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[[File:Sura 24 without vowels and dots.jpg|right|thumb|215px|Arabic script from a Qur'an dated 150 AH showing Sura 24:34-36 without Vowels and Dots.]]
[[File:Sura 24 without vowels and dots.jpg|right|thumb|215px|Arabic script from a Qur'an dated 150 AH showing Sura 24:34-36 without Vowels and Dots.]]
In this article we examine the use of [[Arabic_letters_and_diacritics#The_Arabic_Diacritics|diacritical marks]] and the problems they posed when they were added to the [[Arabic]] [[Qur'an]].
The earliest manuscripts of the [[Qur'an]] made very limited use of [[Arabic_letters_and_diacritics#The_Arabic_Diacritics|diacritical marks]], which is true also of other early [[Arabic]] documents of the 7th century. Dots (or small dashes) to distingish homographic consonants such as ت and ب were used only sporadically at first, and markings for short vowels begin to be seen in the late 7th / early 8th century CE, when coloured dots are introduced for that purpose, indicating a wide variety of reading traditions. There was also a lack of word-internal alifs in such manuscripts. Hamza and tanwin are not marked in early manuscripts either, though academic research has demonstrated that these were not spoken in the [[Internal Rhymes as Evidence for Old Hijazi|Old Hijazi]] dialect in which the Quran was originally uttered, and there was a reduced grammatical case ending system which was later classicized.
==The Quran's Dilemma==


We would like to enlighten our readers on grammatical problems in the Arabic Qur'an, mainly diacritical marks. The Arabic writing system was still in development during the time of [[Muhammad]], so the Qur'an was originally written without today's diacritical marks. These were added years after the final Qur'anic revelation and [[Muhammad's Death|Muhammad's subsequent death]]. The problem with this is the addition or subtraction of diacritical marks radically alter the meaning of Arabic text, thereby potentially altering [[Allah|Allah’s]] book.  
Due to such limited use of diacritical marks in the earliest Quranic manuscripts, as well as the variant oral reading traditions, and also because Muhammad may have allowed leeway in the reading of each word, it is sometimes not possible to have confidence in the original meaning of the [[Textual History of the Qur'an|consonantal text standardised by Caliph Uthman around 650 CE]], though for the majority of the text there was agreement. Through the abundance of opportunities to make mistakes it is likely true that the Qur'an has been altered at least through grammatical changes, individual letters, and sometimes changes to individual words, so that we cannot be sure which (if any) of the variant reading traditions and associated manuscripts correctly preserve the original Quran to the letter or even to the word, as many claim, even as standardised under Uthman.


==The Addition of Diacritical marks==
==Modern Academic Research==


As we stated earlier, the Qur'an was written without diacritical marks. At the time of Muhammad, Arabic orthography was yet to develop into what we have known for centuries. There was no distinction between letters of the Arabic alphabets of similar shape and there were no vowel marks. There were no dots above or below the letters either. For the interpretors who added diacritical marks, to read the Qur'an as it was originally written, would lead the reader to interpret and choose for themselves from the many possible meanings available in the Arabic without diacritical marks.
While it is commonly stated on websites and even by many Muslim scholars today that the earliest Quranic manuscripts entirely lacked diacritical markings, that is a mistaken view largely based on the fact that Kufic manuscripts of the 8th century for a time omitted them entirely. The very oldest manuscripts of the 7th century CE in the Hijazi script style do generally contain a very limited amount of markings to distinguish consonants. Adam Bursi writes in his academic paper, ''Connecting the Dots: Diacritics, Scribal Culture, and the Qurʾān in the First/Seventh Century'', about the early use of diacritics for homographic letters (consonants of otherwise indistinguishable letter shape):


