Paradise and hell word count in the Qur'an: Difference between revisions

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Paradise and hell word count in the Qur'an (view source)

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-This page lists all forms of the words ''jannah'' (paradise, garden) and ''jahannam'' (hell) in the Qur'an. The purpose is to analyze the claim that they both appear 77 times.
+{{QualityScore|Lead=1|Structure=3|Content=4|Language=2|References=3}}
+This article lists all forms of the words ''jannah'' (paradise, garden) and ''jahannam'' (hell) in the Qur'an. Some Muslim apologists claim that they both appear 77 times and that this constitutes a miracle, however that does not appear to be the case. The word count has to be in the Arabic Qur'an, which makes it complicated for most people, but this article is written in a way that can be understood without previous knowledge of Arabic.
 ==Paradise - الجنة (''al-jannah'')==
-The word paradise (الجنة, ''al-jannah'', literally means "the garden". The root of this word is جنن (j-n-n). Other words derived from this word, used in the Qur'an are:
+The word paradise (الجنة, ''al-jannah''), literally means "the garden". The root of this word is جنن (j-n-n). Some other Arabic words derived from this root:
 * garden (جَنَّٰتٍ, ''jannatin'' in verse 2:25)
 * over-shadowed (جَنَّ, ''janna'' in verse 6:76)
@@ Line 10: / Line 11: @@
 * a snake (جَآنٌّ, ''jannun'' in verse 27:10)
-This word appears only in the singular form and it is a feminine word - it ends on ''ta marbuta'' (ة). When a word is alone (not in a context of an Arabic text), the ''ta marbuta'' at the end is not pronounced, so it is read as ''jannah'', not ''jannat'', so when using this word in English it is basically always read as ''jannah''. But when reading whole sentences from the Qur'an in Arabic, the ''ta marbuta'' would be read as "t".
+This word appears only in its singular form and it is a feminine word&ndash;it ends on the letter ''ta marbuta'' (ة). When a word is pronounced without the case markings ('iraab) and/or outside of the an idaafa, the ''ta marbuta'' at the end is not pronounced, so it is read as ''jannah'', not ''jannat''. So when using this word in English, it is basically always read as ''jannah''. But when reading whole sentences from the Qur'an in Arabic, the ''ta marbuta'' would be read as "t" unless the word cames at the end of the line.
 There are 3 forms of الجنة:
@@ Line 17: / Line 18: @@
 * ٱلْجَنَّةَ (''al-jannata'') - accusative
-And sometimes this exactly same word (only with differences in diacritics) actually refers to the jinns and not paradise:
+Sometimes the same word (only with differences in diacritics) actually refers to the jinns and not paradise:
 * ٱلْجِنَّةِ (''al-jinnati'')
+The (optional) diacritics in Arabic determine the vowels. Otherwise الجنة is just ال (''al-'') prefix and letters ج ('''''j'''im'') - ن ('''''n'''un'') - ة('''''t'''a marbuta'').
 {| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5" class= "wikitable sortable"
@@ Line 141: / Line 143: @@
 |}
-As we can see, this word does not appear 77 times and in 5 cases refers to the jinns:
+This word does appears 55 times and in 5 cases refers to the jinns:
 * 1) Verse 11:119 "... Certainly I will fill hell with the '''jinn''' (ٱلْجِنَّةِ, ''aljinnati'') and the men, all together."
 * 2) Verse 32:13 "... I will certainly fill hell with the '''jinn''' (ٱلْجِنَّةِ, ''aljinnati'') and men together."
@@ Line 147: / Line 149: @@
 * 5) 114:6 "From among the '''jinn''' (ٱلْجِنَّةِ, ''aljinnati'') and the men."
-In the verse 41:30 the word appears with a prefix:
+In the verse 41:30 the word appears with a prefixed preposition:
 * "Indeed, those who have said, "Our Lord is Allah " and then remained on a right course - the angels will descend upon them, [saying], "Do not fear and do not grieve but receive good tidings '''of Paradise''' (بِٱلْجَنَّةِ, ''biljannati''), which you were promised."
-So this word count is already very questionable. Not only we didn't get to the number 77, but it's hard to say even to which number we have arrived, because there are many ways of counting:
+Two questions that arise are many ways:
 * Include or exclude the verses where the word refers to the jinns?
 * Include or exclude the verse where the word appears with a prefix?
-Logically, if the miracle is supposed to be that the word count for "paradise" is 77, just like it is for "hell", then we should exclude the cases where it means something else. So the word "paradise" is mentioned '''52 times''' in the Qur'an and the miracle claim is false.
+Contrary to the miracle claim, there do not to appear to be 55 instances of the word occurring.
 ==Garden - جنة (''jannah'')==
@@ Line 163: / Line 165: @@
 The list also includes Arabic words ''jannah'', which have a different meaning, other than "garden". The reason is not that it makes sense to count them, but to understand how apologists got to the number 77.
