Indeed, ˹the hills of˺ Ṣafa and Marwah¹ are among the symbols of Allah. So whoever performs the pilgrimage or minor pilgrimage,² let them walk between ˹the two hills˺. And whoever does good willingly, Allah is truly Appreciative, All-Knowing.

Quran 2:158

The origin of this tradition traces back to the story of Hajira the concubine of Abraham. The story goes like this that when Abraham banished his concubine Hajira and her son Ishmael from his house, Ishmael felt thirsty and Hajira being desperate to quench the thirst of her lad, ran desperately between the two hills Safa and Marwa. This episode is narrated in Sahi Al Bukhari (1643 Book 25, Hadith 125) in detail. A shorter version is in Bukhari 4496 book 65 Hadith 23. 

Narrated `Asim bin Sulaiman:

I asked Anas bin Malik about Safa and Marwa. Anas replied, “We used to consider (i.e. going around) them a custom of the Pre-islamic period of Ignorance, so when Islam came, we gave up going around them. Then Allah revealed” “Verily, Safa and Marwa (i.e. two mountains at Mecca) are among the Symbols of Allah. So it is not harmful of those who perform the Hajj of the House (of Allah) or perform the Umra to ambulate (Tawaf) between them.” (2.158)

Sahih al-Bukhari 4496

Beersheba or the Mecca of Kaaba

This story, of Abraham, banishing Hajira (Hagar) his maiden and her son Ishmael, appears in the Bible also. However, the mythical running of Hajira between the two hills, and Abraham’s establishing of Kaaba (stone) does not appear in the bible. The biblical description appears in the book of Genesis 21:8-21.

The Bible, however, does not mention the two acrobatics of Hajira(Hagar) at the two hills. For our present discussion, it is noteworthy that as per the bible, Hagar (Hajira) left Abraham’s home and arrived at Beersheba (Genesis 21: 14), but according to Islam, she left Abraham’s abode to reach Mecca (Surah 14:35-37, Tafsir Ibn Kathir).

These two places are quite a distance from each other and there is less chance of combining the two. Mecca is 1250 Km to 1400 Km from Beersheba and Paran (the place where Ishmael grew up as a lad as per the bible).

The question is – “which of the story truly describes and which one is fabricated?” Was Ishmael brought up in Mecca and married a woman from Bani Jurhum (Surah 14:35-37, Tafsir Ibn Kathir) or is the biblical description of Ishmael that he married an Egyptian woman and dwelt at Paran about 1200 Km from Mecca?

Did this incident happen in the wilderness at Beersheba as the bible says or at Mecca as Islam teaches? There is no disagreement whether this incident took place or not, but the point of difference is geography because even though Paran or Beersheba may not be important for Christians or Jews, Mecca is certainly very important to Muslims. There is no reason for a biblical writer to fabricate and lie and they might have erred, but the Muslims if they are in error, then if they cannot escape that it is an accidental mistake but have no other escape than to accept that it is an intentional fabrication. So, how do we prove which story is true?

Archaeological Evidences

Firstly, Islam cannot supply historical or archaeological records (prior to Islam) for people to verify its claim that Ishmael indeed lived at Mecca. However, archaeology proves that Paran and Beersheba are 1200 Km away from what Muslims consider Mecca as in the 21st century. The Mecca according to Archaeology is what the bible describes as Paran. Here is the link to Dan Gibson’s archaeological discoveries.

Click here to read the transcript of this video. This proves that if Mecca is near biblical Paran then all the Hajj and rituals that Islamists perform and present site at Mecca is a fabrication.

Does Quran agree with this position of Kaaba?

Quran hints that the story concocted by Quran about Ishmael is a fabrication. Let us see how.

Firstly, Quran says, that Allah sent Mohammad to the people to whom his prophets were never sent with Allah’s words or warning.  

Or do they say, “He has fabricated it!”? No! It is the truth from your Lord in order for you to warn a people to whom no warner has come before you, so they may be ˹rightly˺ guided.

Quran 32:3

Now if this is true then, why did Allah send Mohammad to Mecca and to Arabs again, because Quran says that he had earlier sent Prophet Ishmael to Mecca and Arabs.