In order for non-Arabic speakers to understand what is being discussed here, we will look at several Arabic words and how the use of diacritical marks affect their meanings:
{{Quote|Adam Bursi (2018) ''Connecting the Dots: Diacritics, Scribal Culture, and the Qurʾān in the First/Seventh Century'', pp. 112-115<ref name="Bursi">Bursi, Adam. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5913/jiqsa.3.2018.a005 Connecting the Dots: Diacritics, Scribal Culture, and the Qurʾān in the First/Seventh Century] Journal of the International Qur’anic Studies Association, vol. 3, International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2018, pp. 111–157, https://doi.org/10.5913/jiqsa.3.2018.a005.</ref>|In fact, while signs indicating short vowels and the hamzah are indeed largely absent from Arabic orthography until the second/eighth century, the textual record of written Arabic displays a much earlier and more widespread usage of diacritics for differentiating homographic letters than is commonly acknowledged. Within dated Arabic documents, consonantal diacritics were used already in the early first/mid-seventh century: the earliest surviving examples are two administrative papyri dated to 22/643 and an inscription dated to 24/645, all of which exhibit consonantal diacritics on some letters. The earliest extant qurʾānic manuscripts—written in the Ḥijāzī script and dated paleographically to the first/seventh and early second/eighth centuries—likewise display dots or dashes to discriminate between homographic letters. The fact that these diacritics were written in the same ink as the letter forms in these texts indicates the diacritics “were considered to be part of the script.” The appearance of consonantal diacritics in several different types of first/seventh-century Arabic writings suggests that they were part of “the state of the script at the very beginning of Islam” and, indeed, that the Qurʾān could potentially have been recorded using diacritics even within the lifetime of the Prophet Muḥammad.<BR />
However, while diacritics were clearly used in the Arabic script of the first/seventh century, they were deployed in ways that seem counterintuitive to modern eyes. Manuscripts, papyri, and inscriptions from this period do not display diacritics consistently on every consonantal letter that would exhibit a diacritic in modern Arabic script; instead, diacritics appear in these texts infrequently, often leaving the text quite ambiguous. Illustrating the distinction between a first/seventh-century Qurʾān manuscript and a modern printed edition, François Déroche notes that on one folio page containing most of Q Tawbah 9:113–121, '''there are eight dotted letters where the equivalent modern text has 240 of them.'''}}
 
Regarding short vowels, Bursi writes:
 
{{Quote|Adam Bursi (2018) ''Connecting the Dots: Diacritics, Scribal Culture, and the Qurʾān in the First/Seventh Century'', Footnote 4, p. 113<ref name="Bursi" />|George and Déroche suggest that red dots were used to mark short vowels in Qurʾān manuscripts by the late first/seventh century, basing their dating on several Qurʾān manuscripts in the so-called “O I” script type that exhibit these vowel markers.}}
 
Similarly, Dr Marijn van Putten, leading academic specialist in Quranic Arabic, manuscripts and the reading traditions, writes:
 
{{Quote|1=Marijn van Putten (2022) ''Quranic Arabic: From its Hijazi origins to its classical reading traditions'', p. 224 (downloadable free in pdf format)<ref name="vanPutten2022">van Putten, Marijn, [https://brill.com/view/title/61587 Quranic Arabic: From its Hijazi origins to its classical reading traditions], Leiden: Brill, 2022 isbn: 9789004506251</ref>|2=The earliest manuscripts, those that can be dated to the seventh century, lack any form of vocalization signs and purely reflect the standard Uthmanic text, a consonantal skeleton (e.g. cpp, bl, Arabe 330g, Birmingham, Cadbury Research Library, Islamic Arabic 1572b). By the 8th century a system of red dots developed to write the vowel signs.}}
 
Since there was agreement on how to read most of the Quran, the oral tradition(s) and obviousness must have prevented disagreement for the most part in reading the text. Nevertheless, around 1400 words have variant readings even between the canonical (accepted) oral readings of the Quranic text and there were many thousands more non-canonical variants recited in the first few centuries (see [[Textual History of the Qur'an#The_number_of_Qira.27at_variants.2C_canonical_and_non-canonical|Textual History of the Qur'an]]. Moreover, Marijn van Putten and his colleagues have demonstrated with a wide range of evidence that the original dialect of the Quran lacked certain elements like hamza, tanwin, and had a reduced grammatical case system. He writes:
 
{{Quote|1=Marijn van Putten (2022) ''Quranic Arabic: From its Hijazi origins to its classical reading traditions'', p. 154 (downloadable free in pdf format)<ref name="vanPutten2022" />|2=Pragmatic considerations and extra-linguistic hints would have resolved to a large extent the resulting ambiguities. Nevertheless, "to the Quranic reciters, placement of ʔiʕrāb and tanwīn was a highly theoretical undertaking, not one that unambiguously stemmed from its prototypical recitation and composition."<ref>Ibid. pp. 153-154.</ref> }}
 
On ambiguities in the consonantal text (rasm), van Putten writes:
 
