A dowry is always given, and a simple marriage ceremony performed by afiki (a schoolmaster, or one who recites the Koran, properly one learned in fiqh, Mahommedan law) in the presence of two witnesses.
A fatwa is a decision according to Koran and Sunna, but without reasons, on an abstract case of law which is brought before the mufti by appeal from the cadi's judgment or by reference from the cadi himself.
A great number of explanations are current, some of which claim the authority of the Prophet himself; as, indeed, fictitious utterances of Mahomet play throughout a conspicuous part in the exegesis of the Koran.
A prolonged battle took place in July 657 in the plain of Siffin (Suffein), near the Euphrates; the fighting was at first, it is said, in favour of Ali, when suddenly a number of the enemy, fixing copies of the Koran to the points of their spears, exclaimed that "the matter ought to be settled by reference to this book, which forbids Moslems to shed each other's blood."
A witty man, being asked his opinion about Abu Ja`far (Mansur) and Abu Moslim, said, alluding to the Koran 21, verse 22, "if there were two Gods, the universe would be ruined."
According to Shafi`ite law, such a cadi must be a male, free, adult Moslem, intelligent, of unassailed character, able to see, hear and write, learned in the Koran, the traditions, the Agreement, the differences of the legal schools, acquainted with Arabic grammar and the exegesis of the Koran.
According to the dominant view, however, the ritual use of the Koran is not in the least concerned with the sacred words being understood, but solely with their being quite properly recited.
After a valiant combat, the caliph retired to one of his apartments and sat with the Koran on his knee, in order to die just as Othman had died.
All efforts of European scholars to prove the existence of later interpolations in the Koran have failed.
All modern 1 It is useful to compare the critical study of the Koran, where, however, the investigation of its various " revelations " is simpler than that of the biblical " prophecies " on account of the greater wealth of independent historical tradition.
All pupils were taught to recite portions of the Koran, and a proportion of the scholars learnt to read and write Arabic and a little simple arithmetic. Those pupils who succeeded in committing to memory the whole of the Koran were regarded as fiki (learned in Mahommedan law), and as such escaped liability to military conscription.
Allah, the Koran says, is the best plotter.
Allusions in particular passages of the Koran to the " mother of the scripture," the invisible originals of the prophet's speech, led to the doctrine of its uncreated being.
Also, if they had already assembled the whole Koran, why was it so hard to produce a codex?
Among his numerous unpublished manuscripts are a translation of the Koran and a Histoire generale des empereurs tures.
Among the Mahommedans, the month Ramadan, in which the first part of the Koran is said to have been received, is by command of the prophet observed as a fast with extraordinary rigour.
Among the Moslems, the Koran has always been looked on as the most perfect model of style and language.
An effort was made by many to establish a more refined pronunciation for the Koran than was usual in common life or in secular literature.
An orthodox upper cadi was named instead, and the dogma of the created Koran was declared heresy; therewith began a persecution of all the adherents of that doctrine and other Motazilite tenets.
And since the use of the Koran in public worship, in schools and otherwise, is much more extensive than, for example, the reading of the Bible in most Christian countries, it has been truly described as the most widely-read book in existence.
And the Koran was written by a genuine eyewitness - Muhammad.
As president of the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery, Franklin signed a petition to Congress (12th February 1790) for immediate abolition of slavery, and six weeks later in his most brilliant manner parodied the attack on the petition made by James Jackson (1757-1806) of Georgia, taking off Jackson's quotations of Scripture with pretended texts from the Koran cited by a member of the Divan of Algiers in opposition to a petition asking for the prohibition of holding Christians in slavery.
Astonished by the sight of their long hair and extraordinary costume, he inquired what religion they professed, and getting no satisfactory answer threatened to exterminate them, unless by the time of his return from the war they should have embraced either Islam or one of the creeds tolerated in the Koran.
At certain periods after the burial, a khatmeh, or recitation of the whole of the Koran, is performed, and the tomb is visited by the women relations and friends of the deceased.
At the same time, the other forms of the Koran did not at once become extinct.
Avicenna was put in charge of a tutor, and his precocity soon made him the marvel of his neighbours, - as a boy of ten who knew by rote the Koran and much Arabic poetry besides.
