing. Thefourmain scholars who investigated the issue inthiscen-turycametocompletelydifferent conclusions with regard to the datewhenthe canonical collection took place: SCHWALLYdated it in the timeofthethirdcaliphcUthman,M I N G A N Ain thecaliphateofcAbdal-Malik atthe end of thefirst Islamic century,W A N S B R O U G Hat thebeginningof the3rdcenturyand B U R T O Nin the lifetimeof Muhammad.

30) B U R T O N , Collection,105-240and passim.


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TheCollectionof theQur'an 13In view ofthisvariance we may wonder what the differences are be-tween the theories of Western andMuslimscholars onthisissue. Are theWestern modelsofinterpretation more plausible than the Muslimre-ports? Arethey freeof the prejudicesofwhichthe Muslimscholarsare

suspected? Do the WesternstudiesdifferfromMuslimtraditionbecauseofaspecial scientific quality whichmakes them superiorto the allegedunscientificanddogmatically biased Muslimview?Toanswertheseques-tionsacritical evaluationof thedifferent studiesiscalled for.Ilimitmy-selfhere to some critical comments on each of them.In his detailed study ofMuslimtraditionsconcerning the collection ofthe Qur'n, SCHWALLYtried toseparate the historically reliable reportsfromthe unreliable ones. He compared the contents of thedifferent reportswith oneanother,with historical information on the events and personsmentionedin thetexts,andwiththe Qur'anitself,anddecidedbyvirtueofthis comparison whetherareportorsomeof itsdetails shouldbelabeledreliable,tendentious or spurious. Such an approach is not without danger.Thecrucial questioniswhetherthepointsofcomparison whicharecon-sidered historical factsarereally unquestionable. SCHWALLYstarted,forinstance, from the assumptionthattwo facts cannot be doubted: firstly,thattheknowntextof theQur'an containstherevelationsofMuhammad(whethercompletely or not isofsecondary importance inthiscontext), andsecondly,thatthistextis the result of anofficialedition made by order ofthethirdcalipheUthman.Thereasons SCHWALLYgavefor hisfixedpointswerethat they were universally recognized and uncontested.31) This is,surely,not avery secure starting-point: unanimityon ascholarly issueis atemporary phenomenon. In any case, the historicity of'Uthman'sofficialeditionhadbeen questionedbefore SCHWALLYbyCASANOVAandwouldbedebated afterwardsby M I N G A N A , W A N S B B O U G H and B U R T O N ,whiletheassumptionthattheQur'anisnothing morethanthecollection ofMuham-mad's revelations has since been contested byW A N S B B O U G Hand others. Inaddition, SCHWALLY'Smethodofcontrastingonepieceofinformationwithanotheroftenseems to be arbitrary. To give an example: In the complex oftraditionson thefirst collection madefor AbuBakr,SCHWA LLYdetectsacontradiction:on the onehand,it isreportedthatthefirst collectionwasmade for the caliph and had been bequeathed by him to his successorcUmar,indicatingthatthiscollection alreadyhad anofficialstatus.On theother hand, it issaidthatcUmarbequeathedthe suhuf of theQurantohisdaughterHafsa,whichmakes them aprivate possession. SCHWALLY

31 ) S C H W A L L Y ,'Betrachtungen',324.


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14 HaraldMotzkiargues thusthatonly one of the claims can be historically true. He choosesthelatterone becauseHafsa's suhuf play an important role in the tradi-tionsconcerningUthman'sofficialedition.Heconcludes thenthatHafsa'ssuhuf are ahistorically reliable detail; the wholehistory ofthese leavesas givenby the traditions on Abu Bakr's collectionis, however, in hisview spurious.Yet we may wonderwhyinternal contradictions induceSCHWALLYto rejectthe traditions concerningAbuBakr's collectionbutnot those reporting on'Uthman'sofficialedition although thelattercon-tain,according to him, several inconsistencies aswell.Finally, it is remark-ablethatSCHWA LLYadmittedly collectedthereportsfromawide rangeofsources,earlyandlater ones,andsometimes remarkedondifferencesbe-tweenthereportson thesame event,but did nothistorically evaluatethedifferentversions.32)Comparedwith SCHWALLY, MINGANAhas akeener senseof theprob-lemofdatingthesources. Nevertheless,hisapproach proceedsfromsev-eral axiomatic assumptions,whichcan bequestioned:1) Thehadithre-ports are historically unreliable because they were transmitted onlyorally; 2) Thedateof a report can be determined by thedateof the com-pilation inwhichitfirst emerges. Thus, reportsfound in A L -B u K H A R i'sJarni* but not in IB N SACD'S Tabaqat areyoungerthanthose already ap-pearingin thelatter;3)Thematerial containedinlater sourcesisas*aruleless reliable thanthatofearlier onesand can beignored;4)Christiansources are more reliable than Muslimsources because they are earlierandwritten. Further weak pointsinM I N G A N A 'Sarticle are:a) Hemakesheavyuse of argumenta esilentio,e.g.whenheconcludesfrom the factthatthe Qur'an is not mentioned in thefewearly Christian sources repor-tingon theMuslims,thatthere was noofficiallyrecognizedQur'anduringthefirst Islamic century;b)Acomparisonof theaccount whichtheChris-tianAL-KiNDigaveof thehistoryof the Qur'anwiththeMuslimtradi-tionsis lacking. Such a comparisonwouldhave revealedthatthe Chris-tianaccount is adistortedsummaryofseveralMuslim traditions andthatM I N G A N Asdatingof theMuslimtraditions iserroneous.W A N S B R O U G H rejectedthe traditions concerningthe collectionandeditingof theQur'anwithout investigating themfor tworeasons: 1)Theywere in contradiction with hisviewon the history of the Qu/nictext,whichresulted from a structural analysis of the Qur'an and a typologicalinvestigationof theMuslimexegetical literature,and2 )hethoughtthatthe

32) Forother valuable arguments against SCHWALLY'Sviewscf. A.J O N Es,'TheQur'an IF,in:A.F.L.B E E S T O Nandothers(eds.),ArabicLiteratureto the End ofthe Umayyad Period,Cambridge 1983,235-239.


