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Historical Errors in the Quran: Difference between revisions
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→Nabatean rock tombs at al-Hijr as homes and palaces from before the time of Pharaoh: Have expanded the historical errors of the Thamud story, and added more references for e.g. the chronology of them vs Moses prove/cite incorrect claim.
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(→Nabatean rock tombs at al-Hijr as homes and palaces from before the time of Pharaoh: Have expanded the historical errors of the Thamud story, and added more references for e.g. the chronology of them vs Moses prove/cite incorrect claim.) |
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'''Pharaoh (for this was the Egyptian tyrant's name)''' attempted to counter the divine signs performed by Moses and Aaron with magical tricks performed by his sorcerers. 47 When Moses again turned his own rod into an animal before the eyes of the Egyptians, they thought that the sorcery of the magicians could equally work miracles with their rods. This deceit was exposed when the serpent produced from the staff of Moses ate the sticks of sorcery—the snakes no less! The rods of the sorcerers had no means of defense nor any power of life, only the appearance which cleverly devised sorcery showed to the eyes of those easily deceived.</ref> It is also sometimes written this way in the Syriac bible (the Peshitta - believed to be published 2nd century CE.)<ref>Peshitta verse [https://dukhrana.com/peshitta/analyze_verse.php?verse=Acts+7:13&font=Estrangelo+Edessa Acts 7:13]</ref> such as in Acts 7:13 so Muhammad would not be the first to make a huge mistake, but rather could have simply heard it this way to begin with. | '''Pharaoh (for this was the Egyptian tyrant's name)''' attempted to counter the divine signs performed by Moses and Aaron with magical tricks performed by his sorcerers. 47 When Moses again turned his own rod into an animal before the eyes of the Egyptians, they thought that the sorcery of the magicians could equally work miracles with their rods. This deceit was exposed when the serpent produced from the staff of Moses ate the sticks of sorcery—the snakes no less! The rods of the sorcerers had no means of defense nor any power of life, only the appearance which cleverly devised sorcery showed to the eyes of those easily deceived.</ref> It is also sometimes written this way in the Syriac bible (the Peshitta - believed to be published 2nd century CE.)<ref>Peshitta verse [https://dukhrana.com/peshitta/analyze_verse.php?verse=Acts+7:13&font=Estrangelo+Edessa Acts 7:13]</ref> such as in Acts 7:13 so Muhammad would not be the first to make a huge mistake, but rather could have simply heard it this way to begin with. | ||
===Nabatean rock tombs at al-Hijr as homes and palaces from before the time of Pharaoh=== | ===Nabatean rock tombs at al-Hijr as homes and palaces from before the time of Pharaoh=== | ||
The Qur'anic narrative concerning Thamūd contains several major historical inaccuracies: | |||
The Qur'an | # The structures at al-Hijr were tombs, not homes or palaces, as described in the Qur'an. | ||
# These tombs were built by the Nabateans, not the Thamūd. | |||
# The timeline of Thamūd's existence does not align with the Qur'anic claim that they predated Moses. | |||
# There is no evidence of a sudden mass extinction event for the people as described in the Qur'an. | |||
{{ | ==== Calling the Tombs Homes and Palaces ==== | ||
The Qur'an frequently lists destroyed peoples of the past, particularly the peoples of Noah, Lot, Pharaoh's army, Midian, 'Ad, and its successor, Thamūd. The destruction of Thamūd after they disbelieved their prophet Salih is mentioned multiple times, either by an earthquake ({{Quran|7|78}}) or a thunderous blast ({{Quran|54|31}}). When describing this tale, a key error in the Qur'an is the description of Thamud's structures as homes and palaces. Thamud were a real ancient but extinct people in Arabia centuries before Muhammad that feature in foreign accounts<ref name=":02">Hoyland, Robert G.. Arabia and the Arabs: From the Bronze Age to the Coming of Islam (Peoples of the Ancient World) (p. 68). Taylor & Francis. Kindle Edition. | |||
''..Sargon II (721–705 BC) boasts of having defeated them along with other tribes, ‘the distant desert-dwelling Arabs’, and of having resettled the survivors in Samaria (AR 2.17, 118). In classical times we find them recorded in texts such as Pliny’s Natural history and Ptolemy’s Geography, and some groups of them enrolled in the Roman army. One such group constructed a temple at Rawwafa in northwest Arabia and commemorated it with a bilingual Greek–Nabataean inscription..''</ref> and pre-Islamic poetry including their destruction legend<ref>See: Bulletin of SOAS, 74, 3 (2011), 397–416. © School of Oriental and African Studies, 2011. doi:10.1017/S0041977X11000309 ''Religious poetry from the Quranic milieu: Umayya b. Abī l-Salt on the fate of the Thamūd'' Nicolai Sinai S0041977X11000309jra 397..416 | |||