Besides commentaries on the whole Koran, or on special parts and topics, the Moslems possess a whole literature bearing on their sacred book.
Besides the three main disciplines the student takes up according to his tastes other subjects, such as rhetoric (ma`ani wabayan), logic (mantiq), prosody (`arud), and the doctrine of the correct pronunciation of the Koran (gira'a watajwid).
But all the greatest of the Hebrew prophets fall back speedily upon the unassuming human " I "; while in the Koran the divine " I " is the stereotyped form of address.
But even if the appeal to the Koran had been a stratagem, as Ali himself thought, it would have been perfectly legitimate, according to the general views of that time, which had been also those of the Prophet.
But he was a philosopher as well, and apparently a sceptic. He is said to have rejected the Koran, to have denied the return to God, and to have regarded death as the end of existence.
But it must be remembered that it was never Mahomet's practice to refer explicitly to contemporary persons and affairs in the Koran.
But this redaction is not the close of the textual history of the Koran.
But though he was a student and friend of Ahmad ibn Hanbal he did not go in traditionalism to the length of some, and he defended al-Bukhari when the latter was driven from Nishapur for refusing to admit that the utterance (lafz) of the Koran by man was as uncreated as the Koran itself (see Mahommedan Religion; and Patton's Ahmad ibn Hanbal, 32 sqq.).
By the side of the niche was the pulpit (minbar), and sometimes in front of the latter a platform (dikka) raised on columns, from which chapters from the Koran were read to the people.
During the night following the interment, called the Night of Desolation, or that of Solitude, the soul being believed to remain with the body that one night, fikis are engaged at the house of the deceased to recite various portions of the Koran, and, commonly, to repeat the first clause of the profession of the faith, There is no God but God, three thousand times.
Eating swine is expressly forbidden in both the Bible and the Koran.
Even in the separate narrations we may observe how readily the Koran passes from one subject to another, how little care is taken to express all the transitions of thought, and.
Even the Arabian Moslems would only understand the Koran very dimly and imperfectly if they did not give special attention to the study of its interpretation.
Even while the Akils are assembled, strangers are readily enough admitted to the khalwas; but as long as these are present the ordinary ceremonies are neglected, and the Koran takes the place of the Druse Scriptures.
Every sentence of the Koran was to be interpreted in a general and universal sense; the special application to the circumstances of the time it was written was denied.
Every word of the Koran was to be taken in a literal sense, but that sense was to be learned from other uses in the Koran itself, not from the meaning in other literature of the time.
For the rest, it is highly improbable that before the Koran any real literary production - anything that could be strictly called a book - existed in the Arabic language.
From his youth he stored up in his memory the sacred words of the Koran, the traditions of the Prophet, the verses of the old poets and the stories of the ancient wars of the Arabs.
From that work we learn that the higher education of the youth of Bagdad consisted principally in a minute and careful study of the rules and principles of grammar, and in their committing to memory the whole of the Koran, a treatise or two on philology and jurisprudence, and the choicest Arabian poetry.
From the mass of material comprised in the Koran - and the account we have given is far from exhaustive - we should select the histories of the ancient prophets and saints Narratives.
Greek philosophy, and the interpretation of the Koran; that he was much addicted to worldly pleasures, especially to excessive wine drinking.
Hanbal (q.v.), founder of one of the four orthodox Moslem schools, were obliged to appear before an inquisitorial tribunal; and as they persisted in their belief respecting the Koran, they were thrown into prison.
He carried his zeal to such a point that, on the occasion of an exchange of Greek against Moslem prisoners in 845, he refused to receive those Moslem captives who would not declare their belief that the Koran was created.
He compiled the Koran, instituted the civil list, regulated the military organization.
He forgot that Ali himself, before the Battle of the Camel, appealed likewise to the decision of the Koran, and began the fight only when this had been rejected.
He had embraced the Motazilite doctrine about free will and predestination, and was in particular shocked at the opinion which had spread among the Moslem doctors that the Koran was the uncreated word of God.
He had won the affection of Omar, by his knowledge of the Koran and the Sunna of the Prophet, and by the fact that he had employed the first money he earned to purchase the freedom of his mother Somayya.
He studied the Koran and its traditions (hadith, sunna) there and on a student journey through Mesopotamia, Arabia and Syria.