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TheCollectionof the Qur'an 15historicalunreliabilityof theMuslimtraditionsconcerningthe firstcen-turyhadbeensufficientlyprovenby S C H A C H T .Thepresent articleis nottheright placetodealwiththesetwoissues. Some critical comments con-cerningW A N S B R O U G H ' Smethodscan befoundinseveral reviews writtenonhisQuranicStudies*3)Thereservationswhichcan bemade with regardto S C H A C H T ' SviewsconcerningthedevelopmentofIslamic jurisprudenceandtheHadithare treated in detail in several recentpublications.34)A historicaldimension iscompletely lackinginBURTON'Sstudyof thetraditions concerningthecollectionof theQur'an.Hearrangesthe differ-ent traditions to create a discoursewhichhe thinks took place betweenscholarsoveralonger periodoftime.Heregards somereportsasreactionsto others and thus to be dated later; he speaks of secondary andtertiarystagesofdevelopment;but on thewholethisdiscourse looks rather artifi-cial,althoughnotimplausible.The fewabsolutedatawhichB U R T O Ngivesinhisstudy suggestthattheentire processofdevelopment took placeinthe 3rdIslamic century. However,B U R T O Ndid not try tocheck whetherhisschemeofevolutionishistorically corroboratedby thesources.Heusespreferablyverylatesources suchasAL-SuYTi'sItqanfl 'ulurnal-Qur9anandIBNHAJAR'sPathal-bariwithout askinghimselfwhether someof thetraditionsmayalready becontained inearlier worksand can bedatedmoreaccurately, perhaps evenbeforethe 3rdcenturyAH.The preceding critical commentsonWesternstudiesdealing with theissue of the collection of the Qur'n make clearthatpremises, conclusionsandmethodologyofthese studiesarestilldisputable. Whether theiral-ternative viewson thehistoryof the Qur'an arehistorically more reliablethantheMuslimtraditionon theissuethusremainsanopen question.

III. Thetraditionsconcerningthecollectionof theQurWiinlightofrecent methodological developmentsIn the last twodecades the study ofHadithhasmade considerableprogress. This is due on the one hand to a great number of new sourceswhichhave become available and on the other hand to developments in the33) E.g.th e reviewsbyJUYNB OLL, GRAHAM and NBUWIRTH.34) Cf.H.M O T Z K I,DieAnfnge-, idem,'Der Fiqhdes-Zuhri';idem, 'TheMus-annaf ofeAbdal-Razzqal-San'anias aSourceofAuthenticAhadithof theFirstCentury A.H.5,in:Journal ofNearEasternStudies50(1991), 1-21; andidem,'Da-

tingMuslimTraditions.ASurvey',in:EHardy(ed.),Traditions ofIslam: Under-standingtheHadith,London 2002.


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16 Harald Motzkifieldofmethodology. Amongthe newsources,the pre-canonicalcollectionssuch as the Musannafs of CA B D A L - R A Z Z Q and IBN S H A Y B A orCU M A B B . S H A B B A 'STarikhal-Madlna andmany others have provedto beofprimeimportance.35)In the sphere of methodology two developmentsmustbenoticed:1)Theisn danalysisofsingletraditionshasbeen workedout tobecomeapowerfulresearchtool.Thisis in thefirst placeto thecreditofG.H.A.J uY N B O L L .3 6)2) Thematnanalysisofhadiths hasbeen improvedbyinvestigating thetextual variantsof atraditionand bycombiningthisapproach with anisn danalysis. Among the scholars working inthisdirec-tion,JUYNBCXLL,G R E G O R S C H O E L E Randmyselfcan bementioned.37)The results which these methodological approaches have produced sofarmaketheirapplication to thetraditionsconcerningthecollectionofthe Qur'an desirable. I presented my first observations onthis issuealready some yearsago at aninternational Hadithcolloquium held inAmsterdam in 1991 andsummarized them subsequently in an articlewritteninDutch.38)Since then new sources have become available to mewhichmakeit desirable toupdate myearlier ideas, although the mainconclusions remainthesame.

Dating without isnadsPrevious Western studiesof theissuehad tocope withthefactthattheearliest sourcefrom whichthe traditionsconcerningthe history of themushafw&s knownis aratherlateone,al-Jamieal-sahihofAL-(d.256/870). The long interval of roughly 200 years between the allegedeventsand therecordingof thecorresponding reportsin awritten source35) A L - R A Z Z A Q B . H A M M A M A L - S A N CA N I , al-Musannaf, 11vols.,Beirut1391/1972, 19832.IBN ABIS H A Y B A ,al-Kit bal-musannaffi l-ahadithwa-1- th r,

15vols,Hyderabad 1386-1403/1966-1983.U M A RB. S H A B B A ,Tarikh al-madinaal-munawwara,4vols.,Jiddan.d.36) Of.his'SomeIsn d-AnalyticalMethodsIllustratedon the Basis of SeveralWoman-DemeaningSayings from Hadith Literature', in: al-Qantara 10(1989),343-384.37) Cf.G.H.A. J U Y N B O L L , 'Early Islamic Society asReflected in its Use ofIsnads9,in:LeMuseon107(1994),151-194.G.S C H O B L E B ,Charakterund Authen-ticdermuslimischen berlieferung ber dasLebenMohammeds, Berlin/New York1996. H.M O T Z K I, 'QuovadisHadit-Forschung?';idem,'TheProphetand theCat'.38) H.M O T Z K I,'Detraditiesover hetontstaanvan dekorantekst:verzinsel ofwaarheid?',in: M.B U I TE L A A R / .M O T ZK I(eds.),Dekoran: ontstaan, interpreta-tieenpraktijk9 Muiderberg1993, 1229.