And mention in the Book ˹O Prophet, the story of˺ Ishmael. He was truly a man of his word, and was a messenger and a prophet. He (Ishmael) used to urge his people (his people as he dwelt at Mecca) to pray and give alms-tax. And, his Lord was well pleased with him

Quran 19:54-55

Remember when Abraham prayed, “My Lord! Make this city ˹of Mecca˺ secure, and keep me and my children away from the worship of idols. Our Lord! I have settled some of my offspring in a barren valley, near Your Sacred House, our Lord, so that they may establish prayer. So make the hearts of ˹believing˺ people incline towards them and provide them with fruits, so perhaps they will be thankful

Quran 14:35-37

And ˹remember˺ when We made the Sacred House a centre and a sanctuary for the people ˹saying˺, “˹You may˺ take the standing-place of Abraham as a site of prayer.” And, we entrusted Abraham and Ishmael to purify My House for those who circle it, who meditate in it, and who bow and prostrate themselves ˹in prayer˺

Quran 2:125

So can Muslims answer this contradiction?

Was Allah sending Mohammad to people who never heard the words of Allah ?

OR

Mecca in Arabia is not the place where Abraham and Ishmael erected a house of prayer ?

Conclusion

Muslims need to stop following this absurdity and reorganize their religion and align it back to the religion of the bible. Mohammad was a liar. As modern people inspect and verify his religion does not stand the test. He and those who concocted this religion made blunders. Truth is only with Yahweh the God of the Bible, the God of the people of the book. Accept him and be saved from the eternal damnation of your souls in hellfire. May God Yahweh open your eyes to lies and deception of Allah the god of Islam! 

The Losing Quran

Later on, after the death of Muhammad, As most of the men who had memorized the Quran had died in battles, Umar the next in Caliph feared that they would lose the Quran. Notice some instances from Islamic History where the preservation of the Quran theory has some real problems.

“Umar bin al-Khattab asked about a verse of Allah’s book, they answered: ‘It was with a man who got killed on day of Yamama (battle)’. He (Umar) said: ‘We all shall return to Allah’. Then he ordered to collect the Quran, therefore he was the first one who collected it in one book.”

Kanz ul Ummal, Volume 2, p. 574

Umar was once looking for the text of a specific verse of the Qur’an he vaguely remembered. To his deep sorrow, he discovered that the only person who had any record of that verse had been killed in the battle of Yamama and that the verse was consequently lost. 

Ibn Abi Dawud, Kitab al-Masahif, p. 10 – see also as-Suyuti’s al-Itqan fi ‘ulum al-Quran, volume 1, p. 204

In the Muqaddamah of Q. 33, Jalaluddin as-Suyuti recorded a statement from Sufyan al-Thawri (d. 161 A. H), as narrated by his student Abd al-Razaq al-Sanani (d. 211 A. H.): 

 وأخرج عبد الرزاق عن الثوري قال : بلغنا ان ناسا من أصحاب النبي صلى الله عليه و سلم كانوا يقرأون القرآن أصيبوا يوم مسيلمة فذهبت حروف من القرآن  

“Abd al-Razaq narrated from Al-Thawri that he said: ‘I have come to know that people from the Sahaba of the Prophet who used to recite the Quran were killed on the day of Musaylama and with their deaths letters from the Quran were lost (Zahab).’”

Tafsir Dur al-Manthur, Muqaddamah of Surah Ahzab, Volume 6, p. 558

The Collection Drive

Hence, he asked the caliphate Abu Bakr and they started the project of collecting the Quran, from stones, palm leaves, bones of animals etc. This means they had to look at whatever they could collect. Remember proving that they had only bits and pieces of the Quran memorized. This collected fragmental copy of the Quran was preserved by the existing Caliphate Abu Bakr, who then passed it to Umar and his daughter Hafsa (one of the wives of Mohammad). This, however, was the private copy. It means this was not public. Each man and every follower of Islam had his own copy vaguely memorized, scribbled somewhere in his own dialect (various pronunciations of Arabic).

That is why authentic Islamic sources say that many verses of the Quran were abrogated/lost etc. Some believe that Muslims of that time invented this story to trace the authenticity of the Quran back to the time of the death of Mohammad.

The point is that these bits and pieces of the Quran were not authenticated by Mohammad who is considered the only channel of divine revelation. He had already died and not all men are naturally gifted with an excellent memory.

Imagine 100 tribal illiterate people made to memorize 100-page material and then after the deaths of the majority of them, a few decades later you want to bring all of the material they memorized in written form. What will happen? You can only get bits and pieces of it and there will lot of confusion, flaws, manmade insertions, etc. Thus goes the History of the Quran.