He wrote also a Koran commentary, now apparently lost, and a hortatory epistle to Harlan al-Rashid.
Hence the style of the Koran is not poetical but rhetorical; and the powerful effect which some portions produce on us is gained by rhetorical means.
His book has attained a quasi-canonicity in Islam, being treated almost like the Koran, and to his grave solemn pilgrimages are made, and prayers are believed to be heard there.
His chief work is the commentary on the Koran entitled The Secrets of Revelation and the Secrets of Interpretation (Asrar uttanzil wa Asrar ut-ta' wil).
How the various pieces of the Koran took literary form is uncertain.
I wondered which verse in the Koran wrote openly about the Bible 's essence having been changed?
Ibn 'Abbas, a cousin of Mahomet, and the chief source of the traditional exegesis of the Koran, has, on theological and other grounds, given currency to a number of falsehoods; and at least some of his pupils have emulated his example.
Immediately on death the corpse is turned towards Mecca, and the women of the household, assisted by hired mourners, commence their peculiar wailing, while fikis recite portions of the Koran.
Impressed with the perversions and corruptions of popular Hinduism, Ram Mohan Roy investigated the Hindu Shastras, the Koran and the Bible, repudiated the polytheistic worship of the Shastras as false, and inculcated the reformed principles of monotheism as found in the ancient Upanishads of the Vedas.
In 1859 his history of the Koran won for him the prize of the French Academie des Inscriptions, and in the following year he rewrote it in German (Geschichte des Korans) and published it with additions at Göttingen.
In 1859 his history of the Koran won for him the prize of the French Academie des Inscriptions, and in the following year he rewrote it in German (Geschichte des Korans) and published it with additions at Göttingen.
In any case, when Mahomet died, the separate pieces of the Koran, notwithstanding their theoretical sacredness, existed only in scattered copies; they Trans= were consequently in great danger of being partially mission of or entirely destroyed.
In Arabic it is such an easy thing to accumulate masses of words with the same termination, that the gross negligence of the rhyme in the Koran is doubly remarkable.
In Bagdad he stayed several years, studying the Koran and other works of Moslem theology, for controversial purposes, arguing with Nestorian Christians, and writing.
In default of clear allusions to well-known events, or events whose date can be determined, we might indeed endeavour to trace the psychological development of the Prophet by means of the Koran, and arrange its parts accordingly.
In European libraries, besides innumerable modern manuscripts of the Koran, there are also codices, or fragments, of high antiquity, some of them probably dating from the 1st century of.
In fact, the Koran boldly challenged its opponents to produce ten suras, or even a single one, like those of the sacred book, and they never did so.
In his boyhood he devoted himself to the study of the Koran and the sciences, but from his twelfth year was almost constantly engaged in military expeditions, chiefly against the crusaders.
In legal matters he belonged first to the Shafi`ite school, but came to adopt the views of the Zahirites, who admitted only the external sense of the Koran and tradition, disallowing the use of analogy (Qiyas) and Taglid (appeal to the authority of an imam), and objecting altogether to the use of individual opinion (Ra`y).
In Mahomet's case this is the less wonderful because he was indebted to the instruction of Jews and Christians, whose Arabic - as the Koran pretty clearly intimates with regard to one of them - was very defective.
In Persia any person capable of reading the Koran and interpreting its laws may act as a priest (mullali), and as soon as such a priest becomes known for his just interpretation of the s/1ar and his superior knowledge of the traditions and articles of faith, he becomes a muftahid, literally meaning one who strives (to acquire knowledge), and is a chief priest.
In point of style and artistic effect, the different parts of the Koran are of very unequal value.
In recent times the Koran has been often printed and lithographed, both in the East and the West.
In short, however imperfectly the Koran may have been redacted, in the majority of cases the present suras are identical with the originals.
In that case, from which of the varying interpretations of the Koran would my going astray be a result?
In the Koran great prominence is given to his function as the medium of divine revelation, and, according to the Mahommedan interpreters, he it is who is referred to by the appellations "Holy Spirit" and "Spirit of Truth."
In the relevant verses of the Koran, there is a significant difference between the People of the Book and the idolaters.
In the same sense the term is used in the Koran of both Adam and David as the vicegerents of God.