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TheCollectionof theQuran 17induced M IN G A N Ato reject them as historically unreliable, and thelatedate of appearance of these reports fitted marvelously with W A N S -B R O U G H 'Sand BURTON'Sassumptionsthattheyhadbeen created in thefirsthalfof the 3rdcenturyAH at theearliest. However, evenon thebasisofthesources available until 1977it can beshownthattheassumptionthatAL-BuKHARiis theearliest sourcefor thereportsinquestioniserroneous,and the sourceswhichbecame available since then corroboratethis.Let usfirst examinethesituationof theearlyMuslimsourcesinwhichacollection madeon AbuBakr'sbehalfismentioned. Istartwith A L-B U K H R I ,themost frequently cited source.If inAL-BuKHARFsJamionereport on AbuBakr'scollection were to befound,the conclusionthatal-Bukharihimself might have invented the story or may have taken itfrom someoneelsewho had fabricateditwouldbedifficult todisprove.Wefind, however,not one,but four different accountsin hisJamie*g) afactalready noticedbyN L D B K BinI860.40)Theimpactofthispeculiar-ity on the datingof the reportshas so farbeen overlooked.A carefulanalysisof themainsof the fourversions (three detailedand oneshort-enedone) showsthatthedifferencesbetween them are many and varied.Howcan we explainthem?Is it plausible to assumethatAi>BuKHARipurposelycreated the different versions?Forwhat reason? Could it bethathe received a single versionfrom one person, be it the fabricator ornot, but later could not remember exactly what he had heard and there-foreretold it in three different ways?Against thelatterassumption wenotethatAL-BuKHARiascribesthefourversionstodifferentinformantsandthathe makes explicit note of cases inwhichhe is not sure what theprecisewordingof hisinformanthadbeenandgivesanalternative. Thisseemsto reflect acarefultransmission of thetextshe had received. Thusit seems more plausible to concludefrom the different versions thatA L - B U K H A R Ireceived themfrom different personswho may betermedhis teachers or informants and would most likely have belonged to thepreceding generation. Becausetheir reports are only slightly differentversionsof thesame account,wemust supposeacommonsource.If weleavetheisndsasidefor themoment,thiscommon source couldbe one ofAL-BuKHARi'steachers or another contemporaryfromwhom AL-Bu-K H A R I ' S informants heardthe tradition. Wewill see, however,that thecommonsourceismuch earlier.Our conclusionthat different versions circulated amongthe gene-rationbefore A L - B U K H A R I iscorroboratedbyearliersources.Twover-

39) A L - B U K H A R I , al-Jami

eal-sahlh,Beirut1992, 66:3;65:9,20; 93:37.40) TH. N L D E K E ,GeschichtedesQorns,Gttingen1860, 190.


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18 HaraldMotzkisionsarefoundin IB N H A N B A L ' S(d.241/855)Musnad, onedetailed andtwoshorterones.41)The detailed version is very similar to thosefoundinA L - but it is notidentical withany ofthem.Moreover, IBNH A N -BAL'Stextisshorter thanthatof theformer;hestops with Zaydb. Th -bit'sresistanceto acollection oftheQur' n anddoesnotreportthatacol-lectionwaseventually made. This makesitprobablethatIBNH A N B A L 'Sversionisindependentfrom A L -B U K H A R I 'Straditions andprecludesthatthelatterhas hisversionfromtheformer.However,IBNH A N B A L 'Stradi-tionsdo nottakeus more than one generation earlierthanAL-BuKHARi's.WemayassumethatIBNH A N B A Lreceivedthe tradition from histeach-ers,thusfromthe preceding generation, but without falling back on theisnadwe cannot be sure of it. That thetraditionis indeedmuchearlier isprovedbytheMusnad of A L - T A Y A L is i(d.204/820).42)Histextissimilarto IBNH A N B A L 'Slong versioninthatitbreaksoffafter Zayd'srefusal tocollecttheQur'anbut it is notidenticalto it nor to therelevantpartofAL-BuKHABi'sversions. This favors the assumptionthat A L- TA Y A Li s i ' straditionisindependentand was not themodelwhich IBNH A N B A L andA L - copied,aconclusion corroboratedby the isn dswhich con-taindifferentinformantsfor thetextsinquestion( A L-TA Y A LI SIhasIbra-him b. Sacd,whileIBN H A N B A L and A L - B U K H A R I ' S short version haveY nus).At anyrate,thefactthatthetraditionconcerningthecollectionof the Qur'an onAbu Bakr's behalfis found in AL-TAYALISI 'S Musnadbringsthedatewhenthetradition must have beeninexistence backtothe end of the 2nd century AH.Whatformdid thetradition haveatthattime?Ihave suggestedthattheycontainedall thedetailswhicharefoundinAL-BuKHABi'slong ver-sionsandthatAL-TAYALISI 'SandIBNH A N B A L 'Sversions were truncatedones. At the colloquium in Amsterdam, E Crone objected, opiningthatthe shorter versionwhichignoresthe realizationofAbuBakr's projectcouldbe theoriginalonewhichwasimproved upon later.In1991thisob-jection could not be dismissed on the basis of themainhistory. However,since then three sources havebecomeavailableto mewhich provethatCrone's assumption iswrong.The first is the Kitab fadail al-Qur*anwritten by A B UTJ AYDB.A L -S A L L M (d.224/83S)43)and asecondone

41) IBNH A N B A L ,Musnad,Beirut 1993, vol.1, 10(no. 58),13(no. 77), vol.5,188-189(no. 21700).42) AL-TAYALISI ,Musnad,Hyderabad 1321,3.43) ABU'U BAY D A L - Q A S I M B. S A L L A M ,Fadail al-Quran,Beirut 1411/1991,152-156.


