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Tahrif (تحريف)
Introduction
A necessary clarification of what this text is about and why: it is part of a project to build the religious-normative component of an international-legal framework for a peaceful settlement of the war in the Middle East.
Before we turn to the substantive questions, we must answer the predictable objections to the very legitimacy of the inquiry and of the conclusions I draw.
These are objections I have already encountered, in particular in discussing the text on what exactly is meant by the "Farthest Mosque/Temple" in the Quran (see the text "Al-Aqsa" on my site), and they are two: 1) Islam cannot abandon traditions that have taken shape over the centuries, and 2) "you cannot interpret the Quran from outside the tradition," in a softer variant: "you are an intelligent person, but we must believe our authoritative theologians."
Is renewal of the Islamic tradition possible?
One of the foundations of Islam — to a large extent its distinctive feature in comparison with other religious movements — is the postulate that a tradition inevitably accumulates a layer of distortions over time, and that a periodic return to the sources is not merely possible but a prescribed action.
Indeed, Islam has a special term for this — tajdid (تجديد) , meaning "renewal," derived from the root ج-د-د (j-d-d). From the same root comes the term mujaddid (مجدد) — "renewer, reformer."
Innovations — bid'ah (بدعة) — are condemned in Islam, whereas tajdid — renewal through a return to the original meanings — is held to be good and necessary.
A key basis of this concept is the words of Muhammad transmitted in hadith 4291 of Sunan Abu Dawud, the Book of "Al-Malahim" (Battles/Portents):
إِنَّ اللَّهَ يَبْعَثُ لِهَذِهِ الأُمَّةِ عَلَى رَأْسِ كُلِّ مِائَةِ سَنَةٍ مَنْ يُجَدِّدُ لَهَا دِينَهَا
For at the head of every century Allah will send to this Ummah someone who will renew its religion for it.
In this case the translation is mine. Islamic theologians debated the meaning of the expression عَلَى رَأْسِ — whether it means "at the beginning" or "at the end" (of the century). The prevailing view today is that it refers to the end of the century (contrary to the word's usual meaning), on the grounds that Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz, regarded as the first mujaddid, died in the year 101 of the Hijra, while al-Shafi'i died in the year 204.
I, however, hold — relying, among other things, on the meaning of the root in Hebrew and its reflex in Arabic (رَأْسِ — raʼs, the same as Hebrew ראש — rosh, i.e. etymologically "head") — that this denotes not so much the "beginning" of a time period as the setting of its direction or meaning. That is, the correct translation is neither the literal "at the beginning" nor "at the end" (as the historical analysis would have it), but precisely "at the head."
One way or another, the Islamic tradition recognizes not only the possibility but the necessity of periodically renewing the religion through a return to its sources.
On the possibility and the obligation of accepting a well-grounded position in theology
Here, too, a necessary observation about theological disputes must be made, one that may not be obvious to the reader.
Unlike purely secular scholarly disputes, in a discussion where the parties presuppose, as an accepted basis, the existence of the Most High, the knowability of His will, and the authority of the text that describes it (in this case, at least, the Quran), the attitude toward well-argued conclusions is (contrary to the widespread opposite belief) far stricter.
On the question of the genetic mutations of the fruit fly, a secular scholar is relatively free to hold a position refuted by other scholars' arguments; this may damage his reputation, but it is, broadly speaking, not so dangerous. In a theological dispute, refusing to follow the truth has not only an epistemic but also a religious-moral dimension.
If a person acknowledges revelation and the will of the Most High, he cannot choose a position merely because it is politically advantageous or convenient. He must either show by his arguments that his opponent's position is wrong, or at least debatable, or else accept it — otherwise he commits a sin. For example, if it is proven (textually and historically) that the tahrif spoken of in the Quran is not a change in the text of the Tawrat but a misinterpretation of it, then a person who calls himself a Muslim and nonetheless keeps insisting on the opposite simply "because that is how it is done" commits kufr (كفر) — the concealment/denial of the truth (the root ك-ف-ر, the common-Semitic K-F/P-R, originally meant "to conceal" among the Arabs, and the word "kafir" means "the one who conceals").
To avoid misunderstanding, let me emphasize: kufr is not "to misunderstand"; kufr is to hear well-grounded arguments in favor of a particular position and, while understanding the soundness of the arguments, to reject them because: "they were put forward by a Jew," "we are used to understanding it differently," "I have my own position and I do not want to change it," and the like.
And it is important to place this at the foundation of interreligious dialogue, including between Judaism and Islam. Whoever is unwilling to conduct it honestly thereby already, plainly and decisively, loses it.
What I am asserting here, I assert honestly, with the aim of establishing the truth and the will of the Most High. I am ready to accept objections and counterarguments on the merits. And this gives me the right to demand: either present arguments showing that I am wrong or that my position is debatable, or else explain what motives guide you in rejecting proven assertions. And if those motives lie outside an honest search for the meaning of the sacred texts and the will of the Most High, let us acknowledge this openly — but then you are also compelled to admit that your war is meaningless and doomed to defeat.
It should be noted that a similar situation obtains in legal disputes. In law, as in theology, a position is not a matter of private taste. It claims normative force. Where a position can affect people's lives and freedom, the demands on the participants' epistemological honesty are far higher. A court, for example, has no right to reject a well-argued position simply by appealing to the fact that "well, we have a different opinion," if there are no counterarguments — here there is a duty to agree.
What we are examining here is not a dispute about ancient history; it is a dispute about law, in which the body of international-legal norms actually in force must, among other things, formally incorporate religious law as well.
International law (in particular, Art. 2(3) of the UN Charter) requires states to seek peaceful means of resolving disputes. Religious doctrines that influence an armed conflict must be the subject of open, documented, well-argued, and publicly verifiable dialogue. And this is the path to peace, and to truth.
And this is precisely what the official position of the parties — including Israel and the Muslim states — should become in negotiations.
In particular, Israel can and should declare: the attempt to settle a theological-political dispute by war has not given your arguments victory; therefore, if we do not wish to return to war endlessly, the dispute must be transferred into the space of text, reason, and honest theological analysis.