In these latter schools an excellent elementary secular education is given, in addition to the instruction in the Koran, to which half the school hours are devoted.
Instruction.-Primary schools, maktab (where Persian and a little Arabic, sufficient for reading the Koran, and sometimes also a little arithmetic, are taught to boys between the ages of seven and twelve), are very numerous.
It appears to be traceable in its Greek dress in writings of the philosopher Democritus and the dramatist Menander; it was certainly known to the author of Tobit and perhaps to the author of Daniel; some would trace its influence in the New Testament, in the parable of the wicked servant and elsewhere; it was known to Mahomet and is referred to in the Koran; it has been included among the tales in the Arabian Nights; and it survives in a good many versions ancient and modern.
It is certain, indeed, that they still retain many Mahommedan customs. They take oaths equally on the Koran or on the Shastras; they employ.
It is doubtless to be regarded as a revival of ancient habits of thought and feeling among a people who had adopted the Koran, not by affinity, but by compulsion.
It is no wonder that the godless Korrishites thought these stories of the Koran not nearly so entertaining as those of Rostam and Ispandiar, related by Nadr the son of Harith, who had learned in the course of his trade journeys on the Euphrates the heroic mythology of the Persians.
It is not uncommon for the Koran, after a new subject has been entered on, to return gradually or suddenly to the former theme, - a proof that there at least separation is not to be thought of.
It is still used in the service of the synagogue, and the Mahommedans not only add it after reciting the first Sura of the Koran, but also when writing letters, &c., and repeat it three times, of ten with the word Qimtir, as a kind of talisman.
It is used to designate the religious duty inculcated in the Koran on the followers of Mahomet to wage war upon those who do not accept the doctrines of Islam.
It was held in great reverence by all Moslems, though it did not possess canonical authority, and furnished most of the materials out of which the Koran, as it now exists, was prepared.
It was inevitable, however, that discrepancies should emerge between the texts of professed scholars, and as these men in their several localities were authorities on the reading of the Koran, quarrels began to break out between the levies from different districts about the true form that these initials did not belong to Mahomet's text, but might be the monograms of possessors of codices, which, through negligence on the part of the editors, were incorporated in the final form of the Koran; he now deems it more probable that they are to be traced to the Prophet himself, as Sprenger, Loth and others suppose.
Its professors teach grammatical inflexion and syntax, rhetoric, versification, logic, theology, the exposition of the Koran, the traditions of the Prophet, the complete science of jurisprudence, or rather of religious, moral, civil and criminal law, which is chiefly founded on the Koran and the traditions, together with arithmetic as far as it is useful in matters of law.
Jabiz held him to be the most learned scholar in all branches of human knowledge, and Ibn Hisbam accepted his interpretation even of passages in the Koran.
Just over two hundred years later, its Rector John Rodwell published the first reliable English translation of the Koran.
Like the Koran it is often concise to obscurity and cannot be translated literally; It is interesting to compare the development of Jewish law with that of the Mahommedan, Roman and English systems, the points of resemblance and difference being extremely suggestive for other studies.
Mahomet repeatedly calls attention to the fact that the Koran is not written, like other sacred books, in a strange language, but in Arabic, and therefore is intelligible to all.
Mahommedanism has no priest hood standing between God and the congregation, but Koran and Sunna are full of minute rules for the details of private and civil life, the knowledge of which is necessarily in the hands of a class of professed theologians.
Many Moslems knew large the Koran.
Many of these, taken in part from Jewish and Christian sources, find a place in the Koran.
Milla is properly " word " (= Aramaic melltha), but in the Koran " religion."
Moreover, the origin of Arabic philology is intimately connected with the recitation and exegesis of the Koran.
Moreover, the right recitation of the Koran is an art which even people of Arab tongue can only learn with great difficulty.
Moreover, the word of God in the Koran left many practical points undecided, and therefore it was of the highest importance to know exactly how the Prophet had spoken and acted in various circumstances.
Muslims are commanded to fight the unbelievers in the Koran.
My father, who before had often read the Koran and never missed his obligatory prayers, became an atheist after this search.
Neither Koran nor Sunna distinguishes between temporal and spiritual powers, and no such distinction was known as long as the caliphs acted in all things as successors of the prophets and heads of the community of the faithful.