+The counts in the list:
+* The column "Mixed count" counts all forms of the Arabic word ''jannah'', including the cases where it does not refer to gardens in heaven or where it does not refer to gardens at all. It counts singular, dual and plural forms together.
+* The column "Translation" counts all occurrences of the word, including singular, dual and plural forms, where the word refers to the gardens in paradise.
+* The column "Mixed number" counts singular, dual and plural forms separately, regardless whether the word refers to any gardens or not.
+* The column "Gardens in paradise number" counts singular, dual and plural forms separately, only from the words, which refer to the gardens in paradise.
 {| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5" class= "wikitable sortable"
-!Count
+!Mixed count
 !Verse
 !Word in Arabic
 !Translation
-!Total number
+!Mixed number
 !Gardens in paradise number
 |-
@@ Line 235: / Line 242: @@
 |32||18:32||جَنَّتَيْنِ||two gardens [given to a guy]||dual 1
 |-
-|33||18:33||ٱلْجَنَّتَيْنِ||two gardens [given to a guy]||dual 2
+|33||18:33||ٱلْجَنَّتَيْنِ||the two gardens [given to a guy]||dual 2
 |-
 |34||18:35||جَنَّتَهُۥ||his garden [given to a guy]||singular 6
@@ Line 299: / Line 306: @@
 |64||40:8||جَنَّٰتِ||gardens [in paradise 39]||plural 44||plural 36
 |-
-|65||42:22||ٱلْجَنَّاتِ||gardens [in paradise 40]||plural 45||plural 37
+|65||42:22||* ٱلْجَنَّاتِ||gardens [in paradise 40]||plural 45||plural 37
 |-
 |66||44:25||جَنَّٰتٍ||gardens [in Egypt]||plural 46
@@ Line 359: / Line 366: @@
 |94||70:38||جَنَّةَ||garden [in paradise 65]||singular 21||singular 7
 |-
-|95||71:12||جَنَّٰتٍ||gardens [on earth or in paradise]||plural 65
+|95||71:12||جَنَّٰتٍ||gardens [on earth or in paradise **]||plural 65
 |-
 |96||74:40||جَنَّٰتٍ||gardens [in paradise 66]||plural 66||plural 56
@@ Line 375: / Line 382: @@
 |102||98:8||جَنَّٰتُ||gardens [in paradise 71]||plural 69||plural 58
 |}
+* (*) In the verse 42:22 the word appears with the ''al-'' prefix. ''al-jannah'' usually refers to the paradise and not to the gardens in paradise. But the word is plural and that would mean that there are many paradises. So this word probably means "gardens". However, even if we add this word to the ''al-jannah'' (paradise) word count, it still doesn't get to the word count 77. And for the total word count (paradise + paradise gardens) it doesn't matter in which category this word is.
+* (**) In the verse 71:12 "And help you with wealth and sons, and make for you ''gardens'', and make for you rivers.", Noe promises his people that Allah will give them gardens. It is not clear whether he meant gardens on earth or in heaven. So the plural for "gardens in heaven" might be actually 59 and not 58.
+There are cases where the ِArabic word جنة does not refer to any gardens. 5 times it refers to madness (''jinnatun''). The literal meaning is "possessed by the ''jinns''" and that is why it has the root j-n-n, just like ''jannah''.
+* 1) Verse 7:184 "Then do they not give thought? There is in their companion [Muhammad] no '''madness''' (جِنَّةٍ, ''jinnatin''). He is not but a clear warner."
+* 2) Verse 23:25 "He is not but a man possessed with '''madness''' (جِنَّةٌ, ''jinnatun''), so wait concerning him for a time."
+* 3) Verse 23:70 "Or do they say: There is '''madness''' (جِنَّةٌ, ''jinnatun'') in him? Nay! he has brought them the truth, and most of them are averse from the truth."
+* 4) Verse 34:8 "He has forged a lie against Allah or there is '''madness''' (جِنَّةٌ, ''jinnatun'') in him. Nay! those who do not believe in the hereafter are in torment and in great error."
+* 5) Verse 34:46 "Say: I exhort you only to one thing, that rise up for Allah´s sake in twos and singly, then ponder: there is no '''madness''' (جِنَّةٍ, ''jinnatin'') in your fellow-citizen; he is only a warner to you before a severe chastisement."
+In two cases it refers to "cover" (''junnatun''):
+* 1) Verse 58:16 "They make their oaths to serve as '''a cover''' (جُنَّةً, ''junnatan'') so they turn away from Allah´s way; therefore they shall have an abasing chastisement."
+* 2) Verse 63:2 "They have taken their oaths as '''a cover''' (جُنَّةً, ''junnatan''), so they averted [people] from the way of Allah . Indeed, it was evil that they were doing."
+===The word count===
+The list showed that the word "garden" in the context of "gardens in paradise" appears '''71 times''' including '''10 singular forms''', 3 dual forms and 58 plural forms. If we count the (plural) occurrence in the verse 71:12, then we get 72 occurrences.