Is it legitimate for a person not raised within, or not standing inside, the tradition to understand and interpret the Quran?
(1)
Here, first of all, one must note that Islam itself, as an ideological system, is constitutively founded on the interpretation of texts lying outside the Islamic tradition proper — namely the Torah (Tawrat / توراة) and the Gospels (Injil / إنجيل) — by people who stand outside those traditions (i.e. who are neither Jews nor Christians) and who, moreover, are not prophets (apart from Muhammad himself).
That is, even the appeal to the prophetic gift works only for Muhammad himself. And under the approach "one may not interpret from outside the tradition," most Muslim scholars could be accused of judging, without being prophets, traditions whose languages they do not understand, including in the literal sense (Hebrew and Aramaic for the Israelites, and Greek and Latin for Christianity).
That is, the approach "one cannot judge except from inside the tradition" does not work within Islam itself.
(2)
The Sahaba (الصحابة) — the founders of Islam, the companions of the Prophet Muhammad — were not people originally raised or educated within the Islamic tradition. And the great caliph Umar (Umar ibn al-Khattab) was originally an opponent of Islam and intended to kill Muhammad for having defamed the religion of the ancestors and condemned the worship of idols.
Many of the companions came to understanding before meeting the Prophet (Umar read the Quran in his sister's house; the first Medinan Muslims sent people to Muhammad in Mecca to learn the Quran). The claim that a modern reader cannot understand the Quran without already being a Muslim beforehand would contradict the Islamic doctrine of the Quran as a clear exposition — bayan بَيَان, see 3:138 (the same Semitic root: ב-י-נ (b-y-n) — "to understand, to distinguish," from which also בִּינָה (binah — "understanding")).
At the same time it must be noted that "clarity" does not mean that the Quran is comprehensible apart from the preceding Scripture, which it presupposes and confirms — it rests on the referential background, contemporary to it, of the preceding sacred texts, just as a clear judicial decision rests on a law known to the reader without thereby becoming "incomplete."
(3)
The rule "the text may be interpreted only by members of a particular school" implicitly entails declaring either that text or that school to be false.
For to assert that only those who agree with the text have the right to interpret it amounts to admitting that the text is incapable of withstanding the criticism of those who disagree with it. Or, if one holds that only members of a particular school may interpret the text, this will amount to admitting that the school's approach cannot withstand external criticism.
Any system of views that rejects the possibility of being analyzed from outside thereby asserts, epistemologically, its own untenability.
When, within a community, the very fact of talking with an opponent is classified as betrayal, this is diagnostically significant. It is a sign that the community is not confident in its position's ability to withstand an open clash with arguments from outside. A system confident of its victory in an open clash of ideas has no need to declare the clash itself a betrayal.
(4)
Although Islam and appeals to the Quran currently serve as the foundation of wars against Israel, practice shows that the Muslims who invoke the Quran on so supremely serious a theme as the religious foundation of war are astonishingly ignorant of the text of the Quran.
A vivid example here is the slogan that Hamas chose for its war with Israel, which it named the "Al-Aqsa Flood" (Al-Aqsa Flood). This slogan was a quotation from the Quran, 5:23:
ادْخُلُوا عَلَيْهِمُ الْبَابَ فَإِذَا دَخَلْتُمُوهُ فَإِنَّكُمْ غَالِبُونَ
Surprise them through the gate. If you do, you will certainly prevail. (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
Evidently the reason for using this quotation as a slogan was the victory it promises.
There is, however, the question of who the "you" in this phrase are. In the Quran this phrase is addressed... to the Israelites, and it promises victory in the war for the Holy Land precisely to the Israelites.
What is curious is that, although during the period of active hostilities this slogan was widely used by Hamas (see the standard splash screen of their videos) and was quoted as "inspiring," apparently no one in the Muslim (at least, as far as could be established, the Arabic- and Persian-speaking) public sphere paid attention to the meaning of this phrase in the Quran.
It is not surprising that the ignorant Hamas members were defeated in this war against Israel. Which is a graphic example of how ruinous a careless handling of the Quranic text can be.
(5)
From my own experience, it seems to me that an understanding of both the content and the language of the Quran cannot be sufficiently complete without a basic knowledge of the Jewish religious tradition and of Hebrew.
(6)
And finally, the most interesting point. The Quran itself appeals to the position of knowledgeable people from the Judeo-Christian tradition as a criterion even for Muhammad himself. In verse 10:94:
فَإِن كُنتَ فِى شَكٍّۢ مِّمَّآ أَنزَلْنَآ إِلَيْكَ فَسْـَٔلِ ٱلَّذِينَ يَقْرَءُونَ ٱلْكِتَـٰبَ مِن
If you ˹O Prophet˺ are in doubt about ˹these stories˺ that We have revealed to you, then ask those who read the Scripture before you. (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
This verse is significant not only for methodology but for the substance of our inquiry into tahrif — that is, whether the Quran asserts that the text of the Torah had already been changed or lost by the time of the Quran's revelation, or whether the point is only the existence of distorted interpretations of that text.
The verb يَقْرَءُونَ (yaqraʾūna) — "they read." The readers of the prior Scripture at that time are precisely the Jews and Christians with their texts. If those texts that they were reading are a forgery, then the advice to the Prophet, in case of doubt, to ask the readers of a forgery is absurd.
And so we move on to examining the theme of tahrif on the merits.
Tahrif and its understanding
The word تَحْرِيف (tahrif) itself is not used in the Quran, but the Quran does contain cognate verbs of the root ح-ر-ف (ḥ-r-f) — "to bend, to distort, to shift from its place."