Nevertheless, a great deal remains to be accomplished by European scholarship for the correct interpretation of the Koran.
Nevertheless, it is on a false interpretation of this challenge that the dogma of the incomparable excellence of the style and diction of the Koran is based.
Now when we consider that at that time there were many Moslems who had heard the Koran from the mouth of the Prophet, that other measures of the imbecile Othman met with the most vehement resistance on the part of the bigoted champions of the faith, that these were still further incited against him by some of his ambitious old comrades until at last they murdered him, and finally that in the civil wars after his death the several parties were glad of any pretext for branding their opponents as infidels; - when we consider all this, we must regard it as a strong testimony in favour of Othman's Koran that no party found fault with his conduct in this matter, or repudiated the text formed by Zaid, who was one of the most devoted adherents of Othman and his family, and that even among the Shiites criticism of the caliph's action is only met with as a rare exception.
Of Saracen works actually belonging to the time of Saracen occupation there are no whole buildings remaining, but many inscriptions and a good many columns, often inscribed with passages from the Koran, which have been used up again in later buildings, specially in the porch of the metropolitan church.
Of the four exemplars of Othman's Koran, one was kept in Medina, and one was sent to each of the three metropolitan cities, Kufa, Basra, and Damascus.
Omar then began to fear that the Koran might be entirely forgotten, and he induced the Caliph Abu Bekr to undertake the collection of all its parts.
Omar, on hearing the request of his general, is said to have replied that if those books contained the same doctrine with the Koran, they could be of no use, since the Koran contained all necessary truths; but if they contained anything contrary to that book, they ought to be destroyed; and therefore, whatever their contents were, he ordered them to be burnt.
On his deathbed remorse seized him; he bestowed his goods on the poor, restored unjust gains, freed his slaves, and every third day till his death listened to the reading of the Koran.
On one occasion, when a dispute arose between two of his own followers as to the true reading of a passage which both had received from the Prophet himself, Mahomet is said to have explained that the Koran was revealed in seven forms.
On the other hand, it is yet more remarkable that several of such borrowed words in the Koran have a sense which they do not possess in the original language.
On the whole, while many parts of the Koran undoubtedly have considerable rhetorical power, even over an unbelieving stylistic reader, the book, aesthetically considered, is by Weak- no means a first-rate performance.
One can easily understand that differences of opinion may have existed as to whether and how far formularies of this kind belonged to the Koran.
One of the first acts of Motawakkil was the release of all those who had been imprisoned for refusing to admit the dogma of the created Koran, and the strict order to abstain from any litigation about the Book of God.
One would suppose that the most ignorant Jew could never have mistaken Haman, the minister of Ahasuerus, for the minister of Pharaoh, as happens in the Koran, or identified Miriam, the sister of Moses, with Mary (= Mariam), the mother of Christ.
Othman's Koran was not complete.
Outwardly they are Mussulmans of the Shiah branch, but most of them show little veneration for either Prophet or Koran, and the religion of some of them seems to be a mixture of Ali-Illahism involving a belief in successive incarnations combined with mysterious, ancient, heathen rites.
Police later said they had found a van containing detonators along with an Arabic language tape with verses from the Koran.
Scepticism as to the divine origin of the Koran led him to seek the true religion in an eclectic system.
Several of his essays first appeared in the Encyclopredia Britannica, and his article on the Koran, with some others, was republished in a volume called Oriental Sketches.
Shortly after Mahomet's death certain individuals applied themselves to the exposition of the Koran.
Similar faults are found in the non-narrative portions of the Koran.
Slight clerical errors there may have been, but the Koran of Othman contains none but genuine elements - though sometimes in very strange order.
So much for abrogated readings; the case is somewhat different when we come to the abrogation of laws and directions to the Moslems, which often occurs in the Koran.
Some passages are evidently fragmentary; and a few detached pieces are still extant which were originally parts of the Koran, although they have been omitted by Zaid.
Some writers, both in prose and verse, turned from the exhausted fields of the national glory of Persia, and chose their subjects from the chivalrous times of their own Bedouin conquerors, or even from the Jewish legends of the Koran.
Sprenger arrives at this explanation by a very artificial method; and besides, Mahomet was not so simple as the Moslem traditionalists, who imagined that the Abyssinians could read a piece of the Arabic Koran.
