QURAN

is Arabic, the language of the Quran, which is still current in the world today. Millions of people still speak and write the language in which the Quran was revealed nearly 1500 years ago. Ernest Renan (1823-1894), a French orientalist, carried out extensive research on Semitic languages. He wrote a book on their vocabularies, in which he had this to say about the Arabic language: “The Arabic language is the most astonishing event of human history. Unknown during the classical period, it suddenly emerged as a complete language. After this it did not undergo any noticeable changes, so one cannot define for it an early or a late stage. It is just the same today as it was when it first appeared”. In acknowledging this ‘astonishing event of human history, Renan is in fact acknowledging the miraculous nature of the Quran. It was the Quran’s phenomenal literary style which preserved the Arabic language from alteration, such as other languages have undergone. Jurgi Zaydan (1861-1914) is one of the scholars to have recognized this fact. In a book on Arabic literature he writes: “No religious book has had such an impact on the language in which it was written as the Quran has had on Arabic literature.” This provides proof of the miraculous nature of the Quran, for there is no other book in history which has been able to make such an impact on its language; no other book has moulded a whole language according to its own style, and maintained it in that form over the centuries. World languages have changed so much throughout the ages that no expert in any modern language is able to understand its ancient form without the aid of a dictionary. There have been two main causes of language alteration—upheavals in the social order of a nation and the development of a language’s literature. Over the centuries these factors have been at work in Arabic, just as in other languages. The difference being they have not been able to change the structure of the Arabic language. The Arabic that is spoken today is the same as that which was current in Makkah when the Quran was revealed. No There is no other book in history which has been able to make such an impact on its language; no other book has moulded a whole language according to its own style, and maintained it in that form over the centuries.