{{Quote|1=Marijn van Putten (2022) ''Quranic Arabic: From its Hijazi origins to its classical reading traditions'', pp. 53-4 (downloadable free in pdf format)<ref name="vanPutten2022" />|2=Occasionally it is possible to envision those variant readings indeed have origins in a pre-existent oral tradition where the rasm, by accident, accommodated both readings. For example, in Q33:68 ʕāṣim is the only one to read wa-ʔalʕan-hum laʕnan kabīran “and curse them with great cursing”, rather than wa-ʔalʕan-hum laʕnan kaṯīran “and curse them with many a curse.” (Ibn al-Ǧazarī, §3952). The difference between these two readings comes down to a difference in dotting in the word كٮٮرا which could either be read kaṯīran or kabīran, but these two readings are semantically and phonetically so close, that it does not seem unlikely that such variants could have existed in the oral transmission of the Quranic text before canonization, and by sheer accident happened to agree with the rasm when it was instated. '''However, there are other variants where the phonetics are rather different, and it is by coincidence that in the ambiguous script of Arabic they happen to be written the same.''' It is unlikely that these kinds of variants do not have their basis in the Uthmanic rasm. Some salient examples of this point are the following: ڡٮٮٮٮوا fa-taṯabbatū ‘proceed with caution!’ (al-Kisāʔī; Ḥamzah; Xalaf), fa-tabayyanū ‘be clear!’ (the others) (Q4:94; Q49:6, Ibn al-Ǧazarī, §2951); ىڡصالحٯ yaquṣṣu l-ḥaqq ‘he tells the truth’ (Nafīʕ, ʔabū Ğaʕfar Ibn Kaṯīr, ʕāṣim), yaqḍi l-ḥaqq ‘he decides the truth’ (the others) (Q6:57; Ibn al-Ǧazarī, §3029);7 ٮٮلوا tatlū ‘recites, recounts’ (al- Kisāʔī; Ḥamzah; Xalaf) tablū ‘tests’ (the others) (Q10:30; ibn al-Ǧazarī, §3354). '''In such cases, the most likely explanation as to why the readers disagree is not that they were transmitting an oral transmission, but rather that the readers were confronted with an ambiguous rasm and interpreted it in two ways that both made semantic sense.'''}}
 
For more information on the dialect of the Quranic consonantal text see [[Textual History of the Qur'an#Changes_to_the_spoken_Arabic_dialect_of_the_Qur.27an|Textual History of the Qur'an]].
 
==Importance of Diacritical marks==
 
As we stated earlier, the Qur'an was written largely without diacritical marks. At the time of Muhammad, Arabic orthography was yet to develop into what we have known for centuries. There was very limited use of marks to distingish between consonants of the Arabic alphabet of similar shape (homographic) and there were no short vowel marks or word-internal alifs. While agreement on how to read most of the text is due to it being obvious and a common memory or understanding for the most part, the history of recorded variant recitations and manuscripts show that often the readers needed to interpret and choose for themselves from the many possible meanings available in the Arabic without diacritical marks.
 
In order for non-Arabic speakers to understand what is being discussed here, we will look at several Arabic words and how the use of diacritical marks for consonants affect their meanings and can even change one word into another of a completely different consonantal root:


The word for “girl” is “bent” (بنت). The word is composed of three letters which are “Ba” (ب), “n” or noon” (ن), and “Ta” (ت). When these three letters are connected to each other without diacritical marks they will appear identical. They will look like three adjacent crescents facing upwards (بنت without dots). The difference between them is nothing. Only the diacritical marks (and the dots) can differentiate between them. Here is how it works:
The word for “girl” is “bent” (بنت). The word is composed of three letters which are “Ba” (ب), “n” or noon” (ن), and “Ta” (ت). When these three letters are connected to each other without diacritical marks they will appear identical. They will look like three adjacent crescents facing upwards (بنت without dots). The difference between them is nothing. Only the diacritical marks (and the dots) can differentiate between them. Here is how it works:
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*If you put two points below the first, one below the second, and three above the third, it's "yaboth" (يبث) which translates as "he broadcasts" in English.
*If you put two points below the first, one below the second, and three above the third, it's "yaboth" (يبث) which translates as "he broadcasts" in English.


Even after adding diacritical points above and below the Arabic letters, the meaning of the word will not be explicit with certainty except after adding the vocalization marks (بَ ba, بِ bi, بُ bu). Both the diacritical points and the vocalization marks were not used in the ancient Arabic writings during the time of Muhammad. Therefore, there would have been a wide range of problems and an enormous task for the interpreters to add diacritical points and vocalization marks on every letter in the Qur'an. Therefore there was a lot of opportunity to make mistakes that would have made it impossible to ensure the original word meanings of the Qur'an were unchanged.
For some Quranic examples of variants in the reading traditions caused by amiguity in the written text see [[https://wikiislam.net/wiki/Textual_History_of_the_Qur%27an#Differences_in_the_Hafs_and_Warsh_Texts|Textual History of the Qur'an]].