Such is an imperfect sketch of the composition and the internal history of the Koran, but it is probably sufficient to show that the book is a very heterogeneous collection.
Tha`alibi (q.v.) and Jurjani (q.v.) were almost contemporary, and a little later came Zamakhshari, whose philological works are almost as famous as his commentary on the Koran.
That even long portions of the Koran existed in written form from an early date may be pretty safely inferred from various indications; especially from the fact that in Mecca the Prophet had caused insertions to be made, and pieces to be erased in his previous revelations.
That the adversaries should produce any sample whatsoever of poetry or rhetoric equal to the Koran is not at all what the Prophet demands.
The account of this collection of the Koran has reached - us in several substantially identical forms, and goes back to Zaid himself.
The additional headings found in our texts (the name of the suras, the number of verses, &c.) were not in the original codices, and form no integral part of the Koran.
The allegorical interpretations and metaphysics which had been imported into religion had taken men's minds away from the plain sense of the Koran.
The Arab has built his social structure on the Koran, which inculcates absolutism, aristocracy, theocracy; the Berber, despite his nominal Mahommedanism, is a democrat, with his Jemda or " Witangemot " and his Kanum or unwritten code, the Magna Carta of the individual's liberty as opposed to the community's good.
The Arabs from early times have always been proud of their language, but its systematic study seems to have arisen from contact with Persian and from the respect for the language of the Koran.
The attacks of rationalism, aided by Greek philosophy, were repelled and vanquished by the weapons of scholastic dialectic borrowed from the enemy; on most points of dispute discussion was forbidden altogether, and faith in what is written in Koran and tradition was enjoined without question as to how these things were true (bila kaifa).
The Babis are Muhammadans only in the sense that the Muhammadans are Christians or the Christians Jews; that is to say, they recognize Muhammad (Mahomet) as a true prophet and the Qur'an (Koran) as a revelation, but deny their finality.
The battle at Siffin (657), near the Euphrates, which lasted two months and consisted principally in, sometimes bloody, skirmishes, with alternate success, ended by the well-known appeal to the decision of the Koran on the part of Moawiya.
The Berbers are organized in tribes with purely democratic government and laws of their own, which are not those of the Koran.
The bewildering diversity of religious beliefs collected under the name of Hinduism has no counterpart amongst the Mahommedans (see Mahommedan Religion), who are limited as to their main tenets by the teaching of a single book, the Koran.
The bewildering diversity of religious beliefs collected under the name of Hinduism has no counterpart amongst the Mahommedans, who are limited as to their main tenets by the teaching of a single book, the Koran.
The caliph also shared Mamun's intolerance on the doctrinal question of the uncreated Koran.
The caliphs substituted a covering of figured brocade, and the Egyptian government still sends with each pilgrim caravan from Cairo a new kiswa of black brocade, adorned with a broad band embroidered with golden inscriptions from the Koran, as well as a richer curtain for the door.'
The contents of the different parts of the Koran are extremely varied.
The description of Alexander as " the Horned " in the Koran is, however, in accordance with the result of recent researches, to be traced to a Syrian legend dating from A.D.
The fundamental difference between the Moslem, who know only the despot and the Koran, and a Christian people who have tievelopmentthle Church, a body of law and a Latin speech, was of the well seen in the contrast between the end of the christian greatness of Mansur, and the end of the weakness Kingdoms, of his Christian contemporaries.
The Gospel and the Koran are both regarded as inspired books, but not as religious guides.
The greater part of the Koran is decidedly prosaic; much of it indeed is stiff in style.
The idea of a heavenly model would in itself have suggested such a course and, only in an inferior degree to this, the necessity of setting a new and uncorrupted document of the divine will over against the sacred scriptures of the Jews and Christians, the people of the Book, as the Koran calls them.
The ignorant fanaticism of the multitude viewed speculative studies with deep dislike and distrust, and deemed any one a Zendik (infidel) who did not rest content with the natural science of the Koran.
The interest in all that concerned Mahomet and in the allusions of the Koran to old prophets and races led many professional narrators to choose these subjects.
The Koran (Kor'an) is the sacred Book of Islam.
The Koran breathes a considerate and kindly spirit towards the class, and encourages manumission.