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TheCollectionof theQur'an 19the Tafsir of AL-RAZZAQ(d.211/827).44)Bothcompilationscontainversions which are ascomplete asthose ofA L-BUKHARIwithout beingidentical withone ofthem.Athirdimportant newsourceis thefirstpartofal-Jamie writtenbyALLAHB .WAHB( d.197/812)andpublishedin1992.45)Fragmentsoftraditionsarefoundin itwhich provethatthe endof th e report which is lacking in AL-TAYALisi's Musnad w as alreadyk n o w nin thelastquarterof the 2ndIslamiccentury.46)Thisis thedatethatcan atpresent beassignedto thetraditionconcerningAbuBakr'scollectionof the Qur'an by looking for the earliest sources in which it ap-pears and byignoringth eisn dsof the different versions.Until recentlythedatingof thetraditionconcerning'Uthman's offi-cialedition of the Qur'anby the same method did not produce a com-parable result. Thetext of thesingle complete version contained in A L-BUKHARI'S Jami*47 ) could not be found inearlier sources. Thepossibleconclusionthatthis tradition mustbelaterthanthaton Abu Bakr'scol-lection can be refuted, however,on theground of tw ofragments of thetradition foundalsoinAL-BuKHA Bi 'sJami*whichareobviously indepen-dent of thecomplete version,andseveral reports contained in IB N HAN-BAL'SMusnad and IB N S A C D S Tabaq t,which presuppose theexistence ofatradition on 'Uthman'sofficialeditionatleastin thegeneration beforeA L - B u KH A R i .4 8) The sources mentioned above which recently becameavailableto meprovenowthatthis traditionwasknownnotonlytwogen-erations beforeAL-BuKH ARi(a versionthatis onlyslightlydifferent is

44) AL-RAZZAQA L- $A NCA NI ,Tafsir al-Quranal-aziz,vol. 1,Beirut1411/1991,57-58.Theeditiondoesnotreproducethetextofthemanuscript(Cairo,Daral-Kutub,no. 242to/sir), ofwhich the folios inquestionarealmost unreadable,whollycorrectly,however.TheeditiongivesthetextofMusab.Ismail(cf.A L-Bu- , Jamie, 66:3), whereas the manuscripthas the versionofMuhammad b.eUbayd Allah[AbuTh bit] (cf.op.cit.:93:37). Thecorrectversionisreproducedinthe neweditionbyMahmud Muhammad eAbduh(Beirut1999),vol. 1,249. In theeditionbyMustafaMuslim Muhammad,publishedinal-Riyad1989, whichalsousedthismanuscript,thetextof thefirsttraditionislacking.45) A LLA HB.WA H B,al-J mie.DieKoranwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 1992,13-18.46) ThemanuscriptonwhichtheeditionofAL-TAYA LisFsMusnad isbasedbe-longsobviouslyto a bad transmissionof hiscompilation;IBN ABI D W Dtrans-mitsacompleteversionfromal-TayalisiinhisKit bal-Masahif, Leiden1937, 6-7;seealsoIBNH A J A B ,Fathal-bari,Beirut1989, vol.9, 17.47) AL - ,Jamie, 66:3.48) AL - ,Jumie,66:2; 61:3. IBNH A N B A L,Musnad ,vol.1,nos.399,499.IBN SACD,Kitabal-Tabaqat al-kablr,vol. II/2, Leiden1905-17, 105.


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20 HaraldMotzkicontained in A B U 'UBAYD'SFadail) but alsoin the last quarter of the2ndcentury (accordingtobothI B N S H A B B A ' Sversion,whichgoes backtoal-Tayalisi49) but is not containedin the editionof hisMusnad, and thefragmentsfoundin IBNW AH B 'S Jamic).

Thus,ourinvestigationhasshownso farthatbycarefullystudyingthevariantsof thetraditionsinquestion,thelattercan bedated earlier thanusually supposed evenon thebasisof thelimited sourceswhichWesternstudies writtenup to 1977had attheir disposal. Additionally,the newsources which havebecomeavailable sincenotonly corroboratethiscon-clusionbutalso allowus to fix adateantequernbyonly taking into con-sideration the datewhen the compilersof the sourcesin question haddied: Thetraditionson the history of themushaf musthave been in circu-lationbeforethe end of the 2nd century AH at thelatest.This provisional result, which can be further improvedby isnadanalysis,as weshall soon see, revealsthe weaknessesofsomeofM I N G A -NA'Sargumentsand of the theoriesput forward by W A N S B B O U G H andB U R T O Nconcerning these traditions. M I N G A N A ' Sclaimthattheaccountofthe Christian A L - K i N D iisearlierandtherefore preferabletoAL-Bu-KHARI'Siserroneous. EvenifAL-KiNDi'sletteractually originatesfrom thetimeof thecaliphal-Ma'mun,50)itsaccountof thehistoryof theQur'anisclearlyadistortedsummaryof thereportswhichweknowfromcontem-poraryorearlierMuslimsources.Who isresponsiblefor thedistortionAL-KiNDior hisMusliminformants- cannotbeascertained. Accordingto W A N S B R O U G Hand B U R T O N ,the traditionson the collectionand offi-cialedition of the Qur'an cannot have been created earlier than the 3rd Is-lamic century because they presuppose either the canonization of thetextor thegeneral establishmentof theusultheorywhichW A N S B R O U G Hand B U R T O N cannot imaginetohavecomeaboutbefore the end of the2nd century AH. If these traditions circulatedbeforethatdate, we mustassumeeitherthatthe canonization and establishment of theusltheoryoccurredearlier thanthey supposed orthatthere is no connection be-tweenthetraditionsinquestionand thesupposedtwodevelopments.In

49) IB N S H A B B A ,Tarlkh,vol. 4 , 992.50) AuthorshipanddatingofA L - K iN D i 'sletterhave beenamatterofcontro-versyfor along time. Althoughit ispresentedaswrittenby aChristian seniorof-ficialat thecourtofal-Ma'mun,whichinducedW.M U IRincombination withsomehistorical events mentioned in the text to date it to 215/830,somedetails of itscontent,however,wereusedby L.Massignonand EKraustodateit toroughlyacentury later.Cf. G.T R O U P E A U ,Al-Kindi,eAbdal-Masih',in: The Encyclopaediaof Islam,2nded., vol.5,120-121.


