The Qur'an is the final revelation of God All-Mighty and in this post I will go through it's preservation as the message we have today is the exact version revealed to Prophet Muhammad PBUH.

Firstly, what are the qualities that one would expect to find in genuine revelation from God if the creator is perfect and has knowledge of all things? Surely his true revelation must be free of error, anything less than this can only lead to one conclusion. We are dealing with the imperfect words of man and not the divine.

Scribal tradition

History has not been kind to scripture. The vast majority of religious texts today have been passed down to us through scribal tradition whereby manuscripts were copied by hand word-for-word letter by letter. Naturally this method of preservation is prone to human error, any mistakes such as in spelling or missing words made whilst copying would then be transferred down every time a copy of the copy was made. Extend this process over hundreds of thousands of years and you can imagine how much a text can change over such a long span of time as accidental and intentional changes which gradually creep in.

This is why for example we find that there are a multitude of different versions of the Bible in existence today. It's not possible to compare the modern text to the earliest copies because they were written on fragile and perishable materials such as papyrus, therefore scholars of the Bible have the difficult task of sifting through thousands of later copies all of which differ and because the original copies have been lost, they can't agree on which surviving copies are most accurate to the original. So each version of the Bible that exists is a patchwork of different copies combined together and represents what a particular scholar or group of scholars estimate to be the closest to the original, and so for texts that have relied on preservation through manual copying we can say that we have at best an estimate of the original words. We certainly cannot say that the text we have today is an accurate representation of the origina.

What about the Qur'an?

The author of the Quran makes a bold claim,

"It is certainly We Who have revealed the Reminder, and it is certainly We Who will preserve it" Qur'an (15:9).

God blessed his final revelation, the Qur'an with something that was not bestowed on any of the prior scriptures. He promised to protect and preserve it from any corruption. Unlike other scriptures, the primary means of preserving the Qur'an has and always will be through memorization.

"And We have certainly made the Qur'an easy to remember. So is there anyone who will be mindful?" Qur'an (54:17).

Prophet Muhammad was tasked by God with memorizing/transmitting/explaining the verses of the Qur'an to the Muslims as they were revealed to him. In turn, these Muslims who had learnt the Quran directly from Prophet Muhammad himself, passed on what they had memorized to neighboring tribes and nations. This legacy of mass memorization has continued throughout history. This oral tradition spanning nearly 1500 years has seen the Qur'an being passed down from teacher to student in an unbroken chain going all the way back to Prophet Muhammad himself. There are many different chains and yet when we compare it, they're all the same and it has always been so. Today it is estimated there are many millions of Muslims of all cultures and various ages who have memorized the entire Qur'an from cover to cover in its original Arabic form. In fact, if every written copy of religious scripture in existence today were to be removed from the earth, it is the Qur'an alone that could be recreated perfectly and restored in written form. Once again this is thanks to its mass memorization. The oral tradition of the Qur'an is a phenomenon unique to Islam. If millions of people who have memorized the Qur'an can trace their oral memorization down centuries of teachers and scholars all the way back to the Prophet himself. Who could doubt the authenticity of this oral tradition?

The amount of varying oral transmissions along with the amount of people who have learnt the Qur'an and the fact there are no discrepancies in what they have memorized is no historical coincidence. The conclusion can only be that the Qur'an memorized today is the same as it was taught over 1400 years ago. There is no other rational explanation for this unique oral phenomena,

Recitation style

In addition to the mass memorization of the Qur'an, another unique aspect of its preservation is that the rules and regulations for pronouncing each individual letter have also been safeguarded. This ensures that Muslims not only recite the same content as Prophet Muhammad but in the exact same style. An easy way to appreciate the significance of preserving the recitation style of the Qur'an is with a comparison with the game telephone, here's a simple example.

Player A says the following "we are going to advance, send reinforcements". Player B then speaks quickly and shortens "we are" and says "we're going to advance, send reinforcements". Player C passes on the message and changes the word "advance" because Player B didn't pronounce the V properly or maybe Player C just misheard. He says "we're going to a dance, send reinforcements". Finally, Player D changes the end of the message because they are unfamiliar with the word reinforcements, "we're going to a dance, send four cents".

Ultimately what this demonstrates is that without a systematic means of ensuring the preservation of the message. It's mass memorization would be like a giant unsupervised game - changes would inevitably creep in over time.

What inspired Muslims to pay such attention to detail? When God revealed the Qur'an to the Prophet Muhammad, it was recited to him in a specific manner. The Qur'an itself commands Muslims to recite it in this same specific way.

"....Recite the Quran slowly and distinctly." Qur'an (73:4)

Therefore Muslims throughout history have placed great importance on how they recite the Quran. This has led to the creation of an intricate science known as tajweed that sets out rules and regulations to preserve Prophet Muhammad's recitation style down to each individual letter of the Quran. The fact that today we can find millions of Muslims of all different nationalities who are able to recite the Qur'an as if they themselves were Arabs living during the time of the Prophet Muhammad is proof of the effectiveness of this science in preserving the oral integrity of the text. This in spite of the fact that there is no internationally centralized religious organization to administer such preservation.

Language

The Qur'an has also been preserved in meaning. Why is this important? Because you cannot separate language from Scripture. As God States the Qur'an is tied to the Arabic language.

"We have made it a Quran in Arabic" Qur'an (43:3).

So if we were to lose the Arabic language we would also lose the Qur'an. There is no benefit in preserved scripture if we have lost the meaning of its words. In the Judaic tradition, the Torah was originally revealed to Moses over 3,000 years ago, making it over 1,500 years older than the Qur'an, however the first Hebrew dictionary wasn't created until the 10th century some 300 years after the revelation of the Qur'an. Hebrew was a dead language from the 2nd century CE until the foundation of Israel. In comparison, the oldest Arabic dictionary in existence was published within 200 years after the Qur'an. The early compilation of Arabic dictionaries has ensured that none of the meanings of the words of the Qur'an have ever been lost. As a consequence of this, Bible scholars had to turn to the vocabulary found in the Arabic dictionaries themselves to assist in understanding the many obscure and problematic Hebrew words in the Old Testament. Because Arabic and Hebrew are both part of the Semitic family of languages they have many similarities, so the Arabic language has been used since the Middle Ages to understand difficult words and expressions in Biblical Hebrew. In short, to fully understand Hebrew the language of the Old Testament. Bible scholars have had to rely on the classical Arabic the language of the Qur'an.

Conclusion

Before the revelation of the Qur'an, man was the caretaker of Scripture and ultimately failed in this duty. Was this poor judgment on the part of God? Absolutely not! The revelation given to Moses and Jesus peace be upon them both were only ever meant to be time-bound scriptures which served as a temporary placeholder until the coming of the Qur'an. With the advent of the final Messenger Muhammad peace be upon him and the revelation of the final message, God took it upon himself to protect the Qur'an. As we have seen in every conceivable way the Qur'an has been protected. Whether it's the preservation of its content, its recitation style or the meaning of its words, God has ensured that the Qur'an is the scripture mankind can be certain of.

"This is the scripture in which there is no doubt containing guidance for those who are mindful of God..." Quran (2:2)

Credit

The content of this article mainly belongs to https://www.manyprophetsonemessage.com/ and was transcribed from their YouTube channel. I have adapted it to fit an article format.