The Qur'an in its historical context (pdf - Islam and Christian-Muslim ...

KEVIN VAN BLADEL
It is tempting therefore to think that the Syriac Alexander Legend was associated
consciously at some stage of the transmission into Arabic with an explanation or
oral commentary including reference to Jesus’ prophecies of the end of the world,
since the near-contemporary source of Movses Dasxuranc‘i, the 682 History,
shows that the reference to waves in Jesus’ prophecy was taken to refer to the
invasions of the Türks, identified elsewhere by contemporaries as the eschatological
peoples of Gog and Magog, and their involvement in a war of many nations.
Fredegarius’ chronicle also describes them as waves. If this hypothesis is correct,
the word yamuju, “surging like waves,” in the Qur’an, is essentially a verbal echo
of Luke 21:25 (sunokhè ethnôn en aporíai ékhous thalásses kaì sálou), the
“distress of nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves,” 76 Jesus’
prophecy of what would happen before the final redemption. It suggests that
Movses Dasxuranc‘i’s source (the 682 History) and Fredegarius’ source were not
the only ones to consider Jesus’ prophecies to be fulfilled in these wars.
Muhammad’s earliest followers may have understood the story of Dhu l-Qarnayn
not just as the prophecy of the imminent end made by Alexander, regarded as
a pious, ancient world-conqueror, but also as an allusion to the prophet Jesus’
similar warning of the end times, now very near, which they expected as seriously
as other inhabitants of the region, when nations did indeed crash together, as it
might have appeared on a field of battle, like waves of the sea.
The language of Q 18:83–102
Now that the continuity of tradition between the Syriac Alexander Legend of
Alexander and the Qur’anic passage in question (Q 18:83–102) is established, it
is possible to draw some new conclusions about the language of the Qur’an here.
Though controversy has been aroused by the recent attempt to find Syriac or
Aramaic words in the Qur’an where they had not been part of the traditional
reading, now one can see that where the Qur’an is definitely reinterpreting a
Syriac text, not a single Syriac word is found, but rather there are true Arabic
equivalents of Syriac words. 77 Q 18:83–102 is a distinctively Arabic text and in
no way is it Syriac. Thus it is clear that Qur’anic tradition and, in particular, the
traditional Islamic lexicography of the Arabic words in this passage prove to be
quite reliable. A high number of exact parallels of meaning between the Syriac
and the Arabic (though the Arabic passage is short) come to light while reading
the Qur’anic text in a way that accords very closely with the traditional Muslim
interpretation – interpretation of the words themselves, that is, the lexicography,
and not the explanatory commentary or tafsir. Whatever problems one finds in
the grammar and script of the Qur’an, it is quite clear that the words and basic
meanings of this passage of the Qur’an have been understood by Islamic tradition
correctly. In a sense this Syriac Alexander Legend vindicates the reliability of
some basic, traditional claims about this Qur’anic passage, providing means to
verify Arabic tradition.
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