The Koran even goes so far as to make Noah contend against the worship of certain false gods, mentioned by name, who were worshipped by the Arabs of Mahomet's time.
The Koran is never metrical, and only a few exceptionally eloquent portions fall into a sort of spontaneous rhythm.
The Koran, sacred and secular law, logic, poetry, arithmetic, with some medicine and geography, are the chief subjects of study.
The Koran, the sole authentic authority in all matters, legal or civil, never accurately distinguished between the sheikh and the cadi, and its phrases, besides, are vague and capable of admitting different and even opposite interpretations.
The latter maintain themselves by private teaching and by copying manuscripts, and the former in the same manner, or by reciting the Koran.
The mehkemehs, or courts of the cadis, judge in all matters of personal status, such as marriage, inheritance and guardianship, and are guided in their decisions by the code of laws founded on the Koran.
The method of teaching is confined to that wearisome system of loud-voiced repetition which is so annoying a feature in Indian schools; and the Koran is, of course, the text-book in all forms of education.
The modern name is Bahr Lut or "Sea of Lot" - a name hardly to be explained as a survival of a vague tradition of the patriarch, but more probably due to the literary influences of the Hebrew Scriptures and the Koran filtering through to the modern inhabitants or their ancestors.
The Moslems were as far as ever from possessing a uniform text of the Koran.
The most objectionable parts of the whole Koran are those which treat of Mahomet's relations with women.
The ostensible object of the French expedition to Egypt was to reinstate the authority of the Sublime Porte, and suppress the Mamelukes; and in the proclamation printed with the Arabic types brought from the Propaganda press, and issued shortly after the taking of Alexandria, Bonaparte declared that he reverenced the prophet Mahomet and the Koran far more than the Mamelukes reverenced either, and argued that all men were equal except so far as they were distinguished by their intellectual and moral excellences, of neither of which the Mamelukes had any great share.
The powers of the Shah (Shahanshah,2 or king of kings) over his subjects and their property were absolute, but only in so far as they were not opposed to the shar, or divine law, which consists of the doctrines of the Mahommedan religion, as laid down in the Koran, the oral commentaries and sayings of the Prophet, and the interpretations by his successors and the high priesthood.
The same prince employed the most learned among the ulema of Transoxiana for a translation of TabarIs second great work, the Tafsir, or commentary on the Koran, and accepted the dedication of the first Persian book on medicine, a pharmacopoeia by the physician Abfl MansUr Muwaffaq b.
The sect of the Mu'tazilites which affirmed that the Koran had been created, and denied predestination, began to be persecuted by the government in the 9th century, and discussion of religious questions was forbidden (see Caliphate, sections B and C).
The student had learned the Koran by heart at school and has often repeated it since, but only now is the sense of its words explained to him.
The students are instructed in Arabic and Persian literature, religion, interpretation of the Koran, Mussulman law, logic, rhetoric, philosophy and other subjects necessary for admittance to the clergy, for doctors of law, &c., while modern sciences are neglected.
The study of law (filth), which rests on Koran and tradition, is more difficult and complex, and begins, but is often not completed, in the third year.
The Sunnites, who accept the orthodox tradition (Sunna) as well as the Koran as a source of theologico-juristic doctrines, predominate in Arabia, the Turkish Empire, the north of Africa, Turkestan, Afghanistan and the Mahommedan parts of India and the east of Asia; the Shi`ites have their main seat in Persia, where their confession is the state religion, but are also scattered over the whole sphere of Islam, especially in India and the regions bordering on Persia, except among the nomad Tatars, who are all nominally Sunnite.
The suras of the third Meccan period, which form a fairly large part of our present Koran, are almost entirely prosaic.
The suras of the third Meccan period, which form a fairly large part of our present Koran, are almost entirely prosaic. Some of the revelations are of considerable extent, and the single verses also are much longer than in the older suras.
The theoretical absolutism of the sultan had, indeed, always been tempered not only by traditional usage, local privilege, the juridical and spiritual precepts of the Koran and the Sunnet, and their 'Ulema interpreters, and the privy council, but for nearly a century by the direct or indirect pressure of the European powers, and during the reigns of Abd-ul-Aziz and of Abd-ul-Hamid by the growing force of public opinion.