In order to better understand the meaning of this, we will quote Ibn Kammuna, a native Arabic speaker:
==Other Vocalization Marks==


{{Quote||I do not think an English reader will appreciate how big a problem this is without solid examples. Let me give a couple of examples. Take two Arabic words like “Sami” and “Shami”. The two words are written in Arabic the same way except for one minor thing: the word “Sami” has no dots on top of the letter “S” (س). the word “Shami” has three dots on the same first letter (ش). So the difference between the two words is just three dots on the first letter. Now, the difference in meaning is huge. The word “Sami” in Arabic can be a man’s name, but also means “High in position”. A man with “Sami” morals means a man with high moral values. The word “Shami”, on the other hand, means “Syrian”, or someone from “Sham” (could mean the from the city of Damascus, or from the country of Syria). Here is another example: take the word “Hal” in Arabic (with "heavy H" ح). It mean “situation”. In contrast, the word “Khal” may mean “Empty” or “Uncle-on the mother’s side”. Now the difference in writing in the Arabic language between the two words is just one dot on top of the first letter (خ) in the word “Khal”. The word “Hal” is not dotted at all. You see, one dot difference can make a huge difference in the meaning of the word in the Arabic language. This huge Qur’anic problem cannot be appreciated by an English reader without live examples. I tried to clarify this matter in the two examples I just mentioned.
Even after adding consonantal diacritical points above and below the Arabic letters, the meaning of the word will not be explicit with certainty except after adding the vocalization marks for short vowels (for example بَ ba, بِ bi, بُ bu). These marks include Damma, Fathha, kassra, shadda, scoon, madda, etc. They are put above or below the letter to affect its pronunciation and carry grammatical and often syntactical meaning.  


As if this is not enough, vowels presented another problem for the Muslims. Arabic script is consonantal. Vowels influence the meaning in the Arabic language. They are represented by orthographical signs above or below the letters. So, after settling the problems associated with consonants, Muslims had to decide on which vowels to employ in each case where there is a wording issue. Using different vowel renders a different meaning!
Both consonantal diacritical points and the vocalization marks were not or barely used in the ancient Arabic writings during the time of Muhammad. Therefore, there would have been a wide range of problems and an enormous task for the interpreters to add diacritical points and vocalization marks on every letter in the Qur'an. Therefore there was a lot of opportunity to make mistakes that would have made it impossible to ensure the original word meanings of the Qur'an were unchanged.


The above problems eventually led to the growth of different centers with their own traditions on how the Qur’anic texts should be pointed and vowelized. So, it is clear that Uthman did not succeed in getting rid of the older Qur’anic codices. Charles Adams observes about the Qur’an:
For example:
*The word "bent" (بنت) will become "banat" (بنَت) by putting "Fathha" (َ ) on the second letter, which means "she built" in English.


…far from being a single text passed down inviolate from the time of ‘Uthman’s commission, literally thousands of variant readings of particular verses were known in the first three (Muslim) centuries. Theses variants affected even the ‘Uthmanic’ codex, making it difficult to know what its true form may have been.”<ref>Ibn Kammuna - [http://www.faithfreedom.org/articles/quran-koran/collection-of-the-qur%E2%80%99an-2/ Collection of the Quran Part 2] -  Faith Freedom International, February 12, 2009</ref>}}
*The word "bayn" بين ( which translates as “between” in English) will become "bayyan" (بّيّن) if we add "shadda" (ّ ) on the first and the second letters, which means "He manifests" in English.


In the book "The History of Islamic Law", the author Dr. Ahmad Shalabi, professor of Islamic history and civilization states:
*The word "nabat" نبت (which translates as “grew” in English, for something that was planted) will become "nabott" نبُت if we add "damma” (ُ ) to the second letter, which means "we make a decision" in English.


{{Quote||The Qur’an was written in the Kufi script without diacritical points, vocalization or literary productions. No distinction was made between such words as ‘slaves’, ‘a slave’, and ‘at’ or ‘to have’, or between ‘to trick’ and ‘to deceive each other’, or between ‘to investigate’ or ‘to make sure’. Because of the Arab skill in Arabic language their reading was precise. Later when non-Arabs embraced Islam, errors began to appear in the reading of the Qur’an when those non-Arabs and other Arabs whose language was corrupted, read it. The incorrect reading changed the meaning sometimes.<ref>Dr. Ahmad Shalabi, "The History of Islamic Law", p. 43</ref>}}
For some Quranic examples of variants in the reading traditions caused by amiguity in the written text see [[https://wikiislam.net/wiki/Textual_History_of_the_Qur%27an#Differences_in_the_Hafs_and_Warsh_Texts|Textual History of the Qur'an]].