According to the Quranic Arabic Corpus, the root ح-ر-ف occurs in the Quran 6 times, but specifically as the verb "to distort" — 4 times:
2:75:
أَفَتَطْمَعُونَ أَن يُؤْمِنُوا لَكُمْ وَقَدْ كَانَ فَرِيقٌ مِّنْهُمْ يَسْمَعُونَ كَلَامَ اللَّهِ ثُمَّ يُحَرِّفُونَهُ مِن بَعْدِ مَا عَقَلُوهُ وَهُمْ يَعْلَمُونَ
Do you ˹believers still˺ expect them to be true to you, though a group of them would hear the word of Allah then knowingly corrupt it after understanding it? (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
4:46:
مِّنَ الَّذِينَ هَادُوا يُحَرِّفُونَ الْكَلِمَ عَن مَّوَاضِعِهِ وَيَقُولُونَ سَمِعْنَا وَعَصَيْنَا وَاسْمَعْ غَيْرَ مُسْمَعٍ وَرَاعِنَا لَيًّا بِأَلْسِنَتِهِمْ وَطَعْنًا فِي الدِّينِ وَلَوْ أَنَّهُمْ قَالُوا سَمِعْنَا وَأَطَعْنَا وَاسْمَعْ وَانظُرْنَا لَكَانَ خَيْرًا لَّهُمْ وَأَقْوَمَ وَلَكِن لَّعَنَهُمُ اللَّهُ بِكُفْرِهِمْ فَلَا يُؤْمِنُونَ إِلَّا قَلِيلًا
Some Jews take words out of context and say, "We listen and we disobey," "Hear! May you never hear," and "Râ'ina!" [Herd us!]—playing with words and discrediting the faith. Had they said ˹courteously˺, "We hear and obey," "Listen to us," and "Unẓurna," [Tend to us!] it would have been better for them and more proper. Allah has condemned them for their disbelief, so they do not believe except for a few. (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
5:13:
فَبِمَا نَقْضِهِم مِّيثَاقَهُمْ لَعَنَّاهُمْ وَجَعَلْنَا قُلُوبَهُمْ قَاسِيَةً يُحَرِّفُونَ الْكَلِمَ عَن مَّوَاضِعِهِ وَنَسُوا حَظًّا مِّمَّا ذُكِّرُوا بِهِ وَلَا تَزَالُ تَطَّلِعُ عَلَى خَائِنَةٍ مِّنْهُمْ إِلَّا قَلِيلًا مِّنْهُمْ فَاعْفُ عَنْهُمْ وَاصْفَحْ إِنَّ اللَّهَ يُحِبُّ الْمُحْسِنِينَ
But for breaking their covenant We condemned them and hardened their hearts. They distorted the words of the Scripture and neglected a portion of what they had been commanded to uphold. You ˹O Prophet˺ will always find deceit on their part, except for a few. But pardon them and bear with them. Indeed, Allah loves the good-doers. (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
5:41:
يَا أَيُّهَا الرَّسُولُ لَا يَحْزُنكَ الَّذِينَ يُسَارِعُونَ فِي الْكُفْرِ مِنَ الَّذِينَ قَالُوا آمَنَّا بِأَفْوَاهِهِمْ وَلَمْ تُؤْمِن قُلُوبُهُمْ وَمِنَ الَّذِينَ هَادُوا سَمَّاعُونَ لِلْكَذِبِ سَمَّاعُونَ لِقَوْمٍ آخَرِينَ لَمْ يَأْتُوكَ يُحَرِّفُونَ الْكَلِمَ مِن بَعْدِ مَوَاضِعِهِ يَقُولُونَ إِنْ أُوتِيتُمْ هَذَا فَخُذُوهُ وَإِن لَّمْ تُؤْتَوْهُ فَاحْذَرُوا وَمَن يُرِدِ اللَّهُ فِتْنَتَهُ فَلَن تَمْلِكَ لَهُ مِنَ اللَّهِ شَيْئًا أُولَئِكَ الَّذِينَ لَمْ يُرِدِ اللَّهُ أَن يُطَهِّرَ قُلُوبَهُمْ لَهُمْ فِي الدُّنْيَا خِزْيٌ وَلَهُمْ فِي الْآخِرَةِ عَذَابٌ عَظِيمٌ
O Messenger! Do not grieve for those who race to disbelieve—those who say, "We believe" with their tongues, but their hearts are in disbelief. Nor those among the Jews who eagerly listen to lies, attentive to those who are too arrogant to come to you. They distort the Scripture, taking rulings out of context, then say, "If this is the ruling you get ˹from Muḥammad˺, accept it. If not, beware!" Whoever Allah allows to be deluded, you can never be of any help to them against Allah. It is not Allah's Will to purify their hearts. (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
The following verses also belong to the theme of distortion:
2:79:
فَوَيْلٌ لِّلَّذِينَ يَكْتُبُونَ الْكِتَابَ بِأَيْدِيهِمْ ثُمَّ يَقُولُونَ هَذَا مِنْ عِندِ اللَّهِ لِيَشْتَرُوا بِهِ ثَمَنًا قَلِيلًا فَوَيْلٌ لَّهُم مِّمَّا كَتَبَتْ أَيْدِيهِمْ وَوَيْلٌ لَّهُم مِّمَّا يَكْسِبُونَ
So woe to those who distort the Scripture with their own hands then say, "This is from Allah"—seeking a fleeting gain! So woe to them for what their hands have written and woe to them for what they have earned. (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
3:78:
وَإِنَّ مِنْهُمْ لَفَرِيقًا يَلْوُونَ أَلْسِنَتَهُم بِالْكِتَابِ لِتَحْسَبُوهُ مِنَ الْكِتَابِ وَمَا هُوَ مِنَ الْكِتَابِ وَيَقُولُونَ هُوَ مِنْ عِندِ اللَّهِ وَمَا هُوَ مِنْ عِندِ اللَّهِ وَيَقُولُونَ عَلَى اللَّهِ الْكَذِبَ وَهُمْ يَعْلَمُونَ
There are some among them who distort the Book with their tongues to make you think this ˹distortion˺ is from the Book—but it is not what the Book says. They say, "It is from Allah"—but it is not from Allah. And ˹so˺ they attribute lies to Allah knowingly. (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
The concept of "tahrif" had two interpretations in the history of Islamic theology:
(1) (the original)
Tahrif al-maʿna (تَحْرِيف الْمَعْنَى) — "distortion of meaning": the text of the Torah and the Gospel is authentic, but Jews and Christians misunderstand or misinterpret it. The text itself has not been changed.
