Contradictions in the Quran: Difference between revisions

In contrast, the longer surah 21 version has the people return to find the smashed idols but Abraham is no longer present there. They send a party to bring him, and then back amidst the idols he shows them the folly of their ways. So in that version it is Abraham who comes to them.

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|21|57|68}}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|37|87|97}}

The parallel Guests of Abraham stories in the Quran have been analysed in depth in a paper by Joseph Witztum in order to determine the relative chronology of the parallel passages.<ref>Joseph Witztum. “Thrice upon a Time: Abraham’s Guests and the Study of Intra-Quranic Parallels”. In Holger Zellentin (ed.), The Quran’s Reformation of Judaism and Christianity: Return to the Origins. London: Routledge, 2019, pp. 277–302.</ref> Four contradictions between them are particularly notable here.

! scope=col style="width: 33%;" |{{Quran-range|11|69|79}} (see also {{Quran-range|29|31|32}}

! scope=col style="width: 33%;" |{{Quran-range|15|51|60}}

After the business with Abraham and his wife, the angels visit Lot and his family to save them from the destruction coming to the people there.

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|15|61|74}}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|11|77|83}}

Three contradictions are evident in these parallel passages.

2) Another contradiction concerns the context in which they tell Lot of their mission to save him and his family. In 15:61-66, the angels reveal this in response to him addressing them as people unknown / strange when they first come to him, alluding in verse 63 to Lot's pleadings to the people in other passages. In surah 11, instead they reveal this to ease the fear he expresses about the mob.

All three versions have “O Moses, Indeed, I am Allah” as a common element in the Arabic. However, there is otherwise little attempt at consistency in the variant stories. In surah 27, Allah is introduced as “Lord of the worlds” in the 3rd person and introduces himself with the common element along with another title. In surah 28 we see the opposite sequence with the “Lord of the Worlds” title used in the 1st person after the common introduction.

! scope=col style="width: 33%;" |{{Quran-range|20|10|16}}

! scope=col style="width: 33%;" |{{Quran-range|27|7|9}}

Regardless of differences that could be simply put down to the vagaries of translation from ancient languages or alternative paraphrases and shortening for brevity, the information content and sequencing is more fundamental and susceptible to contradiction, particularly when the Quran claims that such and such was said by a person on a particular occasion.

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|26|10|17}}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|28|33|35}}

{{Quran-range|20|47|49}} narrates Allah's instructions to Moses at the fire and his first encounter with Pharaoh, ending with a display of miracles and Pharaoh's subsequent scheming. In this passage, Allah tells Moses to say that he and Aaron are "messengers of your Lord" and the account of their first encounter begins with Pharaoh asking, "So who is the Lord of you two, O Moses?". However, in {{Quran-range|26|16|23}} Allah instructs them to use a different title, "Lord of the worlds", which Pharaoh then enquires upon at the start of the narration of their first encounter, again before the display of miracles and Pharaoh's subsequent scheming. Similarly, {{Quran|7|104}} narrates "And Moses said, "O Pharaoh, I am a messenger from the Lord of the worlds" on their first encounter.

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|20|47|49}}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|26|16|23}}

Coming after Moses has impressed Pharaoh with the miracles of the serpent and white hand, both surah 7 and 26 immediately then describe a discussion between Pharaoh and his chiefs. In surah 7, Pharaoh asks his council what do they instruct/advise (famādhā tamurūna?), but in surah 26, the same question is transferred from his mouth to the council, apparently asking themselves (in both versions the addressee of the question is plural, and the addressee of the answer is singular i.e. Pharaoh).

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|7|109|112}}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|26|34|35}}

There was some discussion by exegetes as to whether “his people” in 10:83 refers to the people of Moses or (awkwardly as al-Tabari notes, since he is only named subsequently) the people of Pharaoh. Regardless, it contradicts the other surahs in which the magicians now believed in him.