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TheC ollectionof the Qur'an 21both cases crucialpartsoftheirargument losetheirplausibility. One waytoescapethisconclusion wouldbe toclaimthatthesourcesinwhichthetraditions first appearare notreally compilationsbytheir putative au-thorsbut by their pupils or bylatergenerations. W A N S B B O U G Hhas usedthisargument in order to reconcile his theories on the development ofMuslimexegesis with available sources.Thelate N O B M A N C A L D E B re-centlyfollowedhim indating several legalandhadithcompilationsmuchlater than hitherto supposed.51) However, these attemptsto revise thedateof all or most sources ascribed toMuslimauthors of the 2nd and3rdIslamic centuriesareunconvincing,as I andothers have shownin de-tailelsewhere.52)

Datingon thebasisof isnads andmainsThe methodtodeterminethedateoftraditionsby the approximatedateof the written sourcesinwhichthey first appear results in latedates- in ourcasethe lastquarterof the 2ndcenturyAH.This methodconsciouslysidestepsthefactthatthetextsmayhaveahistory beforetheyfound their way into the sources which have been preserved.Thatthey actuallyhad ahistoryhasalready become obviousfromourinvesti-gationof thedifferentmainsfoundin theearly sources.Thequestionis,

however,whether therearemethodstotracetheirhistory further back.Usuallyhadithsprovide indicationsoftheirhistoryin theformof thechainsoftransmitters.SinceG O L D Z IH E B ,most Western scholarsdo nottrustisndsandusually ignore them altogether. Thiswas thecasein allthe studies which dealt with the issueof the collectionof the Qur'an.S C H A C H T ,however, arguedthatinspiteoftheirpartiallyfictitious char-acter,isndscould be used to discover the fabricator of a giventraditionbycomparing all itsdifferent isndsand looking fortheircommon link.Hismethodological suggestions have been pickedup andfurther devel-opedin thelasttwenty-five years sothatwe can speak of a methodologyof isnd analysis. Even if someof its premises are stilldisputed, themethod deservestheattentionofhistorians concerned with early Islam.The firststeptoestablishacommon link consistsincompilingtheis-ndsof allversionsof the sametraditionwhichare found in different

51) N.CALDER,StudiesinEarlyMuslimJurisprudence,Oxford1993.52) E.g.H. M O T Z K I , 'TheProphet and the Cat'.M. M U R A N Y I,'Die frheRechtsliteratur zwischenQuellenanalyseundFiktion',in:IslamicLaw andSo-ciety4(1997),224-241.


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22 HaraldMotzkisourcesintoabundle. Ideallyallavailable sources, evenlateones, shouldbeincluded.For ourpurposes, however,itwillbesufficient toconfine thesampleof the sourcestothoseof the 2nd and 3rdcenturiesAH. I shallanalyzethecollectionof theQur'anon AbuBakr'sbehalf first,andthenthetraditionconcerningitsofficialedition undercUthman.53)Thetraditionconcerningthecollection madebyorderof thefirstca-liph isfoundin so many sources and with so manyisn dsthatit is advis-able for the sake ofclarityto*discussthem in two steps:firstly,theien dsofthecollections which were compiledup to256/870 (thedateofAL-Bu-K HAR I ' Sdeath), and secondly, thoseof the compilations whose authorsliveduntil316/929 (the dateofdeathof thelastcompiler considered,I B NABID W D). The discussion is reproduced in the diagrams I and II.In the first period the tradition is contained in six sources: A L-B U K H A B I ' S Jamie, IBN H A N B A L ' SMusnad, A B U 'UBAYD'SFadail, A L -R A Z Z A Q' S Tafslr, AL-TAYALISI 'SMusnad, and M SA B. 'UQBA'S Ma-ghazi.5*)WhereasA L -T A Y A L i siandA L - R A Z Z A Qgive onlyoneversionwithits isn d,ABUTJBAY Dmentionsinaddition twoother very similarversionsofwhichhegives onlytheisn d,IBNH A N B A Lproducestwovari-ants,alongerand ashort one,and A L - givesfourversionsandthreeadditional isn dswithoutmain.The sixsources together produce15 different transmission lines whichallintersectin asingletransmitter:IbnShih bal-Zuhri(d.124/742).Thisis thecommonlink. Beneathit, asinglestrandreachesvia Ibn al-Sabbaq to the allegednarratorof thetraditionZaydb. Th bit. Some transmission lines betweenthecompilersofthesourcesand thecommon linkare 'singlestrands',others cross withothersandform 'partialcommonlinks'(pels),terms introducedbyJ U Y N -BOL Linisn danalysis. On the level abovethe commonlink,two of thefivetransmittersfromZuhri aresuch pels:Ibrahimb.Sacd55)byvirtueof

53) Inthisarticle,Iconfinethediscussionto thedominant, i.e., most wide-spread and accepted, traditionson the issues in question. The other accountswhichdifferinstructureanddetailmustbestudiedin thesame manner.54) Of.thenotes41-45.MusiB.'UQB A 'S(d.141/758)Kitabal-Maghazl isonlyknownfromfragments citedinlatersources(ausefulcollectionofthese fragmentshasbeen publishedby M U H A M M A D B A Q S H I S HA B U M A L IK , al-Maghazl li-Musa6.'Uqba,Agadir 1994).M ITSA'Straditionon AbuBakr'scollectionaspreservedinIBNHAJAB,Fath,vol.9, 19 isonlyasummary.IomitIBNWA H B'SJamiebecausehisfragmentshaveeithernoisn dor onewhichbelongtoother fragmentsof acom-bined account.55) Ibrahimb.Sa'db.Ibrahimal-Zuhrial-Madani,d. 183/799 or 184/800;A L-D H A H A B I ,Tadhkirat al-huffaz, vol.1,Hyderabad 1955, 252.