The truth is, it would have been a miracle indeed if the style of the Koran had been perfect.
The typical fighting costume of the Malay is a sleeveless jacket with texts from the Koran written upon it, short tight drawers reaching to the middle of the thigh, and the sarong is then bound tightly around the waist, leaving the hilt of the dagger worn in the girdle exposed to view.
The unbounded reverence of the Moslems for the Koran reaches its climax in the dogma that this book, as the divine word, i.e.
The Ustad spoke the first sura of the Koran.
The various dynasties of sultans (Buyids, Ghaznevids, Seljuks, and finally the Mongols) never paid heed to the caliphs, and at length abolished them; but the fall of the theocracy only increased the influence of the clergy, the expounders and practical administrators of that legislation of Koran and Sunna which had become part of the life of the Mahommedan world.
The whole history of religion presents perhaps no more singular spectacle than the mosques of Bagdad in the middle of the 9th century filled with vast crowds of twenty and thirty thousand of the faithful, assembled to discuss the dogmas of the created and the un created Koran.'
The whole legend of this stone, which is full of miraculous incidents, seems to have arisen from a misconception, the Maqam Ibrahim in the Koran meaning the sanctuary itself; but the stone, which is a block about 3 spans in height and 2 in breadth, and in shape "like a potter's furnace" (Ibn Jubair), is certainly very ancient.
Their political influence, again, which arises from the fusion of private and political law in Koran and Sunna, is highly inconvenient to the state, and often becomes intolerable now that relations with Western states are multiplied.
There are Turkish primary and secondary schools in some of the towns; in the village mosques instruction in the Koran is given by the imams, but neither reading nor writing is taught.
There are works on the spelling and right pronunciation of the Koran, works on the beauty of its language, on the number of its verses, words and letters, &c.; nay, there are even works which would nowadays be called " historical and critical introductions."
There is one piece of the Koran, belonging to the beginning of this period, if not to the close of the former, which claims particular notice.
There was no element of heresy in his creed, which was mainly distinguished by a rigid formalism and strict obedience to the letter of the Koran and the orthodox tradition or Sunna.
They entertain reverence for their Prophet; and the Koran is treated with the utmost respectnever, for example.
They involved the touching of a Koran during the normal performance of duty, the press release said.
They involved the touching of a Koran during the normal performance of duty, " the press release said.
This difference, as was to be expected, appears in the Koran.
This is especially useful if your ceremony is a Christian one but other holy books such as the Koran work will for other religions.
Thousands of commentaries on the Koran, some of them of prodigious size, have been written by Moslems; and even the number of those still extant in manuscript is by no means small.
Three gods of the inscriptions are named in the Koran - Wadd, Yaghuth and Nasr. In the god name Ta'lab there may be an indication of tree-worship. The many minor deities may be passed over; but we must mention the sanctuary of Riyam, with its images of the sun and moon, and, according to tradition, an oracle.
Thus the doors of houses are inscribed with sentences from the Koran, or the like, to preserve from the evil eye, or avert the dangers of an unlucky threshold; similar inscriptions may be observed over most shqps, while almost every one carries some charm about his person.
Thus, for example, the Koran contains very different directions, suited to varying circumstances, as to the treatment which idolaters are to receive at the hands of believers.
To the faith of the Moslems, as has been said, the Koran is the word of God, and such also is the claim which the book itself advances.
Tradition, of course, knows in this connexion no doubt, and looks upon the Fatiha precisely as the most exalted portion of the Koran.
Under the paternal eye the education of young Timur was such that at the age of twenty he had not only become an adept in manly outdoor exercises but had earned the reputation of being an attentive reader of the Koran.
We are not at liberty, therefore, in every case where the connexion in the Koran is obscure, to say that it is really broken, and set it down as the clumsy patchwork of a later hand.
While the foreign word Rahman is, in accordance with its origin, everywhere in the Koran to be understood as " Merciful," there is some doubt as to Rahim.
Words of undoubtedly Christian origin are less frequent in the Koran.
Zaid may easily have overlooked a few stray fragments, but that he purposely omitted anything which he believed to belong to the Koran is very unlikely.
Zamakhshari's fame as a commentator rests upon his commentary on the Koran, called al-Kashshdf (" the Revealer").