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

FRED M. DONNER
their attitudes constituted for more than a century nothing more than a muted, if
persistent, minority position in Western scholarly circles. Given the difficulty of
wringing reliable evidence about the seventh century out of our exiguous sources for
Islam’s beginnings, many scholars who held skeptical views about the traditional
stories of the Qur’an’s genesis seem to have preferred simply to hint at their
misgivings and otherwise to pass over the question in silence; for however much
one may have doubted the traditional view, the difficulty of actually assembling
the evidence for a convincing alternative view was clear to everyone, and few
felt encouraged to take on such a challenge. Most who did choose to challenge
traditional views, moreover, focused on one particular aspect of the problem,
rather than addressing comprehensively the question of the Qur’an’s genesis and
development. For example, scholars such as Geiger, Andrae, Bell, and Torrey 2
looked at the question of the relationship between the Qur’an and the Judaeo-
Christian scriptural tradition; Vollers, Blachère, and Fück 3 grappled with the
question of what the language of the Qur’an originally was; and Bergsträsser,
Pretzl, Jeffery, Beck, and Cook 4 considered the question of the many variant
readings about which the Islamic tradition tells us.
It was not until the 1970s that a number of books appeared that questioned
more bluntly and comprehensively the traditional view of the Qur’an’s origins and
early development as a text. Although vastly different from one another, the works
of Günter Lüling (1974), John Wansbrough (1977), and Patricia Crone and
Michael Cook (1977) all posed fundamental challenges to the traditional vision
of Islam’s origins, including the genesis of the Qur’an. 5 Although each of these
contributions met with considerable resistance at first, and none has provided us
with a satisfactory alternative interpretation, they together forced scholars in the
field of Qur’anic studies to confront the simplistic view derived ultimately from
Islam’s own dogmas about its origins, and to open the door – albeit sometimes
grudgingly – to the possibility of assembling a new, and perhaps radically different,
understanding of how the Qur’an text came to be, by drawing on textual and other
evidence more secure than that provided in the Islamic tradition’s own narratives.
The field of Qur’anic studies was, then, in some ferment already from the early
1970s onward. This ferment was for the most part restricted to the limited circles
of Western specialists in Qur’an studies (who were few) and did not have much
impact on the broader public. The publication in 2000 of the first edition of
Christoph Luxenberg’s book Die Syro-Aramäische Lesart des Koran, 6 however,
generated considerable controversy, even in popular circles, although the book is
no more revolutionary than those just mentioned by Lüling, Wansbrough, Crone
and Cook. Perhaps Luxenberg’s work made more waves among the public
because it is presented in a manner that makes it relatively easy to understand
what he is getting at. Lüling’s prose is also generally clear, but he frames his
attempted reconstruction of the Qur’an in the context of complex discussions of
theology that are difficult for those without deep theological training to follow.
Crone and Cook’s Hagarism is convoluted in argument and not an easy read, even
for those well-informed about early Islamic history. Wansbrough’s Qur’anic Studies,
30