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The Collectionof the Q ur'an 23

i c eS0

2S

I

*e


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The Collectionof theQur' n 25

)sS?

sgS

iS*


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26 HaraldMotzkisixpersonswhoappear astransmittersfrom him ( A L-TA Y A LI SI , eA bdal-Rahmnb.Mahdi,AbuKmil,Ya'qb b.Ibrahim,Muhammadb.cUbaydAllah andMsb.Isma'il),and Ynus56) by virtue of two(al-Laythand'Uthmanb.cUmar).Amongtheninetransmittersof thesecond genera-tionabove the common link,fourpels are found(Abul-Yamn,al-Layth,cUthmanb.cUmarandMuhammadb.UbaydAllah).If welookat the collectionsthatwere compiled during the 60yearsfollowingA L - B u K H A R i,the picture is similar. Here we havefivesources inwhichthe traditionisfound:IB N D WD ' SKitabal-Mashif, AL-TA-BABI 'SJamie, A B U YA'LA'SMusnad, A L - N A S A T sal-Sunan al-kubra andA L-TIBM IDH I 'S al-Jami*al-sahih,61)which produce14transmission lines.Again,all ofthem come together inIbnShihb al-Zuhriandthen(withtwoexceptions)58)form asinglestrandwithIbn al-SabbaqandZaydb.Thbit.Two of thefourtransmitterson thelevel abovethecommon linkarepels:Ibrahimb.Sacdbyvirtueof sixtransmitters,andYnusbyvir-tue oftwo.On thesecond level abovethecommon linktherearefourpelsamong the ten transmitters (al-Darawardi, Abdal-Rahman b.Mahdi,Yaequbb.IbrahimandcUthmanb.cUmar).If wecombinethe twobundlesofdiagramsI and II intoasingleone(whichIhavenotreproducedin aseparatediagram becauseitwouldbeovercrowded),it shows29transmission lines whichallintersect in thenameof Ibn Shihb al-Zuhii. This cannot be apure coincidence.Thequestion is,however,howthisphenomenoncan beexplained. There aretwo possibilities: Firstly, the isndbundlecanreflectthereal processoftransmission. Thatwould meanthat thetraditionin question doesin-deedgobackto Ibn Shihb al-Zuhri,whomustbe the 'source5,i.e., theone whospreadthetradition.Secondly,thecommon link couldbe the re-sultofsystematic forgery.Some Western scholars havepositeda theoryaccording to which someone of the second generation following Ibn Shi-hb (e.g.A L -TA Y A L IS I )could have brought the traditionwith hisisndinto circulation first. Hispeers took it overfromhim but theyallcon-

56) Yunusb.Yazid al-Ayli,d.152/769or159/776;A l -D H A H A B i ,Tadhkira,vol.1, 162.IBNH I B B A N ,Kitab al-Thiqat,vol. 7,Hyderabad1981, 648-49.57) IBN D A W D ,M as h i f , 6-8,20,23.A L -T A B A R I,Jamical-bayaneantawllyal-Qur'n,vol. 1, Cairo1954,59-62.A B UYA*L.A,Musnad, Damascus andBeirut1984, vol.1, no.63-65,71, 91.A L - N A S A ' I,al-Sunanal-kubra,Beirut 1991, vol.5,7-8, 9, 78.A L -T iB M iD H i,al-Jamie al-sahlh,vol.5,Cairo 19752,48:10.58) Oneexception isMsB.TjQB A 'straditionwhich only mentionsIbn Shi-hb asinformantbut nofurtherisnad\thesecondone is thetraditionofeUmarab.GhaziyyawhichIwill deal with below (see note63).


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TheCollectionof theQur'an 27cealedthathe was their source. Some of them skipped him in theirisndsbyreferring directlyto hisalleged informant (e.g.Ibrahimb.Sa'd), othersreplaced his informantby another name (e.g.Yunus).59)Later gener-ations(e.g. A BD A L - R A Z Z Q , IB N H A N B A L , A L - B U K H A R I or AL-TABARI)couldhave gone further by inventing completely new transmission lineswhichimitated theexisting onesandalsointersectedin thenameofIbnShihb.60)Inthisway IbnShihb could have becomeacommonlink with-outhaving anythingto dowiththetraditionfabricatedtwogenerationslater.The explanation of the common link phenomenon as a result offorgeryhasseveral shortcomings. Firstly, thesetypesofforgeryareonlyimagined. Admittedly there are some cases which prove that suchforgeriessometimesoccurred,butthereare noindications thatthiswasthe general manner in whichisndsdeveloped systematically. Secondly,the assumption of forgery seems very manufactured in our particularcase, i.e.,in the isndbundle described above, becauseitposits thatagreat number oftransmittersand collectors oftraditionsmust have usedexactly the same procedure of forgery, although a number ofothermethods were theoretically possible. Thirdly,andmostimportant,acom-parativestudyof thematnsof all thetransmissionlines61)revealsacloseconnection between main and isnd. The matns can be classified ingroupsofsimilar texts. Each groupdiffers from otherswith regard tosomepeculiarities. This phenomenonis not confinedto the complexoftraditions described above, but can be observed in manyhadlths.62)Asimilar phenomenon iswellknownfrommanuscript traditionswhere themanuscriptscanoftenbeclassifiedasbelongingtodifferentstemmas. Inthecaseof ourtradition,it isstrikingthatthedifferent groups of matns

9) Thesepossible kindsof forgery have been brought forward by M. COOKagainst the use of the common link fordatingpurposes.Cf. hisEarly MuslimDogma,Cambridge 1981,109-111.60) G.H. A.J U Y N B O L Lusedtheseassumptions to try toexplainthe occurrenceofsinglestrandsin theisndbundle.Cf. his'NafietheMawlof Ibn 'Urnar, and hisPositioninMuslimHadlthLiterature',in:Der Islam70(1993),207-244.61) Thenumberofmatnsis 20; the remainingtransmissionlines are eithercon-nectedwiththe matnofanotherisnd ornot combined withamainat all, butsometimes with remarksonsimilaritiesordifferenceswithotherversions.Forlackofspace,it was notpossible topresentadetailedanalysis of thematnvariants inthisarticle;Ishalldealwiththemin aseparatepublication.62) Cf.M O T Z K I, 'Quo vadis Hadit-Forschung?'; idem, 'The Prophet and theCat'\andidem, 'The Murder3.