This version was accepted, in particular, by al-Bukhari (the transmitter of hadith) and al-Tabari (the classical mufassir). Many classical commentators on the Quran read these same verses (2:75, 4:46) in precisely this way — as an accusation of distorting the interpretation, not the text. The very phrase "they move the words from their places" (4:46) they understood metaphorically — "they wrench out of context," "they interpret perversely."
(2) (the later one)
Tahrif al-lafz (تَحْرِيف اللَّفْظ) — "distortion of the [actual] wording/text": the very text of the Torah and the Gospel has been physically corrupted: fragments cut out, fragments added, words substituted. The text in its present form is not authentic.
In support of this interpretation (in particular, in the article on Tahrif on Wikipedia) one sometimes cites hadith Sahih al-Bukhari 7363, which transmits the words of Ibn Abbas:
أَنَّ أَهْلَ الْكِتَابِ بَدَّلُوا كِتَابَ اللَّهِ وَغَيَّرُوهُ وَكَتَبُوا بِأَيْدِيهِمُ الْكِتَابَ وَقَالُوا هُوَ مِنْ عِنْدِ اللَّهِ
... people of the scripture (Jews and Christians) changed their scripture and distorted it, and wrote the scripture with their own hands and said, 'It is from Allah,'
But in the same "Sahih al-Bukhari," in the section "Kitab al-Tawhid" / كتاب التوحيد, al-Bukhari gives the same statement of Ibn Abbas as in hadith 7363, in a fuller formulation that includes an important clarification:
يُحَرِّفُونَ يُزِيلُونَ وَلَيْسَ أَحَدٌ يُزِيلُ لَفْظَ كِتَابٍ مِنْ كُتُبِ اللَّهِ عَزَّ وَجَلَّ وَلَكِنَّهُمْ يُحَرِّفُونَهُ يَتَأَوَّلُونَهُ عَلَى غَيْرِ تَأْوِيلِهِ
Here يُحَرِّفُونَ يُزِيلُونَ is a gloss, a lexical clarification: "[the word meaning] yuḥarrifūna — [means] yuzīlūna." That is, Ibn Abbas gives a lexical equivalent for the Quranic verb يُحَرِّفُونَ used in 4:46 and 5:13. This is a typical device of early Islamic tafsir — explaining a rare word through a clearer synonym. My translation, accordingly:
They displace [the words from their places] (يُحَرِّفُونَ), that is, they alter [them] (يُزِيلُون), but no one can alter the text (lafẓ / لَفْظ) of any of Allah's books; rather they distort [it], interpreting it not in accordance with its [deeper] meaning.
Characteristically, this text is present on sunnah.com (see Book 97 at the beginning of the (55) Chapter, before hadith 7553), but without an English translation — only the Arabic original. See also in Arabic on islamweb.net.
I emphasize: this is a statement of Ibn Abbas (a companion and cousin of the Prophet Muhammad) that al-Bukhari cites precisely as a clarification of the expression used in verses 4:46 and 5:13, which are the central ones in the concept of tahrif. That is, the Sahaba (the first companions of Muhammad) understood it in exactly this way.
The idea of "tahrif al-lafz" (corruption of the text itself) as a systematic doctrine was introduced and substantiated only later — by Ibn Hazm in the 11th century CE (see Theodore Pulcini. Exegesis as Polemical Discourse: Ibn Hazm on Jewish and Christian Scriptures (1998)).
Ibn Hazm based himself on a study of the text of the Torah, which he found too divergent from his own conceptions of Islam. Ibn Hazm advanced the hypothesis that, after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians, the Torah was lost, and that the existing text of the Torah was composed by Uzayr (Ezra) after the return from the Babylonian captivity.
The question arises: how did Ibn Hazm deal with the above position of al-Bukhari, which cites Ibn Abbas? The answer: in no way. As far as I know, in his works Ibn Hazm does not address this passage in al-Bukhari.
But nowadays, among Muslims — especially in the popular consciousness — it is the interpretation of tahrif set out by Ibn Hazm, and not by al-Bukhari, that has taken root as self-evident.
See, for example, the assertion of Zakir Naik, one of the most popular contemporary da'is (Islamic preachers):
All the scriptures besides the Holy Quran have been changed by human being, they have been corrupted
(Zakir Naik: Concept of God in Major Religions // Mumbai, India, 26th Oct. 1997)
From my experience of conversing with Muslims, one can see that for many their attitude toward Jews is based on the conviction that the malicious Jews, out of their malice, corrupted the texts of the sacred Scriptures. That is, in effect the concept of tahrif, in its modern understanding — i.e. as "a change of the text" — is one of the bases of Muslims' hostility toward Jews, and it plays the role of an insurmountable barrier between Islam and Judaism.
Arguments against the concept of corruption of the Torah's text
Of course, there is an enormous difference between "a distorted interpretation of the text" and "a deliberate corruption of the text itself."
The concept of "tahrif al-maʿnawi" (distortion of the meaning of the Scriptures) — that some Jews and some Christians distorted the meaning of the texts by their interpretations — cannot provoke objection even among Jews and Christians themselves. What exactly was misinterpreted is, of course, a separate and difficult question deserving separate treatment, and here disputes are indeed possible; but as to the general assertion that "there were incorrect interpretations," such disputes are hardly possible.
In this text, however, I will examine the arguments in favor of the view that the concept of "tahrif al-lafzi" (a corrupted text) of the Tawrat (the Torah) is mistaken, and that, consequently, the correct interpretation of "tahrif" is precisely the one that originally existed in Islam.
The principal argument: Isa (Jesus)
The verses about Isa
The Quran has 3 key verses in which the verb مُصَدِّقًا (muṣaddiqan — confirming) is used directly when speaking of Isa's (Jesus') mission in relation to the Tawrat (the Torah).
(1)
Sura 3: Al-Imran (The Family of Imran) 3:50:
In this verse Isa addresses the children of Israel, explaining that his mission is to confirm the truth of the Torah.