+There are 52 occurrences of "paradise" so let's try add the occurrences of "gardens in paradise":
+* 52 + 71 = 123
+* 52 + 10 (singulars) = 62
+No, we don't get the number 77.
+It seems that there is no way of getting the number 77, so how did apologists get to the number 77? They took the 57 occurrences of the Arabic word الجنة, regardless if it is the word "paradise" (ٱلْجَنَّةِ, ''al-jannah'') or "jinn" (ٱلْجِنَّةِ, ''al-jinnah''). Without the diacritics, it can be both. Then they took the 24 singular forms of جنة, regardless if it is the word garden (جَنَّة, ''jannah''), madness (جِنَّة, ''jinnah'') or cover (جُنَّة, ''junnah''). So now they have 57 + 24 = 81 words. And they get 77 by excluding 4 clearly singular forms, because they appear with a suffix:
+* 1) 18:35 (جَنَّتَهُۥ, ''jannata'''hu''''') - '''his''' garden
+* 2) 18:39 (جَنَّتَكَ, ''jannata'''ka''''') - '''your''' garden
+* 3) 18:40 (جَنَّتِكَ, ''jannati'''ka''''') - '''your''' garden
+* 4) 89:30 (جَنَّتِى, ''jannate'''e''''') - '''my''' garden
+These suffixes in Arabic just express possession. But it is still garden. A singular form of the word garden! What makes it even stranger is that occurrences with a prefix (like وَجَنَّةٍ in 57:21, "and a garden", where "and" is represented by the و prefix) are counted.
+It seems however that they used a completely different tactic for this word count, they just searched through the whole Qur'an without diacritics for "جنة". From this search they got 78 occurrences and they excluded the occurrence of أَجِنَّةٌ (''ajinnatun''), which means "fetuses" in the verse 53:32. By this search all plural forms got excluded, because plural forms don't end with a ة (''ta marbuta''), but a regular ت (''ta''). And it also explains why the words with suffixes were not counted, because ة appears only at the end of words and when a suffix is added, the ة changes into ت. Apologists were not worried, that many words which end on the sequence جنة have a different meaning than "paradise" or "garden". Not only do they count occurrences, where the garden is somewhere on earth, but also words like "madness", "jinns", "cover".. also they were not worried that by this harsh method, they excluded clearly singular forms of the word "garden".
 ==Hell - جهنم (''jahannam'')==
@@ Line 545: / Line 583: @@
 The word count for hell is easier. But there is still the question whether to count the words with prefix? In English these Arabic prefixes would be expressed with another word, so the word count would be 77. The word count 77 for "hell" makes sense in Arabic as well. But it should be mentioned that apologists didn't count the word "day" with these prefixes in the [[365 days miracle in the Quran]] so now there is an inconsistency in the counting methods. There are 5 occurrences with a prefix so another possible word count would be 72.
-* When counting the word "hell" without prefixes, we get 72 occurrences. Exactly the same number as the number of virgins muslims are supposed to get in heaven. Is this just a coincidence? What if this numerical miracle means that kafirs actually get the [[72 virgins]] in hell? Another possible interpretation might be that Muslims who want to go to heaven to get the virgins, might actually get 72 hells as a punishment for their lust.
+* When counting the word "hell" without prefixes, we get 72 occurrences. This is exactly the same number as the number of virgins Muslims are supposed to get in paradise. Is this a miracle? If Allah wrote the Qur'an, he must have known very well that this word count would be 72 and that it is the same as the number of virgins and he must had some wise reason for that. One possible interpretation might be that Muslims who want to go to heaven to get the virgins, might actually get 72 hells as a punishment for their lust.
+==Conclusions==
+===Paradise word count===
+* The word count for "paradise" is problematic, but the most logical way of counting it produces the result '''52'''. That method is counting the occurrences of ٱلْجَنَّةَ (''al-jannah'').
+* When we start adding word counts of the word "garden", to the "paradise" word count, we still don't get to 77.
+* The word count 77 for paradise is produced by an absurd counting method, which counts not only the words "paradise" and "garden", but many others, like "jinns", "madness" and "cover". And this method also excludes some singular forms of the word "garden".
+===Hell word count===
+* The word count for hell is less problematic. There are basically only two reasonable counting methods. Counting all occurrences gets the result '''77''' and counting without prefixes gets the result 72.
+* Muslim apologists count the word "garden" hand in hand with "paradise". But in most of the Qur'an, hell is simply described as the "fire". Why are they ignoring this word's occurrences?
+==See also==
+* [[Word Count Miracles in the Qur'an]]
+* [[365 days miracle in the Quran]]
+* [[12 months miracle in the Quran]]
+* [[Iman and kufr word count in the Qur'an]]
+* [[Man and woman word count in the Qur'an]]
+* [[Dunya and akhira word count in the Qur'an]]
+* [[Land to water ratio miracle in the Qur'an]]
+[[Category:Miracles]]