See also: Hoyland, Robert G.. ''Arabia and the Arabs: From the Bronze Age to the Coming of Islam'' (Peoples of the Ancient World) (p. 224). Taylor & Francis. Kindle Edition.</ref> (though likely originally missing the monotheistic messenger aspect; with Muhammad being the one to bring these local tales into salvation history).<ref>Ibid pp.408. Sinai, 2011. [https://almuslih.org/wp-content/uploads/Library/Sinai,%20N%20-%20Religious%20poetry.pdf Religious poetry from the Quranic milieu: Umayya b. Abī l-Salt on the fate of the Thamūd]</ref> | |||
The | The Thamud are described as the builders of well-known palaces and homes, skillfully carved from the mountains, clarified in the Quran and hadith as a place in Arabia known as al-Hijr (the rocky tract), currently called 'madāʼin Ṣāliḥ; literally 'Cities of Salih' after this exact story. | ||
Al-Hijr is accepted as this location by Islamic scholars.<ref>E.g. see tafsirs/commentaries [https://quranx.com/tafsirs/15.80 on verse 15:80]</ref> It is also mentioned once by name in Quran 15:80-83 ("the companions of al-Hijr") and its description and destruction matches that for Thamud.{{Quote|1={{Quran-range|15|80|83}}|2=And certainly did the companions of al-Hijr [ al-Hijr ٱلْحِجْرِ ] deny the messengers. And We gave them Our signs, but from them they were turning away. And they used to carve from the mountains, houses [ buyūtan بُيُوتًا ], feeling secure. But the shriek seized them at early morning.}}Al-Hijr is also identified in hadiths as the "al Hijr, land of Thamud" (al-hijr ardi Thamudi الْحِجْرِ أَرْضِ ثَمُودَ):{{Quote|{{Bukhari|4|55|562}}|Narrated `Abdullah bin `Umar: | |||
The people landed at the land of Thamud called Al-Hijr along with Allah's Messenger (ﷺ) and they took water from its well for drinking and kneading the dough with it as well. (When Allah's Messenger (ﷺ) heard about it) he ordered them to pour out the water they had taken from its wells and feed the camels with the dough, and ordered them to take water from the well whence the she-camel (of Prophet Salih) used to drink.}}However, modern archaeology has confirmed that these were not homes or palaces but elaborately carved tombs. These tombs, over 100 in number, vary in size, with some being very large and others quite small. Even a 14th-century Arab traveller believed they contained the bones of the people of Thamud.<ref>[https://whc.unesco.org/document/168945 al-Hijr UNESCO nomination document] p.36 (includes detailed site description)</ref> | |||
{{Quote|{{Quran|26|149}}|And you carve out of the mountains, homes [ buyūtan بُيُوتًا ], with skill.}} | The Quran explicitly states that Thamud carved palaces from plains and homes from mountains:{{Quote|{{Quran-range|7|73|74}}|And to the Thamud [We sent] their brother Salih. He said, "O my people, worship Allah; you have no deity other than Him. There has come to you clear evidence from your Lord. This is the she-camel of Allah [sent] to you as a sign. So leave her to eat within Allah 's land and do not touch her with harm, lest there seize you a painful punishment. And remember when He made you successors after the 'Aad and settled you in the land, [and] '''you take for yourselves palaces from its plains and carve from the mountains, homes [ buyūtan بُيُوتًا <ref>[http://www.studyquran.org/LaneLexicon/Volume1/00000317.pdf Lane's Lexicon p. 280 بيوت ]</ref>]'''. Then remember the favors of Allah and do not commit abuse on the earth, spreading corruption."}}{{Quote|{{Quran|26|149}}|And you carve out of the mountains, homes [ buyūtan بُيُوتًا ], with skill.}}However, the structures identified at al-Hijr were in fact formal tombs, not homes, contradicting the Qur'anic descriptions.<ref name=":1">[https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1293 Hegra Archaeological Site (al-Hijr / Madā ͐ in Ṣāliḥ)] - unesco.org (includes many photographs of the tombs)</ref> | ||
==== Built by the Nabateans, not the people of Thamūd ==== | |||
Another key error is attributing these structures to the Thamūd. It is now known that these rock-cut tombs were built by the Nabateans, a separate group that lived much later than the Thamud, from the 2nd century BCE to the 2nd century CE.<ref name=":1" /> [https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/326/ Petra] in Jordan was the Nabateans' more famous city before al-Hijr which contains the same Nabatean structures. | |||