وَمُصَدِّقًۭا لِّمَا بَيْنَ يَدَىَّ مِنَ ٱلتَّوْرَىٰةِ
...and to confirm the Torah revealed before me... (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
(2)
Sura 5: Al-Ma'ida (The Table) 5:46:
وَقَفَّيْنَا عَلَى آثَارِهِم بِعِيسَى ابْنِ مَرْيَمَ مُصَدِّقًا لِّمَا بَيْنَ يَدَيْهِ مِنَ التَّوْرَاةِ وَآتَيْنَاهُ الْإِنجِيلَ فِيهِ هُدًى وَنُورٌ وَمُصَدِّقًا لِّمَا بَيْنَ يَدَيْهِ مِنَ التَّوْرَاةِ وَهُدًى وَمَوْعِظَةً لِّلْمُتَّقِينَ
Then in the footsteps of the prophets, We sent Jesus, son of Mary, confirming the Torah revealed before him. And We gave him the Gospel containing guidance and light and confirming what was revealed in the Torah—a guide and a lesson to the God-fearing. (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
(3)
Sura 61: As-Saff (The Ranks) 61:6:
وَإِذْ قَالَ عِيسَى ابْنُ مَرْيَمَ يَا بَنِي إِسْرَائِيلَ إِنِّي رَسُولُ اللَّهِ إِلَيْكُم مُّصَدِّقًا لِّمَا بَيْنَ يَدَيَّ مِنَ التَّوْرَاةِ
And ˹remember˺ when Jesus, son of Mary, said, "O children of Israel! I am truly Allah's messenger to you, confirming the Torah which came before me... (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
A more literal (my own) translation of verse 61:6:
And Jesus, son of Mary, said: O children of Israel, I am the messenger of Allah (rasūlu-llāhi / رَسُولُ ٱللَّهِ — the same expression by which Muhammad is designated in the shahada) to you, confirming (muṣaddiqan / مُّصَدِّقًۭا) that Tawrat (Torah) which is in my hands (li-mā bayna yadayya mina t-tawrāti / لِّمَا بَيْنَ يَدَىَّ مِنَ ٱلتَّوْرَىٰةِ).
The key here is the expression مُّصَدِّقًا لِّمَا بَيْنَ يَدَيَّ مِنَ التَّوْرَاةِ — "confirming that Tawrat which is in my hands" (see the analysis of this phrase on the Quranic Arabic Corpus).
"In my hands" (بَيْنَ يَدَىَّ bayna-yadayya, cf. Hebrew בְּיָדַי bə-yāḏay) — in Arabic (as, similarly, in other languages, including Hebrew) this is an idiomatic expression; that is, it is not implied that he is literally holding a scroll in his hands while speaking these words. But the expression shows quite clearly (through the use of the intelligible image "in my hands") that what is meant is the content (the text) of the Tawrat (the Torah) that Isa (Jesus) himself was using at that time.
Neither in Arabic nor in any other language can the idiomatic expression "that which is in my hands" denote "that which has long been lost or gone."
And if, in this verse, addressing the Jews, he speaks to them of the Torah without making any special reservations, then he plainly means what they understand by the Torah — not selected passages from it (it is precisely a selective approach to Scripture that the Quran criticizes, see 2:85), nor its ancient lost prototype.
In ordinary language, "to confirm" does not mean "to pick out a few correct fragments and stay silent about the rest." If a witness in court says, "I confirm X's testimony," this is understood as confirmation of X's testimony as a whole, unless the witness himself makes the reservation, "I confirm it only in such-and-such part." In just the same way, the Quran's phrase that Isa came to confirm (مُصَدِّقًا) the Torah naturally means confirmation of the Torah on hand as a whole. The reading "he confirmed only some true core unknown to us" contradicts the normal, unperverted understanding of the words.
A necessary qualification here: in Islam, as with the Torah in Judaism, "Tawrat" may refer not to the physical scroll or the text itself but to the content of the teaching. In other words, not so much the set of letters as the teaching it conveys; nevertheless, the form of its existence is text — written or spoken.
That is, the generally accepted variant of translating this point (including in Dr. Khattab's translation), "before me," is inexact; more exact would be "with me" or "at present." But the reason for this inexactness of translation is clear — the translators adjust to Ibn Hazm's concept: in their conception Isa confirms the Tawrat that existed long ago, whereas in fact the plain text clearly says otherwise — Isa confirms the text of the Tawrat that is "in his hands" at the moment of confirmation.
But the point here, of course, is not so much how it should be translated as how the original Arabic text should be understood.
The text of the Tawrat that Isa used
So, we have established that the verses of the Quran unequivocally state that Isa confirmed the Tawrat that "was in his hands."
But today we can assert, with a sufficient degree of confidence, that we know what the text of the Torah (Tawrat) was in the time of Isa (Jesus). We have several fairly independent traditions of textual transmission from which we can draw conclusions:
These are ancient manuscripts found in the vicinity of the Dead Sea: in the caves of Qumran, in the caves of Wadi Murabba'at, and in other caves in the Judean Desert, as well as at Masada.
Radiocarbon analysis dates the main body of these manuscripts to the period from 250 BCE to 68 CE.
When all the scrolls of the Judean Desert are summed up (Qumran + Masada + Murabba'at + Hever + Sdeir + Tse'elim + Ein Gedi) and all the overlaps among them are taken into account, a significant portion of the verses of the Chumash is attested at least once.
Not only the Pentateuch but almost the entire Tanakh is confirmed by these manuscripts. Only the scroll of Esther (the Book of Esther) is missing from the finds. Although the finds contain different recensions of the same texts, the differences among them are not significant in a theological sense.
(2) The Septuagint ("The Translation of the Seventy Interpreters," also designated "LXX"):
a translation of the Tanakh into Greek, carried out in the 3rd–2nd centuries BCE, which subsequently became the basis of the Christian textual tradition. Several very early manuscripts of this translation on papyri are known. For example, the papyrus Fouad 266 (1st century BCE) contains texts of Genesis and Deuteronomy (in Greek).