“Aharuf and Quirat” (role of Arabic language in the History of Quran)

In addition to all this confusion, the history of the Quran has a different angle too. The Islamic Arab community had various dialects which differed based on the location.

The Aharuf

Muhammad had authorized seven of these different dialects saying, “Jibril has given Quran in seven dialects (Aharuf)” Let me explain what it means. It is distinct from pronunciations. Take the example of the word hello. Americans will pronounce hello with stress on the word “H.” The British would pronounce hello as “ello” with h silent. This is a difference in pronunciation. However, these are not different dialects.

To understand the dialect, let us take the same example. Americans would greet someone by saying “hello. How are you doing?”. The British would say the same thing as “Howdy?” Howdy means hello how are you doing. This is what is meant by the usage of a different dialect. It is the usage of informal words common to a particular region. So, Muhammad had allowed his followers to memorize Quran in seven different ways, seven different dialects (Aharuf).

Now when Zaid ibn Thabit (scribe of Mohammad who or order of caliphates ‘Abu Bakr’ and ‘Umar’) began the collection of the Quran (from different sources parts of which were written on palm leaves, stone, camels ribs etc), he had to face the challenge of these Quranic dialects.

It became a herculean task for him to make an accurate standardized copy of the Quran having 777934 words which were to be collected written in different dialects. You need to have an understanding of all the dialects to come to the same conclusion if you are making a standard copy of the Quran (from fragmented remains of the memories of men who had recited it two-three decades back, and from varied other sources). Imagine how accurately you remember the things you memorized decades back when you were in school/college! Is not it funny that Muslims still believe in the perfect preservation of the Quran? 

The Quirat

Another problem of collecting fragments of the Quran was the Quirat (vowels) problem. Since the spoken language in those days was not fully developed, the Arabic language had no vowel system (Vowel or Quira were developed later). Take the example of the word Jibril.

The word Jibril is pronounceable but writing it becomes difficult, because without the vowel “i” or “e”, Jibril could only be written as JBRL  (missing vowel “I” “e” from the language itself). One who does not know the pronunciation of JBRL may pronounce it as jaybeel or jaybeerol.

Imagine a person collecting such words having no vowel system from bits and pieces of Quran written with different dialects on various sources, like palm leaves, camels rib, leather, rock, stone, etc. A man could have written “how are you” or in another dialect as “howdy” and without vowel as “HWDY” (without vowel “o”).

These were the issues faced by “Zaid ibn Tabith” while collecting the 77934 words of the Quran from so many complications. Zaid, therefore, said, “By Allah, if he (Abu Bakr) had ordered me to shift one of the mountains (from one place to another) it would not have been harder for me than what he ordered me concerning the collection of Quran” (Sahi al-Bukhari 4679). Therefore the copy of the written was too far from being perfect. Reading Quran will make you realize that you cannot make up for what it says. No wonder Muslims cannot follow Islam without the help of Hadiths.

The Burning of the Quran

Amid such mayhem and complexities, Zaid somehow managed to resurrect a half-baked Quran the second time. The first time he had done it was during Abu Bakr the first caliphate. At that time the copy he managed was not made public but was preserved with Hafsa which had been difficult to read over time. Uthman the third caliph asked people to surrender their own Quran copies which they had with them, to be burned down. This was done to avoid confusion arising out of conflicting passages within the Quran. 

Many surrendered their Qurans. Uthman collected and burned them. But many of them had differences with Uthman’s way and therefore hid those copies with themselves. Uthman then sent this new copy (edited 2nd time by Zaid) to various places and kept one copy in Medina.

Where is the Uthman Quran?

In Simple words, nobody knows where is the Uthman Quran. We do not have that Mushaf. Uthman sent the copies to 9 Different cities. There is absolutely no linkage that proves the present day Quran is a copy of the Uthman Quran. As of now, we have more than 37 versions of the Arabic Quran and none of them can claim to be the Quran of Uthman. Even though a lay Muslim might claim to have that Quran, they will not be able to prove the preservation of the Quran with all these differences between the 37 different Arabic Quran.

