International
Organisation for
Islamic Reform

The Case Against Islamism

The Historical Case

1. The traditional narrative

Most Muslims believe that Islam was first revealed to the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) by the angel Jibreel in Mecca beginning in 610 CE, and later in Medina until 632 CE. Mohammed recited his revelation to his companions, who memorised it and wrote it down.

But the Qur’an was only codified in the form in which we know it today under the orders of the third Caliph, Uthman ibn Affan in about 650 CE, by which time there were many partial versions in circulation, mostly oral, at a time when reading and writing were rare skills. Once Uthman had settled on his canonical version of the Quran, he had all other known copies destroyed.1

There were however considerable difficulties in interpreting God’s message due to the incomplete nature of written Arabic at the time, lacking for example diacritical marks indicating the distinction between consonants, and the exact meaning of large numbers of words appearing in Arabic for the first time in the Qur’an.    Debates regarding the ultimate meaning of the text have continued until today. 

One result of this textual uncertainty was that, together with uncertainty regarding the validity of vast numbers of Hadith, it contributed to the development of the three main versions of Islam: Sunni, Shia, and Sufism, and the evolution of five main versions of Islamic law, the Sharia, all of which had crystallised by the end of the 9th century.

In this essay we explore the flaws in the traditional narrative that, beginning in early 19th century, have been exposed by modern historical research. Sadly, much of this original research has until now been ignored or suppressed by the traditionalists, unwilling to accept the validity of any discoveries that contradict the traditional view.

2. Flaws in the traditional narrative.

Scepticism regarding the traditional Islamic narrative is nothing new and has existed among scholars since the earliest days of Islam, even though re-examination and reinterpretation of the scriptures was strongly discouraged from at least the 12th century CE.2 Research into the origins of Islam was given a new lease of life in the 19th century by scholars such as Ignatz Goldziher and others3, and has continued up to this day, most notably with the work of Inarah, the Institute for Early Islamic History and the Qur’an, based at the University of Saarland4.

The major points of difference between the traditional and modern views centre on the origins of Islam: there are now good grounds to doubt both the original language of the Quran and whether the story of the birth of Islam in the Hejaz is actually authentic.5

Of particular concern is the notion that the Sharia, as a system on criminal law, has divine sanction. We read in The Theological Case, that Allah intended the Quran to provide advice and guidance to the faithful, not as the basis for a system of law, governance or administration.6 Could anything be clearer? There is no call by Allah for the creation of an Islamic State: the whole idea runs counter to His will as expressed in the Quran.7  Yet a system of Islamic law is precisely what developed in the decades following the death of the Prophet. 

How did this come about? What is more likely, that the Prophet, immediately after receiving the revelation of the Qur’an, would disregard completely one of its major tenets?  Or that, 100 years after the death of the Prophet, the Arab conquerors would have compiled a collection of Hadith, sayings and reports on the life of the Prophet, to provide pseudo-religious support for their control of the conquered lands?

As early as 850 CE, Emir al-Bukhari (d 870 CE) had travelled the world and concluded that of the 600,000 examples of Hadith he had discovered, fewer than 1% (about 4,000) could be considered authentic.8

It is now widely understood that the vast majority of these “recollections” lack any historical validity and were fabricated more than 100 years after the events to which they purport to relate.  Whilst the Sharia might still be considered as God’s guidance on how Muslims should conduct their private lives,9 it lacks any credibility as a system of criminal law for which it is totally lacking in  divine authority.10

There is no “holy” Sharia.

3. Islam is not unique.

Mohammed may have been the last prophet, but he was by no means the first; he had many predecessors, including Moses, Isiah, and Jesus (Issa), many of whom had already received parts of the divine revelation.

It has been known for more than 100 years that Islam incorporates many earlier beliefs from Judaism and Christianity11.  Islam is not therefore unique and cannot be considered the sole repository of knowledge of God. Debate has raged among scholars as to which: Judaism or Christianity, had the greater influence on the development of Islam.  All three religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, carry part of God’s revelation and it is evident that their believers all worship the same God but in differing ways.

Islam, as a set of beliefs, laws and practices, only crystallised more than 100 years after the death of the Prophet, partly from the tenets enshrined in the Quran but also from later accretions based on the supposed life and sayings of the Prophet collected in the Hadith, thousands of which are known to be of dubious validity.

Islam, as it has been handed down to us, can now be seen as an compilation  of religious and political beliefs: a 9th century political system based partly on religious guidance but overlain by laws originally created to control the newly conquered lands of North Africa and the Middle East.  

For centuries, Muslims have been deceived into believing that the political system that emerged was based entirely on the word of God.  But we now know that all such claims are false,12 but have nevertheless been a powerful weapon in the pursuit of political control across the world.