The Septuagint constitutes an independent witness to the text of the Tanakh and confirms the existence of the canon at least as of the time the translation was composed.
The Samaritan tradition had been in conflict with the main branch of Judaism — to which Isa (Jesus) also belonged — roughly since the time of the Jews' return from the Babylonian captivity and the beginning of the building of the Second Temple.
The Samaritan Pentateuch contains differences, but apart from the designation of the principal cultic site (for the Samaritans this is Mount Gerizim), the rest are differences that, although numerous, are minor and do not substantially affect the meaning of the text. That is, on the whole we have before us the same text as the Masoretic Text and the Septuagint. Moreover, the Samaritan Pentateuch is written in the ancient Hebrew alphabet (paleo-Hebrew alphabet), which the Jews used even before the Babylonian captivity.
(4) And, finally, the Masorah (מסורה) itself — the tradition of preserving the text of the Tanakh, including the Pentateuch, in Judaism. A tradition rich in written sources, which — contrary to the notions widespread among contemporary Muslims — testifies that the Jews treated the preservation of the Torah's text with the utmost scrupulousness.
We do not claim that, as many believe, the Masoretic Text was written letter-for-letter by the hand of Moshe. It may be that in some places the Septuagint is closer to the original variant, and in some even the Samaritan Pentateuch. But we have grounds to assert that the text of the Pentateuch that we possess is the result of a tradition that strove to preserve the Torah of Moshe.
And, most importantly, we now have in our hands (بَيْنَ يَدَىَّ bayna-yadayya) that text of the Torah which, according to the Quran, Isa confirmed.
And the people of Israel did not corrupt this text; on the contrary — it is thanks to the people of Israel that this text has been preserved.
And this text, therefore, according to the Quran, is the authentic exposition of the Tawrat — the revelation/teaching received by Musa (Moshe/Moses).
This is the part of Islam that was not yet accessible to the Arabs in the time of Muhammad (there were no authoritative translations or means of understanding the text), but it must now be incorporated into the corpus of the foundational texts of Islam alongside the Quran.
Additional arguments
Verses with a grammatically built-in presumption that the authentic Tawrat was in the possession of contemporaries
These are verses containing a direct assertion of the presence of the authentic Tawrat (the Torah) "with them" / "with you" in the present tense: the Quranic text grammatically (by means of the prepositions maʿa, ʿinda ( عِنْدَ ,مَعَ ) + an attached pronoun) fixes the Torah as actually being in the possession of the People of the Book, and precisely as the bearer of "the law/judgment of Allah" (ḥukmu Allāhi — حُكْمُ اللَّهِ — cognate with the Hebrew khokhmā — חָכְמָה — wisdom (Arabic حِكْمَة ḥikma)).
5:43:
وَعِندَهُمُ ٱلتَّوْرَىٰةُ فِيهَا حُكْمُ ٱللَّهِ
...they ˹already˺ have the Torah containing Allah's judgment...
(English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
"With them" (عِندَهُمُ — indahumu) here means "with the Jews"; see the preceding verse 5:41 — the reference is to hādū — هَادُوا۟, literally "those who became/are Jews."
It is interesting here that 5:43 follows 5:41, in which it is said of the Jews (or part of them) that they "distort the meaning of the words, taking them out of context" (يُحَرِّفُونَ الْكَلِمَ مِن بَعْدِ مَوَاضِعِهِ), which is precisely tahrif.
But one should note that, at the same time, those Jews — as is stated in 5:43 — have "the Torah containing the judgment (the law) of Allah" (ٱلتَّوْرَىٰةُ فِيهَا حُكْمُ ٱللَّهِ). That is, here it is plainly evident that the very text on hand among them does indeed contain the judgment (the law) of Allah, even though they "distort the meaning of the words" — i.e. interpret it incorrectly.
The construction "they have the Torah, in it the law/judgment of Allah" leaves no gap whatsoever: at the moment these words are uttered, the Torah that is in the Jews' possession contains the authentic divine law.
Had the verse meant "it once contained, but is now corrupted," this thought would have had to be expressed differently, lexically or grammatically. For it to read as past tense ("that which in the past was with them"), one would have to insert the absent verb كَانَ (kāna "was"), which is not in the text. The default of a verbless nominal sentence is present/actual; a marked past would require كَانَ (kāna "was").
2:91:
وَهُوَ الْحَقُّ مُصَدِّقًا لِّمَا مَعَهُمْ
and it (the Quran) is the truth, confirming what they (the children of Israel) have
In Dr. Mustafa Khattab's translation:
...it is the truth confirming their own Scriptures
Here the Quran itself defines its status as confirming (مُصَدِّقًا — musaddiqan) what the children of Israel have now (مَعَهُمْ — maeahum — "with them," in the present).
It is impossible to simultaneously (a) confirm what they have, and (b) teach that what they have is spurious.
2:101:
رَسُولٌۭ مِّنْ عِندِ ٱللَّهِ مُصَدِّقٌۭ لِّمَا مَعَهُمْ
In Dr. Mustafa Khattab's translation:
a messenger from Allah—confirming their own Scriptures
This is a continuation of what was set out in the preceding verse 2:91, but here the one who is confirming (مُصَدِّقٌۭ — musaddiqun) what the children of Israel have is Muhammad himself.
4:47:
يَـٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلَّذِينَ أُوتُوا۟ ٱلْكِتَـٰبَ ءَامِنُوا۟ بِمَا نَزَّلْنَا مُصَدِّقًۭا لِّمَا مَعَكُم
In Dr. Mustafa Khattab's translation:
O you who were given the Scripture! Believe in what We have revealed, confirming what you already have
A direct address to the People of the Book of that time: what is confirmed is precisely what is in their possession in the present (مَعَكُمْ). The very act of the appeal loses its meaning if their Scripture is a forgery.
Direct demands that the Jews read or observe the Tawrat
3:93:
فَأْتُوا۟ بِٱلتَّوْرَىٰةِ فَٱتْلُوهَآ
In Dr. Mustafa Khattab's translation:
...Bring the Torah and read it...