The Corruption of the Quran

Pre 19^th Century Islamic sources confirm that a written copy of the Quran thus received (amid such mayhem and complexities) is not the exact preservation. It has many corruptions. See the summary below from Islamic sources:     

• Some verses were MISSING (Saheeh Al Bukhari Vol. 8:817, ,p 539)
• Some verses were FORGOTTEN (Saheeh Muslim Vol. 2:2286, p 501)
• Some verses were CANCELLED (Saheeh Al Bukhari Vol. 5:416, ,p 288)
• Some verses were SUBSTITUTED (Saheeh Al Bukhari Vol. 6:61, ,#527)
• Some verses were LOST (Ibn Abi Dawud, Kitab Al Masahif, p 23)
• Some verses DISAPPEARED (Al – Itaqan – fii Ulum al – Quran p 524)
• Some verses were OVERLOOKED (Ibn Abi Dawud, Kitab Al Masahif, p 11)
• Some verses were CHANGED (Muwatta Imam Malik, p 64) (795 AD)
• Some verses were MODIFIED (Ibn Abi Dawud Kitab al-Masahif, p 11)
• Some verses were EATEN  BY SHEEP (Sunan Ibn Majah, #1944)

We shall see more about the Quran’s immorality, violence, errors, contradictions, mathematical mistakes, and unscientific claims later.

For detailed information on corruption in Quran,

1. Daniel Brubaker is scholar who has officially investigated Quran manuscripts and confirms about insertion, abrogation, overwriting and corruption of Quran from manuscripts (click here to check his research ).
2. To read Hatun Tash’s research from her collections of different Qurans from all over the world, indication that not all men submitted their Quran to Uthman to be burned ( Click here )
3. More on Incomplete Quran by Sam Shamoun (click here)
4. For unscientific claims of Quran, mathematical errors, contradictions in Quran, Mohammad’s dumb claims check this (Enjoy Fun with Quran)  and use pins for dialogues with Muslim (from here)

End of “The Remarkable History of the Quran – Islam 2“

He will speak against the Most High and oppress his holy people and try to change the SET TIMES AND THE LAWS. The holy people will be delivered into his hands for a time, times and half a time.

Daniel 7:25

Exactly as the prophecy in Daniel says, Islam has attempted to change time (calendar) and laws. They have Sharia law, their own calendar (changing of time).

Therefore, for Christians, if we are to indulge in having a dialogue with Muslims, to show them the error into which they have fallen, we need to learn their basic system. From their very own wicked writings, we can show them their blindness – of how they call evil as good and good as evil (Isa 5:2). Only then, we will be able to answer their doubts about Christianity and share the Gospel. Therefore, it is time to get through their basics.

From my personal experiences, I can say, that initially, you will find difficulty in understanding Islam. This is because their religious words are from the Arabic language. But with patience and willingness to bring them to Christ, you will learn enough to handle them.

Origin of Islam in Mecca

Let us first have a glance at how Islam began. The History of Islam is intricately tied to the History of Muhammad. The History of Muhammad is quite scattered over. So we have to gather it from different sources. Remember that Apostle Paul in the first century had already warned

But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God’s curse!

Gal 1:8

Six hundred years after this Pauline warning, in 610 A.D., the Remarkable History of Islam started when an angel appeared to Mohammad in the cave of Mecca (40 years old). Muhammad later thought this angel as Gabriel(Jibreel). He told him that I have come to give you the word of Allah. In direct contradiction to the Gabriel of Christian scriptures, this bogus Jibreel that appeared to Mohammad, said to Mohammad, Jesus is not God but one of the prophets of Allah, like Adam, Moses, etc (c.f. Words of Gabriel in the bible are found in Luke 1:26, 31-32 that he says Jesus is Son of Most High).

History of Muhammad’s encounter with Jibreel

Muhammad was indeed frightened by Jibreel when the revelations came(Sahih Bukhari – 4). Mohammad was initially suspicious thinking that he is possessed by the devil ( Sahih Bukhari 6982, Prophet Stories, Sahih Bukhari 3175 – Authentic biography of Mohammad), but his wife Khadija convinced him. She took him to her cousin named “Waraqah” who used to read gospels in Hebrew and this Gnostic convinced Mohammad that he is indeed a prophet. 

Waraqah died soon after this and the so-called divine inspiration also stopped. At times Muhammad would get suicidal and decide to jump off the cliff when the revelation stopped coming. Mohammad then began to receive frequently visitation from this phoney Jibreel and each time the ghostly Jibreel appeared, he would make Mohammad memorize Quran (which Mohammad in turn would make his followers memorize). This went on until his death from 610 A.D. to 632 A.D.

The Hijrah – Exile to Medina

All Islamic calendars start with Hijrah. That is the milestone that commemorates Muhammad’s exile to Medina. We are now 1442 lunar years after the Hijrah.