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28 HaraldMotzkicoincide with the different groups ofisnds.Formulated alternatively,thereisB>matngroupofIbrahimb.Sacd, anotheroneofYunus,etc. whichdiffer characteristically fromoneanother.63)The close connection betweenmatnsandisndsfavorsthe assumptionthat the common linkis the result of a real transmission process.Theassumption of forgery would meanthatthe forgers not only fabricatednewisndsbutalso accordingly changedthe textsvery systematically.Admittedly,thiscouldbeimagined, too,but itseemsratherunlikelythatthisoccurredon alarge scale.64) Thus,itseems more reasonabletointer-pretthe common link as the common source for all the different versionswhicharefoundin oursources. This leavesuswithIbnShihb al-Zuhriasthe one who hascirculated ourtraditionconcerningthecollectionof theQur'anon AbuBakr'sbehalf. Since al-Zuhri diedin124/742we cancon-clude that this tradition must have already been known in the firstquarterof thesecond centuryAH.Thetraditionconcerning the officialedition of the Qur'nmade byorderof the thirdcaliph cUthmancan bedatedbymeansof the samemethod. SinceIhave already describedtheisnd-cum-matnanalysis65)insomedetail,I can bemore concise now. Thistraditionisless representedin the early sourcesthanthat concerningAbuBakr'scollection.As faras I know,complete versionsareonlyfound insources whoseputative

63) Thematn-cum-isnadanalysis revealsthattheversions transmitted fromIbrahimb.Saed,Yurnis,Shu'ayb[b.AbiHamza al-Himsi, d.162/779 or163/780]andIbrahimb. Ismacil [b.Mujammieb.Yazidal-Madani] are allsimilarinstruc-ture.Theversionsgoingbackto'TJmarab.Ghaziyya [al-Mazini,d. 140/7578],onthecontrary,differgreatlyfromtheotherversions,notonlyin themainbutalsointhe isnadinwhichhegivesKhrija, the son ofZaydb.Thbit,asal-Zuhri'sinfor-mant instead of Ibn al-Sabbaq.Acloseexaminationof 'Umara's versionshowsthatit is a newcompositionmadeon thebasisofal-Zuhri'saccountbutdeviatingfromhim onseveral counts.Thedeviationin the isnaUisadoptedfrom twoothertraditionsof al-Zuhriwhichare concerned withthecollectionof theQur'an.That'Umara'saccountis not areliableal-Zuhritraditionhasalready been noticedbyal-Khatib and,followinghim,IbnHajar (cf. A L- TA BA R I,Jamie,vol.1, 61,notebytheeditor).64) Ihave giventhereasonwhy itseemsunlikelyinsomedetailin 'TheProphetand theCat9,note44.65) The difference betweenisnd-cum-matn and matn-cum-isnd analysisisthattheformerisessentiallyaniswlanalysiscontrolledby thematnswhereasthe latteris in the first placeamaift,-analysis combinedwiththe resultsof theisnad-SbUBlysis.


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TheCollection of the Qur'an 29authors died in the 3rd century AH and later. Iconfinemyself again totheauthorslivingbefore316/929.A B U 'UBAYD'SFadWilhasthree trans-missionlines, IB N SH A BBA ' STarlkh al-Madlna five,the Jami*ofAL-Bu-K H A R Ithree,A L -TIR M ID H I 'SJmieandAL-NAslTsal-Sunanal-kubraeachcontain only one,A B U Y A LA'sMusnad two,A L-TABA BI 'SJami threeandIB NABID W D 'SMashif four.^) Alltogether, these eight sources con-tain22transmission linesofwhich16 areprovided withamain(see dia-gramIII).Allisnds intersectin thenameIbnShihbal-Zuhri. On thelevelabovehim wefindfourtransmitters. Threeofthemarepartial com-mon links:Ibrahim b. Sacd by virtue ofnine transmitters from him,Yunusbyvirtueofthree (perhapsfour)andeUmara b.Ghaziyyabyvir-tue oftwo.Thestatusof IbnShihbascommonlinkin theisndbundleissolidlyestablishedand isalso corroboratedby acomparisonof the differ-entmainswhichcan beclassifiedingroupswhichaccord withtheisndfiliations.67)We canconcludethatthe tradition concerningthe officialeditionof the Qur'angoesbackto IbnShihbal-Zuhri.Theresultof the isnd-cum-matnanalysisis the following:The twotraditionswhichtellthehistoryof themushaf and arewidelyadoptedinMuslimscholarshipwereboth brought into circulationby IbnShihbandcan bedatedto thefirstquarterof the 2ndcenturyAH. Thedateofal-Zuhri'sdeathisthenaterminus post quem.^)Isthisthelastwordon theissueofdating?Theanswertothis ques-tion dependson theinterpretationwhichisgivento thecommonlinkinisnd bundles. Thisis amuch-debated issue. S C H A C H T , J U Y N B O L L andothersclaimthatthecommonlinkis thefabricatorororiginatorof the

6(5) ABUT JB A Y D ,Fadail,153-156(in thetraditionon p. 156, no. 10, the editionwhichisbasedon themanuscript preserved inDamascus, givesthenameMaemarinstead of Yunus as informant ofal-Layth. Thisis probably erroneous, becausethe twomanuscriptsof theFadailpreserved inTbingenandBerlin have Yunusas hasAL-BuKHABi'stransmission from al-Layth).IBNS H A B B A , Tarlkh,vol.4,991-993,1002.AL- ,Jamie,61:3; 66:2; 66:3.AL-TiBMiDHi,Jamie,vol.5,48:10. A L - N A S A I, al-Sunan al-kubra,vol.5, 6;vol.6,430. A B U YACLA,Musnad,no. 63, 91, A L- ,Jamie,vol.1,59-62.IBN ABID W D ,Mashif, 18-21.67) cUmarab.Ghaziyya's account shows again many differencesin the matnanddeviatesfromtheother versions alsoin theisnd(seenote63).68) Thatbothtraditionsgobackto al-Zuhri is notonly suggested by the factthatboth have morethanonepartialcommonlink,butalsoby thefactthatbothtraditions aretransmitted by thesame pupils ofal-Zuhri,notonlyby the mostinfluential Ibrahim b.Sacd,but also byYunus,Shucayb andeventhe unreliablecUmarab.Ghaziyya.