Here a dispute of Muhammad's with the Jews about ancient dietary prohibitions is set out. The Quran, in the name of Allah, proposes to settle the dispute by appeal to the Torah — the Torah that can be "brought and read," i.e. to the actually available text.
This is a direct procedural recognition of the text of the Torah on hand at the time of the dispute as the basis for resolving a disputed (essentially halakhic) question.
5:68:
قُلْ يَا أَهْلَ الْكِتَابِ لَسْتُمْ عَلَىٰ شَيْءٍ حَتَّىٰ تُقِيمُوا التَّوْرَاةَ وَالْإِنجِيلَ وَمَا أُنزِلَ إِلَيْكُم مِّن رَّبِّكُمْ
In Dr. Mustafa Khattab's translation: Say, ˹O Prophet,˺ "O People of the Book! You have nothing to stand on unless you observe the Torah, the Gospel, and what has been revealed to you from your Lord."
Naturally, this call to be guided by the Torah and by "what has been revealed to you from your Lord" (the books of the Prophets are evidently meant) presupposes that the Jews possess, in authentic form, that by which the Quran calls them to be guided.
On the text of the Quran itself
Under Abu Bakr (Abu Bakr) — the first caliph — Zayd ibn Thabit (Zayd ibn Thabit), at the initiative of Umar (Umar), gathered the fragments of the Quran from "flat stones, palm leaves, the shoulder-blades of animals, and the memory of people." This compilation was kept by Abu Bakr, then by Umar, then by his daughter Hafsa (Hafsa bint Umar) — one of Muhammad's wives.
Under Uthman (Uthman) — the third caliph — a new standardized version was created on the basis of Zayd's compilation. After this, Uthman sent out copies to the provinces and ordered all the other versions to be burned — including the versions belonging to the companions.
This is a documented historical fact that the Islamic tradition itself does not deny. The burning of the alternative versions is confirmed in the most authoritative Sunni sources — in "Sahih al-Bukhari" (hadith 4987) it is directly described how Uthman ordered all the copies to be burned except the Uthmanic recension.
These "shoulder-blades, palm leaves, and flat stones," and the early manuscripts with the text of the Quran, ought to have been kept as sacred relics. But they were destroyed.
The destruction of the primary sources looks like a natural action for those who wish to exclude the possibility of verification.
Can you imagine archaeologists finding an ancient parchment, copying out its text, and then burning the parchment itself — so that there would be no doubt as to the accuracy of the transmission of its text?
Or another example: witnesses gave testimony recorded in protocols; then this testimony was gathered and quoted in a court's decision, and the court ordered the original protocols of the testimony to be burned — so that there would be no doubt about what is written in the court's decision. Convincing?
The preservation of the primary sources — the shoulder-blades, leaves, stones, and early manuscripts — would have been a natural action for those confident in the accuracy of the compilation. They would have served as proof of authenticity — this is exactly how the Jews kept the scrolls of the Torah until they wore out, and then ritually interred them in a genizah (genizah), but did not destroy them.
Moreover, Uthman ordered the burning of the Quranic copies (mushafs) of Ubayy ibn Ka'b (Ubayy ibn Ka'b) — Muhammad's secretary — and of Abdullah ibn Mas'ud (Abd Allah ibn Mas'ud). And this despite the fact that, according to the collection "Sahih al-Bukhari" (hadiths 3758, 3760, 4999), the Prophet Muhammad himself ordered the Muslims to learn the Quran precisely from Ibn Mas'ud and from Ubayy. Early Muslim historians (Muhammad ibn Sa'd (Ibn Sa'd)) related that Ibn Mas'ud did not recognize Zayd — who, unlike Ibn Mas'ud himself, had not been approved by Muhammad as an authority on questions of the Quran's text — and called on the Muslims to hide their mushafs.
There exist reliable hadiths — for example, from Aisha (Sahih Muslim 1452 a) or from Umar (Sahih al-Bukhari 6830) — that mention verses which were known to the companions but did not enter Uthman's mushaf: the verse about stoning or the verse about the breastfeeding of adults. In hadith Sahih Muslim 1050 Abu Musa al-Ash'ari (a companion of Muhammad) speaks of two lost suras.
All this, as far as I know, is unknown to the majority of contemporary Muslims, and the overwhelming majority of them believe that the text of the Torah was deliberately corrupted by the Jews, whereas the text of the Quran is directly what was dictated by Muhammad himself, and not the result of the work of a board that destroyed the primary sources and the alternative versions.
Although some contemporary Islamic scholars do acknowledge that the Quran is not a text dictated word-for-word by Muhammad. See, for example, the talk of Shabir Ally, president of the Islamic Information & Dawah Centre International in Toronto, in which he says that the Uthmanic version of the Quran was produced during the lifetime of the Prophet's companions as "their best representation of what they knew collectively as the companions of the prophet."
An interesting situation results.
For the Torah we have:
- The Masoretic tradition, with a system of counting letters and words developed precisely to detect copying errors
- The Septuagint — a Greek translation of the 3rd century BCE
- The Qumran / Dead Sea Scrolls, showing that the text has changed minimally since then
- The Samaritan Pentateuch — an independent tradition with insignificant variations
All of this makes it possible to verify the text through independent sources.
For the Quran:
- All the alternative versions have been destroyed, even though their existence among Muhammad's closest companions is documented
- The original fragments and records, which one would think ought to have been kept as sacred artifacts, have been destroyed
- Some Shia authorities of the first centuries of Islam themselves asserted that the Uthmanic recension was falsified — that verses confirming the status of Ali were removed from it
- Ultraviolet analysis of the Sana'a palimpsest in the 21st century physically proved the existence of other textual versions of the Quran prior to Uthman's reform
The paradox consists in this: the Torah — which the contemporary Islamic mainstream declares "corrupted" — has a far better textual base for verification than the Quran.
The text of the Quran was finalized not by Muhammad himself, and not even by those whom Muhammad himself designated as authorized authorities in the transmission of the Quran, but by a board created by Uthman that destroyed all the sources and the alternative versions.