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|26|38|51}} (see also {{Quran-range|7|113|129}} and {{Quran-range|20|60|76}})

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|7|161|162}}

However, verses 28:40 and 51:40 on the right column state instead that Allah took (akhadhnāhu) Pharaoh and his army then threw them (fanabadhnāhum) into the sea (fī l-yami).

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran|10|90}}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran|28|40}}

|So We took him and his soldiers and threw them into the sea. So see how was the end of the wrongdoers.  

|}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|20|77|78}}<BR />

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran|51|40}}

|So We took him and his soldiers and cast them into the sea, and he was blameworthy.  

|}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|26|63|66}}

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After the golden calf incident, Moses grabs Aaron, who makes two very different pleadings in surahs 7 and 20. It is possible with some awkwardness to harmonise that he gave the two different excuses, one after the other, though it is further worth noting that in both accounts Aaron's protest begins with the common address “O son of my mother” as Moses grabs him.

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran|7|150}}<BR />

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|20|90|95}}

In very similar passages in which Muhammad is asked to mention an episode occurring some time after the exodus from Egypt, parallel verses invert the order in which Allah quotes himself telling the children of Israel to enter a city gate bowing humbly and request relief of their burdens. Ironically, the next verse in each case complains about Allah's words being changed.

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|2|58|59}}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran-range|7|161|162}}

Academic scholars have noticed that the author or editor of the Quran appears to have combined in 2:36-39 the stories of Adam in 7:22-25 and 20:121-124, with the awkward result that Allah tells Adam and company to go down from paradise twice, in verses 2:36 and 2:38.<ref>Witztum, Joseph. 2011. [https://www.docdroid.net/EBk1ghM/the-syriac-milieu-of-the-quran-the-recasting-of-biblical-narratives-pdf The Syriac Milieu of the Qur’ ̄an: The Recasting of Biblical Narratives] Ph.D. thesis, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA. pp. 69-79</ref> In Surah 7 Adam requests forgiveness from Allah, but does not say whether Allah did forgive him. Instead, it immediately proceeds to the command to descend taken word for word from 7:24 in the Arabic text. Surah 20 on the other hand has Adam forgiven before the command to descend (part of a longer section narrated chronologically). Surah 2 appears to fix the ambiguity in surah 7 by inserting Allah's forgiveness after (fa - see note above) the part of the descent command from surah 7, which can be seen also partly in 20:123 where the forgiveness has already occurred.

! scope=col style="width: 33%;" |{{Quran-range|2|36|39}}

! scope=col style="width: 33%;" |{{Quran-range|7|22|25}}

"They will know tomorrow who is the insolent liar" could instead mean that the people of Thamud are to be destroyed that next day and thereby learn that Salih is not a liar. However, according to verse 65 of the surah 11 story, their destruction will instead come three days after they hamstrung the she-camel.

! scope=col style="width: 33%;" |{{Quran-range|54|23|31}}

! scope=col style="width: 33%;" |{{Quran-range|27|7|9}}

In an attempt to rescue the contradiction, Al-Tabari in his tafsir for 41:13 claims that sa'iqatan (thunderbolt) is a catch all term for anything that destroys something, while al-Qurtubi claims that the wind was the sa'iqatan.

! {{Quran-range|41|13|17}}

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41|17|And as for Thamud, We guided them, but they preferred blindness over guidance, so the thunderbolt of humiliating punishment seized them for what they used to earn.

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! {{Quran-range|46|24|25}}

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46:25 '''Destroying everything by command of its Lord. And they became so that nothing was seen [of them] except their dwellings.''' Thus do We recompense the criminal people.

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! {{Quran-range|51|41|42}}

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51:45 And they were unable to arise, nor could they defend themselves.

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! {{Quran-range|54|18|20}}

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54:20 '''Extracting the people as if they were trunks of palm trees uprooted'''

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! {{Quran-range|69|4|8}}

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Amidst a dialogue with the angel bringing good tidings of John, Zechariah answers that his wife is barren and he is too old in 19:8, but answers the opposite way around in 3:40. The passages then resume in close parallel.

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran|19|8}}

! scope=col style="width: 50%;" |{{Quran|3|40}}