Nabatean inscriptions at the site forbid opening the tombs, reusing them, or moving the bodies. The actual town of "al-Hijr / Hegra", where the people lived, was built of mud-brick and stone some distance from the surrounding rock-cut tombs.<ref>[https://www.arabnews.com/node/350178 History and mystery of Al-Hijr, ancient capital of the Nabateans in Arabia] - Arabnews.com</ref> This confirms that the elaborate structures in the mountains were not homes but were burial sites made by a later civilization. | |||
{{Quote|{{Quran|89|9}}|And [with] Thamud, who carved out the rocks in the valley?}} | Despite this, the Qur'an presents the Thamud as the builders of these mountain structures, again linking their story to visible ruins and emphasizing their destruction as a theological lesson who are told to reflect on them as signs of God;<ref name=":02" /> Allāh left them specifically for that purpose,<ref name=":02" /> so we can assume they were still there and known to the audience, at least at the time of preaching. These were well known to Muhammad's listeners:{{Quote|{{Quran|29|38}}|And [We destroyed] 'Aad and Thamud, and it has become clear to you from their [ruined] dwellings [ masākinihim مَّسَٰكِنِهِمْ <ref>[http://www.studyquran.org/LaneLexicon/Volume4/00000118.pdf Lane's Lexicon p. 1394 مسكن]</ref>]. And Satan had made pleasing to them their deeds and averted them from the path, and they were endowed with perception.}}{{Quote|{{Quran|89|9}}|And [with] Thamud, who carved out the rocks in the valley?}}The Nabateans are a distinct people from the Thamud, as evidenced in Arabic literature including the hadith which also distinguishes the [https://sunnah.com/search?q=nabatean Nabateans (al-Anbat)](e.g. {{Muslim|32|6330}}) from the [https://sunnah.com/search?q=thamud Thamud]. | ||
The companies / factions (l-aḥzābu) is a term used collectively for the list of destroyed cities also in {{Quran|38|12-14}}, with each people (umma) getting their own separate messenger (e.g. {{Quran|13|7}}).<ref>Durie, Mark. ''The Qur’an and Its Biblical Reflexes: Investigations into the Genesis of a Religion (pp. 127).'' Lexington Books.</ref> However given the similar locations of past Arab groups, it is easy to see how they were confused. | |||
{{Quote|{{Quran | ==== Before the Time of Moses ==== | ||
The Qur'an references the Thamud as a people who lived before the time of Pharaoh, implying they existed long before Moses before being destroyed:{{Quote|{{Quran|40|28-37}}|And a believing man from the family of Pharaoh who concealed his faith said [...] And he who believed said, "O my people, indeed I fear for you [a fate] like the day of the companies - Like the custom of the people of Noah and of 'Aad and Thamud and those after them. And Allah wants no injustice for [His] servants.}}However, historical and archaeological evidence shows that the Thamud were an ancient but extinct Arabian people who existed from the 8th century BCE to the 5th century CE.<ref name=":2">[https://www.britannica.com/topic/Thamud Thamūd] (ancient Arabian tribe) - Peoples of Asia - Britannica | |||
''Thamūd, in ancient Arabia, tribe or group of tribes known to be extant from the 8th century bce to the 5th century ce..''</ref> Meanwhile, Moses is traditionally dated to the 14th–13th century BCE,<ref>[https://www.britannica.com/biography/Moses-Hebrew-prophet Moses] - Brittanica. Dewey M. Beegle. 2025 (last updated)</ref> though there is ongoing debate among historians about his existence and the exact timeline of early Israelite history. Nevertheless, even ignoring biblical and Islamic (but non-Quranic such as Tafsirs) writings, the most chronologically late estimates must place Moses' time to at least 900 - 850BCE as this is approximately when Israel's formation occurred,<ref>Finkelstein, Israel, (2020). "Saul and Highlands of Benjamin Update: The Role of Jerusalem", in Joachim J. Krause, Omer Sergi, and Kristin Weingart (eds.), Saul, Benjamin, and the Emergence of Monarchy in Israel: Biblical and Archaeological Perspectives, SBL Press, Atlanta, GA, p. 48, footnote 57: | |||
''"...They became territorial kingdoms later, Israel in the first half of the ninth century BCE and Judah in its second half..."''</ref> while the Thamud are attested to have existed until much later than this period.<ref name=":2" /><ref name=":02" /> This discrepancy contradicts the Qur'anic implication that the Thamud predate Moses. In reality, they were a historical people who lived much later than traditionally assumed. | |||
There is also no archaeological evidence for mass sudden deaths of the entire people at once, or any writings from surrounding kingdoms that speak of this. | |||
===Countable currency in ancient Egypt=== | ===Countable currency in ancient Egypt=== | ||