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30 HaraldMotzkitraditioninquestion.69)It wouldbemoreaccuratetoreformulatethisfactualstatementas amethodological principle: Thereis no way toascer-tainthatthesinglestrandof theisndwhich reaches backfromthecom-monlinktoearlier transmittersorauthorities ishistorically reliable.Ifweaccept thisas agiven,thenourpossibilitiesofdatingare exhausted.However, these conclusionsdo not seem compelling to me. As I haveargued elsewhere, the common linkswhichbelong to the generation ofal-Zuhri and the following generation should not necessarily becon-sideredasoriginatorsof thetraditionsbut as thefirst systematic collec-torsoftraditionswhotransmittedthemtoregular classesofstudentsoutofwhichaninstitutionalized systemoflearningdeveloped.70)Therefore,weshouldaskwherethe information comesfrom whichisgivenin thetraditionspreadby thecommon link.Thereis noreasontorejectaprioritheclaimof thecommon linkthathereceivedthetraditionor theinformationonwhichit isbasedfrom theperson he names. In order to rejectthisclaim,we must have concrete in-dicationsthatit is in alllikelihoodnottrue,e.g.,thatthelifetimesof thecommonlinkand hisalleged informantare notcompatible with suchaclaim, etc. We may also wonder whether themainof thetraditionin ques-tionand of comparabletraditionscontainhintsto possible motives forfabrication. This articleis not theplacetoengagein adiscussionof thedetailsof thetraditionswhichal-Zuhrispread concerningthe collectionandeditionof the Qur'an and topondertheirplausibility,letalonetheirhistorical reliability. There are, however, arguments which speak againsttheassumptionthatal-Zuhriinvented themoutright.Additionally,thereseemto be no grounds for assumingthathe cannot have received the in-formation on thefirst collectionfrom thelittle-known SuccessorcTJbaydb.al-Sabbaq(dateofdeathunknown)andthatwhathereportson the of-ficialedition of theQur'ancomesfrom thewell-known Companion Anasb.Malik(d.between 91/709and93/711). This conclusioniscorroboratedby other traditionsofal-Zuhri concerningthe collectionof the Qur'nwhichareadditionsorvarianttraditionsto hismain versionsand aresaidtoderivefromother informantsofhim, suchasKhrijab.Zayd,cUbaydAllahb. AbdAllahb.cUtbaandSlimb.cAbdAllahb.cUmar.Thus, some-

69) J. S C H A C H T ,The Origins ofMuhammadan Jurisprudence, Oxford 1950,171-172.JU YNB OL L ,'SomeIsnd-AnalyticalMethods',359, 369.70) Cf. M O T ZK I , 'Quo vadisHadlth-Forschung?', 45. Theremay have beenoccasionalprecedents alreadyin thegenerationbeforeal-Zuhriwhichaccountforafewcommonlinksamongtheearlytabicun.Foradditional arguments concerningthecommonlink see,H.M O T ZK I , 'DatingMuslimTraditions' chap.3.


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TheCollectionof theQuran 31thing can be said for the ideathatal-Zuhri's accounts are based on in-formation receivedfrom the elder generation. If wetakeAnas'sdateofdeath as achronologicalclue,thisinformation mustgobackto thelastdecadesof the 1stcenturyAH.Thisstatementshouldnot beunderstoodtomeanthatIclaimthatal-Zuhri'saccountsareliterally taken overfromhis informantsandthatall thedetailsof the twoaccounts necessarilyde-rivefromthem; this doesnotseem very probableinviewof themainlyoral character of the transmission in al-Zuhri's time.71)However,it doesseemsafeto concludethatreports on a collection of the Qur'anon AbuBakr's behalfand on anofficialedition madebyorderofcUthmanwereal-readyincirculation towardsthe end of the 1stIslamic centuryandthatal-Zuhripossibly received someofthemfromthepersonsheindicatedinhisisnds.

This datingdiffersfundamentallyfromthedatewhichW A N S B R O U G HandB U R T O Nassignedtothese traditions. They claimedthatthese tradi-tions could not have been reported beforethe beginning of the 3rd cen-tury AH, because they presuppose on the one hand the canonization ofthe Qur'an,which, accordingtoWansbrough,cannot havetakenplacebe-forethe end of the 2nd century, and on the other hand the evolution of theusultheory,which,accordingtoBurton, cannotbedatedbeforethe endof the 2ndcentury either. Their theories concerningtheoriginsof thetraditionsinquestionand thedateoforigin whichtheyassignto themcan, therefore, be dismissed.SCHWA LLYdidnot venture todatethe ma-terial,but heclaimsthatthetraditionconcerningAbuBakr's collectionwasfabricated laterthanthatregardingtheofficialedition undercUth-mn, and he seems to assumethatthe account on Abu Bakr's collectionoriginatedin the Abbasidera. These assumptionsareequally untenable.Conclusion:We are notabletoprovethattheaccountson the historyoftheQur'angobacktoeyewitnessesof theevents whicharealleged tohave occurred.Wecannotbesurethat things really happenedas is re-portedin thetraditions. However, Muslim accountsaremuch earlierandthus much nearerto thetimeof thealleged eventsthanhitherto assumedinWestern scholarship. Admittedly, these accounts contain some detailswhichseemto beimplausibleor, to put itmore cautiously, await expla-nation, but the Western viewswhichclaim to replace them by more plau-sible and historically more reliable accounts are obviously farfromwhatthey make themselvesout to be.71) For the character of the transmission in his time seeM O T Z K I,'DerFiqh des-Zuhri'.


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