I do not assert that the text of the Quran was deliberately corrupted by Caliph Uthman's commission, but I wish to show that the naive notion of the majority of contemporary Muslims — that the modern text of the Quran is, letter-for-letter, the text dictated by Muhammad himself — is too far from reality.
Yes, one may believe that the editorial commission that compiled the "Quran of Uthman" (Uthmanic codex) strove to transmit the content of Muhammad's preaching in the best possible way.
But the notion that the text of the Quran is a monolithic, letter-for-letter text dictated by the Most High without the possibility of editorial errors is theologically doomed from the outset. For the presence of any inaccuracies whatsoever would, on that view, refute the entire message of Muhammad.
Let us give a simple example. Verse 9:30:
وَقَالَتِ الْيَهُودُ عُزَيْرٌ ابْنُ اللَّهِ وَقَالَتِ النَّصَارَى الْمَسِيحُ ابْنُ اللَّهِ
The Jews say, "Ezra is the son of Allah," while the Christians say, "The Messiah is the son of Allah." (English translation: Dr. Mustafa Khattab)
This is an error. In Judaism — whose history and theology are well documented — there was never a concept that Ezra (or any other human being) is the "son of the Most High." This ascribes to the Jews an idea, by analogy with the Christians, that the Jews never had. This can be asserted with a high degree of confidence, since the Jewish theological tradition, with all its currents and disputes, is documented in detail in written sources, in particular in the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds.
If the Quran is, in the literal (not metaphorical) sense, an exact copy of a "preserved tablet" residing in the heavens, from which the archangel Jibril took texts that were then recorded with exactitude in the earthly text of the Quran, then this single error about Ezra demolishes the entire construction.
If, however, the Quran is the result of the work of Zayd's editorial board, which strove in the best possible way — albeit over the objections of other companions — to transmit Muhammad's preaching, then there is nothing terrible in this inaccuracy; it is simply a mistaken ascription to the Jews of an analogue of the Christian concept of the "Son of God." For although we regard the text of the Quran as a source of divine revelation, we understand that its transmission by humans cannot be entirely free of inaccuracies. And this, in particular — this passage in the Quran shows — means that the criticism of the Jews set out in the Quran must therefore be treated critically and checked for correspondence with the facts. This does not mean that all of it is unjust; it means only that it must be re-verified, since we know that it may contain errors.
Yes, such an approach to divine revelation is more complex, since it requires engaging human reason to understand the sacred texts. But one may suppose that this was precisely the design of the Most High, who gave man reason. Moreover, I would say that a person who is afraid to engage his reason in reading texts that transmit divine revelation (be it the Quran or the Torah) in fact does not believe in it.
On using the Torah to clarify the meanings of the Quran
The Quranic text itself is constructed not as self-sufficient but precisely as a supplement to the text of the Tawrat; in many cases it refers to the narratives of the Torah (the Tawrat) and cannot be understood without a knowledge of them — which is itself proof that the Quran acknowledges the existence of a text containing the authentic Tawrat of Musa. It is constructed in such a way as to presuppose its existence.
The Quran itself architecturally presupposes that the preceding Scripture is a verifying layer (see verses 10:94, 21:7); the use of the Tawrat as a hermeneutic key for Quranic obscurities is its own instruction.
In particular, if one acknowledges that we have the authentic text of the Tawrat, this makes it possible to resolve unequivocally the dispute about which son is meant in verses 37:99-113. Standard classical Islamic exegesis of the early period identified the sacrificial son as Isaac. Later commentators, by now striving to interpret it differently from the Jews, interpret it as Ishmael. But if one uses the Tawrat as the hermeneutic support (Bereshit 22), the answer becomes unequivocal: the sacrificial son is Isaac.
This move works not only for the Aqedah. It works for dozens of Quranic passages about figures of the Tanakh, where the Quran briefly mentions what the Tawrat recounts at length. If the Tawrat is a verifying layer, then many obscure passages of the Quran become clear. Thus, a serious reading of the Quran requires turning to the text of the Tawrat wherever the Quran sets out briefly what the Tawrat sets out at length.
And such an approach follows the early Islamic tradition. Isra'iliyyat (إسرائیلیات — Israʼiliyyat) — an entire genre of early tafsir (tafsīr), the tradition of interpreting the Quran, in which the interpreters turned to Jewish sources for precisely this purpose. Subsequently, for political reasons, Islam moved away from this tradition, but as is evident from the results of our inquiry, there are grounds to return to it.
Conclusions
(1) Proceeding from the text of the Quran itself, the Quran is confirming (مُصَدِّقًا — musaddiqan) of the Tawrat that was in the possession of the people of Israel at the moment of the Quran's revelation.
(2) The corruption of the Tawrat (the Torah) — the tahrif spoken of in the Quran — implies distorted interpretations, but not a corruption of the actual existing text of the Tawrat.
(3) The notion now generally accepted among Muslims, and constituting one of the factors of the religious conflict — that the malicious Jews deliberately falsified the text of the Torah — contradicts the plain text of the Quran and the original Islamic tradition, and must be rejected by Islam.
(4) The Tawrat — i.e. the Torah/Pentateuch — must be recognized, alongside the Quran, as a foundational text of the Quranic tradition, and, in particular, as a basis for the interpretation (tafsir) of the Quran, for the resolution of questions concerning Jerusalem and the Holy Land, for the content of the Tanakhic (i.e. ancient-Islamic) prophecies, and for the relations between the Islamic ummah and the people of Israel.
(5) The position set out here must become central in the Israeli-Muslim dialogue and one of the elements of building peace in the Middle East — peace that is possible only as a consequence of resolving the problematic religious questions.
References
Ageyev, Viktor. Al-Aqsa. What is the "Al-Aqsa Mosque" mentioned in the Quran?
Islam Q&A: Have the Torah and Gospel Been Changed?
Joseph A Islam, 'Between His Hands' Or 'Before It' (ma bayna yadayhi) // quransmessage.com
Between the Hands or Having Authority Over (ma bayna yadayhi) // Prima Quran
The Qur’an charges oral corruption of the previous revelations // Prima Quran