Throughout history, autocrats have used religion and the fear of divine retribution to enforce their control, and the caliphs and rulers of the Islamic world have been no different: a phenomenon that continues to this day.  With Islamism, the political ideology now dominating some 20% of the world’s population, we see fear of punishment for apostasy or blasphemy acting as a powerful deterrent to any but the bravest who dare question its accepted tenets.

The time has come to expose the false history on which Islamism and the Sharia, are based, and to urge the Ummah to return to a benign, liberal interpretation of Islam based exclusively on God’s will, as revealed in the Qur’an.

There is no historical justification for claiming absolute certainty for any traditional version of Islam, nor for intolerance in the face of differing religious views, whether Islamic or any other.  

Muslims must now totally reject Islamism as lacking any historical validity.

4.   The Evidence

For more than 100 years, evidence has been accumulating that the traditional narrative regarding the origins of Islam is deeply flawed.  Taken together, this evidence demonstrates unequivocally that there is absolutely no justification for the belief that the traditional Islamic narrative is a valid, historical account of the origins of our faith.

Modern research uses the historical-critical method (the standard scientific procedure for analysing historical texts) as well as the methods of philology, archaeology and numismatics.  This research continues the work begun in the late 19th century, of Julius Wellhausen, Adolf von Harnack and Ignaz Goldziher who had already concluded that the widely accepted narrative of Islamic origins did not accord with historical reality, with the work of Joseph Schacht, Günter Lüling, Suliman Bashear, Yehuda Nevo, John Wansbrough, Patricia Crone, Michael Cook and Ibn Warraq in the 20th century.

Every Muslim must already be aware that sharp differences exist between God’s revelation as set out in the Holy Qur’an, and Islam as augmented by the thousands of stories of the life and sayings of the Prophet recounted in the Hadith: many of which directly contradict the message of the Qur’an, and most of which were compiled more than 100 years after the death of the Prophet.  The majority of the Hadith were transmitted orally long after the death of Mohammed, and a vast majority are known to have been created in order to justify some political point or another.

Rather than list directly the hundreds of examples of distortion and misrepresentation that have been discovered in the traditional narrative, it will suffice here to give references to examples of evidence that justify this claim.

Doubts regarding the authenticity of the traditional narrative began soon after the codification of the canonical version of the Qur’an under the third Caliph, Uthman, and have continued throughout history.  
Often conflicting with the traditional narrative, this research has been largely ignored by mainstream Islam and many who would undertake such research have found their funding disappear.  Times are changing however.  Since 2007, Inarah, The Institute for Research into Early Islam and the Qur’an based at Saarland University, have published 11 volumes of their researches (in German) as “Die Entstehung einer Weltreligion” volumes 1 to 11, published by Schiler & Mucke (Berlin and Tubingen).13

More usefully for the English reader is a summary of the key findings of the Inarah group over the past 15 years: Introducing Inârah, which can be obtained from: secreteriat@ioir.org

Perhaps the most readable overview of original sources on the early history of Islam can be found in “The Quest for the Historical Mohammed” by Ibn Warraq, published by Prometheus Press, Amherst, NY in 2000; and a  collection of sceptical writing on the origins of Islam from the 2nd to the 19th centuries  in “Virgins? What Virgins? And other essays” (2009) by the same author. 

The discovery by the Islamic scholar Christophe Luxemberg that many of the uncertain words appearing in the Quran could be far more easily understood as Syriac14 has shaken our understanding of the Qur’an, most notably the discovery that the 72 virgins awaiting the martyr in heaven are actually a mistranslation of 72 pieces of ripe fruit.

Mainstream Islamic institutions and schools of Islamic studies have largely failed to engage with (or chosen to ignore) this new research for fear of being drawn into a losing debate or worse, of losing their funding.

But it is surely the responsibility of every student of Islam to support honest research into the origins of our faith as the surest way of clarifying God’s will, unbiased by political ideology or financial considerations.

The honest search for truth must reign supreme.

  1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uthman ↩︎
  2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ijtihad ↩︎
  3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ign%C3%A1c_Goldziher ↩︎
  4. http://inarah.net/ ↩︎
  5. See: “Introducing Inarah”, annexed to this website. ↩︎
  6. See: “The Theological Case” on this website. ↩︎
  7. Ibid ↩︎
  8. “The Life of Mahommet” Sir William Muir, (1861). 1894 version pp 41-42. ↩︎
  9. See “The Theological Case” on this website. ↩︎
  10. A summary of the millions of words of evidence for this claim can be found in “The Evidence” below.  ↩︎
  11. See for example: the annex to this website: Introducing Inarah ↩︎
  12. See for example The Historical Case and The Theological Case on this website. ↩︎
  13.   https://schiler-muecke.de/ ↩︎
  14. See for example: Christoph Luxenberg, Die syro-aramäische Lesart des Koran – Ein Beitrag zur Entschlüsselung der Koransprache, Berlin and Tübingen 2000. ↩︎

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