==Muslims Began Using Diacritical Marks Because Errors Began to Appear==
==Classical Muslim scholars: Diacritical marks were introduced because errors began to appear==


According to Ibn Taymiyyah in "Sheik of the Muslims", Muslims began using diacritical marks because reading errors began to appear:
According to Ibn Taymiyyah in "Sheik of the Muslims", Muslims began using diacritical marks because reading errors began to appear:
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The reason for this disagreement is because of the word لَٰمَسْتُمُ (''l<b>aa</b>mastum'') found in the Chapter of Women ([{{Quran-url-only|4|43}} verse 43]) and whether it has a long vowel ''a'' or not. Scholars Jalalayn and Badawi record that both ibn ’Umar and al-Shafi’i seriously disagree with ibn ’Abbas <ref>http://altafsir.com/Tafasir.asp?tMadhNo=0&tTafsirNo=74&tSoraNo=4&tAyahNo=43&tDisplay=yes&UserProfile=0&LanguageId=2</ref> in the way they interpret this verse because ibn ’Abbas insisted that the meaning intended here is actual intercourse while the former said no, it is enough for a man to touch the skin of a woman or her hand to require having his ablution (washing) repeated.
The reason for this disagreement is because of the word لَٰمَسْتُمُ (''l<b>aa</b>mastum'') found in the Chapter of Women ([{{Quran-url-only|4|43}} verse 43]) and whether it has a long vowel ''a'' or not. Scholars Jalalayn and Badawi record that both ibn ’Umar and al-Shafi’i seriously disagree with ibn ’Abbas <ref>http://altafsir.com/Tafasir.asp?tMadhNo=0&tTafsirNo=74&tSoraNo=4&tAyahNo=43&tDisplay=yes&UserProfile=0&LanguageId=2</ref> in the way they interpret this verse because ibn ’Abbas insisted that the meaning intended here is actual intercourse while the former said no, it is enough for a man to touch the skin of a woman or her hand to require having his ablution (washing) repeated.


==Other Vocalization Marks==
In addition to the diacritical marks, there are other forms of vocalization marks that change the pronunciation and meaning of a given word. These marks include Damma, Fathha, kassra, shadda, scoon, madda, etc. They are put above or below the letter to affect its pronunciation.
For example:
*The word "bent" (بنت) will become "banat" (بنَت) by putting "Fathha" (َ ) on the second letter, which means "she built" in English.
*The word "bayn" بين ( which translates as “between” in English) will become "bayyan" (بّيّن) if we add "shadda" (ّ ) on the first and the second letters, which means "He manifests" in English.
*The word "nabat" نبت (which translates as “grew” in English, for something that was planted) will become "nabott" نبُت if we add "damma” (ُ ) to the second letter, which means "we make a decision" in English.
==Conclusion==
Due to diacritical marks not being included in the original Qur'an and their use being so complex, and also because Muhammad allowed for more than one reading of each word, it is difficult to determine the original meaning of the text. Through the abundance of opportunities to make mistakes it is likely true that the Qur'an has been altered or at least its specific form forgotten and that the version we have with us today is not Allah’s word to the letter, as many claim.


==See Also==
==See Also==
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*[[Arabic letters and diacritics]]
*[[Arabic letters and diacritics]]
*[[Textual History of the Qur'an]]
*[[Textual History of the Qur'an]]
*[[Internal Rhymes as Evidence for Old Hijazi]]


==External Links==
==External Links==


*[http://www.answering-islam.org/Campbell/s3c3c.html Variants in the Qur'an] ''- Dr. William Campbell''
*[https://brill.com/display/title/61587?language=en Quranic Arabic: From its Hijazi Origins to its Classical Reading Traditions] by Marijn van Putten (2022) published by Brill (free for open access pdf download)
*[http://www.answering-islam.org/BehindVeil/btv8.html Qur'anic Language and Grammatical Mistakes] ''- Answering Islam''
*[https://quranvariants.wordpress.com Quran Variants blog and resources page]
*[http://www.faithfreedom.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=37990 Diacritical Markings in the Quran Change the Meanings] ''- FFI Forum''


==References==
==References==
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