Scholars
The Qur'an as a Text
The Qur'an as text: the revelation that came down on the Prophet over twenty-three years in Mecca and Medina — 114 suras ranging from short Meccan to long Medinan. The huffaz kept it in their hearts and the scribes wrote it on sheets, bones and patches; Abu Bakr gathered it into one collection after Yamama through Zayd ibn Thabit, then Uthman copied it into uniform mushafs sent to the provinces. The text has stayed one and unchanged since that day: Muslims read it in Arabic in every tongue, children in Jakarta memorise it as in Damascus, and every mushaf carries the same script. It is the oldest holy book whose text has run unbroken since its descent — the standing miracle. It is the one book a whole nation keeps by heart: sixty-odd centuries of days have not changed a letter — the lesson that the true word does not perish.