Initially, the tribals of Mecca (Quraishi, Bedouin etc) rejected Mohammad and his religion. So, Mohammad and his group who had accepted him as a prophet migrated to Medina. They assumed that that the Jews in Medina will listen to him. In order to gain followers, he made his religion have similarities with Jews. Just as Jews have laws of clean and unclean food, so Mohammad also introduced it but with a twist. Now the Camel has become a clean animal in violation of the Torah (Deut 14:7)

Similar to the Jews, his Allah became a monotheist. Just like the Jews, he also instituted a fast in Ramadan but with a twist. Jews and Christians usually fast from start to end. Muslims fast during the daytime and have binge eating at night. He accepted Jewish prophets Abraham, Moses, Noah, David and so on. He used to praise Jews as “the people of the book.”. His tactics were to gather followers from Medina by showing similarities between Allah and Yahweh. He used this new Allah to make friends with the people of Medina.

Soon with their assistance, he made war with the traders of Mecca. This battle is called the Battle of Badr. Having won the war and made followers, he now started using the power of the sword to make converts.  His trip from Mecca to Medina is said to be the beginning of the Islamic Calendar Hijrah (AH) [see Dan 7:25]. From 624 to 627, Mohammad fought few battles. Finally, he returned to Mecca and asked them to submit to Islam or else pay for their lives.

By the year 630 A.D., two years before the death of Mohammad, Mohammad had several bloody wars. He had killed thousands of men and raped their wives. Before his death, most of the Arabs had become Islamic because of the power of Sword. The others had exiled from Arabia.

In stark contrast to Christianity, where disciples did not retaliate while spreading the gospel of the love of God, Islam spread by the use of sword and force. In contrast to the God of the Bible, who had not let David build the temple because of his bloody hands (I Chronicles 28:3), Allah the god of Islam let bloody rapist Mohammad be the founding prophet of Islam.

The Death of Muhammad and the Expansion of Islam

Mohammad had prophesied, God would cut off his heart’s main artery (Aorta) if he were a false prophet (Quran 69:44-47). In 632 A.D., Mohammad died (62 years of age) of poison by bursting the aorta of his heart (Sahi Al-Bukhari 5:59:713). 

The Prophet (ﷺ) in his ailment in which he died, used to say, “O `Aisha! I still feel the pain caused by the food I ate at Khaibar, and at this time, I feel as if my aorta is being cut from that poison.”

Sahi Al-Bukhari 5:59:713

After the death of Mohammad, there was confusion as to who would be the successor (political-religious leader called the Caliphate) of Mohammad and of the Islamic community? Mohammad had eleven wives [7 children born to him (4 daughters and 3 sons)] but none of his sons survived.

As a result, there arose a crisis regarding who would be the next successor of Mohammad. They had bitter fighting amongst themselves and did not bury Muhammad’s body for 3 days. Finally his wife’s Aisha’s father “Abu Bakr” became the first Caliphate of the Muslim community. Here is the list of the first four prominent Caliph in Islam, (Keep yourself acquainted with their names as they play important role in the formation of the Quran)

1. Abu Bakr (Aisha his wife’s father) à  (632 to 634 A.D.),
2. Umar (Hafsa his wife’s father) à (635 to 644 A.D.),
3. Uthman (Husband of his daughter Ruqayya) à(644 to 656 A.D.),
4. Ali Talib (Husband of his daughter Fatima) à(656-661)

See the entire list at (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_caliphs),

Islamic Jargons

Some terminologies you will encounter meanings of which you must know:

1. Caliphate:  Military religious head of the Islamic Empire.

• Quran: Quran is the sacred book of Muslims. They think it is the message of Allah. It has 114 chapters and 6236 verses. Like we have chapter they call it Surah and ayat means verses. Each chapter in Quran has a name.

• Hadith (Hadis): Biography of Mohammad written many centuries after Muhammad’s death. There are over 800 biographies (Hadis). Many are regarded as not authentic because the history of Muhammad is riddled with embarassing facts. Authentic are marked by word “sahih”

• Saheeh-Al-Bukhari,
• Sahin Muslim
• Sunan an-Nasa’i
• Sunan Abi Dawud
• Jami` at-Tirmidhi
• and many more

You can get the details on sunnah.com

• Tafsirs: Commentaries that are written by Muslim scholars trying to explain and justify Quran. These commentaries are also written many centuries after the death of Muhammad.

End of “The Remarkable History of Islam 1“