George Sale, The Koran, commonly called the Alcoran of Mohammed, translated into English immediately from the original Arabic; with Explanatory Notes, taken from the most approved Commentators. To which is prefixed A Preliminary Discource (1734)
who whipt, imprisoned, and put to death those of the contrary opinion. But at length al Motawakkel 1, who succeeded al Wathek, put an end to these persecutions, by revoking the former edicts, releasing those that were imprisoned on that account, and leaving every man at liberty as to his belief in this point 2.
Al Ghazâli seems to have tolerably reconciled both opinions, saying, that the Korân is read and pronounced with the tongue, written in books, and kept in memory; and is yet eternal, subsisting in God’s essence, and not possible to be separated thence by any transmission into mens memories or the leaves of books 3; by which he seems to mean no more than that the original idea of the Korân only is really in God, and consequently co-essential and co-eternal with him, but that the copies are created and the work of man.
The opinion of al Jahedh, chief of a sect bearing his name, touching the Korân is too remarkable to be omitted: he used to say it was a body, which might sometimes be turned into a man 4, and sometimes into a beast 5; which seems to agree with the notion of those who assert the Korân to have two faces, one of a man, the other of a beast 6; thereby, as I conceive, intimating the double interpretation it will admit of, according to the letter or the spirit.
As some have held the Korân to be created, so there have not been wanting those who have asserted that there is nothing miraculous in that book in respect to style or composition, excepting only the prophetical relations of things past, and predictions of things to come; and that had God left men to their natural liberty, and not restrained them in that particular, the Arabiens could have composed something not only equal, but superior to the Korân in eloquence, method, and purity of language. This was another opinion of the Motazalites, and in particular of al Mozdâr above-mentioned and al Nodhâm 7.
Exposition of it.
The Korân being the Mohammedans rule of faith and practice, it is no wonder its expositors and commentators are so very numerous. And it may not be amiss to take notice of the rules they observe in expounding it.
1 Anno Hej. 242.
2 Abulfarag. p. 262.
3 Al Ghazali, in prof. fid.
4 The Khalîf al Walîd Ebn Yazîd, who was the eleventh of the race of Ommeya, and is looked on by the Mohammedans as a reprobate, and one of no religion, seems to have treated this book as a rational creature. For dipping into it one day, the first words he met with were these; Every rebellious perverse person shall not prosper. Whereupon he stuck it on a lance and shot it to pieces with arrows, repeating these verses;
Dost thou rebuke every rebellious perverse person? behold, I am that rebellious perverse person.
When thou appearest before thy Lord on the day of resurrection, say, O Lord, al Walîd has torn me thus.
Ebn Shohnah. v. Poc. Spec. p. 223.
5 Poc. Spec. p. 222.
6 Herbelot. p. 87.
7 Abulfeda, Shahrestani, &c. apud Poc. Spec. p. 222. & Marracc. de Kor. p. 44.
